{"id":304653,"date":"2025-10-13T12:00:45","date_gmt":"2025-10-13T11:00:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=304653"},"modified":"2025-10-10T05:33:15","modified_gmt":"2025-10-10T04:33:15","slug":"bertrand-russells-historic-war-crimes-tribunal-against-the-us-in-vietnam-1964-1967","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2025\/10\/bertrand-russells-historic-war-crimes-tribunal-against-the-us-in-vietnam-1964-1967\/","title":{"rendered":"Bertrand Russell’s Historic War Crimes Tribunal against the US in Vietnam, 1964-1967"},"content":{"rendered":"

The author pays tribute to the extraordinary audacity of Bertrand Russell and Ho Chi Minh to create a transnational war crimes tribunal to try the United States government and some of its allies for crimes against the people of Vietnam and Laos through bombardment of innocent civilians, schools, hospitals, and villages. That the tribunal successfully held hearings in Sweden, Denmark and Japan stands testament to a massive global antiwar upsurge in the 1960s, and signposts the continuing relevance of war crimes trials.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Oct 2025 – <\/em>Sixty years ago, Ho Chi Minh, the leader of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam), began collaborating with the British philosopher, mathematician and antiwar activist, Bertrand Russell, to bring the United States and its regional allies before the International War Crimes Tribunal to face charges of war crimes.[1]<\/a><\/p>\n

At the time, in 1964 Russell was 92 years old, sprightly and sharp witted, and 18 years older than Ho Chi Minh who was 74 and equally alert and in command of his Vietnam Workers Party as its chairman, and head of state.<\/p>\n

Soon after Russell created his two foundations\u2014the Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation and the Atlantic Peace Foundation\u2014in September 1963, he began looking for funding. In January 1964, he wrote to Tran Viet Dung, the London-based representative of the Hanoi weekly, Cuu Quoc, <\/em>requesting money to help run the foundations, and asking him to suggest the names of others who might support the foundations financially.[2]<\/a> The Atlantic Foundation, a registered charity, was to conduct research necessary for the work of the BRPF, which was a limited company. \u00a0<\/sup>Russell explained that these foundations were necessary because antiwar movements had \u201clived from hand to mouth\u201d and had to beg \u201cthe press and film media for a crumb of publicity.\u201d[3]<\/a> The BRPF aimed to investigate the causes of the Cold War, and pursue measures to diminish and eliminate the risk of nuclear and conventional war. UN Secretary-General U Thant endorsed the effort, which appeared to institutionalize the crusade for peace that Russell had been conducting for many decades.<\/p>\n

\"\"Bertrand and Edith Russell demonstrating against the war outside the House of Commons in London on 30 Jun 1965
\nPhoto by the courtesy of the Bertrand Russell Archive, McMaster University<\/p>\n

The sixty-year-old collaboration between Russell and Ho Chi Minh is a crucially important signpost of people\u2019s power speaking up against the use of excessive military force against civilians\u2014and brings up the idea of the Civilian Enemy. The awareness of war crimes developed at the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth, a time when international humanitarian law, or the law of armed conflict, was written\u2014even though the prohibition on excessive military violence can be traced back many centuries.[4]<\/a> The Hague Conventions, adopted in 1899 and 1907, banned warring parties from using certain means and methods of warfare.<\/p>\n

The laws against the use of excessive military power certainly exist, but most often they are not enforced. The Geneva Convention of 1864, and the four 1949 Geneva Conventions and the two 1977 Additional Protocols, aim to protect persons not\u2014or no longer\u2014taking part in hostilities. The Hague Law and Geneva Law identify several of the violations of its norms, but not all, as war crimes. There is not one single document in international law that codifies all war crimes. All the Member States of the United Nations have ratified the 1949 Geneva Conventions, but the Additional Protocols and other international humanitarian law treaties have not attained the same level of acceptance.<\/p>\n

The Ho-Russell Partnership to Create the International War Crimes Tribunal<\/strong><\/p>\n

In November 1964, Russell asked Ho Chi Minh to become a financial sponsor of the BRPF, explaining that the funds would help the foundation to influence public opinion in the West, particularly in the United States.[5]<\/a> Ho Chi Minh believed the idea was a good one, but he argued that it would be inappropriate to have his name advertised on the foundation\u2019s letterhead as an official sponsor because the DRV\u2019s communism could become a liability in the foundation\u2019s work in the West. Russell replied that he recognized these dangers, and he assured Ho Chi Minh that he would publicly defend against any criticism the DRV\u2019s right to struggle against the American intervention. Ho Chi Minh still declined to become an official sponsor of the foundation, but at the very least, Russell managed to secure his financial support.[6]<\/a> Ho Chi Minh initially gave 20,000 NF (New Francs) to support the foundation\u2019s efforts to urge President Johnson to negotiate a settlement to end the war.[7]<\/a> In addition, he contributed 30,000 NF to help organize the war crimes tribunal.[8]<\/a> In total, Ho Chi Minh contributed 50,000 NF (equivalent to US$10,200), and more than double that amount on financing the visits of the IWCT\u2019s investigators to Vietnam, which makes the DRV a significant contributor to the foundation and the tribunal.[9]<\/a> In comparison, Pakistan\u2019s President Ayub Khan contributed a total of 7,750 British pounds (equivalent to US$21,700 at prevailing exchange rates in 1964-1966), to help Russell run the foundation\u2019s peace activism, and to publish its journal, The Spokesman.<\/em>[10]<\/a> King Faisal Al Saud of Saudi Arabia made a one-time contribution of 1,000 British pounds in July 1965 to help the BRPF.[11]<\/a> The ruler of Bahrain, Shaikh Isa bin Sulman al Khalifah, and President Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia made small financial contributions in August and November 1964, respectively.[12]<\/a><\/p>\n

Russell first broached the idea of a tribunal, not with the DRV as one might expect, but with the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam (NLFSVN) because the South Vietnamese revolutionaries were the principal combatants in the struggle to liberate their homeland. In July and September of 1965, members of the NLF central committee, Ma Thi Chu and Dinh Ba Thi, and South Vietnamese journalist Pham Van Chuong, met several times with Russell\u2019s representative Ralph Schoenman, a leftist American, who was educated at Princeton University and the London School of Economics.[13]<\/a> At these meetings Schoenman conveyed Russell\u2019s idea of a war crimes tribunal, and the NLF agreed to cooperate and assist in the tribunal.<\/p>\n

The NLF and the DRV welcomed the plan to form a tribunal. In February 1966, Schoenman met with Ho Chi Minh and Dong in Hanoi. They agreed that the foundation would create the International War Crimes Tribunal, and that the DRV would make available evidence in its possession, including exhibits of weapons used against the people of Vietnam. Witnesses and victims would also testify before the tribunal. Ho Chi Minh agreed to host investigating teams and furnish the necessary facilities in North Vietnam.[14]<\/a><\/p>\n

In July 1966, Russell informed Ho Chi Minh that the IWCT would hold hearings in Paris the following year to put the United States on trial for the war crimes it had committed in Vietnam.[15]<\/a> Prominent personalities who had agreed to serve on the tribunal included the French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre, French feminist Simone de Beauvoir, former Mexican President Lazaro Cardenas, Italian social activist Danilo Dolci (the \u201cGandhi of Sicily\u201d), Italian communist Lelio Basso, German playwright Peter Weiss, British historian Isaac Deutscher, and the American antiwar activist David Dellinger. Stokely Carmichael pledged to hold a meeting of the national council of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee to support the tribunal.[16]<\/a><\/p>\n

The tribunal\u2019s organizers agreed to create five separate commissions to investigate the various legal and humanitarian dimensions of the war crimes: (1) Violation of international agreements; (2) use of experimental weapons such as toxic gas and chemicals; (3) bombardment of civilian areas such as sanatoria, schools, hospitals, and dykes; (4) torture and mutilation of prisoners; and (5) use of forced labor camps, mass executions, and genocidal actions against the population of South Vietnam. The commissions were to report to the tribunal until the war crimes hearings began in May 1967.<\/p>\n

