Holding the Line in Vietnam
ABRAMS, ARNOLD
BACK TO THE EARLY SIXTIES? Holding the Line in Vietnam by ARNOLD ABRAMS Long after the majority of American troops has been withdrawn from Vietnam, the United States is likely to remain involved...
...Intelligence operations generally have recently come under scrutiny because of the Army's abortive murder investigation of Colonel Robert Rheault, former Green Beret commander in Vietnam, and seven of his subordinates...
...They estimate that about half their informers probably work for the enemy, but tolerate this if they feel the fact merchants are impartially peddling accurate information...
...We harass the enemy somewhat," sighed MacDonald, "and maybe we slow him down some...
...At Ba Xoai, for example, Cambodian and South Vietnamese factions, each numbering about 450 men, reside on opposite sides of the camp...
...For appearances' sake, though, the Americans also participate in sham joint intelligence operations, where dual reports are duly filed, mutual consultations are held, and everything is officially harmonious...
...The American commander is more concerned with results than implications...
...All to no avail...
...That necessitates a reshuffling of plans...
...All South Vietnamese enlisted men were ordered to submit to lie detector tests to determine their loyalty...
...Normally, first the fighting stops, then troops are withdrawn...
...The Special Forces team, typically, is stuck in the middle, living between the two groups and devoting as much time to internal peacekeeping as external warmaking...
...I'll speak to him first...
...For if double agentry meant automatic disposal for every spy in Vietnam, Ba Xoai's Green Berets would be left without an effective intelligence operation...
...But here we're operating ass backwards...
...involvement in Vietnam, MacDonald is nevertheless aware of the issues, and candidly concedes his belief that the critics' major objections are "basically sound...
...For four years, Ba Xoai has been home for a 12-man Green Beret team trying to mold 900-odd South Vietnamese and Cambodian irregulars into an effective military force -which is like attempting to blend oil and water into a fire-fighting solution...
...There is, then, an exquisite irony about intelligence procedures at Ba Xoai: The Green Berets will work with suspected double agents, but not with their own allies...
...After shuffling papers for several years in Saigon, he is apparently not hungry for action, as a recent night incident illustrates...
...As long as these guys play it straight, I'm happy," MacDonald said...
...By now, he is either dead or working for the Vietcong...
...There are many here who would insist he knows quite well...
...According to the Americans, the situation called for the dispatch of a company-size interception force...
...Starting July 1, a lid was to have been clamped on their replacements, leading to the gradual removal of Green Beret forces from the country...
...At the same time, counterinsurgency, their specialty, requires aggressive night patrols, wide-ranging reconnaissance trips, infiltration of enemy territory, and terror tactics...
...They, in turn, report separately to one man, the agent controller, who is the only person to deal directly with the Americans...
...The Green Berets, who were working in Vietnam before most Americans had even heard of the country, seek the same latitude given their colleagues in Laos...
...Common throughout Vietnam, it is aggravated at places like Ba Xoai because of Special Forces' especially pronounced skill and professional approach...
...Since reliable information is a precious commodity in this outpost, the U.S...
...Thus, although too well fortified to be overrun, the camp is not capable of fulfilling its primary mission: blocking enemy infiltration from Cambodia...
...They anticipate widened responsibility for training indigenous forces, commanding specialized reconnaissance teams, and directing terrorist and psychological warfare operations...
...Ba Xoai has many such nights...
...Ninth Division was withdrawn last August...
...A few months ago, he told me he expected to be murdered someday...
...Substantially the same view was put forth several months ago in a strategy report submitted to Washington by the Hudson Institute, Herman Kahn's "think tank" in the suburbs north of New York...
...Washington's blueprints for maintaining a long-range but unobtrusive presence in South Vietnam apparently include a key role for Special Forces, whose operations can go undetected by press and public, and unconfirmed-If not actually denied-by U.S...
...They work in T-shirts, ignore military formalities, and act quite civilized...
...With few exceptions, however, they are plagued by bad local leadership...
