I am forwarding this new essay from S. Brian Willson on Vietnam. I find his essays to be some of most informative, heartfelt and truthful writings I have read on U.S. military policy throughout the third world. His web site is www.brianwillson.com. Brian is an American hero, a truth-teller, a man who has devoted his life to exposing the Big Lie that we are all living. Anyone interested in video or audiotapes of Brian Willson can email me at [EMAIL PROTECTED] or call me at 310-838-8131. Sincerely, Frank Dorrel >From: "S. Brian Willson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Reply-To: "S. Brian Willson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Subject: Final version of Kerrey/VN Essay; now on website >Date: Mon, 14 May 2001 19:46:53 -0400 > > >BOB KERREY AND THE CRIME OF VIETNAM: WILL WE LEARN? > >By S. Brian Willson, May 13, 2001 > > > > > >My Air Force Combat Security unit was dispatched to Binh Thuy on March 7, >1969, to fortify a Vietnamese controlled airbase a few miles northwest of >Can Tho City along the Bassac River. This was in Phong Dinh Province, >about 100 miles southwest of Saigon in the Mekong Delta. I was the First >Lieutenant in charge of this unit of nearly forty men. Tet 1969, though far >less intense than the devastating Tet offensive of 1968, had been launched >by the Viet Cong (VC) less than two weeks earlier, on February 23. >Everybody was on edge. Two days later, on February 25, then Lieutenant and >now ex-U.S. Senator Bob Kerrey and six other Navy Seals (Sea-Air-Land >forces) under his command committed an atrocity at Thang Phong where as >many as 24 villagers were gunned down, at least half of whom were women and >children. Thang Phong rests near the South China Sea in Kien Hoa Province, >about 50 miles directly east of Can Tho. > > > >During Tet 1968, the Delta, as most of South Vietnam, had been hit hard. >Thirteen of the sixteen provincial capitals had been seriously penetrated >by the VC. Binh Thuy airbase had received eighteen different attacks in >February and March 1968, far more than the other ten airbases in South >Vietnam, with the exception of Tan Son Nhut in Saigon, which was also hit >eighteen times. The U.S. response had been furious, especially against VC >operations in Can Tho City, and in My Tho and Ben Tre in Kien Hoa Province >to the east, not far from Thang Phong. At that time, The New York Times >(February 6, 1968) reported infliction of at least 750 civilian casualties >in My Tho, 350 in Can Tho, and 2,500 in Ben Tre. Ben Tre had been so >pulverized by U.S. firepower that a U.S. Major explained, "It became >necessary to destroy the town to save it." > > > >Some months later, in December 1968, Operation "Speedy Express," conducted >primarily by the Ninth Infantry Division, had begun sweeping missions >designed to finish off VC units in the Delta, especially in the provinces >of Kien Hoa and Vinh Binh. This operation was in full swing when I >arrived. According to military historian, retired Col. Harry G. Summers, >Jr., when Speedy Express had concluded operations in May 1969, there were >nearly 11,000 "enemy" casualties. > > > >As a combat security officer I had to quickly acquaint myself with >intelligence reports on "enemy" activity, and locations and types of >friendly resources. I had not been in Vietnam more than a month or so when >it seemed to me that virtually everybody, other than Vietnamese business, >political, and military leaders, was at least secretly hostile to the U.S. >presence, and alternately sympathetic with the Vietnamese struggle for >independence from ANY outside political/military force. Though at first I >did not want to believe this "sense," it became confirmed by a combination >of other experiences: discussions with other U.S. Air Force personnel and >members of the Vietnamese military, interactions with members of the U.S. >Army's Ninth Infantry Division, conversations with numerous Vietnamese in >Can Tho City and various villages in the area, examination of Seventh Air >Force bombing reports that conflicted with my own personal knowledge of >bombings, and the reading of a history of U.S. intervention written by two >Cornell University professors [George McTurnan Kahin and John W. Lewis, The >United States in Vietnam (New York: Dial Press, 1967)]. > > > >After Tet 1968, the CIA Phoenix program had begun intense efforts to >eliminate perceived political and military leadership in the VC. U.S. air >and ground forces had become much more indiscriminate in killing Vietnamese >while glibly considering most of them VC. By 1969 I had been briefed that >three-quarters of South Vietnam had been designated by the U.S. military >command and local Vietnamese officials as a "free fire zone," meaning that >virtually any villager in that vast area could be killed with little >question. Nonetheless, in my continued visits to various villages >northwest and northeast of Can Tho, there seemed little real support