Interviewer: Ralph, I wonder if you could begin by telling me when you went to Vietnam and what you expected to do there – the first thing that struck you when you arrived.
Thomas: Okay, well I went to Vietnam in February of 1969.
Thomas: I was, had been, in the service for about one year, and I grew up in a small town in um, Maryland, and uh, the place I was at before Vietnam was a place in Illinois and you just weren't considered a man unless you were, had been to Vietnam, everybody came back with war stories and everything.
Thomas: So, when I was assigned to Vietnam I was sort of uh glad in a way that I could at least go through it and come back and say that, that I had uh been through it.
Thomas: It uh really never occurred to me about the fact that it was, it was, the danger and everything involved.
Thomas: In fact, I put my uh had my baseball gloves and my spikes and everything in my duffle bag and I was really expecting just to go through it and say that I was there.
Thomas: So, when I landed, uh, actually I just wanted to walk off the plane and then get back on and say I was there.
Thomas: But, uh I arrived there and I just looked, I was just uh just a kid with, with big eyes, just trying to look at everything I saw.
Thomas: And the first realization was that a war was going on is that when we got there they told me to immediately get out of my suit.
Thomas: I was in a dress suit uh, and uh, most people were, of course, in their fatigues, but I wanted to look my best.
Thomas: And uh we uh they told me to get out of my suit and get into fatigues because I was going, the place I was going had just been hit.
Thomas: And that I might have to jump out, we might have to bail out on the way.
Thomas: And, and that I should be suited, and that was my first realization that there was something serious going on.
Thomas: And that night, when I stayed in Cam Ranh Bay we were hit.
Thomas: We were hit that night.
Interviewer: How did it look to you as a place? How did the people look? Was it a surprise? Were you prepared for it mentally?
Thomas: Uh, I don't think uh...
Thomas: I was prepared.
Thomas: It, it was like I was expecting one thing and there was another thing going on.
Thomas: Uh, to, to get into the first thing that hit me, since I arrived in Cam Ranh Bay, the town was not on limits.
Thomas: So I really didn't have a close view of Vietnamese people at that time.
Thomas: It was just the servicemen.
Thomas: And the thing that hit me first of all was the, the racial polarization.
Thomas: And I got a real sign of that that night, as I said, I went to the club, the NCO Club, and I saw blacks, y'know, giving the fist sign as a welcome sign, uh...
Thomas: hello, y'know, shaking hands in a certain, in a way that I had never seen before.
Thomas: And uh...
Thomas: everyone I was seen by, every black I was seen by, gave me a smile and a clenched fist.
Thomas: I mean, I had, it was kind of, it was slightly threatening at first because I had seen it in the States a little bit, but it was always seen as uh the extremist.
Thomas: Y'know, these were people who weren't y'know, who were, uh, out to make trouble and you better watch out.
Thomas: But, uh, when I got there I felt a certain camaraderie about, I mean, for the first time, it, it, it, the, I was just accepted.
Thomas: They just took me in and just accepted me as, as uh, as one of their own, as one, y'know, we were all...
Thomas: uh one.
Thomas: And uh I, I kind of liked it.
Interviewer: I wonder if you could, seems a good story, I wonder if you could maybe just go through the story again, and your real surprise was that you were welcome and you felt part of something and why you felt...
Interviewer: I wonder if you could just do that story for me again, because I think we've got into it in a rather convoluted way.
Thomas: Oh, okay, well as I said I was uh...
Thomas: the first black I saw there uh smiled at me and gave a clenched fist.
Thomas: And I, y'know, it it looked, uh pretty good, I mean it looked, uh, like I said uh, before I saw it as threatening but...
Thomas: uh now the thing to me all looked okay, and I gave sort, sort of like (laugh) a weak fist back, y'know the thing, hello, and he came over and started talking, uh, hello brother, y'know, was the first time.
Thomas: And we had called each other brother in the States occasionally, but it really meant something at that time.
Thomas: And then I saw, uh other, everywhere I looked, uh blacks giving either a clenched fist hello or starting, uh giving handshakes, uh I later learned it was called giving the dap.
Thomas: But it was something I'd never seen before and uh, I was really, really uh taken aback.
Thomas: But what touched me most is that although before I viewed this kind of togetherness as sort of threatening, because all the, in in the States that...