...With the exception of the top man, no single agent or combinatiaon of them knows just how much information the American team is receiving...
...The prospect does not displease him-Special Forces advisers largely ran their own show during the early 1960s, before escalation began...
...Holding the Line in Vietnam by ARNOLD ABRAMS Long after the majority of American troops has been withdrawn from Vietnam, the United States is likely to remain involved here in the type of twilight war that has lingered on in neighboring Laos for almost a decade...
...MacDonald's hardboiled pragmatism, his insistence on results, lead him to take great pains in perfecting his intelligence network...
...I assume the enemy feels the same way, since he must have the same suspicions about some of these people...
...Seven months ago, MacDonald's team-which maintains a special spy network inside the camp-was tipped off about a planned uprising in Ba Xoai...
...The agent controller earns about $210 a month for heading this operation...
...The wry amusement was inspired by the alleged official flap over the discovery of a suspected double agent...
...This confusion over phaseout plans makes it look like we can't make up our minds, but the fact is that we've never fought any war this way before...
...And they are dedicated soldiers who genuinely want to get their job done...
...It doesn't bother me that in many cases they're the same individuals, as long as I'm getting the information I want...
...about half fled the night before the tests were administered...
...We have our agents," MacDonald went on, "and the enemy has his...
...Adoption of these recommendations, now expected, would assure the continued presence of Green Berets at outposts like Ba Xoai for an indefinite period...
...He knows too much," MacDonald declared...
...Whatever the case, the feeling is widespread that Ba Xoai represents the wave of the future for the United States in Vietnam...
...Ba Xoai's agent controller was an intelligent, personable Cambodian in his mid-20s...
...The enemy was about two miles from Ba Xoai, and four miles from his goal...
...Contrary to their popular image, Green Berets do not swagger around with polished boots and rakishly tilted headgear, mimicking John Wayne...
...The report's major proposals included a reduction of American forces in Vietnam, reliance on volunteers serving extended tours, the establishment of defensive urban barriers, and Special Forces expansion...
...He has not been notably successful...
...It's like trying to wipe germs from the air," said Captain Brian MacDonald, the 29-year-old American commander...
...Explaining why he participates avidly in the war, he said, "I am a professional soldier and this is what I enjoy and what I'm pointing my life to...
...Moreover, the normal hostility between the Americans and their allies, stemming from the usual gaps in communication, trust and outlook, has been heightened by an enemy presence: The South Vietnamese ranks swarm with Vietcong...
...In all probability, their units will remain in places like Ba Xoai, an outpost buried in the boondocks of Chau Due Province near the Cambodian border...
...A 25-man allied patrol, led by two Green Berets (there are never less than two, so that if wounded, a lone American will not be totally abandoned in a tough spot), sighted about 100 infiltrators from Cambodia heading toward the North Vietnamese mountain bases...
...About 45 minutes later, after the patrol had lost contact with the infiltrators, two fixed-wing fighters flew overhead...
...He had fine command of English and Vietnamese in addition to his own tongue, and knew everyone living within 50 miles of the post...
...mid-June announcement about initial withdrawals involving Army and Marine personnel, Green Beret brass succeeded in having the Special Forces phaseout plan postponed indefinitely...
...Until the summer, the 300 Special Forces troops in the area and their approximately 3,000 beret-wearing compatriots throughout Vietnam were also on the verge of being phased out of the war...
...If it's the way it looks . . . well, I don't know...
...The South Vietnamese leader felt differently, and called for an air strike...
...and South Vietnamese fighting men is another significant problem...
...While Special Forces headquarters banned discussion of the affair, the case caused outrage and amusement in Ba Xoai...
...He vanished shortly afterward...
...their performance is lackluster...
...Undetected, the patrol radioed back for help...
...Walled-in and backed against a boulder-strewn hill, it straddles a major enemy infiltration route and is surrounded on three sides by mountain strongholds manned by the North Vietnamese...
...There are about 60 such camps in Vietnam, established under the Civilian Irregular Defense Group program...