Russell\u2019s Campaign Against U.S. War Policies<\/strong><\/p>\n

Russell\u2019s frequent letters irritated the Johnson Administration in part because Russell did not restrict his complaints to the sole issue of Vietnam. In a letter to LBJ in December 1963, Russell urged the United States to improve relations with Cuba. He informed Johnson about the formation of his two peace foundations and asked the president to support them.[17]<\/a> Johnson\u2019s national security adviser, McGeorge Bundy, brushed Russell off with the comment that surely he would have seen from the president\u2019s public statements the strength and depth of his commitment to building peace.[18]<\/a> On January 6, 1964, Russell complained to Johnson about rumors in the New York Herald Tribune <\/em>that the United States was planning to invade Cuba.[19]<\/a> The White House denied these allegations.[20]<\/a><\/p>\n

Nonetheless, Russell concentrated his efforts in trying to persuade the United States to seek a peaceful solution to the Vietnam question. Russell met and corresponded with David Bruce, the American Ambassador to Britain, in order to impress upon him the urgency of reconvening the fourteen-nation Geneva Conference on Vietnam. During their meeting in London on July 20, 1964 Russell complained that the United States was thwarting efforts to reconvene the conference.[21]<\/a> The majority of the people of South Vietnam wanted to remain neutral and not aligned to either the United States or the Soviet Union, Russell insisted, but they were being blocked by the United States.[22]<\/a> Russell believed that \u201cthe destruction of the Geneva Agreements, the support of a dictatorship [in South Vietnam], the establishment of a police state, and the destruction of all its opponents were intolerable crimes.\u201d[23]<\/a> British Labour Party Member of Parliament William Warbey, who was present at the meeting, claimed that civilians in South Vietnam disliked the Ngo Dinh Diem regime and its successor. Ambassador Bruce reported these comments to the State Department, in keeping with his practice to routinely keep Washington informed about Russell\u2019s activities.[24]<\/a><\/p>\n

In order to deny Russell publicity, the State Department advised the White House not to respond to Russell\u2019s cables and letters to President Johnson. Though he rarely received a reply, Russell did not stop writing to the White House. In August 1964, Russell requested that the United States halt further attacks on North Vietnam because world opinion backed U.N. Secretary General U Thant\u2019s request to reconvene the Geneva Conference.[25]<\/a> The State Department advised McGeorge Bundy not to reply to Russell\u2019s cables of October 1964 calling for amnesty for three South Vietnamese high school students who faced the death penalty for attempting to kill American officials. The department reminded Bundy that British professor P. J. Honey had already successfully countered Russell\u2019s earlier attacks on U.S. policy in Vietnam, which was much more effective in \u201cdeflating Russell\u2019s line\u201d than official American statements.[26]<\/a> Russell again wrote in November 1964, imploring Johnson to show compassion for the Vietnamese people.[27]<\/a> In a strongly worded letter to Johnson in February 1965, Russell warned that the American bombardment of North Vietnam would be condemned at the United Nations, and would trigger worldwide protests.[28]<\/a> The White House replied that his letter had been added to many other opinions received at the White House, obviously a snub implying that Russell was going to be ignored.[29]<\/a><\/p>\n

The International War Crimes Tribunal Starts<\/strong><\/p>\n

The effort to deny Russell publicity was only partially successful because the war crimes tribunal proved to be an irresistible topic for the mainstream media. On August 3, 1966, newspapers announced that a tribunal headed by Russell and Jean-Paul Sartre would try President Johnson, Secretary of State Dean Rusk, and Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara as \u201cwar criminals\u201d for their policies toward Vietnam.[30]<\/a> \u00a0<\/sup>The judges would make their decision based on the testimony of hundreds of witnesses and complete scientific data on chemicals used in U.S. military operations.[31]<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"Ho Chi Minh welcomes the International War Crimes Tribunal in this telegram to Russell
\nPhoto by the courtesy of the Bertrand Russell Archive, McMaster University<\/p>\n

On August 25, 1966 Russell wrote a long and strongly worded letter to Johnson, arguing for the validity and credibility of the war crimes tribunal.[32]<\/a> By McNamara\u2019s own admission, he pointed out, the United States had dropped more bombs on Vietnam than in Korea and the Second World War. Russell charged that the United States had used chemical weapons, poison gas, napalm, phosphorus, and fragmentation bombs against hospitals, schools, villages, and sanatoria. He remonstrated that the North Vietnamese had not bombed one school or village in the United States, or occupied any part of the United States. Because the Vietnamese air force could not possibly check the American bombardment of agricultural land, villages, and towns, the Vietnam War was beginning to resemble the fascist aggression in the Second World War. Consequently, solemn proceedings were needed to weigh evidence of crimes committed by the United States against the Vietnamese people. Russell cited U.S. Justice Robert Jackson\u2019s comment at Nuremberg that crimes of such magnitude required the application of international law against the aggressor.<\/p>\n

Russell invited Johnson to appear before the tribunal in his own defense to answer the evidence and eyewitness testimony concerning the atrocities carried out on Johnson\u2019s instructions. Should Johnson be unwilling to appear personally, Russell requested him to appoint persons who would defend the actions of the U.S. government. Russell maintained that the tribunal drew legitimacy not only from its public mandate, and the eminence and international character of its members, but also from its solemn antecedent in the Nuremberg trials. Russell again quoted Justice Jackson: \u201cIf certain acts and violation of treaties are crimes, they are crimes whether the United States does them or whether Germany does them.\u201d Not surprisingly, the Johnson Administration ignored these demands as it considered the tribunal a farce on par with the Soviet \u201cshow trials\u201d of 1936.<\/p>\n

The U.S. Disinformation Campaign against the International War Crimes Tribunal<\/strong><\/p>\n

Nonetheless, U.S. officials worried about the trial\u2019s impact.[33]<\/a> Beginning in July 1966, the U.S. government organized an extensive intelligence and diplomatic program to discredit Russell, the tribunal, and its staff, and to persuade tribunal officials to withdraw from the proceedings. The disinformation campaign was conducted by an interagency group headed by Undersecretary of State George Ball, and composed of officials from the Central Intelligence Agency, State Department, United States Information Agency, and Department of Defense.[34]<\/a> The government also explored legal avenues but decided that defamation action should not be attempted because any suit against those involved in the \u201cmock trial would itself result in very unfavorable publicity\u201d for the United States at home and abroad.[35]<\/a> The disinformation campaign, which was conducted overseas, does not appear to be connected to COINTELPRO (Counterintelligence Program), a domestic surveillance campaign designed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation to neutralize the American antiwar movement. But the spirit of the effort was the same, namely to discredit critics of America\u2019s effort in Vietnam.[36]<\/a><\/p>\n

In early August 1966, George Ball met with McNamara\u2019s assistant Adam Yarmolinsky, to discuss what to do about the tribunal. Yarmolinsky, who agreed that the tribunal \u201ccould hurt us a good deal in Europe and Asia,\u201d suggested that a private U.S. lawyer defend the Johnson administration. Ball, however, did not want to dignify the tribunal with official American participation. He recommended that the U.S. government promote a \u201ccompeting trial\u201d through the International Committee of Jurists at the Hague. U.S. Embassy officials in Stockholm began exploring a plan to conduct a rival trial. Meanwhile, the interagency group directed the CIA to prepare dossiers on the various persons involved in the trial, as well as members and staff of the Russell foundation.[37]<\/a><\/p>\n

In late August, Ball told President Johnson that the interagency group was \u201cquietly exploring\u201d with British and French government officials what legal steps could be taken to \u201cforestall this spectacle.\u201d He added that the interagency group also planned to \u201cstimulate press articles criticizing the \u2018trials\u2019 and detailing the unsavory and leftwing background of the organizers and judges.\u201d[38]<\/a><\/p>\n

The State Department instructed U.S. ambassadors in Ethiopia, India, Pakistan, Senegal, Tanzania, and Zambia to warn the leaders of each country that \u201chis name is being misused to circulate pro-communist, anti-American propaganda.\u201d The ambassadors were also directed to explain that the Russell foundation \u201chas been captured by a group of extreme left wingers of the pro-Chicom [Chinese communist] stripe,\u201d including \u201cAmerican citizens who are using the ninety-four-year-old Russell\u2019s name, perhaps without his full comprehension.\u201d[39]<\/a> Ball told Johnson that he would speak to the British Home Secretary about this issue. Ball also promised to ask Supreme Court Justice Abe Fortas to press his friend, the cellist Pablo Casals, into withdrawing from the tribunal. Although Casals did not participate in the tribunal, it remains unclear whether he withdrew because of American pressure.<\/p>\n

