THE VIETNAM WAR ENCOURAGING SIGNS AS “VIETNAMISATION” INCREASES

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32459, 20 November 1970, Page 12

THE VIETNAM WAR ENCOURAGING SIGNS AS “VIETNAMISATION” INCREASES

(IAN WARD,

in Saigon, reports on the military situation under "Vietnamisation")

(Reprinted by arrangement [rom the "Daily Telegraph". London)

For the last four months the Vietnam war has been fading Throughout the Mekong Delta Government pacification teams have scored unexpected successes as large-scale Viet Cong'and North Vietnamese units break down into guerrilla groups or withdraw into neighbouring Cambodia. Elsewhere, too, the guns are relatively silent. There have been lulls before, but nothing quite comparable to this.

Capitalising on the generally reduced pressure, President Nguyen Van Thieu, prodded along by the Americans, has sought to broaden his political appeal. Judging from the results of August’s Senatorial elections, where Government candidates suffered crushing setbacks, his efforts have been less than spectacular so far. Determined to salvage something from the disappointing returns, however, the President is shrewdly explaining away the results as proof that the elections weren’t rigged. In so doing he is countering Opposition election propaganda and laying useful foundations for next year’s vital Presidental and Lower House elections. President Thieu is also endeavouring to manipulate the battlefield lull to his advantage in economic and administrative matters. Reforms advance With harassment of the countryside greatly reduced, and a resulting improved outlook for the farmer, Saigon is pushing ahead with land and agricultural reforms. The controversial devaluation of the piastre is showing initial benefits. Furthermore, the stage has been set for a swing to civilian leadership and direction of not only the pacification drive but the entire administrative network at provincial level. It is, of course, far too early to gauge the likely success of these moves. But every day without the manifestations of a major war is a plus factor for the Government. What, then, is the true state of the conflict. It has been fading ... but is it fading away? Does the absence of enemy action conceal yet another tactical pause? Is the Allied invasion of Cambodia, as its proponents insist, buying valuable time for the South Vietnamese? Is the process of Vietnamising the war actually working? Or is Hanoi merely waiting while Vietnamisation and the related American withdrawal run their courses before delivering her “coup de grace?” As has always been the case in Vietnam, statistics can be supplied to support any theory. But at this point in history certain encouraging trends for Saigon are undeniable. The Communists throughout the Republic have been forced to switch the emphasis of their fighting from large unit actions to guerrilla-type operations. Aggressive army South Vietnam’s army is infinitely more aggressive and better trained today than it was 18 months ago. The Viet Cong movement has been unable to grapple with recruiting difficulties as the cause loses its appeal. North Vietnamese units are encountering enormous logistics problems since Allied troops routed the Cambodian border sanctuaries last May. As an extension of all this the Communists have had to place far greater emphasis on terrorism in South Vietnam to compensate for the lack of main force action. Terror in the face of a disintegrating administrative machine proved its worth in the traumatic days of 196364. How it will fare against what appears to be expanding Government control today remains to be seen. The changing emphasis of South Vietnam’s military tactics must also be regarded as encouraging. Until mid--1969 when the American withdrawal began, the South Vietnamese army was faced with two basic tasks: search and destroy missions and territorial defence. Confronted with serious manpower problems, and with the Americans gone, Saigon was forced to fall back on regional, and popular forces and People’s Self-Defence units for territorial defence. The emergency expansion of local forces—initially undertaken as a stop-gap measure against shortages of trained troops—has proved one of the Government’s most enlightened programmes. The philosophy is simple: give a peasant a weapon and ask him to defend another’s land and he is indifferent. Give him a weapon for the protection of his home, his wife and his family and he becomes as determined as any Communist guerrilla ... if not more so. Spectacular by-product

Already local force troops are shouldering wide territorial defence responsibilities, and by all indications giving a creditable account of themselves in the process. For the optimists on Vietnamisation the development of local forces is perhaps its most spectacular by-product. Also reassuring are the pro-Saigon trends in the i Government’s Chieu Hoi ((“open arms”) project for encouraging enemy defectors. Operating in conjunction with an accelerated pacification campaign the project is clearly cutting into the Viet Cong rank and file, even if official statistics tend to impart an over-bright picture. The fact that 16 and 17-year-old boys and girls are being elevated to 'party membership honour

previously bestowed only after six to eight years meritorious service underlines the Viet Cong’s manpower dilemma. Against these and other heartening aspects must be balanced assessments by Saigon’s intelligence chiefs suggesting that the enemy, while burdened with giant problems, has far from lost the capacity to fight. Driven from Cambodian border redoubts which for five years formed the basis of military actions for the lower half of South Vietnam, Hanoi's war planners have now restricted their strategy. Focus of their logistics supply effort has swung to the southern panhandle of Laos, with particular emphasis on the Bolevens Plateau where large storage areas are reported to have mushroomed.

River supply lines Throughout Cambodia's four North-Eastern Provinces Stung Treng, Ratanakiri, Mondulkiri and Kratie North Vietnamese commanders have worked through the monsoons installing supply lines along the intricate river networks which feed into the region from Southern Laos. These have been the targets for extensive American and South Vietnamese air raids. Communist propaganda promises heavy ground attacks in the coming days and weeks, both in Cambodia and South Vietnam. Whether the post-monsoon offensive materialises will be a measure of the air war’s effectiveness. Saigon’s high command is prepared for the worst, however, and the current co-ordinated operation by South Vietnamese and Cambodian forces can be regarded as a sample of much large actions to come. The deployment of North Vietnamese troops in and around South Vietnam’s First Corps tactical zone signals a threat of major proportions developing there. Opposing an estimated Communist strength of some 100,000 troops are three South Vietnamese divisions, approximately two American divisions whose presence can be relied on in the area only until May next year, and a division of Koreans. When the two main

threats—North-Eastern Cambodia and the Republic’s northern Provinces are taken together the importance of the Communists’ continued expansion of facilities in the Laos panhandle are equivalent to those once posed by the Cambodian border sanctuaries.

Understandably, pressure is mounting among Saigon’s

generals for thrusts into Laos along the lines of those into Cambodia. Several delicate political considerations are raised. What, for instance, would happen to Laos’s shaky neutrality? To what extent would Hanoi regard a South Vietnamese invasion of Southern Laos as the signal for maximum pressure in the north of the Kingdom? And perhaps overriding all: would such an invasion shut the possibility of peace through a Geneva-type formula? Major operations into Laos therefore seem unlikely, although priorities could quickly change if North Vietnamese military action resulted in some grave reversal for Saigon, or if it appeared that Hanoi was manoeuvring for occupation of a northern population centre like Hue or Da Nang from which to proclaim a revolutionary capital before suing for peace. Meanwhile Saigon military planners are wrestling with the problems of the American troop withdrawal in the knowledge that by early next year American combat forces in the Republic will have been reduced to about nine brigades. Allied strategists appear to have agreed that from then on the sprinkling American commitments will be somewhat like a strategic reserve.

There are growing apprehensions in senior South Vietnamese military circles that by May 1, when President Nixon is due to announce the next phase of his disengagement programme, American troops will in fact have halted their ground effort. The aim will be to create a favourable atmosphere for further withdrawals and to all intents and purposes Washington will then be observing a unilateral ceasefire—albeit unannounced. This being the case, the period around May 1 could be an auspicious time in Hanoi’s military calendar.