Thomas: we saw it in isolated uh incidences using like television or every now and then you saw someone doing that, but in this instance it wasn't threatening at all.
Thomas: I, I was really accepted uh by, no questions asked, just a brother from the States.
Thomas: Y'know and I was just accepted...
Thomas: uh immediately.
Thomas: When I went to Nha Trang the next morning, uh I was told to take the day off and get used to the base.
Thomas: I went to the uh...
Thomas: club.
Thomas: And uh, as soon as I walked in, I mean uh, these blacks sitting at a table saying "Hey brother, uh, a new one," y'know, and just, and everyone came and they gave me, and I was really embarrassed because I didn't know how to do the handshake...
Thomas: at the time.
Thomas: So uh I had to, to really, they said, "Oh, I see they're doing it different now...
Thomas: in the world?" They used to call the States the world.
Thomas: They'd say, "Oh, oh, they're doing it different now?" I said, "Well, yea, yea" (laughing), sort of lying, y'know, but uh, I eventually uh, uh got into it.
Thomas: And as a part of the other side of the warm camaraderie among blacks is that uh, many whites there took it as, as threatening.
Thomas: And uh...
Thomas: and if you were seen doing this, giving the clenched fist, that drew the line right there.
Thomas: You were uh, you you were uh evidently the other...
Thomas: kind of...
Thomas: kind of people.
Thomas: You weren't somebody that uh you weren't a reasonable person or you were one of those.
Interviewer: How did racism show itself in the form which was there? You were fighting a war against a common enemy.
Interviewer: I mean, how did it, what were the classic illustrations to you that caused you problems or pain or...?
Thomas: Okay, the racial polarization was...
Interviewer: Wait a minute till the...
Interviewer: stop.
Interviewer: Fine.
Thomas: The racial polarization was uh deeper there than, than I've ever seen.
Thomas: Uh, as, as some clear...
Thomas: uh observations...
Thomas: the town was on limits in Nha Trang.
Thomas: And uh...
Thomas: during the day I walked through the town and really trying to find my way around seeing one thing or another.
Thomas: So that night I was supposed to go out with the brothers.
Thomas: And uh they, they took me, and going through it with them was a totally different experience than going through it myself.
Thomas: They had black sides of town, white sides of town.
Thomas: And even the Vietnamese, uh, accepted it.
Thomas: And uh woe to the uh white who walked in the black area unaccompanied, and vice versa, woe to the black who walked into a white area of town uh unaccompanied.
Thomas: And it was so clearly seen, I think on the second day I still wasn't aware of it...
Thomas: of of of it to that extent.
Thomas: But on the second day I went, I went to this place where I was the only black and uh, the the reception there, I mean, was so uh...
Thomas: negative.
Thomas: I mean I could just feel it in the atmosphere.
Thomas: And uh, no one came over to talk, no one spoke, uh none of the women came over to talk, and it was like, it was just something that said "Leave right away while you can."
Thomas: And so, uh, that's what I did.
Thomas: There were several racial flare ups in the city of uh...
Thomas: Nha Trang.
Thomas: Usually, when whites came to the black side of town either unaccompanied or who who just did not fit in right, who did not go along with just sitting there and, and...
Thomas: just being seen and not heard.
Thomas: And uh, there were fights uh, the uh person who was beaten up would go get other people, of course, and uh, the whole thing would start all over again.
Thomas: But, uh getting off the town and back to the base, the uh clenched fist and uh giving the dap, the, the hair styles, the hair styles were changing.
Thomas: This was in the heat of the black awareness movement, uh by the way...
Interviewer: I wonder if you could start again on the just, just tell me about being in the heat of that the consciousness movement and what was meant in terms of hair styles, I mean you've got some lovely things in there, court martial...
Thomas: Okay, right, okay.
Thomas: One, one thing that came with the black consciousness movement, the black awareness movement and black pride, was that blacks, uh, started wearing their hair longer showing the natural texture of their hair.
Thomas: Prior to that it was either very low cut...
Thomas: and uh, or slicked down, I guess, in in some way that was never found offensive.
Thomas: Hair, haircut regulations was never a problem to blacks in the past, just because of the texture of their hair.
Thomas: They, they had it very low, or they had straight hair and then they cut it as as whites did.
