58 To the Editors: I read the April issue of Worldview with double interest: as a Vietnamese and as a daughter of lawyer Tran Van Tuyen, a political detainee mentioned in "They Are Us, Were We Vietnamese" by Theodore Jacqueney. My grief is so very much deeper since not only such a great number of Viet- namese people are being detained un- justly, but also among them are mem- bers of my own family: my father, con- fined under very inhuman conditions since June, 1975, without a single word on his whereabouts from the Hanoi Government; my brother, now in a labor camp somewhere in North Vietnam, according to some sources; my brother- in-law and a cousin (my father's nephew) in "reeducation" camps still awaiting their " g r a d u a t i o n " after twenty months. The response from the Hanoi officials to the Forest appeal (discussed in "Fighting Among the Doves" by James Finn in the same issue of Worldview) with regard to violations of human rights in Vietnam is both a lie and an insult to the civilized world. If we have not seen the bloodbath it is because the Vietnamese Communists have a better means of killing: starvation, mental tor- ture, and physical exhaustion. 1 sincerely hope the two articles on Vietnam in Worldview will wake up those who still believe in the sweet language and promises of the Com- munists. I would like to take this opportunity to express my deep appreciation and my gratitude to Ted Jacqueney, James Finn, and Richard Neuhaus and to all the people concerned about those who have suffered and are still suffering under the oppressive and undemocratic regimes in Vietnam. Tran Thi Dam-Phuong Haworth, N.J. To the Editors: James Finn ("Fighting Among the Doves," April, 1977)see.ms unaware that we have American dissidents—thousands of them, mainly in Canada. They do not have the right to come into the USA even to visit their parents. Why is he so disregardful of their civil rights while sympathizing with dissidents in Communist coun- tries? Conditions in some of our veterans' hospitals are not good. Moreover, we have more than 200,000 people imprisoned in the U.S., and our own prison conditions are bad. If we restored civil rights to our own dissidents in Canada and Sweden and reformed our prisons, our good example might be catching—and the human race would be safer. Alice Franklin Bryant Seattle, Wash. James Finn Responds: Ms. Bryant seems unaware that pages 28-29 of the April issue deal with American dissidents. Of course, there are remediable faults in this country. But must we rehearse that list each time we criticize massive abuses abroad? A dreary prospect. Good and Bad Dictatorships? To the Editors: I read with great interest "Christianity and Communism: The Di- lemma of Dialogue," "Two Ways to Forget Vietnam," and "Latin Ameri- ca and the U.S.—That-Special Rela- t i o n s h i p " in the April issue of Worldview. All those articles treat very up-to-date subjects, such as relations between developed and underdeveloped countries, perspectives on the increase of population tensions, disrespect for the rights, liberties, and guarantees stated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. As a Social Democrat, I consider these problems of major impor- tance, since they are conditions for the via to a humanistic socialism by means of reforms and, therefore, in democracy and in freedom. It is not fair to condemn the absence of democratic liberties in Latin America and to omit the disrespect for the more elementary rights of the human being in the Eastern countries, in Cambodia or in Ethiopia. In fact, there can be no divi- sion into good or bad dictatorships. All of them must be openly condemned by all democrats, who have the responsibil- ity of contributing to man's liberation from every kind of oppression, wher- ever it exists and whatever might be the veil thrown over injustices, inequalities of opportunity, and every form of man's manipulation. Within this point of view I cannot help expressing my total accordance with President Jimmy Carter's new foreign policy, which stands for funda- mental rights, liberties, and guarantees. President Carter has been proving that he has a' more progressive and a wiser character than his predecessors, his pol- icy being truly appreciated in Portugal and, more widely speaking, all over Western Europe. Antonio Rebelo de SOusa Member of Parliament Social Democratic Party Lisbon, Portugal AFSC To the Editors: The American Friends Service Committee has been taking a beating of late in the pages of Worldview. I am of the opinion also that criticism is in order; that the AFSC has not, in regard to Vietnam, lived up to the Quaker tradition of "speaking Tru;h to Power." However, I draw the line on the type of criticism in Abraham Martin Murray's "More on Updated Pacifism" ("A View of the World," April). As all but a few realize, the Middle East conflict is an extremely complex problem and there is no individual or organization that can be credited with coming up with a perfectly satisfactory analysis of the problem and scenario for change. What is the terrible com- promise of pacifist principles that the AFSC is guilty of? Urging Israel to negotiate with the PLO! Yet who else is there but the PLO if negotiations are to be at all meaningful and fruitful? Cer- tainly no party in the Middle East can claim that its hands are not bloody. Perhaps if the AFSC had suggested that Israel bomb the PLO, the American Jewish Committee would not have been nearly as indignant about compromising of principles. Their analogy of the Middle East conflict to the NAACP's confrontations with the Ku Klux Klan is but another example of the puerile tendency of Americans to simplify everything in terms of our domestic issues, as if the world is but our mirror image. Fair- minded objectivity is not a hallmark of the American Jewish Congress, as I am sure most of your readers are aware. They are more than eager to practice the double standard in relation to Israel. You won't find them out beating the bushes about human rights violations in Israel, where they are known to occur, as in many other countries of the world. If the Palestinians silently vanished, the 59 AJC would probably be quite happy about it. Fortunately, President Carter does not seem to be of such mind. Joseph D. McCarty Milwaukee, Wis. Mennonit£ & Quaker Visits to Vietnam To