DIY History | Transcribe | Campus Culture | University of Iowa anti-war protests, 1970 | 1970-10-07 ""Iowa City People's Peace Treaty Committee"" Page 21

Transcribe
Translate

University of Iowa anti-war protests, 1970

1970-10-07 ""Iowa City People's Peace Treaty Committee"" Page 21

have been fairly good by North Vietnamese standards. Crowds of North Vietnamese sometimes gathered around his hut, but they were frequently friendly. After this first month at the camp, Overly was provided with  a cellmate. The problems that did exist, Overly said, may have been "logistical rather than diabolical."
Frishman and Hegdahl charged that some of the prisoners are kept in solitary confinement. This is true and in violation of the Geneva Convention. It is difficult to understand why North Vietnam engages in this practice, except to control or to demoralize the pilots. It might be added, however, that solitary confinement is unfortunately, not an unusual practice in modern penal institutions. When the US Army charged several Green Beret officers with the murder of a Vietnamese in 1969, for example, the officers were placed in solitary confinement in five-by-seven foot cells with no toilet facilities and only a bare light bulb inadequate for reading. The officers complained that their cells became inordinately hot. 
The remaining charges made against North Vietnam involve procedural requirements of the Convention that prisoners be identified and that they be allowed to write and receive letters. North Vietnam has been making dramatic improvements in these respects and now allows the regular exchange of correspondence between the captives and their relatives. The Nixon administration has been reluctant to acknowledge the improvements because to do so would defuse an issue it has been able to exploit.
This procedural compliance, has, to be sure come later than it should have. Until late 1969,. the North Vietnamese had allowed only 115 prisoners to send and receive letters. At the time however, a group of antiwar activists established the "Committee of Liaison with Families of Servicemen Detained in North Vietnam" with offices in New York, and letters and packages have since flowed regularly through the couriers of the Committee. 
The Committee of Liaison has complied from the letters they have received a list of 339 men who are confirmed as captives in North Vietnam. This list may not be complete, but it is virtually so. The North Vietnamese are now regularly responding to requests by the Committee of Liaison about the status of specific men. The lines of communication are often cumbersome but there no longer seems to be a deliberate attempt to withhold information. The North Vietnamese responded, for example, on November 6, to a list of 17 names sent to them by the Committee. Similarly on November 20, they wrote two letters which were received on November 22, commenting on the status of 104 men. On November 26, five days after the raid at Sontay, the North Vietnamese answered the requests by the Swedish government for information about 203 men. The status of most of these men had previously been reported to the Com-

[cartoon hand drawing]
TELL IT TO HONOI

[cartoon hand drawing]
HANOI! QUIT TRYING TO RUN YOUR OWN COUNTRY GET OUT OF VIET NAM AMERICANISM LOVE IT, OR LEAVE, BETTER DEAD THAN RED...
(San Diego Free Door/ LNS.)

