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UP AGAINST THE BULKHEAD
Vol. 2/No.10 968 Valencia,SanFrancisco 94110 November
oTonight the 2d Platoon is supposed to go out on night
ambush. ITm not going. The 2d Platoon is not moving from
their bunker. They will be staying.� Firebase Pace, Bravo Company
GIs in a bunker at Firebase Pace pass around a petition in support of six other men in Bravo Company who
just refused orders to move out on a suicide mission. After this photo was taken, two other units also
refused to move out in solidarity with the six. When another company was flown in to replace Bravo Co.,
they, too, refused to move out.
FIRE BASE PACE
re
GRUNT POWER
oWhen we first got here, they told us their mission
and that was to get on defensive. But night ambush
is an offensive role. And itTa plain suicide going out
there in the middle of the night.�
oDoes anyone back in the world know that Melvin
Laird said our combat role has ended? Fact is, weTre
still out in the bush. Seven people got hit in an am-
bush, and that was the day it was in the newspaper.�
These men spoke to a reporter at Fire Base Pace
about two miles from the Cambodian border near
the city of Tay Ninh. The night before, 15 mean had
been ordered out to set up an ambush in an area
dominated by regimented NVA and local forces.
They had seen the US-backed ARVN troops go out
in groups of 200-300, only to come back really
messed up. There wasnTt any medevac for hit men,
and the only medical aid they had for the ambush
was one guy who'd had a one-hour quickie course
in first aid. When the higher highers ordered a 15-
man platoon to do the same job, they used their
common sense. They refused to move out.
Fire Base Pace is in the Parrots Beak, where Nixon
sent US and ARVN troops in May last year to wipe
out those osanctuaries.� It turned out the sanctu-
aries were never found, and probably never existed.
Now the area is controlled by Vietnamese and
Cambodians resisting US invasion forces who've
been pulled into their own sanctuaries, a string of
fire bases. From these bases, Gls support ARVN
units in Cambodia with artillery fire and more.
At least thatTs the official story. But in spite of all
the talk about troop withdrawals, there are still
grunts forced to carry out insane orders while the
top pigs insist the men aren't there at all. Gls are
really bitter about military hypocrisy in the cam-
paign to convince Americans that the war is ending.
One guy asked, oWe're kind of wondering whether
anybody back in the world knows that we're out
here. Like they say that only two batteries of artil-
lery are supposed to be here, and no grunts are here.
We donTt even exist. We're just meat.� Another man
in Bravo Company, 1/12th of 1st Air Cav, pointed
out, oPeople go home on leave and get asked, ~How's
things back in the barracks in Vietnam? What bar-
racks, man? We sleep out on the ground.�
WHO'S. GONNA FIGHT FOR NIXON AND THIEU?
All of them feel that onobody knows why we're
here. If people donTt want you over here, then what's
your purpose. We're not just rebelling against going
out on that ambush, we're rebelling against this
whole situation. How can it be a democracy when
you have a one-man election? Everybody knew
what that was about.� Every day more Vietnamese
join to fight against Pres. Thieu, and he used heavy
police and US protection to get himself elected. If
the US pulled out, his regime would collapse. No
one in Bravo Company wanted to be the last man to
die defending a corrupt dictator whose only support
is the Joint Chiefs of Staff and American war
profiteers.
WHISKEY MOUNTAIN
Delta Company arrives at Firebase Pace to ~~releiveTT Bravo Company, which had just
refused orders to move out on a suicide mission, It would have meant following ARVN
troops at night into Cambodia at a time when no MEDEVAC helicopters were able
to land due to heavy small arms fire. The next day, these guys also refused to move out.
Nixon plans to continue his support of Thieu and
win a military victory. One half of his strategy is
to deceive the people by saying that no Gls are on
offensive duty. And the other half is to cover up GI
resistance and rebellion. Bravo Company was told
they'd be rescuing some grunts who were cut off, or
that they'd be on permieter defense, or some such
bullshit. When they found out what was really hap-
pening, they told the lifers to shove it. After their
first refusal, the Captain picked out six guys as agi-
tators and threatened them with court martial.
ThatTs where he made a mistake. In a period of
about an hour, 66 men from Bravo Company signed
a petition that supported the men in the 3d Platoon.
The whole company refused orders to go on night
ambush. So the Captain was in a jam. There wasnTt
any way to court martial the whole company and
keep it out of the press.
Richard Boyle, the reporter who brought the peti-
tion and tape out of Pace, picked up on the Captains
fears about the press. A dude told him, oThe Capt.
Said not to talk to the press because things were
backward. He said the. strike wasnTt called off be-
Brothers Revolt
The military likes to say that its racism is just a
reflection of the problem in America, intensified by
conditions in combat and other heavy duty. And a
group of fifteen black Gls stationed at Whiskey Mtn
with the 35th Engineering Group know that lifers
are more than ready to smash any signs of unity
among black brothers.
On September 25, a group of brothers asked per-
mission to attend a memorial service in Cam Ranh
Bay for a two-year old black girl killed by a white
two years ago in Los Angeles. PFC Willie Norwood
said, oThere'd been a lot of rain, and when we got
to the gate, we were told all the bridges were
flooded and we couldn't go. They told us we could
have the service in our hootch.�
So fifteen black and four or five white Gis holed
up in their bunker. Later in the morning, a sergeant
came in and talked the white guys into leaving. The
scene was set up"fifteen blacks in the bunker sur-
rounded by Charlie Company (299th Eng Bn) with
loaded weapons and three APCs.
cause we refused to go. It was because ARVNs were
out there. Now he wants us to go out today.�
MORE REPLACEMENTS"MORE REFUSALS
By Tuesday, October 12, the whole company was
transferred out to oprevent possible harm to com-
pany morale.� Delta company replaced Bravo, and
also refused night ambush patrols. When Captain
Kenneth Smith told everyone In a Delta Co. platoon
to step to the other side of the bunker If they refused
to go, 20 out of 28 crossed the line. The Alamo in
reverse. They agreed to go only after Major Dye,
PaceTs senior officer, offered to go out with them.
Morale is the militaryTs term to describe how well
Gis follow orders. But Bravo and Delta companies
defined it for themselves. Real morale comes from
unity and resistance against fighting in a war we
donTt want. And the Pentagon canTt court martial
everyone.
The source for this story is Richard Boyle, now a writer for Ramparts Press
and an ex-writer for Overseas Weekly. He was at Pace the whole time, and
was asked by the men of Bravo Company to bring back their petition to
Senator Edward Kennedy, and to tell their Story to the rest of the worid
The quotes are from interviews taped with the men of Bravo Company.
Sp/4 Bobby Williams was one of the people inside:
oOne guy said he smelled smoke. That was it. An
explosion went off. We staggered outside and two
of the guys collapsed. One guy went into a state of
shock.�
On the outside, Sp/4 Herlin Lee saw oGuys come
out and drop on the ground like they were dead. It
seemed like the whole of Charlie Company was
already on the scene with their loaded weapons
pointed at the brothers as they came out.�
Reporters talked with three of the brothers as they
were being transferred. The Army charged fourteen
of the guys with mutiny, and held them in Long Binh
for a week before they were persuaded to cop to
lesser charges. The men got demotions, fines, and
pay cuts of more than $100. Two of them were still
in the stockade three weeks after the mutiny. And,
not surprising, no one was charged with setting off
the mysterious explosion.
Racism isnTt the only problem at Whiskey Mtn.
Smack is widely used, and there are frequent frags
and other ooccurrences,� as the Washington Post
calls them. These are all directly related to the
fucked up conditions at the base, like most places
in the Nam. And then the lifers pull their racist tac-
tics out when people begin to combat these condi-
tions. As Whiskey Mountain showed, they'd rather
kill their own men than deal with the real problem:
that Gls, black and brown and red and yellow and
white, shouldn't be there at all.
The okag Offensive
Junk is like war. It keeps people in line while a
few get rich. The whole drug business in this country
is like that. Got a headache? Buy Bufferin. Tense?
Buy Valium. Run down? Buy Ritalin. Just trying to
survive now puts so much pressure on people that
they've got to keep themselves together by taking
chemicals. The result is a pacified people and a
thriving business for drug profiteers.
Popping pills for social ills. Already 10% of this
countryTs adult population is chronically alcoholic,
drowning its sorrows away. In the midwest this win-
ter, kids in elementary schools were drugged with
amphetamines to oadjust� them to schools that
were making them dumber, not smarter.
Harlem pushers deal smack to eight-year-olds from
white Caddies, turning ghetto prisons into a black
paradise. And in the Nam, the misery and madness
of the Vietnam GI is turned into temporary bliss by
the same thing that leaves kids falling out of chairs
in Detroit schools and Puerto Rican sisters nodding
in New York subways. Heroin.
oIt's easy. You can put it in a cigarette and smoke
it, you can snort it, you can shoot it, you can stick
it up your ass, you can drop it under your eyelid, you
can put it under your tongue, you can eat it, you can
do anything with it. It will stone you and it will lay
you back. It is beautiful smack. It is probably the
best smack there is in the world.� Ex-Sgt Jim Jaqua,
formerly of Hq TRAC, Long Binh.
Jim Jaqua was in Nam from early 1969 to early
1970, the time when heroin discovered the Vietnam
Gl. As one of the Gls who started Pioneer House,
Long BinhTs first rehab center, Jim knows the story
from the inside out.
oBecause individuals began using heroin, it be-
came more noticeable. The command _ naturally
thought it was marijuana; at that time grass was
at about an 85% usage across the board.... So they
tightened up on the grass; the more grass they got
rid of, the more heroin was sold.�
So who started pushing skag as the number one
high and where was this shit coming from? 83% of
the worldTs total opium, the plant from which heroin
is made, is grown in the Fertile Triangle (north-
western Burma, northern Thailand, and Laos) by hill
tribes people. But most of the raw opium is refined
in the US-controlled parts of Laos.
A EAE BAP BA SL I AR NOONE TS NN RNR Tc NEE ESN REP RESO A ESTE RRR RRC Ce Oe PRR A
Vietnam and Cambodia, the US is just barely hang-
ing on after ten years of fighting. In Laos itself, the
Pathet Lao guerrillas (Pathet Lao means Laotian
nation) control two-thirds of the territory where
about half the people live.
Opium and US collars prop up a small elite of
parasites who live in big villas, drive Mercedes, and
deposit their profits in Swiss banks. Opium is taken
in from the hills of the Fertile Triangle to cookers
where itTs refined into morphine and then heroin.
Most of these cookers are located in Laos and are run
by the Laotian elite: princes, government ministers,
generals, politicians, police chiefs, you-name-it.
ThereTs even a cooker just two blocks from the
KingTs Palace in Vientiane.
FROM THE COOKER TO THE STREET
COMPLIMENTS OF THE CIA
The problem is how to move the finished product
quickly and safely to the junkies of the world. The
oClearly the CIA 1s cognizant of, if not party to, the extensive move-
ment of opium out of Laos. One charter pilot told me that ~friendlyT
opium shipments get special CIA clearance and monitoring on_ their
flights southward out of the country
two or three flights without
this ~protectionT crashed under mysterious circumstances.�
John Hughes in the Christian Science Monitor, May 29, 1970
LAOS: THE HUB OF THE HEROIN WHEEL
In these areas, two things keep the economy
running: the almighty US dollar and opium. The
US needs Laos: itTs a buffer zone on the Chinese
border and only 250 miles from Hanoi, located right
in the heart of SE Asia. East and south of Laos in
answer: fly it. And whoTs got the planes? Only the
Royal Lao Air Force (supplied by US aid of course)
and (you guessed it) the CIATs own airline, Air
America.
The CIA is the main agency controlling US acti-
vities in Laos. For years they have been paying hill
tribesmen to fight against their own people. The
price: a bigger and better dope trade. Long Chen, a
secret CIA base built in 1962, is the center of this
huge racket. Here smack is collected from the cook-
ers with US helicopters, stored at the base, and then
flown out in C-47s or T-28s. A lot of these planes
land at Tan Son Nhut airport in Saigon where they
are unloaded at a special part of the airport under
police guard.
