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~No army in the world can defeat an idea whose time-has comeTWhy We Lost the War.oThe United States has been de-feated in Vietnam. Like the Chinese,Mongols, Japanese and French be-fore us, we are withdrawing fromVietnam.Though the U.S. has poured over$100 billion into Vietnam in the-last five years and dropped twicethe bomb tonnage we did in WWII,the war is stalemated. This stale-mate, in time, will lead to a Com-in Vietnammunist victory.The clues to this failure of Am-erican military might lie in Viet-namese history-- in the heroic tradi-tion of struggle against foreigners,in U.S. support for French colon-ialism, in the Communist-led vic-tory over the French, and mostrecently in U.S. aid to the corruptSaigon regime.in effect, the U.S. has beenLeefighting on the wrong side in atotally unjust war.The Communist revolutionariesare winning because for the past25 years they have championedthe Vietnamese peopleTs drive forindependence and human rights.We Americans are losing becauseour leaders- from Truman to Nixon-arrogantly believed that Americantechnology and money were more~THIS BRUTAL, DISGRACEFUL| AND UTTERLY INDEFENSIBLE WARb.. AGAINST A GALLANT PEASANT PEOPLE_ WILL BE REMEMBERED FOR A THOUSAND YEARS, AS ONE OF THE BASEST) MOST COWARDLY DEEDSaOF ALL TIME�--- Gen. Hugh Hester f- FsoIT HAS BEEN MY IMPRESSION, AFTER VISITS TO VIETNAVictor Hugoiepowerful thanT the patriotic faithof Asian peasants.The Vietnamese have proved ourleaders wrong, and 50,000 Ameri-cans and hundreds of thousands ofVietnamese have died because ofthat arrogance.The day must come when theAmerican people will call these lea-ders to account for having so gross-ly misled us.ELIEVEWE SHOULD KEEPOUR DIRTY, BLOODY,DOLLAR-CROOKED FINGERSOUT OF THE BUSINESS OF THESENATIONS SO FULL OF DEPRESSED,oEXPLOITED PEOPLE�4 -- Gen. David Shoup (Ret.) :vr =. Commandant, U.S. Marine Corps,Congressional Medal ofTHAT A MAJORITY OF THE PEOPLE IN VIETNAMSUPPORT THE GUERRILLAS IN THE COUNTRYSIDEBUT DO NOT SUPPORT THE THIEU GOVERNMENT�--- Senator Stuart Syrnington (Mo.) ,Guerrilla war defeats Mongol invadersoWe have fought a thousandyears� is the proud boast of Viet-namese patriots. oAnd we will fight~.another thousand if needed.�_For the two thousand yearsVietnam has existed, the Vietna-mese have fought the Chinese, theMongols, the Thais, the Japanese,ard the French.Today millions of Vietnameseare fighting against a huge Ameri-ican expeditionary force sent in1965 and 1966 to suppress a pop-ular peasant revolution.._ Vietnam was a Chinese provincefrom 111 B.C. to 939 A.D. whenthe Vietnamese successfully revol-ted. With the exception of a twentyyear period in the 15th century, theVietnamese were free from foreignrule until the French arrived.Of all the stories of Vietnameseresistance to foreign intruders, fewshow the stubborn character of theVietnamese people as well as theirheroic fight against the Mongolhordes of Kublai Khan in 1284...There were perhaps 300,000Mongol troops arrayed against aVietnamese population of about1,000,000.In this hour of need a great mil-itary thinker, General Dao, posed aa strategy of what we now call guer-rilla warfare.As Bernard Fall (a highly respec-ted French scholar and reporter of |Vietnamese affairs) has noted: o~Hisprinciples could just as well havebeen written by Mao Tsetung orDaoTs present day successor in HanoiCencral Vo Nguyen Giap, the victorof Dien Bien Phu. oThe enemy mustfight his battle far from his homebase for a long time... We must fur-ther weaken him by drawing himinto protracted campaigns. Once hisinitial dash is broken, it will be easyto destroy him� �Thus did the tiny Vietnamese na-tion frce the mighty Mongol Em-pire (which had pushed all the wayto the borders of Europe) to with-draw from Vietnam.In 1615, the first Italian and Por-tuguese Jesuits arrived in Vietnam,Opening up the country to Westerninfluence.The Vietnamese,understandably ,resented the white priests with theirmissionary zeal. In 1833 the emper-or issued a royal edict outlawingChristianity.Twenty-five years later a jointFrench-Spanish fleet destroyed theVietnamese navy near Danang inresponse to the deaths and persecu-tions of Catholic priests. This oper-ation soon developed into a policyof. conquering Vietnam for the

~I think the American peoplegreatly underestimatethe determination of the Vietnamesepeople.TFrench empire.By 1867, France had completedits conquest of the lower third ofVietnam, and by 1884, it had ex-tended its control over the centraland northern parts.Captain Charles Gosselin, an officer who fought against Vietnam-ese resistance movements after 1 883offered this explanation of FrenchFrench Motivesthat France came to intervene inwell-informed on history supposethat France came to intervene inAnnam (French name for Vietnam)solely for the protection of missionaries or to seek vengeance foracts of hostility committed againstthe Catholic religion. The mission-aries, in reality, have only been thepretext for our action against An-nam. The loss o fIndia in the 18thcentury, the increasingly rapid ex-tension in the Far East of our rivalEngland, imposed on us the obliga-tion to set foot in the China seas,the only alternative being our fall-.ing into a state of contemptible in-feriority. Annam gave us the oppor-tunity, the massacre of Frenchmenwho were there as missionaries gaveus the pretext.�Resistance to the French startedimmediately as the young emperor, |Ham Nghi, fled to the mountains tofight. In 1888 he was betrayed, but .the Vietnamese put up strong resis-tance until the end of the century.The French takeover of Vietnamwas a brutal process. One of theTmen France sent to be Governor-General of Indochina tried to reducethe peopleTs hatred of the Frenchby ending what he termed otheacts of incredible brutality� againstthe Vietnamese.In 1894 he wrote: oIt seemed tome that the burning of villages, themass shootings, the bayonet slaugh-ters, and the executions of notablesshould be replaced by other lessviolent procedures.�The anti-French resistance, bythis time, had gone undergroundand spread its roots. There wereabortive revolts (1888, 1908,1916,and 1930)with thousands of Viet-namese murdered and other thou-sands exiled. Secret societies mush-roomed.Ho Chi Minh is bornIn 1890, a son was born to amember of one such society. The- father, an ardent patriot, namedthe boy Nguyen (the family name)That Thanh (Who Will Be Victori-:ous). He would grow up to leadhis peopleTs fight for independence.and take the name Ho Chi Minh,Ho Chi MinhAt the age of 20, after leavinga prestigious French-Vietnamesehigh school in Hué, Ho became ateacher, then a bakerTs apprenticein Saigon. In 1912, he landed a mess-.boyTs job on a French liner.HoTs seafaring life took him toLondon, Marseilles, Boston, NewYork, even New Orleans. He wasdeeply impressed by the racism,the widespread poverty and deca-dence he saw in the West. KKKlynchings, the wretched plight oflabor (low wages, police attacks on.fledgling unions), the excesses ofalcoholism and prostitution" theseand other weaknesses in Westernsocieties convinced Ho that thewhite men who ruled his countrywere hardly a master race.When the Russian Revolutionbroke out, Ho was living in Parisand traveling among the Vietnamesetroops and factory workers (some100,000) brought from the colonyto aid the Allied cause.At this point, Ho still believedthat an appeal to the Western ideals~of equality .and self-determinationwould bring freedom for his coun-try.Ho at VersaillesThe turning point in HoTs lifecame in 1919 when, armed with amodest 8-point program and wear-ing a pinstriped suit, he went to theVersailles Peace Conference to askthe Allies to support the Vietnamesecause in the post-war settlement.Ho never got past the secretaries.Bernard Fall describes the result:oVersailles held out the hope of notmerely being another big-power pa-laver where the map of the world:would be carved up by a few super-cehiTs and NehruTs, the Haile-Selas-ies and Ho Chi MinhTs werenTtabout to forget.�With Versailles, says Fall, odied;HoTs hopes of a ~liberalT solution forhis country, and he was also able toobserve now what the other unsuc-,cessful petitioners were mutteringamong themselves, the Irish in the.jead: armed revolution was the ans-wer, the road to power via the ter-rorist bomb and the guerrillaTs gunbarrel.