The announcement of the tribunal alerted defenders of Johnson\u2019s Vietnam policies. Morris I. Leibman, a senior partner in the Chicago law firm Leibman, Williams, Bennett, Baird, and Minow, who also served as a civilian aide-at-large to the Secretary of the Army, offered to defend the administration.[40]<\/a> Dan B. Jacobs, a speechwriter to the Democratic candidate for governor of New York, feared that the Russell trial would become \u201ca propaganda circus\u201d that could have a negative impact in Europe, particularly among intellectuals. Jacobs and CIA official Cord Meyer proposed setting up a \u201csmall private project\u201d to present the other side of the story. Under this plan, a small non-governmental project would be established to bring politicians from South Vietnam, Laos, Thailand, and a few dissidents from North Vietnam to present the war from their perspective. The Russell tribunal, he argued, would be reluctant to refuse them the right to testify. If they were denied entrance to the proceedings, they could stand outside in the corridors talking to television reporters, or they could hold daily press conferences.[41]<\/a> The NSC rejected this proposal as ineffective. NSC official D.W. Ropa told Rostow in December 1966 that bringing politicians from South Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand to testify at the Russell tribunal would not be sufficient to counter the damaging impact of the IWCT. The plan to provide alternative witnesses would be ineffective, in Ropa\u2019s view, because the tribunal would be stacked with Russell\u2019s supporters. Instead, Ropa proposed that a seminar be held in the same city where the tribunal would be located, to bring together prominent Vietnamese officials who supported the United States\u2019 objectives in Vietnam. This seminar could \u201chopefully blunt the tribunal\u2019s propaganda edge.\u201d[42]<\/a> \u00a0<\/sup>Ropa urged Rostow to request the CIA to develop a broader range of options using the expertise of the 303 Committee, a special interagency body created in 1964 to oversee covert operations. Most of the documents pertaining to the countermeasures against the IWCT have not yet been declassified, so the details of this project are unclear. The circumstantial evidence, however, suggests that the plan was somewhat successful.<\/p>\n

In November 1966, three African presidents and a monarch who had been the sponsors of the BRPF resigned from the war crimes trial: Senegal\u2019s Leopold Senghor, Zambia\u2019s Kenneth Kaunda, Tanzania\u2019s Julius Nyerere, and Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie. Russell complained that these leaders had withdrawn because of \u201cintolerable pressure\u201d from the United States.[43]<\/a> Russell claimed that one of the African leaders who had resigned had sent him a photocopy of a letter that Russell had sent to President Johnson at the White House, inviting him to appear before the tribunal, thereby establishing a connection between LBJ and the African leader. Russell argued this was \u201ca piece of clumsiness which even the Central Intelligence Agency must have deplored.[44]<\/a> At this time, Russell considered the CIA \u201ca vast international agency of subversion.\u201d[45]<\/a><\/p>\n

Other signs point to White House interference in the establishment of the tribunal. The Pakistan government of Ayub Khan publicly condemned the war crimes tribunal, even though Khan had donated money to the Russell Foundation, and Indian President Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan disassociated himself from the campaign.[46]<\/a> The Sicilian social reformer Danilo Dolci also withdrew as one of the 12 judges on the tribunal in November 1966, saying he would be busy with his work at home.[47]<\/a><\/p>\n

U.S. efforts to undermine the tribunal included attempts to influence the press. In August 1966, a State Department official approached a New York Times <\/em>reporter to suggest running a story on Ralph Schoenman, an American citizen, in the hope of discrediting the foundation\u2019s staff. Schoenman\u2019s activism annoyed officials because he openly espoused anti-American and pro-communist views. Schoenman\u2019s activities were regularly reported in the American press: British authorities frequently arrested him for unlawful assembly, and the United States imposed travel restrictions on him following his visit to China in July 1963 to discuss Russell\u2019s plans to mediate the Sino-Indian border dispute.[48]<\/a> In a colorful piece, the New York Times <\/em>alleged that Schoenman harbored a \u201cdeeply neurotic hatred of his native land,\u201d and charged that his \u201ccontroversial style may be classified as the Extreme Hysterical.\u201d[49]<\/a> \u00a0<\/sup>Alleging that Russell had fallen under the influence of Schoenman, the article argued that Russell must be held responsible for his words and deeds because Russell did believe Schoenman\u2019s views, and was not just \u201ca mindless puppet.\u201d[50]<\/a><\/p>\n

Judging by the regular appearance of newspaper stories criticizing Russell, the Johnson administration\u2019s character assassination campaign appears to have partially succeeded. In January 1967, Joseph Califano, the special presidential assistant, sent Johnson a poem by Ogden Nash, \u201cYou are Old, Father Bertrand,\u201d in which the poet condemned Russell for the trial.[51]<\/a> The poem echoed the pejorative comments in many American newspaper editorials that Russell was both judge and jury even though the tribunal and its investigative teams were drawn from Nobel Prize winners as well as prominent literary figures, scholars, medical doctors, and chemists. A New York Times Magazine <\/em>article by British journalist Bernard Levin, which severely criticized Russell, also appears suspicious. Under Secretary of State Nicholas Katzenbach sent President Johnson a copy of the article with the gleeful comment that the administration had provided the background.[52]<\/a> In his article, Levin criticized Russell for having \u201cturned into a full-time purveyor of political garbage indistinguishable from the routine products of the Soviet machine.\u201d Russell had allegedly \u201csunk to defending\u2014not just denying or minimizing, but actively defending\u2014the atrocities of the Viet Cong in Vietnam.\u201d[53]<\/a> Many American journalists enjoyed making fun of Russell. Writing in the New York Times Magazine, <\/em>Levin denigrated Russell as \u201can old man in a hurry, who had left judgment, his reputation, and his usefulness behind.\u201d[54]<\/a> C.L. Sulzberger ridiculed Russell soon after the opening session of the tribunal in Stockholm: \u201cIf a medieval Moorish king died on the eve of battle, retainers would dress up his stiffened corpse, bind it astride a warhorse, and lead it against the enemy to encourage the troops.\u201d Sulzberger asserted that \u201cthe relic of Bertrand Russell\u201d was \u201cled into battle as a totem from the extreme Left.\u201d[55]<\/a><\/p>\n

Washington\u2019s hand also appeared in the difficulties that Russell experienced in trying to find a location for the tribunal. The tribunal sessions could not be held in Paris, as originally planned, because the French government denied permission. President Charles de Gaulle told Sartre that the tribunal would not be allowed to meet in Paris because justice could only be dispensed by the state, and the IWCT intended to usurp that authority by issuing a verdict. Though de Gaulle did not mention it, it was clear that he did not wish to risk further deterioration of Franco-U.S. relations by offering Paris as a pulpit to the tribunal.[56]<\/a> Next, Russell approached the British government about his plan to hold the tribunal in London, and to provide visas to North Vietnamese witnesses. Prime Minister Wilson, unwilling to cause offense to Washington, told Russell that not only would the one-sided character of the tribunal make peace-making efforts in Vietnam more difficult, but it was also not in the national interest to hold the tribunal in London.[57]<\/a><\/p>\n

The trial organizers finally turned to Stockholm, the Swedish capital, even though the Swedish government had indicated it was likely to refuse.[58]<\/a> U.S. Embassy diplomats in Stockholm had warned Swedish officials that the tribunal would have an adverse effect on U.S.-Sweden relations and serve to harden Hanoi\u2019s position toward negotiations.[59]<\/a> Despite these pressures, Swedish Prime Minister Tage Erlander agreed to allow the tribunal to be held in Stockholm after its organizers promised that the mock trial would be restricted to presenting the facts about American activities in Vietnam, and would neither assume the character of a courtroom nor accuse any private person of a crime.[60]<\/a><\/p>\n