Thomas: With the uh...
Thomas: new black pride movement uh blacks began wearing their hair longer.
Thomas: And the uh, the military rules on hair suddenly became uh irrelevant to blacks, it became inapplicable to blacks.
Thomas: I think there was one rule that said your hair couldn't be more than two inches long.
Thomas: Now, to a white man that's pretty reasonable.
Thomas: I mean, two inches, y'know.
Thomas: But, black hair, two inches is out like that, so (laugh) we saw blacks with hair growing out like that underneath their cap, but they were within regulations.
Thomas: And uh, this this just burned people up.
Thomas: I mean, the whites were yelling uh "special treatment;" the officers were, eh eh every time they saw anything that resembled an Afro haircut they would uh try to make the, the uh soldier cut it down to uh uh a level acceptable to him uh.
Thomas: Blacks, although most blacks would get it cut, they certainly were not going back to the old style.
Thomas: And and this was a cause of...
Thomas: the only people who wore wore their hair in the old way were the older uh black soldiers, who uh more or less had a stake in the military.
Interviewer: Ralph, from the way you're talking it almost sounds as though there is a separate war going on – that you're there to fight a war – but the things that are preoccupying many of your reflecions of the black within the service that you're in, would that be a true thing to say...?
Thomas: Yes, it would be a a true, because one, one incident comes to mind in that regard.
Thomas: Uh...
Thomas: during that time black, all black movies were just starting to creep out.
Thomas: I, I think later they called em blaxploitation films.
Thomas: But anyway, one uh came out uh one of the first ones called "Up Tight!" With an all black cast, and pretty much an all black cast, and which exemplified the black militancy.
Thomas: And uh, they were supposed to show it at uh Nha Trang.
Thomas: And uh, it was being shown in the big open air uh theater.
Thomas: And uh, people came from everywhere to see it.
Thomas: Blacks came from every town, out in the hills, the army grunts down from the hills – everywhere.
Thomas: Other nearby bases, everyone was coming to see "Up Tight!" This was the only thing, although we heard about the black experience uh, or what was going en in the States.
Thomas: This was something that, this was a direct uh closeness to it.
Thomas: And uh...
Thomas: we were supposed to have it in the open air theater that night.
Thomas: And uh it was packed.
Thomas: Even whites, even, even whites came.
Thomas: I mean everybody wanted to see why this was so hot.
Thomas: Uh, the military police were gath, driving around the sides, uh I mean it was just this thing that something was gonna happen although I didn't, I just wanted to see the movie, and as far as I'm concerned most blacks just wanted to see the movie too.
Thomas: So it started off with a funeral of, ah, Martin Luther King, right, and uh, then it was just about in the first part to get good, and the uh base commander...
Thomas: or one of his agents, I'm pretty sure it was the base commander, comes driving his jeep onto the open air theater y'know, right on the...
Thomas: Rrrrr!, gets right out of it and says, "This base is now on yellow alert.
Thomas: No movie." Yellow alert mean uh, meant danger of attack.
Thomas: And so, I mean he said, "Clear, everyone disperse." And so, uh, I mean everyone was really angry uh...
Thomas: the blacks especially.
Thomas: I mean, instead of dispersing, everybody was uh just gathering around in huddles very angry, uh deciding what to do.
Thomas: Everybody was certain that this was a, a put on.
Thomas: Everybody was certain that this was just concocted.
Thomas: So that uh we could not see the film.
Thomas: And uh, everyone was wondering wh, what to do.
Thomas: Ah, several blacks wanted to just go rioting through the base, just uh, set things ah, aflame and and do other things.
Thomas: Other people just wanted to beat up white people.
Thomas: And a group of other people, of which I was in that group, we decided to sit down and ah, write a letter to our congressman describing the whole episode.
Thomas: And uh...
Thomas: one of the first lines in the letter was, "We're fighting two wars over here." Y'know.
Thomas: And um, that's why...
Thomas: uh when someone says, "were you fighting, sounds like two wars were going on, that's the first thing that enters my mind.
Thomas: I only heard rumors of anything happening that night.
Thomas: But, at any rate, the uh all that it would've taken was a little push to uh, really to really start something.
Interviewer: You have a very interesting deposition in there in which you talk about the sort of political arguments that went on.
