PARADOXES OF A STRANGE WAR

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00001R000400370006-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: November 11, 2016
• Document Release Date: April 28, 1999
• Sequence Number: 6
• Publication Date: February 21, 1965
• Content Type: NSPR

Pi.4JI DEUCE, R.I.
Jau:ur.AL
Sanitized -Approved For Release : C
1 . 63,635 STATINTL
S. 194,795
FEB 2 1 1965
SPECIAL TO THE PROVIDENCE JOURNAL
Sides-of the road ma tic rifle pointed at them The torpid heat and the fetid After his first capture, he
70 miles outside Saigon the and was staring at Mr, . Ko- stink of the Mekong delta was released when he prcun-
flooded, . pale green paddy nichi wordlessly. On his bare swamps made us drowsy - ised to change his ways, but
.'fields gave way to stands of, feet were black sandals cut until the putt-putt of the en- he had soon returned to his
yellow bamboo and clumps of -from the tires of a U.S. Army gines was shattered with a old haunts in the Go Cong dis- j
dense green jungle. It was a .truck. They were ."Ho Chi loud "bang!" trict and had become a guar-
' hot mid-afternoon, and only Minh sandals," Furious activity broke out rilla district leader, When a
the riotously-plu ed paddy He was a Viet Con,,. on deck, Viet Cong is captured twice he
birds soart> g on thermals over While the three Communist "VC snipers," grunted Capt. is almost certain to be put to
the ripening rice tassels no- ? guerrillas wearing government King, our American military . death.
ticed the passing jeep. uniforms searched and inter- adviser. "We can't kill a fellow na-
"Cham! Ch
"
am!
rogaled Mr. Konichi's driver
The jeep screeched to a and his interpreter, the Viet
stop, J n the passenger seat, Cong commander scrambled
Kenkichi Konichi, correspond- up out of the roadside ditch.
ent for the Japanese news- He looked Mr. Konichi over
paper Mainichi, was startled and laughed.
out of a warm doze. He "This is the
squinted ahead in the dazzling have ever seen a Japanese,"
stmlight and was suddenly he said.
,kmpaled with terror. Not all the encounters the
'' Blocking the road were three Mainichi 'newsmen had
three Vietnamese in army uni- with Viet Cong were so abrupt,
forms, rifles at the ready, so startling. Mr. Konichi was
Still half asleep, Mr. Konichi questioned, then released,
raised his Japanese camera Shunjiro Ishizuka met his
automatically. His interpreter first Viet Cong in a bloody
slapped his arm down and., episode ended by a firing
hissed a warning. squad: This is his story:
MI.
In the morning, we set out
out, staring at the raised
weapons. Mr. Konichi's heart from the elite Seventh Divi-
was pounding and the silence The, headquarters at My
roared in his ears. He raised Tho, 40 miles southwest of
his hands over his head. Saigon, abroad three motor
Sandals
e ramy season was end-
ing, and the Mekong River
aunches. We were to deliver
sacks of cement, crates of
ammunition and food to Tan
Then, 'looking ' across the Dinh village, a tiny govern.
road, Mr. Konichi saw anoth- ment foothold in Viet Cong
er Vietnamese standing in the territory.
deep grass in the roadside Our three craft had 20-mm.
itch. He wore a black home- rapid-fire cannons mounted
pun shirt, baggy black trous- fore and aft, an 81-mm. pur-
rs and a green woven-bam- suit cannon and four .7.7-mm.
hat. He held a semi-auto- machineguns.
The three launches charged
,into . the mangroves, swans
flushed up into the sky. Sud-
denly, one launch emerged
towing a sampan and a cap-
tive. -
Two-Time Loser
The captive's name was
Phanh Le Thanh. He wore
only a pair of black shorts
and thick spectacles.
Dragged up on deck, he ap-
peared melancholy, and puffed
on- a cigarette which he rolled
tional the first time," a Viet-
namese officer explained. "At
the second time, however, he
becomes an enemy."
Realizing that his forged
papers only served to dig his
grave, Phanh Le Thanh of-
fered to lead us to his guer-
rilla hideout in return for his
life. He produced a map and
marked an X on a point of
Con Cau Island.
Our assault group healed
there at full speed.
