ith hated her “ancient walls,
d and frozen,” and the “bro-
ie gowns and velvet boots” of
traitorous courtiers. We im-
iently waited for the day
en, rid of foreign. occupiers,
gs and mandarins, Hue and
- beauty would be returned to
_ people. :
The Hue people rose up in
5 and swept the rulers away.
d from then on, to the French
n American occupiers, the
yple of Hue, so refined and
1tle that one would hardly
ieve them capable of any
ion, put up a tenacious, indo-
able resistance. For years,
9 Dinh Can, Diem’s' brother,
h the support of American
as, had thousands of patriots
tured and summarily execut-
But Hue remained unyield-

t was from Hue that started
1963 the wave of. urban pro-
t which overthrew the Diem
ime; it was in Hue that one
ind the most vigorous opposi-
n to the Thieu-Ky clique.
4t-present, our love for you,
e, city of beauty, city of glory,
no longer mixed. The barbari-
; have destroyed your palaces
i gardens, but under your
ns the Yankee aggressor is
ried for ever, and the victori-
; people will rebuild you in
re beautiful shape than ever.
u will rise again more fasci-
‘ing, than ever, as Johnson,
astmoreland and their gang
ry on their faces the stigmas
defeat and ignominy.

The AFL-CIO’s leaders have
sn basing their backing to the
uth Vietnam government on
ir “solidarity” with the South
1tnamese Federation of Labor.
Tai was seized along with
nut a score of other promi-
it persons in Saigon, including
ddhist leaders and the candi-
res in last year’s election who
yosed the government’s Thieu-
- state. Since Feb. 23 he has
2n held prisoner by Brigadier
n. Nguyen Ngoc Loan, the
ef of police who earlier this
ar was shown on TV screens
the U.S. as he drew a gun
i shot dead a prisoner brought
him by U.S. troops.

Irving Brown, according to
ws from Saigon, conferred

with Thieu after representatives
of State Department in Saigon
claimed they tried to get Tai’s
release, but reported “we can’t
get them to move.” Thieu, it is
reported, pulled out a dossier on
Tai to show Brown he is a
“troublemaker.”

At the time of the strike in
January, Tai and other leaders
were arrested by Loan as his
garbage trucks rounded up the
electrical strikers and gave them
the choice at gun point, to work
or go to prison. Tai was held
about a week, charged with
violating Saigon’s ban on strikes.

After his imprisonment on
Feb. 23, however, Saigon offi-
cials said he was being held for
“Vietcong associations.”

ee @ wey Wi

glory

For four weeks, on the great
flag-tower which dominates with
all its height the ancient imperi-
al city of Hue, the NFL banner
was flapping proudly in the
wind. For Johnson and West-
moreland, this ‘rebel’? flag over
the imperial palaces has become
a nightmare, for it brings out in
full relief the shameful failure
that the Americans have just
suffered in Vietnam. Ten, twen-
ty, fifty times, U.S. Marines,
South Korean mercenaries, pup-
pet troops have been hurled
against the imperial city; ten,
twenty, fifty times, they have
been beaten back with bloody
losses.

The U.S. Command has order-
ed the bombardment of the city
and the citadel by its air force
‘and Seventh Fleet guns, and the
use of napalm, phosphorus
bombs, toxic gases against popu-
lous areas, but Hue still holds
out and its streets are littered
with bodies of dead Marines and
smoking carcasses of tanks. The
patriotic forces hold the city and
the citadel, fiercely attack enemy
positions on nearby hills and re-
inforcement columns, sink river
craft sent to the rescue of
decimated enemy units. U.S. bat-
talions boasting of an advance
of a few dozen yards or the
conquest of a residential block,
only to be vigorously repelled;
U.S. soldiers noisily praising
themselves for having succeeded
in hoisting the Stars and Stripes
ona... broken chair: that’s the
point to which have been reduc-
ed the Marines, those reputedly
invincible warriors, after four
weeks of bitter fighting. To
bomb and napalm a city with no
military target but dotted with
invaluable historical monuments,
a city which the Americans claim
they have come to “protect” and
“liberate”; to what degree of

barbarity and impotence the U.S.
Command has sunk! A Reuter
correspondent on Feb. 8 describ-
ed how a Marine noncom was
plundering elephant tusks from
.a half-destroyed house. A fine
image indeed of the knights. of
the “free world!’

For four weeks, Hue has been
haunting the nights of Johnson
and Westmoreland with the
spectre of defeat. For four
weeks, the red-and-blue flag
with a gold star, fluttering in the
wind above the imperial palaces,
has not ceased singing in all
Vietnamese hearts the song of
victory, heroism, and reconquer-
ed freedom. How lovingly the
entire nation has been following
the fight waged in each street,
in each house, by veteran com-
batants, by youngsters who as
soon as the insurrection broke
out have joined the patriotic
armed forces by the thousands,
by old mothers serving tea and
rice in the combat trenches, by
pedicab drivers and sampan-wo-
men carrying food and ammuni-
tion and bearing stretchers un-
der bombs and shells!

With what joy the entire peo-

‘ple greet the liberation of thou-

sands of detainees from the jails,
and that of villages, wards, and
streets from the grip of torturers,
gendarmes and traitors!

With what delight everyone .

hails the birth of new revolu-
tionary forces and organizations,
the Front of Alliance for Nation-
al Independence, Democracy and
Peace, the People’s Revolution-
ary Committee! Hue, the march-
ing wing of an entire people, the
cynosure of the whole world,
has entered history, taking place
among those heroic cities which
have become the pride of the
nations, for having opposed to
brutal arms the invincible love

of freedom.

in the Youra island prison.

_The only woman member of the Greek parliament when the
military takeover occurred in April 1967, Mrs. Maria Karageorig
(above) is believed to be critically ill following a heart attack

MARCH 29, 1968—PACIFIC TRIBUNE—Page 9

8 appS-—-aMiUAIST DiUDAG—BOL! Vs A IKAN