RIPPLE SALVO… XUAN THUY for NORTH VIETNAM: “President Johnson has been asked the question: ‘Who has sabotaged the Geneva Accords, which guarantee the sovereignty, independence, unity and territorial integrity of Vietnam?’ Is it the Vietnam Army which attacked America and killed Americans? Or is it the American Government which attacked Vietnam and killed Vietnamese? Up to this point President Johnson has not answered this question. Of course, the problem is clear, the United States being the aggressor, it must cease its aggression, and peace will then be immediately restored in Vietnam. Will the United States dare demonstrate its goodwill by accepting the end of its aggression? Excellencies, we are here today on our third meeting in these official conversations between the representatives of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and the Government of the United States of all mankind, I take the liberty to recall once more that our objective in coming to Paris is to determine what the American side the unconditional cessation of bombings and other American acts of war against the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and then to deal with the problems concerning the two parties, as I have stated in detail in our statement on March 15, 1968. In order that these official conversations should achieve results the American side must rapidly give a positive response on this matter. it must no longer avoid it. (End Rolling Thunder)… “…but first…
GOOD MORNING… Day EIGHT HUNDRED SIX of remembering the bombardment of North Vietnam and the warriors of Rolling Thunder who administered it in the years of 1965 to 1968…
HEAD LINES from THE NEW YORK TIMES on Monday, 20 MAY 1968…
PEACE TALKS: Page 1: “DIPLOMATS VOICE HOPES FOR GAINS IN VIETNAM TALKS–SEE POSSIBLE COMPROMISE ON REDUCING LEVEL OF WAR DESPITE PARIS STALEMATE… “…hopeful that, in time, a compromise will emerge on the first critical issue: a reduction of the fighting. The first week went about As expected. Hanoi’s representatives held firmly to their demand for a total halt to American bombing raids on the North and other attacks on North Vietnam and they spurned an American countermand that they exercise ‘matching restraint.’ Diplomatic sources regard it as highly unlikely that Hanoi will ever make an explicit agreement to meet the American demand. Rather, they expect that in time the North Vietnamese may indicate a tacit understanding, signaling their restraint on the battlefield rather than at the conference table.This could then lead to a step-by-step reduction in the level of war. Such a move now by Hanoi would, in the American view give President Johnson the evidence he seeks as a prerequisite to calling off American air attacks on the southern part of North Vietnam… The next session is scheduled for Wednesday.”…
THE WAR: Page 1: “SAIGON IS CALM AFTER SHELLING–11 CIVILIANS ARE LISTED AS DEAD”… “The toll in the Vietcong rocket attack on Saigon just after midnight today was placed by officials at 11 civilians killed and 51 wounded. One hundred and fifty homes were destroyed. In the wake of the attack, the city returned to its old blase’ ways…. A military spokesman said that over the weekend American forces killed 82 Vietcong soldiers in fighting 12 miles south of Saigon.”… Page 1: “Shifts In Saigon Please U.S. Aides–Embassy Feels Shake-up Will Broaden Cabinet”… “The United States Embassy said tonight that it was ‘pleased and satisfied’ with the way the current shake-up in the South Vietnamese Government was developing… According to reports being circulated by South Vietnamese and United States officials, the new Cabinet will include a member of the revolutionary Dai Viet party, several members of past political regimes, and a cross-section of refugees from the north, southern Vietnamese and people from the central part of the country.”…
