By Mary Lackie

“We are making plans to rebuild roads and canals, but we can’t put people back together because we don’t know how,” said Don Luce, 33, former director of the International Volunteer Service in South Vietnam.

A graduate of Cornell University school of agriculture, Luce spent three years in Vietnam before he accepted the position of IVS director, a post he held for six years. He resigned in Sept. 1967 in protest of American policies.

Currently on the staff of Cornell University Southeast Asian Studies, Luce spent days last week in Atlanta sharing his views on present American policy in the war-torn country.

“Many Catholic priests and laymen are against the war, but were afraid to speak out. They will feel free, now,” said Luce, referring to the recent statement issued by 18 Catholic bishops at a national meeting of the South Vietnamese hierarchy.

The statement asked for serious negotiations between the North and South Vietnamese governments. “Right now is the time to end the conflict, despite some disadvantages...because the conflict will have to be settled eventually...perhaps with such horrible damage and disasters that no one can imagine them,” the statement said in part.

Luce noted, “This (statement) will make it easier for the Buddhists and Catholics to get along. The reason they have been so far apart before is that they disagreed about the war.”

Nor are rural Vietnamese satisfied with Ky, Luce said. “There is an old Vietnamese saying, ‘the rule of the emperor stops at the village gates.’ The villagers can vote, but only from an approved list of candidates. Ky is unpopular because of the war, the graft in the government, and to them, he is the young playboy who smokes Salem cigarettes, and not the local brand.”

Looking back on his work, Luce said, “We did a lot of good through the extension program, but since mid-1965, the effort has been one of relief. We are trying to alleviate the problems we have caused.”

Luce who grew up on a Vermont farm, began his work in the Montagnard hill country. When he would visit a strange village, the women would call out to him, offering him a cup of tea. “I was impressed by the openness of the farmers to change and improvement. The villagers were neat. Fruit trees were planted around the houses.”

“In the evenings when I would visit the homes, the children would be seated around the table, studying. Instead of popping popcorn and watching TV, the families would be telling stories and drinking coconut juice.”

Luce, who learned to speak several Vietnamese dialects, said, “The people talked about the future. The crops they would plant next year. ‘Should we try coffee trees and get a cash crop?’ Or, they might ask me, ‘Are your sweet potatoes as good as ours?’” He added, “And they would try a row, and tell me about it when I came back.”

A matriarchal society of about 1 million people, the Montagnard life revolves around land and family, Luce said.” They were a slash-and-burn rice culture. They would go out in the mountainside, cut down the brush, and burn it all when it dried. Then they would use a stick to plant rice and corn, with pumpkins scattered through the fields.”

The Rhade tribe is more advanced, and many of the men have joined the American forces, Luce said. “The Vietcong see this, and they have wiped out whole villages in retaliation.”

The Bru, a smaller tribe, is so primitive they have no written language, Luce said. “Many of them are working as mercenaries for the Vietcong, and my concern is that they may become extinct. They live just south of the DMZ.”

Near Ban Me Thout, Luce met some Montagnard friends. “We had worked together,” he said, “and now they were in the army. I asked them why they didn’t go home and work with their people. They said, ‘We are soldiers, now.’ The people are losing respect for their own culture, and may never go back to their traditional society.”

Farming has become a hazardous occupation. Farmers who went into the fields at 4:30 a.m. now wait until 8-9 a.m., Luce said. “They are afraid they will be shot or recruited by the Vietcong. If the fields have been hit by mortar shells, they don’t dare farm them.”

American and Vietnamese agricultural agents receive constant complaints from the farmers about the damage from the defoliation spraying. “The Vietnamese say when you spray, it is the women and children who suffer. There is a problem of wind drift. The spray is carried along the canals and rice paddles and many of the people in charge of the spraying don’t know how to use the equipment,” Luce said.

As the war spread, entire Montagnard villages were endangered, and the people moved by force to cities and refugee camps. Their land became part of the free strike zone. But the desire to return to the land was so strong, that the villagers would escape and go back. Many never return, Luce said.

He said, “The refugee situation is the real tragedy in Vietnam. There are over 2 million, and the family structure is destroyed. Young men have joined the Vietcong because they hate the American ‘colonialists,’ and want their own land. Whether they join one army or the other, they are often picked up as suspects. The women are left alone, not knowing what happened to their husbands or brothers.”

Refugees are often resettled in camps often near airbases, moved to city slums. “They are allowed to take the garbage from the airbase to feed their pigs, but are not allowed on the base to get it,” Luce said.

The refugees cannot live on the meager food allotments, Luce said. “The old women wash clothes and the middle-aged women do construction work. The young girls find jobs in bars or brothels because it pays well, but they become social outcasts. The youngest become shoe shine boys or pickpockets.” During the evacuation of Ben Suc, Luce worked with the refugees. “The entire village was bulldozed and the people moved to a camp. At that time, they had no idea their village would be destroyed. Now that they are resettled, they won’t plant crops. For one thing, the land is not rice land. Even more important, they think ‘next week we are going home.’” Luce added, “As long as the villager has land, he has security.”

“And you can’t move refugees and start feeding them two days after they are evacuated,” Luce said. “This cycle isn’t good. After a certain point, they are so weak that you can’t help them.”

Luce is often accused of over-sentimentality. “People say I am judging the conditions by our standards. But the villagers are upset for reasons that are important to them. They don’t have a coconut tree, they can’t work the land, and they are no longer near their ancestral burial grounds.”

“There is the challenge of bringing the family back together again, and I don’t know if it can be done. The damage is permanent,” Luce said. The refugees’ apathy contrasts with Luce’s earlier experiences. “The men are gone, the women are sitting around, not talking about their plans. They ask me, ‘What do you have to give us?’ All this opposed to the new idea, a handful of seeds -- all that I as doing when I first came.” “I stopped in Japan on my way home,” he said. “I always stay at the same little inn. The people are very polite, and jump on me in a very polite way, ’What are you doing in Vietnam?’ This time, they were happy because I was leaving.” He added, “I would like to go back soon and help with the rebuilding after the war.”