The Revolution on the Mekong

The first two Communist objectives in the South Vietnamese sector of “the revolution on the Mekong”—the phrase is Ho Chi Minh’s—have now been attained. Le Duan, secretary of the Communist Party of North Vietnam, listed the early stages when, in September 1960, he announced formation of the “National Liberation Front” (FLN) of South Vietnam: “This Front must take as its principal objectives the overthrow of the Diem regime, the abolition of the present Constitution, the orientation of South Vietnamese foreign policy toward neutralism, and the establishment of normal relations between the South and the North.” (I cite from the study by Nicolas Lang, Est & Quest, Feb. 16-28, 1963.)

These objectives have been achieved through what Communist doctrine calls “enlightened terror,” which aims to bring about a situation, chiefly by psychological means, in which active opponents are destroyed by their own camp. A remarkable document found in 1948 on the body of a dead NKVD officer explained: “In the concept of enlightened terror the terror subject not only remains in the shadows, but acts and applies terror not in his own name but in the name of his opponent. . . . In the system of enlightened terror nearly all efforts of the terror subject are directed at converting the [human] environment into a spontaneous assistant and accessory, in ignorance of its role.” The terror subject must indeed be congratulating himself today, in his shadows, for the psycho-political manipulation by which he led the Government of the United States to act as his “spontaneous assistant and accessory, in ignorance of its role.”

JB

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James Burnham

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The first two Communist objectives in the South Vietnamese sector of “the revolution on the Mekong”—the phrase is Ho Chi Minh’s—have now been attained. Le Duan, secretary of the Communist Party of North Vietnam, listed the early stages when, in September 1960, he announced formation of the “National Liberation Front” (FLN) of South Vietnam: “This Front must take as its principal objectives the overthrow of the Diem regime, the abolition of the present Constitution, the orientation of South Vietnamese foreign policy toward neutralism, and the establishment of normal relations between the South and the North.” (I cite from the study by Nicolas Lang, Est & Quest, Feb. 16-28, 1963.)

These objectives have been achieved through what Communist doctrine calls “enlightened terror,” which aims to bring about a situation, chiefly by psychological means, in which active opponents are destroyed by their own camp. A remarkable document found in 1948 on the body of a dead NKVD officer explained: “In the concept of enlightened terror the terror subject not only remains in the shadows, but acts and applies terror not in his own name but in the name of his opponent. . . . In the system of enlightened terror nearly all efforts of the terror subject are directed at converting the [human] environment into a spontaneous assistant and accessory, in ignorance of its role.” The terror subject must indeed be congratulating himself today, in his shadows, for the psycho-political manipulation by which he led the Government of the United States to act as his “spontaneous assistant and accessory, in ignorance of its role.”