Page 1: “DE GAULLE HOLDS TALKS ON UNREST, STRIKES WIDENING–Nearly Complete Shutdown Expected Today–Power Plants In Paris Seized–Major Theaters Held–President To Address Nation Friday–He Hints Move Toward Showdown”… “President de Gaulle grappled today with the prospect of a nationwide general strike in a series of meetings in key aides. The workers revolt, which started five days ago in imitation of the nation’s students, has reached such proportions that the close down was expected to virtually complete in all parts of the country by punch-in time in the morning.”… Page 1: “COLUMBIA STARTS TO DISCIPLINE 500 FOR CAMPUS SIT-IN–School Sends Letter to 25 Students, Calling Them to Dean’s Office This Week”… “…’you are charge,’ the letters said, ‘with participating in the recent demonstrations which started on April 23, 1968.’ …Mark Rudd, the 20-year old junior, who is the leader of the leftist Students for a Democratic Society at Columbia, was one of those to receive a summons to the dean’s office.”… Page 20: “DEMONSTRATIONS BY POOR STARTED TODAY”… “A crucial phase of the Poor People’s Campaign begins here tomorrow with the start of demonstrations to put pressure on the Government to answer poor people’s demands ‘We’re going to jail tomorrow,’ the Reverend James Bevel said while talking with several newsmen, Mr. Bevel, a member of the executive staff of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference”… Page 21: “MARYLAND NATIONAL GUARD ACTIVATE IN RACIAL FLAREUP–Violence Breaks Out Again As Negroes Stone Firemen”… “A sniper suspect was arrested and two lumber yard fires burned on the outskirts of Salisbury tonight as 800 national Guardsmen moved into the city to guard against racial violence. The contingent was drawn from a force of 6,000 ordered to active duty by Governor Spiro T. Agnew following a night of racial disturbances touched off by the killing of a deaf-and-dumb Negro burglary suspect by a white policeman….Detective who killed the suspect accused of manslaughter.”… Page 28: “U.S. IS URGED TO PAY FOR POVERTY PROGRAMS”… “The Federal Government should pay for all programs to combat poverty according to a report released yesterday by the Regional Plan Association. It suggested that cities press for total Federal financing of welfare, public heal;th, special educational programs and anti-poverty projects, which it said put an undue drain on local resources. The report also proposed that the public funds spent to alleviate poverty problems should be more than doubled calling for a national increase from the estimated 1967 level of $11.5-billion to $26.5-billion a year.”…
20 MAY 1968… OPERATION ROLLING THUNDER… New York Times Page 17: “A United States military spokesman said that two more American jets had crashed on 18 May…. One of the planes, an Air Force F-100, exploded in midair 22 miles west of the South Vietnamese capital. It was apparently hit by ground fire. The pilot was killed (CAPTAIN ROLAND OBENLAND (KIA)). The second aircraft was an RA-5C Vigilante from the carrier Kitty Hawk, crashed in North Vietnam northwest of Vinh. The two crewmen were listed as missing (COMMANDER CHARLIE JAMES (POW) and LCDR VINCENT MONROE (KIA)). In North Vietnam United States pilots flew 120 raids against targets in the region south of the 19th parallel. The pilots hammered bridges, trucks, coastal shipping and antiaircraft positions. Navy fliers destroyed one bridge 20 miles north of Vinh. ‘The bridge had three spans,’ said Commander Robert R. Wilson of Santa Rosa, California, who led the attack. ‘It looked like we got a 500-pound bomb right on the center span.’ “…… “VIETNAM: AIR LOSSES” (Chris Hobson) There were no fixed wing aircraft lost in Southeast Asia on 20 May 1968…
SUMMARY OF ROLLING THUNDER LOSSES (KIA/MIA/POW) ON 20 MAY FOR THE FOUR YEARS OF THE OPERATION…
1965… NONE…
1966… NONE…
1967…COMMANDER HOMER LEROY SMITH, USN… (POW Died in captivity); MAJOR NOTLEY GWYNN MDDOX, USAF…(KIA); MAJOR JACK LEE VAN LOAN, USAF…(POW); and 1LT JOSEPH EDWARD MILLIGAN, USAF… (POW)…
1968… NONE…
Humble Host flew #171. A day run to Steel Tiger, led a section with 3 Mk-83s and 2 Mk-82s (each) to work with FAC west of Tchpone. BDA was road cut… Last day of Enterprise line period, off line for eleven days in Subic/Cubi… June and 32 counters to go…
RIPPLE SALVO… #806… NEW YORK TIMES… Sunday 19 May 1968, Page E-1… ANTHONY LEWIS…
VIETNAM: TALKS AND BATTLES: THE NEGOTIATORS IN PARIS ARE STILL LOOKING ELSEWHERE…
“Paris– After one week of the ‘official conversations’ on peace in Vietnam, a pattern has developed; the two sides are carrying on a propaganda battle in Paris and looking elsewhere for the developments that may be determinative–to Washington, to Hanoi and especially to Saigon.