among >villagers for the U.S. and our South Vietnamese political/military ally. > > > >Bob Kerrey, as leader of the Navy SEAL team, was likely participating in >Operation Speedy Express and/or the Phoenix assassination program. Many >Navy SEAL units were identified as "hunter-killer" teams, and were >especially skilled at infiltrating areas by sea in small boats or as >frogmen. Their rigorous training explicitly prepared them for just such >missions. > > > >It became obvious that we in the U.S. military knew little or nothing about >the Vietnamese people, their history, or their authentic sentiments. I >doubt if many of our political leaders in Washington or those in our >military chain of command knew much. The Vietnamese had a long history of >successfully resisting outside forces, no matter the heaviness of their own >losses. They fought the Chinese for nearly a thousand years and then the >French for a hundred. Since the end of World War II the French had suffered >nearly 175,000 casualties in their effort to restore their pre-war colony, >while the the Vietnamese had suffered perhaps more than a million dead in >defending their independence. > > > >The unilateral U.S. intervention began in 1954, immediately following the >humiliating French defeat. Unfortunately, we military troopers had been >tragically duped! Our ignorance as U.S. Americans, along with our intrinsic >cultural racism and historic sense of superiority, combined to manifest in >a lawless, brutal force that knew virtually no limits in our violent >assaults against the humble but proud Vietnamese people and their culture. >We troopers had simply been guinea pigs! We did not realize the Vietnamese >were prepared to defend their sacred independence at any cost. We did not >even believe that the Vietnamese had the right to their independence. > > > >The July 21, 1954 Geneva Agreement concluded the French war against the >Vietnamese and promised them a unifying election, mandated to be held in >July 1956. The U.S. government knew that fair elections, in effect, meant a >genuine democratic victory for revered Communist leader Ho Chi Minh. This >was not acceptable! Therefore, in June 1954, prior to the signing of the >historic Agreement, the U.S. began CIA-directed internal sabotage >operations against the Vietnamese, while setting up puppet Ngo Dinh Diem >(brought over to VN from the U.S.) as "our" political leader. No elections >were ever held! This set the stage for yet another war for Vietnamese >independence - this time of unwanted U.S forces and their S. Vietnamese >puppets. The Vietnamese had been betrayed! > > > >The seriousness of the U.S. government to interfere with independence >movements in Asia cannot be underestimated. U.S. National Security Council >documents from 1956 declared that our "national security...would be >endangered by Communist domination of mainland Southeast Asia." Secret >military plans stated that "nuclear weapons will be used in general war and >in military operations short of general war." By March 1961, the Pentagon >brass recommended sending 60,000 soldiers to western Laos accompanied by >air power that included, if necessary, use of nuclear weapons to assure >that the Royal Laotian government would prevail against the popular >insurgency being waged against it. > > > >The covert operations intended to destabilize the Vietnamese independence >movement were, of course, in direct violation of the Geneva Agreements. >They were also in violation of the United Nations Charter and other >international laws. This covert war lasted nearly eleven years until the >overt invasion by U.S. forces commenced on March 8, 1965. This invasion >was also in violation of international laws, as well as the U.S. >Constitution which requires a Declaration of War by Congress prior to >initiating acts of war. > > > >For the next ten years the U.S. continued its lawless behavior, unleashing >forces that caused (and continue to cause) an incomprehensible amount of >devastation in Vietnam: > >* Eight million tons worth of indiscriminate bombing (four times the > amount used by the U.S. in all World War II), destroyed an area >the size of the State of Maine, if laid crater to crater; > >* Utilization of eight million additional tons of other kinds of ordnance; > >* Dropping of nearly 400,000 tons of napalm on people targets, a totally >indiscriminate incendiary weapon; > >* The callous identification of as much as three-fourths of South Vietnam >as a "free fire zone" justified the murder of virtually anyone found in >thousands of villages in those vast areas; > >* An historically unprecedented level of chemical warfare in the >indiscriminate spraying of nearly 20 million gallons on one-seventh the >area of South Vietnam. The vestigial effects of chemical warfare poisoning >continues to plague the health of adult Vietnamese (and ex-G.I.s) while >causing escalated birth defects. Samples of soil, water, food, and body >fat