Vietnam: A colonial war rebranded as an anti-communist war

Letters to the editor in The New York Times:

To the Editor:

Re “Leaking the Pentagon Papers Was an Assault on Democracy,” by Gabriel Schoenfeld (Sunday Review, June 13):

Mr. Schoenfeld offers perverse criticism of Daniel Ellsberg for leaking the Pentagon Papers to The New York Times 50 years ago. 

In doing so, he acknowledges precisely what The Times urged upon the courts half a century ago — that the materials leaked and published were historical in nature, none being less than three years old, and that “there was not a single secret actually damaging to national security in the enormous trove that Mr. Ellsberg had released.”

Without impairing national security, and at immense personal risk, Daniel Ellsberg provided documents to The Times that revealed what our government itself knew and had not revealed about how the nation became involved in the calamitous Vietnamese conflict in the first place and how and why it had persisted as an active combatant in that war.

When the study began to be drafted, over 37,000 U.S. troops had already been killed in that war. More than another 20,000 would perish thereafter. Yet Mr. Schoenfeld characterizes Mr. Ellsberg as having engaged in “an assault on democracy itself.” 

One might say that of those who led us into that undeclared war. But Daniel Ellsberg deserves only praise for his heroic conduct.

Floyd Abrams

New York

The writer was co-counsel to The New York Times in the Pentagon Papers case.

To the editor:

I am a Vietnam veteran. I was the commander of the 515th Transportation Company, which operated out of Camp Eagle, about five miles from Hue, South Vietnam, for almost all of 1969.

I was lied to about the Vietnam War for all four years I was an R.O.T.C. cadet. I was lied to for all three years I served my country as an Army officer. 

I thought my service was the honorable, patriotic thing to do. I learned soon after completing my service the scope of the lies. I have been ashamed ever since that I was party to that huge lie.

Bob Poley

Boulder, Colorado

Rob's comment:

Among other things, the Pentagon Papers verified the historical fact that the War in Vietnam began as a colonial war, when, after World War 2, France tried to reassert control over its colonies in Southeast Asia.

To justify taking over the war after Dien Bien Phu, the US rebranded a colonial war as an anti-communist war and part of the Cold War against the Soviet Union and China.