Twelve Viet Cong were 'at-
ing lunch when our troops a s-
tacked with grenades and na-
He claimed he was anaagent over in 40 minutes. Most of
of the American -Cenre}b. In.. the VC fled, leaving behind
telligence Agency. He showed automatic auomatic riprisoner,flestwo Br Con
us doubtful-looking
papers flag of red and blue with a
which purported to say he
was on assignment for special of gold Commstar unist and many notebooks
ngs.
forces, that he should have On the unist teachings.
free access to Saigon's Tan at My Thoway back t the base
Son Nhut airport to, board became Phanh Le Than
transport planes. A snapshot come gloomier, probably
showed him dressed as a Viet- stricken with omierh remorse at o-
namese policeman. In Viet fraying his comrades. He con-
Cong country,' such documents dreamed . had once
were suicidal. dreamed d of going to the Uni-
versity of Paris and that he
Finally, after gentlemanly had joined the VC in a fit Of
interrogation, it was certain jealousy because, although he
that he was a Viet Cong and was bright, he was too poor
had even been captured' be- even to compete with the st.u-
fore. ? dents in Saigon, much less go
CPYRGHT Sanitized - Approved For Release : CIA-RDP75-00001 R000400370006-8
 o Paris. tie was too poor Why did he give himself up? In one operation, the unit; Province, with Sgt Nruye'n
'YRGH
to be ceahzcd. Ua11t1z(d
was led away barefoot, by the
intelligence officer. By now he
must: have come to the end
of his 23 years of wretched
life, before a firing squad.
or even his simplest hopes "I had been thinking about it Nguyen and Le were with pun- and his mien. Ills courm? c_t.
Later 1Ir. Ishizuka inter-
viewed another Viet Cong, but
this one had made his sep-
arate peace for entirely dif-
ferent reasons.
-fApproveds F iea d aCI ldAW (6nU It @O tROO0 470fltOfl~?6'?'8',r
is not at the helm, of stale, awn and South Viet Nam is a good coun-, edge of a Mekong tributary. Two days later, as f
try. This is a war between Com- The VCs were trapped and working on an artirlr, 1.
niunism and capitalism. I, began a desperate resistance. Nguyen entered my toner nth
am not in favor of capital- Just then the South Vietna- a hard look on his f rr
.
ism, but I have grown weary mese unit commander ordered " My cousin has died )it I -
of Communism, too. Besides. his troops to break for lunch. Ile said. "That Ga;,,e
.I am still a bachelor. I have The Viet Cong jumped into has been wiped out."
never even had a girl friend." the river and escaped. Nguyen said he wanicd to
If the dreaded face of the "The American,, captain give me a memento to 1emrm.
jungle enemy can exhibit sur- grew red in the ? face with her his cousin and thw nirJit
prising humor, pathos and anger," Nguyen told me, de- we three had talked.
poignancy, so can the face Of. manding to know why we It was a cheap nylon flag
the comrade-in-arms - the didn't press the attack. of blue and red with a yellow
Vietnamese soldier - display (I had heard of the incident star in the center, stained
its puzzling paradoxes, as Mr. already from a furious Amer-! with blood and oil.
Ishizuka found out. He tells scan adviser.) I'. A Viet Cong flag.
this story: At another time,_ when a-
prisoners played ping pong to a small town in Vinh Binh rounded, the same unit corn- the Meinichi correspondents
pass the two weeks of politi- Province, in the Mekong manner left open another aye found, is almost superficial
cal training they receive be- delta, I became acquainted nue of escape. Ile is said to compared with the staggering
fore being freed to return to with two South Vietnamese : have done this three different plight of the Victnajna-. pea.,-
normal society, sergeants, one named Nguyen times. ant caught between the soldier
Very few of these men who Van Hoi, the other Le Van ? "We can understand our' and the guerrilla - peasants
have' surrendered voluntarily Qiet. They were cousins, age commander's feelings," . Ngu whose lives seem drr+merl to
have returned to the Viet 21 and 19. I met them one yen confided to me. "We be- be crnsherl less by bullet:; or
Cong, restless night when I wan- came soldiers in order to
North Vietnamese Army
Capt. Tran Qhoc Bar is one
of the 17,000 Viet Cong who
have surrendered to govern-
ment forces since April, 1962.
I met him (Mr. Ishizaka
wrote) in a tidy rehabilita-
tion center 10 miles south of
Saigon where many of the
tiered out for a breath of air fight. Therefore we believe it ' botnhs than by a boulder of
In the North and found them on guard duty is our duty to will battles and despair and cruelty almost
' In the mud-caked sentry kill as many of the Viet Cong too great to heave upon the
Captain Bar, 35 years old, hquse. as we ran. , ..
f ...__._..._
-
o
was born in w13at is now
"At the same time, for
the northernmost part of Lunch Break The Mekong delta is often
South Viet Nam. In 1947 he most of the South Vietnamese called the ci-anary of South
joined the Indochinese Cnm- "That .doesn't seem suitable soldiers, the army is a 'Way of Viet Nam. But this Aces not
munist Party and two years. for a Vietnamese soldier," I' making a living. After one mean that all who live there
later became a rerulzr said, pointing at Nguyen's year passes, ? American sot- are well off There e
r
e fog and surrendered. again these South Vietnamese left the, village In Vinh Binh
soldiers.