The head of the tribunal, Jean-Paul Sartre, wrote to Secretary of State Rusk in May 1967 to remind him that Russell had not received a reply to his invitation to President Johnson and other U.S. officials to attend the hearings. Sartre invited Rusk, or his designated representatives, to testify because it would help the tribunal in arriving at the truth about the charges of war crimes in Vietnam.[61]<\/a> Rusk rejected these invitations with the sarcastic comment that he had no intention of \u201cplaying games with a ninety-four-year-old Briton.\u201d Sartre shot back that Rusk\u2019s effort to \u201cridicule a great old man\u201d did no honor to the United States.[62]<\/a><\/p>\n

To counter the negative publicity generated by the Russell tribunal, the Swedish Free Asia Committee, a non-government organization, tried to organize a rival hearing in Stockholm on May 10, 1967 that would include the testimony of ten to fifteen defectors from North Vietnam.[63]<\/a> The U.S. Embassy in Stockholm aborted the plan, however, because it believed that the antiwar tribunal was already floundering and being ignored by the press. Any attempt to hold a counter-tribunal risked drawing more attention to the Russell tribunal. Also, U.S. officials did not believe that the Free Asia Committee had the ability to carry off the stunt in time. Instead of organizing a risky alternative tribunal, U.S. officials decided it would be better to ridicule the IWCT\u2019s proceedings.<\/p>\n

As the International War Crimes Tribunal got underway in Stockholm from May 2-10, 1967, the State Department directed all diplomatic missions to portray the IWCT as a communist front. U.S. officials were also instructed to point out that many heads of state had severed their connection with the tribunal. In any case, the United States was not using any experimental weapons, including poison gas forbidden by international law.[64]<\/a> Defoliating chemicals sprayed in Vietnam, the State Department claimed, were the same as conventional, commercially available herbicides and had no harmful effects on humans or animals. Napalm had been using sparingly in North Vietnam, and U.S. air strikes against North Vietnam were carefully restricted to military targets. Moreover, there had been no genocide by U.S. or other \u201cfree world\u201d forces as the United States had not tried to exterminate the Vietnamese population or destroy the communist regime in Hanoi.<\/p>\n

The data shows otherwise. The U.S. military\u2019s use of herbicides in Vietnam began in 1962, expanded in 1965 and 1966, and reached a peak from 1967 to 1969\u2014right when Bertrand Russell was conducting the International War Crimes Tribunal. \u00a0The U.S. Air Force used herbicides extensively in Vietnam under its Operation\u00a0Ranch Hand\u00a0campaign to defoliate inland hardwood forests, coastal mangrove forests, and cultivated land, by aerial spraying from C-123 aircraft and helicopters.[65]<\/a> Soldiers also sprayed herbicides on the earth to defoliate the perimeters of base camps and fire bases, and U.S. Navy riverboats sprayed herbicides along riverbanks. U.S. and Republic of Vietnam forces sprayed more than 20.2 million gallons of military herbicides to defoliate forests and mangroves between 1961 and 1971.[66]<\/a><\/p>\n

The Johnson administration\u2019s propaganda campaign was fairly successful in the United States where many daily newspapers questioned the one-sidedness of the IWCT and the integrity of the witnesses. Time <\/em>magazine, for example, alleged that the tribunal members were not impartial because Russell had handpicked them.[67]<\/a> \u00a0<\/sup>While it is true that invitations to serve on the tribunal were sent out either by Russell or by the Russell foundation, tribunal members were fiercely independent and many had serious differences of opinion with key Russell foundation officials. They were not puppets whom Russell could manipulate. Moreover, Schoenman argued that \u201cthe demand for impartiality or objectivity in the sense of tabula rasa <\/em>does not exist. . . .\u00a0 The only impartiality which has any meaning in an inquiry or a trial is to be found in the evidence: how massive it is, how verifiable, and how accessible to others.\u201d[68]<\/a><\/p>\n

Although some Americans spoke out against attempts to smear the tribunal, their messages were confined to less prestigious media outlets. For example, J.B. Neilands, professor of Biotechnology at the University of California, Berkeley, tried without success to get mainstream newspapers to print his article criticizing the American press for distorting and manipulating the news about the proceedings of the tribunal. His article finally appeared in the Daily Californian <\/em>magazine in December 1967.[69]<\/a> International views were more mixed. The British press, like its American counterpart, was critical of the tribunal, but French and Italian press coverage was more positive.[70]<\/a> Most Western media, except the Scandinavians, denounced Russell and Sartre as \u201cwell-intentioned dupes of Hanoi.\u201d[71]<\/a> While the two philosophers were caricatured in the Western press, they were portrayed as intellectual giants by Third World media.[72]<\/a> The French daily Le Monde <\/em>carried the entire text of Sartre\u2019s closing remarks at the Stockholm session, but most Western mainstream dailies ignored it. Media in India, Pakistan, Mexico, Chile, Uruguay, Algeria, and Egypt published lengthy extracts.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Download the PDF file of the book<\/mark><\/a><\/p>\n

The Verdict of the International War Crimes Tribunal<\/strong><\/p>\n

Recognizing that the tribunal lacked the power to impose sanctions, the organizers decided that the tribunal would try to answer the following questions:[73]<\/a><\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Have the United States government and the governments of Australia, New Zealand, and South Korea committed acts of aggression under international law by sending their troops to fight in Vietnam?<\/li>\n
  2. Has the U.S. Army used or experimented with new weapons, or weapons banned by law in Vietnam?<\/li>\n
  3. Have these foreign forces bombed civilian targets such as hospitals, schools, sanatoria, and dykes?<\/li>\n
  4. Have Vietnamese prisoners been subjected to inhumane treatment forbidden by law, and have there been unjustified reprisals against civilian populations?<\/li>\n
  5. Have forced labor camps been created, and has there been deportation of the population, or other acts tending to the extermination of the population?<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    In his statement at the tribunal\u2019s session in Stockholm, Russell insisted that the tribunal would function impeccably, its investigations would be thorough, and its evidence undeniable. U.S. civil rights attorney Stanley Faulkner argued that the United States Army had breached its own Law of Land Warfare, issued by the U.S. War Department in 1956 defining war crimes and the culpability of individuals who participate in them. Faulkner claimed that the United States military was also in breach of the Hague Convention of 1907 which forbade the use of weapons calculated to cause unnecessary suffering.[74]<\/a> Journalists such as Wilfred Burchett, Bernard Couret, and Tariq Ali, and medical doctors such as Abraham Behar, John Takman, Axel Hojer, Jean Michel Krivine, and Francis Kahn explained how aerial bombardment and chemical weapons had damaged the Vietnamese population. Investigators who testified at the tribunal included surgeons, biochemists, radiologists, doctors, agronomists, lawyers, sociologists, physicists, chemists, and historians. Their medical, scientific, and historical findings filled many trunks and filing cabinets.[75]<\/a> The findings consisted of hundreds of thousands of feet of film showing the bombings and the use of chemical weapons, whose properties were revealed in meticulous detail.<\/p>\n

    \"\"Jean-Paul Sartre, Vladimir Dedijer, and Lawrence Daly at the Stockholm session of the International War Crimes Tribunal
    \nPhoto by the courtesy of the Bertrand Russell Archive, McMaster University<\/p>\n

    After the Stockholm session of the tribunal, the Japanese branch of the BRPF conducted hearings in Tokyo from August 28-30, 1978. A twenty-eight member Japanese tribunal heard testimonies from thirty-six witnesses. It found that the United States had breached international law by attacking Vietnam with chemical weapons. It also found the Japanese government and Japanese business corporations guilty of acting as accomplices of the United States.[76]<\/a><\/p>\n

    The second session was held in November 1967 in Denmark. Russell\u2019s supporters in Denmark were keen to host a session of the tribunal because they wanted to mobilize Danish citizens around a major human rights issue. Danish antiwar activists reasoned that the Stockholm tribunal had contributed to transforming Sweden into a humane society. Moreover, it was high time for Denmark to follow Sweden\u2019s example of acting independently of the United States.[77]<\/a> \u00a0<\/sup>The Danish government approved the tribunal, but shifted its location from the capital Copenhagen to Roskilde, a small town 30 km outside the city, to keep it low key and to avoid embarrassing publicity.<\/p>\n

