NET Journal; 171; North Vietnam

it's been a national educational television liza andy g journalism's a special two hour program on north vietnam including this film to be followed by commentary by to authorities on vietnam good evening i mean eighty correspondent the mccutcheon in just a moment you'll see felix grains north vietnam this is an unusual film about a subject that has engendered much emotion controversy and confusion to help further our understanding that we have in our studio david schoenbaum veteran journalist and a recent first and observer of conditions in north vietnam and currently lecture on the academy's history at columbia university and dr roberts

got you know professor of political science at the university of california and a leading expert on asian affairs felix greene a british citizen who lives in the united states has reported an asian affairs for many years he has visited communist china three times and in nineteen sixty he was granted an exclusive interview with permits show a lot he went to north vietnam for the first time in nineteen sixty five obtaining an interview at that time with coaching him in nineteen sixty seven he again receive permission to go to north vietnam where he spent three months and ten days shooting the material from which he made this film grain told and at that while he was barred from military sites and accompanied by an interpreter he was by and large gratin the itinerary of his choice and permitted to choose his own subjects <unk> green said that his tone was sent out of the country and developed and was therefore not viewed by north vietnamese authorities felix greene said that he was not impartial in making this film he described his own attitude in this way and i quote no opposed to the

war i did not especially search out material damaging to either side in this conflict i decided to let the journalistic chips fall where ever they might now feel like screens north vietnam now you can this is the land that has a state of people of vietnam for more than

two thousand years ninety five other than three hundred people in this country are peasants living coast of the saw north vietnam is the size of the united states here are living in harmony with each other up with its ethics chinese primitive mountain tribesmen cambodians ties a lot today is that day all our all woman than an id laurie in norway they're

even in the larger towns during the french occupation the pace of life is slow leak any issue became a nice boy a knee

he'd been on march the second nineteen sixty five as an extension of the war in the south the united states began a daily systematic bombing of north vietnam fishes is it to be a time when you know and

when and the kid with a power station in any case be key k it killed the

country's banks because because because because because communities by his bed was the third largest city in north vietnam two years ago this city

was a bustling thriving city of ninety thousand people mostly textile workers today it is desolate and for long and much of it is a shambles the officials here tell me but the city is being bombed fifty nine times thirty of these attacks being at night i have no way of very fine these figures but there's really no need to for the evidence of great destruction is all around seventy five percent of the city has been destroyed when it became clear that the city was a major target list of the people evacuated to the country in the parts of the city still standing the stores were closed the streets were deserted

on april twenty six nineteen sixty five the united states secretary of defense attempted to a show and increasingly disturbed american public that civilians were not being bombed each target he said was chosen only after careful review of reconnaissance photographs to ensure that it was isolated and apart from urban populations right

towns whose names americans have never heard of being bombed into a reduced to rubble champion totally destroyed totally destroyed you to an indian owned a hundred and twenty times totally destroyed totally destroyed

the list could go on a path from hanoi and haiphong city life in north vietnam has ceased to exist on the small country of vietnam united states pains of drop the great advantage of bombs than they drop the nazi germany an aura of world war two fb three days before i was in this village it was bombed the village isn't much more than a collection of mud and bamboo

huts over the hand without an atmosphere of shock and bewilderment the children were gathered silently in groups i could find nothing in the village all around it that could even remotely be considered a military target this is mr van taylor one of the villages the white band on his child's head is a sign of mourning i asked mr van taylor whether he would tell me what had happened they mean you really got me enough for neil <unk> nine one one plumbing that my interpreter mr ventura told me that the planes dropped fourteen bombs

but beyond all about half the homes in the village were destroyed in poland bomb on the nightly news there being no one most of those were killed were women and children because the men were working in the socket some distance away warmer you tell me that the papers on the sticks indicated whether destroyed homes and stored they have on them the names of the families would live there or both his two daughters were able to jump in us more every chapter but his wife and small boy went to work what he said as we ever done to the american people that they should send the bombers to get out women and children i've got knowledge and mosul took mosul poignant and

dom flemons and that line with him than my mom and warm and i don't need that enabled meaning it's about reinventing book let it build your blog anna oh you did and behind the army as a whole nation at times allow no

one will allow this then is a people's war the total mobilization of all human and material resources the o's young are a presence in the workers or are ready to fight and die in defense of their country one that every factory every village has its militia you know what even in remote mountain areas the peasants are trained not only to resist the bombing attacks but the guerrilla war should the united states landed invasion force but i don't know the

pay to play and he's paid in it's been

when i'm playing it hit islands are sometimes captured sometimes not in the military hospital in hanoi i had a talk with an american pilot was major james e hi to who had been shot down eleven days before i ask him what happened why wasn't he or change it

everything's quiet trees and then they move around the stall in the time i was here i was captured with him one minute after hearing grant you i what happened when you landed well i well the horse did anybody see you injured yes this all those

injured and they get somebody to america first thing that came to me yeah but at a major way but you know they got a stretcher to carry me into the neighboring village in the premier league with a hostile friendly ally in libya and in that way elizabeth gilbert is a good deal of discussion going on about the use of anti personnel weapons he'd be used so forth were you ever wanted to drop the navy's over north vietnam chorus

i do along the way what about the offensive this is a small village northwest of hanoi in a recent raid united states being struck high explosive and anti personnel bombs both on the village itself and on the peasants who were working in the rice fields many children and women workers were killed a japanese war crimes commission was to visit the village and so the peasants base tomato way each of this more anti personnel bombs at fourteen

the larger graders made bombs no mocking as others from neighboring villagers were helping to rebuild some of the destroyed huts on the platform in a tree ago watch for bombing places bridges in north vietnam oh one of the main

targets this breach was first hit six months ago yesterday it was bombed again it wasn't hit but a near miss loosened the underpinning the bridge must be strengthened by nightfall for the trains to cross if i were with husbands and brothers in the army women have taken over much of the heavy work coming has been intensified where formerly a single crop of rice was planted every year now to a candid and in some areas three the plane carrying

