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PROBLEMS of WAR VICTIMS in INDOCHINA Part II: CAMBODIA and LAOS

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PROBLEMS OF WAR VICTIMS IN INDOCHINA Part II: CAMBODIA AND LAOS HEARING BEFORE' 'I'HE SUBOOMMITTEE TO INVESTIGATE .PROBLEMS" CONNEOTED WITH REFUGEES AND ESCAPEES,: . OI!' THI~ , COMMITTEE ON THE J1J'DICIARY"'; '.'" . UNITED ~TATES SENAT;E NINETY-SECOND 'CONGRESS SEOOND'SESSION.· .' .':1 ,'. " :. ,"" ~.' .; ,', ,'; " .- t Printed for tbe use of the Committee on the Judiciary . U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OItFICE 79-lISS WASHtNGTON : 1972 . COMMITTEE. ON THE. ,JUDICIARY , , , ' . ;'_,; ':1 ,·,fJA¥l~S. O. EASTLAND, Miijslss1p~!. Ol~atrtn~, JO:aN'·L.-M'CCUIDLLAN. Arlift'u$Qs ' ROMAN t. HRUSK~, N6braskQ' cl~¥-J~ ~RV~N;,.JR".Not.th.9afolina HIRAl!d: L. FO~G, Hawaii PI1I{.JF:,A. HAltT"Mlchl'gM ;' : HUGH SCOTT i,Pennsylvania EDWARD M. KElNNEDY," Mnssachusetts 8'1'R01\£ THURMOND, 'South Carolina BIRCH BA,YH. Indiana , ,MARLOW W. COOK, Kentucky QUENTIN N. BURDICK, North Dakota CHARLES MeC. MATHIAS. JR., Maryland ROBERT C.'BYl'!'>. )1"1' ylr'lnl~ ': ]jJD'o/AilD J;.Gl)RN1!!".,])l9rldil JOHNV,TUN'NEn\caiHoblbt- ' "C"·" .. ,I"."" _., ;,' SUBCOMMITTEE TO i~I~~'BTIG~TE PBQBtJilM8 CoNNEo'TED! ~ir REFUGEES AND • < " ESOAP)nES ~,-; , ,.-, ,-) ~.) ,,' ,:' - ,- . EDWARD M. KENNEDY, Massachusetta, Chai~man JOHN L. McCLELLAN, Arkansas ·z' ., ,,~Bl),JI'A.M\L.:'FONG, Uawall FHILlr A. HART, Michigan CHARLES MCC;:MATHIAS, JR., Maryland DALII S"DIII HAAN"OOtm8tll JERRY M. TINKIIIR, Staff Oon8tdtant (n) CONTENTS Statement of- Pa~ Roderic L. O'Connor, Coordinator for Supporting Assistanc~} Agency for International Development; accompanied by Hon. William H. Sullivan, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of East Asian and PacifiQ Affairlij" Department of State; and Maj. Curtis G. Cook- USAF, Office of International Seourity Affairs, Department of Defense; Dr. Patricia A. McCreedy, Public HeaItl) Adviser, USAID Mission to Laos; Jack L. Williamson, Deputy Assistant Director for Regional Affairs"", USAID Mission to Laos j Andrew F. Antippas, Embassy: Phnom reuh.;,. Thomas J. Corcoron, ' Director for Laoand Camboaian Affairs, vepartment of St"atej Robert BlaCkburn, Embassy, Phnom Penh; and Ernest L. Kerley, Department of State ______________________ ~_________________ 6 APPENDIXES L United. Nations D.evclopment Program ReP~ft on "Pr~blems Posed by DIsplaced Persons Around Phnom Penh __________ ... ____ .., ___ _ 49 II. A Survey of Civilian Fatalities Among Refugees from Xieng Khouang Province, Laos, prepared by Walter M. Haney ___________ '_____ _ 53 III. A Statement on Antip_~rsonnel. Weaponry, by Fred Branfman, Director, Project Air War, Washington, D.C __________________ _ 67. IV. Seleoted Press Reports and, Comments__________________________ _ 75 V. A.LD. Comments on GAO report on Cambodia _________________ _ 105 (In) PROBLEMS OF WAR VICTIMS IN INDOOHINA PART II: OAMBODIA AND LAOS TUESDAY, MAY 9, 1972 U.S. SENATE, SUBCOMMli"'I'EE ON REFUGEES AND ESCAPEES OF'THE COMMITTEE ON TIrE J UDIOIARY, WASHINGTON, D.C. 'rhe subcommittee met, pursuant to recess, at 9 :50 a.m., in room 2228, New Senate Office Building, Senator Edward M. Kennedy ( chairman) presiding. Present: Senators Kennedy and Fong. Also present: Dale S. de Haan, counsel; Jerry M. Tinker, staff consultant; and Mrs. Dorothy Parker, assistant to Senator Fong. Senator KENNEDY. The subcommittee will come to order. If the decade of death and devastation we have brought to Vietnam has taught us any single lesson, it is that the road to peace is not the road of wider war. And now, because President Nixon has once again so clearly failed to learn that lesson, the United States and the world community of nations have this morning entered a new and far more deadly and dangerous era in the Indochina" war. " The mining of Haiphong Harbor is a senseless act of military desperation by a PresIdent incapable of finding the road to peace. A~ain and again in the tragic history of AmerICan involvement in VIetnam, President Lyndon Johnson wisely resisted the siren call of the military planners for the, mining of Haiphong. Now, President Nixon has succumbed to that foolhardy proposal, and the mines are being dropped. , In a sense, t1e dropping of the mines is the most vivid demonstra­ tion we have yet had of the total failure of the President's plan to end the war in Indochina and the bankruptcy of his unfulfilled plan for peace. For years, we have known the vast international rislrs of Illimng Haiphong, and the negligible military benefit it, can bring on the battlefields of South Vietnam. What sense does it make to challenge the Soviet Union in the coastal waters of Indochina, when we ought to be challenging the North Vietnamese at the peace table in ParIs! , . What sense does it make to mine Haiphong in North