Elections in Vietnam
TOLISCHUS, OTTO D.
THINKING ALOUD Elections in Vietnam By Otto D. Tolischus In line with classical precedents, the war in Vietnam is being waged on two fronts. It involves first of all a military offensive—a...
...No military action, however massive, would reverse such a verdict...
...They are scarcely ready to ease their totalitarian controls— for the present...
...But that is not enough...
...After their ignominious defeat in Austria despite a prolonged occupation of part of that country, Communist leaders vowed never to risk free elections again...
...Such a program obviously smacks of acquiescence in the continued partition of Vietnam...
...The United States committed itself at Geneva to national unification elections supervised by the United Nations for all partitioned countries, including Vietnam...
...Thus, the "free elections by secret ballot" agreed upon at Geneva were rejected, not by the Diem regime, but by Ho Chi Minh...
...The Diem regime, which did not sign the Geneva Accords and did not consider itself bound by them, nevertheless agreed to the elections and in July 1955 declared itself ready to discuss election procedures with Ho Chi Minh...
...Furthermore, the billion-dollar "Marshall Plan" for Southeast Asia, which promises the Vietnamese a higher living standard with surcease from both the old Mandarin and the new Communist rule, should appeal to all factions, North and South...
...But an "election" of this kind would have been a mockery...
...withdrawal from Vietnam...
...Given cessation of Communist aggression, the United States declares itself "ready and eager" to withdraw from South Vietnam and entrust its security to some new international control of the sort that has failed so miserably in the past...
...Vietnamese nationalism—however dim or vague in jungle-bound villages—is among the main sources of Ho Chi Minh's strength, including whatever sympathy he commands in the South...
...The stage for such a campaign was set by the Geneva Accords of 1954, which have national reunification in freedom as their final goal...
...But how is national reunification to be achieved...
...It involves first of all a military offensive—a determination to use American power with all possible restraint to avoid a wider war, but with all means necessary to stop Communist aggression...
...That way appeasement is born...
...And South Vietnamese leaders have long complained of the U.S...
...On the contrary, he further tightened Communist control, built up his party apparatus and military force and savagely suppressed all actual or potential opposition...
...Of these two fronts, the peace offensive could well be the more important...
...In such an agreement the Vietcong would have to join...
...President Johnson has rightly pointed out that the Communists never won a free election anywhere...
...For the moment perhaps...
...Unrealistic...
...The United States favors free elections in the Dominican Republic—there is no reason why it should not pursue them vigorously in Vietnam...
...Yet by their rejections they can only injure themselves before the eyes of the world, and justify the present struggle...
...Now, following the usual Communist tactic of identifying Communism with any popular cause, he has written nationalism and national unification on his banner and is exploiting them for Communist ends...
...They no longer mention free elections for Vietnam, but instead advance a simple formula under the military clauses of the Geneva Accords: The United States must go and the South Vietnamese must be left to settle their own affairs in compliance with the program of the "National Liberation Front," the political arm of Hanoi and the Vietcong...
...There are also hints of quasi-recognition of Communist North Vietnam: We disclaim any threat to its Communist regime and include it among the "governments" with which we would negotiate...
...It does have important positive elements: It makes plain that, unlike the French, the United States is not fighting for colonies or military bases and does not seek to dominate anybody...
...He was getting ready to march the terrorized population of the North to the polls in a typical totalitarian "election" rigged to assure him the usual 99 per cent Communist majority...
...The Communists must be expected to continue rejecting such demands...
...There is only one way in keeping with the principles of the United Nations Charter and the free world: Let the Vietnamese people themselves decide, not by bullets but by ballots...
...We are prone to abandon sound principles simply because the Communists at first say "No...
...The Johnson policy falls short of the requirements for such a peace program...
...He, like Secretary of State Rusk, holds out hope for a settlement that would permit "free elections under international supervision" in South Vietnam and "throughout all Vietnam...
...But this approach is too timid and is unlikely to arouse Vietnamese fervor...
...And Senator Fulbright sees "really free elections" as a sound basis for a settlement...
...Even more necessary is a comprehensive peace program that will rally world opinion to the U.S...
...But Communist perfidy is no reason for the U.S...
...These demands were repeated in 1958 and 1960...
