[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 8 (Friday, January 13, 1995)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E98]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


              20 YEARS LATER: A LIBERAL REPENTS ON VIETNAM

                                 ______


                        HON. GERALD B.H. SOLOMON

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                        Friday, January 13, 1995
  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker, ever since the killing fields and the boat 
people began, some of us have been waiting for a confession from those 
who got it wrong on the Vietnam war. And those who were wrong, of 
course, were those on the liberal left. The ones who told us that 
America was on the wrong side in the war. The ones who called Ho Chi 
Minh, the Vietcong and, yes, the Khmer Rouge simple agrarian reformers. 
The ones who saw America and her allies as the source of all evil, and 
who saw in our enemies only a various desire for liberation. The ones 
who spat on our soldiers as they returned. The ones who hounded us out 
of the war before we could secure a full accounting of our missing men.
  But instead of an apology, or even an admission of intellectual 
error, most of these people have continued arrogantly along, 
indifferent to the suffering they contributed to or lacking the courage 
to air their guilty consciences. In the 1980's, they were Sandinista 
fans and nuclear freezers. Today, they are global warming crusaders, 
population controllers, and senior foreign policymakers in the Clinton 
administration.
  But Mr. Speaker, perhaps there is hope. For at least one major 
liberal opponent of the war, William Shawcross, author of the book, 
``Sideshow,'' has seen the light. In an extraordinary article in the 
December 16, 1994, London Times, Mr. Shawcross admits what many of us 
have known for 30 years. Please listen carefully to this quote from the 
article:

       Indeed those of us who opposed the American war in Indo-
     China should be extremely humble in the face of the appealing 
     aftermath: a form of genocide in Cambodia and horrific 
     tyranny in both Vietnam and Laos. Looking back on my own 
     coverage for the Sunday Times of the South Vietnamese war 
     effort of 1970-75, I think I concentrated too easily on the 
     corruption and incompetence of the South Vietnamese and their 
     American allies, was too ignorant of the inhuman Hanoi 
     regime, and far too willing to believe that a victory by the 
     communists would provide a better future. But after the 
     communist victory came the refugees to Thailand and the 
     floods of boat people desperately seeking to escape the 
     Cambodian killing fields and the Vietnamese gulags. Their 
     eloquent testimony should have put paid to all illusions.

  Mr. Shawcross is to be commended for having the courage to be so 
honest, Mr. Speaker. Too bad that cannot be said about the 1960 
generation liberals who are running our foreign policy now, as they 
busily normalize our relations with Vietnam, prepare to dump taxpayer 
money into North Korea, and gut this Nation's defenses. A confession 
from some of them on Vietnam would do the country a lot more good.


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