GOVERNMENT MINISTER'S REALISTIC WARNING ON VIETNAM

"President Ho Chi Minh had lost any chance of a military victory over the allies, the Minister for Defence, Mr. Fairhall, said last night. But there would not be an early end to the war because the communist strategy was to protract the war and 'so frustrate the free world forces that they will get tired and give up the struggle'... He said the only hope for the communists was the psychological warfare being carried out around the world to encourage the allies to negotiate for peace on communist terms... 'But I do not think at the moment there will be early negotiations - Ho Chi Minh has not yet lost the war," The Australian, November, 13.
This is the first realistic public comment from a Government Cabinet Minister that we have yet seen on the fundamental aspects of the war in Vietnam.

We have previously referred to the Summary Report by the Preparedness Investigating Sub Committee of the Committee on Armed Services of the United States Senate, issued on August 31. This report reveals that during the whole of 1966 less than 1 per cent of the American air sorties flown against North Vietnam were against targets recommended by the Joint Chiefs of Staff. In spite of increased air attacks on significant targets throughout this year, the Report states that there were 57 targets recommended by the Joint Chiefs of Staff against which strikes have not been authorised."

The Report quotes General Greene as saying on August 23:
"The key targets have not even yet been hit," In recent weeks there have been reports of key targets having been hit for the first time. But the long delay in hitting key targets has enabled the Soviet Union to install a most effective anti-aircraft defence system, with consequent increased hazards for American pilots. And now that the monsoon season has started, there will be a decreasing number of American strikes for the coming months, enabling the Communists to repair some of the damage to their transport systems.

It is clear that no end to the Vietnam War is in sight while the present no-win policy is maintained. The Communists are therefore demonstrating supreme confidence, as witnessed by the following report:
"The North Vietnamese Premier (Mr. Pham Van Dong) says a settlement to the Vietnam war can only be reached on his country's terms. Speaking at a reception given in Hanoi last night by the Soviet Ambassador (Mr. Cherbakov) to mark the 50th anniversary of the Bolshevik revolution, he said: 'The basis to settle the problem is the four-point stand of the North Vietnam Government and the political programme of the South Vietnam National Front for Liberation…" - The Age, Melbourne, November 9.

The Communist strategists believe that they only need to hold on long enough, at least into next year, and that slowly but surely their psychological warfare will confuse and erode the will of the Americans and their allies to continue the war. There is already evidence of an American shift on the question of the National Liberation Front.

The Review of The News (U.S.A.) carries the following report from Washington with a date line of November 2:
"U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Arthur J. Goldberg tells members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that the United States would vote for participation by the National Liberation Front (Vietcong) in any Security Council discussion of Vietnam…In response to a question, Goldberg also remarks that the Johnson Administration is willing to accept participation of the front in a reconvened Geneva conference.

During an operation called Cedar Falls last January, American troops captured a North Vietnamese tape recording by Major-General Do, a deputy commander of the Viet Cong armed forces, in which the following statement was made: "After any war, there are some negotiations. After negotiations, there is again war. And if there is some fighting while the negotiations are in progress, there is nothing extraordinary in it, there is nothing astonishing in that."

This is the Communist concept of protracted conflict, in which military activities are but a part of the total conflict. It is this concept, which must be challenged if there is to be real victory in Vietnam. The statement by Mr. Fairhall is encouraging evidence that some political leaders are beginning to grasp the real nature of the struggle.

THE BRITISH ELECTORAL REVOLT

"Whatever may be thought by the awful coalition of political party leaders, chair borne Whitehall mandarins, and the affluent wise boys of current society - all embracing alike a complete lack of faith in Britain - the people of these islands do not share their defeatism. Whether they take refuge in nationalism of the Welsh or of the Scottish variety, or simply in England feebly stay at home, the British long for a patriotic leader. If Labour's decline were simply due to the economic state of the country, then the other parties might have been expected to gain support. That they have not done so is because these parties offer no alternative policy on a major cause of socialist decline - Harold Wilson's general reversal of his previous attitude to the Common Market. Significantly, public opinion shows a widening majority against this course…" John Paul's Political Intelligence Weekly, London, November 10.

The current British electoral revolution has demonstrated that the British people are still sufficiently interested in their future to make it clear to the present party leaders that they and their policies are rejected. The commentators everywhere are distressed by the revolt by the British electors against traditional party loyalties. It is distressing to the centralisers of all kinds to find that at the very time they are preaching about the "Inevitability" of uniformity and centralisation, groups of electors are demonstrating that they wish to preserve their own local cultures and to have more direct say over their own affairs. Genuine evolution is towards diversity and decentralisation. The drive towards centralisation, with the Wor1d State as the ultimate objective, runs contrary to the genuine aspirations of the individual. What is happening in Britain at present could prove of the greatest significance.