mittee of Liaison in New York, but some of the information was new. 
Between December, 1969, and November, 1970,, the Committee of Liaison received and transmitted to the prisoners' relatives more than 2,500 letters, an average of seven-and-a-third letters from each of the 339 confirmed captives. Americans in North Vietnam are now also receiving packages whose contents range from instant breakfasts and medicines to art supplies and games, The rate of letters coming from North Vietnam is still below the minimum of two letters and four postcards per month required by the Geneva Convention, but it is almost equal to one letter per month that POW's in the camps run by the Saigon government are permitted to send. 
There are other respects in which the Americans in North Vietnam need not be envious of their counterparts who are incarcerated in South Vietnam. The International Committee of the Red Cross reported a year ago that seven North Vietnamese prisoners of war were transferred from the formal POW camps to the tiger cages of the prison on Con Son Island because they refused to salute the flag of South Vietnam. In the tiger cages they were kept in their cells twenty four hours a day, strapped in irons from five in the evening to six in the morning, and never permitted to exercise or have fresh air. They were allowed to wash only twice a week: they were not given enough fresh good or water: and they were only rarely given fresh clothes.
After the existence of the tiger cages at Con Son Island was made public six months ago, some American officials in Saigon conceded that these conditions had been known about since at least 1963 and that there had never been any effort to improve them. Lawyers in the State Department's Office of the Legal Adviser told a New York Time reporter that the United States was responsible for the treatment of prisoners at Con Son because there were persons in that prison who had been captures by American troops. Article Twelve of the Geneva Convention states that it is appropriate to turn captives over to another government only if the receiving government is providing treatment that conforms to the requirements of the Convention. 
Many of the Americans who have spent time in Vietnam, both military personnel and civilians have brought back eyewitness accounts of frequent torture and abuse of prisoners committed both by Americans and South Vietnamese. The President of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Marcel Naville, has, in fact, directly criticized the policies of the Saigon government.
It is profoundly regrettable [he said in Geneva on August 31, 1970] that South Vietnam grants prisoner-of-war status to only a small part of its detainees, and authorizes Red Cross delegates only with many restrictions to make visits to a large proportion of its other detainees.
The faults of the Saigon government and of our own forces in South Vietnam do not, of course, excuse the failings of the North Vietnamese, but they should cause those government officials who self righteously condemn the North Vietnamese to consider cleaning up our own house. 
One aspect of prisoner treatment on which the North Vietnamese have never altered their position is the question of international inspection of the camps. One reason for the rigidity of their position would seem to be that they genuinely doubt whether any international body can be truly neutral in the Vietnamese war. The US had for some time tried to persuade North Vietnam to allow the International Committee of the Red Cross to visit the captured American pilots. The ICRC is entrusted with general supervision of the Geneva Convention and has regularly inspected the formal POW camps in South Vietnam. The United States government views the ICRC, which is composed entirely of Swiss nationals, as a neutral body and cannot see why the North Vietnamese do not similarly view the Committee.
Asian nations were, however first introduced to the Red Cross by Western countries which brought it along on their colonizing missions, and many Asians still view the Red Cross as an instrument of imperialism. Although the ICRC has 

[photo]
ONE OF LON NOL'S TROOPS WITH PRISONERS

tried to be fair to all parties in the war the Swiss naturally find it easier to communicate with other Westerners and have maintained a close relationship with the United States. The North Vietnamese therefore view the Committee with deep mistrust. 
A second and perhaps more important reason why the North Vietnamese do not want any foreign organizations inspecting their prison camps is that they tear a renewed bombing campaign by the United States. If the United States learns the exact locations of all the prison camps, the North Vietnamese reason, the Air Force and Navy would be free to begin a saturation bombing campaign in all other parts of the country, not to mention more commando raids on the camps themselves. The sporadic but intensive bombing attacks on various parts of North Vietnam in January, February, May, September, and November, 1970, provide new reasons for North Vietnam's fears. Indeed, the recent commando raid may end forever the possibility of international inspection. 
The North Vietnamese should not, however, be viewed as intransigent on the issue of prisoners-of-war. On September 17, 1970, the Viet Cong's representative at the Paris Peace Talks. Madame Nguyen Thi Binh, presented - with North Vietnamese concurrence - a new peace proposal that included a remarkable concession on the question of prisoners-of-war. Madame Binh said that if the United States would agree to withdraw its forces from South Vietnam by June 30, 1971, the communist forces would refrain from attacking the withdrawing US troops and in addition they would begin immediate discussions on the exchange of prisoners. Never before in modern warfare has there been a general prisoner exchange prior to the end of hostilities. 
Yet the Nixon Administration virtually ignored this offer, which has been repeated several times since. Instead of responding to it directly, President Nixon made a much publicized address on October 7, 1970, in which he favored an immediate release of all prisoners. But he would not link this gesture to a withdrawal of all American military forces from Vietnam. It should be clear by now than the only course that will lead to settlement with the North Vietnamese is a convincing announcement of a schedule for complete withdrawal. 
The North Vietnamese should have released the names of their prisoners and permitted correspondence earlier; they should provide the pilots with more recreation and let them out of solitary confinement. But the available evidence indicates they are hardly as inhumane as the Nixon Administration had painted the, Nor is there any valid reason for this issue to be receiving the amount of hysteria that is now being devoted to it. 
Certainly, the United States is not justified in launching commando attacks deep into North Vietnam's territory because of the prisoners. Before the recent raid, the Administration's use of the prisoner issue seemed a cynical attempt to manipulate popular sentiment in order to gain support for a war we have no business fighting. But the raid raises even graver questions. Unlike President Johnson, Mr. Nixon has given no assurances against American military expeditions to the North. The possibility cannot be excluded that the Administration's inflammatory use of the prisoner issue may serve as the pretext for yet another expansion of the war. 