Interviewer: Seems to almost be like a baptism of fire for you cause of the political arguments and principals and validity of the war.
Interviewer: I wonder if you can tell me how these arguments came about.
Interviewer: How they would develop and what would happen, and how heated were they? Could you set the scene for me?
Thomas: Yes uh, one part of coming to Vietnam...
Thomas: uh not only for blacks, but many young whites, was getting more politicized...
Thomas: about uh the war.
Thomas: We weren't fighting every day, so we had time to reflect about, we were working hard, we were working ab—about six, twelve, hour days a week and then next Sunday maybe a half a day and uh so we had time to sit around and and reflect about just what was happening.
Thomas: Uh, for blacks such as myself, it was reading uh after reading uh Malcolm X and black history uh...
Thomas: Martin Luther King and and and other more black milit...
Thomas: Eldridge Cleaver, etc., it it naturally led in into a political reading.
Thomas: And uh I read Dr. Spock on Vietnam.
Thomas: There was anti-war literature in Vietnam...
Thomas: readily available.
Thomas: And readily available to everyone.
Thomas: So it made us more politicized and we talked about it among ourselves and uh, so when something was said by the our superiors or upper echelon, or even people of our own age, we we we answered it, we we'd say, "Look, it's ah, America's fault that we're here in the first place."
Thomas: And and we would cite uh, uh certain examp...
Thomas: certain figures, etc., you know, that we're doing these people wrong – we're ruining these people.
Thomas: Now we shouldn't uh be over here...
Thomas: uh...
Thomas: uh etc., etc.
Thomas: When a uh patriot, not that I'm not a patriot, but when a, a down home patriot heard this y'know my country right or wrong hear, heard this, uh it led to a very furious arguments.
Thomas: And we were not afraid to argue with anybody; I took on anybody.
Thomas: Captains, uh, my superiors, uh we felt that we had the facts and that we were right and that we were correct and that as long as as we were correct nothing could could happen to us.
Thomas: I guess it was certain naiveté of the, of the early movement.
Thomas: Uh, I remember a General Walt of the Marines wrote an article for Life Magazine.
Thomas: And it was entitled, "When War Comes,"...
Thomas: no he, it was entitled, "When Discipline Erodes, Men Die Needlessly." And I wrote an answer to it.
Thomas: "When War Comes Men Die Needlessly." Naturally (laughing), Life uh, I guess took mercy on me, thank heaven, and did not print the article.
Thomas: But, it was kind of uh an answer to him, a reply.
Thomas: It wasn't the discipline in the military that were making men die, it was the Vietnam War that was making men die.
Interviewer: How did this affect, I mean you were there, you were there to fight the war.
Interviewer: How are you able to fight a war when, from what you say, there was considerable groundswell for an argument that things are wrong.
Interviewer: I mean this seems an immense contradiction in the way in which one thinks armies fight and morale and everything else.
Interviewer: Talk to me about that.
Interviewer: What did that do to your fighting spirit...?
Thomas: Well, men, people who felt that way, or or like I...
Thomas: uh...
Thomas: they...
Interviewer: These are people you felt were against the war?
Thomas: Right, right.
Thomas: People who uh who were anti-war indoctrinated, I guess.
Thomas: They uh...
Thomas: they ah compromised with themselves in various ways.
Thomas: They came to grips with it in various ways.
Thomas: Some people said, would say, "Well, by being here I'm doing more than being in jail.
Thomas: At least I can be here and see it, and I can go back and tell it." Y'know.
Thomas: Uh, other people would say, "Well, I'm just following orders.
Thomas: And no one can call me an Uncle Tom, or no one can call me a sell out because I'm a soldier, and I was ordered to come here and do a job, and I'm doing the job.
Thomas: And, and, I'm not doing this job forever.
Thomas: I'm, I'm in a contract." Other people would say, "Yes, that's," other people would say, "Well, what am I I doing here?" It would be a contradiction.
Thomas: "I'm not gonna do anything else!" Or, "I'm gonna do everything I can to subvert it." Y'know.
Thomas: "I'll work slow," Or, "I won't do things that I think are wrong." Uh, it, it was those people, of course, that uh, got in the most trouble.
Thomas: But uh, it varied.
Thomas: Peoples' reactions varied.