EVERYONETS GOT A PIECE OF THE ACTION
The ~path from the airport is filled with middle
men. The network is so huge and so complex that
you can find junk profiteers on every level, from
Pres. Thieu on down to the district police chief. In
mid-July, Phil Brady, an NBC correspondent in
Saigon, filed a report that charged Thieu and Vice
President Ky with financing their election campaign
with profits made by hustling heroin. Specifically,
he said Ky had been flying opium since 1955, for the
CIA in Operation Haylift, and for the Dragon Lady
(Madame Nhu, ex-president DiemTs wife) ever since.
And he still makes regular runs between Dak To,
Kon Tum, Pleiku, and Saigon. Brady also said his
sources fingered the National Police Chief, Maj. Gen.
Tran Thanh Phong, as one of SaigonTs major pushers.
Also named were Lt. Gen. Dang Van Quang, now
ThieuTs closest adviser, and Gen Ngo Dzu, military
commander in the central highlands.
Just think. Straight from the hills of Laos to you
compliments of the CIA, Laotian warlords and gov-
ernment ministers, Air America pilots, Thieu, Ky,
Mafia middlemen, and thousands of Vietnamese
officials in every level of the government, the army,
and the police force. And with special thanks to Pres
Nixon, whose war has been built up a network for
junk dealing thatTs unrivalled by the best of James
Bond, and much more profitable.
WHY NOW? WHY THE VIETNAM GI?
Money is only a part of the answer. After all, there
are other markets: New York, Detroit, Manila, Hong
Kong, Tokyo, San Francisco, Marseille. But the
Vietnam GI is like a bomb. Only heroin can defuse
it. And Nixon's sitting right on top of the whole
shebang.
HereTs the powder keg as described by Marine Col
Robert Heinl in an article called oThe Collapse of
the Armed Forces�: oBy every conceivable indicator,
our army that now remains in Vietnam is in a state
approaching collapse, with individual units avoid-
ing or having refused combat, murdering their of-
ficers and noncommissioned officers, drug-ridden
dispirited where not near mutinous.� in eight
pages of facts and figures, Hein! deseribes the GI
resistance and the strength of the revolt. Nothing
can stop this revolt. But heroin can delay it. Junk
sucks life, and the military command is using junk
to suck away the life of the Gl movement.
IT HAS HAPPENED BEFORE
Heroin has been used many times before by an
oppressor to head off an uprising of the oppressed.
When the Portuguese went for the riches of India
in the 16th century, they used opium to lull the
Indians to sleep while they pilfered their land. In the
19th century, the British used opium to pacify the
Chinese while ripping off the wealth of China. By
the 1920Ts, it was said that one-fourth of the adult
population was addicted to opium.
Today, nonwhite communities in cities all over
the US have watched the Mafia and criminal syndi-
cates hustle heroin into the veins of their commu-
nities. In New York City, itTs known as the plague.
Black youth get it bad, because under the influence
of junk, the oppressive, nauseous ghetto prison
melts away. That is, until that dreamy numbness
wears Off, leaving the junkie face-to-face with the
reality of tenement dungeons and wailing sirens.
And the fastest way out is to shoot up again. Soon,
reality, everything ceases to matter. Except the
reality of heroin, the plague.
Again the same play. Different stage. The Haight-
Ashbury began to change after the Summer of Love.
Speed came to dominate the dope scene, and heroin
followed soon after. Smiles on the street were re-
placed by nervous glances. More and more people
were copping, but no one had the bread. Rip-offs
became common. Over 20 people were murdered in
the first six months of 1968 as the Mafia fought for
control of the drug traffic. While some people in
power felt threatened by the new life in the Haight,
others went after the profits to be made from hook-
ing white youth on high-powered junk. The politi-
cians with the Tactical Pigs and the big smack
dealers made the Haight another ghetto jungle.
THE VIETNAMIZATION OF THE USA "OR"
THE BUSINESS IS INTERNATIONAL
Wherever dope is dealt, profits run into billions.
And like most businesses, the heroin trade couldn't
work without the support and cooperation of the
policeman, the businessman, and the politician.
With the police, it's the same story in Hong Kong,
New York, or Fort Bragg. Police give certain dealers
immunity from arrest in exchange for a cash or
dope pay-off. Often a dealer gets busted, his dope
seized, and come court time 90% of his shit is gone.
The New York Times of February 26, 1970 read:
o..last year the Federal Bureau dismissed 49 of its
agents and got indictments against 14 of them for
traffiking in drugs.� And last year, the entire New
York State Narcotics Control Bureau was dismantled
because of corruption, and their responsibilties laid
on the State Police. From the beat cop to the bureau
chief, the pay-off is complete.
People wouldn't take such heavy risks unless the
risk were worth it. And in this case it is. $350 gets
you ten kilos of raw opium. That refines to one kilo
of pure heroin. By the time it gets to the wholesaler
in Saigon, the dealer is paying upward of $20,000
for that same kilo. And when that kilo reaches the
streets of New York, after it's been cut with speed
or strichnyne or God-knows-what, it'll bring more
than $225,000.
HOW CAN YOU TELL IF A GUY HAS ODTD?
For a while, an overdose and a nod look the same. The head droops.
The eyes close. The body goes limp. But when a person ODs, his
pulse will slow down, he will stop breathing, and his skin color will
change. This is how to check for an overdose. Breathing: a man ex-
hales through his nostrils. Hold something below his nostrils to see
if air is coming out. A piece of paper, a feather, or a finger will do.
A piece of glass or a mirror will cloud up if heTs still exhaling. Also,
the chest will rise and fall if breathing is regular. Pulse: you can feel
someone's pulse if you hold your index and middle fingers over the
vein where the hand joins the wrist..Check his heartbeat. You
should get about 90 beats a minute. Skin Color: white dudes will
turn green, while black dudes and dark brown brothers will get grey.
OVERDOSE
HOW TO FIGHT AN OVERDOSE
1. Keep your partner breathing. Mouth-to-mouth resuscitation is the
only way. Even if your friend has stopped breathing, you can
breathe for him as long as eight hours. Learn this technique well.
First, lay him on his back, and clear any food or gum out of his
throat. If his tongue has gotten stuck in his throat, just move it out
of the way. Second, tilt the head back by lifting under his neck and
pushing down on his forehead. Third, pinch the nose closed as you
take a breath. Fourth, breathe deeply and slowly into his mouth.
Fifth, turn your head and watch for his chest to fall as a sign that
your breath is getting into his lungs.
2. Keep your partner awake. Walking helps. So does slapping his
face. A cold shower helps, too. If heTs at all conscious, make him
angry. A pissed-off human doesnTt want to die.
3. Get your partner to a medic as soon as you can. They may have
breathing equipment and/or certain drugs which cancel out the
heroinTs effect. These are Nalline, Lorfan, and Dopram.
HOW CAN YOU TELL IF HETS MADE IT?
If you can get him awake and breathing normally, youTve made it.
Be sure to stay with him for several hours more, just to be sure. This
is because your friend may go into withdrawal. Even though with-
drawal is hell for the user, it means heTs going to live.
WHAT NOT TO DO
1. DonTt try to shoot him up with any weird shit like milk or salt-
water. This is very dangerous, and is no more effective than a slap
in the face.
2. DonTt force him to drink anything. An unconscious person could
choke and suffocate on liquids. But if he can hold a cup firmly in his
hands, heTs able to drink something warm.
3. DonTt panic. Good information and a level head can save a
brother's life.
The businessmen who have a corner on the junk
market are the Cosa Nostra, the Mafia. Since the
Mafia profits from heroin dealing are poured back
into Mafia-controlled legal businesses like restau-
rants and laundries, the laundromat youTre working
for could be paying your wages with the money you
laid on your contact the week before.
Politicians support the junk business by keeping
the heat off organized crime and making only token
efforts to set up detoxification and _ rehabilitation
programs.
So here you've got a situation where the men who
are in a position to cut off all heroin traffiking are
really the ones who profit by it. Caught between an
angry people who want heroin out of their lives, a
plague of addiction which has spread like a prairie
fire to their own sons and daughters, and their own
greed for the dollar, government officials and Mafia
traffikers have come up with a solution which is no
solution at all: methadone. ItTs a drug similar to skag.
More addictive but without the kick. You donTt get
high and you donTt get low. You just stay on it.
oColonel,� I said, oYou just can't
you feel when you come down from
believe the incredible aggravation
amphetamines. That time at Plei
Me 1 was so pissed off at the world that I wouldTve shot children in the
streets and not even flinched. I know,
I once asked to be removed from an
large number of civilians had been killed.
influence of dextrine diamphetamine sulphate,
which were issued by the Army for combat fatigue.
because when I wasnTt on them,
operation in which an unusually
I was usually under the
fifteen milligram pills
?
a vet interviewed in Murray PolnerTs No More Victory Parades
GPR ERAN ZEMIN AONE AEE NR hi NARMS RO NASI HN VEER ATED LEIP NEE EIEIO REALL LE LAERSA LSE SELLE LLDALIEALLA SABLE LEDALADADS,
oSo I donTt know where itTs all going to end. I really donTt, itTs such a
heavy problem. I think the only way to end it is to get everybody back to
where they should have been all the time, back home.
HOW CAN THE PROBLEM FIND A SOLUTION?
One example of that tokenism is the Veterans
Administration program. Knowing that there are at
least 35.000 guys strung out in the Nam alone, the
VA program nationally has only 200 beds available
for heroin addicts. In New York City, only about 7%
of the cityTs addicts have any contact with treatment
programs.
Heroin: The Plague. 900 deaths in New York City
alone in 1969. 210 of those deaths were young
people between the ages of 12 and 19. Better than
80% of those dead were black and Puerto Rican.
But only in the last two years have treatment pro-
grams, rehabilitation centers, and Congressional
inquiries hit the front pages. Why so much commo-
tion all of a sudden? Sons and daughters of higher
ups have started to fall victim to the plague. Black
junkies? That was okay. Puerto Rican junkies? That
was tolerable. But white middle class high school.
junkies? Never. And when 13 or 14-year-old Embassy
official's kids started nodding out in psych wards
in Vientiane, that was it.
So with methadone dispersed through govern-
ment programs, you've still got junkies. Only this
time Uncle SamTs the pusherman. And the entire
network of heroin profiteering remains in tact.
There's no neat way to end this article, to tie it all together.
So we're going to run it over next issue,
tit
Make Your Own Histor
or They'll Make
It For You ,
BRING ME HOME NOW!
Vietnam (November) - According to UPI, an uniden-
tified sgt who was a medical corpsman at Hue kid-
napped Col. Donald Zubriggen, a senior US adviser,
and then ordered a chopper pilot at gunpoint to take
them to Da Nang. The sgt said he was on his way to
his home in Billings, Montana. He changed his mind
during the flight and turned himself in. (SF Exam.)
NAZIS FOR NIXON IN 1972
Los Angeles (October) - Dr. Joseph Pauco, one of
Hitler's main men in Czechoslovakia during World
War II, is now a power on the Republic National
Committee. Pauco is chief Slovak-American adviser
to the Republican National Committee and is a
Nixon appointee on the Small Business Advisory
Council. The guy who is supposed to keep track of
ex-Nazis, Asst. Attorney General Robert Mardian,
told Pauco at a Slovak World Congress that he felt
oespecially akin to you and your organization.�
He declared sitrringly, oIt is a common heritage
that binds us together here today.� You betcha.
(LNS)
ANOTHER RIOT CONTROL REFUSAL
Ft. Bliss, Texas (October 13) - In El Paso, the 13th
was an anti-war Moratorium Day. Working as one
group, the Vietnam Veterans Against the War
(VVAW), student groups, WomenTs Liberation, and
community groups planned a memorial service at
the Ft. Bliss National Cemetery. A motorcade would
leave a downtown rally and drive to the service on
post.
The Army tirst approved the permit, and then the
day before the service, pulled it. This double cross
brought things to a real head on post. In HHB
Battery, 6th Bn, 6ist Artillery Brigade, sergeants
ordered guys to take the peace signs off their hands
(to support the Moratorium, Bliss Gis drew peace
signs on their hands). Anyone who attended the
memorial service was threatened with court martial.