of Vietnamese continues to the present day to reveal dangerously >elevated levels of dioxin. > >* Today Vietnamese officials estimate the continued dangerous presence of >35 million landmines left over from the war, and 300,000 tons of unexploded >ordnance. Tragically they continue to explode when farmers and children >accidentally detonate them in their work and play activities, and kill or >injure several thousand every year. The Vietnamese report 40,000 people >killed alone since 1975 by land mines and buried bombs. That means that >every day 4 or 5 Vietnamese are continually killed due to U.S. ordnance. > > > >The war against the Vietnamese, thus, goes on and on. > > > >It is now believed that the U.S. and its allies killed as many as 5 million >Southeast Asian citizens during the active war years. The numbers of dead >in Laos and Cambodia remain uncounted, but as of 1971, a Congressional >Research Service report prepared for the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations >Committee indicated that over one million Laotians had been killed, >wounded, and refugeed, with the figure for Cambodia being two million. More >than a half million "secret" U.S. bombing missions of Laos that began in >late 1964 devastated whole populations of ancient cultures there. >Estimates indicate that around 230,000 tons of bombs were dropped over >northern Laos in 1968 and 1969 alone. Increasing numbers of U.S. military >personnel were added on the Laotian ground in 1961. Land invasions of Laos >occurred for two months in early 1969, and again for one week in early >1971. "Secret" bombing of Cambodia had begun in March 1969. An outright >land invasion of Cambodia had occurred from late April 1970 through the end >of June, causing thousands of casualties. And the raging U.S. covert wars >in these countries did not finally cease until August 14,1973, inflicting >countless additional casualties. When the bombing in Cambodia finally >ceased the U.S. Air Force had officially recorded dropping nearly 260,000 >tons of bombs there. The total tonnage of bombs dropped in Laos over >eight-and-a-half years exceeded two million. > > > > > >The consensus now is that more than 3 million Vietnamese were killed, with >300,000 additional missing in action and presumed dead. In the process the >U.S. lost nearly 59,000 of her own men and women, with about 2,000 >additional missing, while four of her allies lost over 6,000 more. South >Vietnamese military counted nearly 225,000 dead. All this carnage in order >to destroy the basic rights and capacity of the Vietnamese to construct >their own independent, sovereign society. None of these people deserved to >die in war. Vietnamese, Laotians, Cambodians, and U.S. military grunts were >all victims. All of these corpses had been created because of the >perpetuation of an incredible LIE - a "cause" that had been concocted by >White male plutocrats in Washington, many of whom possessed Ph.Ds from >prestigious universities. These politicians and their appointees, along >with their profitable arms makers/dealers, desired, as did most of their >predecessors going back in U.S. history, to assure the destruction of >peoples' democratic movements that threatened the virtually unlimited >hegemony of the U.S. over markets and resources - in this case those >located in East Asia - and the profits to be derived therefrom. But never >did a small country suffer so much from an imperial nation, as the >Vietnamese did from the United States. > > > >To grasp the nearly incomprehensible consequences to the Vietnamese society >it is instructive to reflect that during the U.S. war against the >Vietnamese, nearly one in ten, or 10 percent of her population of >approximately 35 million was grievously killed. In addition, vast areas of >territory were devastated by bombing and chemical warfare, and Vietnam's >infrastructure was largely destroyed. This contrasts with one in 3,300, or >.03 percent of the U.S. population who needlessly died in the lawless >intervention. What would be the effects on the U.S. society if we had >suffered losses of twenty million, or 10 percent of our population in a >war? Furthermore, how would it have affected us if vast regions of our >country had been bombed and chemically defoliated, simply because we >insisted on the right to be free from a foreign power intending to dominate >and control our political ideology and functioning society? > > > >During the devastating U.S. Civil War, slightly more than 185,000 Union and >Confederate soldiers died out of a population of about 32 million, or about >.6 percent of the U.S. population. During World War II, with a population >of about 135 million, the U.S. lost nearly 300,000 soldiers, or .22 >percent. In the latter war, the U.S. suffered no property damage with the >exception of the destruction of their military base at Pearl Harbor, but >that was located on colonized land taken from Hawaiian natives formally >annexed