Thomas: Everybody came to grips with it somehow, much like Vietnam veterans even today are trying to come, come to grips with being there.
Interviewer: How did you come to grips with it yourself? How did you personally feel and how did you act?
Thomas: You know that's the first time I've been asked that question.
Thomas: Uh, and I I really don't know if I have an, the way I came to grips with it is that uh Vietnam was exploratory for me.
Thomas: It was a learning period.
Thomas: Things that I had read, when I was becoming politicized, things I read I would check out with the Viet...
Thomas: I was very close to a lot of Vietnamese there.
Thomas: And, and I would check uh things out that I read with them.
Thomas: And it was just coming more and more true.
Thomas: I found an ingrown respect for Ho Chi Minh, a deep respect even within the South Vietnamese for Ho Chi Minh.
Thomas: Even the day, I was there when he died.
Thomas: And and and it was a, there was no rejoice among the South Vietnamese people, it was a very solemn uh quietness.
Thomas: I used the uh, the the time in Vietnam as as I guess exploratory.
Thomas: Why, why was I there? I guess, even before I left I was, I think I was anti war, but as I said, I wanted to...
Thomas: I wanted to uh see it.
Thomas: I wanted to uh say that I had had been there.
Thomas: And uh, boy was I sorry sometimes after I was there.
Thomas: But, uh I just wanted to say that that I was there.
Thomas: I think, uh...
Thomas: I think the way today the the coalition between Vietnam veterans and anti war groups is that we are the surface of their well.
Thomas: We are the, we are, we are the verifiers of their allegation, what they can only uh, what they can only speculate we can verify.
Thomas: And so...
Interviewer: Ralph, does it seem to you the proportion of blacks seem to be about the same as it was in the States where you personally were? Were there many black officers? Or...
Thomas: Well, I wasn't aware of many black officers.
Thomas: I only saw, I only remember one.
Thomas: I only remember one.
Thomas: And uh he was a lieutenant, which is sort of a junior officer.
Thomas: And uh, he was, of course, revered by the rest of us because he acted like one of us, he would go to places, uh, that the black enlisted men went.
Thomas: Oh, to slightly contradict myself though, one incident I remember, and I don't think these people were from, these officers were from Nha Trang, but there were two young black captains.
Thomas: And we were in town.
Thomas: And...
Interviewer: Just say, "We were in town with these two black captains."
Thomas: Right, we, we were in town.
Thomas: I, I was with a group of my friends, enlisted friends, and coming opposite us was, uh, two young black officers.
Thomas: And, in the military, if you're in uniform you have to salute no matter where you are.
Thomas: And we uh went to salute and both of the black captains at the same time gave us the clenched fist salute and walked in, and annnnd, it it it ah made us feel so good, I mean, to even...
Thomas: y'know even if the military uh...
Thomas: bearing even as far as something as basic as a salute had not transcending racial togetherness or, and uh, that, that was kind of another sign of, of the closeness, and the camaraderie of of blacks in Vietnam.
Interviewer: Wasn't that conceived then that a black officer was an "Uncle Tom" that he was playing the game, or didn't it seem that way?
Thomas: Well, wwwe, of course, we thought more that way towards the upper non-commissioned officers, the the senior level sergeants, who we felt, a lot of those were looked at as uh as Uncle Toms.
Thomas: And uh, playing the game, but more so than rank...
Thomas: uh was associated with Uncle Tomism.
Thomas: It was uh, time and service.
Thomas: I mean there was mainly the four striper, the low sergeant, staff sergeant, who had in about 16 years in the service, who, who, who people usually viewed as running scared anyway.
Thomas: And uh, those were I think, most viewed as Uncle Tomism, because they pretty much ran the service.
Thomas: I don't think it was fair for uh a lot of them to be labeled with that, but uh.
Thomas: To, ha, I I I I guess they had their reasons.
Thomas: Ah and, not all of them were like that anyway.
Interviewer: I wonder if we could move on to the drug scene and the prostitution scene and what is actually happening to the social fiber your lives at the time had.
Interviewer: What, what for example was the drug and prostitution scene like? Was it holed in a corner, was it up front, or, could you just describe it to me?
Thomas: Prostitution was a way of life in uh, Nha Trang.
Thomas: Prostitution...
Thomas: uh, could be said in the same breath with my job was an administrative clerk.