In order to keep guys from going, the entire 500
~man 6th Bn, 61st Artillery Brigade was mobilized
for riot duty. This backfired when 8 men in oD�
Battery refused to do it. So far, support for them has
been very strong, so no action has been taken
against the 8.
The motorcade made it on post, but reached
locked cemetery gates. The only Gis let in that day
were dead Gis. People at the gates saluted riot duty
troops with fists and peace signs. When smiles and
fists came back from the Gis, you could tell who
had it together. And it sure wasnTt those stone-
faced sergeants. (Gis For Peace. El Paso, Texas)
STOCKADE REBELLION AT FORT GORDON
Ft. Gordon, Georgia (October) - At least 100 soldiers
rebelled in the Ft. Gordon stockade Tuesday night
on October 26. Eleven soldiers, including two
prison guards, were hospitalized and a two-story
prison barracks, valued at $30,000 was burned to
the ground.
The soldiers were acting in a solidarity protest
against the denial of home leave to a prisoner
whose wife had just suffered a miscarriage. Pvt.
Jesse Simmons of Memphis has not yet even been
tried, but is being held under the ArmyTs opreven-
tive detention� law, awaiting court-martial for
alleged assault. When word spread that Pvt. J.
Simmons was denied emergency leave to see his
wife, soldiers gathered in the stockade yard and
refused to disperse. MPs and stockade guards used
tear gas, and fired at least one shotgun round to
put down the uprising, which lasted five hours.
Soldiers attending classes at an Army school close
by were rushed away from the area in fear they
might move to support the rebelling prisoners.
Despite attempts of the authorities to minimize
it, the tension at the fort is greater than it has been
in many months. It is not yet clear what actions
will be taken against those involved. (SPD News
Service, Ft. Gordon)
JUDGE PREPARES FOR COURTROOM
SHOOT OUT
Salinas, Calif. (Aug) - Judge Stanley Lawson
showed his true colors in August when he pulled a
pistol in court and pointed it at the two men on trial,
who were both inmates of Soledad prison. Lawson
said that he began keeping the revolver after the
August 7, 1970, Marin County Courthouse shoot-out
in which Judge Harold Haley and three others were
killed. Angela Davis is now on trial for that event.
o| do not intend to go the way of...Judge Haley
without a battle,� he said. (LNS)
WHAT IF THEY GAVE A WAR AND...
New York (October) - During March, April, and
May, the Selective Service system issued 110,387
induction orders. But only 36,195 men were drafted.
The other 74,000 (two-thirds) either never
showed, showed up and refused induction, failed
their physicals, or jived their way out. The result:
the Pentagon only filled 77% of its quota. (LNS)
HUGE PROTESTS IN CANADA"AMCHITKA BOMB
Canada (November) - Massive protests swept Cana-
da just before the Nixon administration set off the
largest nuclear blast ever 6000 feet underground on
Amchitka Island off the coast of Alaska. The protests
received almost no attention in the American press.
In British Columbia, most of the major unions sup-
ported a general strike which brought close to
150,000 workers off the job. Thousands of young
people and students blocked the bridges between
Canada and the US at Detroit, Port Huron, Michi-
gan, and Niagra Falls. Canadian police refused to
break up the demonstrations. In Toronto, 3000 sur-
rounded the US Consulate shouting oBomb Nixon,
not Amchitka� while in St. Johns, Newfoundland,
demonstrators attacked the consulate when they
heard the bomb had exploded. (SF Chronicle)
Gi PROTESTS ABOUT AMCHITKA BOMB TEST
Ft. Ord/Hawaii (November 6) - At Ft. Ord on the
California coast, seven Gis armed with weapons
tried bravely to rip-off a light military plane and
fly it to Amchitka to make a bomb test impossible.
They were stopped by air marshalls before they got
their plane off the ground, and then immediately
transferred. They werenTt busted because that would
have meant press coverage. Meanwhile at Pearl
Harbor, six men off a destroyer went UA and took
sanctuary to protest the blast. (The Grapevine)
COAST GUARD OPPOSES AMCHITKA A-BLAST
Anchorage, Alaska (October 12) - Eighteen crew
men of the Coast Guard cutter ~ConfidenceT have
been busted for expressing support of the protest
ship ~GreenpeaceT. The ~GreenpeaceT had sailed
toward Amchitka, sight of NixonTs five-megaton
nuclear blast, to protest this nuclear/military mad-
ness. The ~ConfidenceT was assigned to head off the
~GreenpeaceT. When the two ships met, the crew
of the ~ConfidenceT passed this message to the
~GreenpeaceT: oDue to the situation we are in, we,
the crew of the ~ConfidenceT, feel that what you are
doing is for the good of all mankind. If our hands
weren't tied by these military bonds, we would be
in the same position you are in if it were at all pos-
sible. Good luck. We are behind you 100%. (This one
we dug out of the Anchorage Daily News).
NO ASYLUM IN SWEDEN FOR NIXON
Stockholm (September) - for the first time ever,
the Swedish government has granted ohumani-
tarian asylum� to a fugitive from the American
government. In this case, it was Michael Lee Bran-
some, who in May 1969, destroyed draft board files
and equipment. After serving seven months of a
three year sentence, Michael split to Canada while
on a seven day leave. From Canada he flew to
Sweden where again he went underground while
waiting for a decision. The case is important for
Gls on the run. (LNS)
THE FIRE NEXT TIME
Ft. McClellan, Alabama (Sept) - The new CO of the
83d Engineers tried to shape up his command by
giving 43 Article 15s in two months. And there were
only 180 guys in the brigade. The command was not
in shape for the IG inspection, though, since the
motor pool office was burned down and everything
lost except the o348� forms. (Left Face)
THE CHICKENS COME HOME TO ROOST
THE HEROIN PLAGUE HITS DEPENDENTS KIDS
Vientiane, Laos (Sept) - In the Spring of this year,
two American teenage dependents of USAID em-
ployees were caught mailing 20 kilos of pure heroin
through the APO. They were headed for Saigon,
where the junk would have been dealt by other
dependents. Since junk has found dependent's kids,
no one under 18 can now mail anything larger than
a letter through the APO. Strange how their parents
may fly opium out of Laos for Air America. But
when their kids get a Jones, itTs a different story.
(LNS)
NIXON HIDES AT AIR FORCE BASE IN OHIO
Dayton, Ohio (Sept 3) - Nixon came to Wright-
Patterson AFB on Sept 3 to dedicate an Air Farce
museum, and met some resistance. Up to 300 folks
"vets, people on welfare, and more marched out-
side the base with a coffin decorated with the
medals and ribbons of Nam vets. The people said
the casket represented the lives of over a million
brothers and sisters who have been killed in SE
Asia.
Imagine how uptight Nixon got. Anyone under 25
years old, or who had long hair, or who confessed
to being a student, was kept out of the base and had
to face fire hoses and MPs at every gate. But some
of these brothers on perimeter duty turned their
weapons toward the demonstrators to show that
their clips weren't in place. About 60 people were
detained on base before the security got tight, and
now the brass face heavy press criticism and a
Congressional investigation. Nixon canTt go any-
where except some military bases. HeTs about as
popular here as Pres. Thieu is in the Nam. (CAMP)
PRISON REBELLION AT ATTICA
POLICE KILL 37 BUT THE MOVEMENT GROWS
New York (Sept. 9) - Over half of Attica PrisonTs
2,237 prisoners rioted and took over four of the
prisonTs five cells blocks. After five days of nego-
tiations, over 1300 State troopers from 14 counties,
National Guardsmen and Sheriff's deputies, armed
with CS and Pepper Gas, machine guns,and new
AR-15 army rifles, attacked on Monday. When the
dense smoke and gas cleared, 28 prisoners and 9
guards were dead, over 150 prisoners were wounded
and 8 were missing.
All the guards who work in Attica are white! But
85% of the prisoners are black or Puerto Rican! It
is a maximum security prison. oITve been in prisons
all over the state. ThereTs no place like Attica; you
have to be there to believe it,� said one former con
who got out two weeks before the uprising.
The guards have three-foot long oak clubs"which
they call ~niggersticksT"which they use to beat in-
mates. oMen are thrown into solitary confinement"
called the box"for 60-90 days"whatever the guards
want,� remarked the former inmate.
oMedical care is terrible or non-existent. One guy
didn't have an examination in nine years"when
he went to the clinic he was told they didnTt have to
treat him. A Spanish-speaking inmate went to the
infirmary and the doctor told him to ~wait until you
get out"learn English so when you come back we
can understand you.�
The prisoners presented their demands to Correc-
tions Commissioner Oswald and the press. The de-
mands included complete amnesty and freedom
from physical, mental and legal reprisals, true reli-
gious freedom, and an end to censorship of reading
materials, adequate food, water and shelter for all
inmates, freedom to be politically active without
punishment, transportation out of confinement to a
non-imperialistic country, the right to. communicate
with anyone at their own expense, adequate medical
care and Spanish speaking doctors, coverage by
State minimum wage laws (current wages: 25¢ a
day), and removal of Warden Mancusi.
L.D., a tall young black man with wire rimmed
glasses, read a statement following the demands:
oWe are all men. We are not beasts and we do not
intend to be beaten or driven as such....we call upon
all the conscientious citizens of America to assist us
in putting an end to this situation that threatens the
life of not only us but of each and every person in
the United States as well.�
RESERVISTS FUCK UP"NOT BUSTED
Massachusetts (October) - Reservists continue their
resistance to training designed to keep them fit for
domestic duty against their own people. Thirty men
from a Massachusetts unit refused to go into the
bivouac area to play war games. No one was pun-
ished for fear of oembarrassment� to the Army. Ten
men from another Massachusetts unit refused to
work and ship any arms or supplied to Vietnam
during their two week duty at a defense plant.
(source: Redline)
JAILBREAK IN URUGUAY
Montevideo, Uruguay (Sept 6) - In one of the most
spectacular prison breaks on record, the Tupa-
maros (Uruguayan guerillas) freed 106 of their
most important leaders from the maximum security
Punta Carretas jail. The escape came just five
weeks after 38 Tupamaros crawled out of the
womenTs prison through a drainage pipe and"like
their male counterparts"vanished into the city of
a million and a half people. (LNS)
be
ql
wae
if t
df
bed
bi
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EAM,
pay
faded
J
fee
y
oe
ede
sateen ac
i
Y a6 CORB Region
nk inna ~
8 aba ii!
oWhat has happened here is but the sound before the fury of those who are oppressed.�
Ut
sya
i}
8 speed
py
ESS
ind
om Ta
ih
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2 " - 2 2
cannot:
AP hee
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(Eliot James
Barkeley, known as oL.D.�, on the right with the wire-rimmed glasses. He was killed after the massacre.)
RIP-OFF ARTISTS CORNERED, OR,
oHEY Gi, YOU WANNA BUY A DIAMOND FOR
YOUR LONELY MOTHER?�
Chicago (September) - Rip-off jewelers are finding
tough times in the diamond trade. TyrellTs near
the Great Lakes Naval Training Center stopped
their sidewalk high pressure sales tactics when
faced with pickets and a boycott. TyrellTs branch
stores in San Diego, Camp Pendleton, Long Beach,
Newport, Ft. Sill, Ft. Bragg, and Ft. Hood are also
under attack by Gis who're tired of people making
money off their loneliness. It seems that other
stores are pressuing TyrelisT to meet these demands:
drop the Vietnam Honor Roll (men who've died in
the Nam owing them money), stop high pressure
sales tactics, end Army cooperation in collecting
payments, stop exploiting GI homesickness. (CAMP)
ADVANCED PIGGERY FOR BRAZILIAN LIFERS
Washington (September) - What would a Pentagon
sponsored oorientation tour� of the US for future
Brazilian military officers include? According to
the recent hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations
Subcommittee on Latin America, it. includes night
club shows in Las Vegas, trips to Disneyland, pool
side luaus and accommodations in plush hotels. In
three years, the bills for these jaunts ran up to $1
million. Next time you get your paycheck, next
time you hear about another wage freeze, think
about this shit. (LNS)
BLACK SERVICEMENTS CAUCUS FORMS
IN THE COAST GUARD
New York (Sept 30) - The US Coast Guard Cutter
Galatin was the stage for a play seen millions of
times before over the last 400 years. White Coast
Guardsmen threatened blacks on board the cutter,
and a fight broke out when other black Coast
Guardsmen boarded the ship to back up their bro-
thers. The next day, black servicemen on Governor's
Island refused to work, and instead presented the
demands of the Black ServicemenTs Caucus to the
base CO. The demands were:
An end to the exploitation and oppression of
Third World people in the US; an end to all rules
that prohibit black servicemen in engaging in the
struggle for liberation in their communities; an end
to the use of the military In the streets and on the
campuses of the US; and the right to form self-
defense squads for protection against assaults on
base.