�At that very moment, one coun-try not present at Versailles wasproving this very point"Soviet Rus-sia. Her example was wildly debatedby every Socialist party in theworld. "Ho joined the French SocialistParty and soon found himself in themidst of a heated debate aboutwhether the Socialist Party ought tojoin LeninTs Third International:Ho has explained what happenedthen: oWhat I wanted most toknow-"and this precisely was not de-bated in the meetings-was: WhichInternational sides with the peoplesof the colonial countries?oT raised this question"the mostimportant in my opinion"in a meet-ing. Some comrades answered: It isthe Third, not the Second Interna-tional. And a comrade gave me Len-inTs oThesis on the national and co-lonial questionsT to read.oThere were political terms dif-French words to express all mythoughts, I smashed the allegationsagainst Lenin and the Third Inter-national with no less vigor. My onlyargument was: oIf you do not con-demn colonialism, if you do notside with the colonial people, whatkind of revolution are you waging?�In 1930 a unified Communistparty for Indochina was organizedunder the leadership of Ho ChiMinh. Soon it was the main forcein the nationalist movement for in-dependence. ~Joseph Buttinger in- his. defini-tive work on Vietnamese history,Vietnam: A Dragon Embattled, ob-served that other nationalist groupsdid not think social reforms couldbe made a vital issue in the strugglefor independence, whereas o...theCommunists spoke of the need forlowering taxes, of the distributionof estate land among the landless,of higher wages and better medicalcare for plantation workers and ofthe right to organize unions.oThey knew that peasants andworkers could be brought into thefight only by showing them thatthe people who wanted indepen-dence wanted it also for reasonsimportant to them, that indepen-dence also meant lower taxes andhigher wages.oThe Communists were the onlygroup in the anticolonial camp whospoke for the grievances of 90 per~The Communists were the only group |who spoke for the grievances of 90 per cent of thepeople under colonial ruleTpowers but"as AmericaTs PresidentWilson hoped"was to be the cradleof a just peace for all and bring theright of self-determination to na"'tions yet unborn... The aspiring lea-ders of such nations, from the Bal-kans to the Caucasus, Eastern Eur-ope and South Asia, hovered in thewings in the hope of finding a pow-erful champion for their causes...oBut this was still a white manTsworld: Nobody backed indepen-ence for any African or East Asiancountry"a lesson which the Gand-ficult to understand in this thesis.But by dint of reading it again and'again, finally I could grasp the mainpart of it.oWhat emotion, enthusiasm,clearsightedness, and confidence itinstilled in me! I was overjoyed totears. Though sitting alone in myroom, I shouted aloud as if address-ing large crowds: oDear martyrs,compatriots! This is what we need,this is the path to our liberation!�oAfter that, I had entire confi-dence in Lenin, in the Third Inter-national... Though I was still lackingJoseph Buttingercent of the people under the coloni-al regime.oIn contrast to the Communiststhe nationalists never gained, never ~even consistently sought any sup-port among workers and peasants.It was their belief that only the ~ad-vanced elementsT of every classcould participate in the anticolonialstruggle.oThe Communists soon provedthem wrong.�By the beginning of World War IIthe Communists were the only na-tionalist group with any nationwide

~The case of Indochina is perfectly clearFrance has milked it for one hundred years.Indochina are entitled to something better than that.The people ofFDRU.S. backs French colonial warorganization.The Japanese moved into Indo-china (Vietnam, Laos and Cambo-dia) in 1940. In contrast to theirpolicy elsewhere, they collaborated-with the white European power in-stead of working with the nativepopulation.Ho helpsU.S. pilotsHo Chi Minh was freely recog-nized by both the United States andNationalist China as the leader ofthe Free Indochina movement dur-ing World War II. The Allies sup-plied HoTs forces with weapons andammunition. His forces, in return,supplied intelligence and helped A-merican pilots shot down over Viet-nam.In March 1945, the Japaneseended their collaboration with theFrench colonial government and setup a puppet regime under Bao Dai-the emperor of Vietnam who hadpreviously collaborated with theFrench. On August 24, Bao Dai ab-dicated.A week later on September 2,1945, Ho Chi Minh spoke from a bal-cony in Hanoi and declared the in-dependence of Vietnam.He started by quoting this pas-sage: o~All men are created equal.They are endowed by their Creatorwith certain unalienable rights, a-mong these are Life, Liberty, andthe Pursuit of Happiness.�Then he continued: oThis im-mortal statement was made in theDeclaration of Independence of theUnited States of America in 1776.Now if we enlarge the sphere of ourthoughts, this statement conveys a-nother meaning: All the peoples onthe earth are equal from birth, allthe people have a right to live, behappy and free.�After listing grievances againstthe French, Ho again appealed tohis former allies to support Vietna-mese Independence: oWe are con-vinced that the Allied nations whichhave acknowledged at Teheran andSan Francisco the principle of self-determination and equality of sta-tus will not refuse to acknowledgethe independence of Vietnam.�ooA people that has courageouslyopposed French domination formore than 80 years, a. people.thathas fought by the AlliesTTside théselast years against the Fascists, sucha people must be free, such a peoplemust be independent.�: oBritish restoreFrench rule?For the Allied nations Septem-ber 1945 was a time of rejoicing be-cause the last of the Fascist powers,Japan, had surrendered.The Vietnamese were rejoicingtoo, for it looked as if the war wasover and Vietnam once again wasfree.But the Vietnamese were to bebetrayed, by the U.S. among others,in their hopes that the Allies wouldsupport the Vietnamese desire forindependence.The British moved into Vietnamand began using defeated Japanesetroops to: restore French authority66in Vietnam.Commenting on this, General"Douglas MacArthur said: oIf there~is anything that makes my bloodboil, it is to see our Allies in Indo-china and Java deploying troops toreconquer the little people we pro-smised to liberate. It is the most ig-noble kind of betrayal.�The British action was a blatantviolation of the Potsdam Accords..But no country, not even the U.S:moved to block the British.For those .of a cynical turn ofmind it is well to note that neitherthe Soviets nor the French Commu-~ nists supported Ho Chi Minh.Stalin was far more interested in.befriending France so as to preventthe formation of a Western Europe-an military alliance.The French Communist Party~had hopes of remaining in the-post.war coalition government in Franceand the Communist cabinet ~mem-bers voted with the government insupport of the war in Indochina. Itwas only after the political ambi-tions of the French Communistshad been clipped that they began to:Dien Bien Phu falls~call for a new policy in Indochina.In August 1950 the United Statesbegan to help the French as they~fought to reestablish their control inIndochina.The first year U.S. aid amountedto only $850 million, but by 1954the United States (or rather the A-merican taxpayer) was underwriting80 per cent of the cost of FranceTseffort-in effect America was a part-ner in this attempt to revive Westernimperialism in Asia.By so underwriting the Frenchwar, the United States was betrayingnot only the Vietnamese people but~also its own revolutionary past asthe first colony to break away fromEuropean control.In May 1954, the American-backed French effort in Indochinacollapsed near the Laotian border atthe battle of Dien Bien Phu.It was a humiliating defeat forWestern imperialism in Asia.General Navarre, the French,Commander, wanted to bait a trapTto entice Vo Nguyen Giap (nowMinister of Defense in North Viet-nam) into throwing his main unitsaaa OM eaAsians beat the white manat his own game.NeHo ChioverMinhT 8GeneraltroopsdeFrench General de Castries ii dile~ When the Viets come down fromothe hills, we'll slaughter them.TT~raiseCastriestheir flagbunker.into ~a set-piece battle.In November 1953 Navarre be-gan to send troops into Dien BienPhu.Giap accepted the gambit.The fatal mistake of the FrenchIKE admits U.S.has imperialist motivesoLet us assume we lose Indo-china....The tin and tungsten thatwe so greatly value from that areawould cease coming. So when theU.S. votes $400 million to helpthat war, we are not voting a give-away program. We are voting forthe cheapest way to prevent theoccurrence of something that wouldbe of the most terrible significanceto our power and ability to getcertain things we need from theriches of Indochina.�--- Eisenhower, 1953~Yomnenricnsy: soocennmeranets eo: wet SERSwas in assuming that the Viet Minhwould not be able to supply a mas-sive assault.After a secret buildup, the VietMinh launched an attack on the ar-tillery protecting the small airstripused to supply Dien Bien Phu.On March 27, the airstrip wasdestroyed, and on May 7, Dien BienPhu fell.As Bernard Fall remarked: ooTheAsians, after centuries of subjuga-tion, had beaten the white man athis own game.�T~«/"

