RIPPLE SALVO… #587… Not to worry…These journalists are citizens of the Democratic Republic of Germany…We can trust them when they write: “The treatment of the United States Air Force Pilots imprisoned by the Democratic Republic of Vietnam does full credit to the Geneva convention on treatment of captured combatants.”… but first…
Good Morning: Day FIVE HUNDRED EIGHTY-SEVEN of a return to the air war with North Vietnam secretly called Operation Rolling Thunder…
14 OCTOBER 1967… HEAD LINES from The New York Times on a rainy Saturday in NYC…
Page 1: “BIG ENEMY FORCE ATTACKS MARINES NEAR BUFFER ZONE–AT LEAST 23 AMERICANS DIE SOUTH OF CONTHIEN–384 ARTILLERY ROUNDS POUR IN–Heaviest Shelling in weeks”… “five hundred North Vietnamese troops attacked a United States Marine battalion near the demilitarized zone today under cover of the heaviest enemy shelling in nearly four weeks, military spokesmen reported. At least 23 Marines were reported killed and 36 wounded in the assault and the shelling.the battalion was based south of Conthien and the Marines responded in king to the attackers, but there was no report on enemy casualties. Enemy gunners struck the Marine outpost with 384 rounds in 24 hours a Marine spokesman at Danang said. Damage reports were not available immediately…after September 25, when North Vietnamese gunners struck the Marine outpost at Conthien with 1,000 rounds of artillery fire, the month-long siege of the outpost began tapering to less than 100 per day. It was believed this morning that most of the Marine casualties had been suffered in the ground fighting. Unofficial reports said 20 of the 23 Marine dead and 21 of the 36 wounded were victims of the ground assault.”… Page 1: “U.N. Debate on Mideast Put Off For Consultation–Postponed And The General Assembly Will Be Recessed Until October 23.”… Page 1: “Welfare Officials Say Red Tape Bars Decent Housing for Clients”… “…can’t pay rent for a dwelling that the Buildings Department certifies to be extremely hazardous.” (Catch 22)... Page 1: “Romney Requests Open Housing Law–Puts His Political Prestige Behind Call To Legislature For Tough Measure”… “Governor George Romney proposed today a package of fair housing laws for Michigan…will result in a battle… Fair Housing bills have failed in Michigan before.”…
Page 1: “Eisenhower Chides Vietnam Critics–Says Most Outspoken Ones Speak With An Expertise They Don’t Have”… “Former President told a press conference on the eve of his 77th birthday that ‘no man is so all-seeing so as to he can afford to be arrogant. Where we get into trouble abroad, we’ve got to follow our leaders. If we dissent we ought to be moderate in our tones and our emphasis.’ He called for a lot less talking and a lot more thinking about Vietnam and deplored ‘all this business about hawks and doves,’ and said that ‘everybody is for peace on honorable terms, but peace at any price, is no pace at all.’ Eisenhower has supported President Johnson’s Vietnam policy, said it was ‘very fortunate for the nation that division over the war was not a division between the Democrats and Republicans.”… Page 3: “Army’s Rejected Trained At Fort Lewis”... “Ongoing ‘Project 100,000’ aids lower mental categories and appears to be working…700 Group 4s have completed training and a few Group 5s (6th grade mental level)…”...Page 9:… “President Is Urged To Give a New State of the Union By Senator Javits”… “Based on an erosion of prestige of the Presidential office and that the President should head off the very dangerous deterioration in his standing in the office.”…
Page 2 (Oct 15): DISPATCH FROM HANOI DISPUTED U.S. REPORTS ON BOMBING OF SHIPYARD by Wilfred Burchett… (Dateline: Haiphong, North Vietnam, 14 Oct)… “The United States communique reporting direct hits by American planes Thursday on shipyards and a big military barracks in Haiphong in Haiphong was–inaccurate. On the spot observations indicates; the first and main raid in the small hours of the morning demolished a large hospital convalescent complex. The complex was occupied, the authorities said, by two caretakers and the 4-yer old daughter of one of them. All Three were killed in their beds. At least 20–500 and 1,000 pounders– were said to have landed on the complex. It was almost a total wreck. In other early morning raids bombs were said to have fallen in the Lachtray River, about three miles southwest of the city and in surrounding rice fields, wounding a 37-year old peasant woman and a 14-year old girl. I visited both bombing sites a few hours after the attacks
“A third raid at midday was against a ferry station more than a mile from the ship yards. The ferry station had been heavily attacked some weeks earlier. The United States command in Saigon reported heavy damage Thursday to two Haiphong shipyards, one on the Lachtray River and the other on the Cua Cam, an estuary, as well as a big military base just south of the city where Soviet-built missiles and helicopters are assembled. Haiphong Mayor Le Duc Thinh, and other city officials said a third of the city’s residential areas had been destroyed, mainly in heavy raids that started September 1 and been intensified in recent days.