The BSC also listed some typical instances of
racism on the base. In one case, a brother was held
for a month in __ pre-trial confinement after being
AWOL for five months. At his court-martial he got
6 months hard labor. A white dude who'd been gone
AWOL 8 months wasnTt locked up before trial, and
got his charges dropped. White Coast Guardsmen
rarely get sent to the islandTs brig. BSC also
charged that base command cooperates with white
racist groups on base. This has come up before in
Germany, where Ku Klux Klan cells were allowed
to meet openly and burn crosses on base.
As the case stands now, several blacks will
soon be charged for inciting to riot, and the base
command is ignoring the demands, adding fuel to
fire. (LNS)
AWOL GI CHARGES HONEYWELL CORP.
WITH WAR CRIMES
Honolulu (Sept. 10) - Eight anti-war activists had
their charges dropped in Hawaii after their jury was
unable to reach a decision. They had sat in at the
offices of Honeywell Corporation, a war contractor
which makes a wide variety of anti-personnel wea-
pons for use in Indochina. The eight, including
AWOL GI Rodney (Jake) Marley, were accused of
physical trespass at the Honolulu branch of the
Corporation last May. Their defense was based on
international law, including Nuremberg principles
pertaining to war crimes and complicity. They
maintained that it was not a crime to enter build-
ings such as Honeywell oin order to prevent murder
in Indochina.� (LNS)
TAKE A DEEP BREATH
New Jersey (Sept 25) - At' least 40 high school ath-
letes in northcentral New Jersey got sick from just
breathing the air and exercising hard. New JerseyTs
Air Pollution Control and Health Depts said there
was little doubt that air pollution was the cause.
This sort of thing happens a lot in California where
schools shut down the physical education program
when the smog level gets too high. (LNS)
NIXON FORGETS SOME POWS
Washington (October) - ~Parents of POW Sgt. John
Sexton discovered recently that the US govern-
ment, not the National Liberation Front (the so-
called Vietcong), has been ripping off the letters
he had written them. The NLF recently released
John in good health. And parents of W.O. Quentin
Beecher learned that Quentin, classified MIA for
four years, really crashed in the China Sea when
his chopper ran out of gas. The Army tried to blame
the NLF. Many families of POWs/MIAs have had it,
though, with being used by Nixon to rip off other
sons. They are fighting back and have formed
Families For Immediate Release to force Nixon to
negotiate in good faith in Paris. ThatTs why you
won't hear Nixon talking about saving our POWs
anymore. (Washington Post, Wall Street Journal)
THEY GAVE A WAR AND NOBODY CAME
BUT THEY STILL KEPT FIGHTING
USA (November) - Two studies of the war, one by
Cornell University and the other by the Quakers,
were released recently to offset the latest public
relations smoke screen from Washington. One shows
that Nixon and Co. are continuing the war by remote
control through the use of technological horrors
like the automated battlefield. The other shows how
the air war has become all-important for the US as
it cuts back the number of ground troops. The air
war will be continued especially against Laos and
Cambodia, using 50 B-52s from five bases in Thai-
land and about 300 fighter-bombers from carriers in
the Gulf of Tonkin. By the end of this year the US
will have dropped six million tons of bombs on an
area the size of Texas. The study concluded that de-
spite incredible destruction bombing in no way
brings the US closer to its goal in Indochina. Of
course, when you understand that the Nixon's goal
is destruction, things make a little more sense. (San
Francisco Chronicle)
USS CORAL SEA
The USS Coral Sea is an attack aircraft carrier,
home station Alameda Naval Air Station, California.
At all times, three carriers cruise the Gulf of Tonkin
launching-raids into Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia.
The Coral Sea was scheduled to sail for the Gulf on
November 12. On its last cruise it flew over 4000
bombing missions over Indochina.
The US ground war has been defeated in Indo-
china: First in Vietnam (the Tet Offensive of 1968),
then in Cambodia (the invasion of May 1970), and
finally in Laos (the invasion of 1971). Repeated
defeats have sparked rebellions among Gis in Nam
and at home. As a result the burden of fighting has
been shifted to the Navy and Air Force.
Carriers are playing a key role in these new plans.
Unable to conquer Vietnam on the ground, Nixon's
strategy is to destroy it from the air. Now 50% of the
raids over Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam are
launched from carriers.
oThe feeling on the ship, the general feeling of
the people when theyTre working. When you're
busting your ass sixteen, twenty hours a day, you
get to wondering why the hell youTre doing that cuz
youTre sure not doing it for yourself. It seems you're
doing it for an awful stupid cause. A lot of people
really get together and talk about that too. One time
in the Tonkin Gulf they had a show on closed circuit
TV put on by Flight Ops. They explained everything
they did over there"like how many bombs they
dropped and where they dropped them. This guy
explained how they were bombing the Ho Chi Minh
trail and destroying the trucks, people, and ammu-
nition dumps. He really seemed to get into that,
really enjoy telling people they destroyed so many
supply dumps, digging that there was a secondary
explosion. The dude got up to show a point on the
map and when he turned around, in big block let-
ters on his back was written oMurder, Inc.� When
he did that, man a lot of people were really uptight.
He wasnTt there thirty seconds before the Captain
came running in and threw him out. He was afraid
that people would all of a sudden think about what
was going on. And it worked because everybody on
that ship did.�
Carrier duty has always been one of the worst in
the Navy.
oMost people donTt want to come to a bird farm.
There were fatalities on the Hancock, two crashes.
One was a cold cat. It just lobbed the plane off the
front and the guy drowned. Another was a crash on
the fantail. The pilot hit the ejection button and
landed in the superstructure. The radar was going
around with him. He was up there an hour before
anybody even noticed that he was there. Like half of
his neck was gone.
When they [on the Coral Sea] were coming back
in and launching all the planes for Alameda, they
were catapulting one plane and the front landing
gear collapsed. Both of them ejected. One landed in
the water, one landed on the ship. . . . Two people
died in the yards. They were dropping the anchor
chain from the focsie and one man got wrapped
around the anchor chain and got pulled right thru
a pad eye. The other, a chief, both his legs were
severed. :
There is a long history of resistance on carriers.
Sailors off the Coral Sea helped organize Movement
for a Democratic Military. Six months ago there was
a black movement aboard the same ship calling for
an end to racism and demanding that the Coral Sea
not be sent to Vietnam because of the racist nature
of the war.
There had already been refusals to work, acts of
sabotage like chicken bones in the intakes of planes,
and dozens of other individual actions against the
war and the Navy on the Coral Sea. So when 9 sai-
lors from the USS Constellation took sanctuary in a
church after there had been a huge anti-war vote in
San Diego, sailors and Marines on the Coral Sea
were ready to start their own movement to SOS,
Stop Our Ship.
Several guys drew up a petition to Congress,
asking them to keep the ship from deploying to
Vietnam. Within a day they had over 200 signatures.
The first petition was confiscated by the executive
officer and sent to Washington for investigation. The
Sailors responded immediately by printing up new
petitions. They gave them to their friends in each
division, left them in stacks on tables, in passage-
ways, on the mess decks, in berthing compartments
and anywhere else where people would be.
The first day on that sea trials (Sept. 27) three of
our brothers were busted for carrying anti-war
newspapers. The executive officer gave them a
direct order not to pass out any more literature or
pass around the petition. We thought that order was
illegal because it was our constitutional right to
petition Congress. That night we did pass around
petitions and we got busted and the three brothers
who were given a direct order were put on report for
disobedience of a direct order. The next day in pro-
test of that we took more papers and petitions
around from one end of the hanger bay to another
passing out all this literature right underneath the
CaptainTs nose. Twelve of us. The captain came over,
busted us, and took our names and sent us up to his
cabin. On the way to his cabin we all walked with
clenched fists.�
oAll of a sudden when SOS comes on board no
buttons are allowed anymore. Any person passing
anything out would be written up under Article 82,
willful disobedience of a direct order. Gathering in a
number or in small numbers we couldnTt get more
than three in a group without the pigs coming by
and telling us we couldnTt have meetings. Sitting in
the chow hall they have some big round tables, you
fit eight people at it. We would usually get six or
seven of us to sit at one of these tables some of us
with our buttons and probably non-SOS people. |
Every meal we noticed that we were being watched
by the Master At Arms. Almost a meal didnTt go by
without some form of harassment, somebody walking
by and saying hurry up and finish eating, people
need your trays and table. Or this isnTt a place for a
meeting. Or they would come over and tell us, you
need a haricut or quit smoking. If you were walking
down the hallway and saw two people that you knew
"the hallways are pretty big, some of them are ten
feet across"a Master At Arms or a lifer would come
up and say, you canTt congregate here. You're block-
ing the hallway.
Harassment from lifers increased but the move-
ment kept growing. Out of 160 Marines, for instance,
in the Air Squadron, 80 signed the petition. When
ship returned from sea trials in early October, there
were approximately 1000 names on the petition.
Everyone on the ship knew about SOS. Sides were
being taken. Lifers were getting freaked out and
freaks were getting turned on. Within a couple of
TO THE CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES,
FROMTHE BROTHERS OF THE CORAL SEA:
IN OUR OPINION THERE IS A SILENT MAJORITY ABOARD SHIP WHICH DOES
NOT BELIEVE IN THE PRESENT CONFLICT IN VIETNAM. IT IS ALSO THE
OPINION OF MANY THAT THERE IS NOTHING WE CANDO ABOUT PUTTING AN
END TO THE VIETNAM CONFLICT. THAT BECAUSE WE ARE IN THE MILITARY
WE NO LONGER HAVE A RIGHT TO VOICE OUR INDIVIDUAL OPINIONS CON-
CERNING THE VIETNAM WAR, THIS IS WHERE WE FEEL THAT THE MAJORITY
OF THE CORAL SEA HAS BEEN FOOLED BY MILITARY PROPAGANDA, AS
AMERICANS WE ALL HAVE THE MORAL OBLIGATION TO VOICE OUR OPINIONS,
WE THE PEOPLE MUST GUIDE THE GOVERNMENT AND NOT ALLOW THE GOV-
ERNMENTTO GUIDE US! IN OUR OPINION THIS AC TION IS EVEN MORE JUSTI-
FIED FOR THE MILITARY MAN BECAUSE HE IS THE ONE WHOIS TAKING PER-
SONAL INVOLVEMENT IN THE WAR.
THE CORAL SEA IS SCHEDULED FOR VIETNAM IN NOVEMBER, THIS DOES
NOT HAVE TO BE A FACT, THE SHIP CAN BE PREVENTED FROM TAKING AN
AC TIVE PART IN THE CONFLICT IF WE THE MAJORITY VOIGE OUR OPINION
THAT WE DO NOT BELIEVE IN THE VIETNAM WAR, IF YOU FEEL THAT THE
CORAL SEA SHOUI.D NOT GO TO VIETNAM VOICE YOUR OPINION BY SIGNING
THIS PETITION,
ONLY THE
weeks a right-wing group first calling itself SOB (for
Sail Our Boat) and then LOC (Love Our Country)
got together to harass SOS people and break up
their meetings on the ship. They could never rally
much support and within a few days they faded from
the scene.
