Article about North Vietnam invading South Vietnam

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363-01188 to 363-01195.pdf

Digital Object Identifier

363-01188 to 363-01195

Title

Article about North Vietnam invading South Vietnam

Description

Original caption: "infiltrate." Article about the North Vietnamese invasion of the South. For the New York Herald Tribune

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Draft transcripts were automatically generated via Google Document AI and are currently under review. Please report significant errors to Archives & Special Collections at archives@unl.edu.

Transcript

Beverly Deepe 101 Cong Ly Saigon infiltrate one FIRST DIVISION AREA, VIETNAM--A serious question regarding the credibility of an American military announcement about North Vietnamese troop infiltration south of the 17th parallel has been raised by South Vietnamese generals. The official American statement minimizing reports of infiltration here has been sharply contradicted by South Vietnamese officers in this mountainous, 2-province area bordering both Laos and North Vietnam where the infiltration has been concentrated. On July 14, a top U.S. military spokesman (informatively only--chief of staff Stilwell) at a specially convened press conference handed reporters a prepared statement--which had been at least checked by the American Embassy--reading “there are no indications of the presence of any PAVN (People’s Army of North Vietnam) units on South Vietnamese soil.” However, only the day before Premier General Nguyen Khanh in an exclusive interview [XXXX indicating deletion] described the infiltration as “overt invasion” and explained, “Before we ahd the problem of infiltration and subversion. Now we have whole units coming in from North Vietnam. Before they (north Vietnam) took soldiers from the south of the 17th parallel and sent them back. Now we find for the first time we caught prisoners who were born in North Vietnam.” (More) infiltrate 2 The North Vietnamese prisoners--the first ones captured in the war, he said--were [deletion: the first] concrete proof of Hanoi’s involvement in the guerrilla movement in the South. The U.S. military statement--followed two days later by a similar one from Defense Secretary Robert McNamara in Washington--raises a question which is troubling many observers here: What was the evidence on which the U.S. statment was based? Was the statement an example of “managed news?” If, for example, Washington [XXXX indicating deletion] acknowledged that Hanoi was escalating the five-year-old war against anti-Communist Vietnam, would Washington be forced therefore to retaliate against North Vietnam as Administration officials had threatened to do last month. Or did the American statement reflect a more cautious and less emotional analysis than the publicly expressed views of [deletion: Prime Minister] Premier Khanh and his generals? Khanh last weekend called for direct attacks on North Viet Nam. On-the-spot investigation by this reporter in [deletion: First] the 1st Division area, comprising the two northernmost provinces, discloses that: 1. Prior to issuance of the U.S. military statement on July 14 and the Washington statement on July 16, [deletion: no American official had interviewed any of the North Vietnamese prisoners seized by government forces during the previous eight days.] In fact, American field officers conceded they did not even know how many North Vietnamese prisoners had been captured. (A Vietnamese intelligence report listed three; this correspondent saw two.) [XXXX indicating deletion] (More) deepe infiltrate--3 2. Since American officials had not interviewed the North Vietnamese prisoners and hence had no independent source of judgment, they were forced to rely primarily on prisoner interrogation reports prepared by Vietnamese military officers. These “initial” reports, averaging four pages per prisoner, dealed primarily with immediate tactical information. 3. U.S. military officials demonstrated a selective credibility by accepting just one part of one report as accurate--namely that two Russian helicopters had ferried troops from North Vietnam into Laos and that these troops had then marched across the border into South Vietnam. 4. [insertion: But] Other sections of the interrogation reports were discounted or ignored by American military officials as lacking substantiation. During a three-day visit to the 1st Division area, this reporter interviewed [insertion: one] North Vietnamese prisoner for three hours and discussed with division commander Sub-Brig. Gen. (one-star) Nguyen Chanh Thi and his intelligence staff the testimony of the prisoners. These staff officers openly criticized the American officialdom for being “too slow and sticking too close to form.” “The Americans weren’t even interested in these prisoners,” Gen. Thi exploded. (Informatively only--he used a four-letter word to describe the Americans). “None of the American advisors here speak Vietnamese, but the American consul (in Hue) does. He wouldn’t even condescend to come here (to military headquarters) to interview them. We gave them (American military advisors) this report,” he said waving the brief prisoner interrogation report. “Maybe they translated it; maybe they didn’t.” (More) deepe infiltrate--4 American officers in the field, conceding that Americans had not interviewed the prisoners, replied [XXXX indicating deletion] “We’ve never had a policy of interviewing prisoners. We’re not running this war.” Presumably, no orders from Saigon--or Washington--reversed this policy, even during this unique situation, though American advisors actively participate in other areas of the war effort. The American advisors in the field also called Gen. Thi “a sensationalist and publicity hound.” However, PRemier Khanh said in an exclusive interview, “we are in the first state of massive infiltration like in Laos. In Laos, North Vietnamese infiltrated cadre to command Pathet Lao units. Then they infiltrated the units.” In addition, this correspondent also read the interrogation report of prisoner Lee Phan Hung, a 24-year-old middle-class peasant born south of Hanoi. He was listed in the report as a private first class, [XXXX indicating deletion] who had entered the North Vietnamese