17th parallel meant to bea temporary dividing linea LLREAD IT FOR YOURSELFFINAL DECLARATION OF GENEVA TRUCEA few weeks before the collapseat Dien Bien Phu, an effort wasmade to involve the U.S more di-.rectly with air and naval supportand possibly troops and atomicweapons. 3John Foster Dulles, who wasthen Secretary of State, sought Bri-tish help, but the British-on Win-ston ChurchillTs advice-refused tointervene.Richard Nixon, who was VicePresident, was one of the most out-ARTICLE 6:The Conference recognizes that the essential purpose of the agreementrelating to Vietnamis to settle military questions with a view to endinghostilities and that THE MILITARY DEMARCATION LINE IS PRO-VISIONAL AND SHOULD NOT IN ANY WAY BE INTERPRETEDAS CONSTITUTING A POLITICAL OR TERRITORIAL BOUNDARY._ otl never talked or correspon-ded with a person knowledgablespoken hawks in the administration.Nixon said: ooThe United States,as a leader of the free world, cannotafford further retreat in Asia. It ishoped that the United States willnot have to send troops there, butif this government cannot avoid it.the Administration must face up tothe situation and dispatch forces.�TAs in so many other cases thephrase ofree world� distorted realityand was being used by: Nixon todeceive Americans into thinkingthat they were about to embark ona noble crusade, when in truth hewas proposing an imperialist policyof helping to resubjugate an Asian,people to white foreign rule. © ~The cynicism of this policy canonly be fully comprehended whenit is fully understood what 80 yearsof French rule had meant for Viet-nam. Two sets of facts are particu-larly revealing.1) Before the French arrived 80ver cent of the Vietnamese were lit-erate. Only 20 per cent could readand write by the time they left.2) During the years from 1869 to - #1937 exports of rice rose from al-most nothing to about 1.5 milliontons per year.At the same time per capita con"sumption of rice dropped 30 per :cent.In times of poor harvests this .meant that peasant families were ,starving--literally starving.French businessmen were rob-bing Vietnam of the basic neces-sities of life. Such was the moralityof capitalism in Indochina.Gen. Ridgwayopposes NixonThe Nixon view did not pre-dominate - primarily for strategic,reasons. General Matthew B. Ridg-way, who along with General JamesGavin opposed U.S. intervention in1954, wrote this in his memoirs:oWhen the day comes for me toface my Maker and account for myactions, the thing I would be mosthumbly proud of was the fact thatI fought against and perhaps con-tributed to preventing the carryingOut of some harebrained tacticalschemes which would have cost tliclives of thousands of men. To thatlist of tragic accidents that fortun-ately never happened, I would addthe Indochina intervention.�f In July, 1954, the Geneva Con-�,�rence which had intended to focusessentially on the Korean trucebegan to consider a settlement insndochina.© Chi MinhTs forces had wonabout % of the land in Vietnamexcept for Hanoi and Haiphong,. and about half of southern Vietnamincluding the Mekong and most ofARTICLE 7:The Conference declares that, so far as Vietnam is concerned, thesettlement of political problems, effected on the basis of RESPECTFOR THE PRINCIPLES OF INDEPENDENCE, UNITY AND TER-"RITORIAL INTEGRITY, shall permit the Vietnamese people to enjoythe fundamental freedoms, guaranteed by democratic institutionsestablished AS A RESULT OF FREE GENERAL ELECTIONS BYSECRET BALLOT. In order to ensure that sufficient progress inthe restoration of peace has been made, and that all the necessaryconditions obtain for free expression of the national will, GENERALELECTIONS SHALL BE HELD IN JULY, 1956 UNDER THE SUPER-VISION OF AN INTERNATIONAL COMMISSION.FINAL SESSION AT GENEVA: 1954the area between the 13th and 17thparallel.Because of pressure from Com-munist China and Russia the Viet=Minh agreed to accept the 17thparallel as a truce line.The settlement which was finallyworked out provided for 1) thecessation of hostilities, 2),regroup-ing of Viet Minh partisans north ofthe 17th parallel and French Unionforces (including Vietnamese whofought for the French) south of the17th parallel, 3) elections in 1956to unify Vietnam.These agreements have oftenbeen misrepresented by theKennedy, Johnson and Nixon ad-ministrations to justify. the war. Itis important to know that the agree-ments explicitly stated that the17th parallel was a oprovisional�line of military demarcation andoshould not in any way be inter-preted as constituting a political orterritorial boundary.�(In 1964 Lyndon Johnson wasto say that these oagreements guar-anteed the independence of SouthVietnam.� They did no such thingand anyone can confirm this forhimse'f by reading the Final Declaratio1. « Geneva in any of severalbooks on Vietnam.)The United States governmentdid not particularly like the GenevaAgreements.But in a separate statement. theU.S. representative declared that hisgovernment would not use force orthe threat of force to disrupt theAgreements.The main effect of the GenevaAgreements was to move the strug-gle from the battlefield to the po-litical arena, i.e., in the form ofelections.The Viet Minh were confidentthey could win on either level, andwith good reason. "President Eisenhower, in hisautobiography, attested to Ho ChiMinhTs popularity, observing: oI ne-ver talked or corresponded with aperson knowledgable in Indochineseaffairs who did not agree that, hadin Indochinese affairs who did notagree that, had the elections beenheld as of the time of the fighting,possibly 80 per cent of the populacewould have voted for the Com-munist Ho Chi Minh rather thanthe Chief of State Bao Dai.�--- President Eisenhowerin Mandate for Changethe elections been held as of thetime of the fighting, possibly 80 percent of the populace would have vo-ted for the Communist Ho Chi Minhrather than the Chief of State BaoDai.�The Saigon regime obviously be-lieved Ho Chi Minh would win in1956, and it refused to even con-sult with Hanoi about elections.Townsend Hoopes who was Un-der Secretary of the Air Force from1967-69 explained what happened:oIn July 1955, the new govern-ment took, with U.S. encourage-ment, the next logical step; it rejec-ted the North Vietnamese invita-tions to discuss elections...oIt is significant that these pol-icies and actions were strongly sup-ported by the American people;there was no dissent from withingovernment, very little from Con-gress or the press, and nothing signi-ficant from scholars or other closeobservers of foreign affairs.�oAs a nation we had very littleperception that we might be frus-trating a widely supported nationalindependence movement by lendingour aid and prestige to what wereat best colonial puppets, who lackedan innate capacity to win over anysizable segment of the Vietnamesepeople to their side, and who as itturned out, could not govern at allwithout the direct presence and sup-port of a very large U.S. éxpedi-tionary force.� TU.S. backsDiemMidway through the GenevaConference a new man appeared on |the scene to become Premier in theFrench puppet government of BaoDai (Bao Dai was the ex-emperorwho abdicated in 1945 but re-turned in 1948 to head a puppetgovernment under the French). Thisman was Ngo Dinh Diem, and hewas to play an important role inVietnam for the next nine years.On January 1, 1955, the Frenchhanded the reins of government toDiem and Bao Dai. Near the end of~1955 Diem maneuvered Bao Daiout of power.