RHODESIAN PRIME MINISTER HITS "COLD WAR" TACTICS

"Rhodesia's Prime Minister, Mr. Ian Smith, has charged Britain with adopting cold war tactics reminiscent of those of the Soviet Union. Broadcasting on the second anniversary of his government's seizure of independence, he accused Britain of subjecting Rhodesia to taunts and insults and attacking her with incredible viciousness." - The Sun Melbourne, November 13.

The tone of Prime Minister Smith's second anniversary address revealed that the Rhodesian Government is now operating from a position of increasing strength. British Commonwealth Secretary George Thomson said that he was "pretty surprised" by Mr. Smith's address. Just because Mr. Thomson was treated courteously in Salisbury by Mr. Smith was no reason why Mr. Harold Wilson's representative should feel surprised when, on the occasion of celebrating the second anniversary of survival against a vicious international economic and psychological war, the Rhodesian leader took the opportunity to draw attention to the nature of this war.
Only recently Mr. Wilson insulted Rhodesians when he refused even to accept a note from Mr. Smith asking him to use his influence with Zambian leaders to stop aiding Communist-trained terrorists from attacking Rhodesia from Zambia.

Why shouldn't Mr. Smith correctly describe Mr. Wilson's policies as "deceitful and inconsistent?" Mr. Smith's most devastating comment was that Mr. Wilson's policy of crushing Rhodesia was "aimed at appeasing the forces of world Communism."

Prime Minister Ian Smith has emerged as one of the Free World's greatest political leaders in the global struggle against the strategy of International Communism.

THE SOVIET UNION AND ISRAEL

"In 1948 Moshe Sharett, then the Foreign Minister of Israel, sent a telegram to the Soviet Union saying, 'We express the deepest feeling and thanks of the Israeli Jews and of World Jewry for the staunch Soviet support in the United Nations for the establishment of the Jewish state and for the Soviet's consistent defence of the right of Jews to a state, notwithstanding all the difficulties; and also for the understanding that the Soviet Union showed to the Jews in Europe who suffered under the Nazi yoke.' And in 1967 Mr. Kosygin at the United Nations again affirmed Israel's right to exist." - Advertisement in The Australian of November 13, by the Jewish Progressive Centre.

Although the Jewish Progressive Centre can be correctly described as a Communist front organisation, the historical facts mentioned cannot be disputed. An understanding of these facts "overlooked" in another advertisement in The Australian, authorised by Mr. M. Ashkanasy, C.M.G, Q.C., is essential for an understanding of the critical Middle East situation.

King Hussein of Jordan continues to campaign in Western capitals for justice for the Arabs, stressing that the Arab nations will accept Israel as an independent Middle East State if borders are firmly guaranteed and Israel "de-Zionised." Rejection of King Hussein's desperate appeals by the West will only result in further Communist penetration of the whole of the Middle East.

LABOR LEADER URGES HALT TO VIETNAM BOMBING

"The bombing has not brought North Vietnam to the conference table; it is not winning the war. It is wrong for the Government to intensify a war to which it sees no end to which it will not help to put an end. Stopping the bombing would overnight change this situation . . . If the bombing stopped the pressure would be on North Vietnam to negotiate. Pressure from Hanoi's friends may succeed where her enemies' bombs have clearly failed. That pressure will never be applied while the bombing continues," - From A.L.P. leader Gough Whitlam's Senate Election policy speech, reported in daily press of November 14.

The American Sub Committee Report on Military Preparedness states "The propaganda campaign from Hanoi designed to stop the bombing is strong evidence that the enemy is paying a price he does not wish to pay." Admiral Sharp testified to the Senate Sub Committee that the cessation of bombing "would be a disaster for the United States" as " we would immediately face a large loss of American troops in South Vietnam" and "in my opinion extend the war indefinitely."

All American military leaders warned the Sub Committee that any cessation of bombing would inevitably result in increased American and allied casualties in South Vietnam. The Sub Committee also observed that, "Those who propose a temporary bombing lull, as evidence of our good intentions in the hope that it would bring Hanoi to the conference table, overlook the hard facts of increased U.S. casualties and past history. The net effect of such truces was shown clearly by the Ted stand down in early 1967. We were told that during the 4 day lapse in air attacks during that period North Vietnam pushed through a volume of supplies that would have required at least 38 days to move during periods of our air activity."

As every expert on Communist revolutionary warfare has warned, failure by the Americans and their allies to bring maximum military and economic pressure to bear on the Communists to end the Vietnam war in the shortest possible time has left the Communists free to win the psychological and propaganda war.
Latest Gallup Poll results from the U.S.A. provide disturbing evidence of Communist successes in this type of war. And unless the Australian Government can show some real initiative concerning Vietnam, it may find that Mr. Whitlam has correctly assessed the right note to strike at the present time.

EXPANSION FUND MOVES TO $20,000