_ NEW YORK—On Sunday after-
on, April 15, Carnegie Hall will

@ the scene of a salute to Paul
ai €son, sponsored by such peo-
as Gregory Peck, Syney Poi-
Ms : Mrs, Martin Luther King, Ot-

; Reiger. Woody Allen, Leon
On. Dihanne Carol, Peter
“s ole, Zero Mostel and Toron-

critic Clyde Gilmour.

Black and white performers will

. 5 ;
fect in this 75th birthday sal-
-° the most outstanding Black
Ist of all time.
Sreetings can be sent to:
We lute to Paul Robeson,'' 157

st 57th Street, Suite 1100
®w York, N.Y. 10019, USA.

Singing out freedom
all over the world...

On the occasion of. Paul Robe-
son's 75th Birthday, April 9, the
Communist Party of Canada's
Central Executive Committee,
under the signature of William
Kashtan, General Secretary, sent

the following greeting:

Congratulations on your 75th
birthday. By deed, word and song
you have made an outstanding
contribution to the cause
peace and friendship among the
peoples, to the struggle for equal-
ity of the Black people in the
United States, and to the great
cause of national and social libe-

ration.

We wish, on behalf of our Party
and for progressive Canadians
who have heard and known you,

good health and long life."

Paul Robeson, born 75 years ago on April 9, 1898.

Robeson! The name _ re-creates a
sound in the ear of all who have ever
heard that great, gentle bass in speech
or song. And there was a time in this
Canada when police stood by to see
that he used it for song only—he was
forbidden to speak!

Robeson put the fear of hell into
the racists and reactionaries. A single
song from his throat at once sent the
rats of backwardness looking for their
injunctions, and raised the morale of
the working class to battling confi-
dence.

On the picket lines of the USA, in
fighting Spain, in the halls of honor
throughout the socialist world, in his
second homeland — England, among
the Welsh miners, in the homes of
Canadian working people, Robeson
helped us through a hard time, when
the powers that be were even harder
on him.

Today, we hear occasionally, Robeson

recordings ~formerly suppressed by
broadcasters. And we share with the
dilitantes a deep appreciation of his
mighty voice hushed to a _ lullaby,
raised in the fervor of the spirituals
which sustained his people in their
deepest misery, disciplined to the
operatic milieu. He sang Duke Elling-
ton, and he sang Beethoven.

But of Robeson the artist, committed
to the working-class philosophy, Robe-
son the Communist, Robeson the de-
fender of all the earth’s downtrodden,
it is for us to speak—because the dili-
tantes dare not-venture so far.

Those of us who had the good for-
tune to hear Paul Robeson in person,
to shake that hand of warm friend-
ship, owe it to another generation to
say: listen to that voice; read Here I
Stand. The young generation should
not be denied such a stimulus.

May this be the best of all years,
Paul.

Iw
the oS More fortunate: before
ed adians arrived I had tour-
the Bui Ospital grounds under
directgs nce of Dr. Doan Dai,
of the oR the hospital and one
(ol neh, V’s outstanding medi-
been BBR 30 buildings had
and 25 €d: 28 people had died
Taids. ee Wounded in three
Crater © was a huge bomb
Cling. “&Xt to the blood donors’
Ox Where 11 died.
Maternity, Wall of a wrecked
Written. Anaad someone had
Man.» xon, a bloodthirsty
Bical €r building: eight sur-
Smasheq destroyed: Mevators
the Bhi assrooms destroyed:
Shelt stead department a
Oom wake laundry, work
Nae ae kitchen de-
ter, Other huge bomb
_ ‘Wo Ee filled with: eater
landeg ‘t O-pound bombs had
S0Ws pecther here. “He who
Whitlwing 4d will reap the

Serg : a

Wle Prophet = h
Sage ih a & wall, And a ied
Nam “USSian: “Long live Viet-

Hospital Targets

Cc .
Mbeq vai Was not the only
; ee! I saw in Viet-
Best cit ‘Phong, the second
the 3 M the DRV, I visit-
Nendsh: ~*°Choslovak-Vietnam

f a

2 Sepuiy- diner and talked
kg iddte., ~Or Le Thi Mai
: ree na aR woman inh bare
> ork at endals, She came to
“y ] 8: a hospital as a nurse
j s Hang; . sie work was sent
he dy and graduat-

‘Pointed weRCOM: in 1968 was
aS husbanq her present post.
cmen ¥ c IS_a worker in a
hildron Ae They have three
lends a boys: the eldest at-
ersity. in Hanoi, re

Of ana tPing holes in the roof:

second is in the army, and the
third is a fifth-grade student in
Haiphong.

The hospital came under at-
tack in April 1972 and again in
December. Most of the patients
had been moved to the country-
side and though many buildings
were hit there were no casual-
ties. One building completely
wrecked had been filled with
patients just two days before;
luckily they had all been eva-
cuated some hours prior to the
bombing.

“I entered the medical profes-
sion to serve people and save
lives,” said Le Thi Mai. “We are
proud that 75% of our staff are
women. The staff number 600,
including over 100 doctors and
assistants. We have received
two awards from the govern-
ment for our work.”

Long-range Plans

On the outskirts of Thai Binh,
a two-hour drive south of Hai-
phong, a medical school branch
of a Hanoi hospital was com-
pletely destroyed by 30 bombs,
all 1,000-pounders, on Aug. 17-
18, -1972.

The apartment block where
600 students lived was gutted.
But simple one-storey buildings
with thatched roofs have already
been constructed and in May
classes will resume. Long-range
plans call for an entirely rebuilt
area by 1980, with labs, lecture
rooms, boarding houses to ac-
comodate 1,800 students and 500
professors and tutors.

The B-52, flying superfort, is
an insane colossus of destruc-
tion. Random bombing and pat-
tern bombing caused immense
damage. Yankee pellet bombs,
napalm, phosphorus and poison
chemicals wrought great havoc
in the North and South of Viet-

nam. Gaping wounds and ugly
gashes appeared on the face of
the country. But the vast might
of the U.S. military machine fail-
ed to conquer the Vietnamese
people. Enduring all, they have
finally emerged triumphant —
free and independent.
In the immortal words of
Uncle Ho, written in his Pri-
son Diary:

“Random bombing and pattern bombin
phosphorous and poison chemicals wroug
on the face of the country. But th

namese people . . “

“In this world the ills of
’ man may number tens of thou-
sands,

But nothing that can befall
him is worse than loss of
freedom.”

The Democratic Republic of
Vietnam, said Prime Minister
Pham Van Dong, is “advancing
from the condition of a former
colonial and semi-feudal country

Mit
Ninny
i
UvtveanaennevvnvucavccvnevecuaccensueceanecouucuneecguoceevgnucueneesuuenceeeesuuueeaeQQUUeeeeQUUUUUGUUUUUUUUOEEREEAOUEER ELUATE EERE

Nstruction begins in North Vietnam

straight to socialism, bypassing
the stage of capitalist develop-
ment.”

To see this process with my
own eyes I visited Vietnam’s
three largest cities — Hanoi,
Haiphong and Nam Dinh — and
toured the countryside. A look
at industrial plants will be the
subject of my next article.

g caused immense damage. Yankee pellet bombs, napalm,
ht great havoc. Gaping wounds and ugly gashes appeared
e vast might of the U.S. military machine failed to conquer the Viet-

- PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, APRIL 13,.1973—PAGE 13