eg Om eme a callie ea axthe conflict.=e = oAmeriea was stepping into France's boots..the South was turned into a colonial base for a policy of~pacificationT and ~democracyT while the North, the bastionof national resistance;-sought to negotiate rather than resumeWould Vietnam ever cease to be the plaything andthe prey of the great powers?�--- Philippe Devillers and Jean Lacouture inEnd of a War Indochina, 1954oeb. a e % te fi: o :Once mote~U.S. steps into FranceTs bootsDiem was a nationalist and aCatholic. He had spent nearly twoyears in the early fifties in theUnited States in seminaries in New "Jersey and New York. Though notknown how much influence the U.S.exerted to move Diem into powerin Vietnam, it is clear that a con-siderable amount of money andenergy was expended to help himconsolidate his power in the earlyyears of his rule.DiemTs authority over the armyDulles and Diemwas shaky. So the United Statesgovernment let the commandinggeneral know that if he attemptedto move against Diem, dollar helpwould be cut off. "Diem began to assert the author-|ity of his government over twolarge religious sects and one largebandit gang, using as much as 12million American dollars to bribesect leaders.The U.S. assumed FranceTs finan-cial and training responsibilities forthe Saigon Army and began tofurnish a large amount of economicaid which would total over one anda half billion dollars before Dicmwas assassinated in 1963 by officersin the army.In any revolution deep antagon-isms are created and almost in-evitably large minority groups leave.After the American Revolutionabout 100,000 American Toriesleft for Europe or Canada, which atthe time was one of the largestexoduses in history.It is not surprising, therefore,that some 900 ,000Vietnamese tookadvantage of the provisions in theGeneva Accords to move south ofthe 17th parallel and about 100,000went North.The exodus to the south hasbeen at the center of controversyever since the mid-fifties. Somepoints deserve to be clarified.Between 80 and 85 % wereVietnamese mercenaries who hadfought for the French or worked inthe French administration.Bernard Fall observed :ooThe massflight was admittedly the result ofan extremely intensive, well-con-ducted and in terms of its objectives,very successful American. psycho-logical warfare operation.�oPropaganda slogans and leafletsappealed to the devout Catholicswith such themes as oChrist hasgone to the South� and the oVirginMary has departed from the North.�These refugees became the back-bone of DiemTs support but even asthey helped secure support, theycreated tensions within South Viet-nam. Vietnamese Catholics com-prise about ten percent of the totalpopulation and relations betweenthis minority and the rest of thelargely Buddhist Vietnamese havenot always been smooth.Vietnamese Catholics were perse-cuted before the French took over.When the French were consolidat-ing=their control in the 1880Ts and1890Ts the Vietnamese Catholics,through their collaboration, helpedcrush the resistance which was ledby the emperor and high mandarins.Diem himself was a Catholic,and many Catholics moved into toppositions in his government creatingresentment among the Buddhistpopulation.Bad effectsof French rule remainThe fact that France had physi-cally left Vietnam did not meanthat the bad effects of French mis-rule had ended. DiemTs bureacracywas essentially the old colonialbureacracy minus the French (butplus the Catholic refugees).DiemTs army was essentially themercenary army that had fought~for the French. Even today, topofficers of the Saigon army are menlike Ky, a veteran of the Algeriana Swiss account).It was on this need to createa more democratic society that theCommunists were to build a revo-lutionary base so solid that it wouldfight a° huge American expedition-ary force to a standstill in the1960Ts.A new classof despoilersA Catholic intellectual, Ton ThatThien (editor of a Saigon newspapernow banned by the government) hasdescribed Vietnamese society thus:**...France started training a newelite to induce the Vietnamese toserve them. The French colonialadministration offered them spec-ial privileges, including a generous,or rather over-generous, grant ofland" part of which was seized fromthe peasants" and a status close tothat of French nationals.~Some of the holdings were solarge that they were referred to inpopular parlance as oland over whichthe stork can fly endlessly withoutmeeting obstacles.�oIt was from this source thatthe new class derived its immensewealth. This inevitably alienated itfrom the rural population, partlybecause the rural inhabitants lookedupon the new class as despoilers.oTo qualify for high governmentoThe fact is that Communism, in the dress of nationalism and in itsadvocacy of land to the peasants, represents a powerful force in South Viet-nam, and one which receives widespread support from the peasant popula-5tion.-- Robert Sciglianoin South Vietnam: Nation under Stresswar, who served the French.French rule had created a West-ernized elite in Vietnam which livedaloof from the mass of landless pea-* sants. Vietnamese society urgentlyneeded reforms to restore socialjustice, and many Americans hopedthat Diem would press for these re-forms. But this hope was naive be-cause Diem was himself a part ofthis privileged elite, as were theofficials of his government.Over the years, this -Catholicelite had given its allegiance, not toVietnam, but to the West by send-ing their sons and daughters to ex-pensive French schools and by stash-ing their profits in Swiss banks.(Pres. Thicu is reported to havemore than $500,000 deposited inpositions, new diplomas were re-quired and these could be gainedOnly through a long and expens-ive period of schooling obtainableonly in the cities. The peasants weretherefore excluded from the high aswell as the middle positions.�DiemTs failureTon That ThienTs view was thatthe Americans were perpetuatingthis system and making it inevitablethat the Viet Cong would keep con-trol of the nationalist movement.Diem failed to build a large poli-tical following because he failed torespond to the real social and eco-nomic problems that 80 years ofFrench misrule had created.

The Viet Cong tells the peasants:~You are oppressed by corrupt men.: Land reform was and is the criti-cal issue in a land where most ofthepeople are peasants.Before the French came everypeasant had his own plot of land.But the French consolidated theseholdings to turn rice growing into aprofitable enterprise. As a resultmany Vietnamese families foundthemselves working as tenants orjust laborers on their own ancestrallands. "During the struggle against theFrench, the Viet Minh took the landof landlords who were sitting outthe war in Saigon or Paris. The VietMinh then redistributed this landand issued new deeds to the pea-sants.As the Diem regime asserted itscontrol over the countryside, the ab-sentee landlords returned, in somecases claiming 50% back rent forthe eight years they had been gone.The Viet Minh thus had littletrouble persuading the peasants thatthe Saigon regime was corrupt andhad to be overthrown.Some Americans realized that theCommunists were winning the pea-sants support largely because of theland issue. They pressured Diem tostart land reform and dutifully landreform measures appeared On paper.The Vietnamese are a toughwhose life"style is more communalcloser toBut in the end DiemTs regimefailed to distribute more than about10% of the available land.Two Americans who were veryclose to the agrarian problems ofVietnam have suggested that a basicthecommunism than toIn a nation of Buddhist. peasants,Diem family wereand devout,hard ~ working opeople :conflict of interest was the cause ofDiemTs failure in land reform.John Montgomery, a U.S. foreignaid expert, wrote: oThe Vietnamesegovernment, not wishing to disturbthe strong landowning classes, re-rich aristocratsCatholics.than individual"capitalism.sisted the proposed transfers of landand sharper rent controls.�J. Price Gittinger, an agriculturaladviser, was more specific: o~Gov-ernment officials, beginning withthe Minister for Agrarian Reform,have divided loyalties, being them-selves landholders.TGittinger added that the Ministerof Agrarian Reform was reported asnot having osigned leases with histenants as provided for in the landreform decrees, and he is most cer-tainly not interested in land distri-bution which would divest him ofmuch of his property.�But the peasantsT resentment ofthe Saigon regime goes deeper thanthe land issue.Five years ago a French reportertried to explain why the Viet Conghave popular support: oThe VietCong tells the peasants, ooYou areoppressed by corrupt men repre-senting a government which has soldout to a foreign country.� ¢oOn hearing this the peasantslook around. The chief of the prov-ince appointed by the Saigon re-gime lives in a big house, drives aMercedes, and loads his wife withjewelry. The Governor is a man ofimportance who is approached withdeference, protected by police, sol-diers and assistants.oHis Viet Cong opposite numbercan be seen every day. He is outamong the people. He is dressed likea peasant, in black calico and withsandals cut from an old tire. Hemakes his rounds in his district onfoot, walking along the public roads.You can be sure of one thing: he isnot getting rich on the backs of thepeople.�The Saigon elite has refused toidentify itself with the aspirationsof the peasants. For the young pea-sant, therefore, the Viet Cong offersthe only outlet for his anger: andhis patriotism. That is why VietCong officers, unlike those in theARVN who are drawn from theelite, come from peasant stock.Unwilling to believe that theCommunists have won their supportbecause they champion a popularcause, Americans have accepted theirleadersT lie that ~terrorismT is the real~basis for Viet Cong success. Themost frequently cited fact is thekilling of government officials.But these officials were appoint-ed by Saigon, were corrupt andinvariably outsiders to boot. AFrench reporter, Max Clos, noted:oWhen the Viet Cong began theirrevolution in 1959 and 1960 it wasopened with a wave of terrorism.oIn isolated places, in hamlets.then in villages and cities, officialsand private persons loyal to Saigonwere assassinated. Government pro-paganda strove mightily to exploitthese facts fo arouse popular indig-nation.

