When I ah came into Vietnam it was in 1963 in mid ’63, I was probably better prepared than most because I had studied the insurgency against the French. Ah. I knew of the Viet Minh, I knew of revolutionary warfare. I knew of the structure. But, it was ill-defined in my mind ah because I knew of the Viet Cong ah the term for Vietnamese communists, but I wasn’t quite certain who the Mah Tron was, the National Front for Liberation. And, so it was a, a case of a, an indefinable organization out there represented by individuals we call the Viet Cong who populated the area around the cam in which we were operating. Ah. The VC either in a combat situation or...

Just a second.

The times that we encountered...pardon.

Okay.

You ready. The times that we encountered the Viet Cong as individuals whether in combat or as prisoners ah our contact was limited in that we had the Vietnamese special forces who were actually in control of the cam. They ran it. We were advisors. So, we in a sense viewed from a distance and could only measure our knowledge based on, in many instances, what the Vietnamese special forces allowed us to know. Ah. Ah.

Their perception was not necessarily the correct one at all times. Ah. There were times when we did get to ah to talk with Viet Cong, either officials or operatives or soldiers, and those were the only real breakthroughs that we had. Of course, engaging them in combat ash we were able to measure just how intensely they were involved in what they were doing because they were tough. They were good fighters.

After I was captured and was in the PW camp. Of course, controlled by not only the type of Viet Cong I had faced, that is, combatants who were the guards, but also the Viet Cong political cadre ah I began to understand a little bit more about how they functioned. Not only what they believed, but why they believed it. And, of course, this was the, the first change that I had had really to study them ah in effect on their own ground.

One of the individuals ah Major Que Inshi Cong ah cover name was Bai Cong, Major Bai had begun as a rear rank private with Ho Chi Minh fighting against the Japanese during the Second World War. And, after the defeat of the Japanese had joined the Viet Minh had fought through that conflict and then from 1954 through ’60 he had been an underground operative for the emerging Viet Cong.

Now, he had lived in the U Minh Forest where I was held, and so here was an individual who had started as a rear rank private with Ho Chi Minh and had fought right straight through two conflicts and was in his third. Ah.

His belief and his dedication was number one to the expulsion of all foreigners from Vietnam. Xenophobia was, was an important part of his belief, but secondly, was the charismatic appeal of Ho Chi Minh who was the, the nationalistic leader in their minds, not necessarily totally communist because that some of them even rejected, but he was the leader in the movement of the Vietnamese to make Vietnam a country of the Vietnamese without foreign influence or foreign domination.

One of Major Bai’s responsibilities was my indoctrination and because he was military and I was military, I think he felt that one of the ways that he could influence me was by expressing to me and giving examples of the strength of his belief and dedication. And, to do this, during the indoctrination sessions ah he would get into war stories, and of course, this allowed me to probe into his background ah as much as he was trying to prove into mine and by doing so to attempt to sway me and so I was able to spend more time listening ah with him ah rather than attempting to fend off and resist interrogation and indoctrination ah he gave me an opportunity to just sit back and listen. Ah. I was very happy for that but nevertheless it was...

Okay.

With Major Bai it was a case of listening to his war stories during the indoctrination, you know, which gave me an opportunity to sit back and listen rather than attempting to resist an interrogation and indoctrination ah I could sit back and find out about him. I didn’t necessarily agree with him ah but that wasn’t required at the time because he seemed to believe so strongly that he felt that the weight of his convictions would sway me.

Explain ah...

Okay.

At the time that Major Bai was conducting these indoctrinations I was in a camp in the Mekong Delta of Vietnam, the U Minh Forest which is a swamp forest. Ah. I was in a camp that we had nicknamed ah the NO K Corral and ah I was at that time being held in ah a cage, wooden structure with a thatched roof. Ah. It was about four feet high, about three feet wide and about six feet long. But, during the indoctrinations I was taken over to a guard hut which was somewhat more spacious and ah I would be seated on the ah pole floor while Major Bai was sitting ah at a raised platform and ah sort of talking down at me ah during this period of time. Ah.