21

Saving...

have been fairly good by North Vietnamese standards. Crowds of North Vietnamese sometimes gathered around his hut, but they were frequently friendly. After this first month at the camp, Overly was provided with a cellmate. The problems that did exist, Overly said, may have been "logistical rather than diabolical." Frishman and Hegdahl charged that some of the prisoners are kept in solitary confinement. This is true and in violation of the Geneva Convention. It is difficult to understand why North Vietnam engages in this practice, except to control or to demoralize the pilots. It might be added, however, that solitary confinement is unfortunately, not an unusual practice in modern penal institutions. When the US Army charged several Green Beret officers with the murder of a Vietnamese in 1969, for example, the officers were placed in solitary confinement in five-by-seven foot cells with no toilet facilities and only a bare light bulb inadequate for reading. The officers complained that their cells became inordinately hot. The remaining charges made against North Vietnam involve procedural requirements of the Convention that prisoners be identified and that they be allowed to write and receive letters. North Vietnam has been making dramatic improvements in these respects and now allows the regular exchange of correspondence between the captives and their relatives. The Nixon administration has been reluctant to acknowledge the improvements because to do so would defuse an issue it has been able to exploit. This procedural compliance, has, to be sure come later than it should have. Until late 1969,. the North Vietnamese had allowed only 115 prisoners to send and receive letters. At the time however, a group of antiwar activists established the "Committee of Liaison with Families of Servicemen Detained in North Vietnam" with offices in New York, and letters and packages have since flowed regularly through the couriers of the Committee. The Committee of Liaison has complied from the letters they have received a list of 339 men who are confirmed as captives in North Vietnam. This list may not be complete, but it is virtually so. The North Vietnamese are now regularly responding to requests by the Committee of Liaison about the status of specific men. The lines of communication are often cumbersome but there no longer seems to be a deliberate attempt to withhold information. The North Vietnamese responded, for example, on November 6, to a list of 17 names sent to them by the Committee. Similarly on November 20, they wrote two letters which were received on November 22, commenting on the status of 104 men. On November 26, five days after the raid at Sontay, the North Vietnamese answered the requests by the Swedish government for information about 203 men. The status of most of these men had previously been reported to the Com- [cartoon hand drawing] TELL IT TO HONOI [cartoon hand drawing] HANOI! QUIT TRYING TO RUN YOUR OWN COUNTRY GET OUT OF VIET NAM AMERICANISM LOVE IT, OR LEAVE, BETTER DEAD THAN RED... (San Diego Free Door/ LNS.) mittee of Liaison in New York, but some of the information was new. Between December, 1969, and November, 1970,, the Committee of Liaison received and transmitted to the prisoners' relatives more than 2,500 letters, an average of seven-and-a-third letters from each of the 339 confirmed captives. Americans in North Vietnam are now also receiving packages whose contents range from instant breakfasts and medicines to art supplies and games, The rate of letters coming from North Vietnam is still below the minimum of two letters and four postcards per month required by the Geneva Convention, but it is almost equal to one letter per month that POW's in the camps run by the Saigon government are permitted to send. There are other respects in which the Americans in North Vietnam need not be envious of their counterparts who are incarcerated in South Vietnam. The International Committee of the Red Cross reported a year ago that seven North Vietnamese prisoners of war were transferred from the formal POW camps to the tiger cages of the prison on Con Son Island because they refused to salute the flag of South Vietnam. In the tiger cages they were kept in their cells twenty four hours a day, strapped in irons from five in the evening to six in the morning, and never permitted to exercise or have fresh air. They were allowed to wash only twice a week: they were not given enough fresh good or water: and they were only rarely given fresh clothes. After the existence of the tiger cages at Con Son Island was made public six months ago, some American officials in Saigon conceded that these conditions had been known about since at least 1963 and that there had never been any effort to improve them. Lawyers in the State Department's Office of the Legal Adviser told a New York Time reporter that the United States was responsible for the treatment of prisoners at Con Son because there were persons in that prison who had been captures by American troops. Article Twelve of the Geneva Convention states that it is appropriate to turn captives over to another government only if the receiving government is providing treatment that conforms to the requirements of the Convention. Many of the Americans who have spent