Whitlam and the Vietnamese SIR: In his failure to rescue—indeed to actively prohibit the rescue of—South Vietnamese at the time of the fall of Saigon, Gough Whitlam stands self-condemned. In a letter to Gerard Henderson of December 30, 2002, Whitlam states: “RAAF planes brought more than 200 Vietnamese war orphans to Sydney on Saturday 5 April 1975. On the front pages of the SMH and Australian of 7 April there are large photographs of me nursing a 7-month orphan at North Head quarantine station …” On April 5, 1975, the fall of Saigon was not inevitable. It held out to…
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