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derivative filename/jpeg
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363-05272 to 363-05279.pdf
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Digital Object Identifier
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363-05272 to 363-05279
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Title
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First article on the significance of the Communist-held elections in South Vietnam
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Description
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Original title: "Election", Keever's Title: "Communist Hold Secret, Night-Time Elections Miles from US Embasy", Article draft about Communist rival elections, for the Christian Science Monitor, page 1-8
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AI Usage Disclosure
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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.
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Transcript
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- Page 1
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Beverly A. Deepe
33. Vo Tanh
Saigon, Vietnam
September 15, 1968
Election--page 1
(This is the first of a x series on the significance of the Communist-held
elections at the rice-roots level of South Vietnam).
In
SAIGON, SEPTEMBER 1 In Gia Dinh,
that soggy donut province
surrounding this edgy capital, the Communists are holding night-time
elections in the rural villages some ten or fifteen miles from the
American Embassy and Vietnamese Presidential Palace.
Vietnamese government sources report the election process is ter
taking a clandestine form. A Communist cadre calls at each village house
during the government-imposed curfew hours and presents the Communist-
approved slate of candidates. Then, under the nose of the greatest
concentration of Allied conventiona 1 military power in Vietnam,
and
the Communist
under the barrels of overwhelmingly superior Allied firepower,
cadre asks the villagers in the house to vote for the candidates of their
choice by writing the conde corresponding number,
candidates candidates'
names,
but not the
on a slip of paper. The self-made
ba llot is then placed in an e envelope and the flaps are glued down.
The Communist cadre shoves the primitive ballot into his shirt pocket-
instead of a centralized ballot box--and slips away into the night.
==more IN
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Doope
Election pago 2
Communist radio broadcasts also describe the election process in no
less dramatic tems. The Liberation Front radio broadcast on September 5
referred to the election near Danang and in Quang Nam provinco, where the
Eg huge American Marine commitment is headquarterod. The broadcast said:
"Under the boiling spirt of the offensive and uprising...the people
in the liberated areas and particularly in some areas under the
Amorican control, the Poople participated in the election of the
Foot People's Liberation Councils and Committees.
The turnout was 95
the people still
per cent of the eligible voters in the villages. In a number of villages
where the enemy is conducting mopping-up operations,
managed to show up at the proper time for voting. At Vil village within
two hours after the enemy withdrew, the people wont to vote and finished
the election. In village L the people were holding the cloctions
when the American bandid bandits arrived. The people went to the villago
gate to carry the political struggle and to stop them from coming into the
village. They succeeded; the Americans wore turned back and the election
continued. In some villages, our militia encircled the puppet (Vietnamese
government) outpost, harrassed and pinned down the troops inside, while
the people wont to the election. "
#amore
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Deepe
Election-pace 3
The overwhelming ramifications of the newly-elected People's Liberation
Councils wereco considered profound enough for Washington to dispatch
a White House staff officer here for an on-the-spot field assessment. The
American officialdom here has also ordered a spei special country-wide
the Vietnamese government
reporting on them by their provincial offices;
is known to be keeping a watchful eye on them.
--more
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- Page 4
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Deepe
Election--page 4
OPI
dd
The sum-and-substance significance of the People's Liberation
Councils is they are victory committees.
They represent not only the
determination of, but also the vehicle for, the Communists to fight the
The
war until victory-unless the Allies agree to their peace terms.
heart of victory for the Communists is the destruction of the elected,
constitutional government in Saigon. The y Communists now seem
entrenched in this committment, for the formation of the People's
Liberation Councils are the first official, albeit mina miniature
governments they are establishing in the countryside as an explicit
alternative to--and substitute for-the current Saigon government.
--more
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Deepe
Elections-page 6
The bleso blossoming of these People's Liberation Councils in the
countryside does not harden the Communists
official peace position--they
simply implement at the village level the rigidity of the Communists
previously stated declarations. For some time, the Communists have
continually denounced the validity and legitimacy of the Saigon government
constitutional government; but, the Pee People's Liberation Councils
represent the first time the Communists deliberately sought to set up
their own official, quasi-legal, elected go rival to the Saigon
the councils are a political point of no
government.
