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Page 4-Friday, January 19, 1979-The Michigan Daily
420 Maynard St., Ann Arbor, MI 48109
Eighty-Nine Years of Editorial Freedom
Vol. LXXXIX, No. 91 News Phone: 764-0552
Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan
TheRegents
Who should govern the University
Vietnam vs. China
By Gareth Porter
TN HIS State of the State Address
last week, Governor Milliken again
proposed that University Regents no
longer be elected by voters, but that
they now be appointed by the Gover-
nor. The Republican governor's
proposal has been viewed by most ob-
servers as a political ploy. It has little
chance of passing in a state
legislature dominated by Democrats.
However, the fact that at least one
government official is questioning the
procedure for picking Regents, leads-
us to ask: What are the interests that
the Regents are supposed to serve? Do
they now serve those interests
adequately?
Three Oroad-based groups take the
most active interest in what goes on at
the University. These groups are
faculty, students, and the state. The
faculty and the students make up the
University community; we spend
almost every day during the semester
parading through the maze of
libraries, halls, and dormitories on
campus. Citizens in the state con-
tribute greatly to the University
budget through taxes, but their con-
nection to the institution is remote.
Other groups such as the alumni, the
city of Ann Arbor, even potential
students (namely high school seniors)
are concerned with operations at the
University. But the concern of these
groups pales when compared to that of
the aforementioned groups. It is ironic,
however, that only one group is direc-
tly represented on the governing body
of the University. The very basis for
state control of the Regents stems
from the principle of one person one
vote. However, in this case, that prin-
ciple does not hold just; it is not the
most efficient way to govern an in-
stitution as varied as ours.
It is true that, as elected officials, the
Regents are obliged to consider the
needs of all constituents. The problem
which must be analyzed is whether a
board of Regents, as it is now chosen,
can best serve the needs of the people
of this state, but specifically of this
University community.
It is unreasonable to govern a school
which incorporates the interests of
three distinct groups with people elec-
ted from only one of those groups.
Moreover, the group which is repre-
sented best is the least concerned. A
taxpayer in Muskegon has little
knowledge of the innerworkings of the
University. In fact, the average
Muskeon resident doesn't even care
about the University. Besides hearing
about the Wolverines' exploits on the
field, major scientific breakthroughs
at the University, and during the 1960s,
student unrest on campus, most
Michiganders have little contact with
the University.
This is exemplified by the low per-
centage of voters showing an interest
in Regental election. Most years,
voters do not even know the names of
Regental candidates, but simply vote
along party lines. Governor Milliken
must have had this uninspiring record
in mind when he suggested that
responsibility for appointing Regents
be handed over to his office.
His solution, however, would be no
improvement over the present one. It
would, in fact, be worse. If appointed
by the Governor, Regents would not
even represent the one group that now
sits on the board. History is a good in-
dication of the future; in the past, the
Governor's appointments have in-
volved political graft. In 1975, for
example, when a seat on the Regents
opened up, Governor Milliken appoin-
ted David Laro, his Genessee County
campaign manager.
There is no doubt that the Governor
has less right than the people of the
state to appoint Regents. But it also
appears that the system as it exists
now is' not the best. Governor
Milliken'sw proposal, to which
diametrically opposed, does give the
legislature and the University com-
munity the opportunity to analyze the
system. It seems a good time to discuss
what would be the most adequate
method of governing the University
and making the board in control a
responsive tool rather than a stum-
bling block.
The bold Vietnamese move to
unseat the Pol Pot regime in
Cambodia is the outcome of a
series of developments which
destroyed the elegant power
balance established in Indochina
after the victories of the
Vietnamese and Cambodian
revolutionary movements in
April 1975.
The factors which combined to
eliminate that balance included
Cambodia's own. provocative
border policy, the deterioration
of Chinese-Vietnamese relations,
the growing Chinese role in
supporting Cambodia against
Vietnam, and the weakening of
Pol Pot's regime because of
military insurrections and'
purges.
The circumstances at the close
of the war in 1975 held Vietnam
tightly in check. Concerned about
maintaining friendly relations
with China, which regarded
Cambodian independence as
vital, Vietnamese foreign policy
also required normal relations
with Southeast Asia as well as
with the United States. So Hanoi
leaned backwards in 1975-76 to
avoid the appearance of
aggressiveness in its relations
with Cambodia.
Moreover, Vietnamese officials
did not regard Cambodian border
attacks in 1976-77 as an
immediate threat and were still
confident that Cambodia would
have to negotiate a border
settlement. When Vietnamese
troops launched a major counter
attack in late 1977, Hanoi
apparently felt it could teach the
Cambodian regime a lesson and
force a negotiated settlement.
Instead, Cambodian stepped up
its own attacks across the border
and spurned a Vietnamese offer
to withdraw troops five
kilometers behind the border and
establish an international
presence between the two sides to
insure a cease fire. Later,
Vietnamese officials would attest
that they had underestimated the
seriousness of the Cambodian
attacks. "In fact, we somewhat
looked down on them," said a
Central Committee member in
Hanoi last November.
