What’s Old in Vietnam?

May 15, 1966
Plainfield

What’s Old in Vietnam?

Why speak on such a controversial subject? Because moral appraisal of human events seems inevitably involved if one gives thought to why this undeclared war escalates continuously with an ever-lengthening roster of deaths and [the] labyrinth of confusing and conflicting events becomes ever more complex. I am not presumptuous, I hope. I do not assert that my present and long-held convictions are moral and all other views immoral or non-moral. Recognizing that mine represents a minority position, I trust that those who disagree, and are in the majority, hold their views not because they represent the official Administration policy, but rather because the convictions can be justified on grounds that are historically sound and morally testable.

Why speak today? These are days when those who disagree with the majority point of view unite in protesting. A week ago, (NYT, 5/1/66), The American Jewish Congress, "by an overwhelming show of hands – 800 delegates appealed to our Government to make clear its willingness to offer an immediate cease-fire and to negotiate without prior conditions all points now outstanding between the adversaries."

Today in Washington, thousands are participating in "The Voters’ March on Washington." They are bringing tens of thousands of pledges promising support for candidates who will advocate and work for a scaling-down of escalation, for U.S. initiative in encouraging negotiations with all parties including the Vietcong (National Liberation Front), for establishing circumstances which permit the Vietnamese people to work out their future, for the use of international agencies to settle disputes among nations and for constructive use of economic and social programs. Among the featured persons at this Voters’ March on Washington is our own Dr. David Frost, who has announced his candidacy for the Democratic nomination for the U. S. Senate on a platform pledging efforts to widen discussion of the war in Vietnam.

I read to you the statement drawn up by the National Inter-Religious Conference on Peace which pleaded for essentially the same principles and positions.

Next Saturday, at the 1966 General Assembly of the Unitarian Universalist Association in Hollywood, Florida, the delegates will consider the following general resolution:

“Reaffirming the intent of its 1964 resolution urging the United States to reconsider its policy in Vietnam and to explore solutions other than military,
The Unitarian Universalist Association
Notes again that the present war in Vietnam threatens to escalate into a world nuclear war,
Urges the Government of the United States to make full and continuing use of the facilities of the United Nations to secure and maintain a cease-fire and peace in Vietnam,
Urges the Government of the United States to negotiate with the National Liberation Front as one of the principals in the conflict in seeking a cease-fire and in aiding in the formation of a representative interim government of South Vietnam, and
Transmits to the President and the Congress its continued deep concern for an immediate and honorable peace in Vietnam."

I want you to know why I applaud David Frost's courage, admire his ability and will support his candidacy; why I will vote for the resolution at the U.U.A. General Assembly; why I respect such men as Senator Morse and Senator Fulbright who are willing to endure all manner of insult and innuendo because of their stand and may have terminated their political careers; why the oceans of testimony by our State and Defense Department officials fail somehow to deal with the stubborn facts of history. This is not to denigrate the sacrifice of those soldiers, sailors, marines and civilians who have given their lives, who have been wounded, who have interrupted their careers and postponed family life. All honor should be theirs, including that of the constant re- examination of official policy positions and truth-claims. For we do not honor those who have sacrificed all or given much for liberty by abdicating the freedom to make democratic responses of affirmation or dissent as our convictions may require.

Out of the pounds of books, clippings, articles available, I have chosen to speak on “What’s Old in Vietnam," for I believe the fallacies, inconsistencies and uncertainties of our official policy are rooted in circumstances more greatly removed in time than in most of the recent headlines. A complete discussion of all issues is not feasible in the time available this morning. There are other and important issues with which I will not deal. But there are resources for those who seek knowledge and understanding.

First – What’s old, unadmitted in our official circles, and yet is central to the dismaying problems is the degree to which this is an internal conflict within Vietnam.

When the Vietnamese nationalistic movement defeated the French Colonial forces at Den Bien Phu the Geneva agreements were the basis for the cessation of hostilities. Signers were the Commander-in-Chief of the French Union forces in Indo-China and the Commander-in-Chief of the People’s Army of Vietnam. Article I represents a formidable fact which seems to be ignored by our government: “A provisional military demarcation line shall be fixed, on either side of which the forces of the two parties shall be regrouped after their withdrawal, the forces of the People's Army of Vietnam to the north of the line and the forces of the French Union to the south."