During October the sailors and Marines began to
work with a group of sympathetic civilians. Every
shipTs movement during sea trials was greeted by
demonstrations of solidarity outside the gates of
Alameda. A couple of hundred people leafletting at
the gate during rush hour caused impressive traffic
jams.
oWe pulled back in through the Golden Gate from
sea trials. About seventy of us, Marines and sailors,
were right on the bow of the ship and going under-
neath the bridge we formed SOS.� (October 7)
The brass responded to the growing support for
SOS among sailors and civilians by discharging men
that they had singled out as leaders. Others were
restricted to the ship. At one point there were 5 SOS
crewmen in a brig built for six. In all, 9 guys ended
up with general discharges and two with punitive
transfers.
oThe SOS people were thrown in the brig and
they were refusing to cooperate. The Captain saw
that the brig was an ineffective means of stopping
people from organizing. Instead of being on, display
anymore"you are forced to march around and stuff-
the men could see that we still had our spirits ana
we werenTt conforming to the regulations.�
In the last three weeks before deployment the
crew intensified their work on the ship as the cam-
paign to stop the ship became the primary focus
of the anti-war movement in the Bay Area. Crew
members held meetings on a regular basis off-base.
Two picnics with entertainment were pulled off, one
of them within a stoneTs throw of the base. Stickers
and leaflets appeared all over the ship announcing
the latest events and spreading the word about SOS.
The shipTs disc jockey plugged SOS and added to
the growing paranoia of the lifers when he dedicated
the song oDeath Walks Behind You� to the Captain.
An issue of the Plan of the Day was forged and dis-
tributed on the ship in piles of the NavyTs Plan of
the Day.
BERKELEY SANCTUARY
The week before the ship sailed the Berkeley City
Council passed a resolution offering shelter for men
refusing military service and ordering its policemen
not to assist in the arrest of these men. At the same
time 12 Bay Area churches offered sanctuary for
Gls.
The designation of Berkeley as sort of liberated
zone for men who chose to leave the ship became
symbolic of the kind of public support the sailors
built in the week before the ship left. A contingent
from the Coral Sea led the November 6 anti-war
march. And the appeal by spokesmen for the crew
at the dayTs rally for civilians to get behind a move-
ment that was real, not symbolic, a movement
that could stop the war machine, was powerful.
SOS was like a shot in the arm to a failing anti-war
movement. Two days after the march, more than
2000 people gathered before dawn at AlamedaTs
main. gate for one of the most spirited gatherings
seen in the Bay Area in a long time. Several thou-
sand men from three carriers"the Hancock and the
Midway recently back from Vietnam"passed thru
lines of cheering civilians as leave ended near 9am.
Up to the last minute everyone felt that it was an
open question whether the ship would sail or not.
Everyone knew that there were a number of men
solidly behind the movement and that there were
hundreds of others who were waiting, waiting to see
if some dramatic event would sway them one way or
the other. Only on Friday at the critical hour would
it be clear how many would not make the sailing and
whether there would be enough men from key divi-
sions to stop the ship.
Most men had planned to leave the ship quietly
and disappear. It was generally felt that the bust of
men off the Constellation during their sanctuary
wasn't a good thing. It was better to get out of sight
than to be rounded up by the military pigs and flown
back to the ship.
NAVY PUBLIC RELATIONS BULLSHIT
When Bay Area churches and the Berkeley City
Council moved behind the SOS campaign, the Navy
and the federal government responded with a well-
organized public relations effort designed to show
how high morale was on carriers and to intimidate
men who were considering public sanctuary. Sudden-
ly the mass media, which had hesitantly covere
SOS, was giving precious time to reports of how
calm things were on the Constellation when it
reached Nam and how little was going on on the
Midway when it returned to Alameda from Nam. On
the day before the ship was scheduled to sail, the
federal attorney threatened to prosecute anyone,
including members of the Berkeley City Council,
who owillfully concealed a deserter,� a ten year rap.
Friday, November 12. Cold wind and rain greeted
the 1500 people who gathered outside the base
before dawn for a last minute gesture of support.
The pigs freaked and prepared for a mass attempt to
enter base and block traffic onto Alameda Island.
Cars that attempted to enter the base were allowed
in and if people got out on the base, they were
booked for illegal trespass. Eighteen were busted.
SANCTUARY
The sanctuary in Berkeley at the University Lu-
theran Church was maintained for several days.
About two dozen sailors came by but none decided
to stay. Just before sailing time the Captain announ-
ced that morale on the ship was high and that about
35 men, the usual number, were missing from the
ship. It was rumored that about 250 men left the
ship. Brothers are checking out the scene on the ship
in Hawaii and will report in the next Bulkhead.
At a press conference the day after the sailing,
former members of the crew discussed the future of
SOS. Though the men were critical of their move-
ment (see below), they felt that several important
things had been accomplished:
e¢ The men on the ship had learned that they
could speak and act against the war;
e They were able to build a strong, lasting bond
of unity with civilian brothers and sisters;
e The movement on the ship and its growing
civilian support focused public on the continuing
genocidal war in Indochina and helped educate
the anti-war movement about the critical impor-
tance of the GI movement;
¢ Important new commitments against the war
were made by Bay Area churches and the Berkeley
City Council;
¢ Most important of all, they felt, the sailors
and Marines had laid the basis for an ongoing pro-
ject to stop the future deployment of attack carriers
to Vietnamese waters.
TODAY THE CORAL SEA
TOMORROW THE FLEET
SOS received messages of support from Gls and
civilians from all over the world. The most important
message was that SOS was spreading throughout
the Pacific Fleet. There had already been a sanct-
uary established in Hawaii by four sailors off a
destroyer, the USS Cochrane. (The four brothers
also denounced the Amchitka test, the destination
of their ship.) Brothers have sent petitions to stop
their own ships from the attack carriers Enterprise,
Oriskany, Midway, Ranger, and Hancock. The Han-
cock is scheduled to leave the Bay Area on January
12 and will be the next target of SOS. The destroyer
USS J.C. Owens sent in a petition with 57 names
while steaming toward San Francisco. It arrived
Nov. 15. SOS also heard from the USS Okinawa,
stationed at Long Beach. Let us know what is hap-
pening on your ship.
The following was typical of the letters of support:
Coral Sea Brothers:
I'm glad someone finally got the guts to do something.
This constant WESPAC deployment that the 7th fleet has
been doing is wasting our money in taxes and ruining the
economy. ... In my opinion, as far as accomplishing any
thing in Vietnam, we're doing nothing more but wasting
money, peopleTs lives, people's land, and American lives.
. I'm behind you and so are many of the other human
beings here on the Enterprise. So don't feel like the Lone
Ranger. You've got my vote for the petition.
K.K. and the Enterprise humans
The Coral Sea Brothers
Rap About Organizing
o| don't think we really knew what we were get-
ting into when we started that petition, and we did
not know the potential that it finally developed. If
we'd realized that, other people would see that in us
and be more interested right off.�
oThe petition wouldn't stop the ship. We knew
that, but at least the petition gives you something
to work with. Say we've got 300 names. Those 300
are somewhat sympathetic with the cause and that
gives you 300 people to work with. You may not get
300 solid people out of those 300, but you maybe can
make it 20 plus the people it started out with to work
on those other 300. And like that was never done.
But it was always encouraged.�
oAnother thing that | think is that there was a lot
of personal convictions that everyone was going for
too, you know, and the personal convictions were
against the war, right? The SOS movement was also
against the. war and -personal convictions was like
an individual trip and if we can make the movement
it would be more than in individual trip. It would be
like a unity trip and that would probably accomplish
a lot more than an individual trip would, and | think
thatTs where we fucked up a /ot too. | mean instead
of just a lot of us saying we're COTs and we want out
! mean thatTs getting us out of the Navy and thatTs
getting us away from the problem. But is it doing
anything about the problem?�
oWhen you start an organization you're going to
have to find the people who are capable of educating
other people.�
oYou got to talk to a lot of people and let them
know they're getting fucked over. Like | know a lot
of people down in the Engineering Dept. They gripe
about, yeah, | got to work 18 hours, get 2 hours sleep
and wake up for GQ. I'm getting tired of this shit,
and you got to tell them just say fuck it, man, donTt
even make GQ. Stay in your rack, donTt muster in the
morning. If they bitch, they better do something
about it cause the poor beggars down there, they
work them to death. They can get them organized
and get a group, say fuck it we ain't going to go to
GQ. WeTre going to sleep.�
oThe first thing"work on the people who are most
likely....YouTre going to have to get a real good rap
with the people and itTs going to have to be constant
rap. Not when you rap with this guy one day and
another tomorrow. Go and see what's in his head
See what heTs been thinking about and itTs going to
have to take a lot of work.�
oWe've also got to breakdown cliquism because |
think a lot of people saw SOS movement people as
a clique which was basically the 12 original people.
When we first started having meetings, it was those
people because we didnTt want it to get too disrup-
tive. | think possibly it could have grown where the
core group could have been a large number of
people who covered a larger area instead of staying
with the original twelve.�
oWe did two things that showed strength, like on
the hangar bay that time where we passed out
literature in front of the Captain and we showed
unity and nothing happened to us. Like if there were
more demonstrations on board where we _ were
showing the crew that we weren't afraid and really
nothing could happen to us together. Where there
was unity then that would get a /ot of guys.�
oOne thing that really came out that was a success
is that everybody on the ship knows SOS. Maybe
they don't realize right now what SOS meant. But
when they're out at sea for awhile and when they're
on the line for 20 days, theyTre going to start reali-
zing what SOS is. What we were trying to do is have
quick education. You canTt get everybody on educa-
tion. But you realize through experience and they're
going to get the education. That's where a work
stoppage and slow down can really come in and
maybe stop the ship.�
oWe didn't know how heavy this thing was when
we Started. We just started a petition to stop the ship
and that's all there was to it. But thatTs not all there
was to it. | mean thatTs all there was in the beginning.
Hopefully in the future the people on other ships
won't have that problem cause they'll know. Yeah,
| guess thatTs something that builds with each move-
meant. ItTs getting bigger.�
ray
HE MORALE, DISCIPLINE and battleworthiness
of the U.S. Armed Forces are, with a few salient ex-
ceptions, lower and worse than at any time in this
century and possibly in the history of the United
States.
By every conceivable indicator, our army that
now remains in Vietnam is in a state approaching
collapse, with individual units avoiding or having
refused combat, murdering their officers and non-
commissioned officers, drug-ridden, and dispirited
where not near-mutinous.
Elsewhere than Vietnam, the situation is nearly
as serious.
Intolerably clobbered and buffeted from without
and within by social turbulence, pandemic drug
addiction, race war, sedition, civilian scapegoatise,
draftee recalcitrance and malevolence, barracks
theft and common crime, unsupported in their tra-
vail by the general government, in Congress as well
as the executive branch, distrusted, disliked, and
often reviled by the public, the uniformed services
today are places of agony for the loyal, silent pro-
fessionals who doggedly hang on and try to keep
the ship afloat.
Historical precedents do exist for some of the ser-
vicesT problems, such as desertion, mutiny, unpop-
ularity, seditious attacks, and racial troubles.
Others, suchas drugs, pose difficulties that are
wholly new. Nowhere, however, in the history of
the Armed Forces have comparable past troubles
presented themselves in such general magnitude,
acuteness, or concentrated focus as today.
By several orders of magnitude, the Army seems
to be in worst trouble. But the Navy has serious
and unprecedented problems, while the Air Force,
on the surface at least still clear of the quicksands
in which the Army is sinking, is itself facing dis-
quieting difficulties.
Only the Marines"who have made news this year
by their hard line against indiscipline and general
permissiveness"seem, with their expected staunch-
ness and tough tradition, to be weathering the
storm.
To understand the military consequences of what
is happening to the U.S. Armed Forces, Vietnam is
a good place to start. It is in Vietnam that the rear-
guard of a 500,000-man army, in its day (and in
the observation of the writer) the best army the
United States ever put into the field,is numbly ex-
tricating itself from a nightmare war...
oThey have set up separate companies,� writes
an American soldier from Cu Chi, quoted in the
New York Times, ofor men who refuse to go out
into the field. It is no big thing to refuse to go. If a
man is ordered to go to such and such a place he no
longer goes through the hassle of refusing; he just
packs his shirt and goes to visit some buddies at
another base camp. Operations have become in-
credibly ragtag. Many guys donTt even put on their
uniforms any more...The American garrisons on
the larger bases are virtually disarmed. The lifers
have taken our weapons from us and put them
under lock and key...There have also been quite a
few frag incidents in the battalion.�
Can all this really be typical or even truthful?
