‘Ho Regarded As George Washington Of Vietnam’

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30803, 15 July 1965, Page 13

‘Ho Regarded As George Washington Of Vietnam’

fN.Z. Press Association—Copyright)

SYDNEY, July 13. r2r^£i Ort^ V 1 X tnamese leader ’ President Ho Chi Minh North^tnd d^ a H, the r9 eor^ e o Washington o£ Vietnam, in both the North and South, a United States clergyman said today.

If general elections were held in North and South Vietnam Ho Chi Minh would be elected, said the Rev. J. M. Lawson, minister of the Centenary Methodist Church in Memp. his, Tennessee. The Saigon Government essentially did not have the support of the people, he said. Mr Lawson arrived in Sydney today with the Right Rev. W. Crittenden, Episcopal Bishop of Erie, Pennsylvania. Both men visited Thailand, Cambodia and South Vietnam for two weeks before coming to Australia to give talks on their visit While in South Vietnam they conferred with Government and military officials, religious leaders and antigovernment factions.

They described the situation as primarily a social and economic problem rather than a military one. “You have members of the same family fighting on opposite sides without know--BW£’ ““

“The main thing which concerns me as a Christian clergyman is the ‘dehumanis•ng of the South Vietnamese,” he said. “Their villages are being used as testing grounds for two conflicting ideologies.” Mr Lawson said he believed that if the U.S. withdrew from Vietnam the Saigon Government would fall. The Vietnamese did not want to be controlled by Saigon or Hanoi.

Torture and terror were being used by both the Viet Cong and South Vietnamese in this civil war, he said. There was little possibility of a military solution to the problem.

He said there should be: an immediate stop to bombing of North Vietnam, a cease-fire, negotiations between North and South Vietnam, conference under the auspices of the United Nations between interested parties, including China.

Mr Lawson said there was evidence that not more than 30 per cent of the Viet Cong were Communists.

The war in Vietnam was a battle between two ideologies. They had found a deeply complicated situation in which they could not judge either side to be wholly right or wholly wrong. They deplored the way in which major powers were using the villages of Vietnam as a testing ground for ideological positions such as “wars of national liberation” or “containment of communism by military force." Both men said they support President Johnson’s call for a U.N. conference on Vietnam. But such a conference should include representatives of the National Liberation Front The men described the situation as primarily a social and economic problem rather than a military one. “You have members of the same family fighting on opposite sides without knowing why,” Bishop Crittenden said. “It’s degrading.” The clergymen hope to have an interview with President Johnson when they return to the United States on Friday.