University of Virginia Library

Apocalypse In Indochina
The Guns Of February

"What the U.S. needs is a Dienbienphu," a
French student told us recently. His thinking
was that a major setback at the hands of the
DRV and NLF forces would convince Nixon
to desert the Saigon regime, abandon fantasies
of "Vietnamization" and get the hell out of
Southeast Asia. Our friend was
wrong. "Vietnamization," for all its unreal
implications, has transformed an earlier war
of pitched battles and ground-fighting into an
even larger conflict of unprecedented
saturation bombings. So-called "Allied" losses
pale beside the higher cost of civilian
causalities in Vietnam, Cambodia, and now, in
Laos with Nixon's latest move - operation
Dewey Canyon II. In recent days, heavy
helicopter traffic has shuttled troops and arms
between U.S. and South Vietnamese bases
along the Laotian border: this same area, it
might be recalled, was determined by U.S.
Marines to be "insecurable" two years ago.

Now we are told this invasion of Laos by
South Vietnamese troops corollary last May's
Cambodian incursion. But in sharp contrast to
what happened last spring, Nixon's new ploy
is emerging under cover of secrecy — a total
news black-out — and this time the South
Vietnamese are fighting on the ground, with
the deadly assurance of massive U.S. air
support. Such bombing by American jets and
helicopters is nothing new to Laos: it is
typified, perhaps, by our well-developed
cluster bombs, which spray a wide area with
"bomblets" of shrapnel. These have been
effective since 1964 in what Pentagon
officials openly acknowledge to be
"Vietnamization's" primary goal in Laos — to
undercut the popular base of the Pathet Lao.
The secondary mission, in fact our announced
excuse for operation Dewey Canyon II, is to
cut off DRV (North Vietnamese) supply lines
which loop around northwest South Vietnam.

The Big Lie, the overriding fallacy about
U.S. activity in Laos, involves none other than
our own CIA. MIT linguist Noam Chomsky
has written a book, At War with Asia, in
which he recounts his personal observations in
Indochina last spring. Hear him on Laos:

"It doesn't take long to become aware of
the CIA presence in Laos. The taxi from the
airport to our hotel (in Vientiane) on the
Mekong passed by the airfield of Air America,
a theoretically private company that has an
exclusive contract with the CIA. Many of its
pilots, said to be former Air Force personnel
for the most part, were living in our hotel. If
you happened to be up at 6 a.m. you could
see them setting off for their day's work,
presumably, flying supplies to the guerrilla
forces of the CIA's army in Laos, the
Clandestine Army led by the Mao General
Vang Pao."

Recent events indicate that the CIA-Meo
Army has been nearing the end of its ability
to wage war, even with heavy American
logistical support. The South Vietnamese
invasion, the black-out; and the general
conclusion that the war has again been
escalated by the U.S. high command, seem to
bear out this oncoming collapse. For Nixon,
whose desire to withdraw is surpassed only by
his pugnacious zeal for further risks, there was
no alternative but operation Dewey Canyon II
— the only other option was to leave. His
choice has laid bare the stark realities of
"Vietnamization": it has been no less than a
metamorphosis — a shift of strategy which
might render U.S. aggression palatable, if only
Americans could learn to love an air war,
whereas before they had rejected a hopeless
land war in Asia.

The proximity of the new fighting to
Thailand introduces the awesome possibility
of a major Thai entry in the expanded war,
while the chances of shutting down the
North's elusive supply routes remain as
remote as ever. Meanwhile, Capitol Hill has
been likened to a snake pit. The realization
that information readily obtainable in Saigon
and even Hanoi had been cut off at home
failed to humor many Congressmen, and
furthered the probability of successful
legislation to stop funds for the war. If this
latest madness should create such an
outcome, so be it.

"There is only one way to get out of
Vietnam," remarked Sen. Frank Church of
Idaho, "and that is to get out. When will the
President learn that?" We wonder, too.
Yesterday the National Student Association
(NSA), which earlier announced plans for a
"shut-down" of Washington, D.C. if the U.S.
persisted in the war as late as May 1, was
formulating new strategy, which it will
announce soon.

The Apocalypse has come in Indochina —
not in the form of a Dienbienphu, but rather
with the Day of the Locusts — as big birds
spread metal wings, delivering a message of
fiery death to a people we barely know.