cash and when that work is especially heavy so his return to the field to help out with several hundred raids over north vietnam every day the sound of bombing and gunfire to come part of normal life with amazing and concern that people paid no attention unless the obamas come really close economic condition is number one the main highway of north vietnam running southwards from hanoi except for these repair cuts or traffic on this road whose only at night to avoid being bombed by nightfall

this road will be jammed with trucks military equipment ox carts and bicycles are moving in both directions so even a small bomb crater at the edge of the road just be filled before doc it's been i suppose for having to transport the use of bicycles in this way has been called the secret weapon that help the victim he's defeated the french one bicycle can carry four hundred pounds five and carry a ton of stone or military supplies because the people on the couch more than half a million bicycles are used for transportation the equivalent of twenty thousand five dump trucks

and they don't need a highway just a trail through the jungle only occasionally sees a piece of modern machinery north vietnam usually imported from the soviet union or china equipment such as this could be destroyed by a single bomb most of the work in north vietnam has done this way without machinery as they're doing in this invitation ph we

can you got a few electric pumping stations in north vietnam an installation like this could be destroyed in a single bombing raid but how many bombs will it take to destroy the tens of thousands of people who move rivers with our hands the vietnamese have never known modern technology and so have never become dependent on it

you know they don't rely on machinery they rely on their own ingenuity the muscle and the spirit of determination this it's the answer to the paradox of how a very small country and successfully resist the richest and strongest nation in the world and when they realize i hated most of the repair work is done by the young people of the volunteer youth brigade and a brigade has invested about a hundred thousand boys and girls most of them are between sixteen and twenty two who have volunteered for this work for three years they didn't get any pay they don't even get vacations their work as hard and very dangerous for pings frequently

attacked them want to walk they're divided into unit of about two hundred that are stationed at intervals near the railroad i was staying with a unit of the youth brigade in a small village in kandahar province about four kilometers from the rail line in the early morning a section of the nih receives and direct hits and i went with a volunteer youth brigade thank you right

the name of this bridge come wrong that means the jaw of the dragon it has become a national symbol of defiance this bridge spanning the my river is an important road and rail link and it has been attacked during this war more times than any other single target in north vietnam the authorities here tell me that it is being attacked during the last twelve months no less than one hundred times and make a the seventh fleet has been shelling it also it has been hit a score of times it is better do it is the bad many times are bad but it still stands and it is still the news tv show

the pittsburgh the first convoy of trucks in the villages the work continues into the evening a village where she finishes a bank along the country road that occur but that

it proves across iraq despite its long night journey to enjoy it this is the port of haiphong as faults go it's a small one but doing conscience from almost all parts of the world from the soviet union from china from france and britain and germany from poland in cyprus and a dozen other countries the political consideration a miniature equipment and the steel to repair the broken bridges when i was there this portend

get involved but no one and haiphong expected that to last everyone i talked to felt sure that sooner or later the port would be destroyed the authorities to make that alternative methods of unloading ships have already been booked that a lot in many ways has had a liberating effect upon the winning through sheer necessity owed inhibiting customs had been broken for many young women of the cities and towns would never have involve themselves in anything but their home and their children now they're learning new skills and taking on all kinds of new responsibilities even the small workshops which had been

evacuated from the bomb cities to the country are now operated by women ek many textile factories have been destroyed some are still in operation the war is never far away the young people in north vietnam i urge to follow what they call the three postponements won awards on they asked to postpone fourteen enough if there were really in love they asked to postpone marrying and if they're already married to postpone having children it doesn't always work but

with a number of media now at work hundreds of additional nursery schools as not to take care of the children i asked one of the factory workers with i could see what her living quarters one day he told me with a note of pride in her voice that her husband was away in the army iain lee will

his mother to read it because the scans but that the rice rations adequate and usually there was a good supply of fish and vegetables will again amen he is ms wells

the port is being killed the air raid shelters cost a great deal and the private joseph doesn't have all seven and these have developed simple one men shelters which are nothing more than holes in the ground in hanoi and haiphong these hos are usually nine with some men there are millions of these folks those in north vietnam i found when i had to jump a cover that i was never even in the country more than a few yards from one of these homes these foxholes good protection against everything but a direct hit and they have probably saved thousands of lives

the chemical things this week eight

in all on our shoes yes b reported to congress that in

nineteen sixty seven that where on average thirteen thousand bombing raids on north vietnam every month which is more than four hundred and thirty everyday no wonder temporary hospitals have been set up in almost every age that is one of them all the patients in this hospital where wounded in bombing raids there's no running water here no electricity surgeries performed by flashlight the floors of mud but everything is key it seemed to me that the medical attention was expert it's been years very often buffalo boys become attached to their animals during

an air raid this board refused to leave his buffalo and run to show he tried to drag his animal to a tree to concede it the boy was hit in the stomach by anti personnel parents and both his legs were broken his buffalo was killed in kandahar province an area under almost constant attack i visited another small hospital here to all the patients had been injured by bombs on

it de dios you five months fifteen hours ago this baby was dangerously injured by an anti personnel bomb fifteen years ago the baby's mother lost her arm during the war against the french math know you fifteen years ago

or ten years ago now or an herb herb four miles away in the same heavily bombed and their children from the destroyed city of him how a attend that eventually gets cool in this province when i was there united states beings will move ahead constantly and the people would have to run to their showbiz eight or ten times a day or the first class of the day his instruction

investigate several children had gone to a vintage hospital to be trained and i'm not teaching the other children you're welcome well the

pittsburgh even in human gene and that also says several so i don't know what they do here is coaching

new poet philosopher military strategist and revolutionary he is the symbol of his people's passion and desire for independence from foreign rule almost fifty years ago at the versailles conference following world war wound oh first demanded freedom for his nation from the french in the half century since then he has never stopped fighting for it today nearly eighty years of age who julian often travels to the country villages to me just before they always speak of him as uncle whoa whoa whoa meetings like this a common line on it that now you realize they come from the fact that they worry about that when we

went they put the mike in cancun them that one they all are going to go and i don't want to today everywhere are so has the same message of encourage employees people is telling these villages that soon now or later in vietnam will win its independence and have peace north and south will once more be united he's telling the people that the various declarations of the government could all be summed up in three simple words yankee go the cage the people of north korea