The failure of the Vietnamese
effort to shake the Cambodian
regime from its truculent stance
undoubtedly created strong
pressures from the military for a
more carefully planned and
ultimately successful campaign
in Cambodia.
By early 1978, the Vietnamese
began to realize that the
Hanoi """
Vientiane o l
Rangoon HANA
Bangkok y
Anda n oenh" Saigon
- - - -- - - --- G lf of "
0 300 south China sea
Miles
Cambodian attacks on
Vietnamese border settlements
and towns were a serious and
long term threat, aimed at
creating a "no man's land" in the
border area. Thousands of
Vietnamese civilians living near
the border were massacred by
Cambodian troops, and a general
climate of insecurity in the
border provinces prevailed.
Hundreds of thousands of people
which had previously been
accepted as the basis for border
demarcation. When the
Vietnamese refused to accept
changes, Cambodian delegates
suspended the talks to consult
with Phnom Penh and never
resumed negotiations.
The Cambodian ambassador in
Hanoi, In Sivout, told a European
diplomat in September 1977 that
Phnom Penh would not negotiate
recognizing China as the enemy.
By that time, according to a
Central Committee source, the
Vietnamese saw China's hostility
in bilateral relations with
Vietnam and the border war with
Cambodia as "one war."
The logical implication was
that the Phnom Penh regime was
not attacking Vietnam because of
Cambodian interests, but was
serving the interests of China.
The Vietnamese broadcast last
June 22 of a former battalion
commander's call for Cambodian
troops to turn their guns against
the Pol Pot regime was a signal
that Hanoi's aims were no longer
to reach a negotiated settlement
but to overthrow the incumbent
government.
The Vietnamese were also
emboldened by internal uprisings
against the Pol Pot regime,
extensive political purges carried
out in 1977-78 against civilian and
military official- at all levels,
and by Cambodian defections to
the Vietnamese side.
Vietnamese sources claimed a
series, of mutinies and
insurrections by units of the
Cambodian army, mostly in
eastern Cambodia.
By mid-1978, a number of
middle and upper cadres from
Phnom Penh's army and party
were prepared to collaborate
directly with the Vietnamese in
overthrowing the Pol Pot regime.
The Vietnamese believed they
would be able to put together a
Cambodian regime to replace the
Pol Pot government when it was
necessary. The only question
remaining then was the precise
timing of the lightning offensive
which ended the world's most
radical experiment in
revolutoion.
Gareth Porter recently re-
turned from his fifth visit to
Vietnam where he interviewed
numerous high level officials
as a guest of the government.
Former co-director of the
Indochina Resource Center~
and a consultant to the House
MIA Committee, Porter is the
author of A Peace Denied, a
history of the Paris peace
agreement. He is now
completing a two-volume
compilation of documents on
the Vietnam war. This article
was written for Pacific News
Service.
were forced to abandon the two
ecomomic zones which had ben
expected to provide productive
employment for the jobless from
the cities in the South. This
coincided with increasingly
serious food shortages
throughout Vietnam, which
intensified after devastating
floods last September wiped out
three million tons of paddy.
The rigid refusal of the Pol Pot
regime to negotiate with its
ancient enemy Vietnam deprived
Cambodia of one of the
constraints on Vietnamese
power. The Cambodian
Communist leaders appear to
have shared former Prince
Norodom Sihanouk's attitude
that any negotiation on territorial
issues would ultimately invite
aggression by Vietnam.
According to Political Bureau
member Xuan Thuy, in an
interview last November, the
Cambodian delegation to
preliminary border talks in May
1976 demanded eleven changes in
the last French map of the border
a border agreement with
Vietnam unless Vietnamese
troops were first withdrawn from
contested areas - a position
which ruled out any possible
diplomatic solution.
The Vietnamese might have
attempted some other means of
solving the border problem,
however, had they not begun in
1978 to consider the Pol Pot
regime as an arm of their real
enemy - China.
Ironically, it was China's
military and political support for
Cambodia that caused Hanoi to
conclude that China was
deliberately threatening
Vietnam's security, stability and
economic development. After
China began to attack Vietnam
for its alleged mistreatment of
ethnic Chinese, and withdrew its
aid program in May of 1978, the
Vietnamese decided that China
had to be considered as
Vietnam's main enemy. At a
secret Central Committee
plenum in mid-July, Vietnamese
party leaders passed a resolution
Letters
An open letter to Athletic Director Don Canham
The Michigan Union
Score one for the Regents and one for the students too!
<:::
Editorials which appear without a by-line represent 'a con-
sensus opinion ofjthe Daily's editorial board. All oth(-r editorials,
as well as cartoons, are the opinions of the individuals who sub-
mit them.
Dear Don:
As I have done for the last 9
years, I again write to you
pleading that you replace
Schembechler.
My brother John and I are
charter members of the Victors
Club which we set up 10 years
ago. We encouraged other fellow
men to join and contribute
$1,000.00 gifts each year to the
University and designated it for
the Athletic Scholarship Fund.
We hoped to get a hundred mem-
bers but, as you know, we got
hundreds.
When Bo got that heart attack
at his first Rose Bowl game, Bob
Westfall and I went after Forrest
Evashevski to come back to
Michigan, where he naturally
always wanted to be. He
unequivocally agreed to be head
coach and that he would never
take over your job as athletic
director.
