FRIDAY, DECEMBER 16, 1966
THE DAILY NEBRASKAN
PAGE. 11-
i
City Of Contrasts: Saigon Rots
out still Has Cultural Identity
Editor's Note: The follow
ing is an installment of a
series on the Vietnam war
written by Howard Moffett,
former editor of the Y a 1 e
Daily News. Moffett is a
fulltime correspondent for
the Collegiate Press Service
and is presently working in
Saigon.
SAIGON Saigon is a jad
ed city. There are no inno
cents here, not even little
kids. Everything happens
in the streets, and a ten-year-old
Vietnamese girl is
likely to know more about
the way adults behave in
the dark or under stress
than a 20-year-old Ameri
can college boy.
Layers of dust give busy
streets the same dull yellow
look as the stucco walls
around French villas and
office buildings.
For lack of private toilet
facilities, many urinate or
defecate in alleys and
streets. A year ago piles of
garbage lay rotting on Sai
gon's main boulevards, and
even now in some places
jj t h e trucks can't cart it
T away fast enough.
On Tu Do (Freedom)
Street, once a fashionable
office and shopping district,
scores of bars now cater to
American GI's. The dull, in
evitable pump of Nancy
Sinatra or the Beatles lasts
from three in the afternoon
to eleven at night, when
military police move
through to hustle lingerers
home before curfew.
Inside, a young air caval
ryman down from An Khe
tells a sad-looking girl the
same war story he told an
other girl last night, and
wishes he were telling it to
the girl back home
For her part, the bar girl
tells him in broken English
about her divided family
maybe the same story she
told last night, maybe not
and wonders if he will take
her home. She made more
money last week than her
father did last year. Prices
are higher now though.
Outside, teen-age boys
peddle pornography and
young men with motor
scooters and old men with
pedicabs offer a ride home,
Thousands
Gifts for
TAI PAN
by James Clowell
Story of Dirk Sfruan, pirate, opium smuggler, China trader,
master manipulator of men. ruthless intriguer, mighty lover...
THE PASSOVER PLOT
Dr. Hugh J. Schonfield
Jesus, Schonfield maintains, sincerely believed himself to bo
fho Messiah of Ureal and deliberately plotted his cructfication.
MR. FIXER
Bernard Molmud
Yakov Bak, Tarist Russian Jew, is falsefy arrested for a mur
der he did not commit in Kiev during a virulent period of
anti-Semitism. In the long suffering that follows his refusal
to 'confess,' Yakov is transformed from a little man into a
big one.
THE PROPHET
by Cibron
The famous American religious classic that has sold over 1
million copies.
NAKED LUNCH
by Burrough
Surrealistic many-leveled vision of horrors not only of tht
destruction of departed men by their drugs, but the destruc
tion of oil men by their consume addictions.
THE CASTLE
by Franz Kafka
Based en the greatly expounded text of the most recent and
definitive Sermon editions of 'Das Schloss.'
MARKINGS
by Dag Hammerskjald
The manuscript of this book was left behind to be published
after his death. A remarkable record of the spiritual lite of
the man whose public image is universally known and ad
mired. A record thot reveals tht extent of his committment
lo the Way ol the Cross.
Bertrand Russell
Kahlit Grbran
E. E. "Doc" Smith
Joan-Paul Sartre
Philip Wyleo
The HEROIC BOOKSTORE invites invest
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and a "nice young girl
cheap." Students dodging the
draft buy forged creden
tials, and money changers
who often turn out to be
sleight of hand artists or
secret police agents prom
ise double the official rate
for greenbacks.
The refugees and the poor
live in their alleys on t h e
perimeter of the middle
class city. These thorough
fares, some of them all of
three feet wide, wind in in
terminable mazes wherever
there is ground to build a
house.
Despite the weariness, the
closeness and the heat, Sai
gon's culture has a spon
taneity that twenty years of
war has not stamped out.
Delta hospitality is fam
ous throughout Southeast
Asia; any guest is given the
best in the house.
Night life is tinny, but
those who frequent the
city's clubs give it a pulsing
rhythm of its own. Any sol
dier lives close to the sur
face, and the Vietnamese
Infantryman tends to be
more fatalistic than most.
A terrorist grenade or a
drunken officer's pistol shot
could end it any time. Pri
vate dance parties require
a permit, but many young
hosts and hostesses take
their chances and often
wind up with the police as
uninvited guests.
French influence is s t i 1 1
evident everywhere. Those
city boys who have man
aged to avoid the darft of
ten affect French styles in
dress, haircuts, and speech.
Well - stocked French
bookstores bear testimony
to a large class of people
who continue to enjoy litera
ture for its own sake. At
this moment, contoversy
rages over whether to per
mit the French to maintain
their prestigious lycees,
and whether or not to sub
stitute Vietnames e
or English for French as
the language of instruction
in the universities.
The performing arts have
been hit hard by the war,
but every week or so a con
cert or recital is announced,
Sets at 15 off (by author)
Albert Schweitzer
Isaac Asimov
Ernest Hemmingway
Sir Arthur C. Doyle
Paul Tillich
and Vietnamese plays draw
large audiences.