Nations participating in the Geneva Conference were Cambodia, Democratic Republic of Vietnam, France, Kingdom of Laos, People's Republic of China, State of Vietnam, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, United Kingdom, United States of America. All but the United States approved the agreements by voice vote. Under Secretary of State of the United States, Walter Bedell Smith, made a unilateral declaration for the United States, asserting that the U.S. was not prepared to join in the Declaration but that it would refrain from the threat or use of force to disturb the agreements, in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations.

The unrelenting reality of history is that the Genera agreements did not establish or look forward to two Vietnams, but one, to be decided by election before 1956. The 17th parallel represented a provisional military boundary, not the political boundary between two nations. The subsequent historical fact that Diem, the ruler of South Vietnam established by us (and kept in power by us), repudiated the Geneva Accords, does not alter the record that such a disavowal of agreement ruptured relations and blew the sparks of conflict into the fires of war.

It is my observation that insufficient recognition is made by the most powerful communications media – press, radio, TV that the "Viet Cong,"(the name given to the rebels by Diem), or the "National Liberation Front,"(as they named themselves), is and has been largely made up of Vietnamese living south of the 17th parallel. At the time of the French defeat, those who fought for French forces, included thousands of Vietnamese nominally giving allegiance to Bao Dai, who was first the puppet emperor of the Japanese and later, the French. As well as controlling territory north of the 17th parallel, the Viet Minn controlled 2/3 of South Vietnam. Ho Chi Minh felt he was making a substantial concession when agreeing to the provisional military line because millions of his supporters lived south of it. Even today, after so many escalations on our part and responding escalations on the part of the Viet Cong, North Vietnamese troops in South Vietnam are estimated at only 20,000 by our Government.

There seems little evidence to refute the charge that neither the Diem family nor the Eisenhower administration wanted elections held in keeping with the Geneva Accords, because the Ho Chi Minh government would have won the votes of the people. In his memoirs, General Eisenhower wrote, (MANDATE FOR CHANGE, p.372), “I have never talked or corresponded with a person knowledgeable in Indo Chinese affairs who did not agree that had elections been held at the time of the fighting possibly 80% of the population would have voted for the communist Ho Chi Minh as their leader rather than Chief of State Bao Dai.”

Yet I know of no acknowledgment by our Government that the understanding and intent of the 1956 Geneva Accords was a united Vietnam with one government to be chosen by a plebiscite before 1956. Even a year ago, President Johnson in his John Hopkins speech, set as a condition for peace, "an independent South Vietnam."

Thus what is old is our reluctance to acknowledge the complexities of politics, religion and social structure in the land now divided as South and North Vietnam. Occasionally there are belated admissions which cannot help but raise difficult questions in our minds. For example, (5/3/66, NYT) Secretary McNamara was quoted as saying that recent political disorders were viewed far more seriously than was acknowledged at the time of crisis. There was fear that civil war would break around Danang, and that the northern section of South Vietnam would secede or that the Ky government would be overthrown.

Are we listening to the people of Vietnam? For example, (NYT, 4/17/66) did you see the statement attributed to Pham Ngoc Thah, student at the University of Saigon and leader of the University Buddhist student organization: "We object to your policy here ...you are always supporting one person. First it was Diem, and now it is Ky. Ky was appointed by the White House. You should not think that because you send a lot of troops and weapons here that you can interfere with our sovereignty....

"Look at the corpses on the battlefield. The Vietcong are Communists, but they are Vietnamese too. We are all the same people. We should not be killing each other like this. We want to stop this war by any means. We want to have peace right now – we are all exhausted, we are all tired of this war.”

A French correspondent, Max Clos (Le Figaro), wrote last month, "No Vietnamese thinks the war is his. The majority think it an affair exclusively American between Washington and Peking which unhappily takes place on their territory." (quoted Stone's Weekly, 4/16/66)

In addition we seem to have overlooked not only the complexities of conflict between Viet Cong and Saigon supporters but also we underestimate the intensity of conflict between Buddhists and Catholics. Neither group wants the other to have substantial political power. If it had prevailed and been continued, the policy held by President Kennedy might have proved wiser because he insisted that although the U.S. could provide weapons and supplies, the war must be won or lost by the South Vietnamese themselves.

SECOND is another old uncertainty – do we really seek a situation of self-determination for a united Vietnam as provided in the Geneva Accords? Do we really seek a situation of self-determination even for a politically separated and self-governing South Vietnam? The dictators we have maintained in power from the Diem Family to the present Ky government have never permitted the conditions to prevail which encourage free elections. The succession of Saigon military juntas which we have tolerated in power have not allowed freedom of speech or freedom of the press. Just a week ago (NYT 5/7/66) Marshall Ky said plainly that he and his military would not permit any self-determination to prevail if the people of Vietnam chose a neutralist government or one in which the Vietcong were represented. The President, the Secretary of State and the Secretary of Defense have shown a willingness to reply aggressively and immediately to Senators Fulbright and Morse. Why is there not a corresponding eagerness to disavow Marshall Ky’s totalitarian pronouncements?