It was to establish a, a subservient and superior relationship between the PW and the cadre. Ah. The thing that I remember from this was Major Bai’s definition of friends and enemies and the Americans were representative of the French presence. In other words, he ah he felt there was really no difference between the Americans and the French other than the fact that there were more of us and we had better equipment than the French had had. Ah.

But, as far as the Vietnamese, he seemed to equate all Vietnamese interests with the interests of the Liberation Front, ah, which I knew was wrong, but of course, in, in their dialectic ah the people supported the revolution. And, we’ve seen that this is false time and time again, but nevertheless, that was what was conveyed.

That’s where I understood that with them there was no need to understand, just to memorize, repeat and believe and ah he, he tried to float some real winners past me as far as concepts probably having dealt with people who were ah less well-equipped with current events, with history and with foreign affairs so that a half truth or a lie could get mixed up in half truths, and ah they could get past them. But, again I never doubted the sincerity of what he was saying to me. He really believed it.

Okay.

One of the major themes that Major Bai expressed and I really had difficulty ah arguing with this in my own mind was the ultimate victory of, of the revolution in that the thought that he expressed was that the Americans would get tired and go home before the Liberation Front and the North Vietnamese got tired and quit fighting and he was talking about Mao’s protracted war, which they were well-prepared and willing to fight and we, being impatient, would be unwilling to endure.

Okay.

One of the important things to, to realize in this is that being a prisoner of the communists ah bears absolutely no resemblance to what you see on Hogan’s Heroes or remember about imprisonment during the Second World War with the Starlags and all of that. The communist have a prisoner management system which is designed to systematically break down an individual’s will to resist. Break his faith in his country, in his government, in his own people, ah his loyalties ah to alter his pattern of, of responses. Ah.

This is where we got the term brainwashing from Korea which is not really accurate. The Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese call it thought correction or thought reform and in this they have three stages. Interrogation, indoctrination, and exploitation. Ah. The interrogation sometimes was used simply to pressure an individual, make him susceptible to indoctrination which is where they actually tried to alter ah his past patterns of beliefs and his loyalties. Ah.

Once they can do that then they’re on the way to inducing an individual to either collaborate with them, to at least conform to their requirements and produce propaganda and ultimately, if they can, to convert you. That’s way down the line though and so their immediate goal is to, to induce collaboration. That’s to produce propaganda for them or to help them.

The ah the system that they use is, is basic respondent conditioning. It’s a punishment and reward type of system and, you know, they can use all the subtle pressures. Ah. Malnutrition, disease, vitamin deficiency, ah dehydration, sleep deprivation, isolation which is one of their best techniques, most effective techniques. They just let disease work on you. The threat of death is always there and it’s a laboratory situation, but what you realize is that they’re bargaining with you. Ah. It’s a cooperate and graduate situation. If you will cooperate.

Now, if you don’t ah they can go from a more subtle psychological pressures to more obvious physical pressures ah down to and including physical torture. Ah. They did use that. They found, however, as one of the cadre first told me and it was a revealing statement. He said merely because you control the physical does not mean that you control the individual. But, if you can control and manipulate the mind, then you have the individual. And, so, we began to realize that the target was the mind, and ah if you were not cooperative ah you hurt. One way or another they made you hurt.

One of the most revealing things that, that I learned while I was a PW was that after beginning to decipher the system that they were using against me I began to realize that they used it on their own people. Ah. Behavioral modification and thought control ah was a standard pattern that they, they established within their own organization and that...For instance a squad of nine men was broken down into three three-man cells. Each of the cells had a cell leader and in turn the squad had a squad leader but he was a, a sort of a thought reformer, thought control leader and each of the individuals was responsible for watching and commenting on the actions and thoughts of the individuals within his group. Ah.