“In a tour of the city, heavy destruction was obvious in residential areas, especially in the most densely populated Hongbang ward, one of three city wards. One large new housing unit opposite the scene of the raid Thursday was completely wiped out. Heavy civilian casualties appeared to have been avoided only by a large-scale evacuation of the city and by allowing virtually all remaining residents to live only in ground floor rooms adjacent to individual concrete air-raid shelters.
“A high proportion of delayed action bombs have been dropped in the raids since early September. The bombs hamper rescue work and are believed to be aimed at paralyzing movement about the city. I visited Kydong hospital after the raids that destroyed the pharmacology department, but there were no casualties because the patients and staff were in shelters. There is an average of one minute between the sounding of an alert and the start of the attack by planes sweeping in from carriers which are some times only 30 miles off shore.
“I visited the port area Thursday, shortly after the raid. A group of Polish sailors were playing volleyball with a group of off-duty Vietnamese dockers. Two Chinese, one Soviet and one Polish freighter were unloading, and other ships were moving in. I was told the raids had not affected the average turnaround time–3 to 10 days for 5,000-ton ships, depending on the type of cargo. Port Authorities and the head of the dockers’ union said that contingency plans had been prepared more than a year ago so that in case Haiphong harbor was blocked, the turnaround time would be maintained…”
14 OCTOBER 1967… The President’s Daily Brief (CIA-TS): VIETNAM DEMONSTRATIONS: Plans for antiwar demonstrations on 20-21 October are being drawn up in many countries to parallel those in the US. The sponsoring organizations are a mixed bag of pacifists, professional peace agitators and communists. In Communist countries, only Hungary and Cuba are known to be planning to participate… COMMUNIST CHINA: We are seeing more signs that the Red Guards are being defused... BOLIVIA: Fingerprints taken from the body of “Che” Guevara confirm that the slain leader was indeed Guevara… NORTH VIETNAM: Wilfred Burchett is back in Hanoi. The North Vietnamese charge’ in Laos in a 12 October conversation with Ambassador Sullivan hinted that Hanoi may once again use Australian journalist Wilfred Burchett as a medium for publicizing an important official statement on the war. The charge’ also claimed that the 28 January offer of talks with the US in return for a bombing halt, which was given in an interview with Burchett, had been a “misunderstanding” by the US. When asked how these misunderstandings could be cleared up, the charge’ replied that “it is too late now, as too many other things have happened since that time,” He expressed hope However, that the US would not “misunderstand” any new statement given Burchett and that it would be given careful study. Burchett has been in Hanoi recently and is now scheduled to travel to France. There has been no announcement from Hanoi of his meeting with officials there, although on previous occasions such meetings have not been made public until several days or weeks after the journalist’s departure.
14 OCTOBER 1967… New York Times (15 Oct reporting 14 Oct ops)… Page 1: “U.S. BOMBERS RAID FIVE NEW TARGETS IN HAIPHONG AREA–HEAVY DAMAGE IS REPORTED AT LARGE SHIPYARD, ONE OF THREE ATTACKED–STORAGE AREA ALSO HIT”… “United States pilots struck deep into North Vietnam and bombed five previously untouched targets near the center of Haiphong. These were a storage area 1.3 miles south of the center of the city, a major shipyard 1.5 miles west of the city and a radar site at Kienan, 8 miles south of the center. the other two targets struck for the first time were a boatyard at Xomtrai, 27 miles west-northwest of Hanoi, 31 miles west-northwest of Hanoi. A military spokesman described the Haoloan yard, a storage and transshipment point as well as a boat-repair site. The Xomtrai yard was used mostly for the construction of barges and large sampans, he said. Air Force pilots reported that their bombs had been on target, the spokesman said, but smoke and clouds prevented complete assessments of damage.
“Navy pilots reported heavy damage on the tree targets near Haiphong. Pilots from the carrier Constellation, after striking the yard west of Haiphong said there had been sizeable damage’ through the yard, they said. The spokesman reported that this yard was capable of producing 10 per cent of the steel barges used in North Vietnam. At the storage area, pilots of Navy Skyhawk jets reported all the buildings destroyed, with smoke curling to 3,000-feet. They told of one secondary explosion–a blast of ammunition stored above the ground.