the Editors: The May, 1977, issue of Worldview has a short, one-paragraph item on page 34 that is factually incor- rect. It states that the group sponsored by the Mennonites and the American Friends Service Committee returned in mid-March from Vietnam. There was a joint MCC-AFSC visit to Vietnam in November, 1975, but that is the only joint visit that has occurred. Mennonite Central Committee had another visit in June, 1976, and then again in January, 1977. Every time a Mennonite delegation has gone to Vietnam human rights is- sues were very high on the agenda. We asked frank, penetrating questions and expressed concerns. The statement you make in the May issue of Worldview does not apply to Mennonite visitors to Vietnam. Vern Preheim Secretary for Asia Mennonite Central Committee Akron, Pa. The Editors Respond: Our apologies. The quotation from an AFSC (not Mennonite) leader appeared in a March news report that gave the impression .that an AFSC-Mennonite group had just recently visited Vietnam. Perhaps the leader who was quoted to the effect that Americans have no right to ask at>out human rights in Vietnam was speaking on the basis of the earlier visit mentioned by Mr. Preheim. Perhaps he had not been to Vietnam at all. On this one we just know what we read in the papers. In any case, we are pleased to learn that the Mennonites have pressed the question of human rights when visiting Vietnam. We hope they will continue in that good work. Portions Omitted From the Text Pub- lished in the April issue of Worldview. We the undersigned were actively en- gaged in opposition to the war suffered at America's hands by the Vietnamese people. Some of our efforts are well known to you. We fought for the end of America's intervention in Vietnam and lived in grief for the horrors suffered beneath America's bombers. We realize, of course, that our resistance to that war can bring none of the dead back to life nor restore maimed bodies, nor purge America of its immense burden of responsibility. J h u s we are now in- volved in encouraging the U.S. gov- ernment to welcome Vietnam into the United Nations, to provide massive rep- arations for the destruction it wrought in your homeland. At the same time we are involved in private efforts to relieve sufferings caused by the war and to contribute to the process of reconcilia- tion between American and Vietnamese people. In fidelity to the same values that led us to these commitments, however, we find ourselves obliged in conscience to speak on behalf of those Vietnamese who reportedly are being denied funda- mental human rights. Appeal to the Government of Vietnam In our criticisms, which cannot be separated from our friendship, we do not wish to single out your government unfairly. We are familiar with the double-standard of various states, in- cluding our own, in the human rights area. There are client states of the U.S. .. .We could not in conscience keep silent when General Thieu filled the American-funded prisons with thousands upon thousands of innocent people. We cannot be silent now, even though America's intervention is ended. We voice our protest in the hope that your government can avoid repeti- tion of the tragic historical pattern in which liberators gain power only to impose a new oppression. the sacrifices made by Buddhists and Christians to end the war, to assist its victims, and to reunite the country—a witness which helped build world sup- port for peace in Vietnam. We appeal to you to reassess your policies regarding religious bodies, not to limit the defini- .We recall with immense gratitude tion of religious freedom merely to cul- tic practice, and to welcome and en- courage the social contributions of Buddhist, Christian and humanitarian agencies of the Vietnamese people. In addition, we express a concern motivated by caring for families living in endless uncertainty about the fate of lost relatives who were among the forces that invaded your country. We ask you to make public any unreleased information you may possess regarding Americans who died or were imprisoned in Vietnam. While we have no knowl- edge that you possess unreleased infor- ' matiqn, we are concerned at the cynical way in which the United States govern- ment has exploited this issue and used it as an excuse for withholding economic assistance and to veto Vietnam's admis- sion into the United Nations. At the same time, we express our grief for those Vietnamese families who lost children, parents and grandparents in the war and who, in many thousands of cases, know nothing of the fate of those victims of America's war and for whom no compassion has been expressed by the United States government. We continue to feel a deep friendship toward the people of Vietnam and to nourish the hope that you who are en- trusted with the government will do everything in your power to encourage the conditions of a better life in peace, justice and tolerance. We pledge our continuing readiness to do all we can to be of help. government (Chile, Brazil and Iran among them) in which reliance on im- prisonment and torture is routine. We are also aware of the many socialist states in which suppression of human rights has been widely accepted. We are also painfully aware of the violence and injustice of the United States in its domestic and foreign policies, the abyss that separates American profession from American practice. Many of us have viewed this society from within court rooms, prison walls and slum neighborhoods. Nonetheless, the history of the last two decades has made Vietnam a place of special concern and hope for millions of people throughout the world—in its crises and hopes our own lives have been bound.up. To you who are Vietnam's leaders, we say: Invasion, imperialism and civil war for years made your country's name synonymous with the worst horrors of violence and brutal repression. With the. end of the war and of the Saigon regime, many hoped that the name of Vietnam might be transfigured into a symbol of that liberation from fear and terror which we desire for ourselves and for all people. As you repair the physical de- vastation of your land, we appeal to you to create a society of tolerance and compassion worthy of the hopes and sacrifices of all those Vietnamese who died, "and which inspired the sympathy and support of millions throughout the world.