Unfortunately the answer is yes.
oFrag incidents� or just ofragging� is current
soldier slang in Vietnam for the murder or at-
tempted murder of strict, unpopular, or just ag-
gressive officers and NCOs. With extreme reluc-
tance (after a young West Pointer from Senator
Mike MansfieldTs Montana was fragged in his sleep)
the Pentagon has now disclosed that fraggings in
1970 (209) have more than doubled those of the
previous year (96).
Word of the deaths of officers will bring cheers at
troop movies or in bivouacs of certain units.
In one such division"the morale-plagued Amer-
ical"fraggings during 1971 have been authori-
tatively estimated to be running about one a week
Bounties, raised by common subscription in
amounts running anywhere from $50 to $1,000,
have been widely reported put on the heads of
leaders whom the privates and Sp4s want to rub out.
Collapse
oi the
Armed
Forces
By Col Robert D. Hein, jr.
North American Newspaper Alliance
Shortly after the costly assault on Hamburger Hill
in mid-1969, the GI underground newspaper in
Vietnam, oG.I. Savs�. oubliclv offered a $10,000
bounty on Lt. Col. Weldon Honeycutt, the officer who
ordered (and led) the attack. Despite several at-
tempts, however, Honeycutt managed to live out
his tour and return Stateside.
oAnother Hamburger Hill,� (i.e., toughly contest-
ed assault), conceded a veteran major, ois defi-
nitely out.�
The issue of ocombat refusal,� an official euphem-
ism for disobedience of orders to fight"the sold-
ierTs gravest crime"has only recently been again
precipitated on the frontier of Laos by Troop B, 1st
CavalryTs mass refusal to recapture their captain's
command vehicle containing communication gear,
codes and other secret operation orders.
As early as mid-1969, however, an_ entire
company of the 196th Light Infantry Brigade pub-
licly sat down on the battlefield. Later that year,
another rifle company, from the famed 1st Air Cav-
alry Division, flatly refused"on CBS-TV"to ad-
vance down a dangerous trail. ...
While denying further unit refusals, the Air Cav
has admitted some 35 individual refusals in 1970
alone. By comparison, only two years earlier in
1968, the entire number of officially recorded re-
fusals for our whole army in Vietnam"from over
seven divisions"was 68.
oSearch and evade� (meaning tacit avoidance of
combat by units in the field) is now virtually a prin-
ciple of war, vividly expressed by the GI phrase,
oCYA (cover your ass) and get home!�
That osearch-and-evade� has not gone unnoticed
by the enemy is underscored by the Viet Cong dele-
gationTs recent statement at the Paris Peace Talks
that communist units in Indochina have been or-
dered not to engage American units which do not
molest them. [See Bulkhead, June, 1971] The same
statement boasted"not without foundation in fact"
that American defectors are in the VC ranks.
Symbolic anti-war fasts (such as the one at Pleiku
where an entire medical unit, led by its officers,
refused Thanksgiving turkey), peace symbols, oVT-
signs not for victory but for peace, booing and curs-
ing of officers and even of hapless entertainers such
as Bob Hope, are unhappily commonplace.
As for drugs and race, VietnamTs problems today
not only reflect but reinforce those of the Armed
Forces as a whole. In April, for example, members
of a Congressional investigating subcommittee re-
ported that 10 to 15% of our troops in Vietnam are
now using high-grade heroin, and that drug addic-
tion there is oof epidemic proportions.�
Only last year an Air Force major and command
pilot for Ambassador Bunker was apprehended at
Tan Son Nhut air base outside Saigon with $8
million worth of heroin in his aircraft. The major is
now in Leavenworth.
Early this year, an Air Force regular colonel was
court-martialed and cashiered for leading his
squadron in pot parties, while, at Cam Ranh Air
Force Base, 43 members of the base security police
squadron were recently swept up in dragnet nar-
cotics raids....
it is a truism that national armies closely reflect
societies from which they have been raised.
For this very reason, our Armed Forces outside
Vietnam not only reflect these conditions but dis-
close the depths of their troubles in an awful litany
of sedition, disaffection, desertion, race, drugs,
breakdowns of authority, abandonment of disci-
pline, and, as a cumulative result, the lowest state
of military morale in the history of the country.
Sedition"coupled with disaffection within the
ranks, and externally fomented with an audacity
and intensity previously inconceivable"infests the
Armed Services:
e At best count, there appear to be some 144
underground newspapers published on or aimed at
U.S. military bases in this country and overseas.
Since 1970 the number of such sheets has increasec
40% (up from 103 last fall). These journals are not
mere gripe-sheets that poke soldier fun in the
oBeetle Bailey� tradition, at the brass and the ser-
geants. oIn Vietnam,� write the Ft. Lewis-McChord
Free Prees, othe Lifers, the Brass, are the true
Enemy, not the enemy.� Another West Coast sheet
advises readers: oDonTt desert. Go to Vietnam and
kill your commanding officer.�
e At least 14 GI dissent organizations (including
two made up exclusively of officers) now operate
more or less openly. Ancillary to these are at least
six antiwar veteransT groups which strive to influ-
ence Gls.
e Three well-established lawyer groups specialize
in support of GI dissent. Two (GI Civil Liberties De-
fense Committee and New York Draft and Military
Law Panel) operate in the open. A third is a semi-
underground network of lawyers who can only be
contacted through the GI Alliance, a Washington,
D.C., group which tries to coordinate seditious anti-
military activities throughout the country.
One antimilitary legal effort operates right in the
theater of war. A three-man law office, backed by
the LawyersT Military Defense Committee, of Cam-
bridge, Mass., was set up last fall in Saigon to pro-
vide free civilian legal services for dissident soldiers
being court-martialed in Vietnam.
Besides these lawyersT fronts, the Pacific Coun-
seling Service (an umbrella organization with
Unitarian backing for a prolifery of antimilitary ac-
tivities) provides legal help and incitement to dis-
sident Gls through not one but seven branches
(Tacoma, Oakland, Los Angeles, San Diego, Mon-
terey, Tokyo, and Okinawa).
Another of Pacific CounselingTs activities is to
air-drop planeloads of seditious literature into Oak-
landTs sprawling Army Base, our major West Coast
staging point for Vietnam.
eOn the religious front, a community of turbu-
lent priests and clergymen, some unfrocked, calls
itself the Order of Maximilian. Maximilian is a saint
said to have been martyred by the Romans for re-
fusing military service as un-Christian. Maximil-
ianTs present-day followers visit military posts, in-
filtrate brigs and stockades in the guise of spiritual
counseling, work to recruit military chaplains, and
hold services of oconsecrations� of post chapels in
the name of their saintly draft-dodger.
e By present count at least 11 (some go as high as
26) off-base antiwar ocoffee houses� ply Gis with
rock music, lukewarm coffee, antiwar literature,
how-to-do-it tips on desertion, and similar disrup-
tive counsels. Among the best-known coffee houses
are: The Shelter Half (Ft. Lewis, Wash.); The Home
Front (Ft. Carson, Colo.); and The Oleo Strut (Ft.
Hood, Texas)...
eThe nation-wide campus-radical offensive
against ROTC and college officer-training is well
known. Events last year at Stanford University,
however, demonstrate the extremes to which this
campaign (which peaked after Cambodia) has
gone. After the Stanford faculty voted to accept a
modified, specially restructured ROTC program,
the university was subjected to a cyclone of contin-
uing violence which included at least $200,000 in
ultimate damage to buildings (highlighted by
systematic destruction of 40 twenty-foot stained
glass windows in the library). In the end, led by
university president Richard W. Lyman, the faculty
reversed itself. Lyman was quoted at the time that
oROTC is costing Stanford too much.�
e oEntertainment Industry for Peace and Justice,�
the antiwar show-biz front organized by Jane Fonda,
Dick Gregory and Dalton Trumbo, now claims over
800 film, TV, and music names. This organization
is backing Miss FondaTs antimilitary road-show.
[Now touring US bases in Asia.]
e|Freshman Representative Ronald V. Dellums
(D-Calif) runs a somewhat different kind of anti-
military production. As a Congressman, Dellums
cannot be barred from military posts and has been
taking full advantage of the fact. At Ft. Meade, Md.,
last month, Dellums led a soldier audience as they
booed and cursed their commanding officer who
was present on-stage in the post theater which the
Army had to make available.
From oThe Armed Forces Journal,� official organ of
the Pentagon. (PART I)
ong Binh Meeting
The Army won't admit it, but 60 to 80 Gls got it
together outside the service club in the Plantation
section of Long Binh on the night of November 6 to
discuss means of getting home and ending the war.
The meeting, which had been planned for more
than a week, was comprised of representatives from
at least ten units in the Plantation (so called due to
the rubber plantation which used to be there).
oWe're all opposed to the war. We feel it is an
unjust war and that we should not be here. We're
here tonight to discuss means of making our de-
mands heard,� one guy said.
oThe people here tonight all trust each other;
there is no one here any of us wouldnTt smoke with.�
According to a typed notice handed out at the
meeting, which could hardly be labelled a demon-
stration, the aims of the group are to: end the war,
secure the release of POWs, and to legalize weed.
oIn fact,� one Gl with beads and headband said,
odope is one of the prime reasons for our getting
together.� Another guy said, oMarijuana used to be
real easy to get here at Long Binh, but now they
hassle you so much that it is really hard to get. And
what happens when you canTt get grass? Some
people donTt like to drink, so they turn to skag. The
Army has forced guys into taking skag by making
grass so hard to get. We donTt think that is right. We
donTt want to turn on to skag, and want to get our
buddies off it. To do that, we have to be able to
smoke grass.�
Asked how easy it is to get heroin at Long Binh,
the group roared, oItTs so easy you wouldn't believe
it. You just walk down the street, anywhere, skag
is no problem to get. But try getting grass!�
What does the group have in mind? oYou cut off
the body and the head canTt go anywhere. if we all
sit on the runways at Tan Son Nhut and Bien Hoa,
and stop the jets from coming in with more people,
who will do our jobs? TheyTll have to send us home.
For instance, there are only two water truck drivers
on Plantation who donTt smoke. If we want to call a
work stoppage, we will be able to do it. ThatTs the
purpose of this meeting, for people to get to know
each other, to get together so we can use the power
we have.�
Every man at the meeting contended that morale
on the post is low and pointed to harassment, living
Billy Smith is a black private from Watts, Calif.
Before he was drafted he went to school and
worked at a lot of different jobs. When the Watts
insurrection broke out in 1965, he was picked up in
the city-wide dragnet of curfew violations, and was
later found not guilty. In 1969 he was drafted. He
was opposed to the war and Army, even then, and
wanted to resist induction, but instead respected his
familyTs desire that he not go to jail. He tried to
appear too dumb to be drafted, but found that next
to impossible and was inducted into the US Army.
He underwent training at Ft. Ord, Ft. Sill, and then
was sent to Vietnam in October, 1970, where he
was assigned to the command of Capt. Rigby.
For many reasons, some clear and some not, Capt
Rigby and First Sgt Willie spent a large number of
wakina hours makina life miserable for Pvt. Smith.
He had been given three Article 15s by Capt Rigby
within a few months for minor infractions, and
was being processed for a o212� discharge for un-
suitability and unfitness. Rigby said Billy would
never make a good solider. oSection chiefs prided
themselves on rapid, effective artillery fire!�, said
Rigby. But he said that Billy was unenthusiastic
about oclosing with the enemy.�
BillyTs lack of enthusiasm for the war, the Army,
his CO, and his 1st Sgt. were obvious to those who
knew him. He often talked to those around him
about the racism he'd experienced and how much he
hated it, and how to fight it.
On March 15, 1971, at 0045 hours, a fragmenta-
tion grenade exploded in an officer's barracks at
Bien Hoa, killing two young lieutenants and wound-
ing a third. Capt Rigby and 1st Sgt. Willie, who
were to have slept in those barracks, arrived on the
scene, and decided they were. the real intended
victims"and that the logical guilty party could only
be one Pvt. Billy Dean Smith.
