Tew
in Vietnarff”

+ Because a friendly

severnment asked us t
: © protect
‘ Ittrom invasion,

_ . What friendly government?

tes Well, you see, there was no
a. "ment, so that CIA — that’s
_, Central Intelligence Agency

the United States — setoneup,

ti Q. And that government asked
§ to intervene?

A. Yes,

Q.° We invited ourselves in?

A

ie ‘ That’s right, son, after all
ahead 80 back on our com-
ey ents, We made a promise,

= ae now that there has

os a Uccession of governments

: P, One general after another

4 oe Over from another, does
; Ommitment still stand,

a . A. Oh, VOSis:

2 Why?

ye Because the vital interests

_ Mle United States are at stake,
Q. What Vital interest?

; 7 <A.
~ Q,

lose Us lots of lives?

A Ww :
cat eanod Ould you h
‘i - efeateg? y ave us be

We must not lose face.

oy a Aren’t we going to be?

‘ A,
one How can we? After all, we
4 €r lost a war!

| & But isn’t this a civil war?

AG)! stilt want to know what our
~ ~~ Vital interest is?

He

ea
nie son, our vital interest
Now don’t

hee : am sorry about irritating
» Sut T still don’t understand,

S our face, as you call it,
ang sag Million dollars a day
0 American lives? Or

}: PEp
aa SEEGER, ‘popular folk
on May aes in Vancouver

But won’t not losing face

350,000 more American lives if
we slide into full scale war?

A, Son, you just don’t under-
stand our vital interest.

Q. - That is what I am asking,

~ what is our vital interest?

A. I’m glad you asked that
question, Our vital interest is
that we have a friendly country
that’ asked us to come in and
give them a hand,

@. To destroy the people?
A. Only those who don’t co-
operate,

Q. Such as school children
and townspeople?

A, Well, we can’t let a Viet
Cong go unkilled just because
he’s with a bunch of school kids,

Q. Kids aren’t important?

A, Well, of course they are,
but then these are just gooks.

Q What life is important?

A. Well now, I think every-
body should be allowed to live so
long as he doesn’t cogitate or
agitate or do any of those things.
Look son, we had a mighty sweet
world goinghere until you came in
here with all your damn fool
questions, I’m doggoned tired,
you hear? f

Q,. I’m sorry, but I have one
more question.

A. Shoot, son.

Q. Whyare we fighting ina land
far away, and fighting people who
never hurt us or, maybe, never
heard of.us before? Why are we
killing them and their women and
children? Why are we equipping
them to kill each other, and in-

- sisting that they do it? Is it just

because they are “Gooks” and
therefore expendable?

A, Son, you just don’t under-
stand the vital interests of the
United States of America.

_DISPATCHER, April 2, ’65.

“And while our boys were peacefully bombing North Vietnam they
were viciously attacked by anti- aircraft fire and fighter plane

1 ASSAILS VIETNAM POLICY

Prominent American writes

an open

by LEWIS MUMFORD,

_the famous American sociolo-
‘gist, author of “ Technics and
Civilisation” and “The Cul-
ture of: Cities,” two of the
world’s major works on “*plan-

ning and architecture.

Holder of America’s Presi-
dential Medal of Freedom, he
wrote this open ‘Jetter to
President Johnson, which has
been published in the San

Francisco Chronicle

Mr, President,

The time has come for some-
one to speak out on behalf of
the great body of your country-
men who regard with abhorrence
the course to which you are
committing the United States in
Vietnam,

As a holder of the Presidential
Medal of Freedom, I have a duty
to say plainly, and in public, what
millions of patriotic fellow-citi-
zens are saying in the privacy of
their homes, Namely, that the
course you are now following
affronts both our practical judg-
ment and our moral sense,

Neither your mannersnor your
methods give us any assurance
that your policy will leadto agood
end: on the contrary, your attempt
to cure by military force asitua-
tion that has been brought about
by our own arrogant, one-sided
political assumptions cann ot
have any final destination short
of anirremediable nuclear catas-

. trophe,

That would* constitute the ter-
minal illness of our whole civi-
lization, and your own people, no
less than the Vietnamese and the
Communists, would be the help-
less victims,