oThis backfired. It was under-stood too late that in most casesthe peasants had fearlessly helpedin the brutal liquidation of the menon whose death the Saigon regimewas basing its case. Instead of mur-derers, the terrorists were considereddispensers of justice.�Like the Thais and the Laotians,the Vietnamese traditionally had el-ected their own village officials.Neither the Mandarins nor the Frenchhad interfered with this practice.But in 1956 Diem abolished thisvillage-level democracy and sent inappointees.Americans have been brainwashedto believe that the South Vietnamesegovernment is democratic. Yet Diemwas ending an ancient democraticsystem in the villages. And becauseDiem was so dependent on U.S. aidto survive, the U.S. must also beheld responsible for destroying realdemocracy in Vietnam!Bernard Fall considered this tobe DiemTs worst mistake. He wrotethat DiemTs appointees, o...most of~them outsiders, were met with openhostility by the villagers. DiemTsmen would have to go outside thevillage to the police post to sleepsafely.oMany of them were known tobe gouging the villages. The hardfact is that when the Viet Cong ass-assinated these men, they were giv-en a Robin Hood halo by the pea-sants.��Nothing belied the official gov-ernment explanation that terrorismarthoWe must honestlyCong terrorism that drove the refugeeshomes to the cities and towns-- though 1impressment of the men and taxation have increased. |t wasnd Vietnamese bombing and shelling.American a-R Hilsman, Asst.Pas Eastern Affairs in Kface the fact that it was not Vietfrom their ancestralViet Cong terrorismof State fory AdministrationU.S. bombingA nightmare world of flying metal and flaming napalm.the violence program indicated a_ fective method of winning popularfairly widespread distaste for terroron the part of the NLF rank andfile.�He also noted: o~NLF cadres re-garded the proper use of terror asterror applied judiciously, select-ively and sparingly...in general, theNLF theoreticians considered terrorto be the weapon of the weak, theoTerror is an integral part of guerrilla warfare, and the Viet Cong fightwith what they have. However, as applied by the Viet Cong, it is a terror thepeople can understand-" although cruel, it is more ~selective than saturation bomb-ing. Can you imagine the terror of waking up in the middle of the night toa nightmare world of flying metal and rivers of flaming napalm?22�** Donald Duncan, ex- Green Beretin The New Legionswas the basis for Viet Cong successmore than Douglas PikeTs research.Pike, a USIA official, has writtenthe definitive study on the VietCong. Though sharply critical ofthe NLF policy of killing govern-ment officials, Pike concedes that~the internal: documents dealingwith criticism and self-criticism ofdesperate or the ineffectual guer-rilla leader. They held that mostoObjectives could be achieved with-Out its use.�Though the U.S. tried to makethe assassinations a major issue, thisselective (limited) tactic of killingunpopular leaders was being taughtin Special Forces training as an ef-support when trying to foment aguerrilla war in an enemy country.The simple truth is that the U.S.government has exaggerated the ter-rorism of the Viet Cong and distort-ed its effect on the general popu-lace in an attempt to divert attentionfrom the devastation caused by theAmerican military.Though the Vietnamese haveknown war for two thousand years,no other invader has come closer todestroying Vietnamese society thanthe United States military.American bombing alone has kill-ed literally hundreds of thousandsof Vietnamese civilians and crateredthe landscape. According to theDepartment of Defense, betweenJan. 1965 and June 1970, the U.S.has dropped 5,172,823 tons ofbombs on North and South Viet-nam. This more than doubles thetotal tonnage for World War II inEurope and the Pacific (2,057,244)-in an area about the size of lowaand Missouri combined!The English language press inSaigon pleaded against the owantonbombing and shelling of entire vil-RE Sei tae. oe . ere

1963 Buddhist monk protests1970 Tiger cagesDiemTs Repression Forces VC to FightA high ranking party memberwho left the Front in 1965 becauseof ill health (he died in 1968) anddisagreements with the Party leader-.ship. had this to say about the ori-gins of the armed uprising againstDiem.The end of 1959 was o~the dark-est period for the party in theSouth, when if you did not have agun you could not keep your headon your shoulders.oThere was no place wherePartymembers could find rest and securi-ty. Almost all were imprisoned orshot or were forced to surrender.Some village chapters which hadfour or five hundred members inlages...the merciless destruction ofunharvested rice fields under a col-umn of armored personnel carriers,or the scorched earth policy of nap-alm are examples of peasant grie-vances.�A quasi-policestateQuite early in his regime Diembegan to repress those who had sym-pathized or supported the Viet Minhagainst the French.A writer in Foreign Affairs, ascholarly journal dealing with US.foreign policy, wrote in late 1956:oSouth Vietnam is today a quasi-police state characterized by arbi-trary arrests and imprisonment,strict censorship of the press, andthe absence of an effective politicalopposition... All the techniques ofpolitical and psychological warfare,as wellas pacification campaigns in-volving extensive military operationshave been brought to bear againstthe underground.�This repression grew through1958, and in 1959 Public Law 10/59formalized DiemTs police state.All this posed a serious crisis forthe Communist leadership in theSouth.Most of them had not been hap-- py with the 1954 Accords, feeling ,they should not have given up ter-ritory which they already control-led.The old Viet Minh cadres fol--lowed the political line of the Par-ty, but DiemTs repression was ma-king this ne longer viable.1954 were now reduced to ten mem-bers, and even those could not re-main among the people but had toflee into the jungle to survive.oIn the face of such fierce activi-ty by the Diem government the de-mand for armed security by Partymembers increased daily, particular-ly in the West and particularly afterthe proclamation of Law 10/59.oParty members felt that it wasno longer possible to talk of politi-cal struggle while looking down thegun barrels of the government.�oBut despite the bitterness with-in the Party and the anger againstthe Central Committee, the Region-al Committee, etc., Party memberswere unable to break out from theorganization that was killing them.~o~There were never clear factionsor groups within the Party demand-ing armed activity which might havebroken off from the Party Organiza-tion in the South or from the Cen-tral Committee in Hanoi-that couldnever happen.oNevertheless there were indivi-'duals"say draft age youths"who be-came so angry they took weaponswhich the Party had hidden andcame out of the jungle to kill the~Ne find ourselves supporting a government of mandar-ins with little basis of popular support fighting for an armythat has little inclination to do its own fighting.�Robert Sherrod in Life, Jan. 27, 1967officials who were making troublefor them or their families.�oThey did this not because theParty had condemned these offici-als, but in order to preserve theirown lives or to defend their fami-lies. Sometimes these individualswere so angry at the Party that theypurposely allowed themselves to becaptured afterwards"just to spite theParty.This created a dilemma for theparty leaders in the South who wereexhorting cadres to continuc withthe political struggle at the sametime they were pleading with theNorthern leadership to renew themilitary siruggle.In May 1959 a new line was ¢s-tablished: opolitical struggle mixedto the right degree with armed strug-gle.�NLF quicklywins supportBy the end of 1961 the NLF hadextended its inflience over four-fifths of South Vietnam.Recognizing that itg control wascollapsing, the Saigon regime initi-ated a program of strategic hamlets.This plan to fortify villages andthus to deny them to the Vietcongwas acknowledged in September1963 to be in a orotten state� bythe chief American adviser to theprogram, Rufus Phillips.Systematic rapeof the countrysideLt. Col. William Corson (USMCret.), who was deeply involved inpacification efforts in Vietnam, call-ed strategic hamlets part of theosystematic rape of the country-side.� He wrote of the forced re-settlement, physical oppression, co-ercion and political persuasion bythe club.These measures naturally increas-ed resentment among the peasants.The theory of ostrategic hamletsappealed to the ~progressiveT policy-makers in Washington. But it hadto be abandoned as a major blunderwhen faced with the realities of

