Word: pendleton
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...Vietnamese C130; at the U.S. naval base at Subic Bay, 110 miles from Clark, where about 6,000 were staying; and at Thailand's Utapao Airbase, where almost 3,000 Vietnamese sought refuge. Soon they would be moving on to three military bases on the U.S. mainland-Camp Pendleton, Calif., Fort Chaffee, Ark., and Eglin Air Force Base, Pla.-where they will remain until the U.S. Government has figured out what to do with them (see THE NATION...
Like most immigrants before them, the Vietnamese are sad about the life they have left behind and apprehensive about what lies ahead in America. "We are getting bona fide refugees without anything or anybody," says INS Official Don Day at Pendleton. "I never know what will happen to me, only what has happened to me," mourned Hoan Lac, 39, a psychotherapist, who cried softly as she rocked her two-year-old child. "I have many friends in this country, but I have lost their addresses. I had to leave Viet Nam in 50 minutes." Pham An Thanh, 40, once...
...after day, as artillery fire thundered a somber greeting from a nearby range, the buses disgorged their weary passengers. Vietnamese refugees were arriving at their first destination in America: Camp Pendleton in Southern California. Small-businessmen and Saigon bureaucrats, their faces etched with fatigue and suffering, their tight-lipped wives stifling tears, their children staring blankly in the bright sunlight, filed into the camp. There they were issued mattresses, bedclothes and kits containing toilet articles, sandals and one candy bar each. Inside the tents and Quonset huts hastily erected for the emergency, the refugees finally gave way to emotions stored...
That scene will be repeated many times, not only at Pendleton but at Fort Chaffee, Ark., and Florida's Eglin Air Force Base until the thousands of refugees are processed by the U.S. Government and ushered into American life. Like last week's first arrivals, many of the refugees will undoubtedly be bewildered by the impersonal routine of the camps. They will be given a medical exam, fingerprinted by the Immigration and Naturalization Service, issued a Social Security card, tested for their job skills and command of English, and interviewed about a U.S. sponsor. Without one, no Vietnamese...
Because of the rapid exodus, U.S. Government officials were caught unprepared, and have fallen behind in the processing. "Organization!" scoffed Stuart Callison, an Agency for International Development official assigned to Pendleton. "We beat the first load of refugees here by an hour and a half. That's how organized we are. I haven't the vaguest idea what's going on. I get all my news out of the Los Angeles Times." William Wild, another AID official who is in charge of the Pendleton operation, considered himself in business once he was able to lease a small...