~. ~,wm ana live in eie nant as , aac e,z+dcil the
let Nam for four ftnitItzed; Apps l r . e5 ges: CIA- DP1v-~8b01 R000400370006-8
ast Jtine, he slipped away in But let us contemplate Early the next morning, I
C regulars. He fought in the much as they do themselves,, Vietnamese whose faces and
some
dirrs can return home. Even
soldier of file Viet Minn heavy old M-1 rifle. "Why f,ihulously gi t landrnrners,
forces fighting the French. don't you change to a car- after' that we must continue but there are also many- thcnus-
After Dien Bien Phu and the bine?" fighting - for who knows, how ands of desperate peasant
1954 cease fire, he went north "It's all right as soon as, l0'7^'' %Are'nay he alive moor- farmers.
to become a political secre- you get used to it," he said, few hut wI ll Syr still hr. slay-One of them is Tran Van
tary of the Viet Minh Fifth, breaking the ice with me. "It 'n^ out: of coffins t+vn ,yours Nam, 29, of the village of An.
Military District and ad- packs a big punch." loin' nova" Nguyen asked. Binh. Trans troubles began
vanced rapidly. He said he_ As we talked away the "\;e rect?ivc nue pay, FUJI- from the fact that his hoop
knew - personally both North night, I learned that Nguyen P011 our families and con- fared the national high,+'.ay
Viet Nan:'s President Ho Chi was born in Hanoi and had time fi brio until ,+c die. We running from Can The to 5"
Mir, i.t}3 He s r. ii't=fi't' '?'P.,' c ---i17 ,4' .C ~~n- 44."?l:l
tih}'? Er :-. d ltl t, '.nf +=n. T. ,L^,^a.: ;R yac iT.,^>r .
a~"s rim. \'a ?ate, Cap. 'so tt:oti:e-s a: er s fa^er It It not sttan;e, i% ii, for a T.an':c house is a hrid-,,
But North Viet Nam was not was executed by the Com- commander to desire to keep .ac.rnx.s the D;11.1 Sal River. The
rich enough to satisfac- i nunists and a fourth son was his men alive?" Viol Cong had blown tip the
torily accommodate all those shanghaied into the North Viet- Much of what Nguyen said toad neat' the bridge. so a;
who had come up from the namese Army. Nguyen was 11 . was a matter of fact. Joining strict guard was posted. Tr)
south, particularly Viet Minh then. the army in South Viet Nan? make it easier to protect the
soldiers of southern origin. When he became 18, 1 is equivalent to gaining ent- bridge, the district leader or-
Capt. Bar said their life in Nguyen enlisted in the South., ployntcnt? tiered Tran to cut rlowu 2110
North Viet Nam was full of Vietnamese Army, burning There, are, of course, man ' banana trees, 1.00 orange
vexations. The land reform - with desire for revenge. Two y , trees, 20 breadfruit trees and
program went awry, there years later, his cousin Le en- intrepid soldiers. During the
as a farmers' uprising and listed. They started with a river attack after Phanh Le 29 mange trees. As a result,
frequent friction between month's a of 900 Thanh was captured, I saw a his annual income of $180 uas^
pay piastres, Vietnamese corporal plunge
naked into 1ti rl''ed out in an instant.
coops of northern and south- or roughly $9. They fought "I didn't rnccive a hit of
ern origin. well, and when I met them. in enemy ranks
Furthermore, the long- they were being paid about firing a mat iineggn. mAnc+y as compensation, and
waited reunification of North 1,700 piastres, or $17 a month. The 21st division's Ranger that -as the year the man.
nd South Viet Nam failed to Keeping only a small. Battalion is continually en- .goes "'Or" coming not for 111P
aterializp as the Communist amount for pocket money, . gaged i bitter fighting with first time," Tran atd. Then
ffort to dominate was both boys sent the rest home elite Viet Cong veterans nn' he adored casually, "That dis-
hwarted by American support to help their mothers. Ca Mau Peninsula-and the tri ?t lead(,'" was killed the fol
if Saigon. They , were , small and Rangers. generally emerge : lowing year by the Viet:
At that point, President Ho small boned, as are most victorious. Con:."
nd General Giap began their Vietnamese, but these sol- Howeve , I cannot help but -, 'fran'c entire livelihr,rs-t is'
ovement to "liberate the diers do not complain even ; realize that the South Viet- thus depcnrlent upon his Irss,
outh." Capt. Bar was infil- though they leap into the jtin "allies(' soldiers have their t1i, n fill." acres of paddy
rated into Lamdong, near his ' gle from helicopters from a: own view of this war and their field. lie and Isis wife work:
ome province, in 1960, and height of 30 feet carrying. own attitude toward it, The desperately hard At it, hoeing.
ut in charge of a platoon of packs that weight almost as men they are fighting are and planting on May 5 of the
 lolling the water in ingJune, cal case of absentee owner- vice: "My 23 - year - old
}, . r
u cedit 'Ti ~ its CO hill. 1r~~ Id ~4rf ei ,Si e~C ? 0 ,1, } 0 040
in Au 9nT
following January., (Between f+-nn France changed all that, months ago, on a night of:
transplanting and harvesting, and all income from the land heavy. rain, t woke up and'
Tran works as a plasterer to ? -- which had been such a, saw my mother giving a mid.
supplement their meager re- scrtue investment before - night meal to two young
sources.) halted. soldiers.