Thomas: Ah, when you went into town, you saw prostitutes, you met prostitutes.
Thomas: There was no place frequent—frequented by...
Thomas: uh GI's in which prostitutes were not present.
Thomas: Though prostitution was an accepted way of of casual life, uh...
Thomas: one thing different though, prostitutes there, or and prostitutes in America is that uh guys had girlfriends who were prostitutes, although the the the girl may have worked all day doing her job as prostitute, when she went home, much like a housewife to her, to her man who was staying there.
Thomas: An unfortunate result was the babies, of course, that were left behind.
Thomas: And uh...
Thomas: the the emotion, it was very hard to marry a Vietnamese woman and bring her back to the States, made purposely hard, I guess.
Thomas: But uh, I knew several couples who would've gotten married if they could have, and uh, were not able to.
Thomas: As far as drugs, drugs was also a way of life.
Thomas: Drugs could be said in the same breath also as "my job was such and such." Ah, I saw characters change, the whole character change.
Thomas: I was a country boy from Frederick, Maryland.
Thomas: Okay? Now, if uh...
Interviewer: Could you start again...
Thomas: I was a country boy from Frederick, Maryland.
Interviewer: Once more.
Thomas: I was a country boy from Frederick, Maryland.
Thomas: There were...
Thomas: still engrained to American values and traditions.
Thomas: There were other people, many other people just like myself from other parts, ah, although I came through it alright, as far as, ah, as the drug scene.
Thomas: There are, there are others who, who did not.
Thomas: In the same predicament as I was, who in a year just changed so dramatically in in their outlook on life, and and are probably still ruined uh because of the drug situation.
Thomas: There was an easiness of...
Interviewer: How come? Was it overall the military was willing to turn a blind eye? Was it because it was available so cheap? Was it just spare time? Or what? How did it come about?
Thomas: Drugs uh, were available cheaply, uh.
Thomas: In fact the first, I don't know if I should tell this story (laughing) of my first day, when I went into town, I got into...
Thomas: this Vespa.
Thomas: They had to have these little taxis that they called Vespas – these three wheel jobs which starts like a lawn mower – I got in and the first thing the guy asked me did did I want a girl? I said, "No, I'd like to see the town first." And he said, "Would you like," and he held up this big pack of what I assume was uh...
Thomas: marijuana, now I know it was marijuana.
Thomas: At the time I just assumed it.
Thomas: And uh, it was something like ten dollars, ah I guess what now would be, I mean, hundreds of dollars, and even then in the States it was a high amount.
Thomas: But it was available, if I wanted it, it was available.
Thomas: I could either have drugs or I could have a girl, or I could go to any part of town I wanted to.
Thomas: Now, uh, let's say you can turn down a girl, or you can turn down going to a bar.
Thomas: I mean, it, whatever the taxi driver said, offered you, you couldn't turn down every one.
Thomas: I mean, it was something he said that you were gonna want (laughing).
Thomas: And so, uh, that was one availability.
Thomas: It was available everywhere.
Thomas: And uh, the uh, the military couldn't clamp down on it too much.
Thomas: I mean, iiiif they did, the arrests would be, it it it would take too much man hours, too many man hours.
Thomas: And uh, and uh, I don't guess it was a uh...
Thomas: uh a crime in which they would want to pursue, I mean, with other things going on in ah, in Vietnam, that could have been a third war.
Thomas: Not only the war between the the the South Vietnamese and the North Vietnamese and, and the race wars, you also have a third war – a drug war.
Thomas: And uh, I guess they weren't ready to prompt uh, uh a third war.
Interviewer: Let's cut.
Interviewer: Could you tell me how did Vietnamization affect you, Vietnamization was going on, what was happening?
Thomas: Well, as, we were one of the last units to leave.
Thomas: The more Americans left the more often we were getting hit.
Thomas: Ah, we always felt that the Vietnamese stake in protecting the base was not as uh as deep as our own.
Thomas: And, I think a lot of Vietnamese soldiers were sympathetic to ah the ah Viet Cong, or the North Vietnamese cause.
Thomas: Uh, I talked, we were working very close to the Vietnamese in the army or in the air force.
Thomas: And uh, we were, I was having this philosophy discussion with one of them.
