The Buddhist Revolt in Vietnam
Howe, Irving
April 12, 1966 Something important is happening in South Vietnam, even if its exact nature is not yet clear. The demonstrations in Saigon and Hue, the consolidation of the Buddhist...
...They were there in the mid-fifties, unwilling to submit to the dictatorship of Diem or the dictatorship of Ho...
...accept this possibility for ending the war...
...Let the South Vietnamese decide, by themselves, what they propose to do with their countryl—and right now the Buddhists, or at least some of them, seem to offer a way out...
...If the South Vietnamese can resolve their tragic situation in the way indicated by the Buddhists, then the U.S., no matter what anyone may think of the wisdom of the proposed resolution, must accept the outcome...
...it cannot therefore, in logic or conscience, denounce the Buddhists who may, in fact, succeed in negotiating...
...intervention—nor is there any reason why they should...
...There would then follow, presumably, negotiations among the rival Vietnamese themselves, the creation of a transitional government in which the NLF might be represented, and the holding of elections in which not only the currently recognized political tendencies within South Vietnam but also the NLF would present slates of candidates...
...The record of U.S...
...The demonstrations in Saigon and Hue, the consolidation of the Buddhist factions into an apparently united force, the visible weakness of Ky's military government (which, by the time you read these lines, may well have collapsed)— such developments suggest that new political energies are making themselves felt within South Vietnam...
...That this did not happen—a major political tragedy—is largely the fault of the United States, a country so blinded by sterile "antiCommunism" and realpolitik that it staked its moral-political reputation on a series of petty autocrats ranging from Diem to Ky...
...that, in short, the South Vietnamese people be gin to take their destiny into their own hands...
...but insofar as the Buddhists express the sentiments of a weary and disenchanted people still trying, in what may be the last act of desperation, to shape their own life, there is reason for favoring the fullest play of political opinion and even discord in the cities of South Vietnam...
...Had there been some freedom in South Vietnam after the Geneva agreement, these nationalist and religious groupings could have contributed toward the formation of a viable South Vietnam, the kind of society that would have satisfied the needs of the peasants and the city population, thereby undercutting the Communist appeal...
...To do anything else would be to insist that we have the right to decide for the South Vietnamese that they would be better dead than red...
...Not only humane and moral considerations, but simple political realism dictates that the U.S...
...It is almost certainly too late for completely satisfactory solutions, or anything like them...
...but it may not yet be too late to avoid complete disaster...
...Who are the Buddhists and what do they represent...
...the true Vietnamese nationalists who have been exploited by the French colonialists and the "dictatorial" Diem regime, and are currently exploited by the foreigners as well as by the Communists...
...The proposals advanced by the Buddhists therefore seem to make sense: that the present regime desist from all repressive acts against critics and political opponents...
...and a small minority of "war profiteers" into which he lumps the Vietnamese generals, government officials and Vietnamese traders...
...that preparations be made immediate ly for an election within South Vietnam that would have as its goal a civilian government in Saigon...
...The U.S...
...has repeatedly declared that it favors negotiations...
...or that we have the right to decide for them which negotiating teams or terms are proper and which are not...
...To accept the U.S...
...In any long-range valuation of the Vietnam tragedy, it will have to be noticed that the forces making themselves felt in Saigon and Hue have always been there, even if suppressed, confused and ill-structured...
...perspective of an indefinitely prolonged war becomes less and less palatable to large numbers of non-Communist Vietnamese...
...intervention in Vietnam is a record of disaster, stupidity, reaction...
...and the disaster of a reenactment in the South of the totalitarian terror which followed in the countryside of North Vietnam shortly after Ho Chi Minh took power...
...They have, apparently, no confidence in U.S...
...Now it is quite possible that one outcome of such a course would be a government in Saigon that would press for a gradual detente with the NLF, aiming at a formal or tacit cease-fire...
...April 12, 1966 Something important is happening in South Vietnam, even if its exact nature is not yet clear...
...Writing on April 10, 1966 in the New York Herald Tribune, Beverly Deepe reports the views of a leading Buddhist, Thich Tri Quang: He has divided the Vietnamese society into three categories: the Communists and pro-Communists "who exploit Vietnamese nationalism for tactical reasons...
...By now, with a background of decades of corruption and reactionary politics in South Vietnam, it would be fatuous to assume that any policy can offer much hope for a decent solution...
...If this report is at all accurate, it offers a small glimmer of hope...
...If there are now stirrings among the Vietnamese people to regain control of their political and social life, then these stirrings deserve the support of everyone who wishes this appalling war to come to an end...
...At least some sections of the people, acting through or near the Buddhists, are trying to assert control over their destiny, apart from the decisions of one or another big power...
...Clearly they are indigenous to Vietnamese social-political life, and just as clearly there are many political tendencies among them, ranging from those who are ready to make an immediate deal with the Communists to those who would establish a new and independent government in Saigon that could enjoy some freedom of movement vis a vis both the United States and the NLF...
...Nor can it, in logic or conscience, insist that the negotiations be primarily the privilege of outside powers like itself or the Chinese...
...It may indicate a path by which the people of South Vietnam, acting on their own, can find a way to avoid the disaster of a prolonged and fruitless war in which South Vietnam would become a mere pawn for the U.S...
...Without denying that this course entails the serious risk of a total Communist take-over, and without claiming that it will necessarily lead to results pleasing to liberals and democratic radicals, we believe that it is probably, in the present extreme situation, the best choice...
Vol. 13 • May 1966 • No. 3