In embarking on this program,
you are gambling with your coun=-
try’s future, because you have
not the courage to discard a
losing hand and start a new deal,
though this was the magnificent
opportunity that your election
presented to you,

Your games theorists have per-
suaded you to play Russian Roul-

”
s!

ette, But you cannot save the
government’s face by blowing out
the country’s brains,

* * *

From the beginning, the pres-
ence of American forces in Viet-
nam, without the authority of the
United Nations, was in defiance
of our own solemn commitment

when we helped to form that body, ©

Our steady involvement with
the military dictators who are
waging civil war in South Viet-
nam, with our extravagant finan-

cial support and underhanded

military co-operation, is as in-
defensible as our government’s
original refusal to permit a popu-
lar election to be held in Viet-
nam, lest Communism should be
installed by popular vote,

Your attempt now to pin the
whole blame on the government
of North Vietnam deceives no one
except those whose wishful think-
ing originally committed us to
our high-handed intervention; the
same set of agencies and intel-
ligences that inveigled us into the
Bay of Pigs disaster,

Instead of using your well-

known political adroitness tores- —

cue our country from the military
miscalculations and _ political
blunders that created our impos-
sible position in Vietnam, you
now, casting all caution to the

‘The mediator’

If you have to crawl,

Mr. Pearson,

Then do it alone.

Lick your Yankee master’s . . .
(Boots),

If you wish:

But don’t do it in my name,
Or in the name of my country.
If, on the other hand,

The rising tide of indignation
From all over Canada,

From all kinds of people,
Has forced you to protest

The American piracy in Viet Nam,
Then do it like a man.

Stand up — speak out:
But for God’s sake
Stop grovelling!
—by John Hope

Want books

Arthur Stratton, North Vancou-
ver, writes: Paul Benjamin, 244
Plaisance Park, Plaisance
Village, Pointe-a-Pierre, Trini-
dad, West Indies, hasasked me to

' appeal to any of your readers,

who have any of the following
books that they could spare and
send him for their Youth Clubs,

USSR Weight Tables; Science

Qeet FORUM

April 15, 1965—PACIFIC TRIBUNE—Page 9

letter to Johnson

winds, propose to increase the
area of senseless destruction and
extermination, without having any
other visible ends in view thanto
conceal our political impotence,

* * *

In taking this unreasonable
course, you not merely show a
lack of “decent respect for the
opinions of mankind,” but you
likewise mock and betray all our
country’s humane traditions,

This betrayal is all the more
sinister because you are now, it
is plain, obstinately committing
us to the very military policy
that your countrymen rejected
when they so overwhelmingly de-
feated the Republican candidate,

Before you go farther, let us

‘tell you clearly: your professed

aims are emptied of meaning by
your totalitarian tactics and your
nihilistic strategy,

We are shamed by your actions
and revolted by your dishonest
excuses and pretexts, —

What is worse, we are horri-
fied by the immédiate prospect
of having our country’s fate in the
hands of leaders who, time and
again, have shown their inability
to think straight, to correct their
errors, or to get out of a bad
situation without creating aworse
one,

The government has forfeited .
our confidence, and we will op-
pose with every means available
within the law, the execution of |
this impractical, and above all,
morally indefensible policy,

There is only one way in which
you can remove our opposition
or regain our confidence: and that
is to turn back from the course
you have taken and to seek a
human way out,

of Health and Long Life in the
USSR; Russian English Dic-
tionary; Earth and Sky; Races
of Mankind; The Lower Depths;
Physics for Entertainment,

We would be most grateful to
receive any of them,

’

Gutter press

J.K, Vancouver, writes: Just
how low can McCarthyite gutter

_journalism sink? One answer to

that question can be found in the
Vancouver Province editorial of
April 5, which brandsall citizens
who seek or advocate peace in
war-torn Vietnam as “Com-
munist dupes,”

A later editorial in this Gold-
water rag even tries to get Prime
Minister Lester Pearson into its
“dupe” category, because of his
mild suggestion to President
Johnson for “a pause” in the
killing, But no, rages the Prov-
ince, “U.S, military might is
beginning to pay dividends,” so
don’t let us give the Reds a
breather, . .” There’s “divi-
dends*in mutilated and dead
Vietnamese women and children,

The Province editorial proves
there’s no depths to which a
truly prostitute journal cannot
sink,