South Viet Nam: What the People Say

Some observers on the spot have gloomily concluded that the war to save strategic South Viet Nam from the Communist Viet Cong guerrillas cannot be won under President Ngo Dinh Diem, despite his promises to reform his rigid, often corrupt regime. The critics have no alternatives to offer, and the U.S. is still backing Diem full force, but there is a growing discussion of the case against him.

So far the U.S. has given Diem $2 billion in economic and military aid. Since last fall, the buildup has included 56 large helicopters. The U.S. now has 3,600 men in South Viet Nam, piloting planes, tending war dogs used for combat patrols, training Diem's 170,000-man army in anti-guerrilla tactics. Ships of the U.S. Seventh Fleet patrol the South China Sea to prevent Red infiltration by junk and sampan. U.S. special forces are on the way to beef up Diem's military intelligence, communications and logistics.

On paper, this should be enough to dispose of the estimated 20,000 Viet Cong guerrillas. But Diem's critics cite his unwillingness to delegate authority, the inefficiency of his administration, the low morale of his officer corps. The charge most often made is that President Diem is alienated from the 14 million people of South Viet Nam. Says a U.S. officer in Saigon: "This country is less a battlefield than a political arena. No matter how much military help the U.S. pours in, the war cannot be won without the support of the people."

To hear something of the people's feelings, TIME Correspondent Jerry Rose went on a three-week tour of the farms and villages, from the canal-laced Mekong delta to the lowland jungles of Darlac to the sagebrush plains of Pleiku. His report:

For 20 years the Vietnamese peasant has been ordered about, brutalized or wooed by soldiers—French, Japanese, Communist Viet Minh. Now, he is once more caught in the middle, between the Communist Viet Cong guerrillas and Diem's army. Squatting in the shade of his oxcart, a farmer north of Saigon said wearily: "Many times we are forced by the Viet Cong to spend the night digging ditches across the road. In the morning we are forced by the army to fill in the holes. The next night, we must dig them again."

The Red Appeal. The peasants refer to both the Diem government and the Communists as they, as if recognizing that a peasant cannot be a participant in the war, only a victim. But even the most isolated tribesmen must choose to which of them he wants to give his allegiance. Typical of the Reds' recruiting and propaganda is one of their recent forays among the Jarai tribe of the central plateau. More than 100 Viet Cong arrived one night, lit a bonfire and assembled the people. "A Communist spoke for 30 or 40 minutes," reported a tribesman. "He spoke Jarai, just like us. He told us that his men would soon be masters of the South, that the French left the country to them. 'And when we are masters,' he said, 'you can have everything in the jungle. All the fish. All the meat.' "