in 1898 against their will. The people of the United States simply >have no comprehension of the amount of damage and destruction our policies >have caused others, as we have never faced anything closely comparable to >what we did in Vietnam. Similarly, in Korea only ten years earlier, though >unknown to virtually all Westerners to this day, there was a similar effort >on the part of Koreans throughout its Peninsula to be free of U.S. >occupation and subsequent military intervention following the Japanese >surrender in August 1945. That conflict ultimately culminated in what we >call the Korean War, where it is now believed that a shocking 5 million >were killed, 4 million of whom were Koreans and one million Chinese. Korea >had a total population of about 30 million, meaning that Korea's population >losses were greater per capita than Vietnam's - greater than one in seven >killed, or more than 13 percent! > > > >To repeat: Bob Kerrey and I, along with 3.5 to 4 million other U.S. men and >women were thrust into a fundamentally immoral, lawless intervention >against the authentic desires of the Vietnamese to build an independent, >sovereign nation. (The Pentagon appears to not know a precise number of >military personnel assigned to Southeast Asia due to significant numbers >assigned temporary, versus permanent, duty, and others participating in >classified, unreportable missions. For example my entire unit in Vietnam >was considered temporary duty with our official location identified at an >airbase in Louisiana.) Most of us simply did not understand the historical >context at the time. We believed we were doing our duty for our country to >protect Vietnam from the evils of monolithic communism. Of course, our >government did not want us to know the authentic history, even if it did >know. My job was, in essence, to protect airplanes in between their >bombing missions. Since the villages they were bombing had been identified >as being in a "free fire zone," it was easy to rationalize destroying >everything. On occasion, through ground observations, I witnessed the >horrific aftermath of these bombing missions - villages with bodies of only >young women, many children, and a few elderly strewn on the ground. I never >saw any weapons in these virtually defenseless villages. The bombing of >villages which at first I thought must be the result of mistakes, I later >concluded was deliberate and systematic. I was feeling sick about what I >was realizing was happening but I had no one to talk to. > > > >Now we know more about United States history, and that our violent >intervention in Vietnam was, unfortunately, not an aberration. The defining >and enabling experience of our U.S. civilization was the Holocaust >perpetrated against the millions of original inhabitants living on the >Hemispheric land base. That experience was followed by the kidnapping and >transporting of millions of Africans to the Americas providing "free" labor >for building our original agricultural and mercantile system. Two-thirds >of those originally apprehended in Africa perished while resisting arrest >or during the deplorable conditions of transport across the Atlantic Ocean. > "Free" land at gunpoint. "Free" labor at gunpoint. This is an intrinsic >part of our cultural ethos and karma. > > > >It is known that the U.S. has historically intervened militarily exceeding >400 times in more than 100 nations expanding our control over global >resources and markets. And it is now believed that the U.S. covertly >intervened in a variety of destabilizing actions anywhere from 6,000 to >10,000 times in over 100 countries since the end of World War II. No one >knows just how many people have been murdered and maimed by these >aggressive (and lawless) actions, but the figure is in multiples of >millions. This is a tough conclusion, one that is extremely painful, to >acknowledge about the nation of our upbringing and citizenship. > > > >Obsessive addiction to our disproportionately privileged American Way Of >Life (AWOL) exacts heavy demands upon Mother Earth and her citizens. As a >nation we have but 4.5 percent of the world's population, yet insist on >consuming anywhere from 25 percent to nearly half of the world's resources, >depending upon which asset is examined. For example, the U.S. consumes >slightly more than 25 percent of the world's oil production, but higher >percentages of other critical resources. The U.S. has nearly 500 passenger >cars per one thousand people, nearly six times the rate for the entire >world's population, consuming high percentages of the globe's steel and >rubber resources. People in the U.S. consume paper at seventeen times the >rate of those in the "developing" world, and nearly six times the rate of >the total world population. We in the United States are carefully >insulated from experiencing the incredible pain and suffering that directly >results from our ignorance and arrogance. > > > >We