time in Vietnam, both military personnel and civilians have brought back eyewitness accounts of frequent torture and abuse of prisoners committed both by Americans and South Vietnamese. The President of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Marcel Naville, has, in fact, directly criticized the policies of the Saigon government. It is profoundly regrettable [he said in Geneva on August 31, 1970] that South Vietnam grants prisoner-of-war status to only a small part of its detainees, and authorizes Red Cross delegates only with many restrictions to make visits to a large proportion of its other detainees. The faults of the Saigon government and of our own forces in South Vietnam do not, of course, excuse the failings of the North Vietnamese, but they should cause those government officials who self righteously condemn the North Vietnamese to consider cleaning up our own house. One aspect of prisoner treatment on which the North Vietnamese have never altered their position is the question of international inspection of the camps. One reason for the rigidity of their position would seem to be that they genuinely doubt whether any international body can be truly neutral in the Vietnamese war. The US had for some time tried to persuade North Vietnam to allow the International Committee of the Red Cross to visit the captured American pilots. The ICRC is entrusted with general supervision of the Geneva Convention and has regularly inspected the formal POW camps in South Vietnam. The United States government views the ICRC, which is composed entirely of Swiss nationals, as a neutral body and cannot see why the North Vietnamese do not similarly view the Committee. Asian nations were, however first introduced to the Red Cross by Western countries which brought it along on their colonizing missions, and many Asians still view the Red Cross as an instrument of imperialism. Although the ICRC has [photo] ONE OF LON NOL'S TROOPS WITH PRISONERS tried to be fair to all parties in the war the Swiss naturally find it easier to communicate with other Westerners and have maintained a close relationship with the United States. The North Vietnamese therefore view the Committee with deep mistrust. A second and perhaps more important reason why the North Vietnamese do not want any foreign organizations inspecting their prison camps is that they tear a renewed bombing campaign by the United States. If the United States learns the exact locations of all the prison camps, the North Vietnamese reason, the Air Force and Navy would be free to begin a saturation bombing campaign in all other parts of the country, not to mention more commando raids on the camps themselves. The sporadic but intensive bombing attacks on various parts of North Vietnam in January, February, May, September, and November, 1970, provide new reasons for North Vietnam's fears. Indeed, the recent commando raid may end forever the possibility of international inspection. The North Vietnamese should not, however, be viewed as intransigent on the issue of prisoners-of-war. On September 17, 1970, the Viet Cong's representative at the Paris Peace Talks. Madame Nguyen Thi Binh, presented - with North Vietnamese concurrence - a new peace proposal that included a remarkable concession on the question of prisoners-of-war. Madame Binh said that if the United States would agree to withdraw its forces from South Vietnam by June 30, 1971, the communist forces would refrain from attacking the withdrawing US troops and in addition they would begin immediate discussions on the exchange of prisoners. Never before in modern warfare has there been a general prisoner exchange prior to the end of hostilities. Yet the Nixon Administration virtually ignored this offer, which has been repeated several times since. Instead of responding to it directly, President Nixon made a much publicized address on October 7, 1970, in which he favored an immediate release of all prisoners. But he would not link this gesture to a withdrawal of all American military forces from Vietnam. It should be clear by now than the only course that will lead to settlement with the North Vietnamese is a convincing announcement of a schedule for complete withdrawal. The North Vietnamese should have released the names of their prisoners and permitted correspondence earlier; they should provide the pilots with more recreation and let them out of solitary confinement. But the available evidence indicates they are hardly as inhumane as the Nixon Administration had painted the, Nor is there any valid reason for this issue to be receiving the amount of hysteria that is now being devoted to it. Certainly, the United States is not justified in launching commando attacks deep into North Vietnam's territory because of the prisoners. Before the recent raid, the Administration's use of the prisoner issue seemed a cynical attempt to manipulate popular sentiment in order to gain support for a war we have no business fighting. But the raid raises even graver questions. Unlike President Johnson, Mr. Nixon has given no assurances against American military expeditions to the North. The possibility cannot be excluded that the Administration's inflammatory use of the prisoner issue may serve as the pretext for yet another expansion of the war. 21