And one can only ask in the face of these costs whether "victory" will, in any case, be possible. A recent article in the Washington Post reported that full-time Viet Cong strength rose from 65,000 to 80,000 during the month of September alone. Hanoi and Peaking may withhold their armies only so long. And increased bombing can only alienate large pockets of the Vietnamese population.
But let us suppose that the U.S. actually succeeded in "pacifying" South Vietnam. What then? The remaining Viet Cong could fade back among the people and wait for opportunities to strike. It would be impossible to seal hermetically the borders from further guerrilla infiltration. Hanson Baldwin has estimated that a perpetual police force of as many as 250,000 soldiers would be required to keep the country "in order." The economy would be in shambles from years of devastation; thousands would be without food. Hostility among the population would force the U.S. to rely on familiar cliques of embattled generals, out of touch with the citizenry. Social reform, by the very necessity of an authoritarian response to the ubiquitous guerrilla threat, would be nearly impossible.
III. Proposals
The only way to avoid this long and senseless war is to achieve settlement through negotiation. And the only way to reach settlement, as suggested above, is for America to accept the possibility of a Communist Vietnam. Specifically the United States should take the following steps:
* Stop the bombings in North Vietnam.
* Use bombings in South Vietnam only in cases of actual combat.
* Announce a willingness to negotiate with the National Liberation Front at the conference table.
* Propose a cease-fire.
* Declare a desire for the eventual removal of all United States troops from Vietnamese soil.
* Declare that South Vietnam has the right to determine its own future, even if that future is a Communist one.
PHILIP ARDERY, PETER CUMMINGS, NANCY H. DAVIS, JOHN D. GERHART, CURTIS A. HESSLER, ELLEN LAKE, A. DOUGLAS MATTHEWS, GREGORY P. PRESSMAN, GEORGE H. ROSEN, RAND E. ROSENBLATT, DANIEL J. SIGNAL, AND WILLIAM H. SMOCK.