The Foreign Service Journal, April 2015

36 APRIL 2015 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL Eglin proved too small, the Army opened an additional camp at Indiantown Gap in Pennsylvania. By early June 1975, about 130,000 Vietnamese refugees were under American control: 56,000 were in the United States, 44,000 were at bases outside the country and 30,000 had already been released from the system. In addition to daily maintenance, the camps needed to provide medical screening, immigration pro- cessing and counseling about life in the United States. Concur- rently, we pushed a worldwide appeal to other countries through the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the Red Cross and the Intergovernmental Committee on European Migra- tion, to establish resettlement programs elsewhere to welcome Vietnamese refugees. Everything Happened So Quickly To organize the settlement of refugees in the United States, we promptly began holding meetings with a half-dozen volun- tary agencies whose work in this field dated back to World War II. These included the International Rescue Committee, Church World Services, Catholic Relief Services and Lutheran World Services. We also contacted local community organizations to facilitate sponsorship and resettlement. We helped all these organizations set up offices at the military camps, which many of us visited to monitor conditions and programs. In the weeks following South Vietnam’s collapse, State pro- posed legislation (drafted by our task force), testified on its behalf before both houses of Congress, and witnessed Pres. Ford signing into law the Indochina Migration and Refugee Assistance Act of 1975. This authorized $405 million for costs relating to the recep- tion centers, resettlement support, medical and welfare services, and the movement of some refugees to third countries. It was also the beginning of what would become the largest refugee resettle- ment program in the United States since the end of World War II. Everything happened so quickly in the spring of 1975 that it was hard to tell when one activity ended and the next began. Within two months our task force oversaw the evacuation of Vietnam, established restaging camps, developed sponsorship programs, obtained legislative authorities, began resettling thou- sands of refugees in the States and promoted the resettlement of thousands of others in third countries. While all of us on the task force brought our individual knowledge and commitment to its work, events on the ground quickly brought the entire department, and federal government, together to accomplish our goals. But the bottom line was the personal satisfaction we all derived from making a difference on an important national issue. n