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During the boat people crises that started in earnest in 1978 there were thousands of odd stories. Some,like the fellow who pretended to be a customs officer in Saigon and hid on a freight boat and walked off in Singapore, were amazing stories of pluck and humor. Many were of tragedy. There are too many to relate here.
There is one story that provides an interesting point.
All of the countries in the area offered some sort of asylum, except Singapore. Except for the plucky fellow mentioned above no refugees arrived directly from Vietnam to Singapore. Singapore felt that being a small city state, predominately Chinese in a neighborhood of Muslims that it would become a magnet for all of the Chinese refugees streaming out of Vietnam if they made any exceptions. (Vietnam was at war with China at the time and was organizing the expulsion of Chinese - for profit - en masse.)
Refugees that were picked up by commercial shipping at sea could be off loaded in Singapore on one condition, that they had a letter of guarantee from the country that the ship was sailing under. There were a lot for Denmark, Sweden and the United States because these countries dominated the shipping lines in the area.
Refugees would be checked for family reunification and if found to not have a suitable anchor would have to be sent to the country that carried the flag for the ship that rescued them.
The routine was broken one time when the US Embassy Refugee Office received word that an American Naval ship had picked up a small boat of about 18 refugees. It was obvious that something was very wrong because all of the boats out of Vietnam were packed with almost no room to sit, and in this boat there was space, a lot of space.
The naval officers separated the refugees and heard one of the most horrific stories of the whole era. Thugs had taken over the boat. They had raped the teenage girls. The boat had been lost for weeks. They had ran low on food and when somebody got sick the thugs threw them overboard. When food got scarce they threw some more over. When food ran out they killed and cannibalized the victim.
The refugee office identified the thugs before they arrived. They were part of a ruthless band that operated as a cell to the VC but had no ideology, they used the conflict steal, extort and create mayhem. The refugee officer documented all of the alleged crimes of this group of thugs in Vietnam and the terrible crimes they committed at sea.
The refugee officer then transmitted the information to every embassy in the world, explaining exactly how terrible these guys were. Then the Naval ship arrived and the refugees were unloaded unto Singapore under a letter of guarantee.
A few days later it became obvious that the refugee officer had just created a great Gordian knot. No one was going to take the murdering/raping/cannibal Viet Cong. And yet the US Government had guaranteed they would take them.
The refugee officer was moved and 'the clean up guy' came in. He had to twist arms. He made deals with countries that couldn't take a lot of refugees to swap 500 guaranteed refugees if they would take one 'cannibal'. It took 6 months, he did what he had to do to get rid of the 8 thugs.
Obama wouldn't have started the Iraq war.
He wouldn't have opened Guantanamo Bay to hold combatants in a legal mumbo jumbo.
He wouldn't have authorized the torture.
Without the torture there wouldn't be any pictures that wouldn't have to be withheld.
Without the torture there wouldn't be any need for military tribunals. The criminals would have been caught and their statements from legal interrogations would have been used.
I understand why people are upset about the photos, the tribunals and all of the other mess. Its an easy shot to take.
But right now Obama has to either prosecute or relocate 200 people that would be as popular as a murdering/rapist/canibal Viet Cong thug. He didn't get them there and he didn't screw up their prosecutions.
Now President Obama has undertaken to make a major speech in Egypt on June 4th to try and undo the damage to American-Muslim relations that Bush/Cheney have done over the last 8 years.
Having had to do a couple of 'clean up jobs' one thing is always clear; When the time for clean up has arrived all of the good options are long gone.
I would have preferred that the pictures be released. I would have preferred the tribunals not needed.
While these preferences were not met my over ridding preference has been, that Obama takes care of the clean up.
He isn't the guy who started the war, authorized the torture or mangled the judicial options.
He is just the clean up guy.
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