Buddhist activity has
waned considerably since
Prime Minister Ky's suc
cessful crackdown on t h e
Struggle Movement in Hue
last spring. Still the pago
das are filled with saffron
clad monks trying to patch
up or widen further the rift
in the Buddhist Unified
Church. Buddhists and Con
fucian funerals periodically
fill the streets with color.
The newspapers are still
subject to government cen
sorship but political discus
sions in restaurants and
cafes are often heated and
free. Unlike the last days
under Diem, students now
do not hesitate to criticize
the regime, and charges of
corruption and-or incompe
tence are regularly if quiet
ly flung at some of the Di
rectory's leading generals.
But political discussions,
even those involving the
new Constituent Assembly,
inevitably smack of resigna
tion. South Viet Nam is at
war against itself, Saigon is
under siege and even the
most hopeful know that as
long as this goes on, and
may be longer, the generals
will wield effective power.
READ
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VALLEY OF THE DOLLS
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The nightmare world where sex Is a weapon; where love It
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IN COLD BLOOD
by Truman Capote
On tht best seller list for over o year. A true account of the
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COLLECTED POEMS
bn Dylan Thomas
Contains a collection of poems sellected by the author before
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THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN
by Thomas Mann
Tells tht complete story of the consciousness in tht making,
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by Willa Cather
The glowing story of the growth of an American farm bey te
manhood. Awarded the 1921 Pulitzer priie.
DEATH COMES TO THE ARCHBISHOP
by Willa Cather
Classic novel set In Mexico.
THE BATTLE OF THE LITTLE BIG HORN
by Mari Sandoi
An account of the battle on which Gen. George Custer staked
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ECSTASY AND ME
by Heddy Lamar
The flesh end blond autobiography of an emoiine woman who
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Cease-Fire Set; U.S.
Two major news stones
have come out of Vietnam
in past weeks. The first
important development con
cerned a Christmas cease
fire. The truce, proposed by
the neutralist countries and
by Pope Paul, will halt
military opeations for two
24-hour periods during
Christmas and New Years.
A similar truce last year
was violated by the Viet
Cong, and several Ameri
cans were killed in sneak
attacks during the supposed
"cease fire."
Many war observers, in
cluding Dr. Peter Cheng,
assistant professor of polit
ical science, think that be
cause of the tenuous Viet
Cong line of commun
ication, many of the gueril
las simply failed to get
word of the truce.
Cheng added that the VC
have agreed to the truce
because many of their
members are Catholic.
Cheng even suggested that
many of the Viet Cong
fighting men requested the
truce, and Hanoi had little
choice but to agree.
"It's a good idea, but
last year a lot of guys were
killed in the same kind of
truce. This year we'll by
ready." Even high-ranking
American officers agree
that Christmas in Vietnam
this year will be a gun-in-one-hand,
turkey-in-the-oth-er
affair.
The second news develop
ment is the U.S. bombing
in or near Hanoi. United
States officials have yet to
deliver an official pro
nouncement concerning this
new turn of American war
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policy. Western news papers
are depending on Radio
Hanoi for details.
But the Christmas truce
has produced substantiation
for a new political analysis
of the Vietnam war.
The war in Vietnam has
produced theories, demon
strations, and explosive po
litical campaigns. Theodore
Sorenson, a former Kennedy
advisor refuses to say any
thing about how JFK would
have handled the war.
The New Left claims that
the United States has no
Goo
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business in Vietnam. Many
of our "allies", notably
France, have refused to en
dorse the United States war
position. To the Administra
tion, the war is a United
States attempt to give de
mocracy to a country long
ruled by dictators, to t h e
Right the United States is
stemming the Red Tide.
The policies of that Allies
(the US, Korea, Australia
and South Vietnam) has
produced virtually hun
dreds of interpretations. But
recently political analysts
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about the feelings of t h e
Communist bloc toward
Vietnam. '
Victor Zorza, an English
analyst of the Vietnam war,
maintains (in the Dec. 27th
issues of Look) that the
Communist bloc is almost
as divided on Vietnam as
the West.
Zorzo's thesis is that
Hanoi war leaders are di
vided into "hawks" and
"doves", every bit as much
as the West. ("Hawk" is the
term applied to a hard-
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Hanoi
line, get-tough advocate,
"Dove" indicates a softer
position spokesman.)
Certain members of the
Hanoi regime, according to,
Zorza beleive that "the Viet
namese Communists should
give up for the time being
their unrealistic attempt to
defeat, single-handedly, the
whole power and might of
the U.S."
Hanoi, consequently, is
looking to the United
States for a softening of
the U.S. war postion, Zorza
contends. (This article was
written before the United
States bombings near Han
oi.) Zorza thinks that the
Christmas truce, and an
other cessation of Air Force
bombing, would provide the
doves with concrete proof
for their position.
The RAND Corporation,
(a "think factory" of bril
liant political and economic
analysts), corroborated Zor-"
za's thesis. They also rec
ognize the need, according
to Zorza, for a softening of
United States policy to sup
port the doves.
Zorza accuses the United
States of refusal to recog
nize the Communist schism.
Robert J. McCloskey, a
State Department spokes
man, did in fact, refuse to
acknowledge the validity of
Zorza's thesis.
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236 No. 12
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