maj gen as presented felix grains north vietnam after a brief pause any teacher will continue with an analysis of this film and a discussion of the conflict with north vietnam why david shaw himself a recent visitor to north vietnam and the roberts' going on a more formal endorsement barrel all of you gemma like theirs to each of you for a brief general reaction to that film when it specifically for sure we will conduct a filipino service phil mother presented north vietnam as the north vietnamese communists would

like to have us say it indeed in my opinion if the north vietnamese ministry of information that made a similar film i think they would emphasize the same points and probably along that the same thing whether the curse you know whether it presents north vietnam the way won zero they want us is here not is really irrelevant question we'll address ourselves to it is this an accurate reflection of vietnamese resistance nominate barack obama and from my own experience in vietnam analysis software is i would say yes it is an accurate reflection of the air war the morale of the people on the matter which they carry all the purposes and functions under attack you would understand it a prominent obviously spirit not whether gay actors say has to be viewed in the road perspective when it comes to north vietnam and the war let me give you a few illustrations of where i think this film is inaccurate for example i think it's an accurate

to present a fifteen minute film on north vietnam and never mention the word commoner somewhat once it gets inaccurate to give the impression that they're either are very few military targets that we're having out there are minimal and that the primary emphasis at least as depicted in this film as a one thousand villages i think its inaccurate to give the impression of that they were the liars contest without pointing out but in this instance go rss play certain limitations on himself including i might say a cost him man than planes because he is the bombing of forty or fifty thousand people in so far as what it did you're not his age its implications know i think there are certain themes that carried through it that again are not accurate if we are going to concentrate only on two points the ones that mr shane brown introduced only the toughness of

the people and the relatively primitive type of society our economy and the difficulty of nation a large scale war to these conditions that i think it's certainly accurate that i would not question well i'm surprised you mentioned that they did mention communism this is true and i think my feelings when in family so that when he does a film about north vietnam as one would also about russia that's one would not waste films to say in the soviet union's communist is rather well known that it is as for the military targets as against the civilian targets appeared agree with you he plays such emphasis on the civilian targets that it gave a false impression that this is what will prove we weren't fighting against however having its useful come to port two warring propaganda to the american people and to the world that we are mainly aimed at military targets because indeed we're not when we destroy whole cities and although perhaps finish respond to four

to one side i think all of the vendors gone too far it's a kind of a fan of a corrective as for david and goliath it is a david and goliath story it's a very small country in a very great country which is attacking it as the limitations personally i can't believe that the dropping over seven thousand tons of bombs among or total damage on that small country are more than on nazi germany an oil or world war two and properly be described as limited government and maoist this show is a chance that future human values shone can conjure them to be let me begin by saying that i would have certainly depicted the fact that the communist leadership in north vietnam has certain very clear objectives of a political nature and i would've spelled those objects tears up i would've attempted to present some background to this controversy and i think incidentally but i would also pointed out that american lives have

been expended whereas they could have been saved that we adopted the kind of bombing tactics that we do toward nazi germany in world war two i think it's a very this could've saved quote american lives in in the sense of relationships between the bombing and our own pilots and ticket he's an old nautical as maverick i'm opposed to it but i'm just pointing this out as an illustration of what i regard as the destroyed here let me go back over to the writer's standpoint which mr shawn brim reyes everybody knows communist that may well be true but we've done some magnificent documentaries on soviet communism and there's been no innovation about going into what the company's position is what the viewers are for example i would think it would be very important to explore the four points and the five points which the communist say are prerequisites for successful negotiations of

this conflict i would also say as of that leonardo and monopolize the time here but i would also say that even on certain more technical aspects when you show the vietnamese people working in some very interesting scenes here to repair hand and feet the damage done i don't think it would be a mess to point out that their considerable number of chinese working in the north you get no evidence that there is any support from chinese police technicians or other external bodies what evidence do you have a really large scale chinese laborer there's been a good deal of reporting on this from various people in north vietnam that they have run into for example i talked to japan with his tamara who was in north vietnam he had seen chinese a human are getting better than me than other of course and it would surprise me there were no chinese but i don't think that a few chinese working in north vietnam there's something so significant that philly

swinger pointed out nor the nature of the four corners of northern edge of the town has poured at as well the difference though i believe the feelings we had set out to do a film called this is not vietnam and meant to be a kind of an omnibus comprehensible for digital donald things and say as i understood what featuring was trying to do and as he explained at the premiere of the film which i attended he wanted to show what north korea looked like in warren on the war which is what people asking about and how to get their supplies through on the bombing and i think he's recently that actually and you say he hasn't told the whole story of lafayette no of course you quite correctly that you that you have written of the north vietnamese people sharing we've called on sharing a great historic invention is a stone substantiate those were to do nothing so he gave that background tov a country which has been a war against foreign invaders for more than one thousand two thousand years of its history a date

certainly have a sense of continuity of history they regard the americans as the latest in a long line of invaders of the country the chinese the mongols japanese the french another that states the government skillfully exploits this they bring up all the heroes of the past though korean green try they have pictures of best heroes they build temples and voters and statues and monuments to them and i tell the people that they are sharing in the great history of a country once again fighting for independence and their spirit those very caught the village green shoulders and that's where the moral fact is that americans must face and try to answer the question of the world the most of all completely us how can this little people in a sense terrible bombing hold out but what's a song for this discussion that this film doesn't use a say everything that the north yemeni ministry of propaganda like it's just like to hear what i'm trying to say those permits unless and we cannot totally ignored sings this name before attempting to

speak to the point referred to something mr schumer and also as one student of asian communism i'm well aware of the fact that communism has sought to use to capture and use the nation's movement not only in vietnam but elsewhere and where it's been most successful it has in some ways you've been able to do that either and said that however i think it's terribly important to point out the other side of the coin that is to say that there are tens of thousands of ardent vietnamese nationalists who do not want to join the communist movement indeed it saves me here again unless we will go into the politics of vietnam a picture like this is a distortion because if you get from this picture the simple little nice closer commoners or the good guys are on the side of all the bad guys are on our side it seems to me at the very least this is a problem