BLACK VIEWS ON THE WARAnother question crucial to under-standing the war is, to what extentare AmericaTs actions in Vietnamcompromised by racism?Some critics argue that the indis-criminate bombings, the ofree-firezones,� and the ruthless osearch anddestroy� operations of Americanforces reveal an assumption of ra-cial inferiority about the Vietnam-ese by Americans.The GITs bitter contempt for theoogooks� (ogook,� like onigger,�oowetback� or okike� is clearly aracist hate-word) and their frequentabuse of the villagersT buffaloes,their paddies, their ~ohootchesTT,(homes), their old men and younggirls" all this only widened the~credibility gap about AmericaTs truemotives for being in Vietnam.A 1967 poll taken by a Saigonnewspaper showed that a majorityof the Vietnamese polled believedthat Americans treated them withscornful superiority.As the war progressed, GITs re-turning from Vietnam confirmedthe charge of racism with countlessstories of individual atrocities againstpeasants, of rape and vandalism and_ outright murder.At the same time, GITs oftenquestioned the PentagonTs absurdrationale for why the VC and NVAtroops were so dedicated and brave"that they were all brainwashed anddoped out of their minds duringbattle.The experience of ohumping itfor a year through malaria-infestedjungles had taught GITs that men donot lug cannons over mountains fortwenty years, or march ten milesat night and keep fighting with fiveM-16 rounds in them, for such flim-sy reasons.Some dream, some anger had tobe sustaining the guerrillas in theirfight."Here lies a yellow man,killed by a black man,fighting for the white man,who killed all the red men,"#* Malcolm X, on seeinga photo of a VC soldierslain by a black GI,in The AutobiographMalcolm Xof:Martin Luther Kingon Vietnam WarWhat do the peasants tthink as we ally ourselves with the landlordsand as we refuse to put any action into our many words concerningland reform? What do they think as we test out our latest weapons onthem, just as the Germans tested out new medicinein the concentration camps of Eurindependent Vietnam we Clairvoiceless ones?They watch as we poison thetheir crops. They must weepY) to heir Water,as theareas preparing to destroy the precious trees.and new torturesare the roots of thebuilding? Is it among theseype? Whereas we kill a million acres ofbulldozers roar through theirThey wander into thehospitals, with at least 20 casualties from American firepower tor oneVietcong-inflicted injury. They wander into the towns and see thou-sands of the children,homeless, without clothes,running in packson the streets like animals. They see the children degraded by oursoldiers as they beg tor tood. Theysee the children selling their sis-ters to our soldiers, soliciting tor their mothers.We have destroyed their two most cherished institutions: the tamily i}and the village. We have destroyed their land and their crops. \Vehave cooperated in the crushing of the nationTs only non-communistrevolutionary political force"the Unitied BuddhistsChurch. We havesupported the enemies of the peasants of Saigon. We have corruptedtheir women and children and killed their men.What liberWho is really the aggressorTVietnamese society.Not only was the incompetence,corruption and brutality of the Sai-gon regime involved in the failureof strategic hamlets, but the armylacked the motivation to fight andthe peasants would rarely betraythe Viet Cong to the government -proof of where their true sympa-thies lay.Diem ousted_ _In May 1963, a crisis broke outin Vietnam which ultimately led tothe downfall of the Diem regime.The Buddhists had long resentedthe Catholic influence in the govern-ment. In a parade on BuddhaTsbirthday nine tneanle were killedby DiemTs police and this ignited theBuddhist fesott.An old monk burned himself todeath on June 11. The shock wavesled to a reevaluation of Americansupport for Diem and eventuallyPresident Kennedy let it be knownthat the U.S. would not oppose acoup to remove Diem.There were plenty of people whowere willing to overthrow Diem,.and on November 1, 1963, Diemand his brother were assassinated bygenerals in the South VietnameseArmy.The people of Saigon staged awild, jubilant celebration, but thenew generals in command had nei-ther the vision nor the ability to dealwith the problems of Vietnamese so-ciety.The new police chief, for ex-ample, was arresting people only tolet them go if they paid big bribesto him. Diem was gone, but a pal-ace revolt was not going to alter thebasic nature of the conflict in Viet-nam.The authority of the Saigon gov-ernments continued to slip and theJohnson administration decided tosend large numbers of troops to Viet-nam.Tonkin incidentThere is no quicker way to rallya country to war than to be able toclaim that the country has been at-tacked. (Remember the Alamo! Re-member the Maine!)Lacking a Pearl Harbor, the John-son administration settled on whatwas to be known as the Gulf of Ton-kin incident.In August 1964 the Americangovernment charged that North Vi-etnamese torpedo boats had at-tacked two heavily armed U.S. de-stroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin.President Johnson retaliated withthe first bombing attacks on NorthVietnam, and Congress hastily pas-sed the Gulf of Tonkin resolution,which Johnson later used as a blankcheck to expand U.S. involvementin the war.Many prominent officials cameto doubt that the Tonkin Incidentwas serious enough to warrant John-sonTs reaction.The first casuaty of waris +yuth. - heschylusThe Tonkin incident was not pre-ceded by any significant naval ac-tion, nor did it herald the beginningof open aggression on the high seasagainst the United States.Senator Wayne Morse, one of thetwo Senators to vote against this re-solution, said that the destroyerswere justified in returning the firebut that the bombing of North Viet-nam constituted a serious violationof international law and a major es-calation of the war.Senator J. William Fulbright,head of the Senate Forcign Rela-tions Committee. has concludedthat it is a poss» lity we provokedthe attack in the act of supervisinga raid by the South Vie~namese.Considering _ that UnitedStates did not go to war over thePueblo incident or the shootingdown of a spy plane near Korea, itis clear that the Gulf of Tonkin in-cident was merely a pretext for moveing troops into South East Asia.Later it became known in Wash-ington that Johnson and some ofhis aides had carried drafts of theresolution around with them forweeks before the incident.Contending that North Vietnamwas committing aggression againstSouth Vietnam, the United Statesbegan bombing North Vietnam on acontinuing basis in February 1965.This was the biggest myth of allin a war built on myths.The Senate Majority Leader,Mike Mansfield, observed in 1966that owhen the sharp increase in theAmerican military effort began in1965, it was estimated that only a-bout 400 North Vietnamese soldierswere among the enemy forces in theSouth which totaled 140,000 at thetime.�It should be noted that at thistime there were 23,000 Americantroops in Vietnam.These uncomfortable facts raisethe serious question of who was thereal aggressor.\

The February 1965 State De-partment White Paper tried to sub-stantiate its claim of North Vietna-mese aggression through statistics ofcaptured weapons. ,Inspite of the fact that 7500weapons had been captured fromthe Vietcong from the middle of1962 to the end of 1963, only 179were of foreign Communist manu-facture.Where were the rest of the-wea-pons coming from?Gen. HarkinTs viewGeneral Paul D. Harkins, whowas in charge of American forcesbefore Westmoreland, admitted inMarch 1963 that the guerrillas ob-viously were not being suppliedfrom North Vietnam, China, or anyplace else. Most of the weaponswere either captured or homemade.A year later the State Depart-mentTs Director of Intelligence can-didly conceded that ~o~by. far thegreater part of the Vietcong forcesin South Vietnam are South Vietnmese, the preponderance of Vigcong weapons come not from Cogmunist countries but from captpurchase and local manufacture.Captured weaponsBernard Fall estimated thper cent of the Vietcong wesion of the Geneva truce that had They eliminated two of the most(the dreaded head of the secretstranded these people in the north.Theodore DraperTs appraisalseems accurate enough: oIn man-power and in weapons, North Viet-nam was not, at least until 1965,the main or even a significant provi-der. It is fair to conclude that untilabout 1960 the Vietcong was'strjly a Southern enterprise, ang1965 the Northern co onwas mainly limited to £ ~The real reason tf ed StatesTgovernment di a huge ex-peditionary fg vietnam in1965 and Lee because ofthe North # Dut becausethe Saigon fégime ling apgrt.This wasT happ nthe fact that U.S. §governme :HanoiTs arades iminimaTranh, who had been a minister inon the ballot,and Communists wereexcluded. :serious. contenders - the popular _ police) stood in the galleries, the :General Minh who came to powerwhen Diem was overthrown, and abrilliant economist, Au Truongfull assembly voted by only a 57-44margin to accept the results.The only candidate who haddared run on a peace platform (af-ter his place on the ballot had beenassured) soon found himself in pri-fTs cabinet,/F No oneTwho advocated a neu-ralist solution was allowed to beson. Though he was charged withcorruption, the real cause of his im-prisonment was his peace platform.The election had been a totalFour newspapers were shut downduring the election. fraud.In the delta province of Kien George Romney was to be ridi-Hoa voter registration increased to -cyled out of the 1968 LS ~Presiten.419,000 from 120,000 in one tial election because he cant weymonth. General Thieu even admit- been brainwashed about Vietnam.ted that oSome soldiers have been. [pn truth, the American peoplegiven two cards.