army in May, 1963, was sent to a training center for three months and was then sent to join Co. 6, Battalion 7, Division 324, stationed in Nghe An, North Vietnam, [insertion: 220 miles South of Hanoi]. Excerpts of the report reads: “he then underwent further training for six months on .81 mm. mortars and was then sent as a laborer to building dikes for three months…He was then sent back to the battalion, given five days rest, was later instructed on the situation in South Viet Nam, then received orders to go to South Viet Nam to destroy the control of the enemy over the population. He was well fed over the five days in preparation for the trip South and was promoted to private first class. (More) deepe infiltrate 5 In May, 1964, he received the order to start the trip with his whole company. Other companies have not started the trip yet, but they may perhaps go later. This company is composed of draftees of 90 fighting men. All the cadre (Ed Note: generally meaning officers) stayed in the North. In addition to this company there’s another company of 90 men which came South with his. So 180 men started moving south May 1964 by nine trucks from Nghe An to Dong Hoi [insertion: 130 miles South of Hanoi] one day, making one overnight stop. At 6 a.m. the next day they were taken to the airfield of Dong Hoi and boarded a helicopter painted black. The helicopter carried 20 passengers. There were two helicopters and each helicopter made four trips. Each [XXXX indicating deletion] trip took forty minutes. At about 2 o’clock in the afternoon all 180 men had been transferred. The helicopter landed in the jungle in Laos. Location unknown….” During a 3-hour interview with this reporter, the prisoner confirmed and expanded upon this report. Several sections of the report were accepted by high-ranking American officials in Saigon and in the northern provinces: first that the prisoner was bona fide; second that he flew to Laos in a Russian helicopter. They also accepted that the prisoner was a private--and that rank would indicate combat troops rather than Mr. McNamara’s description of “cadre of individuals.” Cadres generally mean military officers, political [deletion: experts] commissars or military specialists. The [deletion: Saigon] U.S. Military statement and McNamara press conference [XXXX indicating deletion] sharply contradict these fundamental parts of the report: 1. The prisoner said he came to Vietnam with his own 90-man company along with another 90-man company. (More) deepe infiltrate--6 The U.S. military statement reads that the infiltrators were “dispatched in small groups to South Viet Nam where they reportedly were to combine with existing local units to form new companies and battalions.” Mr. McNamara indicated at his Washington press conference that he knew of no instances of infiltration of organized North Vietnamese units into the South Vietnamese war. The prisoner interrogation report makes no mention of [insertion: whether or not] the 90-man company of the prisoner was [insertion: comprised] of [deletion: North Vietnamese personnel] personnel born in North Vietnam. [XXXX indicating deletion] However, the U.S. military statement said they were trained in “mixed packets,” indicating some were born in North Vietnam and some in South Viet Nam. ([deletion: this] The prisoner told this correspondent all 90 men in his company spoke in North Vietnamese dialect.) 2. The prisoner identified himself with 6th company of the 7th battalion of the 324 division of the People’s Army of Vietnam. The report lists names of its officers in the north. [deletion: In] The report states the prisoner moved into South Vietnam with the 90-men in the company with whom he was trained. The U.S. military statement explains that though low-ranking infiltrators “continue to identify themselves with their parent unit in North Viet Nam,” this “occasionally gives rise to false initial impressions that regular PAVN units have infiltrated into South Viet Nam.” The U.S. military statement also [deletion: explains] reads: “As far as can be determined, all former members of PAVN units and groups of men drawn from PAVN units [deletion: several] sever connections with their former units once they have → (More) deepe infiltrate--7 infiltrated into South Viet Nam. Thus it can be said with a fair degree of probability that there are no members of PAVN in the northern areas of South Vietnam, for that matter, anywhere in South Viet Nam.” American intelligence [XXXX indicating deletion] procedures demand at least two pieces of evidence--such as prisoner report and a document--before [deletion: they may confirm] confirming the existence of a unit. A similar, but oversimplified analogy to the infiltration situation here might be something like this: suppose a 90-man company of [deletion: American] U.S. Army recruits, newly trained at Ft. Bragg, N.C., were dispatched on a special mission to Cuba, [deletion: and] but broke all communications with Ft. Bragg. Would there be a regular U.S. army unit on Cuban soil? The American version--based on the U.S. military statement in Saigon--would be no. But the Vietnamese version insists there would be. It is on this basis that Vietnamese premier Khanh labelled the situation as “an overt invasion.” -30- deepe infiltrate--8 insert to page five after third para x x x or military specialists. A rough analogy [insertion: of the difference] between the North Vietnamese private and McNamara’s [deletion: calling the infiltrators] “cadre of individuals” would be that of the U.S. government sending American combat troops instead of advisors to South Viet Nam. Pickup next para: The U.S. military statement 30-

Date

1964

Subject

Vietnam War, 1961-1975; Vietnam (Democratic Republic). Quân đội; Strategy; New York herald tribune

Location

First Division Area, South Vietnam

Coordinates

16.4498; 107.5623

Size

21 x 27 cm

Container

B4, F2

Format

dispatches

Collection Number

MS 363

Collection Title

Beverly Deepe Keever, Journalism Papers

Creator

Keever, Beverly Deepe

Collector

Keever, Beverly Deepe

Copyright Information

These images are for educational use only. To inquire about usage or publication, please contact Archives & Special Collections.

Publisher

Archives & Special Collections

Language

English