i want to send to write well i think any good piece of propaganda says more than one thing and i think this is quite a good piece of propaganda dozens of bahrain the fight for a beautiful photography into that lyric and a very vivid vital presentation i would say four bishops basically number one that this third north vietnam cannot be defeated because hands and feet are stronger than bombers on max men disappeared a weapon she might say to use the mouse faces number two cats or the north vietnamese people are engaged on mats and there's a man was a nation of foreign aid in this picture there is some reference to it but it's really

quite minimal in so far as the presentation was concerned that number three that the bombing is unjust immoral and it is wreaking havoc upon innocent people and you get the usual presentation of lots of women and children involved on what to say in passing the north vietnamese government has without some statements that civilian casualties have been rather minimal i don't remember the precise figures when they were strikingly low on the other hand the south vietnamese government has said that there were over thirty five hundred civilians in the south that were killed by communist terrorism last year about five thousand kidnap a bad of course you wouldn't put into this picture finally i would say there's the thesis right at the outset that all races creeds and groups are living in harmony that this is a perfect society that's been disrupted from external sources now it only terribly interesting to

analyze each of these themes some degree of truth exists in them in some of them in varying degrees i would say oh you work from propaganda to a more balanced approach i think in a way though your question itself vehicle and they say so is unfair when you said what they tried to tell us now an enormous reminds you know that this film was made by fear which way my sentence in prison as a session we will assume that this was a message from the north vietnamese <unk> information impressed with that well on its of its of its appeal was a former hard to upset because you know neither is really isn't that it is felix greene with a thorough knowledge though i would agree with one exception the work of dystopian or said about four things one north vietnam and actually the figures of fame and a very effectively present of one i have to believe that is also correct secondly that people all mass or working for the country that that would be true when the things are startled me as i went around north vietnam is it stopped offering going to hamlet's place that i knew well that i

visited many times book of cousins and discovered that all of the patients have been harmed the government is truly rifles the militias have been created any government that can give weapons and rifles to its people must be pretty sure of the support of his people find out that our own government would distribute weapon for example in holland brought to chicago detroit on this that i think that i think they still count on the fact that the people united behind the regime against what they considered the american aggression and in a curious why all bombs has really forged a unity which had not totally existed before the event their difficulties north vietnam in nineteen fifty six a peasant uprisings the regime a very serious errors many will kill the regime admitted publicly but now i think under american bombs a kind of unity and forge and people are working on mars these hundreds of

thousands of bicycles the girls that we saw play in the field with these baskets on was literally jumping rope i've seen as a hundred times in the film was very active in that respect we use a minimal foreign aid was mentioned i think what field's green and i would be inclined to agree with them is that the amount of foreign aid in the total effort the north are young is making is minimal indeed after all they haven't called upon russians or chinese to give them soldiers were saigon as required us to give five hundred thousand soldiers to the army they are unwilling or unable to fight for themselves but had lawyers not as the soldiers north and i live as for any but vietnamese soldiers so it's a foreign aid rice from china's more long from china missiles and heavy weapons from russia or isn't for third in the total effort as i can see that it is less important than the effort that the people of north korea to making that you say that the bombing is shown as unjust and immoral and that innocent people suffer i think that's true of many innocent people suffer if he gives the impression that all would do is bombing

innocent people of course it would be quite wrong but unquestionably many innocent people suffer and finally you say gives impression of harmony in a perfect society where we saw the same film i did not get the impression that village green was trying to tell us that this is a perfect society do you believe that north korea cannot be defeated i believe the north vietnam and the national liberation front cannot be defeated because of more than one put into this war but if we go by north vietnam along i don't think any amount of money will make them surrender or will bring them to be stable and agreed to pull out of the war i think they cannot be four seven worn out and even on the first place i don't think that the shoe bombing rides on forcing north vietnam of of the lord if i may go on this point though i have many earlier disagreements with mr sean combs analysis

if i made well on this particular point no more complicated the ship to emerge probably in this crisis than the issue of the bombing of the north and certainly one factor involved was were not communists employee in the concept of people's war updated text only seeking to unify those countries through the use of large scale violence should be primitive a privileged sanctuary that is to say could you assume of all acquit or medical technicians could get to the seventeenth carolyn scott free and little damage took place on the other side it loses usually not that mountain and i think barack obama can be defeated i think that it is time now to see whether north vietnam wishes to have some kind of compromise sentiment and here i might say i'm not too

optimistic though i think one can always hope but i'd like to go back to a couple of the points were sure they've made this question for example of you mr green prison a scene of people living in harmony i don't have to remember the second thing it starts out with both as catholics eyes all living in common than i was and i think making out anything here i think secondly the but the important point i would make about soviet and chinese assistance is different than when you admit i would say that soviet and chinese assistance is indispensable to the continuance of the war and that there without that assistance they communists could not continue the worn ironically less so as very important but we have a difference of opinion about cisco's that rut i'd like to go on with this point because you make a continuous

were a distinction between and ian l f i hope we get that this show because i think this would be a point where we probably would have very different views will it have i would make the point with respect to the mls those files of course if you say that every person in the mls as a communist others will that is incorrect but i think the evidence now is overwhelmed but the basic directives of the eno of emanate from hanoi and indeed feedback to suggest so anybody who has strong doubts on this artery the so called cousin document that was taken injunction operation junction city which spells out very very clearly the fact that this is a unified communist operation with a relationship that has hierarchical that doesn't mean that every element in the mls as common as even within the top

echelons there are some non communist presumably but this artificial separation of him on the left is i think to a very mistaken both about the character of events and what is likely to happen friday don't agree with at all on the mls as you know very well was formed in december nineteen sixty he has all of the advice of hanoi the people been fighting in the south often on now since nineteen forty six have frequently i was good cause accused hanoi of abandoning them amalie abandon the south after the convention of march nineteen forty six which was signed with essentially for north vietnam and allowed kitchen janitor made more or less a french colony he wants to consolidate his barn and off at the time of the geneva treaty once again gucci mane pulled its forces out of south vietnam north of the seventy two wave elections and when the elections were held he didn't send those troops back again and the southerners accused him of abandoning them then they started their own people and they were not health plan on our own government doesn't find that hanoi