When I put it up to you, you
rejected him and said you wanted
to give Bo a chance. I reminded
you that when we made you
athletic director, you promised
you'd never let us suffer along
with a "dead horse". I also told
you that the University of
Michigan football program was
not compatible with coddling a
cardiac patient who didn't dare to
rip and rare about bad officiating
and who couldn't even run up and
down the sidelines to shout en-
couragement to his players. You
had no answer for that.
So you rejected Evashevski
who had taken lowly Iowa to
back-to-back national champion-
ships. He went into TV announ-
cing and Bo has done just as I
promised you he would. He nur-
sed his faint heart and broke all
of our hearts! There isn't a
Michivan alumnus alive who
I haven't sent my-$1,000.00 for
the past two years now.
I know you won't resign, so we
shall have to get the Board in
Control of Physical Education to
dismiss you, like we did Kipke
and Cappon in 1938 and hired
Crisler.
Please note how rapidly Russ
Davis improved when he
"escaped" from Bo in the Rose
Bowl and played under Coach
Blaisdell who allowed him to
carry the ball in the shrine
classic. Six touchdowns he made!
One hundred ninety-nine yards
he carried! I'm glad I helped him
on his way to Michigan so he
could get into a game where he
was justly noticed.
And Leach in the Hula Bowl!
But those boys never had a chan-
ce under Bo's coaching.
So today I get the attached let-
ter from Bo to the Victors Club
members. First time he ever
acknowledged our existence! He
knows he can't go out and recruit
any more for two reasons:
1. Weak heart.
2. Six straight bowl losses.
The idea of him stating at this
late date:
"The importance of re-
cruiting quality young men
can not be over estimated
in maintaining the Uni-
versity of Michigan as
'Champions of the West.' "
The Michigan program is en-
ded for a while. Never again
can it rise with you and Bo at the
helm. We can not get quality
young men to come there. It isn't
For whom does Ashe speak?
fair to them anyway.
That punt Bo called for on
fourth down on the U.S.C. 48 yard
line with'only 2:45 to play was
like the punt Bump Elliott called
for in 1967 on Navy's 31 with 30
seconds to play. Navy won 26-21.
That was curtains for Bump!
Now read Jim Murray's attached
article about that great call
which prevented Michigan from
scoring a touchdown and a 2-point
conversion to win the Rose Bowl
18-17.
Well, I'll send a copy of this to
the Michigan Daily and the Free
Press as I do every year, but they
have never known Michigan in all
its glory as "Champions of the
West" so I doubt that they will
follow up on it.
-Earl Townsend, Jr.
SPORTS STAFF
To The Daily:
Aetna Life and Casualty Com-
pany sponsored Monday's ap-
pearance of tennis champion Ar-
thur Ashe. In The Daily's report
(16 January) Ashe's anti-divest-
ment position was stressed, but
there was no mention of Aetna's
considerable holdings in South
Africa. There is little doubt that
Ashe is, as the Daily stated, "a
long-time opponent of South
Africa's apartheid policy." Aet-
na, on the other hand, may feel
that it has a lot to lose by
vigorously opposing apartheid.
Perhaps Aetna was as concerned
about polishing its corporate
image as it was about informing
students about "Careers in
Business."
As Ashe mentioned, he has
visited South Africa "several"
which they have had to endure
great suffering; many have died.
Though it is illegal to do so, most
black organizations in South
Africa have called for the with-
drawal of foreign corporations.
In discussions with anti-apar-
theid forces abroad these same
organizations have asked for
divestment campaigns as well as
material aid.
The growing support, among
black South Africans, for divest-
ment was made apparent by the
U.S. ambassador to South Africa,
Mr. Bowdler, in a confidential
memorandum. In March 1977
Bowdler wrote that "with
radicalization of black attitudes,
the tendency to call for divest-
ment grows stronger. . . it must
be expected that the role of
American firms here will become
plementing the concept of black
majority rule, that is out, of cour-
se they cannot play any role
whatsoever.
Ashe is also quoted as saying:
"If America gets the hell out of
South Africa, Europe will get the
hell in, and they don't care." A
quick glance at a history book
shows that the Europeans were in
South Africa long before
Americans were. British firms
have larger holdings than their
U.S. counterparts in South
Africa.
We. urge the University com-
munity to consider the interests
of people who are speaking on
South Africa, whether that per-
son is Arthur Ashe, Robben
Fleming, or an Aetna official.
D e bi Duke
EDITORIAL STAFF
Editors-in-chief
DAVID GOODMAN
Managing Editors
M. EILEEN DALEY
DAN OBERDORFER
F dinria iliu fn
GRIEGiG KRUPA
BOB MILLER..........
PAULCAMPBELL.......
ERNIE DUNBAR .........
HENRY ENGELHARDT .
RICK MAD)OCK ........ .
CUB SCHWARTZ.........
........................Sports Editor
..............Executive Sports Editor
.Executive Sports Editor
.Executive Sports Editor
.........Executive Sports Editor
.Executive Sports Editor
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