Bringing the War Home...

(The author, a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University from 1969-70, spent more than two years in Vietnam as a correspondent for Time. During that time he conducted a private survey of the racial attitudes of black and white American troops in war. He distributed 833 questionnaires, each with 109 items, to black and white Americans and interviewed many of the respondents at length between May and September, 1969. Although it was not a scientifically designed probability sample, the 833 servicemen were selected in a variety of units and geographic locations, and do represent a significant trend in GI attitudes. Terry graduated from Brown University in 1959 where he edited the Brown Daily Herald. He was a Rockefeller Fellow at the University of Chicago from 1959-60. He covered the black revolution for Time and the Washington Post from 1960-67.)

Black soldiers, schooled in the violent arts of guerrilla war as no generation of blacks, are returning home from Southeast Asia, fed up with dying in a war they believe is white man's folly and determined to earn their share of American opportunities even if it means becoming a Black Panther or turning to guns.

My survey of black and white troops discloses attitudes that are not only frightening but which could add significantly to the racial problem in the United States.

For example, many black enlisted men are fed up with fighting and dying for a racist America. A majority of black GI's in the survey feel that they have no business fighting in Southeast Asia. They say their fight is in the United States, against repression and racism. A frightening number - 45 per cent of black combat troops - say they would join riots and take up arms if necessary, to get the rights they have been deprived of at home. The spirit of black militancy has enveloped the GI on the battle ground in much the same manner as I have seen it involve the student on the college campus, and many black soldiers say they will join the ranks of radical groups like the Black Panthers or Students for a Democratic Society when they return home.

This is in direct contrast to my impression of the black American fighting man of 1967 and 1968 who was anxious to prove himself in the most integrated war in U.S. history-and did so by accounting for up to 22 per cent of U.S. combat fatalities while back home newspapers, magazines and television networks were heralding the spirit of brotherhood between blacks and whites in the foxhole.

"The notion has been disproved on the Vietnam battlefield," Maj. Beauregard Brown, a black, told me in Saigon in 1967, "that Negroes can't produce the same as white soldiers. Given the same training and support, the Negro has shown that he can do the job just as good as anyone else."

American commander William C. Westmoreland and President Lyndon B. Johnson agreed. Charges of cowardice (usually baseless) against segregated black troops from World War I to Korea were laid to rest. Concluded the Reader's Digest: the American Negro has earned his red badge of courage.

But blacks today feel differently about the war, life in America and themselves. "The young black soldiers are much more hostile than ever before," said Capt. Alexander Benjamin of Mobile, Ala., a black personnel management officer in the 9th Army Division when I visited him in Dong Tam. "I think we are probably building a recruiting base for militant groups in America. It frightens me."

The change in mood, leading to ugly incidents, even killings, has been induced by a combination of factors.

In large measure, the U.S. military in Southeast Asia reflects the entire American society. A major factor contributing to the new unrest is the growing unpopularity of the war among blacks as well as whites. In 1967 black soldiers roundly criticized Martin Luther King and Cassius Clay for objecting to the war; today, King, Clay and others like Eldridge Cleaver and Julian Bond, who have been heavy critics of the war, stand highest in their esteem.

Then, too, many of the black volunteers of 1967 in the Marine and Army Airborne Divisions have been replaced by conscripts. Some of the "volunteers" I talked to were escaping the draft or a jail sentence stemming from an arrest.

Before the war went stale, the black soldier stoically accepted Martin Luther King's proscriptions against violent protest. But such stoicism gave way to impatience, even riots, among black youths. Consequently, many of to day's black soldiers are yesterday's rioters. Also, King and Robert F. Kennedy, the young black's ghetto heroes, have fallen prey to the very violence he had been led to reject.

"Kennedy was getting ahead; King was getting ahead," observed Wardell Sellers, a black rifleman from New York City in the 1st Army Division. "They were trying to help the brothers. So you can see what that got 'em."

Furthermore, in the White House now sits a President who fails to speak to black needs. "He's not for the black man," said Seaman Ronald Washington of Los Angeles, stationed at Danang. "He's thinking only of foreign policy and his own race. If Nixon were a brother, he'd be the number one Uncle Tom."

And the black soldier has begun to flex his new-found black pride, making him less likely to take without notice the cross burnings, waving of Confederate flags and common use of racial slurs that have persisted among whites since American troops arrived in Vietnam in large numbers.

This conflict has yet to have an observable effect on military performance in combat situations. The close reality of common danger tends to suppress racial differences when troops are under fire and in the field. But when the shooting stops, blacks will readily speak their minds.

"The immediate cause for racial problems in Vietnam," explained Navy Lt. Owen Heggs, a black attorney from Washington, D.C., "is black people themselves. White people haven't changed. The same people in the military today were in the military in 1930, 1940 and so on. What has changed is the black population. As the military represents in microcosm the society we live in, black people today in the lower ranks represent the young black movement in our country.