“A spokesman reported that a radar site at Kienan had been ‘heavily damaged,’ with one radar van engulfed in flames. The strikes were part of a series of sharp thrusts in North Vietnam, which also included bombing of the railroad causeway at Quangkien, 39 miles northeast of Hanoi, and of rail lines at the Kep yards 38 miles northeast of Hanoi. Navy pilots also struck a highway bridge 2.5 miles southeast of Haiphong. The pilots reported that their 1000-pound bombs had fallen on target. Hanoi reported two planes were downed by ground fire, one at Haiphong and one in Thanhhoa Province.”
“Vietnam: Air Losses” (Chris Hobson) There was one fixed wing aircraft lost in Southeast Asia on 14 October 1967…
(1) LCDR ROBERT REDDINGTON VAUGHN and LTJG M.M. MOSER were flying an RA-3B of the “World Famous” VAP-61 heavy photo squadron operating out of Cubi Point, and on this flight from Danang, on a day photo recce mission along the coast of North Vietnam when hit by ground fire 15 miles southeast of Thanh Hoa. The aircraft was flown to sea and abandoned by the two aviators. LTJG MOSER was rescued by a Navy helicopter. LCDR VAUGHN perished and is listed as”killed in action, body not recovered” to this day, fifty years after his last flight, he rests in peace where he fell in the service of our country…. Left behind but not forgotten… .
RIPPLE SALVO… #587… NYT, 14 October 1967… “EAST GERMANS SAY HANOI TREATS U.S. CAPTIVES WELL”…
“United States pilots captured by the North Vietnamese have told East German journalists that they are not forced to work, are well treated and may even put out their own camp newspaper, called New Runway.
“These and other details are offered in an interview that two East German newsmen, who filmed and interviewed the prisoners, gave a West German colleague, Egon Vacek of the Hamburg magazine Stern. The magazine is publishing the interviews in the 22 October issue.
“The two east Germans who spent seven weeks in North Vietnam this summer, told Mr. Vacek that the film and articles they brought home documented the presence of about 130 American pilots in nine prisoner of war camps. They stressed that the number of American prisoners in the North Vietnamese hands was considerably higher.
“The East Germans, who work for D.E.F.A., the state-owned movie company in East Berlin, tape-recorded seven hours of conversation with 10 American officers who they said had volunteered to be interviewed. (In Washington, a United States spokesman charged Hanoi with “trafficking in doctored photographs and films of captured Americans. Officials implied that a majority of the prisoners were being kept out of sight and subjected too harsh conditions,)
“According to the East Germans, the prisoner-of-war camps, though closely guarded, do not resemble World war II camps in that there are no watchtowers, barbed wire or watchdogs. There were 30 to 40 prisoners in the camp, all Air Force officers except for a sailor who was washed overboard and captured during a sea battle.
“The inmates call the prison the Hanoi Hilton, the East Germans said, and their daily rations correspond to the fare of North Vietnamese officers–soup, rice, vegetables, meat, bread, grapefruit, bananas and tea.
“The German newsmen said prisoners had a reading room and could go for walks in the prison compound, but were not forced to do physical work, since working is the open could be too dangerous because of constant air attacks. The East Germans reported that the prisoners they met did not appear depressed. ‘Our impression was that not one of them was harboring plans to escape,’ they said. The two newsmen said the prisoners were exchanging letters regularly with their families and ‘because of certain gaps in their knowledge, preferred books on politics, history and sociology for reading matter.
“They may not tune in to Western radio stations but they can listen to the ‘Voice of Vietnam,’ an English language program of the Hanoi radio, which also gives the latest results of American baseball games’
“The treatment of United States Air Force pilots imprisoned in the Democratic Republic of Vietnam showed full credit to the Geneva convention on treatment of captured combatants,’ the East Germans asserted
“The prisoners described their treatment as ‘fair,’ and most of them expressed the wish for a quick termination of the war in Vietnam. The East Germans said, and added that the American pilots were quickly discovering that their ‘anti-communist cliche’ notions’ were not borne our by reality.”…
(Webmaster note: What a crock of communist propaganda bullshi*. The courageous Jeremiah Denton let the U.S. know what our POWs were experiencing in these NVN hellholes)
HUMBLE HOST COMMENT: Looks like “fake news” to me… Count on the State Department to respond tomorrow…
RTR QUOTE for 14 OCT: DRYDEN: “Some truth there was, but dashed and brewed with lies. To please the fools, and puzzle all the wise. Succeeding times did equal folly call, Believing nothing, or believing all.”
Lest we forget… Bear