    At the second session from November 20 to December 1, 1967 at Roskilde, American soldiers David Tuck, Peter Martinsen, and Donald Duncan testified that they went to Vietnam to fight communists, but became disillusioned when they discovered that Vietnamese civilians were the enemy.[78]<\/a> At Roskilde, Russell\u2019s opening statement drew attention to the Stockholm findings, and asked that the Roskilde participants acknowledge that the concept of aggression covered all of the U.S.\u2019 crimes in Vietnam. Sartre observed that despite several invitations the U.S. government had refused to send a representative to the session.[79]<\/a> The American playwright Carl Oglesby, a former president of Students for a Democratic Society, and a member of the IWCT, told the session that the Stockholm tribunal had played an important role in developing militancy among American youth. The tribunal, he believed, had shown Americans that their refusal to be inducted into the U.S. military was based on sound legal arguments because the American intervention in Vietnam violated international law. More important, the tribunal had served as a clearinghouse of information on the war, which gave Americans a clear idea about the use of anti-personnel bombs used by U.S. forces.[80]<\/a><\/p>\n

    The Roskilde session found Japan, Thailand, and the Philippines guilty of complicity in the aggression committed by the United States against Vietnam. By using Japan\u2019s land, naval, and air bases at Okinawa, and using Japanese technical facilities to repair U.S. air, land, and naval equipment, the United States had turned Japan, with the complicity of its government, into an essential element in the war against Vietnam.[81]<\/a> Out of eleven tribunal members, eight found Japan guilty of complicity, and three agreed that Japan provided substantial aid to the United States government, even though they did not regard Japan as an accomplice in the crime of aggression. The complicity of Thailand was established by documents presented to the tribunal showing that the Thai government gave diplomatic help to the United States, and sent an expeditionary corps to Vietnam to fight alongside American forces. The use of Thai military bases made it easier and less expensive to launch air attacks against Vietnam. The government of the Philippines also gave access to military bases to U.S. forces, and sent troops to South Vietnam.<\/p>\n

    By unanimous vote the tribunal concluded that the United States had committed aggression against Laos. It found that the United States had used and experimented with weapons prohibited both by the Hague Conventions of 1907, and the U.S. Law of Land Warfare of 1956 which obliges armies not to use unnecessary violence for military objectives. The tribunal observed that U.S. forces had repeatedly breached the Geneva Conventions of 1949, which stipulate that prisoners of war must receive humane treatment. Even though the United States had signed this agreement, numerous American and Vietnamese soldiers testified that summary executions and torture were common, prisoners were thrown out of flying helicopters, and medical care was systematically refused to the wounded and ill who refused to provide information. In further violation of the Geneva Convention prohibition against rendition, prisoners held by the United States were handed over to the Saigon regime, which was known to conduct torture. The tribunal unanimously found the United States guilty of subjecting civilians to inhuman treatment prohibited by international law. The tribunal heard the testimony of three American veterans, some Vietnamese victims, and a report of the tribunal\u2019s investigative team in NLF areas that showed that in the course of American raiding operations thousands of inhabitants were massacred, villages were leveled, fields devastated, and livestock killed. The tribunal cited American journalist Jonathan Schell\u2019s report about the extermination by American forces of the population of the village of Ben Sue, and its complete destruction.[82]<\/a><\/p>\n

    At the end of the session, the American activist David Dellinger emphasized that the United States had deliberately expanded its intervention in Vietnam beginning with \u201cdiplomatic warfare\u201d at the Geneva Conference, conducting political infiltration, training puppets, organizing the counterinsurgency, training and leading Saigon troops, and finally sending American troops.[83]<\/a> Citing the extermination of American Indians and African-Americans as a precedent, Dellinger insisted that a democratic society such as the United States was capable of committing genocide. Dellinger defended the legitimacy of the tribunal, and urged the United States to withdraw its forces from Vietnam.[84]<\/a><\/p>\n

    Russell expressed satisfaction at the outcome of the tribunal, but he conceded that it had not been as big a success as it could have been primarily because the more prominent members of the tribunal were either unwilling or unable to devote much time and effort to it, and some of them even vacillated in their support.[85]<\/a> Russell appeared to be referring to Stokely Carmichael, who was invited to serve on the tribunal but excused himself saying he did not have enough time. Nevertheless, Carmichael made a brief appearance at the Stockholm session.[86]<\/a>\u00a0 <\/sup>Moreover, Russell was not pleased with Sartre\u2019s initial reticence to get involved owing to his own work in Paris, even though Sartre later took full control of the tribunal as its executive president.<\/p>\n

    Russell did not attend the tribunal\u2019s sessions that were held in Stockholm and Denmark in 1967 because he was too old to travel, leaving it to Schoenman to read his address at the opening session. Despite the support of Ho Chi Minh and others, the tribunal did not have sufficient funding. U.S. Embassy officials in Stockholm learned that many delegates had given up hotel rooms, and some were commuting from thirty miles outside Stockholm.[87]<\/a> Despite these minor internal troubles, the peace foundation succeeded in drawing attention to the horrors of the American intervention in Vietnam.<\/p>\n

    The DRV played a crucial role by actively supporting, guiding, and financing the activities of both the IWCT and the BRPF. Russell was greatly assisted by Ho Chi Minh, who helped organize the visits of the tribunal\u2019s fact-and evidence-gathering teams to North Vietnam and the liberated areas of the south. Equally important were the efforts of the London-based representatives of Cuu Quoc <\/em>Weekly, who helped Russell organize an international commission to investigate war crimes in Vietnam, and enabled Ho Chi Minh to maintain close contact with Russell. Moreover, the heads of various DRV people\u2019s organizations coordinated anti-U.S. events with Russell and his staff. In these ways, Russell became one of Ho Chi Minh\u2019s closest allies in the West. Russell genuinely shared with Ho Chi Minh the belief that the United States was a threat to world peace. However, the North Vietnamese did not exercise any influence over the tribunal, and their one attempt to control the tribunal ended in failure as Russell himself objected to it.<\/p>\n

    Because Russell\u2019s efforts to convince the Johnson administration to withdraw from Vietnam fell on deaf ears, the tribunal became an important vehicle to publicize the damage the United States had inflicted on Vietnamese society. The Johnson administration\u2019s efforts to thwart the IWCT mostly failed, although U.S. officials did manage to persuade some foreign heads of government to withdraw their support from the tribunal, and the U.S. mainstream media did raise questions about the tribunal\u2019s credibility.<\/p>\n

    How the IWCT Showed the Way Forward <\/strong><\/p>\n

    It was extraordinary that an ageing Bertrand Russell was able to jointly create the IWCT with Ho Chi Minh\u2019s assistance to break a new path to challenge the imperialist policies of a superpower by giving marginalized people their voice in an international forum and uniting them with antiwar activists in the West.[88]<\/a> The IWCT\u2019s contribution was far-reaching, and went beyond borders in several ways: it had a widely resonating impact on global public opinion, and its scrupulous proceedings with attention to meticulous detail boosted the antiwar movement in the United States. The tribunal took centerstage at a historical moment when even the United Nations was powerless to restrain the United States in Vietnam. Its proceedings were sober, fair-minded, and reflected the opinions of the vast majority of people opposed to war crimes.<\/p>\n

    When \u00a0the Johnson Administration rebuffed Russell\u2019s entreaties to convince it to withdraw U.S. military forces from Vietnam, the tribunal became an important vehicle to publicize the damage the United States had inflicted on Vietnamese society. Russell and Ho Chi Minh hoped that the tribunal would restrain President Johnson and lead the U.S. government toward peace talks with North Vietnam. It is difficult to demonstrate that the tribunal pushed the United States to hold peace talks, but it certainly lent a shoulder in the global effort to end the U.S. intervention.<\/p>\n

