Westmoreland Libel Suit

The opinions expressed in The Times by Stanley Karnow (Opinion, Feb. 24) and Antonio Rossmann (Editorial Pages, Feb. 25) share a common thread: “The Vietnam war was an American tragedy.” How to deal with this tragedy is now the problem. The prevalent approach in the past was try to forget it. A tragedy of that magnitude, affecting so many lives, will not disappear.

The CBS approach to dealing with the Vietnam tragedy was criticized by Karnow because Gen. William C. Westmoreland was singled out as the “sole culprit.” I agree that Westmoreland did not act alone, but to leave the inquiry and judgment process to the media, as he seems to suggest, is not adequate. Rossmann provides a more satisfying answer by demanding a “final act of official judgment.”

Now, I suggest that if we do not have this official judgment on the tragedy of Vietnam we will become accustomed to, and accept, statements such as:

“I have listened to the tapes and they absolve me of any wrongdoing.”

“The Vietnam experience was the noblest period in American history.”

“I will send the battleship Missouri with her 16-inch guns and teach them a lesson.”

“In the presence of God and the civilized world I am requesting $100 million dollars to conduct a covert war.”

“We want only to interdict arms movement. We do not plan to overthrow their government . . . if they agree to abdicate.”

“We did not mine the Nicaraguan harbors and even if we did I will not abide by the World Court’s decision.”

H. DUANE BUSBY

Thousand Oaks

Re Westmoreland vs. CBS: Gen. Westmoreland, an American patriot, has been crucified a second time. We know who the real traitor was during the Vietnam war. It was CBS (Conspiracy Broadcasting System) with its nightly barrage of anti-American propaganda spewed from the putrid lips of Walter Cronkite and Dan Rather.

THOMAS KOPE

Baldwin Park

Now that it appears that Westmoreland gave up his lawsuit before even more embarrassing testimony came to light, we are again reminded of the greatest failure of the post-Vietnam War era, i.e., the failure to demand accountability from the Pentagon in the way it conducts itself both on and off the field.

In the absence of such a shake-up and reassessment, the problems keep getting bigger and refuse to go away no matter how much our elected officials ignore them.

Any doubts? Then why is the federal government asking us to forgo all spending to improve or even maintain the quality of our life so the Pentagon can spend thousands of dollars for each 10-cent component it procures while searching for another Vietnam-style war to involve us in?

GREG FRY

Culver City

Having built a strong case against Westmoreland for “breach of duty,” Rossmann suggests it might be wise to say “enough” to legal process and look “solely to the prevention of Westmoreland’s type of conduct in the future.”

Just how, one wonders, does Rossmann think such behavior can be prevented if those guilty of it are allowed to go unpunished? The truth is we can’t. We’re being lied to right now about our involvement in El Salvador, lied to in ways appallingly similar to those of Vietnam.

When, in the late 1960s, after the expenditure of billions of dollars and thousands of lives in Vietnam, we still hadn’t begun to “pacify the countryside,” it became apparent to me that my support for the war had been gained by a fiction--namely that the government we supported was the government of the majority of the people of South Vietnam. When Westmoreland and others decided not to count the large numbers of South Vietnamese who supported Ho Chi Minh, he didn’t just make a military mistake. He joined a deception that got the American people to support a war they never would have supported had they known the truth.

I haven’t much heart to prosecute the old soldier myself, but how are we going to stop those who are doing the same thing today if we don’t? The sworn testimony is there. How can we ignore it?

ANN ALPER

Pacific Palisades

I want to thank Karnow for sharing his perceptions of the Westmoreland trial. Many times, in following the trial, I had wanted to badly to say “Yes! He’s the one! He did it!”, but that was too simple. There is no one person who should be made to take such an enormous responsibility, such as American conduct in the Vietnam War.

If we were inclined to “make somebody pay” for the events during the war, we’d have to bring to trial a few Presidents, their various administrations, and, possibly, even a former French government. And after this, would our national conscience then be satisfied?

No. The premise that Westmoreland is responsible cannot withstand. He was only infected with a particular type of nationalism that ran through the best and the brightest of that time; American power was right and would prevail.

No less than anyone do I want the truths of that war to be known; the tears and pain must stop sometime. But I will refuse to go on a witch hunt.

JANICE MANCHESTER-

WERNER

Pico Rivera

Upon moving to the Nation’s capital, my wife and I decided to pay a visit to the newest attraction in town, a monument planted in the Mall on the northwest end, which is inscribed with the names of those who paid with their lives in our country’s greatest folly to date.

The impact of the Vietnam War Memorial and what it represents are beyond description and to stop to ponder at this time with Westmoreland’s libel suit. How many names might not have been inscribed if not for the military ego or political vanity of a particular group of individuals.

If a judgment is to be given on Westmoreland it should also be rendered upon the American public, for we are as guilty as he (Westmoreland) in attempting to rationalize our previous actions in regard to Vietnam.

Westmoreland’s sentence should be a legacy to America to never forget those who died for a general’s mistake and not to repeat history (as we attempt to change the governmental structure of a Central American nation targeted by the Administration through armed force and alienation). This would allow us, hopefully, to look to the past and learn for the future, so the next generation will not have to erect monuments to their war dead.

MARK H. DAVIDSON

Washington, D.C.

For those who would harshly judge Westmoreland for his position as portrayed in the “Uncounted Enemy,” I have a few thoughts.

I was president of a small corporation that operated for three years in Vietnam during the war. I am quite sure there were enemy operatives nearby and around us all the time. I have no idea which persons they were or how deeply they were involved in the war, or exactly what they did. Nor do I have a clue as to how anyone would accurately estimate their numbers--they were part of the “Uncounted Enemy.”

Opposite our office a fleet of vegetable trucks parked every day. They had no seeming reason to be there and we often tried to guess how many of the drivers were enemy agents. Across Cam Ranh Bay from the U.S. Navy base was an openly hostile village. They did not actually shoot, but I imagine most were enemy. When we surveyed along the Mekong and wanted to set up instruments on an island (before the American troops arrived) we would tell the local Vietnamese commander who would level the brush with machine-gun fire, land troops to form a perimeter, and say--”You’ve got an hour--then we pull out.” Neither he nor we ever saw the enemy. Their number could have been zero or any number. But the Viet Cong were there because they sunk a dredge nearby. How many men did it take to sink it?

We had a beat-up auto that ran between Saigon and Vung Tau once a week with supplies for an old ship we were surveying the river with. One day the driver had a flat tire and stopped to change it. Presently an old farmer came along carrying a large rice bag, which he set down on the road in such a way that an automatic weapon was easily visible in the loose rice. In reasonably good English he told our man that the VC had been watching and counting his trips. There was a tax for each trip, which our man gladly paid and the old “farmer” padded off. How many people did he represent? Tens, hundreds, thousands? We never knew in any village, or Saigon, how many were enemy. Should Westmoreland have counted everyone as enemies. And, if so, why did we send him there?

WILLARD BASCOM

Long Beach