The United States of America: A History of Stealing Babies?

Abduction of children is one of the alleged crimes that the West, headed by the United States, has accused Russia and its president Vladimir Putin of. The accusations came that Putin ordered that Ukrainian children living in areas directly under Russian occupation like the Donbas be deported to Russia and adopted by Russian families. Russia from its side has not denied taking children away from Ukraine, portraying itself as a hero that is saving orphan children from death in the war zone. The international community accuses them of wanting to strip these kids of their Ukrainian nationality and identity, and attempting to make them Russian. Although public opinion agrees majorly that this is a bad and abhorrent action, others have also called on the United States to not dare criticize Russia since it has done the same thing more than 40 years ago in its own swamp, Vietnam. In this article, we will launch a wide investigation to determine and prove that the United States is guilty of half if not all of the crimes it's accusing Russia of, without defending the latter and focusing solely on “Operation Babylift “.  

In 1955, US President Dwight D. Eisenhower ordered the deployment of a US Army advisory team of personnel to an already divided Vietnam, supporting the Southern Republic against communist northern part. Over the years, from the sixties up till much later, the US presence and role grew significantly stronger after the Gulf of Tonkin incident where the North Vietnamese torpedo boats attacked two American destroyers. This attack resonated heavily in mainland US, which led to President Lyndon B. Johnson ordered airstrikes against the attacker’s naval bases and also managed to get Congress to pass a law that would allow him to take any measures he deemed necessary in the region without consulting them.

After that decision, the US officially entered the war, beginning from 100,000 troops to the war developments we now learn about in the history classes.

The Vietnam War was near its end; the communist forces were clearly about to take full control of the south. The United States had to take a multitude of emergency actions, one of them was to save children whose fathers are serving in the military along with other fatherless children (sounds familiar, doesn’t it?). 3300 children were taken out of Vietnam during that operation in the span of a single day on April 3^rd 1975. The US government even admitted to this operation. The then President, Gerald Ford even personally welcomed an airplane at the airport.

This operation was greatly controversial amongst the American people. Some, such as certain senators, questioned the ethics of these actions. While others, like the Americans in Vietnam, have celebrated this move because they were on the ground of seeing the difficulties these children were facing, according to them they would die first because of the lack of essentials before getting killed in the war.

But, historical facts and events will tell us that all of this didn’t exactly happen. Not all kids were orphans, some had living relatives, who were unable to reach them back in their country, and some even received regular visits from their parents. They had put them in orphanages because at least there they would be fed. The kids were transported in not so comfortable planes. Since the latter were officially unauthorized, they did not receive clearance by the allied governments of the US and South Vietnam. So, instead of seated planes, the children were airlifted in cargo planes, like objects along with their card boxes and blankets. The sick amongst them would be put in hospitals in the Philippines. It is also important to note that the South Vietnamese military and officers would sometimes ban young men from traveling because they would see them old enough to fight.

This situation forced some volunteers and activists to file a class action lawsuit against the official authorities and Henry Kissinger, responsible for this lift. Needless to say, this lawsuit was manipulated and defeated.

Today, almost 50 years later, the children are still searching for their birth parents, still searching for their identities. During the time of the lawsuit, only a few dozen kids were reunited with their parents. And today, it is found to be absolutely hypocritical that a country, who had committed such crimes and illegal acts, would go after another, equally responsible country, giving them a lecture on morals and ethics.

Edited by : Ritaja Kar 

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