"Today there is a different breed of young blacks, not satisfied being in the Marine Corps with their hair cut short. Either they say, 'Hell no, we won't go, or 'Yeah, I got to go and I'm here, but I'm not going to take any pushing around. I'm not going to come 12,000 miles from home to be insulted by some girl in the enlisted men's club who's been hanging around with some whites. She calls me nigger. Why? Somebody taught her.' They don't want to take the same pushing around they took in Philadelphia and Detroit, Hough and Watts. They're not ready for it, and they won't put up with it."

In six months I submitted questionnaires to 833 black and white men in uniform of all branches and ranks along the Vietnam landscape, asking each to answer 109 questions. I interviewed many at length. The results of that survey, some of which are included here, were recently tabulated with the assistance of Thomas Pettigrew and Kent Smith of the Harvard University faculty and Howard Zinn of the Boston University faculty.

A large majority of the black enlisted men agreed that black people should not fight in Vietnam because they have problems of discrimination to deal with at home, a striking contrast with the typical attitude of the black soldiers I talked with in 1967. "Negroes should be used in this war because the United States consists of Negroes and whites," Johnny E.Lawrence of Fuquay-Varina, N.C., told me then. "If King had any pride in his race, he ought to do what he can to support us." Said James H. Scott of Miami: "I don't think King and Carmichael are right. They live in a free country and somebody has to pay for it."

But today's black in Vietnam has a different view. "I think blacks should not be fighting here because in America there are places we can't go, homes where we can't live and jobs we can't have without chaos," said Thomas Garrett of New York City, a rifleman in the 199th Light Infantry Brigade. "Even if you have money, whites don't trust you. But as soon as a war breaks

out, we're pushed to the front lines."

Of 392 black enlisted men surveyed, 64 per cent believe that their fight is in the U.S. "I think the black man in Vietnam is definitely fighting two enemies," Ken Bantum, a black Air Force sergeant, told me. "And he should only be at home fighting one." Bantum, stationed at Bien Hoa, is from Philadelphia. One-fourth of the black officers and senior non-commissioned officers agreed.

Only 22 per cent of the black enlisted men thought they should be fighting in Vietnam for the same reasons as whites; 62 per cent of the officers took that view.

More than half of the enlisted men objected to taking part in the war because they believe it is a race war pitting whites against nonwhites or because they flatly don't want to fight against dark skin people. Only 37 per cent agreed that they were fighting a common Communist enemy with their white buddies in arms-the prevailing attitude among blacks three years ago.

"America is just fighting this war so that the white man can put boo-coo money in his pocket," Pvt. Bruce Jessup of Washington, D.C., said in Pleiku. "He just lets you die so he can send his little war materials over here. To hell with this war. We should say, come on in. Ho Chi Minh, this is yours. You can probably do a whole lot better with drove a gas truck for the 815th Army Engineer Battalion.

"I can't see dying in Vietnam to make someone else money," Marine Cpl. James E. Baker Jr. of Chicago told me. "The way whites treat the natives of this country I know they don't give a damn about their free-dom."

Less than a quarter of the black and less than a third of the white enlisted men agreed that the war should be ended by the strategy President Nixon has pursued. Only 22 per cent of the blacks and 28 per cent of the whites agreed that the best way to pursue the war was by new attacks on North Vietnam and invasions into Laos and Cambodia.

A small fraction wanted the war to continue as it was before Mr. Nixon ordered the Cambodia invasion. About three per cent of the blacks and eight per cent of the whites approved that course. Much larger groups. 24 per cent black and 46 per cent white, argued for a reduction in the battle tempo and a U. S. pullout as soon as the South Vietnamese could shoulder the full burden.

But 32 per cent of the blacks and 11 per cent of the whites answered that a withdrawal should come immediately because the U.S. had no business in Vietnam in the first place. Twelve per cent of the blacks and less than three per cent of the whites wanted an end to hostilities because the loss of American life has been too great.

"The best way to end this war is to threaten to use 'the bomb,'" said James Bennett, a white soldier from San Lorenzo, Calif. "If they don't surrender, then use it. You'll save a lot of GI's, and perhaps we won't have many more Vietnams."

As for why America is involved, most blacks and a large majority of whites rejected the notion that the war is stemming the spread of Communism; 32 per cent of the blacks, however, and 54 per cent of the whites agreed that the conflict is. More than 40 per cent of the blacks and nearly 20 per cent of the whites believe that America should not be fighting in what is essentially a civil war or Asian problem. About 14 per cent of the blacks and 21 per cent of the whites believe that the American presence is needed to build democracy in South Vietnam.

"Give it [Vietnam] to them," said Claude E. Bowen, a black Marine from Los Angeles. "If the cracker wants to stay here and fight, let him. If they kick his ass, too damned bad. It's about time somebody did."

What is frightening many black officers and a few knowledgeable white ones is not so much the course of the war as it is the potential of the young black to bring the lessons of violence he has learned in the war against the Viet Cong to America with him.

"It's a new breed of black over here," said Army Capt. Robert Robbins, a black officer from Wilmington, N.C., serving in the 9th Division. "He has graduated from peaceful demonstrations up to riots. He comes here to put his life on the line for some cause he probably doesn't believe in When he goes home, he'll think the only way he can get what he wants is to take it. He knows that first of all they stopped over in Africa and took us."