...Separated by a considerable cultural chasm, they want nothing to do with each other...
...His disappearance occurred after MacDonald had routinely requested him to take a lie detector test for record-keeping purposes...
...We send troops home, then seek an agreement...
...Relations between the Green Berets and South Vietnamese at Ba Xoai are perhaps most starkly reflected in an area crucial to camp survival: intelligence-gathering...
...The intricate system is in fact rigged for his safety, and theoretically preserves considerable secrecy about his identity...
...This is a dangerous game," he added with a smile...
...But I won't make any decision until he returns-If he ever does...
...But under these conditions [he nodded toward the South Vietnamese side of camp] that's generally the best we can hope for...
...Two North Vietnamese divisions are massed around Ba Xoai, having slipped across the border less than three miles away...
...Knowledgeable officers in Vietnam believe the scheme has now been scrapped...
...Shortly after President Nixon's Arnold Abrams is Southeast Asia correspondent of the Seattle Times...
...About 15 informers-paid $3 for each item furnished-Submit their intelligence to several principal agents, who are in effect, district managers...
...The outrage-quite widespread throughout Green Beret ranks-resulted from the troops' high opinion of Rheault, and their belief that the regular Army was seeking scapegoats in an effort to downgrade its elite branch...
...team runs a unilateral intelligence network, excluding the South Vietnamese and, in many instances, withholding sensitive information from them...
...Several weeks later, he sent the American commander a letter saying that he had been called away on urgent family business and would return soon...
...It looks like we'll eventually be getting back to where we were seven or eight years ago," observed one high-ranking beret wearer...
...The old setup made sense," he explained, "because even if an agreement is concluded with Hanoi, we'll need some means of detecting and controlling enemy movements...
...Let our glorious allies in on anything," explained one Green Beret at the camp, "and the enemy knows about it within an hour...
...Strafing possible enemy positions, they put on a spectacular show: flares, rockets, tracers, machine-gun runs-the works...
...The motivation gap between U.S...
...Even with expanded responsibility, therefore, Special Forces in Vietnam will still face basic problems that went unsolved in the early 1960s, and remain so today...
...If he does, Ba Xoai's former top agent will have much explaining to do: at his level, double agentry and defection are deadly matters...
...The commander is a wealthy 31-year-old captain who arrived last summer...
...It is South Vietnam's camp, and their commander can, and does, veto MacDonald's suggestions...
...Advised and trained by Green Beret teams, these forces supposedly specialize in counterinsurgency tactics...
...He intends to stay in Vietnam a long time, because combat duty puts promotion points on his record and over $1100 a month in his bank...
...Untroubled about moral arguments raging at home and around the world about U.S...
...We're not stopping him...
...All are manned by South Vietnamese and Montagnards, Cambodians, or other indigenous groups...
...This cannot be said for the South Vietnamese, who generally do not like to look for trouble?particularly in the remote border areas where it lurks...
...With visibility poor, and the exact North Vietnamese location unknown, the strafing was nothing but guesswork...
...The enemy attained his objective without any casualties...
...One of them concerns continuing friction among the native populations...
...He can become quite wealthy by local standards, if he stays alive...
...This little-known plan, never publicly announced, was pushed back to August 1 when speculation about larger, regular troop removals gained momentum...
...But there are few secrets in Vietnam...
...authorities...
...They pose a growing threat to the lower Mekong Delta, a rice-rich gateway to Saigon that was left defended solely by South Vietnamese and their American "advisers" when the 10,000-man U.S...
...MacDonald, for instance, has tactfully tried to spur his local counterpart into more forceful action, especially at night, when enemy infiltration is at its peak...
...I figure I'm not losing anything that the enemy wouldn't get anyway...
...MacDonald chuckled when this was pointed out to him, and remarked "Yeah...
...This camp, some 200 miles southwest of Saigon, is a concrete fortress that might have been lifted from a John Ford movie set...
...You can try to clean things up, but you never get all of them...
Vol. 52 • November 1969 • No. 21