� : * had been brainwashed.Because no area under Vietcong They had trusted their govern-ontrol voted, only 56 per cent of ment. But their government hadp cligible populace took part. lied to them.Of this the u-Ky Of course, eventually the truthhieu-Ky ticket re-ceived just 35 p@r cent of the vote. about Vietnam - that we were sup-~porting an unpopular governmentagainst a revolution that had thesupport of the peasants - would as-- sert itself. :were captured American wediians cdThus, in the early stages 6fwar, the American logistical systemwas supplying both sides of theconflict.The other majorT point in theState DepartmentTs fabricated casewas the claim that between 1959and 1964, 37,000 southerners whohad gone north with HoChi Minh in1954 had returned to the south toprovide leadership and technical ad-vice for the guerrilla forces.But these people had left thesouth in 1954 fully expecting to re-turn in 1956 after the country wasreunified by elections.It was the Diem governmentTs re-fusal to honor this essential provi-in a military coup.His name was Nguyen Cao Ky.In time, charges that this newgovernment was nothing but a mili-tary dictatorship began to embar-rass President Johnson. So electionswere set up in South Vietnam. ©The story of these elections isthe story of a fantastic charade, andit reflects'little credit on the Amer-ican public that they could not de-tect the hoax.General Thieu and General Kyrefused to allow-anyone with Bud-dhist connections to run eventhough most Vietnamese are Bud-dhists.VIETNAM: A DRAGON EMBATTLEDJoseph ButtingerTHE VIETNAMESE AND THEIR REVOLUTIONJohn T. McAlister, Jr. and Paul MusABUSE OF POWERTheodore DraperVIETNAM: HISTORY, DOCUMENTSBOOKSANDOPINIONS ON A MAJOR WORLD CRISISed. by Marvin GettlemanTHE INDOCHINA STORYCommittee of Concerned Asian ScholarsTO READ~THE ROOTS OF AMERICAN FOREIGNPOLICYGabriel KolkoVIETNAM: THE UNHEARD VOICESLuce and SommerLAST REFLECTIONS ON A WARBernard FallTHE NEW LEGIONSDonald DuncanON VIETNAMVIETNAM: LOTUS IN A SEA OF FIRETrich Nhat HanhTWO VIETNAMSBernard FallNo amount of lyingNo amount of official lying inWashington could alter the histori-cal and social realities of Vietnam.And these realities were deter-mining the outcome of the war.In November 1967, U.S. militaryspokesmen were claiming that Viet}.S. Generalson Vietnam War~ mission of the Constituentgia hen voted 16-2 not toE tho@esults of the election be-fethegsicfeated civilian candi- .dgaeen able to produce sub-Hence of . fraud.when the final vote wasand Brig. Gen. Ngoc LoanRIDGWAY GAVINSee Osaland war in Asia. I think we would be fightinga wrong war at the wrong place against thewrong enemy,"~- General Omar Bradleye707e7e7e"e7e7e7e 0787675 s%e"etererete e's ete" etetetatatetetetetetsweacetatetetetetete tata tetate te tet tates ta etetetetetetetetetatetatetetet a etetetetetetateteteteteteretete"e solelererererereceleteteteteteteretetetetatetetetetetesBs Bet BrAL es ere elecererecerererererecerererecertrttstatstetst hehe etst te tet tate etate tate tatatatatetatatatatatatetatatetatetetetetstatetatatatetetatatatete stata stat tstetatats setsx,4=: oAnybody who commits the land power of the Uni-= ted States on the continent of Asia ought tohave his head examined,"betta aa aes - General Douglas MacArthur #*eet nata tee ature ta terete ect an cada ase a atlas o ctsie ce ata a a state nate ste Me a tase atataMehna%e®. 8.0.0.0. 0.5.0 006 6 0 0.00600 6.6 6.0.6.0.0.0.0.0,0,0.0%- oeI I I RRR I he ee ee eeNEP et ere ele terete eee eee ate ete a etererarere eH # elerere Sl8.#.# #1818 teases ewrererererareratetstatetetatatstatatctetatetatatatetatetetetetetetetetetr thee erarelerereterererstes.eee ed hd Lh ed en ee ee eee eee ee"I think we should go back to the 195), Geneva: Agreements and hold free elections in Vietnam.I have no doubt they would go Communist, butour own political morality demands that weabide by the results of free elections,"~ General Wm, Wallace FordERK,pik ik fai b ne mh eee Aeweleleletetelatetetetetetetetetetetatetatatatetetatatetetatatetetetetetetetatatatatatatatetetetatetatatatatatatatatatatstatstitatatetetstatatatatetatatatetatateteretererererarerslelersrersrenesoases ce DDoS Deteteaeaeecetoaeegeteaetetetetebetetetetetetetetetetetatatetetetetets tess trsssrsteetereseteteleteteletetetetetetereteleretereletelelersteretetetemeaeter saat ritetetser eratete et etetaetatetatatetetatetetetaatatetatatetatetatstatatetenatetatstetatatatatetatstatstatetatatetetatetstetet tet tetreeeitete tate ete ate atete% "I see no strategic or other reason for main-% taining a base in Vietnam...our Communist ad-ventures bring us no return, while social pro-grams suffer at home and twenty million of ourcitizens are in such despair that there isrioting in the streets."- Rear Admiral Arnold Trueote e eee see ee 8s 8s an n®.*.*.*,*,9. 8 8 808 6's + 9 0 © 8 © 8 6 8 ee 6 6 6 8 8 6 5 6 6 6.6 8 6 «6 6 6 8 6 8 6 8 6 ee eo 66 ee 8 ee a 8 ee oe se ee 8 6 + ea 6 8 ee oe ©ones oe a ee

" -_"""YEH~-+* BUT IT AAIGUTBE HEACED wontAT AHIGH RATE oFWELL, AT LAST WE CAN SEE A( LIGHT AT TH END OF THE TUNNEL.let Explodes MythsCong morale was low and deser-: ! trocities inflicted by the Vietnamesetions were high as contrasted withOn Our compatriots in Hanoi, De-The February 1965 State De-partment White Paper tried to sub-stantiate its claim of North Vietna-mese aggression through statistics ofcaptured weapons.Inspite of the fact that 7500weapons had been captured fromthe Vietcong from the middle of1962 to the end of 1963, only 179were of foreign Communist manu-facture.Where were the rest of the-wea-pons coming from?Gen. HarkinTs viewGeneral Paul D. Harkins, whowas in charge of American forcesbefore Westmoreland, admitted inMarch 1963 that the guerrillas ob-viously were not being suppliedfrom North Vietnam, China, or anyplace else. Most of the weaponswere either captured or homemade.A year later the State Depart-mentTs Director of Intelligence can-didly conceded that oby. far thegreater part of the Vietcong forcesin South Vietnam are South Vietnagmese, the preponderance of Vigcong weapons come not from Comunist countries but from captpurchase and local manufacture. *%Captured weapons.Bernard Fall estimated tper cent of the Vietcong wwere captured American wedgmanThus, in the early stages 6war, the American logistical systemwas supplying both sides of theconflict.The other majorT point in theState DepartmentTs fabricated casewas the claim that between 1959and 1964, 37,000 southerners whohad gone north with Ho Chi Minh in1954 had returned to the south toprovide leadership and technical ad-vice for the guerrilla forces.But these people had left thesouth in 1954 fully expecting to re-turn in 1956 after the country wasreunified by elections.It was the Diem governmentTs re-fusal to honor this essential provi-sion of the Geneva truce that hadstranded these people in the north.Theodore DraperTs appraisalseems accurate enough: oIn man-power and in weapons, North Viet-nam was not, at least until 1965.the main or even a significant provi-der. It is fair to conclude that untilabout 1960 the Vietcong was'strjly a Southern enterprise, and1965 the Northern cong onwas mainly limited to tage.�The real reason tk ed StatesTgovernment di a huge ex-peditionary yietnam in1965 and because ofthe North Dut becausethe Saigon ling gpert.This wasT happthe fact that U.S. §governmeHanoiTsrades iminimalgsin a military coup. |His name was Nguyen Cao Ky.In time, charges that this newgovernment was nothing but a mili-tary dictatorship began to embar-rass President Johnson. So electionswere set up in South Vietnam.The story of these elections isthe story of a fantastic charade, andit reflects'little credit on the Amer-ican public that they could not de-tect the hoax.General Thieu and General Kyrefused to allow-anyone with Bud-dhist connections to run eventhough most Vietnamese are Bud-dhists.VIETNAM: A DRAGON EMBATTLEDJoseph ButtingerTHE VIETNAMESE AND THEIR REVOLUTIONJohn T. McAlister, Jr. and Paul MusABUSE OF POWERTheodore DraperVIETNAM: HISTORY, DOCUMENTS ANDBOOKSOPINIONS ON A MAJOR WORLD CRISISed. by Marvin GettlemanTHE INDOCHINA STORYCommittee of Concerned Asian ScholarsTO READ~THE ROOTS OF AMERICAN FOREIGNPOLICYGabriel KolkoVIETNAM: THE UNHEARD VOICESLuce and SommerLAST REFLECTIONS ON A WARBernard FallTHE NEW LEGIONSDonald DuncanON VIETNAMVIETNAM: LOTUS IN A SEA OF FIRETrich Nhat HanhTWO VIETNAMSBernard FallThey eliminated two of the mostserious. contenders - the popularGeneral Minh who came to power ©when Diem was overthrown, and abrilliant economist, Au TruongTranh, who had been a minister inTs cabinet,/ge No oneTwho advocated a neu-(tralist solution was allowed to beon the ballot,and Communists wereexcluded. ©Four newspapers were shut downduring the election.(the dreaded head of the secretpolice) stood in the galleries, the :full assembly voted by only a 57-44margin to accept the results.The only candidate who haddared run on a peace platform (af-ter his place on the ballot had beenassured) soon found himself in pri-son. Though he was charged withcorruption, the real cause of his im-prisonment was his peace platform.The election had been a totalfraud./In the delta province of Kien George Romney was to be ridi-Hoa voter registration increased to -cyled out of the 1968 LS ~Presifen.419,000 from 120,000 in one tial election because he said he hadmonth. General Thieu even admit- been brainwashed about Vietnam.ted that oSome soldiers have been. [pn truth, the American peoplegiven two cards.� * had been brainwashed.Because no area under Vietcong They had trusted their govern-ontrol voted, only 56 per cent of ment. But their government had¢ eligible populace took part. lied to them.Of this the Phieu-Ky ticket re- Of course, eventually the truthabout Vietnam - that we were sup-~porting an unpopular governmentagainst a revolution that had thesupport of the peasants - would as-sert itself. .:No amount of lyingNo amount of official lying inWashington could alter the histori-cal and social realities of Vietnam.And these realities were deter-mining the outcome of the war.In November 1967, U.S. militaryspokesmen were claiming-that VietU.S. Generalson Vietnam Warmission of the Constituentabieathen voted 16-2 not tothemesults of the election be-iheagmiefeated civilian candi- .dgmeen able to produce sub-fence of _ fraud.m�"� when the final vote wasand Brig. Gen. Ngoc Loanland war in Asia. I think we would be fightinga wrong war at the wrong place against thewrong enemy,"- General Omar Bradley= "Anybody who commits the land power of the Uni-= ted States on the continent of Asia ought tohave his head examined."