Thomas: And I said, "Yyyyy'know, the way you sound, you could be a Viet Cong." I said, "Why aren't you? Why are you in the army?" And he said, "Uh, why should I be?" Y'know.
Thomas: He said, "If I was a Viet Cong, I would have to live in the mountains.
Thomas: Now I live at home.
Thomas: I wouldn't be sure when my next meal would be coming from.
Thomas: Now I'm fed three times a day, and the army pays for it." He said, "Uh, I wouldn't uh, see my family as much.
Thomas: I wouldn't be as secure.
Thomas: Why should I, uh, join the Viet Cong?"
Thomas: And, and there was an implied uh inference that that they were gonna win, that he knew that they were going to prevail anyway.
Thomas: Uh, one of the things they used to say, they had had seen so many people come and go, like the French had come and gone, uh, the Chinese uh before that, and now the Americans.
Thomas: The Americans were just taken as another wave just uh we were there and soon we’d be gone.
Thomas: And uh, so that's pretty much how, how Vietnamization affected, affected me personally.
Interviewer: What about the Vietnamese? You seem to talk in very friendly terms and that guy you were speaking to yesterday.
Interviewer: Would it be true to say that as a black you identified pretty strongly with them because of their position? That in some respects they were closer to you then some of the white guys.
Interviewer: Could you actually verbalize that?
Thomas: Yes.
Thomas: We felt, I think blacks felt very much closer to the Vietnamese and sympathized with their cause eeeven much more so than we did with our white counterpart.
Thomas: Most, Vietnamese were called uh, whites had a term for them, they called them "gooks." And ah, they would really hold them up to to scorn, as if y’know, we're protecting you, so you should be grateful to us.
Thomas: You should wanna be able, you should wanna do everything for us that you possibly can.
Thomas: Uh blacks, on the other hand, had been a part of that, had been on the other side of that scorn.
Thomas: Uh...
Thomas: before, and I would, I would take up, I would uh defend Vietnamese verbally anyway, when when it came that, uh, in any kind of uh, uh, attack by whites on them.
Interviewer: So you think it was very much a racist, racial denigrations.
Thomas: It’s racial, right.
Interviewer: Could you just discuss that? How...
Interviewer: We’re not gonna have much more.
Interviewer: Were you aware of the war being fought against the Vietnamese almost on racial terms? You mentioned the word “gooks” and so on.
Interviewer: How did this express this, or how did you see it?
Thomas: I think that the general white attitude towards the South Vietnamese was uh one of condescension.
Thomas: Or, uh, condescension and contempt.
Thomas: Like, although we're carrying the red, white and blue flag for democracy, it's also we're defending your country.
Thomas: We're, we're fighting your war.
Thomas: Yyyou should be beholden to us.
Thomas: Y'know.
Thomas: You should be, you should uh, bow down to us.
Thomas: And uh, this is what a lot of blacks, including myself, found so, so contradictory, so uh...
Thomas: uh unwarranted.
Thomas: Uh, as I said, we had been on the, on the other side of that scorn before.
Thomas: And uh, we knew exactly what it was all about.
Thomas: I mean, it was, it was pure and simple racism transferred from uh one place to another.
Thomas: And uh, this time they had more of a ground for it because they were defending uh...
Thomas: South Vietnam for democracy.
Interviewer: How do you think, to go back to the point I raised slightly earlier, you were talking about people just go home, do you think that in fact morale within the army remained the same, that it got worse as Vietnamization went on, did morale, what happened to morale whilst you were there in this period of '69 to '70?
Thomas: Even in the short year that I was there, early '69 to early '70, uh, to me it seemed like a 180 degree drop downward in uh morale.
Thomas: The things that we were reading in the papers just weren't, uh...
Thomas: jibing.
Thomas: It just just got more and more uh, uh ridiculous.
Thomas: Uh...
Thomas: the uh...
Thomas: uh, as Vietnamization came, and we felt that the Vietnamese were not doing their job as far as as defending ah, the base, etc., we got more and more people were saying, even people who thought we should've been there thought that, they were now saying, "Well, we should be here, but the war is being fought wrong."
Thomas: Now, that's quite, that's a substantial change for uh, for many uh, down home patriots.
Thomas: And uh, like I said, in in...
Thomas: just in that short period of time, just that year, the morale of a lot of people changed uh dramatically.
