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Enthusiastic United States euppo: ‘© provided for a variety of inhuman pacification the. cs of dubious ef- fectiveness. Entire rural communities were arbitrarily resettled in prison-Sike camps to prevent their pro viding succor to the rebettious forres. New chemicals warfare tactics, introduced to defoliate wooded arca had the side effect of destroying crops. a fact which aid not deter us frow using them. Brutal tortures and the burning of entire villages were undertaken at a means of extracting information about Viet Cong and other rebels from eyinpathetio peasants. Practices whose cruelty revolte civilized men and which must certainly be considered “crimes against humanity” if that teria has any meaning whatsoever became standard pro- cedure. Not surprisinghs. the more destructive and grotesque the combat tactics, the greater berame the resentment of the local peasantry which had to bear the wrath of both antagonists (more than eighty per cent of Vietnani's population is rural), The arca of the country under rebel control continued to inerease, and the number of guerrilla recruite (a the rebels’ cause grew to the currently estimated twenty-five thousand. with sym pathizers. perhaps running into the millions. providing food and shelter. Defections from the South Vietnamese army itself have become inercasingly a problem. and niost of the rebels’ weapons are reported to consist of United States arme which haye been captured by, sold or given to the rebel forces. There is no way to distinguish pro: rom, anti-govern- ment sympathizers awovg-t the local populace, The tall, fairskinned Americans are the only obvious in- trudere, a fact which gives eloquent credibility to the wideapread charge that we are the new colonialists. To tne Vietnamese who watch their country being ra- vaged and their people being mutilated by the air power and my-trriows chemical agente which we have supplied, the igea tat the Gnited Stetes may be using Vietnamese territory ia achieve American objectives becomes inerea-ingls convincing. Qur protestations that we are fighting for liberty ring hollaw when it is only by the foree of Vuited States support that the unpopu- Jar South Vietnamrse governments have heen able to achieve and retain power. Our exbortations that Com- mais piist he dofrated seen irrelevant in an area whece other foes ace och more tangible. More re- cently. our talk of introducing nuclear weapons awakens latent memuaries with racist overtones potentially more explosive than the A-bomb itself. UN, Secretary Gen. eral © Thant. himself a Burmese, even felt obliged 10 wara the Cnited States bow such a decision would be viewed by Asians. He said: s. action is sure to generate widespread resentment and ister criticisms, particularly from quarters which so fac have not heen very vocal. and have not been very ouspoken regassing the situation in Southeast Asis, In 145, when atone bombs were dropped over Hiroshime and Nagasaki in Japan, there was a widespread feeling many parts of Asia that these deadly atomic bombs were dropped on Japanese cities because the Japanese were nonwhites . The American public has been intentionally victimized throughout this entire adventuce, The genuine complex- ity of the situation as been made particularly unintel- Jigihle hy distorted reparting and 6 partial blackout on news Troa the areca. apparentiy at the instigation of Washington authorities. According to a recent New York Times editorial (July 29, 19641, “the Govern- ment’ negative —indecd repressive and distorjed—news policies ghscured both the purposes and ‘progress of the war, The public was nat only misinformed by Gov- erpinent spokesmen gmt. ) hel {and the trath Qo cried.” The shifting pronounces mente and blatant Whtradictions of Secretary McNa- mara have exasperated members of the Senate as well asthe press and the public. Optimien and gloom have played tag in official 8 ashington views since early 1961, Troop cutbacks have been made. only to be reversed within a few months. MeNamara’e predictions, reiter- ated at recently ax February 1964, of ceentially total United States milinary withdrawal by 1965. have been replaced by an announcement (July 27, 1964) of a five thomand man inerease in our Vietnam military mis. sion and by talk of twenty imuce yeart of warfare. Similar contradictions can be found between the erm pathetic support which rebel forces obviously receive from the rural populace throughout South Vietnam and the claim of Prewier General Khanh that “the people have called for the war to he casried to the North.” Guerrilla insurgents can anceeed only when the sure rounding population provides them aid and cover, a fact which acconnts both for the sucerss of the rebel forces in the South and the failure of attempts to carry out subversion in the North. Speculating oa the wiss dom of United States-eponsored infiltration of the North, the New York Times’ military speciatict, Hanson Bald. in. eaid: “The population of North Vietnam ie un- be friendly.” Actually, the commander of ctnam’s Air Force announced at a preset con- ference on July 22. 1965, in the presence of top-ranking United States officers, that combat teams bave been jnfiltrated inside North Vietnam for at feast three gears, without aucerss. Massive aerial attack on Norih Vietnam, on the other hand, requires na popular enpport whateovver. At dhe same press confereiwe on July 22nd. Air Commodore Ky announced that thirty pilots bad been epecially trained to bomb North Vietnam. “We could go this fieravon,” he said. “T cannot aseure you that all af orth ¥ietnam would be destroyed, but Hanui would certainly be destroyed.” The extent of the direcr invelvement of the Nocth in the insurgency activitier has in fact heen a subje of considerable disagreement among knowledgeable observers. As secently as March 196d. Pulitzer-Prize- winning reporter David Halherstam. of the New York Times, reported: The war is largely a coullit of Southerners fought on Southern land. No capture ef North Vietnamese in the South has come to digh. By mid-J964 charges of actual intervention of North Victnuprese military forees in the Southeen steugele were being heard with inercasing frequency. Although nat yet eubstantiated, shinld sach reposts in fact prove true they would certainly indicate a widening of the framework within which this civil war ie being Sought. Key United States deaders lisse admitted, however, mat seria} hombardment of North Vietnam would. by ite self, be mnlikely to improve substantially the situation in the South. There are aleo significant by-products which deserve ious consideration with respect to bombing Notth Viet. nam. Such action would further fasten upon the United States the image of unprovoked destroyer of Asian peoples and their property. It would accelerate the conversion of Vietnamese Nationalists to pro-Commua- ists, a shift which our obtuse policy has been secom- plishing in the South for quite some time. Furtuernure. such au attack would push North Vietnam firmly inta the arma of China to which she would obviou-ly ° to turm for support, Thus we would accompli palatable facts were with