Vietnam whe~ weeks and months wi11pa~b~forethe a~tion can have any possIble effect on the current offenSIve In South V,etnam i What sense does it make to adopt a military course of action on the war with a maximum of potential confrontation with the Soviet Union and a minimum potential gain in Indochina! III 2 It was 4 years agO' this spring that Presidelit JO'hnsO'n began to' implement the fragile decisiO'ns that had the first real PQssibility O'f leading us O'ut O'f Vietnam. And nQW, by SQme cruel Irony, in the fO'urth year O'f the Presidency Qf Richard NixQn, in sl?ite Qf all the prQmises. we,have heard to' end the war, we arewitnessl1!g Qne Qf the mQst drtlistic> steps in the entire histO'ry Qf the' escu,latiO'nof the war. At this crucial time Qf crisis in Vietnl'm I believe that histO'ry and the American peQplewill recQrd that President NixQn has taken a terri­ bly wrQng and ill-cO'nceived turn. It never had to be this way. After tens Qf thousands Qf American lives have been IQst and tens Qf billiQns Qf ,dollars have been spent, after hundreds Qf thQusands of N Qrth 'md SQuth Vietnamese have been killed, after milliO'ns Qf civilian victims have felt the awful hQrror O'f the war, the WQrld is re'ldy fQr peace in IndQchina, and all the President c!tn find to' give us is mQre war. The President whO' promised peace is bringing wider war. And llOW;, because of his blindness Qn the war, mO'r~, Americans and N<;>rth and SQuth Vietnamese trO'QPs will die, mO're inuO'cent men and women and children will be killed and mQre AmericanprisO'ners will be taken, and all Qur hQpes fQr recQnciliatiQn with the SQviet Union are placed in jeQpardy. , ' " ' I yield to' ,nQne in my cQndemnatiQn of the invasiQn frQlll the N Qrth. But I alsO' knQwthat the way to' the peace table lies clearly at ,tpc entraneetQ the cQnference table in Paris,and not at the entrance to', the hai'bO'r Qf HaiphQng. SO' IO'ng as we have a President ,who is imprisQned by the war, SO' IQng as we have a President whose only ,refiex· is the belligerance and, aggressiQn we heard last night, SO' long ,as we have ~ Presidellt whQse Qnly realgQlll is thepursuitQf the phantQm Qf military victO'ry O'n thebattlefield,we shiilI.never have peace in IndO'china. ,,' , . , ' The, hearing tQday c.Ol\!inues the subcQ!llmittes's pt1blic inquiry intO' the prql/lems Qf the VIctIms Qf the war 1ll' IndQchm!1' Yesterday, we reviewedthe.,fa,st deteriO'r,.ating situatiQn in Vietnam. Of special ,CQnCern this mO'rning, is the situatiQn in LaO's, CambQdia, and NQrth Vietnam. ,. In, eltrly 1969,' LaO's became, the~rincipal target Qf a "nO' holds barred" air war Qver IndQchina. UntIl recently, when the fO'cus Qf the IndQchina war again shifted to' Vietnam, a rising number Qf refugees and civilian casualties tQld us of the intensity of the cO',nfiicir-alld'the devastating illlpact the Ilir war was havillg on the civilian PQPulatiO'n ,iu Laos.,. " " Although SQme ,limited prQgress is being made in meeting the need,S Qf the'LIlQtian war victims, there is, I feel, ,acQntinuing tendenoy an ,the part (If our. natiQnal leadership to \jnderplay the seriQus dimen­ , siQns Qf people prQblems thrO'ughO'ut Indochina. We nO'ted yesterdaY, fQ~ example, that it ~QO'k 6, mQ~lths fQr Qt~r. GQvernment to' ,aplm;>ye ,SaIgon's request fO'r httlemQre than $1 mIlhQntQhelpqare fQr'O'ver 700,OOOerphans in .SQuth Vietnam ... And thecasua], IIpproa~h of,. pur , . GO'vernment to' the needs and the impact Qf 1 milliQn neW ,refugees in that de.vastated cQuntry, is (list'ressing to this subcQmmitteeand all Americalls. .. , ' . But nQwhere has our sense Qf natiQnalpriQri1iiesQverseas, and the traditiQnal humanitarian cQncernaof the American peQple, been mO're 3 distorted than in Cambodia. Estimates put thenumber of Cambodian refugees, over the last 2. years, at more than 2 million. Civilian casnalties have numbered in the thousands. The p,ublic record sug­ gests that our Government has not only rejected aU appeals for help, but that it is the policy of our Government not to become invo~ved with the problem of civilian war victims in Cambodia. Given the vast amounts of military hardware we arc pumping into that country­ hardware which helps create these war victims--'-'olirpolicy towards the people problems of Cambodia defies understanding. But the President has told us ,that the bloodbath will <lontinue.,He told us last evening that the peace long promised. the Amerk'lll people is nowhere in sight, He told us that VlCtnamization has failed. He told us that we will try, again,.to do from the air what we c01il(l not do for the past decade from the ground. We will have more wa,r because we have missed the opportUl1ities for peace--because we COn­ tinue to play great power games over the future of Indochina rntlier than allowii'g the peop,les of the area to sort out their Own fnture.
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