seventy regular troops surveyed four hundred percent early nineteen sixty five and as for their objective be insane i was in hanoi an incumbent talking to the mls went on the first of member of the shia they promulgated a new program which i'm sure you've read and does not agree at all when hanoi his own objectives and you may say this is a shadow play and they're saying different things that mean the same thing it was debris that they're saying different things i don't agree and sort of the different things and it's a wide public view of all let me just responsive or three points anyway because i think each of them is important and i think that where we differ sharply as we do on these points we ought to get the evidence out on the page of threats firstly your theory of the way in which the iowa of was formed contradicts my beliefs on the evidence that i've seen very strongly the mls has i see the evidence was formed in

the nineteen fifty nine sixty period incidentally the ratification took place in the fall of nineteen sixty one one of the top leaders of hanoi those southern in origin was in south vietnam at a part of this time and help to formulate the program the l l y as a creature of paranoia in this sense in my opinion and i think the evidence is very strong for third congress of the log on party ratified piano left an effect but the decision was made this place a period or secondly the question of going to hanoi state you see i think what confuses this problem is that if you say hanoi was sending organized units south in this period that is not correct but if you say that all during this period what we call regroup because having been in the south going north for training an undertaking certain assignments and

being sent by almost all of them seven's initially then have always involvement is crucial that i don't think anyone that i know of who study this area denies that more government denies that are in your long list of others good let's go to geneva i think here to the point that i would emphasize very strongly is that this thesis about elections i quite frankly regarded somewhat phone i regard this funny because the thesis that you could have free and fair elections either in north or south vietnam at any time after nineteen fifty four as fallacious how can you have free and fair elections in the country that's already removed its opponents that's already dissolved opposition parties that has controlled must be so i say book and i think it's terribly important to point out there for the hinge the figure of geneva upon are not allowing free elections is i think stretching

before isn't it true that geneva did agree that free election is by secret ballot controlled by international powers should be held was that there was an agreement but there was a different interpretation incidentally of the concept of election came out that there were those who felt others will as the facade of guarding the polling places on election day they're carried out it didn't matter the context in which the options well was as ever said at the geneva follow widely united states of america objected to giving as it did what is the united states of america declined to sign the geneva agreements vision of heaven as a government of south vietnam war so that it learns i'm afraid that as a misleading statement as two scholars of vietnam we better get this fractious grade level on the final declaration on geneva was a verbal declaration nobody's side when you say the united states

didn't sign of a sort of an implication that we refuse that nobody in that declaration was read aloud by anthony eden each country was asked to stand up and say what it would do about one of those countries with the united states of america in the person of general bill smith i'm sure that you are serious value read all the documents now general smith was speaking for our government in general smith said that the united states would not use force over frozen assets that radical to it was a refusal to enter into a joint statement that's exactly my point le point is meaningless dayan the united states of america made a statement saying that it would not overthrow the women of course but that's not why you ask this is a time to ask whether we signed a joint statement i never i never thought well this is the united states of america was not responsible in any way the united states of america are voicing objections to the geneva agreement signed a separate protocol agree not to use force to overthrow the status quo and i think that that is a way to

put this we started by putting what would you agree with me that the united states made a statement at geneva saying it would not use force to overthrow us and it is not a pass at this disaster now separate or joy is it a responsible decision by our government so it certainly is and we did not use force in our way of thinking to overthrow that you know somebody over for them we argue that the decisions made by the communists to use large scale violence were responsible for the overthrow of the jundi sure notice not true what about large scale violence began and it began insisting on sixty then how could have been an effect on the fifty six i really love the fifty six agreement related only to interpretation of the elections won't occasionally gotten or do in june on her way to sell the geneva treaty there will be free of elections by july of nineteen and if there can be no for election day when nobody ever said if they can be missed

the beatles that never stood up and said that they cant be free election you see this goes but they say that the representatives of the two zone south and north through zones not to countries should meet by july nineteen fifty five in electoral commission to set the terms of free elections that was the point that we could have gone and said now this is what we want to assure freedom instead we feel is doable right simple as a dual question back to my major point we'll get that measure for the major point was that the geneva elections hinged upon free and fair elections do you think so that it was possible the whole free and fair elections in hanoi at any time or in north vietnam after nineteen fifty i have no idea i would have liked to know i want you to answer this do you find that and it was i don't know i can do with hypotheses you're asking me would something happened or i can tell you that it was

supposed to happen and the lively show excess that we think we have lots of evidence what had happened to the non communist leaders that were important the constitution opposition in north vietnam what had happened to these leaders while for one thing you have the famous non violent for which i think you're familiar with that in which a number of hanoi intellectuals who were even try and in certain sensors to collaborate with the marxist leninist moment were put down you also have issues of referred to at the peasant uprising which was put down ruthlessly where is the evidence that you couldn't have a legitimate spoken opposition that would've been allowed to use mass media and campaign the evidence is found in an agreement of international supervision over a secret ballot and if we had applied that we could've forced the communist only elections or if they didn't agree we then the republicans said this is a farce the elections that you know we didn't dare tested and the reason is quite obvious why

president eisenhower himself has admitted it many others admitted poaching he was the hero of his country he had defeated the french a small asian people are defeated a great white western pop and hold by the estimate of the president every other observers sure yourself included would have won eighty percent of the vote now you see this is also an interesting point that's made over and over again all would have wanted i've always us first of course that the whole eisenhower statement the clothes because joe iser has rarely quote with of vietnam by your stuff like that and i think the one that you quote in your say what he said was approaching and then ran against the emperor about that's right in nineteen fifty four in serving up and i didn't have to sign it before us about that i was the whole repository of force legitimacy that we're using was then depots by guardians yeah well a dictator we haven't solved it would have been like if anything i think we're getting off on some pretty

