Vietnam: Fraud of “The Other War”

On March 22 The New York Times declared editorially that at the Guam meeting of U. S. and South Vietnamese leaders, the emphasis was not on military problems but on “that other side of the war—the progress toward economic and social development and constitutional and representative government in South Vietnam.” Only through a government “responsive to the needs of the people,” the Times warned, can “the kind of victory be achieved that could never be won by military means.” The Guam communique, the Times concluded, “seems implicitly to recognize this fact, by its stress on the so-called Revolutionary Development program, on the importance of the coming village and hamlet elections, on the necessity of financial stability and reform of land policies, on the creation of a `free modern society’ in South Vietnam.” The Times also quotes premier Ky as saying that the only way to eliminate Communism in South Vietnam is through a “social revolution.”

Ky’s reference to “social revolution” brings to mind a promise we are obviously supposed to have forgotten: that the need for a vigorous prosecution of “the other war” was precisely wha...