THE ACCUSATIONS AND THE CHARGES
Without hesitation, they. informed the CID of-
ficer of their conclusion"or was it a verdict"and
together they called a battalion formation. In spite
of a complete lack of evidence, and without so
conditions, and persecution as the causes. oThey
treat us like they used to treat soldiers twenty years
ago,� a representative from an aviation company
explained. oAnd it isnTt going to work. We are better
educated than the crop then and we won't stand for
es
There had been a fragging at one of the units, in
5/42d Arty Bn a few weeks earlier. A 1st Sgt was
seriously injured. A man was arrested, but people
from his unit contend he is the wrong guy. oFrag-
gings are not the answer,� a man from the unit said
oWe want to settle things non-violently, but we don't
want to stay here.�
oAnyway, we can't get frags. I've seen men get
killed in Cambodia because they only had concus-
sion grenades. The lifers are scared of us so don't
let us have frags anymore. In fact, we donTt even
have guns. EverybodyTs weapon is locked up on
Long Binh. Can you see it if we ever got hit, all
lining up outside the arms room with the sergeant
singing ~pick up your '16 and run?T We'd be picked
off from a mile away.�
These and other complaints such as EM living in
cockroach and bug-infested rooms while senior
NCOs and officers live in air-conditioned trailers,
routine shakedown inspections, illegal searches,
urine tests and harrassment, were discussed.
The meeting lasted for an hour and a half, and
guys felt it was successful. oA lot of us here are
thinking about these things, the way we're treated
and lied to, the war, the hassles over dope. But now
we are coming together, and together we have
power. Between the heads on this post we control a
lot of important jobs. When these representatives
go back to their respective units and pass the word
around that we are getting something together, in
no time at all we will have hundreds and hundreds
of people.�
One man, who was wounded in the field, given
morphine and shipped to the rear, then sent to the
drug detention center because of morphine in his
urine, said, oThe man will try to bust us, scare us
and break us up. We suspect there are CIDs planted
in every company. The man will try to keep us from
stopping the war so he can earn more money and so
his mass assassination machines can keep on killing
much as questioning RigbyTs theory, Billy Smith
was called to the front and told that he was under
apprehension for murder"the equivalent to a de-
claration of guilt before all the potential witnesses.
To this were added two charges of resisting arrest"
plus two charges of attempted murder (Rigby and
Willis).
: FITTING FACTS TO THE THEORY
Once they had a theory, no one ever asked if
someone else might have done the fragging or what
the reasons might have been. Instead, the entire
military effort was directed toward fitting the facts
to the theory. After interviews with scores of wit-
nesses, after hundreds of leading questions and
answers, the entire case against Billy rests on the
following list of direct and circumstantial
evidence:
THE EVIDENCE
The direct evidence consists of one item: when
arrested, Billy was illegally searched, and a
grenade pin was found in his pocket, together with
some oblack leather gloves� that olooked. suspi-
cious�. The gloves were never connected to any-
thing. The grenade pin was sent to a laboratory in
Japan for tests against a grenade spoon found
near the explosion. While the photographs of mark-
ings of the two items clearly show there is not the
slightest matching between them, the Army claims
there is. But the Army has all the evidence it needs,
and is not concerned that there is not a single
piece of evidence to link Billy with the fragging.
WHY BILLY SMITH?
The circumstantial evidence is even more incred-
ible. It shows basically that Billy Smith hated the
Army, hated the war, hatgd his CO and ist Sgt,
that he'd stated that all these were racist and that
he would oget even� with them, that fragging was
a good way to do it, and that he had access to a
fragmentation grenade. With that kind of evidence
about 90% of the EMs in his unit could get convicted
of the same crime.
Billy Dean Smith is fighting back. The Army is
asking for the death penalty. Even though he is
innocent people. We canTt see that. ITm not a baby
killer, and | donTt want to be called one when | go
home.�
oJust getting together was the important. thing
tonight. As far as doing things, the possibilities are
limitless,� one-man said. He pointed to the crowded
motor pool of the 63d Artillery Group just up the
road from the meeting place. oA month ago some
heads emptied the air out of all the tires on every
truck in that motor pool. It was days before all the
trucks were on the road again, because they threw
away all the valves. And those trucks carry ammu-
nition out to the firebases.�
oSo thereTs a lot we can do, but first we have to
get together, so we can co-ordinate. Then if the war
pigs hassle us too much, we can effectively pull off
a complete work halt when we want.�
About half an hour after the meeting broke up,
five military police jeeps raced to the scene. From a
nearby hill, guys watched as jeeps, with red lights
flashing, sped from one point to another around the
post.
This article was not fiction. It was send in to the Pacific News Service by
their Indochina correspondent, Thom Marlowe. Tom Marlowe has spent the
last three years reporting on Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. He's written
for Overseas Weekly, Asia. Magazine, and Dispatch News Service. And he's
also worked as a reporter for Metromedia Radio. If thatTs not enough stars
for you, he also was assistant financial editor at the Hong Kong Star.
presumed innocent, he has been in the Ft. Ord
stockade without bail (locked up in an isolated cell
for 23 out of every 24 hours), while Lt. Calley, who
was convicted of the murder of 26 Vietnamese
people, is allowed all kinds of privileges.
WHY WE SHOULD GIVE A SHIT ABOUT BILLY
Billy is being framed for all the fraggings in the
Nam. His is the first court-martial in the US for
fragging (although hundreds more have occurred
in Vietnam). The military command is trying to
make an example out of Billy in order to intimidate
other Gls from any other kind of dissent/resistance.
People all over are coming to the defense of Billy
and demanding his freedom. They all know that if
he is convicted, all of us who hate this war and the
military machine that keeps it moving, we'll all
suffer. But if Billy is freed, that'll be a step towards
our own freedom. O
ee ee wee ih acs tn tlhe segtatateet
o*e%e' e's
LETTERS
Dear People,
Howdy! What's happening? Just thought I'd drop you a
line about one of the largest lifer installations in Vietnam.
This place is called Newport. Better named by the junio
EM as oPig port.� ItTs on the edge of Saigon, and its sole
Purpose is unloading ships from the states loaded with
everything from ammo and tanks to PX good and every-
thing else used to support this absurd war....
Five attempted busts on us in less than a week! This is
really too much! | guess we're all super drug addicts and
Criminals according to the lifers. We've all got less than
100 days left and haven't had or been in any trouble since
we've been in Nam. Not even an Article 15. But we've
been branded here as obad news� along with others.
There is more going on here also. All the lifers manage
to live in air-conditioned hoothces while lower EM does
not. We know how they get air conditioners. They do it
through black market by selling and trading supplies and
equipment they have access to in the warehouses here.
Most of them spend days at a time living off post in hotels
in Saigon living it up with their booze and whores. We,
along with Vietnamese civilians do the work. They even
have a boat here, a small cabin Cruiser type they use to
ride up and down the Saigon River in at their leisure.
These lifers include the top brass from the USARV heaa-
quarters in Saigon and Long Binh. They ride about enjoy-
ing themselves on the weekends, partying with whores on
board. They don't fool us, man! They even have a range to
drive golf balls on in Long Binh and a mess hall that looks
like something you'd see in Beverley Hills. Can you dig
that?!
...| donTt think there are too many places quite like this
in the army, LetTs hope not anyway. The Viet Nam Capital
for blackmarketing, dirty dealing, low-underhanded-back-
Stabbing lifers. Take it easy and I'll be writing...
Sincerely,
Doug U., 5th Trans. Co.
Republic of Vietnam
rank and name
military number
Dear Bulkhead,
It was really far out to hear from you again and I'v glad
to inform you that the Movement is going on well here
aboard the Midway....The news about the Connie (Con-
Stellation CVA-64) is really exciting. | work in the Elec-
tricians Office and the news came in today that the Com-
manding Officer of the Connie has suffered a obreakdown�
and is under medical care. That is the carrier that is
supposed to relieve the Midway....1 hope that no one has
to come over here anymore and when | do get back, ITm
going to do all in my power to try to keep the Midway
from returning here.
Chipand Brothers
USS Midway
To the Bulkhead,
I'm a captive in the Army in Vietnam, and ever since I've
been in this fuckinT mess, my life has been one big hassle
after another....Like the other day this friend of mine and
me were in talking to our CO and he give us both a direct
order to get a haircut and to make formations. Well, need-
less to say we did neither one, and now heTs trying to give
us an Article 15. But we won't sign them and | haven't
heard another word about the matter but | think we will
today or tomorrow.
...| have a major for a CO, and let me tell you he won't
cut you no slack. Twon is off limits and since we can't go
there we set around in the barracks and do our thing and
just last night about seven of us were sitting around
listening to some sounds and a few other things and our
CO and his 1st Sgt. came in and said they smelled pot.
They asked to smell my cigarette, but it was nothing. We
got over on them. Ha! Ha! That's one for Our side and in
the future there will be more.
Peace to the People
Pvt. W. Mc.
388th Trans. Vietnvm
Dear Bulkhead,
| am with the US Army in Germany, and just about 5
minutes ago | finished reading my first Bulkhead. | hate
the Army, because they have been fucking over me. | will
do everything in my power to hurt the Army. | have not
been paid for the last 6 months, and | am sick of being
| have received several Article 15s, for AWOL and also
for drugs. If | stay in the Army much longer | will end up
in jail. | have 22 months to go. All this hassle and | have a
brother who is a major, a lawyer. He is a lifer.
We had an AGI two months ago, and we failed it. This
was because of the officers here in the Bat. They fucked
up, and we get the shit....We have a little black book with
things in it that have fucked up here. When things go
wrong, people come to me or David and we write down
their problems. Maybe after they read your paper, they
can write you instead of me and David.
Say Hi to the World for Me
Arnold and David
1/509th Abn Inf., Germany
Room 104
Pacific Counseling
Service
The people at Pacific Counselling Service know military law.
They can let you know what your rights are, and back you
up when you have to fight to get them. In the States and Asia
1232 Market Street
Dear Bulkhead,
| was down to Frisco for the Peace Rally last weekend
(Nov. 6), and was delighted to receive a copy of the Bulk-
head. | would only be too glad to distribute copies on
base. Mare Island is living in the past. They are constantly
hassling the EM with no apparent reason or system. It
certain people.
The living quarters are disgusting, and recently they
installed a new Master at Arms with direct orders to make
it hard on us. Several times on watch | observed rats in
the barracks, called the otrouble desk� and logged it in
the otrouble log.� It was a very long time before anything
was done and when you ask staff about it, they'll tell you
how quickly and efficiently the rats had been extermi-
nated. They were here for about a year altogether. What
| really wrote to say is how about an article on EMs rights.
SZ.
Mare Island
Peace Brothers of the Bulkhead,
.. The USS RathburneTs no different than the others of
its class"undependable, Slow, with a staff of officers and
lifers that would just as soon step On a person than listen
to him. The CaptainTs a Washington desk jockey with his
first Command has gallantly led his ship into every ship
yard in the Western Pacific for some major repairs. As for
the brothers on board, we are a closely knit group fighting
for our own rights and being bombarded with long
working hours and almost unbearable living conditions.
... The freaks on board fairly well control the happenings.
There's always some one telling off some lifer and being
placed on the dreaded pad and sent to the XO where heTs
persecuted at the kangaroo court and sentenced to re-
Striction and extra military instruction, as they call it.
The Navy is the part of the military that isnTt so much
a physical as it is a mental burden. I've known many
brothers that were driven into mental wards, states of
depression and drug addiction. When will they ever learn
we are people, not military robots to do as they bid.
Myself, | fought for many rights and was charged with
disobedience, disrespect, and other articles of the Unjust
Code of Military Injustice. Along with my brothers we
suffered, mentally for our sour military attitudes, but for
a just Cause. Many have left this ship on drug charges.
Many have turned themselves in to the man to get off and
out of the Navy. | have a short time left in the service and
they will have to suffer with me for | will make it as diffi-
Cult as possible for them as they did to me.