small point because like that are largely here and a very important one is that there's a distinction between an individual part if you're saying that what she meant is in the village would've gotten their high above i think this is correct but if you are saying that if the vietnamese communist party had surface and runs the park that you would have gotten the majority of the vote i said the burden of proof is on you and let me tell you prove only vague nature of vietnam is such that people when they have freedom to vote and vote in accordance with religion regional affiliations sexual violence and we've seen this over and over again i think there's every reason to believe that is free and fair elections could be held throughout vietnam you would get an enormous proliferation of parties and groups reflective of these defendants david you said something isn't the bombing has given the north it means people are unity you never had before

and that's true of all people elizabeth i lived in london over the bliss and love the unity of the of the british was actually solidified by the nazi attacks and i think the people of vietnam are engaged in what anyone would agree is for them a war of survival and to whatever problems they have among each other they've very simply to survive under american bombing projecting one people think might have the bombing to stop orleanian thing much is going to change the country have been so well organized now by the regime and by the communist party the glamour and you'll see the hamlet now groups his life around two essential individuals who organize the content quite remarkably and that is the county agent was a government representative and the coming to sell the beloved aunt was a party and these men have scenes and rifles and ammunition and bandages know if they have the things the persons need to be working so closely with the peasants in the war that they had won acceptance of the

regime in some places enthusiastic support even campaign manager such as far as him and forty and i believe the bombing stopped the lights will just go back to normal illinois and despite any of great differences with the car i believe that the communist regime is fully in control of north vietnam how would you contrast to the spirit of the north vietnamese people is depicted in the snow with a spirit of the american people of the well as a it and fair contrasts with two different kinds of people i i don't want to answer your question out for before the contrast the mood in north vietnam with a selfie in the same country it is remarkable that the communist have been able to sow identify themselves with nationalism and so motivated people that they fight very successfully against our commanders pot and against the saigon government without one foreign soldier helping hand out that lee the united states heston support the saigon government

was i got the mood collapse as our country alt country is not a country is ten thousand miles away from battlefield we are thank goodness of democracy the right of dissent in our country i think morale here in the united states has been very seriously shaken by the profound divisions among men of goodwill and friends and scallop feelin myself would we have so many things and he we are disagreeing on vietnam this device academic colleagues to divide friends as you know it divides families are this great to send protests violence in our country that disturbs everyone loves his country it american morale has suffered but seriously as compared to morale in north vietnam with us the surprising than a few bombs dropped on washington i think the morale which are and i would go first nurse so that i didn't have to underline something that i think is terribly important matters though they were talks as if

all of the true vietnamese patriots and motionless for common is this is simply not so i think ordinary things i didn't say that i define south with a nationalist motivated by most modern most suggests that what to me is extraordinary is that with all of the troubles involved in trying to get a truly representative government established in saigon not a one party state but something that will give representations a different group it's a no one would doubt least for me the problems involved in the uncertainties as to the future of representative government well i make the point very strongly that despite this none of the significant nationalists of south vietnam to join the communist movement the money what i'd like to continue this this discussion and to set in our country in a statement the department fourteen others gather you wrote our opponents can upon our impatience our pensions this hour in the torrent they must be proven wrong how heavily in your

opinion is had on banking on internal dissent and this point oh i think illinois accounts rather heavily opponents states fall in the center of france that is a combination of external world pressures of internal dissension producing forehand on a combined political military victory and write i think no i think the role but let me just go on for months a hanoi says this all the time in there in their propaganda they say we know with satisfaction the progressive peoples of the world including the american people joining our cause well i think all of us would agree incidentally that i've very insignificant percentage of americans so are opposed to the war because their programming stunt i don't want that implication made apple and five must say in our state that we did not make this a month and i think one has to separate two things the importance of

pointing out that the non has politicized this war to the maximum and is going to continue to politicize the war and that means trying to interact with dissidents wherever they exist it's and this is a very powerful aspect of illinois program the other side of this is that of course were going to protect the right of the search in this country we must now we've got to draw some lines between this and an illegal action that's another matter and i don't think we should get into this discussion which and probably because long way away from where we agree completely wrong that i couldn't agree with you more aren't it's interesting that you keep oliver are talking about hanoi accounting very heavily upon us and the united states and i must say i don't agree with your medical i think that hanoi ways this is one factor in the war and that they appreciate those factor and i think it's useful work of people aren't built to handle oily an l f an experience of two decades now that has convinced me that these people know that they must in the final analysis rely upon

themselves pushing me in and the people who only lead including many national us from nineteen forty five on the fight through nineteen forty nine four years all along without chinese a four there was no red china until december nineteen forty nine without russian aid for the russians did not recognize know until january nineteen fifty they've relied upon themselves an eye for long and they know that they have been abandoned before by their so called communist allies they know that the russians have pulled the rug out from under the chinese they count on nobody but themselves now they don't feel that the sense in america might weaken the resolve to some extent and they judge that as anybody would as one of several factors i think that self reliance or what is the feel of what they're what they exist for real we are differing here in degree perhaps but i wouldn't say it's number one and annoyed that they recognize as the

crucial importance of come and soviet chinese eight and the missions that it is sending to begin in moscow periodically to discuss this are one sign among many of how crucial that assistance is to them i don't think you would argue that if tomorrow a mosque down picking turned off the aid hanoi wouldn't be in desperate straits is this may surprise you i would org you that no matter what russia and china did that hanoi and yuki like mr ross talking only about hamlet but hanoi and the two hundred and fifty thousand men fighting on a banner of the mls would continue to fight about why are you making this separation maybe we can get into this question of your sense of the difference between an all in the mls for variety of reasons the two of the two hundred and fifty thousand men which is a very estimate we get from the pentagon and fighting there are some fifty thousand north vietnamese regulars troops and some two hundred thousand the south vietnamese men fighting under the mls now these two hundred thousand men of southerners they're not