A sort of a system of dynamic mistrust. They had the three togethers. Eat together, work together, sleep together. And, at least once a week they would have a critique and self-criticism session in which peer pressure was exerted I think to the utmost in that each individual within the, within the group that he was operating and he would criticize himself for all of the actions and thoughts that he had had during that week which did not contribute to the party goals or to the unit goals. Then it was open season on him as everybody else in the group just lacerated him verbally on the things that they had observed that he did that did not conform to the party requirements.

And, so they actually just through peer pressure just forced everybody into lock step and there was no way to doubt or to question anything that was said and so that you actually had one mind thinking for all of those bodies. And, that was frightening. That was where I realized it was there’s no need to understand it. Just memorize it and repeat it and believe it.

Okay.

All, you know, although I was busy fighting my, my own little war there trying to stay alive, ah, one of the things that struck me about the revolutionary process and the, the thought control and the pressure that’s existing or that does exist within that system is that it is a, it’s an economical form of warfare. You don’t need a lot of people belonging to the movement because you have ah total unanimity within the organization.

You don’t have to worry about dissent. You don’t have to worry about opinion within the group in that the group is guided by one mind. One central committee. One central planning group and in directing it towards underdeveloped countries or emerging countries ah it’s a natural vehicle, a very inexpensive economical vehicle for, for taking governments. You know, look at the Soviet Union.

I think it was eleven percent of the population ah effected the revolution of 1917, and you see minorities in each one of these countries because they are a united minority ah able to accomplish, you know, total domination within an expended, expanded period of time. They look in terms of decades. We look in terms of years.

Okay.

The ah question of Vietnam being relevant to me is, is, is really simple because in the case of Vietnam was, is past is truly prologue. Not necessarily for us, but for them. Because as one of the cadre told me in one of the indoctrinations, he said to the effect of Vietnam is but one act in a worldwide drama and we simply play our part, play our role. And, after Vietnam, it will be Laos, it will be Cambodia, it will be Thailand, it will be Indonesia, and so on.

And, I think what they have established in their minds with Vietnam is not necessarily that they can defeat us militarily but that they can outlast us. And, of course, with the, the double-edged sword in our own country of, of dissatisfaction with Americans being committed to that type of war, that is, dissent against our being there, and the other side of it active and open support for the aims and goals of the enemy among a minority in our country, they have the basis for destroying our will to continue to resist.

And, of course, they did that with the French, they did it with us in Vietnam and they look forward to doing it in the future. So, that established for them ah the, the modus operandai for the future. It’s an economical form of warfare. It’s the way they’ve made their money for the last two decades and I would suppose just from a personal point of view not a, not an official point but, of course, my own, is that we’ll see more of it. And, we have to learn how to win it.

The...

Wait a second.

Okay. The things that I, that I drew from my experience were that number one that type of conflict no matter where it may spring up it, it’s called a war of national liberation or national liberation movement, it’s the same thing, it will be protracted. Ah. It will be a classic example ah adapted, of course, to the environment, but a classic example of revolutionary warfare.

We know the stages, we know how it works, but we have to be prepared I think to go to what we first said in Vietnam, that is, when we went there it’s their country, it’s their war, let them fight it. If they want to win it we’ll help them, but the, the country, the people, the government of that country they have to want to defeat the revolution. Ah. The US can’t do it for them.

But then if...

Okay.

I was an advisor as a, an executive officer on a special forced AID attachment in the Mekong Delta in 1963 and ah had gone on an operation to ah sweep a number of canals ah where suspected enemy forces had been gathered. Ah. En route back from the operation ah we were ambushed by ah a large enemy force.

It was ah roughly a two battalion size force against our one company. Ah. We were surrounded and overrun all three of Amer...the Americans on that operation were wounded and we were taken prisoner and then I spent five years and two months as a prisoner of the Viet Cong before I escaped in December of 1968.