WORLD > OUTLOOK
Volume 3, No. 31 October 29, 1965
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A BIG STEP FORWARD IN FIGHT AGAINST VIETNAM WAR
"For the first time since the intervention of the United States in the Vietnam war, demonstrations organized on American soil to protest against this war -- and particularly against the inter» vention -= have reached sufficient size to be called mass demonstra~ tions.
"Of course, the masses set in motion during this weekend continued essentially to be made up of students. But the new fact is not only that their size surpassed by far the most optimistic hopes of the organizers and the most pessimistic fears of the authorities, Still more important, especially in New York, was the attitude of the spectators, who showed themselves on the. * whole to be rather friendly, the hostile acts emanating from isolated and well defined groups, generally of the extreme right."
The above estimate of the October 16 demonstrations in the United States against Johnson's escalation of the war in Vietnam is not from a participant in the marches. It constitutes the two open= ing paragraphs of a dispatch sent from New York by Ldo Sauvage, special correspondent of the conservative Paris daily Le Figaro [October 18].
“Washington,” he-satd, "is displaying great embarrassment over these demonstrations and the repercussions they may have throughout the world,"
The American capitalist press, while giving headlines to the demonstrations, sought to minimize them by reporting a much lower number than actually marched and by giving equal prominence to the few isolated scuffles staged by ultrarightists, some of whom are selfdeclared Nazis and admirers of Hitler,
The New York Times, for instance, gave the number of marchers as "over 10,000" in New York. Reporters estimated the crowd at from 25,000 to 40, 0003; one police estimate was 35,000. The parade comnit= tee itself, deciding to be conservative, listed the turnout in New York as 30, 000. 7
Similar demonstrations.were staged in some sixty cities throughout the United States, the total number of participants reaching an estimated 70,000 to 100,000.
Perhaps even more significantly, sympathetic demonstrations were held in many cities in other lands on the very same day. The call for such demonstrations, sent out by the "Vietnam Day Committee" in Berkeley, California [see World Outlook September 17], met with a surprisingly good response. The spirit of international solidarity is clearly on the rise.
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The most notable feature of the demonstrations in the United States is the proof they offer of the swiftness with which antiwar sentiment is developing among the American people. Nothing like it was seen at the beginning of World War I, World War II or even the highly unpopular Korean war.
In World War I the dominant mood at the beginning was vulgar patriotism. At the opening of World War II there was little blatant patriotism among the masses but rather a feeling of fatalism which did not burst into active opposition until victory was won. After that a movement to get the troops back home spread very rapidly. The swift opening of the Korean war stunned the American people. Within a year, however, the opposition had begun to appear and by 1952 it was sufficiently strong to lead to the defeat of the Democrats in a presi-= dential election after Eisenhower promised to end the war,
The present opposition began in an organized way within weeks of February 7, the day Johnson escalated the war, the first teach-ins being held in late March. The October 16 demonstrations thus give promise of rapid development into a powerful movement with a political potential not yet seen in the United States,
Another fact of symptomatic importance was the policy of non-~ exclusion followed by the organizers of the demonstrations. The pacifist demonstrations staged in recent years in centers like New York against nuclear weapons have barred "Communists." This antidemocratic and self-defeating policy meant weak marches characterized by slogans that played into the hands of the very elements who favor war and the use of nuclear weapons in war.
In the October 16 parades, all political tendencies of the left were included. The slogans thus included some very good ones, with the main emphasis being on the demand to “Withdraw the troops." Lé0 Sauvage noted the presence of "CGastroist and Trotskyist activists" among the marchers.
The Johnson administration was obviously disconcerted, Johnson himself attacked the demonstrations October 18, saying he was deeply disturbed -- the demonstrations might be tnd sinterpreted" by "adversaries of America" as showing opposition in the American public to the war in Vietnam!
Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach said that the Justice Department had started an "investigation" of the groups involved in the demonstrations, which, he believes, are connected with the swift rise in opposition to conscription among the youth,
These, along with some red-baiting statements by J. Edgar Hoover, head of the FBI political police, were obvious trial balloons to test the reaction to a wave of government~sponsored witch<hunting. What effect these threats will have on the new generation of youth who are spearheading the antiwar movement remains to be seen, If their
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mood is in any way indicative of the mood of their families, the witch-hunting can prove to be a boomerang with a hard wallop.
The capitalist press also sought to get statements from Amer-~ ican troops in Vietnam that might be used as propaganda against the demonstrators. Most of the troops who were queried, however, chose to say nothing. They have been indoctrinated to believe that it is illegal for them to express a political opinion -- that is, a political opinion in opposition to official policy. Their real views should presently begin filtering through to their families at home, as they did in the Korean war,
As for the freedom fighters of the National Liberation Front in South Vietnam, they voiced their gratitude over their underground broadcasting station, saying they were “profoundly thankful" for the demonstrations, Similar comments were published in the press in Hanoi and Peking.
Amidst the rain of napalm and high explosives poured down on their homes and families by the most powerful imperialist country on earth, they were deeply moved by the demonstrative proof that there are sectors of the American people who put humanity above imperialist policies and who are not afraid to speak out,
THE BRUSSELS DEMONSTRATION
Some 54000 persons marched in Brussels October 16 in obser-~vance of the "International Days of Protest" against U.S. military intervention in Vietnam called for by the "Vietnam Day Committee" of Berkeley, California. It proved to be the biggest demonstration in Europe,
The march was sponsored by the "Committee for Struggle Against Neocolonialism and Fascism" headed by Pierre Le Grave, the left socialist member of parliament. The main organizer of the demonstration was Jean Godin, who became prominent during the Algerian war for his work in the solidarity movement in behalf of the Algerian freedom fighters.
The Brussels demonstration was backed by three unions == the railway workers, gas and electricity workers, and teachers == as well as the Young Guard Socialists, the Socialist students, the Communist Youth and the Communist Students.
In fact, it proved to be a united-front