    The IWCT was a demonstrable success in that it damaged the image of the U.S. government abroad. Fearing adverse publicity, the Johnson administration attempted to sabotage the IWCT, but these efforts mostly failed. Without a doubt the antiwar movement owes an enormous debt of gratitude to Russell\u2019s vision of creating a global tribunal that was fulfilled when, after his death in 1970, the IWCT germinated a whole range of tribunals that interrogated human rights abuses across the world.<\/p>\n

    The victorious North Vietnamese Communists honored Russell\u2019s contribution by naming a street after the British philosopher, after they succeeded in reunifying the two halves of their country in 1975. Bertrand Russell Street in Tan Phu Ward of District 7 in Ho Chi Minh City is concrete evidence of the respect he receives in Vietnam and serves to memorialize his global antiwar activism. It symbolizes the road to peace and justice that Russell and Ho Chi Minh traveled on.<\/p>\n

    NOTES:<\/h5>\n

    [1]<\/a> Russell to Ho, August 17, 1963, Bertrand Russell Archives (BRA), 650, Heads of State, Vietnam (Democratic Republic), File 71, Box 1.61, McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada. Also see, Harish C. Mehta, People\u2019s Diplomacy of Vietnam: Soft Power in the Resistance War, 1965\u20131972<\/em> (Newcastle upon Tyne, UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2020); Harish C. Mehta, \u201cRestoring Agency to Informal Diplomats in Narratives of the Vietnam War,\u201d History Compass,<\/em> June 25, 2015; and Harish C. Mehta, \u201cNorth Vietnam\u2019s Informal Diplomacy with Bertrand Russell: Peace Activism and the International War Crimes Tribunal,\u201d Peace & Change<\/em> 37, no. 1 (2012): 64-94.<\/p>\n

    [2]<\/a> Letter, Russell to Tran Viet Dung, January 3, 1964, BRA II, 375, Working Correspondence with Vietnamese (December 1966), Box 10.5.<\/p>\n

    [3]<\/a> Statement by Bertrand Russell at Television Interview and Press Conference on Launching of Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation and Atlantic Peace Foundation, September 29, 1963, Peace (Bertrand Russell), Box 3, Lyndon Baines Johnson Library (LBJ), Austin, Texas.<\/p>\n

    [4]<\/a> \u201cWar Crimes,\u201d Office on Genocide Prevention and the Responsibility to Protect, United Nations, https:\/\/www.un.org\/en\/genocideprevention\/war-crimes.shtml<\/p>\n

    [5]<\/a> Letter, Russell to Ho, November 1964, BRA, 650, Heads of State, Vietnam (Democratic Republic), File 71, Box 1.61; and Letter, Russell to Ho, December 30, 1964, BRA, 650, Heads of State, Vietnam (Democratic Republic), File 71, Box 1.61.<\/p>\n

    [6]<\/a> Letter, Russell to Ho, February 8, 1965, BRA, 650, Heads of State, Vietnam (Democratic Republic), File 71, Box 1.61.<\/p>\n

    [7]<\/a> Letter, Russell to Ho, March 3, 1965, BRA, 650, Heads of State, Vietnam (Democratic Republic), File 71, Box 1.61.<\/p>\n

    [8]<\/a> Telegram, Ho to Russell, August 2, 1966, BRA II, 375, Working Correspondence with Vietnamese (December 1966), Box 10.5; and Letter, Russell to Ho, August 12, 1966, BRA II, 375, Working Correspondence with Vietnamese (December 1966), Box 10.5.<\/p>\n

    [9]<\/a> For exchange rates, see International Monetary Statistics, International Monetary Fund, www.imfstatistics.org\/imf Accessed on November 5, 2008. One US dollar was worth 4.902 French New Francs in 1965, and 4.914 French New Francs in 1966.<\/p>\n

    [10]<\/a> See, Pacific Exchange Rate Service, University of British Columbia, Sauder School of Business, http:\/\/fx.sauder.ubc.ca\/etc\/GBPpages.pdf Accessed on August 19 2009. One British Pound was worth 2.80 US Dollars from 1964-1966. Also see, Letter, Bertrand Russell to President Ayub Khan, August 14, 1964; Letter, Ralph Schoenman to High Commissioner of Pakistan in London, October 27, 1964, BRA, 650, Heads of State, Box 1.59; and Letter, A. Hilaly to Bertrand Russell, March 3, 1966, BRA, 650, Heads of State, Box 1.59.<\/p>\n

    [11]<\/a> Letter, King Faisal Al Saud to Bertrand Russell, undated; Letter Russell to King Faisal, January 6, 1966; and Letter, Hafiz Wahba, Ambassador, Saudi Arabia to Russell, July 16, 1965, BRA, 650, Heads of State, Box 1.59.<\/p>\n

    [12]<\/a> Russell\u2019s papers do not mention the amounts contributed by Bahrain and Zambia. Letter, Personal Secretary, Ruler of Bahrain to Russell, August 4, 1964 to Russell, BRA, 650, Heads of State Box 1.57; and Letter, Schoenman to President Kenneth Kaunda, November 17, 1964, BRA, 650, Heads of State, 1.61.<\/p>\n

    [13]<\/a> Summary Report of Series of Meetings, BRA II, 375, Working Correspondence with Vietnamese (December 1966), Box 10.5.<\/p>\n

    [14]<\/a> \u201cSummary Report of Meeting between Ho, Pham Van Dong and Russell\u2019s representatives,\u201d BRA II, 375, Working Correspondence with Vietnamese (December 1966), Box 10.5.<\/p>\n

    [15]<\/a> Caroline Moorehead: Bertrand Russell: A Life <\/em>(London: Sinclair-Stevenson, 1992), <\/em>529.<\/p>\n

    [16]<\/a> Letter, Russell to Ho, July 20, 1966, BRA, 650, Heads of State, Vietnam (Democratic Republic), File 71, Box 1.61.<\/p>\n

    [17]<\/a> Letter, Russell to Johnson, December 21, 1963, Peace (Bertrand Russell), Box 3, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [18]<\/a> Letter, McGeorge Bundy to Russell, January 8, 1964, Peace (Bertrand Russell), Box 3, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [19]<\/a> Letter, Russell to Johnson, January 6, 1964, White House Central File, Name File, Russell, Bertrand, Box R 339, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [20]<\/a> Letter, Bromley Smith to Russell, January 27, 1964, White House Central File, Name File, Russell, Bertrand, Box R 339, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [21]<\/a> \u201cImpartial Report on Meeting of Bertrand Russell and Others with the United States Ambassador in London, Mr. David Bruce,\u201d July 20, 1964, BRA II, 320, World Affairs, Vietnam Correspondence (February 9, 1965), File 178, Box 9.55.<\/p>\n

    [22]<\/a> Secretary of Defense McNamara believed that the NLF\u2019s \u201cpublic pronouncements of a neutral solution\u201d were \u201cpure propaganda.\u201d He argued that American officials did not take \u201cneutrality\u201d seriously because Hanoi and the NLF would not permit a neutral South Vietnam to exist. See, Robert S. McNamara, James G. Blight, Robert Kendall Brigham, Thomas J. Biersteker, and Herbert Y. Schandler, Argument Without End: Jn Search of Answers to the Vietnam Tragedy <\/em>(New York: Public Affairs, 1999), 101.<\/p>\n

    [23]<\/a> Bertrand Russell, The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell, 1944-1969 <\/em>(New York: Simon and Schuster, 1969), <\/em>243.<\/p>\n

    [24]<\/a> Cable, David Bruce to State Department, July 16, 1961, Berlin Crisis, Item No: BC02178, Digital National Security Archive; David Bruce Diaries, October 28, 1962, Cuban Missile Crisis, CC01623, Digital National Security Archive.<\/p>\n

