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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (April 21, 1972)
| Editorials_ Rally against the war On the following page is a scene that Americans have ignored too long—the continuing U.S. air war in Indochina. In his three years of winding down the A-ar, President Nixon has dropped more tons of bombs than President Johnson dropped luring his five years in office. Nixon’s ad ministration has dropped some three million tons of bombs in that part of the world we’ve all tried to forget. The effects of that bombing have been ■quite devastating. We’ve killed and maimed [many innocent people. We’ve destroyed the ■land. By one estimate there are now more Ithan 20 million bomb craters in Indochina. (And now that bombing has been escalated. The war, quite obviously, is not over. But what can you do about it? First of all, you can participate in Saturday’s march and rally against the war. I Nixon must be shown that the American [people don’t want to “wind down” the war |any longer, that they want to end it—now. The march is a first step in that direc jtion. The march will leave the EMU at 11 la.m. and walk to a rally on the Mall which will begin at noon. And the beginnings of some second steps will be available at the rally. fables will be available with information about where to go from here. There will also be canvassing against the war. But perhaps most important—as far as further steps to take—will be the table where persons who haven’t registered can sign up in time to be eligible to vote in the May primary. We must make the war an issue in the primary, but we won’t be successful unless people are registered to vote in that election. Register to vote This spring’s Oregon primary will be very important. But only if you register and are able to vote. The 18 year-old vote will be meaningless if the nation’s young people don’t register and participate in elections. In Oregon, this means you have to register by Saturday in order to vote in the primaries. You also must be registered in either the Democratic or Republican parties in order to vote in either of those parties respective primaries. It’s well and good to proclaim your voting independence, but in the primaries you only hurt yourself, depriving yourself of the ability to provide input during the election. There are several places you can register to be able to vote in the May primaries. In Eugene, you can register at the Lane County Courthouse, U.S. National Banks and local fire stations. Some of these places will not be open Saturday, but a voter registration table will be provided at Saturday’s anti-war march to enable persons to register on the last day possible. You must take advantage of your right to vote in this all-important election year. But to vote, you must be registered. Letters > 4 Strike In response to the escalation of war crimes in Southeast Asia, the NSA and Student Union Against the War have called for a nationwide student strike on Friday, April 21. Pressure must be brought to bear on the U.S. Government to recognize the evil and stupidity of its monstrous war policy. No effort is too small. As students, we can help by demonstrating the solid op position of the college community. For one day, students across the country will cease functioning as students, to dramatize the disruption of life at every level, everywhere, caused by the war. This will not be a holiday. Students are urged to spend the day helping with and participating in the various anti-war ac tivities. There is plenty to be done and it is up to all of us to make sure that every student is aware of the importance of not going to classes Friday. Dennis Bradford Rich Levine Protest I protest. The immediate activity that is following the recent escalation of the war is an important part of the news. But it is only a part of the news. SUAW, for example, is working on long term activities in cluding an air war education program, getting a sister city in North Vietnam, raising the war issue in the elections, working in the May 1-6 activities and in the community coalition that is making arrangements for the rally Saturday. The Emerald story on our Tuesday work meeting ignored every one of these ac tivities even though they were discussed most of the meeting. Such one sided reporting is a disservice to students who want to know where to put their effort into longer term activities to end the war and support the Indochinese peoples. It also gives an unfair characterization of those who are now working in these longer term activities. i also object to being misquoted in the same article. The increase in space allotted to articles on the war is a welcomed sight. I'm assuming you’re working on the quality too Dennis Gilbert Remember you’re human The following is from an editorial in the April 9th Washington Post: “In his three years in the White House, Mr. Nixon has dropped more bombs by ton in Indochina, some three million tons, than Lyndon Johnson did in his five years. If you count the 500-pounders and the white phosphorus and the 7Vi ton ‘Cheeseburgers’ and all the rest, Mr. Nixon has dropped more than one ton of bombs per minute during every single minute of his administration. He has become—here’s a ‘first’ for you—the man who has assembled and let loose more devastation from the sky than anyone else in the history of creation; all this, mind you, while ‘winding down' the war.” This is the man and heavy bombing is the policy that we all support simply by going about our everyday activities. I hope professors can forget they are professors and students forget they are students long enough for us to remember we are also human. It is imperative that everyone participate in anti-war events in Eugene this spring. Rick Fitch Grad., Interdisciplinary Studies Stop the rape We talk of preserving the environment in Oregon while we allow our air and naval power to devastate thousands of square miles of land. We talk of justice in Eugene while we allow thousands of innocent men, women, and children to be maimed by our fragmentary and anti-personnel bombs. We talk of peace while we allow flagrant violations of international laws and treaties by our unlawful attacks upon foreign countries. We must stop talking. We must act to withdraw all funds allocated to US. military involvement in Vietnam. If we do not act now, we shall no longer be able to talk with honor of justice or peace or brotherhood We must stop our rape of Vietnam. Clayton H. Brant | Commentary An open letter to the Anti-war movement We are scattered at the moment, still licking our wounds and thinking about the clobbering we took last Spring. We are isolated from one another, too, bitterness remains over the factional disputes that tore us apart a year ago. We still distrust Nixon and want to do something to end the War, and yet we distrust one another as well. We were smashed last year, nationally and locally, because the various groups in the Anti-War Movement became alienated from one another and did not co operate. Divided we were easy to deal with, especially when some of us became adventurist (look who’s talking). Provoking and confronting the police, blocking intersections, building bonfires, and roaming around the streets at night is not the way to win the hearts and minds of the American People. Confrontation tactics have not shown the American people that the Nixon Regime is lawless, aggressive, and destructive. Fur thermore, law enforcement agencies have made it quite clear that they have the power, the desire, and the public support to literally get away with murder in dealing with confrontation. Obviously, we need a new strategy. We must move the 1972 elections, and we must bring pressure to bear on the Nixon Regime. To do this requires that we em phasize propaganda and mass education, using direct action and civil disobedience very carefully. The American people do not know what is going on in Vietnam. They have not been educated by our chanting in the streets and the fragmentary bits of information from the media. To end the War we must move among the American people and conduct mass education We must speak to them, not leaflet them We should spend less time on the Mall and more time at church, community, business, professional, labor union and grange meetings. We have not presented our evidence coherently and we have not answered questions. We have been too busy trying to close the ROTC building and writing indignant letters to Congressmen and colleagues. We must raise the question of Vietnam— calmly and cogently—at every op portunity. The 1972 election gives us a good forum. We must organize and participate in debates and panels, arrange for speaking engagements by Anti-War speakers, local and national. And we must stop shouting down op ponents. If we are to win support from the American people we must respect their mores, and be careful about how and when we offend their concepts of legitimacy and decency. We are in no position to seize power, and we should stop acting like we are. We aren’t even fooling ourselves anymore. We will lose any confrontation. Tear gas, Mace, clubs newspaper and tv portrays irrational hippies screaming and throwing rocks we lose. Any direct action or civil disobedience must be very unambiguous. We must stop doing things that can be interpreted as petty van dalism. We must remember who we are and what we are up against. Above all, civil disobedience and direct action cannot degenerate into mere scuffling with police. We must adopt a position of militant non violence, and not be tempted or provoked to deviate from it We are trying to end the War, we are not trying to get one up on the police department. The Vietnam War is in a potentially decisive phase (you can tell that something is happening in Vietnam whenever there is a moon mission), and we are in a position to start, to sustain, and to expand a political dialogue that could affect the way it goes. We are not in a position to disrupt American society and force an end to the war. We must face this fact We must end the War, not “by any means necessary,” but by any means that will succeed. Tim Travis Pan» 1<