Last year Tran's paddies For (cn years,' South Viet "One of thean was my
produced nearly four tons of Nam': landlords "suffered". brother whom I had not seen
rice, well over the average for until tj_o Dinh Diem-himself: for nearly a year. My mother
South Viet Nam. One ton was the son of a. rich landowner-- and the soldiers were silent..
cold for $37. The rest is the launched the ]and reform pro-' She 'served rice and the two
family's food for the year -` gran, in 19513, The government; Of then' ate.. Soon they left,
they eat meat only twice a obligingly bought all land in' in the rain.
month. Because of the de- excess of 250 acres from the, `. "In the village I atn a meni-
stroyed fruit trees, Tran does landlords. payinz in cash anrl' he'1' of the militia fighting the
not have to pay government bonds. The Landlords +hus" Viet Cong. But must a brother.
taxes. His plastering odd-job made their first income in kill ji brothher:.. ?
makes him only 50 cents a . ten years off land that was
day for those two months. Otherwise useless In them. And
Putting all these sources to- the 230 - acre limit en-
gether, Tran's family income allied them to . keep 30 per
is only about $180 a year - cent of the best land in the
and he has a wife and four South.
children. The family expenses Thg peasants who were sun.-
for food, clothing (a new dress -.'posed to' benefit received five
foi' his wife once a year) and acres each-five acres they
srhooling for the . children
amounts to more than double' will hardly be able to pay
Tran's annual income. He is for within the designated fire
always in debt. year period. Even at the corn-
"It is like cutting my own pletion of the program, there
throat," Tran said.
years do you think it will take. south with no land at all' or
you to get hack on your feel?" with less than they need td
"Five or six years," he re-' feed themselves.
lied There is sonic question
p
It was only a dream the re- fit from, ' the reform. 1`t ha
porter realized as he left his not impeded the Viet Cc'er,
miserable hovel, asking hint- and as an a_concmi' move it
self if lie would live that ' was a failure.
long. Mr. Vo benefited. lqs tcpe,K
Yo Xuan Haiih is a. 76-year ilhe $2,!500 ]le rer river' t,?r 1''.'.
old landowner who lives in ? a. long-useless land and b ilt ?9
beautiful red brick house in houses in Can The., Within
the French colonial?style on a several year. the rent ant in-
quiet spot facing the Song terc-.st on his eovern Ghent
Bassac. River near the center' bonds let him recover all he
of the town of Can Tho. Mr. spent oil the house. .
Vo is a happy family man,
with one son educated in den- In a crowxcled, 1lhirrl-cla~r.-
w:istry in ' France and five , railway coach along a rail line
daughters educated in Saigon that is blox+nn up t?vehy fee
who are married to young days, correspondent. Kiyoshi
meth of appropriate 'station. Yamamoto meta Vil~titanhese
Otic daughter and her hus- by of about 23, (raveling with
band were living in Mr. Vo's his elderly mother. When the
house, but of course the son- hoy discoverer' that Mr. Ya-
in-law did no work at all, for manhot.o was a Japane a and
ht' was a landowner, too. therefore. a fellow Asian the
In his youth, Mr. Vo served leaned forward and c' r.i ded
as a medical officer in the' hik life story. If was ao~tcli the
French Army. When he left same as the -five of ether
the army, he entered medical Vietnamese, but the hay- con-
practice in Can The. With the ? eluded:
money he earned, Mr. Vol "The w A r has c'rttit?ued
bought ]and because at the .tinc;e the tinter: 1 was a hoy of
time it was the safest form five Or six. chasing tile gran-
of investment. By 13"15, Mr. in' gnat:; with a banhhon role.
Vo's land l'olrlings totaled al- The fi lhtin is still going on.
most 1.600 acres, covering Govet?nmmnt troops come to
eight villages anrt prorlucinq' our village from time to fide
an annual rice crop worth $16,- ' during the clay. At night; the
000. Viet Cong come. Young men
Mr. Vo had no idea how' between 20 and 25, except. for
.many worked for him-eve--y- eldest sons, are running from
thing was taken care of by place to place to. keep ft?on:
supervisors in each village, ' being shanghaied by either
There were many areas Mr,- - side."
VO ow tY$1g~k t'1hadA'Ci'E 'raved For Release - CIA-RDP75-00001 R00040
370006-8
CPYRGHT
370006-8