Editing 76-15-A2 (section)

=== Transcript ===
A former member of the South Vietnamese National Assembly, leader of the
"Peace bloc" which opposed President Thieu and which rejected strongly our
intervention in Vietnam, has escaped to Japan with two of his former colleagues,
Interestingly, his anti-war activity had made him an honored figure among the
North Vietnamese conquerors. He was a member of the National Legislature in
Hanoi until he escaped.

He and his two companions have asked -- from the safety of Japan --
for American military assistance to those who want to overthrow the North
Vietnamese Communists. The three ex-legislators frankly and sadly admit their
complete turnaround. They say they wanted relief from the war and all its
destruction, but now they realize how precious was the freedom their country
had which has now been lost.

When an American journalist skeptically asked if the South Vietnamese
people, after more than 30 years of war, would actually take up weapons and
fight again, the answer was an emphatic "yes".

Meanwhile in Paris, where representatives of the Carter Administration
are proceeding with talks leading to normalization of relations with the
Vietnamese conquerors, an open letter to the United States was distributed by
Vietnamese exiles. Calling themselves the Vietnamese Committee for Human Rights,
they begged the United States not to establish relations with Hanoi until it
ends its brutal repression of freedoms.

One sentence in their letter cannot be denied. It read, "Whether you
accept it or not, the United States bears a great part of the responsibility
before World History for the annexation of South Vietnam by the Communists and
for the imprisonment of hundreds of thousands of their own allies". Unfortunately,
"human rights" weren't being discussed by our team in Paris.

Other things concerning Vietnam are being discussed in a variety of places,
all having to do with tax dollars taken from the American people.

The administration has granted licenses for $5 million in private aid for
Vietnam through charitable groups. Those, of course, aren't tax dollars but
they're coming up. The U.N. Development Program has agreed to send Hanoi
$44 million. We put up 20% of the budget for that program.

The World Bank, to which we give a full one-fourth of its funds, is expected
to approve major loans to Hanoi. Its affiliate I.D.A., -- the International
Development Association -- makes 50 year loans at no interest to Third World
nations and has about $6 billion a year for development loans.

The Bank has sent a mission to Vietnam which has been described as,
"a useful and constructive start to the Bank's relationship with a unified
Vietnam". I suppose calling it a "unified Vietnam" is alright if you'd describe
a lion that just has a lamb for lunch as unified.

Hanoi didn't just listen at that meeting. They presented a shopping list
as long as your arm. It ranged from vast irrigation systems and expansion of
electric power to factories for building rail road equipment. Maybe we could send
them Amtrak.

In Paris, direct aid to Hanoi wasn't denied -- we just said it would have to
wait till we'd established normal relations. Then, magnanimously, the Vietnamese
handed us 20 more names of men missing in action. That only leaves about 1,150
or so to be accounted for.

We're writing a chapter for the history books we won't be proud to read. 

This is Ronald Reagan.

Thanks for listening.

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