Vietnam: A Rebuttal

(The following represents the opinion of a minority of the Editorial Board)

Yesterday's editorial in the CRIMSON, and Administration statements on Vietnam, obscure the real issue of the war. Both the editorial and the government hold out a hope that our improving military posture will force a negotiated settlement, creating a neutral coalition government. These positions draw attention from the central goal of American policy: preventing Communist domination of Vietnam. By clinging to this goal, the government forecloses all possibility of meaningful negotiation.

I. Negotiations

The Johnson Administration has stressed repeatedly its willingness to negotiate a settlement of the war at any time under any conditions. At the some time, however, according to Neil Sheehan in last week's New York Times, the United States "has made clear to Hanoi through neutral intermediaries and in the fine print of its public pronouncements that it will not countenance a Communist South Vietnam or the creation of any coalition regime in Saigon which might lead to a Communist seizure of power." The government seems to ask of Hanoi that it bring an end to guerrilla activities in the South, agree to a permanently divided Vietnam, and accept a government in the South with no Communist influence. By quitely insisting on these conditions, it makes the prospect of negotiations meaningless for Hanoi and the Viet Cong, who have fought 20 years for exactly what Washington would have them renounce.

Hanoi has offered its own set of preconditions for negotiation: it has asked the United States to agree in principle to the freedom of South Vietnam to choose its own government (which they feel must necessarily include the National Liberation Front), the eventual withdrawl of all foreign troops from Vietnam, and ultimately a unified and independent Vietnam. Those principles have in turn been rejected by the Johnson administration.

On May 15, for instance, the United States ceased in bombing of North Vietnam with the apparent hope that Hanoi would show its willingness to come to the table. On May 18, Hanoi relayed its conditions for negotiations through the French government. The United States did not reply, and resumed the bombing a day later.

In the same way, the NLF has made a series of peace offers which Washington has ignored by leaving their consideration to the government in Saigon. During the last week in July, the New York Times reported that the Viet Cong proposed a coalition government formed by direct elections, allowing the U.S. a six-month period of withdrawl from the country. The offer was rejected by Saigon and left unexplored by the United States, which clearly found the prospect of Communist victory in the elections unthinkable.

The Administration now says it has made enough overtures for negotiation and that future advances must come from Hanoi. And yet it must know that Hanoi will not renounce the possibility of Communist domination in the South. As long as the U.S. refuses to "countenance" a Communist South-Vietnam, the prospects for negotiation are at a stalemate. Washington's continual talk of negotiations is pure deception.

II. The Long War

The Administration is left only with the possibility of preventing a Communist South Vietnam by pacifying the country. Recent newspaper accounts suggest that Washington has in fact begun to adopt this strategy. Sheehan wrote recently from Saigon that "American diplomats and military commanders here are...not pinning any hopes on Geneva. They are, instead, preparing for a long war." A recent article in Newsweek reported that "suddenly" it has become "fashionable" to "soft-pedal talk of a diplomatic settlement."

It will be a long war indeed if the United States tries to prevent Communism by erasing it from the countryside. Optimistic officials guess it will take five years. Most estimates are on the order of ten to fifteen years.

The cost of victory against the Communists will be paid in more than dollars:

* As the war progresses, hundreds of thousands of innocent Vietnamese will be killed, many more injured. Jack Langguth recently estimated in the New York Times that U.S. bombers will kill two or three civilians for every Viet Cong. Charles Mohr, also of the Times, wrote that "Few Americans appreciate what their nation is doing to South Vietnam with airpower...This is strategic bombing in a friendly, allied country...innocent civilians are dying every day in South Vietnam."

* America's world prestige will come increasingly into question. China's prophecy of U.S. imperialism will make more and more sense to the Third World; its offer to help underdeveloped nations "liberate" themselves from the West will become increasingly meaningful. And those who rely on the U.S. for defense against Communism may well ponder the costs of that "defense." We can only wonder with Langguth when he writes: "Will Thailand be reassured by a victory in Vietnam if it is achieved at a great cost to the civilian population?"

* The war will profoundly affect the United States itself. In human costs alone, thousands of American soldiers will be killed. In terms of foreign policy, the chase for "victory" will lend increasingly voice to those who would meet revolution anywhere with military intervention. Domestically, the need for a war consensus could threaten civil liberties, place in doubt the fate of controversial programs for The Great Society, and inflame even further a public opinion which tolerates no concessions to the Communist threat.

And one can only ask in the face of these costs whether "victory" will, in any case, be possible. A recent article in the Washington Post reported that full-time Viet Cong strength rose from 65,000 to 80,000 during the month of September alone. Hanoi and Peaking may withhold their armies only so long. And increased bombing can only alienate large pockets of the Vietnamese population.

But let us suppose that the U.S. actually succeeded in "pacifying" South Vietnam. What then? The remaining Viet Cong could fade back among the people and wait for opportunities to strike. It would be impossible to seal hermetically the borders from further guerrilla infiltration. Hanson Baldwin has estimated that a perpetual police force of as many as 250,000 soldiers would be required to keep the country "in order." The economy would be in shambles from years of devastation; thousands would be without food. Hostility among the population would force the U.S. to rely on familiar cliques of embattled generals, out of touch with the citizenry. Social reform, by the very necessity of an authoritarian response to the ubiquitous guerrilla threat, would be nearly impossible.

III. Proposals

The only way to avoid this long and senseless war is to achieve settlement through negotiation. And the only way to reach settlement, as suggested above, is for America to accept the possibility of a Communist Vietnam. Specifically the United States should take the following steps:

* Stop the bombings in North Vietnam.

* Use bombings in South Vietnam only in cases of actual combat.

* Announce a willingness to negotiate with the National Liberation Front at the conference table.

* Propose a cease-fire.

* Declare a desire for the eventual removal of all United States troops from Vietnamese soil.

* Declare that South Vietnam has the right to determine its own future, even if that future is a Communist one.

PHILIP ARDERY, PETER CUMMINGS, NANCY H. DAVIS, JOHN D. GERHART, CURTIS A. HESSLER, ELLEN LAKE, A. DOUGLAS MATTHEWS, GREGORY P. PRESSMAN, GEORGE H. ROSEN, RAND E. ROSENBLATT, DANIEL J. SIGNAL, AND WILLIAM H. SMOCK.