    [25]<\/a> Telegram, Russell to Johnson, August 6, 1964, National Security-Defense (EX ND 19\/CO 230), Box 214, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [26]<\/a> Telegram, Russell to Johnson, October 29, 1964, GEN CO 312, 9.1.64, Box 83, LBJ Library; and Memo, Benjamin H. Read to McGeorge Bundy, January 21, 1965, National Security Defense (EX ND 19\/CO 230), Box 214, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [27]<\/a> Telegram, Russell to Johnson, November 27, 1964, National Security-Defense (EX ND 19\/CO 230), Box 214, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [28]<\/a> Letter, Russell to Johnson, February 9, 1965, National Security-Defense (GEN ND 19\/CO 312, 2.24.65, Box 235, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [29]<\/a> Letter, Chester L. Cooper to Russell, February 24, 1965, National Security-Defense (GEN ND 19\/CO 312, 2.24.65, Box 235, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [30]<\/a> \u201cSartre on Panel Named to \u2018Try\u2019 U.S. Leaders,\u201d August 3, 1966, New York Times. <\/em>The tribunal included Russell as Honorary President, Sartre as Executive President, and historian Vladimir Dedijer as Chairman of Sessions. After dropouts and new additions, the tribunal members included: political scientist Wolfgang Abendroth, writer Gunther Anders, Turkish parliamentarian Mehmet Ali Aybar, American novelist James Baldwin, Italian parliamentarian Lelio Basso, writer Simone de Beauvoir, former Mexican President Lazaro Cardenas, SNCC chairman Stokely Carmichael, General Secretary of the Scottish National Union of Mineworkers Lawrence Daly, American activist and editor of Liberation <\/em>David Dellinger, historian Isaac Deutscher, lawyer Haika Grossman, Philippine poet laureate Amado Hernandez, chairperson of the Cuban Committee for Solidarity with Vietnam Melba Hernandez, Pakistani Supreme Court lawyer Mahmud Ali Kasuri, Swedish author Sara Lidman, Vice-Chairman of the Japanese Civil Liberties Union Kinju Morikawa, former Students for a Democratic Society President Carl Oglesby, physics professor Shoichi Sakata, French mathematician Laurent Schwartz, and playwright Peter Weiss.<\/p>\n

    [31]<\/a> Telegram, Russell to Johnson, October 29, 1964, GEN CO 312, 9.1.64, Box 83, LBJ Library; and Memo, Benjamin H. Read to McGeorge Bundy, January 21, 1965, National Security Defense (EX ND 19\/CO 230), Box 214, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [32]<\/a> Letter, Russell to Johnson, August 25, 1966, White House Central File, Name File, Russell, Bertrand, Box R 339, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [33]<\/a> The U.S. Government and the Vietnam War: Executive and Legislative Roles and Relationships, Part IV: July 1965-January 1968, <\/em>United States, Congress, Senate, Committee on Foreign Relations, Library of Congress, Congressional Research Service (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1986), <\/em>433.<\/p>\n

    [34]<\/a> For more on the U.S. government\u2019s efforts to create propaganda, particularly the foreign initiatives of USIA, see Cull, The Cold War and the United States Information Agency: American Propaganda and Public Diplomacy, 1945-1989; <\/em>Wilson P. Dizard, Inventing Public Diplomacy: The Story of the U.S. Information Agency <\/em>(Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 2004); Alvin A. Snyder, Warriors of Disinformation: American Propaganda, Soviet Lies, and the Winning of the Cold War <\/em>(New York: Arcade, 1995); Leo Bogart, Cool Words, Cold War: A New Look at USIA’ s Premises for Propaganda <\/em>(Washington, DC: American University Press, 1995); Walter L. Hixon, Parting the Curtain: Propaganda, Culture, and the Cold War, 1945-1961 <\/em>(New York: St. Martin\u2019s, 1977); John W. Henderson, The United States Information Agency <\/em>(New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1969); and Propaganda and the Cold War: A Princeton University Symposium, <\/em>ed. John Boardman Whitton (Washington, DC: Public Affairs Press, 1963).<\/p>\n

    [35]<\/a> The U.S. Government and the Vietnam War: Executive and Legislative Roles and Relationships, Part JV: July 1965-January 1968, <\/em>433.<\/p>\n

    [36]<\/a> For more on COINTELPRO (or Counterintelligence Program), see, Ward Churchill and Jim Vander Wall, Cointelpro Papers: Documents from the FBJ\u2019S Secret Wars Against Dissent in the United States <\/em>(Boston, MA: South End Press, 1990); James Kirkpatrick Davis, Assault on the Left: The FBI and the Sixties Antiwar Movement <\/em>(Westport, CT: Praeger, 1997); and James Kirkpatrick Davis, Spying on America: The FBJ\u2019s Domestic Counterintelligence Program <\/em>(New York: Praeger, 1992).<\/p>\n

    [37]<\/a> Telcon, Ball and Yarmolinsky, Ball Telcons, August 5, 1966, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [38]<\/a> The U.S. Government and the Vietnam War: Executive and Legislative Roles and Relationships, Part IV: July 1965-January 1968, <\/em>434.<\/p>\n

    [39]<\/a> Ibid., 434.<\/p>\n

    [40]<\/a> Letter, Morris I. Leibman to Walt W. Rostow, August 16, 1966, White House Central File, Name File, Russell, Bertrand, Box R 339, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [41]<\/a> Letter, Dan B. Jacobs to William Connell, November 19, 1966, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, The Bertrand Russell \u2018Trial,\u2019 Box 191, LBJ Library; and Memo, William Connell to Rostow, December 2, 1966, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, The Bertrand Russell \u2018Trial,\u2019 Box 191, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [42]<\/a> Memo, D.W. Ropa to Rostow, December 12, 1966, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, The Bertrand Russell \u2018Trial,\u2019 Box 191, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [43]<\/a> Memo, State Department to Johnson, February 17, 1967, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, The Bertrand Russell \u2018Trial,\u2019 Box 191, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [44]<\/a> Russell, The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell, 1944-1969, <\/em>245.<\/p>\n

    [45]<\/a> \u201cA Communication,\u201d February 1966, Frontier, <\/em>BRA II, 320, Box 9.50.<\/p>\n

    [46]<\/a> Memo, State Department to Johnson, February 17, 1967, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, The Bertrand Russell \u2018Trial,\u2019 Box 191, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [47]<\/a> \u201cDolci Resigns as War Crimes \u2018Judge\u2019,\u201d November 16, 1966, Daily Mail.<\/em><\/p>\n

    [48]<\/a> \u201cU.S. Curbs Russell\u2019s Aide,\u201d July 24, 1964, New York Times; <\/em>\u201cU.S. Aide of Russell Arrested,\u201d February 1, 1965, New York Times; <\/em>and \u201cRussell Aide Detained at Airport by French,\u201d January 12, 1967, New York Times.<\/em><\/p>\n

    [49]<\/a> New York Times, <\/em>February 19, 1967.<\/em><\/p>\n

    [50]<\/a> Ibid.<\/p>\n

    [51]<\/a> Memo, Joseph Califano to Johnson, January 12, 1967, National Security-Defense (EX ND 19\/CO 312), 10.1.66, Box 223, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [52]<\/a> Memo, Katzenbach to Johnson, February 17, 1967, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [53]<\/a> Bernard Levin, \u201cBertrand Russell: Prosecutor, Judge and Jury,\u201d February 19, 1967, New <\/em>York Times Magazine.<\/em><\/p>\n

    [54]<\/a> Bernard Levin, New York Times Magazine, <\/em>February 19, 1967.<\/p>\n

    [55]<\/a> C.L. Sulzberger, Sacramento Bee, <\/em>May 17, 1967.<\/p>\n

    [56]<\/a> Arthur Jay Klinghoffer and Judith Apter Klinghoffer, International Citizens’ Tribunals: Mobilizing Public Opinion to Advance Human Rights <\/em>(New York: Palgrave, 2002), 121.<\/p>\n

    [57]<\/a> Ibid.<\/p>\n

    [58]<\/a> \u201cSwedish Note to Russell,\u201d December 12, 1966, Agence France-Presse.<\/p>\n

    [59]<\/a> Cable, American Embassy Stockholm to Secretary of State, April 25, 1967, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, The Bertrand Russell \u2018Trial,\u2019 Box 191, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [60]<\/a> Sam Hall, Reuters, April 27, 1967; and \u201cSwedish official view as to Russell\u2019s \u2018Vietnam war crimes tribunal\u2019,\u201d Royal Swedish Government statement, April 26, 1967, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, The Bertrand Russell \u2018Trial,\u2019 Box 191, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [61]<\/a> Letter, Sartre to Rusk, May 3, 1967, Against the Crime of Silence: Proceedings of the Russell International War Crimes Tribunal, <\/em>ed. John Duffel (New York: O’Hare, 1968), 25-26.<\/p>\n

