To the Editor:

What purports to be “the story of H. Bruce Franklin,” written by Anna-Sofia Lesiv and published in the Nov. 15 issue of The Stanford Daily is so full of errors and false statements (including a wildly erroneous chronology) that correcting it would require an essay. Readers interested in some truth that can easily consult my homepage (hbrucefranklin.com) or the Wikipedia article about me (which I had nothing to do with writing).

I do want to point out that the claim that, “Franklin himself acted in complete contradiction to the spirit of academic freedom by threatening the speech of those he disagreed with,” is utterly false. The claim is based on Stanford’s charge that I interfered with the speech of Henry Cabot Lodge, the U.S. Ambassador to South Vietnam who orchestrated the overthrow and murder of South Vietnam’s President Ngo Dinh Diem (a fact verified in secret correspondence reprinted in “Vietnam and America: The Document History,” a volume I co-edited). Ms. Lesiv omits the inconvenient fact that the Stanford panel acquitted of this false charge. Also, Alan Dershowitz never represented me in the hearing of my case, during which my only legal aid came for a law student (while Stanford’s case was presented by a prestigious Los Angeles law firm.)

Readers interested in my deeper exploration of the real issues Ms. Lesiv is trying to explore can delve into my forthcoming book, “Crash Course: From the Good War to the Forever War,” to be published by Rutgers University Press in 2018.

– H. Bruce Franklin

Ph.D. ’61

 

Contact H. Bruce Franklin at hbf ‘at’ scarletmail.rutgers.edu.