“To say that it is to indicate how much the mood has changed here since the expectant days before the American and North Vietnamese delegates sat down for substantive talks. Even realists fully understand the difficulties, felt then the very fact of talking must bring some change into the tormented Vietnam situation. The instinctive appraisal of the prospects may still turn out to be true. But the reality of one week’s events has certainly made things look less than romantic. Most significant has been the realization that these talks are only the formal, visible manifestation of a complex of forces working in many places. The political currents in South Vietnam, the tension between pro-Chinese and pro-Soviet elements in Hanoi, the trend of the American Presidential campaign–any of these could shape the works spoken by the delegates. Last week’s change of premiers in Saigon, therefore, evoked great interest here as a possible part of a long-awaited broadening of the Government.
“In the old Hotel Majestic near the Etoile, where the delegations have now held three substantive sessions, there has been a rising level of abuse. It was indicative that the American negotiator, W. Averell Harriman, in his second formal statement, said it was no use to ‘rekindle old controversies’ and then used seven pages of a 10-page text to do exactly that.
“All the miserable history of Vietnam, since the Geneva agreements of 1954 that were supposed to have settled the country’s future has been rehearsed. Mr. Harriman condemned North Vietnamese infiltration of the South, ‘terror’ and ‘subversion.’ Xuan Thuy of North Vietnam spoke of American bombing and other ‘criminal acts of aggression.
“Each side, in short, has been offering its own well-known definition of who is the aggressor, who the victim. Familiar as the words are, their repetition at close quarters makes forcefully clear how disparate are the basic assumptions and purposes of the two parties. The flow of words across the hollow rectangle of the conference table has been amplified by a public relations operation on each side. The formal statements have been handed out in mimeograph, and in the intervals between sessions reporters have continued to obtain uncomplimentary mutual comments.There has been no private diplomacy yet.
“The North Vietnamese have put on the longest and loudest propaganda efforts. They obviously came here ready for a major publicity campaign, and they have carried it out with a skill that even observers unpersuaded by their claims find impressive. Their press briefings alone demonstrate that it would be a mistake to underestimate their intelligence or determination.
“The American spokesman William J. Jorden, has played it in a comparatively low-key. His language has supported Mr. Harriman’s rather strained attempt to show that among Xuan Thuy’s angry words there might be some areas of possible agreement. The issue which the North Vietnamese have kept drawing everyone back, both delegates and press, is, of course, their demand for ‘the definitive and unconditional cessation of the bombing and all other acts of war against the Democratic Republic of Vietnam.’
“The United States has clung to the position that there must be reciprocal ‘restraint’ by Hanoi if the present bombing limitation is to become a total halt. Mr. Harriman suggested restoration of the buffer status of the demilitarized zone as one good example of a possible restraint.
“If these talks are going to get anywhere, there must be some movement on the bombing issue. It is easy to imagine possibilities– tacit indication by Hanoi, for example, that something concrete by way of de-escalation would follow cessation of bombing, or a gradual decrease in bombing runs by American planes to see what would follow. But for the moment it seems the North Vietnamese are content to stick to their unyielding position that the ‘aggressor’ must stop his warlike acts without compensation, and to hammer at that line in propaganda. The open aim is to arouse pressure against the bombing in the world an in the United States–and to unsettle President Nguyen Van Thieu’s Government in Saigon.
“The idea of political change in Saigon is very much on the minds of the North Vietnamese delegates. They hope–perhaps expect–that continuing guerrilla action in Saigon and attacks on the ground elsewhere will sap the Thieu Regime’s political will. They also will try to arouse doubts between Saigon and Washington in order to unsettle the South Vietnamese regime.
“The general opinion of observers here is that political change in Saigon and an accommodation to some degree with the National Liberation Front or individual figures in it must be part of any final peace agreement. but that is a long way off, and the United States does not want to see its bargaining position here undermined by a war of nerves against Saigon. For the same reason, the Americans are concerned about the military situation and hope that continuing pressure of arms will produce a more conciliatory attitude in Hanoi. It is developments at these distant points that may someday have their effect on the delegates in that rather cramped room near the Arc de Triomphe. Despite the distractions of events abroad and turmoil in France, there is still that vital import in the fact that the United States and North Vietnam are talking. The mechanism is here and operating, ready to register any basic shifts in attitude or power when the time comes.”
RTR quote for 20 May: EDMUND BURKE, Speech on Conciliation With America, 22 March 1775: “All government–indeed, every human benefit and enjoyment, every virtue and every prudent act–is founded on compromise and barter.”…
Lest we forget… Bear…