| NDP demands Ottawa’s assurance

OUT OF V

Pee

a

| DOUGLAS

SPEAKS OUT ON

VIETNAM

SEE PAGE 5_

~

Areas controlled by ve
the South Vietnam bd
National

-
Areas of disputed /

Areas occupied by the
Americans and Saigon -
puppet Government.

Gre rcbete Maps show why the Americans are getting desperate in Vietnam and
Worlg "ting more and more to extreme measures which threaten to engulf the
thermonuclear war.

© the Briqroduced from Vietnamese maps which were published last Saturday in
fe orker, the maps show the sweeping advances made by the South
tional Liberation Front in the past four years.

‘KEEP CANADIAN TROOPS
IETNAM WAR’

The New Democrati¢ Party in B.C. has taken a stand “‘unalterably opposed to
involvement of Canadian troops in Vietnam” and has asked for assurances
from Ottawa ‘‘that no Canadian forces will be involved at least without full
debate in Parliament.’”’ This action came shortly after the U.S. committing
American troops to full combat duty in Souff® Vietnam, and after External Af
fairs Minister Martin gave a broad hint in Ottawa that Canadian troops may
be committed if the war continued to escalate.

In a press statement last Fri-
day, NDP provincial officers said
that “involvement of Canadian
troops is completely at variance
with the aims and objects of the
United Nations to which Canada
and Canadians are pledged,”

It said that “responsible Am-
ericans themselves are in-
creasingly concerned with com-
mitments of major American
forces. in Vietnam without ap-
proval of Congress, The state-
ment added that “the escalation
of the war in Vietnam, indicated
by the increased participation
of the United States forces and
of contingents from Australia
-is of vital concern to Canadians,”

The B.C, NDP has requested
T.C, Douglas to bring this matter
to the attention of the House of
Commons and to the government
of Canada,

Frank Snowsell, B,C, NDP
President said that the “NDP is
seriously concerned over pos-
sible involvement of Canadian

troops in view of other inte- _

Liberation > -
Front,

territory.

gration with American forces,
He said many people do not
realize how closely committed
Canada is to U.S, military com-
mands and that Canadian forces
are under U.S, commandin North
American air defence and many
Canadians are trained with U.S,
personnel,

_ The latest U.S, decision to
commit its ground forces to di-
rect combat with the National
Liberation forces in South Viet-
nam has come under sharp fire
from many quarters around the
world and in the U.S,

‘EES ee ee
City labor backs NDP stand,
see pg. 3° :
[Ss eer oc aera ee ero

In a sharply critical editorial
the New York Times charged
President Johnson with launching
“an American war against
Asians,” and added that the Am-
erican people had now been told
“they were in a land war on the
continent of Asia.”

Four-fifths of South Vietnam liberated

1965

Despite the might of American arms ranged against them, the NLF forces,
today control four-fifths of South Vietnam's territory. Virtually only the towns

erican masters.

_ are left in the hands of the puppet South Vietnamese “government” and its Am-

Now even their hold of the towns is being challenged by the NLF as this
weeks battle near Dong Xoai, only 60 miles north of Saigon, showed clearly.

It said that no explanation was
offered for a move that funda-
mentally altered the character
of the American involvement in
Vietnam, It demanded that Con-
gress should be consulted “before
another furious upward whirl is
taken onthe escalation spiral,”
and warned that Vietnam *might
ultimately absorb as many Am-
ericans as were employed in
Korea.”

Great anxiety has been caused
among Canadians by the state-
ment of External Affairs Min-
ister Martin last Thursday. In
that statement he accepted com-
pletely the false arguments on
which the U.S, justifies its ag-
gression in Vietnam, Martin
said Canada will “reject” any

“appeasement of the Com— .

munists,* .

He added, “If North Vietnam
succeeds in taking over the whole
of Vietnam by force; if the rest
of the world is prepared to sit
back and see this happen, . .we
would, I think, be guilty of an
error of the same nature as the
mistakes made at Munich and,
before that, in the League of
Nations, Aggression is aggres-
sion whether it takes place in
Europe, or in Ethiopia or in
Vietnam.”

Coming at a time when the
U.S. is taking steps to further
escalate the war by stepping up
the bombing of North Vietnam
and committing U.S,, and evi-
dently Australian troops too, to

direct fighting in South Vietnam, .

Martin’s statement is seen as
preparation of the government’s
case to justify the sending of
Canadian troops to South Viet-
nam later under the pretext of
“fighting aggression,”

The recent maneuvers in B,C,
between U.S, Marines and Can-
adians troops in “fighting guer-
rillas* and the absence of any
statement to the contrary from
Ottawa, leaves the clear impli-
cation that the Liberal govern-
ment is thinking in terms of
joining the U.S, in Vietnam if
it.continues to get worse,

Commenting on Martin’s state-
ment, Charles Caron, Communist
Party candidate for Coast-Capi-
lano said that *Martin’s false
historical comparison of
appeasement of Hitler’s fascist
hordes at Munich with the people
of South Vietnam fighting for life
and freedom is the most odious
statement ever to emanate from
Ottawa,”

See VIETNAM, pg. 3