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Salient: Victoria University Students' Paper. Vol. 28, No. 8. 1965.

Vietnam: behind the war news headlines, a people's progress

page 5

Vietnam: behind the war news headlines, a people's progress

cover of a booklet received by Salient from the United States Information Service

"Full bags from a bumper rice crop, being loaded for export, tell a part of South Vietnam's story that is too often overlooked: Its people's solid work to develop their country."

The Greatest problem by far with the whole Vietnam question is the paucity of available facts. Governments are having to make important decisions, and it often seems that they possess no more facts than those possessed by the average reader of the daily newspapers. The vital questions as to what extent the uprising is a civil one, and to what extent China is supplying arms, have not been answered with any degree of certainty. One would imagine that the United States Information Service would endeavour to answer these questions, honestly and conscientiously.

And yet it seems that, on a simple checkable fact like the level of the Vietnamese rice exports, the USIS can be plainly, demonstrably, Wrong.

The picture above shows the cover of a booklet received by Salient from the United States Information Service on May 24. The caption on the photo reads:

"Full bags from a bumper rice crop, being loaded for export, tell a part of South Vietnam's story that is too often overlooked: Its people's solid work to develop their country."

On the 7.10pm "News Review" on the main national stations on Thursday. May 27, the NZBC relayed a commentary from the BBC's Saigon correspondent. In the course of discussing the current situation in Vietnam, he gave the following figures for rice exports from South Vietnam (tons):

1963 .... .... 340.000
1964 .... .... 44.000
1965 (Jan.) exports banned
1965 (May) rice imported from USA

The booklet is undated, but gives figures for refugees for the "first few months of 1965" which would place its date at about MayApril. 1965.—G.E.J.L.