- General Douglas MacArthur #* "I think we should go back to the 195), GenevaAgreements and hold free elections in Vietnam,[ have no doubt they would go Communist, butour own political morality demands that weabide by the results of free elections,"~ General Wm, Wallace Ford= "T see no strategic or other reason for main-taining a base in Vietnam...our Communist ad-ventures bring us no return, while social pro-grams suffer at home and twenty million of ourcitizens are in such despair that there isrioting in the streets."2, 1954, General Navarreforces in Indo-China that he fumonths of hard fighting.(French) told his French Unionlly expected victory...after six moreFrench victory.On March 23, 1954, Admiral Arthur W.; Radford, ChaiJoint Chiefs of Staff said: oThe F or airman of the U.S.rench are going to win.�In July 1959, ~Major General Sam Meyers (U.S.A.) said: oThe guerrillaswere gradually nibbled away until they ceased ta he 0-2Im March 1903, Secretary of State Dean Rusk declared: othe strategichamlet program is producing excellent results� and omorale in thecountryside has begun to rise.� �In May 1963, the Defense Department stated: oThe corner has definitelybeen turned toward victory in Vietnam.�On November 1, 1963, General Paul Harkins, the senior U.S. Army officer inVietnam said in STARS AND STRIPES: oVictory in the sense thatwould apply to this kind of war is just months away. I'can safely saythat the end of the war is in sight.� ©oON NOVEMBER 1, 1963, THE DIEM DICTATORSHIP WAS OVER.THROWN. POLITICAL PRISONERS WERE RELEASED ANDTHERE WAS ECSTATIC CELEBRATING. THE OPTIMISTICSTATISTICS ON STRATEGIC HAMLETS WERE REVEALEDTO BE FRAUDULENT AS ONLY 20% COULD BE REGARDEDAS USABLE. "In February of 1964, Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara said: oTheU.S. still hopes to withdraw most of its troops from South Vietnambefore the end of 1965.� °IN FEBRUARY 1965, PRESIDENT JOHNSON ANNOUNCED SENDING50,000 TROOPS TO VIETNAM. THIS WAS THE BEGINNING OFMAJOR U.S. INTERVENTION. ~In October 1965, McNamara said we have stopped losing the war.AT THE BEGINNING OF APRIL 1967, THE UNITED STATES WASABLE TO CLAIM CONTROL OVER FEWER VILLAGES THANIN 1962. ©---1967 Republican Senate Committee Report on VietnamTRUE PATRIOTISMoMy country, right or wrong.When right, to be kept right.When wrong, to be put right.�" Senator Carl Schurzthe Saigon army.Claiming they could see ~thelight at the end of the tunnel,T theySaid that the NLF was no longer ca-pable of launching any major mil-itary action,In the early days of February1968, the Vietcong launched theirTet offensive.Vietcong cadres penetrated Sai-* gon and attacked the American em-bassy.More than 800 planes had beendamaged and 200 completely des- |-- Neil Sheehanin The New York TiOctober 9, 1966tary ©raror 11VvuUuis."~ywe we wen eae-In Hue, the old Imperial City,the Vietcong managed to hold outfor four weeks.American forces launched a bar-rage of firepower on Hué, and onMarch 23, 1968, Robert Shaplen re-ported for The New Yorker that:oNearly four thousand civilians werekilled in Hué, most of them by A-merican air and artillery attacks.�In late 1969 after the story ofthe My Lai massacre was uncovered,high American officials includingPresident Nixon tried to pin theblame for these deaths on the Viet-cong.This was perhaps a new story tocember 19, 1946, are either inven-_tions or erroneous.�General Westmoreland claimedthat the Tet offensive had been asetback for the NLF, but he alsorequested 200,000 more troops!At this point Lyndon Johnsondecided to reverse his course onthe war. He replaced Gen. West-moreland, announced an end to thebombing of North Vietnam, andsaid he would not run for re-election.Clearly, as Robert KennedyTsvictories in New York, Oregon,Pennsylvania and California showed,the American people were disillus-ioned with the war and wanted itended.When Richard Nixon becamePresident, he announced that hispolicy for Vietnam would be oViet-namization�" meaning that as theSaigon regime was more capable ofstanding on its own feet, U.S. troopswould be withdrawn.Yet the earlier attempt at oViet-namization� had failed by 1965when it was obvious that indirectAmerican support would not propup the corrupt Saigon regime. ThatThe weakness of Western technologyoDespite the enormous scale of violence and the far-reaching changes in the country, the most important aspectsof the struggle remain the same. Pro-Western governmentsare still trying to wrest control over the countryside awayfrom rural-based revolut@naries who have developed powerby relating their strategy to Vietnamese traditions.In Vietnam therefore, the technological power of theWest has had its weaknesses exposed by the political powerOf a peasant people.�-- John T. McAlister, Jr.in The Vietnamese and Their Revolutionthe American public, but the Viet-namese had heard it all before.When the French governmentwas trying to inflame French publicopinion in 1946 as well as distractfrom the November shelling of Hai-phong (where according to Frenchmilitary estimates 6000 Vietnamesecivilians were killed), they told sto-ries of Viet Minh atrocities in Ha-noi.By 1949, Paul Mus, the mosteminent French authority on Viet-nam, wrote: oI am in a position tostate and to prove that four-fifthsof the stories or reports of awful a-failure led to the oAmericanization�of the war.Anyone who understands theflow of Vietnamese history knowsthat the Saigon elite- largely Catho-lic, French-trained and urban-orientedin a country where the majority areBuddhist peasants" will never be-able to defeat the nationalist revo-lution in their midst.The only realistic course left -for the United States- and Americanspride themselves on being commonsense realists- is to leave Vietnam asthe Chinese, Mongols, Japanese andFrench have all done.9

US AURORA ERIE AR | aE, Roki caeoWhich image do Americans prefer? Do they want theworld to regard them as a nation with a revolutionary tradi-tion, sympathetic to colonies in their struggles against Saimperial rulers, regi sas and progress, and dedica-rinciple of equality: : asne "a oa nebo. that other image which AmericaTsadversaries depict, that of a counter-revolutionary America,everywhere on the side of urban elites seeking to stamp outthe ardor for change on the part of the peasantry, againstall national movements which seem to have a socialist orienta-tion, as a white supremacist power determined wscvgl td eto put down wars of liberation started by the colored races:Richard B. Morris :in The Emerging Nations andThe American Revolutionlessons ofvietnamThe philosopher Santayana oncesaid that othose who refuse to learnfrom history are doomed to repeata"rhe world is full of poor, angrypeoples who are ruled by corrupt,re nresentath\ eovernments, andyples have in the past look-ited States- the homenationalist revolutioninspirationtheir independence and1itices- iO}lragically, the United States hasyften betrayed these peoplesT hopesyy allying itself with their colonialnasters ( France, Britain, Portugal,[he Netherlands, South Africa, etc.)ind freanently sent American troopsof Haiti, Panama, Bolivia, Guatema-a, Lebanon, Okinawa, Greece andnany other countries- Vietnam theatest example- show instances ofAmerican interventions and economc exploitations.If the United States remainslind to the hard lessons. of. the/ietnam War, there will surely beither, bloodier oVietnams� in Asia,atin America and Africa, and~mericans will be bitterly hatedhroughout the world.To learn the lessons of Vietnam,-mericans will have to give upur. cherished belief that we areicially and culturally superior toveryone else- a belief that under-2s our Vietnam involvement.Americans will have to face thect that our government has lied» us time and again and has tried» Cloak an imperialistic policy inthe noble rhetoric of odefendingfreedom.�We will have to face the factthat Communists are quite capableof winning popular revolutions andthat the U.S., in too many cases,is quite capable of supporting themost despicable tyrantit isto growingenuity� and a onever-say-dicfootball spirit can NOT solve everyproblem in the world head-on!It is past time for Americansto see that the President and theGenerals are NOT always impartial,infallible men who ohave all thefacts� and act without ulterior mo-tives in the best interests of all con-to see that other peoples do NOThold OUR truths" progress, Chris-tianity, mass production, etc."o~ tobe self-evident.� 'Finally, it is past time for Am-ericans, in the words of poet RobertBurns, to osee ourselves as otherssee usTT ~ all too often, as Swagger-ing, red-faced, beef-fed men whoarrogantly try to impress otherswith our size, power and wealthand who wrongly assume that aheavy dose of bombers, Bibles andbank accounts is the way to otherpeopleTs hearts.IF we can learn these lessonsfrom our tragic adventure in Viet-nam, then withdrawal will be morethan a cure for one crisis but willlead to a way for America to live ina revolutionary world, true to theBEST side of the American charac-ter instead of the worst!past timeup and seeoThese bitter words, in bronze, are onthe East Bay grave of a 19-year old Marinewho was killed in Vietnam. The questionis his parents. The answers could be thathe died to make the world safe for Kyand Thieu, to justify the wilfulness ofthe Sage of the Pedernales, to save theinscrutable Oriental face of Dean Rusk,to support the mistakes of computerized.Pentagon minds, to defend a meaninglessand temporary boundary line, to satisfythe blood lust of safe if not sane old menwho watch the war on TV and say ,This paper was prepared for Bragg Briefs bySp/5 Richard Olson and Sp/4 William RobbWwIDnD TOR WHAT?re]oGo team, go!� as though it were afootball game, and who glory in suchdinner table jargon as oWe oughta takeHanoi out with a nuke.�The 19-year old died because weintruded on a domestic fight. As thegraffiti says, oHow many Vietnamesefought in OUR civil war?� If there areno more Vietnams, perhaps the youngman did not die in vain" small comfortto his parents and the other parents of" Herb Caenin the San Francisco Chronicle