know those are not all of the two hundred thousand i think you'd be the first one maybe to be appointed was so are communists you don't have that many hard core of fighting are a sense that that's right that two hundred thousand and many years ago or non communist nationalist selfie and is fighting for what they consider to be the independence of their country against what they consider to be a puppet military dictatorship insight on the client of the united states of america that's the way they see it now they have been fighting this law since nineteen forty six as a very very long time they thought first against the french along then we came in and helped the french with aides and two billion dollars worth of aid from forty nine to fifty four and they won the war against the french then we substitute us of movement for them it's a continuing war oh you're talking about and talking about various groups once called the viet mean the league for independence in vietnam the viet minh was dominated largely by the first elements of the indo chinese communist

party and then the loud on when it revises cell from the original and the chinese communist party and a number of nationalist groups remnants of the vienna judy be the jive yeah but afterward kerry voiced troops withdraw these groups enjoy and which remain in the underground they were still without you mean when he emerges from the nineteen forty five and which remain organize the viet mean as the dominant force and became and remains the dominant force of vietnam when the communist leadership successfully so this is just to my question is directed toward to efforts there there is no question in my mind as a us that the viet minh its initial period in the period roughly down the nineteen fifty and slightly below was a broad united front although at certain junctures individuals had to make a basic decision i was talking about

earlier are you going to serve under the communist know incoming is dominant success are you know that's a very painful decision from and the making of the second part of the makers of my nineteen fifty fifty one fifty two coming this dominance of this moment was so clear that those were not prepared to answer that question i pose an affirmative got out and that's certainly true that most of the end to the dea and other types of that sort of ivf that is a what i come back to david as this piano after day has set forth its terms we start to talk about that and got sidetracked and i find these terms terribly interested because in my opinion there is only one issue in vietnam and that one issue is charlotte be a unified communist dominated vietnam or shallot now this to me is what makes a vietnam question so complicated because that's money show easily compromise i don't see any sign on the one hand the family wishes to compromise those i don't see a sign with the intellect incidentally there was a

january first secret meeting between and an hour of middle level padre and an american and british correspondent them once again this was published in the christian science monitor incidentally and once again the l f one was hard you cannot have the those other than the patriots who fought for the liberation involved in the political system which was a part of the ten points this was a formula specifically what each of the gentleman on is a satisfactory resolution was for lung cancer week i think we should first listener to what we're about and say and eighty during the debate whether or not vietnam should be united and whether or not the vietnam should be common has dominated is not the business responsibility right or interest of the united states of america we have no business getting in there in the first place and we have got into a can of

worms that we're not going to ever be able to clear up and i think that eventually we must get out having made a great big mess we cannot and should not was reportedly turned tail and run it we radically the rest are in the sense of extricating ourselves from our normal and in that sense we want to be brave and very hard to believe other things along with a revised the specifics i'll try hard today i think the first step but the very first step towards caring about to stop bombing north vietnam and to accept the challenge of becoming less of an oil flow into us stop bombing and we will talk it spin over two weeks now since they've told us and our government is running around serious complications difficult when it was put in favor of peace when they say all right stop and we'll talk to you it becomes was complex issue in the world i say stop the bombing has not been totally effective it is not force them out of the war does not force and i think that would be a fair thing to stop the bombing and say whether or not they will talk and whether or not they'll

take advantage of the cessation of bombing and test them i think the risk of evaluation is less than the risk though of the escalation unless the risk of escalation which might bring about a war i think we must change the climate we must limit this war before world war three breaks out so the first step stop bombing talk to north vietnamese see what happens to offer as long as is necessary so long as they're not taking advantage of that period by greatly increasing their effort i think we should talk to be an outlet malls and finally i believe that i'm going quickly there many qualifications i should get i think bob knows what they are i think that we should accept the geneva principle it should be an international conference that would set up the terms of elections to a new assembly for yourself i think that the american troops would be withdrawn and i think senator by sector we should turn over our sectors department of the army of saigon and let's see whether they're willing to fight for the

country we ought to day sending a teen a nineteen year old american men into war and they'll refuse to draft they're eighteen a nineteen year old boy's in saigon i think that we must be faithful to what the president told us in nineteen sixty four to what kennedy said to what eisenhower said that american boys mustn't fight a war that asians to fight for themselves so we should transfer sect is give them all the arms try to get an international conference the ceasefire and elections and extricate the united states step by step from this terrible dilemma that we find ourselves in in vietnam people in the first place i think one thing we've all noted in this discussion is putting vietnam in any context that is to say we've talked about it as if it were a vacuum all unto itself to me the most extraordinary thing the last forty five years is that the decision of the united states to make a commitment in southeast asia has changed the whole political and military structure that area from indonesia through male asian into thailand and burma in

this entire region want to discuss the new policy trends in japan i've been powerfully affected by the decision that there can be a balance of power that there can be some political equilibrium in this part of the world and that in my opinion is crucial to the prevention of world war three because if at any point a philosophy that you can use violence to change or alter or to put it to your advantage international agreements however imperfectly his enunciated in the principles of asian politics this area is far too vital to the big part of the world to remain outside the conference german partially but i don't wanna be lopsided about the china problem on the one hand we certainly must contain and deter chinese extremism and the other hand i think it's terribly important we open up avenues so that if and when pragmatists come to power in china there will be available chants in all of these murders you see i would take the

position that we have to pursue what i called incremental policies not total listed words mollohan are not all up but that limit the stages of development able to come into a policy issued fifty four and stand that that position or go up to sixty two but no higher or down the forty but no low oh does this mean specifically in case of vietnam as i said earlier to me that radiation in vietnam and as the only issue is will the communist unify the country by force or can there be to vietnam's one for the communists and one for those who don't want to live under the communists a communist really don't believe they could when elections in south vietnam and uneven structured for elections they call strikes that therefore they've tried to get people not to vote and i think joe hickey whose article and this will vary interest in the mid point of that all of their political efforts have been very minimal in effect they're structured as a military go rock outfit at the moment

and not as a political operation not therefore if they would accept the concept of free elections if they would accept the concept of mutual military de escalation this would be the first stage in my opinion toward getting some kind of viable solution we use something called were experimental cancer what do you mean by experian i think it's quite clear that if we were to market to say we unconditionally stop the bombing because you say you will come to the table we take certain kinds of risks unless we make it clear that some degree of reciprocity must follow you will remember that the communists came to the table and then john and they sat there for two years while twenty thousand american boys was there like nobody you have several times uses phrase the continent from a scholar like yourself i can understand that you know i'm not saying that the korean communist