There are other curious and alarming contradictory statements from our own official or semi-official sources. For example, our Senator from New Jersey, Clifford Case, in his recent release NL 77, writing about his participation as a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in the televised hearings on Vietnam commented, "I have felt that the widely-expressed concern and confusion over our involvement in Vietnam did not stem from misunderstanding of our objectives. These, as I see it, are 1) to contain Communist China – and block her from overrunning all of Southeast Asia, and 2) to help South Vietnam resist a take-over by terror from within or aggression from without – and thus to prove that the West is not as helpless as a sitting duck against the Communist technique of aggression in the nuclear age the 'war of national liberation.'”

Senator Case is silent about self-determination. He states our first objective is to contain Communist China. If this is our goal, why cannot the Administration announce this forthrightly. Of course, even more serious objections and rejections of policy would occur, because l) we have never maintained extensive air, naval, and army bases in Asia. Why do we need to now? What evidence is there that China has acted overly aggressive in a fashion to warrant hundreds of thousands of our troops and all the other personnel and mountains of supplies? There has not been a report of a single Chinese soldier yet being involved. Undoubtedly China provides supplies in some undetermined quantities; and there are reports that Chinese engineers and workmen are helping North Vietnam repair the roads and bridges we have bombed out. Certainly we should raise the question with our government, is our objective one of war against China?

If it is then, by what standards of international justice or humanity do we choose to use Vietnam as a battleground, where civilians as well as Vietcong are killed and wounded; where farmlands are destroyed; where an ancient culture is being fractured by the inevitable disastrous changes of war, occupation armies, inflation. Then, too, Senator Case makes a comment which should cause us considerable apprehension: “to help South Vietnam resist a takeover by terror from within or aggression from without and thus to prove that the West is not as helpless as a sitting duck against the Communist technique of aggression in the nuclear age: the ‘war of national liberation.’”

“Aggression from within” is an emotion-laden phrase to describe a civil war. Do we have to "prove something" every time there is a civil war in Asia? Or elsewhere? If so, then there will be no end to these involvements for this is an age of revolution in countries hitherto undeveloped, reaching for the comforts and benefits of industrialization and modern technologies – and intent on ending feudal or colonial rule by the few.

Speaking in the Senate, January 14, 1966, Senator Stephen Young of Ohio, one of the more blunt men in the Congress said, "From Sept. 28 to last October 20 I was in Southeast Asia most of the time. I went, looked and listened. Very soon I learned we are involved in a civil war over there. In South Vietnam I was at every airbase except one – traveling through the entire area by helicopter, airplane and jeep. It is my considered judgment that South Vietnam is of no strategic importance whatever to the defense of the United States. Furthermore, the fact is that the conflict raging in Vietnam is a civil war. General Westmoreland stated to me that the bulk of the Vietcong fighting in South Vietnam were born and reared in South Vietnam. General Stilwell in Thailand, went further. He stated that 80% of the Vietcong fighting in the Mekong Delta area south of Saigon were born and reared in that area. They were not infiltrators or Communists from the North."

This leads to another old difficulty in Vietnam as far as our official policy is concerned. Third – if our search for peace is thorough and has been candid and forthright, why are our efforts for peace so consistently intermixed with our new escalations of war activity? Just this week, as President Johnson so eloquently re-asserted our search for peace, our airplanes somewhere north of Hanoi, at least perilously close to Chinese territory, if not actually in it, shot down a Chinese airplane. This brings even closer the threat of widespread Asian land war.

When the heralded bombing pause a few months ago was dramatized by the President and his globe-trotting U.S. diplomats seeking peace, this bombing pause extended only to North Vietnam. The bombing continued in South Vietnam, where most of the enemy solders and civilians are located. Would you take seriously an offer of peace while you were still being devastated by repeated bombings which may claim more civilian lives than military? One must recall that the pattern of bombing North Vietnam began after the Tonkin Gulf incident when our Naval forces lost no lives and suffered no damage. The retaliation would seem to be disproportionate.

Fourth – There is another moral difficulty in the present conflict, and it's an old one. Not the Saigon military Junta, but the Vietnamese people are suffering the most.

