This collection contains interview transcripts, published and unpublished reports, research notes, working papers, maps, clippings, correspondence, memoranda, and statistical data gathered by Joseph M. Carrier primarily while he was employed as a Rand Corporation counterinsurgency specialist with the Chieu Hoi Program in Vietnam. The bulk of the materials pertains to the Chieu Hoi Program, which was operated by the Republic of Vietnam from 1963 to 1973 to encourage civilian and military defections from the communist-controlled South. The collection contains materials documenting the administration of the Chieu Hoi program in addition to transcripts of interviews conducted with defectors (or "ralliers"), prisoners of war, and refugees. English and Vietnamese interview notes, translated Viet Minh (or "Viet Cong") documents, and preliminary interrogation reports are also included. The collection also contains administrative materials produced by the Rand Corporation, the United States government, Republic of Vietnam government, the National Academy of Sciences, and other agencies documenting such topics as Viet Cong and U.S. military activities; counterinsurgency movements; the use of herbicides and their toxicological and environmental effects; and Vietnamese socio-economic conditions, social history, politics, and demographics. A small group of files contain Carrier's research materials for the San Francisco Center for Southeast Asian Refugee Resettlement's 1991 study of AIDS knowledge, attitudes, beliefs and behaviors in San Francisco Southeast Asian communities. The majority of materials are in English. Some materials are in Vietnamese.

Joseph Michel Carrier was a counterinsurgency specialist for the Rand Corporation. He conducted fieldwork in South Vietnam in 1962 and again from 1965 through 1967. During the last half of 1966 and in the spring of 1967, this fieldwork focused on the Chieu Hoi Program. In the early 1970s, Carrier joined the National Academy of Sciences as a staff officer on the Herbicide Committee. At this time, he conducted more field investigations in Vietnam, gathering data on the effects of U.S. defoliation programs. The spraying, code named Operation Trail Dust and Operation Ranch Hand, was used to defoliate forests to expose Viet Minh (or "Viet Cong") compounds. In addition, the U.S. military sprayed Viet Cong food supplies with defoliants such as Agent Orange, which contained high levels of a poisonous contaminant known as dioxin. Carrier produced a National Academy of Sciences working paper on the effects of herbicides in 1974. He received his Ph.D. in Social Sciences from the University of California, Irvine in 1972.

10.4 linear feet (26 boxes)

Publication Rights Property rights reside with the University of California. Literary rights are retained by the creators of the records and their heirs. For permissions to reproduce or to publish, please contact the Southeast Asian Archive Librarian.

Access Collection is open for research.