veterans who now understand this grotesquely unfair reality can exercise >a choice to take courageous responsibility for our actions, especially >since our cowardly government which made the intervention decisions is >sadly unlikely to do so. Regularly forgotten is that the Paris Peace >Accords signed by the United States and Vietnamese governments on January >27, 1973, and subsequent letter signed by President Nixon on February 1, >promised more than $4 billion for healing the wounds of war and postwar >reconstruction. The U.S. shamelessly reneged on this promise and the aid >has never been provided. > > > >In a profound way the entire U.S. American society needs to take >responsibility for the crime against Vietnam. The U.S. Constitutional >democracy and its political structures representing the people and >taxpayers of the United States, made a series of choices, all of them >criminal and in violation of both international law and its own >Constitution, to invade the nations of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, >devastating the people, their infrastructures and cultures. Nonetheless, >veterans who viscerally participated in the tragic war have an opportunity >to pursue our own healing and set an example for our society. Bob Kerrey >and his men killed for this lie, and participated in this terrible assault >on the Vietnamese people. Though Kerrey had been on a mission designed to >likely result in the direct killing of villagers, my duties led me to only >witnessing the aftermath of bombings that murdered large numbers of >Vietnamese. I viewed the sickening sight of dozens of bodies of women, >children, and elderly. I was a participant, nonetheless, in the killing >machine, even being minimally complicit in the bombing campaigns that >murdered far more Vietnamese (and Cambodians and Laotians) than all ground >operations combined. > > > >I herein offer a healing prescription for Bob Kerrey. Other U.S. souls >still haunted by participation in that criminal war might consider >something similar: > > > >First, Mr. Kerrey, please publicly return your Bronze Star received for the >killing of the civilians at Thang Phong. You need to clearly renounce it >as a medal drenched in the blood of the innocent people of that village. > > Second, Mr. Kerrey, I urge you to travel to the village of Thang >Phong in the Province of Kien Hoa to personally express your sorrow for the >consequences of your actions, asking those people for forgiveness. > > Third, Mr. Kerrey, create a reparations or atonement fund, in >cooperation with the Vietnamese people in that area, as a concrete effort >to repair in some way the harm done. This will make saying your sorry >possess more meaning. > > And fourth, Mr. Kerrey, and perhaps the most important act for your >own healing and for the healing of our entire nation, begin publicly >speaking and teaching about the authentic history of the Vietnamese people >and the U.S. role in sabotaging the 1956 unifying elections as mandated by >the 1954 Geneva Agreements, how the U.S. fabricated an alternative puppet >government not supported by the vast majority of the Vietnamese people, how >the U.S. maintained its posture through a series of incredible lies that >put the Vietnamese, Cambodians, Laotians, and U.S. men and women in harm's >way, causing the needless death and maiming of millions. Thus you can >educate the U.S. American society on why so many civilians were murdered in >confusion about who was a VC or not, as the vast majority of Vietnamese >were simply defending their rights to be free of unwanted outside forces. >We would likely do no less if invaded here at home. > > > >Never has there been a more critical time in our nation's history for there >to emerge a dramatic new consciousness rooted in humility and genuine >respect for other nations and people, including all of our own citizens. >Veterans have a unique standing to initiate courageous leadership in a >national healing process. This requires speaking truth to what we know, >including that all people and the earth are intrinsically interconnected. >It requires recognizing that at a deep level we feel lonely sadness, which >we have often defended with anger, but begs to be grieved with voluminous >tears. Our souls, and the soul of our country, are at stake. Furthermore, >the future of peace in the world may rest on a profound reckoning on the >part of U.S. Americans that our historical imperial policies have been >wrong, and that we now want to truly make amends for our crimes, for our >arrogance. I urge all veterans, especially those from Vietnam, to find the >courage to reveal our own, and our country's, dark role, and disclose the >incredible lies that our government perpetuated against us, leading to the >murder of millions of innocent human beings. The future of the human >condition, not just our souls, may actually be at stake! > _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com