chinese punishment yet to be determined as a one breed of cattle if i'm certainly not saying the nation communism is monolithic absolutely not what i am saying this that that and if you want it sounds and please do i am so but at this point in history there's of an interesting division between the european communists whose tactics and strategy are now based upon peaceful coexistence and the asian communist leaders whose tactics and strategy are not based on peaceful coexistence and that's a significant difference and my whole thrust this will only have peace in asia or we can begin to get the asian communists to take a look at their tactics and strategy of violence and services to resonate or the current level where and that we will also as historians and scholars recognize the fact that each country has suffered in particular in different circumstances cargo political social and economic there's this notion that there's such a thing as asian communism they're very different vietnam is unique in so

nowadays your letters that's why to my wife is there any one of these asian communist party's that has in its tactics and strategy not as well it's the thesis that violence is the only reliable method to produce change yes joy in life for example in china from nineteen fifty up until nineteen fifty seven the chinese were very minor you know you talk and i just thought about chinese extremism and it's highly inappropriate for an american citizen whose country is violently bombing in asia and sent a half a million people within a few hundred miles of china's wonky up with other chinese reaction to pull the chinese extremist i'm astonished guys you knew are two is a scholar china's been as restrained as china hasn't been made go and that has both ends of that experience just president i had in the first place i continually come back to a point that though we certainly have on north vietnam extensively we have it within our power and you

notice to eradicate north vietnam and from the map and the fact that we have risk american lives over months and months and months in an effort to avoid that kind of total mass destruction of this country is one indication again those are so the glow of as play certain limitations upon his power now with respect to china and i would put it this way david many of us have said and myself that we think that if we were to march to the yahoo in the sense of i land operation against north vietnam or the total liquidation of this area the risks of china involving yourself in this war would indeed be very great and i think that's probably true but the point i would make is that when you hearings chinese extremism on to this one facet of chinese politics i think you do the field somewhat of a disservice i would put it this way mobs of those theories

that man over weapons' read over expert to me what's going on in china in recent months and years has been a dramatic struggle between what i call the primitive from the professionals the match happens in many respects to represent that old romantic revolutionary first generation gorilla talk which is still very much in evidence in north koreans are that way and also in vietnam which is to some extent rely upon primitive as you yourself have said yes it's true but nonetheless at some stage in the evolution of the society that kind of extremism that i think is represented by this primitive just approach it as to say for example that power comes out the barrel of the gun then a man over weapons' sacrifice overall no economic incentives are limited one says at some point in the evolution of the society's if we can keep the peace now peace in the broader sense of asia i think we can witness an evolution toward more modest china are starving the peace

of a job by sending invading armies into other countries starting the case of asia why training tai revolutionized by threatening the burmese government with over seven thousand miles it with burma which loses this vote for peace when you ask the burmese the overthrow and they winter much surely when events even though i don't know this was when it was the five year itch is that there is this saturday but sihanouk himself said stop pushing me around or i will resign bring the army in europe pro american government now i ask you that but my point is unless we can achieve some political equilibrium us so it's normal for him is filled with sheet the political level i think we're well and ruth doing if as i said earlier we don't become either immobilized by virtue of our impatience an opt out or on the other hand become panicked and escalate the global war which i think would

be equally possessed only are you good finally answered without it you're out of the question that i was myself to what would i do and i said well i get to the chaos of the idea about what do you want to accomplish what your objective the vietnam you see in the long run then i might not disagree with you all about getting out under the right conditions to me for example is not incompatible aren't yes and the true neutralization of indochina and its desirable of the people wanted the rhyme but when i say true neutralization i'm not using this time as the prime minister using i mean by this an enforceable multilateral agreement and one that has not violated as the calmness pilot of the laotian agreement for i think this is a clear you don't wanna argue layoffs bigger you know i'm an agreement we violated laws sixty two percent a very suggestive what i would do i would explore with

utmost seriousness every overture of hanoi pro fighting i made it clear that there had been military reciprocity or informal in the form of de escalation of their infiltration as we de escalate of the bombing and whether the precise timing of this is not important to me that is i would be perfectly willing if we can get some kind of private assurances or something that looks reasonable to make the first things that was about me but we've got to have the sense of reciprocity <unk> briefly the only thing they are doing in the war is going to the aid of allies of the mls infiltrating as you say it they would stop that they be pulling out of the war so you're calling for this a rental i think if you are correct if you are correct or perhaps not you but some others and assert that the south vietnamese people our overthrowing their government were trying to say that mutual the

escalation of the two parties concerned ought not to be so difficult the point i want to make is this art do you yourself david think that had on it at the moment is interested in making any substantial concessions and to reduce the four point five point position so that holds out whether new and i'd great no and this point way a great way to make any concessions other than dividing that country maintaining an independent non communist american client state in south vietnam known and only had a few minutes and i know this probably was difficult as some of those two but is there anything in summation of one thousand and twelve i think i can really only repeat what i said earlier and that is we have to extricate ourselves i think we're fighting the wrong war in the wrong place wrong time and i am i think the honor of our

country is a state i think we've lost prestige of that we've lost allies i think overall opposition in the world the weekend as a result of this war our own society and very badly split and we have great internal problems to face at home i think that this is probably the most unfortunate and just more that we go forth to the mexican spanish american adventures imperialism in and i will would hope very much that americans would learn the facts about vietnam decide what true national interests or and those were picked to get ourselves i think were called for them to do so and retain all credibility in the world i think that it's quite clear that at this point the vietnam is connected with the whole future history of eastern asia that a communist victory in vietnam and my opinion will reduce the credibility of the united states is there although we can undermine all of the small non asian a non communist asian states and will produce that kind of

political upheaval that will lead to world war three contrary to be an act of peace it will be an act of war a lot like again our guests david schoenbaum end up around the skillet you know this is the question for a meeting it's both burman railroad is an nba team and their national educational television only

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