In this sense,
return for the Communists-they can not turn back and renounce their
own elections and they have made it virtually impossible to accept the
to integrate into Saigon's constitutional framework, as the Allies
peace
Modemende
more reuter
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Deepe
Elections-page 5
e57
At the peace table, once the current official talks in Paris hurdle
the question of the American bombing of the North,
then the fundamental
the
issue becomes the future government in South Vietnam. At this time,
Allied peace position and the Communist peace position on this issue seem
irreconcilable--and beyond compromise. Either the Communists or the Allies
must cp capitulate from their current positions-- or else fighting continues
on the battlefield. The Allied position here is simply that the constitutional
government in Saigon must remain the sole, legal government--but it will make
substantial concessions to integrate individual Communists back into its
framework. The Communist position calls for the destruction of this
constitutional goverment; after it is destroyed, then the Communists will
form a "coalition" government with those leftisits w leftists who helped to
topple the current government. If there is to be peace, either the Allies
or the Communists must capitullate i capitulate--and the elections of the
Liberation Councils indicate that it is not the Communists who will yeild.
yield. If a peace settlement for the South is to be arrived at, it will be the
Allies who will have to change positions and "dump" the whole constitutional
framework they are currently fighting for. If the Allies do flipflop in their
pso position, then the Communists will not only influence, if not dominate, the
central government, but will also control large chunks of the countryside through
their People's Liberation Councils. If the Allies do no change policy, then the
Communists are geared towards protracted war--and they believe the People's
Liberation Councils are the vehicle for them to win it.
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Deepe
Election-page
The great question here is whether the new American Administration in
January will continue to support and fight for the current Saigon
regime, or whether it will "dump" the government that the Johnson Administration
Uncertainty and doubts on this question are
insisted on having elected.
being raised here as the American Presidential election campaign
progresses. The official American Embassy view, widely propaga
propigated propagated here, is that the American commitment to
the Saigon government will continue--no matter which Presidential
candidate is elected. But, most Vietnamese nationalists, including
President Nguyen Van Thieu, know very el vell the American Embassy
here is not the spokesman for Candidates Nixon, Humphrey and Wallace.
And, as one Western diplomat recently commented, "Hubert Humphrey just
exploded a nuclear bomb on the South Vietnamese government and body politic
by saying American troops might be withdrawn from Vietnam by the end of
'68 or early 19 169."
--end
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Deepe
Election--page 8
Some American and Vietnamese government officials believe the elections
of the People's Liberation Councils indicate the Communists are preparing to
capitulate to the Allied peace demands at the conference table,
attempting to control the countryside as they attempt to seize power
within the Saigon government's constitutional framework.
but are
"These Liberation Councils are being set up just to pull the wool
over your eyes," one Vietnamese Cabinet Minister told a Western journalist.
"They hope you go out in a helicopter and see the red flags flying over
every village, indicating they have the support of the people. Well, it's
not going to happen that way--the Vienteme Vietnamese government is going
to move in their own village officialdom fast the minute a ceasf ceasefire
is ordered agreed to to at the conference table."
However, specialists who have studied the Communist documents
in depth agree that the newly-elected councils symbolize the Communit
Communist determination to press on to victory on the battlefieldt and
to overthrow then Saigon's constitutional government by violence--unless
the Allies themselves do them this favor during the peace talks.
--end
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Date
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1968, Sep. 17
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Subject
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Dảng Nhân Dân Cách-Mạng; Communism--Vietnam (Republic); Mặt trận dân tộc giải phóng miền nam Việt Nam; Đảng lao động Việt Nam; Elections
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Location
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Saigon, South Vietnam
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Coordinates
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10.8231; 106.6311
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Size
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20 x 26 cm
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Container
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B10, F39
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Format
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dispatches
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Collection Number
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MS 363
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Collection Title
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Beverly Deepe Keever, Journalism Papers
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Creator
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Keever, Beverly Deepe
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Copyright Information
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These images are for educational use only. To inquire about usage or publication, please contact Archives & Special Collections.
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Publisher
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Archives & Special Collections, University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries
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Language
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English