There have been pictures which are painfully graphic testimony that not only the Vietcong but also our Saigon allies resort to cruelty and terror, not to speak of torture, in the treatment of prisoners. There have been pathetic pictures and reports of women, babies, children, elderly ones being caught in the burning pincers of this war on villages. Whether or not Senator Fulbright's description of Saigon as a "brothel" is accurate, who can deny that the culture, honesty and morals in any metropolitan area where a war effort is concentrated usually suffer severe erosion. This is the nature of war; always has been.

In the speech referred to, Senator Young also said, "attacks with sophisticated weapons on unsophisticated and illiterate Asians are building a vast reservoir of anti-Americanism and misunderstanding of our country among the masses of people in Asia."

Or, take this quotation: “...if the war within Vietnam gets bigger and bigger and goes on and on, the likelihood grows that there may not be any Vietnam worth anyone's having. The U.S. is fighting in part to save South Vietnam, but there is a limit to the destruction of the people and property that can be tolerated before something gives; the government collapses or the people refuse to take it any longer.”

Would you guess the source of that comment? It was not Professor Genovese, not A. J. Muste, not any variety of so-called "peacenik". These words were taken from the Wall St. Journal, (editorial 2/15/66, quoted by Stone's Weekly).

LAST – What can be done? If your own evaluation of events and probabilities gives you reason to believe that there is no rational alternative to peace, you might let your influence be felt by your Congressional Representative directly or through one of the numerous organizations struggling against the tide of popular opinion, but which I believe is uninformed opinion. The President is reported again and again to count the results of public opinion polls as his authority for his continued policy of escalation.

For well-known reasons, it seems increasingly difficult to involve the United Nations officially in the search for peace, but you might reflect carefully on the merit of the sentence in the U.U.A. general resolution which "urges our Government to negotiate with the National Liberation Front as one of the principals in the conflict in seeking a cease-fire and in aiding in the formation of a representative interim government of South Vietnam."

About what to do there are differences of opinion among those who dispute the official policy. Some advocate that the U.S. withdraw, period. This solution I cannot now accept because there are so many Vietnamese persons who would probably be victims of retaliation. Such victims may in good faith have been part of the U.S. effort and do not deserve to be in the vacuum which might exist if we left suddenly.

There has been a serious study made by a group sponsored by the American Friends Service Committee, published in paperback, PEACE IN VIETNAM (Hill & Wang) which suggests authentic choices that could help the world out of the present awful dilemma. Anyone who has experienced any of the confusions, reservations, fears that some of us feel, may respond to their suggestions which can be summarized as follows:

1) The future of Vietnam should be decided by the Vietnamese themselves, with the U.S. making clear that it will sign and support settlement agreements.
2) Assurance that Vietcong-NLF will be included in the negotiations, and not just as a non-official auxiliary of Hanoi.
3) A general cease-fire supervised by an enlarged international control commission, with a firmer mandate to maintain order.
4) A Geneva type conference to be reconvened.
5) Establishing a Vietnamese council of notables to initiate referendum in Vietnam.
6) Withdrawal of U.S. forces on a phased basis, moving first into three or four enclaves, which would also serve as sanctuaries for those Vietnamese who might fear reprisal under the preceding conditions.

All signs indicate that the pressure-cooker situation will continue. Is it not appropriate that we use the privileges of freedom to weigh the contrasting claims of fact and the difficult choices of where one is to place the influence of his opinion? Should we not seek more facts and not just fervid rhetoric which seems to be disassociated from history? Should we not give those Americans who have bravely died or suffered wounds the better tribute by seeking more satisfactory answers from our Administration so that causes and policies may be much clearer than now to justify this Vietnamese war which is exacting such high human cost and such wide-spread social disruption?

Although I am not a member of the academic community, I would take to heart words President Johnson spoke at Princeton, "for I would remind you, to wear the scholar's gown is to assume an obligation to seek truth without prejudice, and without cliché, even when the results of a search are sometimes at variance with one’s own predilections and own opinions."

There are those of us who also seek light, not heat, who have tried to search for the truth and who still believe that the demands of morality, the need to assure Vietnamese self-determination without unnecessary delay, an understanding of what war with China would do to the people of our land and all lands, and whether all Asia is the battleground or the orbits of missiles, requires that the Government take far more seriously than it has, the urgings of such peace groups as is represented by the American Friends, Sane, the Voters' March, the National Inter-Religious Conference on Peace and numerous other separated or related efforts.

We must put an end to war or war will put an end to us.