From Myself and My Brothers,
Love, Peace, and Happiness,
Jerry
To the Staff,
| have been receiving your papers since Feb. | really dig
it and | know the people | distributed it to liked it....WeTve
already got the brass, CID, and a lot of NCOs scared shit-
less. This week-end we are going to hold a rally outside of
the main gate, our friends and the staff of the paper oLast
Harass�. We ~have to let these mongreal pigs know that
we're sick and tired of their bullshit, all of their fucking
games have got to cease. As of now we are lacking money,
so whatever you are able to send is far out....1 really am
a prisoner.
Thank you
Steve, Fort Gordon
148 Chico Street
Project 2, Quezon City
SAN FRANCISCO, THE PHILIPPINES -
CALIF. 94102 e
* military address/unit Ph. 415 / 431-8080 Box 447
e Koza
1733 Jefferson Street OKINAWA
OAKLAND, CALIF. *
oe BRD Ishii Bldg. 6-44
Ph. 415 / 836-1039 Kagurazaka, Shinjuku-ku
branch of service release date
e TOKYO, JAPAN
: : 288 Alvarado Street Ph. 269-5082
[ ] !am a captive of the US Armed Forces and want to get this free. MONTEREY, CALIF. .
oete ; 93940 P.O. Box 4
[ ] |! will distribute Bulkheads on base. Send me (S) (10) (25) Ph. 408 / 373-2305 lwakuni-shi
(50) (100) Yamaguchi-ken
Box 366 IWAKUNI, JAPAN
{ ] I'm a civilian who's enclosing $5 for 12 issues (donations are TACOMA, WASH. e
welcome, folks) Ph. 206 / GR 5-0496 The Ow!
ie 2-4-9 Chuo Cho
1924 Island Misawa-chi,
SAN DIEGO, CALIF. Aomori-ken,
HereTs the name and address of a friend in the service who ought to a aS acta age JAPAN
be getting this paper: ; °
D-2 Floor 9 The First Amendment
Mirador Mansions Yokota AFB
54-64 Nathan Road
KOWLOON, HONG KONG
Ph. K-687 449
P-12, 2099, 3-5
1 Chome / Musashi-no-dai
FUSSA, TOKYO
A VICTORY FOR BLACK GIS IN GERMANY
Darmstadt (October) - A group of about 30 white
soldiers armed with sticks and iron bars walked
into the 93d Signal Bn mess hall on July 18. ~AT
CompanyTs Capt. McGrew, who'd been sitting in the
mess hall, quitely disppeared. Almost on signal,
the whites attacked a group of blacks who were
listening to soul music on the juke box. Before
the blacks had asked the whites to turn down a
country and western tape.
At the end of the riot, 20 Gis were treated for in-
juries, and one black, Cpl. Larry Dixon, was charged
with inciting to riot. The very next day, 53 brothers
marched to Battalion Hq to demand that the new
CO, Lt. Col. Partin, release Dixon. Darmstadt is a
center of GI resistance, and Partin was only the
latest in a long string of lifers sent there to oclean
things up.� Partin refused to talk, ordered the men
to split, and when they didnTt, called the riot squad.
At bayonet point, the all-white riot squad forced
the black Gls into a truck and then took them to a
barb-wire compound where they spent the night
without food or water.
When the international press got ahold of the
Story, the Army freaked and offered the Darmstadt
53 a chance to plead guilty to a minor charge
that'd mean only a little brig time and a small loss
of pay. The brothers told the Army to forget it,
and started building their legal defense.
When the Army started the trial on August 30,
black and white Gis from nearby installations filled
the courtroom. Local support was built, a team of
lawyers organized, and by mid-October, the ArmyTs
case had been shot down so bad that charges were
dropped and the brothers set free! (LNS)
NO VIETNAMESE EVER CALLED ME NIGGER
Philadelphia (September) - The North Vietnamese
army has set down a policy of avoiding conflict
with predominantly black American combat units,
according to the Rev. Muhammed Kenyatta, direc-
tor of the Black Economic Development Confer-
ence. He was announcing the findings of his five
week tour of North Vietnam and China. (LNS)
A WARSHIP CAN BE STOPPED
San Diego, California (October) - On Oct. 2 between
40-50 Federal marshalls broke into Christ the King
Church and dragged out nine Navy dudes who were
Stationed aboard the USS Constellation. the men,
now known as the Constellation 9, had missed ships
movement and sought sanctuary. They couldn't
go along with the ConnieTs mission any longer.
Carl Scott Flanagan, one of the nine, said to the
press before they were picked up, oI can no longer
support the killing and destruction of war....as a
patriotic American and as a human being, | must
refuse to take part in my shipTs mission.�
The nine were flown to the carrier where they
refused a request for court-martial, denied civilian
counsel, and forced to accept the punishment
meted out by the Captain. Their requests to be let
off the ship and out of the Navy as COs were ig-
nored, and they were given 30 days correctional
custody abvard ship, forfeiture of one-half of two
monthTs pay, and reduction of one rank.
oThe USS Constellation under orders, not from
the American people, but a few powerful politicans
and military people, has taken the right over life
and death. | refuse to take part in this murder,�
said Charlie Andrews, another of the nine.
Having no way to resist or protest without being
suppressed by the Navy, the men went on a week
long hunger strike. It was especially hard for them,
since they were kept super isolated from the rest
of the crew.
oTo me, being a man is being able to stand up
and fight for what you believe in. | must stand up
for what | believe in.� Daniel Hoag of the Connie 9.
The Harbor Project in San Diego was originally
Started to okeep the Connie home for peace.� They
organized a successful referendum in San Diego
county, NixonTs own backyard, very military and
very right-wing. But of the 54,721 who voted,
82.4% wanted the Constellation to stay home.
o! did this (sanctuary) because of my strong con-
victions against the war and my refusal to partici-
pate in the Vietnam war.� Jon C. Obe of the C-9.
o| have been forced into sanctuary by the coun-
try in which we live. A country which is waging a
cruel and unjust war against the Asian race....|
love my country, but they make it hard.� Jim Mikell
of the Constellation Nine.
Stake.
f
he
NATION-WIDE VETERANS DAY ACTIONS
USA (Oct 25) - Vets all across the country marked
veteransT day by marching in fatigues against the
war. This was the action in just a dozen of those
cities. San Francisco: 150 vets marched. 6 sent to
hospital after fighting with police. Denver: 84 vets
arrested when they tried to march in a city vets
march. New York: When 300 vets applied to march
in the offical march, they found the march cancelled
the next day. Killeen, Texas: 118 vets and active
duty Gls busted during official city march. Two are
still in jail on hunger strike. New Orleans: Permit to
march denied, and 34 busted when they attempted
to march anyway on the sidewalk. If we had the
space, we'd list actions as they took place in 42
states. (LNS)
STRONG SUPPORT FORCES ARMY TO DROP
ALL CHARGES AGAINST HARVEY AND PRIEST
Killeen, Texas (October) - All charges against John
Priest and Kelvin Harvey stemming from a stockade
riot at Ft. Hood in December 1970, have been
dropped. If the two men had been convicted, they
could have been hit with 65 years. The stockade
oriot� occurred as a result of racism towards black
prisoners and the lack of medical attention in the
stockade. Harvey, who is black, and Priest, who is
white, had been transferred to Leavenworth to serve
out their sentences on other charges and were not
brought back to Hood to face riot charges until July
1971. The Army says that the charges were dropped
as othe result of a breakdown in Army administra-
tive procedures.� But thatTs the ArmyTs way of
getting out of a ticklish situation. The Ft. Hood
United Front had been publicizing and protesting
the case of Harvey and Priest ever since they were
brought back to Hood and charged. They had a big
rally to demand their release and the FTA Show
(with Jane Fonda and Don Sutherland) held a press
conference to explain the situation. The day after
the press conference all charges were dropped.
(source: the Fatigue Press from Killeen)
A DEATH AND A VICTORY FOR BLACK
PEOPLE IN ALABAMA
Alabama (Sept 16) - Down in Butler, black high
school students have been demonstrating against
racism in the schools. On Sept 11, 19-year-old
Margaret Knott was run over at a demonstration
and killed by a white driver. When the murderer
was released on bail, the people took to the streets.
Four hundred were arrested during the next week,
including Rev. Ralph Abernathy. As a result of the
fighting, the white establishment gave in and ag-
reed to hire a black deputy sheriff, black assistant
school superintendant, and black policemen, and
that the students would go back to classes without
reprisals and that a once-fired black teacher would
be rehired. (Guardian)
MURDER IN MEMPHIS
Memphis, Tenn. (mid-October) - On the night of
Oct. 16, a pick-up truck spun into a ditch. A squad
car saw the accident, and put out a radio call. No
one knows what was said over that radio, but in
minutes 28 Memphis police were there. If the men
in that pick-up were white, those 28 cops would've
helped the men pull their truck out of the ditch.
But the men inside were young and black. The 28
white pigs jumped on Elton Hayes (17-years-old),
Calvin McKissack (14-years-old) and George Barnes
(15-years-old), and beat them all senseless. Today
Elton Hayes is dead.
All but five of the pigs were immediately given
leave with pay (a paid vacation). None of the other
five were even reprimanded. The shock of Elton
Hayes murder had hardly even rocked the black
community when a squad car roared screaming
through ghetto streets. It never stopped for three-
year-old Robert Reed. Now he, too, is dead. Mayor
Loeb set a curfew to try to contain the black rage
that had now moved into the streets. The curfew
was ignored. But rather than strike out as five fin-
gers, the black people of Memphis have hit like
one fist, demanding for now the arrest of all 30
murders. Unless the city of Memphis brings these
30 to justice, the people will. (from Memphis local
papers and the Black Panther News Service. Note:
this incident happens all over this country every
day. Too few of us ever hear of it, and too many are
already too numb to the anger of so many.)
WESTMORELAND RUNS FROM PISSED OFF Gis
Fort Ord, California (Oct 29) - On the last Friday
in October, Gen. Westmoreland was supposed to
pay a formal visit to Fort Ord. Instead, he wound up
spending only an hour there, and even during that
time, his whereabouts were kept a closely guarded
secret. When he left, he just about had to slide out
the back door.
HereTs why. It seems that almost 200 guys were
planning a sitdown strike. Rumor had it that they
would block the GeneralTs car. Word leaked, though
and 160 men were given transfers the same day.
Another rumor had it that black Gis were going to
kidnap two white officers while Westmoreland was
on base, and hold them at gunpoint until their
brother, Billy Smith, was released from the stock-
ade (BillyTs the first GI to be tried for fragging in
the United States). What wasnTt rumor were the
three fires that occurred in the two weeks preceding
WestmorelandTs visit. The base theater was com-
pletely gutted. A dayroom in the Personnel Control
Facility was only slightly damaged. And a guest
house for visiting VIPs was burned.
But the Billy Smith trial has meant even more
trouble for base command than WestmorelandTs
visit. For the past several weeks, groups of 150-200
Gis have been marching across the base, chanting
oFree Billy!� and meaning it. Black Gis have been
meeting regularly in the 4th Brigade area. But base
command has no idea of what's going on, who
attends the meetings, whatTs discussed, or where
they take place.
GUESS WHOTS COMING FOR DINNER?
Detroit (Sept 23) - When Nixon came to:an Eco-
nomic Club dinner in downtown Detroit, he had to
wade through 10,000 auto workers, unemployed
people, black people, welfare mothers, anti-war
freaks, secretaries, high school students, and more.
They had turned out just to boo him. Even the
waitresses who served the club dinner put the heat
on the President, wearing buttons that said, oFreeze
the Freeze.� If the Dump Nixon movement keeps
up at this rate, heTs going to have to campaign from
bank vaults (Guardian)
SOURCES
SF Chron San Francisco Chronicle
SF Exam San Francisco Examiner
LNS Liberation News Service
Redline Newsletter of Reservists and Guardsmen Against the War
CAMP Newsletter for the Chicago Area Military Project
PNS Pacific News Service
wP Washington Post
o
The thing is that when the Navy sees that people have started awakening to what is
really happening in the world, the power structure and the way it works, and how the
military is used as a club, it kind of scares them. Something like that could really destroy
them.
We want to get our people together with the people from the (attack carriers) USS
Ranger, Hancock, and Constellation, people from Travis Air Force Base, and Fort Ord.
Everybody together to fight the thing collectively. With everybody together, there isnTt
much they can do to stop it.