    [62]<\/a> Jean-Paul Sartre, \u201cConcerning Dean Rusk,\u201d Against the Crime of Silence, <\/em>36.<\/p>\n

    [63]<\/a> Cable, American Embassy Stockholm to Secretary of State, May 5, 1967, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, The Bertrand Russell \u2018Trial,\u2019 Box 191, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [64]<\/a> Cable, State Department and USIA to various U.S. Government agencies, May 8, 1967, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, The Bertrand Russell \u2018Trial,\u2019 Box 191, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [65]<\/a> Veterans and Agent Orange: <\/em>Health Effects of Herbicides Used in Vietnam<\/em>,<\/em> Institute of Medicine (U.S.) Committee to Review the Health Effects in Vietnam Veterans of Exposure to Herbicides (Washington, DC:\u00a0National Academies Press, 1994). The purpose of spraying herbicides was to improve the ability to detect enemy base camps and enemy forces along lines of communication and infiltration routes, and around U.S. base camps and fire bases. Spraying was also done to destroy the crops of the NLF and the DRV.<\/p>\n

    [66]<\/a> J.M. Stellman, et al, \u201cThe Extent and Patterns of Usage of Agent Orange and Other Herbicides in Vietnam,\u00a0Nature <\/em>422, no. 6933 (2003):681\u2013687.<\/p>\n

    [67]<\/a> \u201cTrial\u2019s End,\u201d Time<\/em>, May 19, 1967.<\/em><\/p>\n

    [68]<\/a> Against the Crime of Silence, <\/em>8.<\/p>\n

    [69]<\/a> \u201cThe Press and the International War Crimes Tribunal,\u201d August 1967, BRA II, 373, IWCT Investigation Teams and Witnesses, Box 10.4; Letter, Russell to Neilands, September 7, 1967, BRA II, 373, IWCT Investigation Teams and Witnesses, Box 10.4; and Letter, Neilands to Russell, September 15, 1967, BRA II, 373, IWCT Investigation Teams and Witnesses, Box 10.4.<\/p>\n

    [70]<\/a> Klinghoffer, International Citizens\u2019 Tribunals: Mobilizing Public Opinion to Advance Human Rights, <\/em>132.<\/p>\n

    [71]<\/a> Tariq Ali, Street Fighting Years: An Autobiography of the Sixties <\/em>(London: Collins, 1987), 124-125.<\/p>\n

    [72]<\/a> Ibid., 126.<\/p>\n

    [73]<\/a> \u201cAims and objectives of the International War Crimes Tribunal,\u201d Against the Crime of Silence, <\/em>15. Also see, Laurent Schwartz, A Mathematician Grappling with His Century <\/em>(Basel: Birkhauser Verlag, 2001), 407. Schwartz, a French mathematician, argues that \u201cthe tribunal proved clearly that the American objective was to kill as much of the civilian population as possible.\u201d<\/p>\n

    [74]<\/a> \u201cInternational Law and the Military Draft: Testimony by Stanley Faulkner,\u201d Against the Crime of Silence, <\/em>91.<\/p>\n

    [75]<\/a> Ibid., 10.<\/p>\n

    [76]<\/a> \u201cFindings of the Tokyo Tribunal,\u201d BRA II, 376, IWCT, General Correspondence with Vietnamese.<\/p>\n

    [77]<\/a> \u00a0<\/sup>Klinghoffer, International Citizens’ Tribunals: Mobilizing Public Opinion to Advance Human Rights, <\/em>153.<\/p>\n

    [78]<\/a> \u201cTestimony and Questioning of David Kenneth Tuck;\u201d \u201cTestimony and Questioning of Peter Martinsen;\u201d and \u201cTestimony and Questioning of Donald Duncan,\u201d Against the Crime of Silence, <\/em>403-457.<\/p>\n

    [79]<\/a> \u201cOpening Address to the Second Session by Jean-Paul Sartre,\u201d Against the Crime of Silence, <\/em>315-317.<\/p>\n

    [80]<\/a> \u201cGreetings to the Tribunal from American Supporters: Address by Carl Oglesby,\u201d Against the Crime of Silence, <\/em>318, 323.<\/p>\n

    [81]<\/a> \u201cSummary and Verdict of the Second Session,\u201d Against the Crime of Silence, <\/em>643-650.<\/p>\n

    [82]<\/a> Against the Crime of Silence, <\/em>648.<\/p>\n

    [83]<\/a> \u201cAppeal to American and World Opinion read by Dave Dellinger,\u201d Against the Crime of Silence, <\/em>650-652.<\/p>\n

    [84]<\/a> \u201cBertrand Russell’s Final Address to the Tribunal,\u201d Against the Crime of Silence, <\/em>633-634.<\/p>\n

    [85]<\/a> Letter, Russell to Pham Ngoc Thach, September 27, 1967, BRA II, 375, Working Correspondence with Vietnamese (Dec. 1967) Box 10.6.<\/p>\n

    [86]<\/a> Klinghoffer, International Citizens’ Tribunals: Mobilizing Public Opinion to Advance Human Rights, <\/em>155.<\/p>\n

    [87]<\/a> Cable, American Embassy Stockholm to Secretary of State, May 6, 1967, National Security File, Country File, Vietnam, The Bertrand Russell \u2018Trial,\u2019 Box 191, LBJ Library.<\/p>\n

    [88]<\/a> Mehta, \u201cNorth Vietnam\u2019s Informal Diplomacy with Bertrand Russell,\u201d Peace & Change<\/em> 37, no. 1 (2012).<\/p>\n

    ____________________________________________<\/p>\n

    \"\"<\/a>Harish C. Mehta is the Editor-in-chief of the\u00a0<\/em>Rising Asia Journal (Kolkata, India).<\/em><\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

    \"\"<\/a>Bertrand Arthur William Russell, (18 May 1872 \u2013 2 Feb 1970), 3rd Earl Russell, was a British Nobel Literature laureate, philosopher, logician, mathematician, historian, writer, social critic, and political activist.<\/em><\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

    \"\"<\/a>H\u1ed3 Ch\u00ed Minh (19\u00a0May 1890 \u2013 2\u00a0Sep 1969) was a Vietnamese revolutionary and politician who served as the founder and first president of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam from 1945 until his death in 1969, and as its first prime minister from 1945 to 1955. Ideologically a Marxist\u2013Leninist, he founded the Indochinese Communist Party in 1930 and its successor Workers’ Party of Vietnam (later the Communist Party of Vietnam) in 1951, serving as the party’s chairman until his death. Because he was in exile for nearly 30 years, H\u1ed3 could speak fluently as well as read and write professionally in French, Russian, English, Cantonese and Mandarin, as well as Vietnamese. In addition, he was reported to speak conversational Esperanto. In the 1920s, he was bureau chief\/editor of many newspapers which he established to criticize French Colonial Government of Indochina.<\/em><\/p>\n

    Copyright \u00a9 2025 Rising Asia Journal<\/em><\/p>\n

    Go to Original – rajraf.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Oct 2025 – The audacity of Bertrand Russell and Ho Chi Minh to create a transnational war crimes tribunal to try the US government for crimes against the people of Vietnam and Laos through bombardment of civilians, schools, hospitals, and villages. The tribunal hearings in Sweden, Denmark and Japan signposts the continuing relevance of war crimes trials.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":301103,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[139],"tags":[3143,2642,240,122,232,244,907,1854,3621,818,2708,70,2052,1953,965],"class_list":["post-304653","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-justice","tag-anti-hegemony","tag-anti-imperialism","tag-asia","tag-bertrand-russell","tag-capitalism","tag-china","tag-communism","tag-crimes-against-humanity","tag-laos","tag-proxy-war","tag-russell-sartre-tribunal","tag-usa","tag-vietnam","tag-vietnam-war","tag-war-crimes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304653","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=304653"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304653\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":304700,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304653\/revisions\/304700"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/301103"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=304653"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=304653"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=304653"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}