...In Vietnam, as in all countries still seeking their national identity, nationalism, more than any ideology, OTTO D. TOLISCHUS, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting on Germany in the '30s, recently retired as a member of the editorial board of the New York Times...
...Nobody contends that Ho Chi Minh did anything of the kind...
...But no more unrealistic than the Communist demand for American capitulation...
...On the contrary, this demand, together with calls on the Communists to create the conditions for a free, secret ballot, and agree to international supervision, should be trumpeted to both North and South Vietnam as the only means of fulfilling their national aspirations...
...We must proclaim not only what we are against but also what we are for...
...Our first task ought to be to turn this nationalism against Communist colonialism in a campaign for real national liberation...
...That is also the method laid down by the Geneva Accords to which both sides profess willingness to return...
...More effective military operations are required, with greater Asian participation to counter increasingly racist Peking propaganda portraying the struggle as a war of rich white America against poor colored Asians for colonial domination...
...This goal was embraced not only by Ho Chi Minh but also by the Ngo Dinh Diem regime and the South Vietnamese National Assembly...
...The agreement calls for national unification through free elections by secret ballot under international supervision—the same kind of elections the UN demands for Korea and the 1955 Geneva Summit directive provides for Germany...
...With such methods he would indeed have won, especially since North Vietnam had a larger population than the South...
...failure to understand the potency of Vietnamese nationalism...
...Certainly not by a coalition with the Communists, such as doomed China, Czechoslovakia and all Eastern Europe...
...to go back on its commitments by abandoning the demand for unification through free elections...
...That is not true...
...President Johnson concedes that "in the long run there can be no military solution to the problem of Vietnam.' But there can be no solution whatsoever unless Communist aggression is stopped...
...Hanoi spurns all peace overtures based on partition as "imperialist plots" and demands U.S...
...They were not...
...is the dominant force...
...The prerequisite, naturally, would have to be a cease-fire and agreement on election procedures that will guarantee a free choice...
...The lack of such a program is one factor permitting the Communists to step up their attacks...
...That, of course, would mean a Communist takeover...
...It calls for an end to fighting but has only vague references to Vietnamese national aspirations (principally as something the Chinese Communists oppose, not as something we support...
...That is why anti- Communism is not enough...
...cause and inspire the whole Vietnamese people to fight for peace, independence and progress, persuade Vietcong guerrillas to stack their arms, and undercut Communist domination in the North...
...Its main emphasis is on a "sovereign and independent" South Vietnam which its neighbors must leave alone...
...Thousands of North Vietnamese preferred to vote with their feet by fleeing to the South...
...There are, of course, misgivings about the possible results of any election...
...and the impression has been spread that President Diem, prodded by the U.S., refused to permit them for fear the Communists would win...
...Like Cuba's Castro, he first posed as a nationalist before unmasking himself as a Communist...
...We would then have no alternative but to cut our losses and leave the Vietnamese to their self-chosen fate, hastening to erect new barriers against Communist expansion elsewhere...
...If, on the other hand, contrary to all experience, the Vietnamese people should be ready to become the first nation in the world to vote itself freely into Communist slavery, then our cause in that country is already lost...
...In any case, we cannot uphold good principles where it suits us and abandon them where it might not...
...The formula is a seductive one that demands a better answer than has been given so far...
...It ignores the one factor that could unite all Vietnamese, both North and South, including the feuding factions in Saigon...
...and he is taking full advantage of the American default...
...These elections were to be held in Vietnam in 1956...
...Even worse, it hands the unification issue on a silver platter to Ho Chi Minh...
...It also involves a peace offensive, demonstrated by President Johnson's appeal before the United Nations—an offensive which offers "unconditional discussions" on peace and security for everyone and on a billion-dollar economic development program under UN auspices and Asian leadership...
...And in Vietnam, as in Korea (and for that matter Germany), the goal of burgeoning nationalism is national reunification...
...Yet on this issue, the Johnson program is largely negative...
...But it quite properly demanded that Ho first comply with the Geneva agreement by creating the necessary conditions for free elections in the North, ending Communist terror and totalitarian control and assuring liberties at least equal to those in the South...
Vol. 48 • August 1965 • No. 16