Lt. Col. Frank Petersen of Washington, D.C., a black Marine pilot who led a squadron of Phantoms at Chu Lai, agreed. "You have some very angry blacks who are here who are going to go back and are going to be more angry once they return. There is a hell of a chance that many of the blacks who are being discharged, if they encounter the right set of conditions, will become urban guerrillas."

Indeed, only 38 per cent of the black enlisted men surveyed agreed that weapons have no place in the struggle for their rights in the U.S. Nearly fifty per cent said that they would use weapons, while, 13 per cent said they would consider arming themselves if forced to.

"Half the brothers over here can build their own weapons," observed Washington. "They are going back ready for anything."

"I ain't coming back playing, 'Oh, Say can you see,' " said Marine Sgt. Paul Thomas of Chesapeake, Va., in Danang. "I'm whistling' 'Sweet Georgia Brown,' and I got the band."

"When you come back to the States and the [white] Man's going say, 'Sorry, son, but I'm going to give you these rights, but you ain't ready for the rest of them yet,' after I put my life on the line. Uh-uh," said Sgt. Randolph Doby, a black Marine from Milwaukee in Danang. "The man who says that, I'm going to try to kill him. If I can't kill him, he's going to wish he were dead."

Only one black enlisted man in three believed that the use of weapons would damage the black move for independence of choice and full opportunity. Thirty per cent contended that weapons would help, and 24 per cent believe they would make no difference.

A significantly high percentage promised to carry home the lessons they learned in self-defense and black unity to radical groups like the Black Panthers. Slightly more than 30 per cent said they would join such groups; 17 per cent said they might. Among combat veterans even more, 36 per cent, said they planned to.

"The Black Panthers is what we need as an equalizer," explained Seaman James Cannon of Gary, Ind. "The beast [white man] got his Ku Klux Klan. The Black Panthers gives the beast something to fear like we feared from the Ku Klux Klan all our lives." Said Seaman Milton Banion of Maywood, Ill., another sailor at Danang: "The honkies made the Panthers violent like they are. I'd join 'em, and I'd help 'em kill all these honkie motherfuckers, because do unto him before he do unto you." Albert Jackson of Chicago, a black Marine stationed at Chu Lai, promised, "If at all possible I plan to move as quickly as possible with a group that is ready to move. The Panthers are definitely the most readiest group in the world, because they move so awesomely."

The vast majority, 83 per cent, of the blacks believe that America is in for more race violence that has marred the nation in the last decade, and most of these, 45 per cent, believe that they would join renewed rioting.

"There's going to be more violence back in the world because we're going' back," said Bowen. "Hell, yes, I'd riot. If they're kicking crackers' asses, I'm going to get in and kick a few myself. I'm just doing what my grandfather wanted to do and couldn't." Said another black Marine: "My ancestors said, please. Yeah, they said, please. Did they get any mercy? Why should we turn around and say, please, may I have this. Hell, no. I say start an armed revolution." "I always back a riot," said a black sailor. "Riots is good. It makes people wonder what's going on, and they come in and check it out."

Only 14 per cent of the black enlisted men said they would follow without reservation orders to put down rebellious blacks. More than 45 per cent replied that they would refuse the order. "I'd put 'em right down," said Jessup. "And put myself right down in the heart of the riot, and riot right with them, Army clothes and all. As a matter of fact, I'd get out there and put down the police."

(The Army has already had direct experience with this problem. At Fort Hood, Texas, 43 black soldiers refused to be part of the force assigned to guard the Democratic National Convention, fearing they might be used to fight Chicago blacks. The military discipline accorded them was lenient.)

The white student movement against the war drew surprising support from black troops. Most black students have ignored the war issue, pressing instead for separate curriculums and housing while protesting police as-assaults on blacks. But 60 per cent of the black enlisted men and 50 per cent of the black officers agreed that the right to make the war protests should be protected; 14 per cent of the enlisted and 12 per cent of the officers expressed outright support for the campus protesters.

A strong majority of white GI's took exception to the protests, including 47 per cent who would either draft or jail the student dissenters. "I'd like to kick them in the ass," said James Pole, a white private from Way-cross, Ga. "They should be made to see how we live and die over here," argued Bennett, "then perhaps they would appreciate college more."

Blacks are more tolerant; the right to protest means more to them. "I'd either join the Black Panthers or SDS, preferably SDS," said Jessup, "because SDS is down on the whole thing, down on this war, down on society, the establishment. The society and the establishment are messed up. They need changing', man, so that people can live, live equally. Get all this racist stuff on out of here." "Hell, yes, I'd riot," said Cpl. Toby Hoffler, a black Marine from Brooklyn. "The white man had his goddamn Boston Tea Party, so why can't we have our riots, and the white students their marches? Is there any difference? Check it. Is there any difference?"

Despite the military's contention that life for blacks is better in service than out, fewer than three black GI's in ten said they get along better with whites in Vietnam than they did back home. And nearly 65 per cent of them expect the racial strife in Vietnam to grow.

( The conclusion of this article will appear in tomorrow's CRIMSON.)