Thomas: Even officers looked like they were just going through the motions.
Thomas: Just carrying out their orders.
Thomas: We knew that what they were saying in private conversations was not what they were saying when they were around us.
Thomas: They were trying to keep up appearances for us, but it became harder and harder for them as time went on.
Interviewer: What about morale being affected by things that were happening at home? You said there was anti-war propaganda.
Interviewer: But what about things like race problems at home, economic problems at home.
Interviewer: I mean, what did that do to the guys in the field and to you?
Thomas: One thing stands out clear.
Thomas: The conspiracy trial was, the Chicago conspiracy trial was going on uh while I was there.
Interviewer: Would you explain what the Chicago conspiracy trial was?
Thomas: The Chicago conspiracy trial was uh eight uh activist leaders uh, whom one of them was black, uh Bobby Seale.
Thomas: And, and others were tried for conspiracy to disrupt the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in 1968, which nominated Hubert Humphrey, uh shortly after the assassinations of King, Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy.
Thomas: These people were charged with conspiring to disrupt it.
Thomas: Ah, the trial, their trial was going on while I was in the, ah, in Vietnam.
Thomas: Ah, during the trial Bobby Seale was gagged, tied and gagged to a chair.
Thomas: Bobby Seale was chairman of the Black Panther Party.
Thomas: And uh, we knew that something, the way they were reporting it in the papers, we knew that that couldn't be right, the way he was just making a scene in court, just acting crazy and the judge had to have him uh, gagged and tied down.
Thomas: We knew that there was something else to it.
Thomas: And uh, it just uh, it, and it turned out that we were right.
Thomas: But anyway, we were, we were supporting, it made us more, more uh, closer uh, together, and and more polarized as to the ah white establishment.
Thomas: It was two total different reactions.
Thomas: The whites were saying, "Uh huh, you see that, we're going to wipe them all out." Ah, and when the blacks were saying, "you had, you couldn't shut him up, y'know as you did in the past.
Thomas: You had to tie him down and gag him in a court room before you could even get him partially quiet." That was a part of of of uh of the dignity, pride, etc.
Thomas: Blacks were much more uh less open to to uh suggestions that they uh keep quiet or do one thing or another.
Thomas: Like I said, it was uh, probably a naive kind of uh of a dignity...
Thomas: that we were, we're right and nothing can happen to us.
Thomas: We know we're right on this and we're gonna say what's right to anybody.
Thomas: And, and nothing is gonna happen to me because I'm black.
Thomas: You know.
Thomas: And, and so that's that's the type of effect it it had.
Thomas: And one thing I'd like to add is that knowing the problems in Vietnam uh made me more uh, made my arguments better later in life when I became, ah, sort of a lawyer for people with less than honorable discharges.
Thomas: Ah, people got less than honorable discharges for, many blacks, for exerting their new found pride and dignity.
Thomas: And uh, it was it's good to explain that at a hearing on a level that that senior officers can understand.
Thomas: But it's to bring mostly, it goes into bringing out the fact that this guy had every element of being a good soldier – determination, hard worker, good worker, ah, punctual everything that you'd want.
Thomas: And that the only problem is that – was the white insensitivity to uh the uh black consciousness movement going on.
Interviewer: You were talking about the handshakes, and so on.
Interviewer: I wonder if you could explain what even the dap was and what, could you just sort of show us.
Thomas: Okay, here's one handshake.
Thomas: It it changed over a period of time.
Thomas: It got longer and longer but ah, the most simple kind of handshake was two blacks would see other, ball their fist, clench their fist, one would hit each other, one would hit the other's fist down.
Thomas: The other would hit it down like that, and then they'd meet.
Thomas: Okay? Ah, sometimes it got to be this, this, this, and then you'd go do this and do that.
Thomas: And then it got, like I said, it got longer and longer and you really had to keep up with it.
Thomas: Keeping up with it though, was also showing how much you were into ah black you know, camaraderie, and and it showed your interest, really.
Thomas: And if you could keep up with the handshake, it pretty much showed you knew what the blacks were all about in Vietnam, what ah, what they were doing.
Thomas: So it it showed a certain, I guess, degree of ah, of blackness, I guess.
Interviewer: That’s fine.
Interviewer: Let’s cut it.