Next Battlefield? MILITARY MOVES EXTENDING INTO LAOS AND THAILAND

Press, Volume CV, Issue 30958, 14 January 1966, Page 8

Next Battlefield? MILITARY MOVES EXTENDING INTO LAOS AND THAILAND

IBy

FRANK ROBERTSON

writinp to the •■Datlg Telegraph,” London, from Bangkok!

(Reprinted from the “Daily Telegraph,’* by arrangement) In recent weeks Peking has given warning a number of times that developments in Laos have taken a dangerous turn. At the same time Government-inspired press accounts in both Thailand and the non-Com-munist areas of Laos allege that North Vietnamese regulars have begun to filter across the River Mekong from Laos to Thailand.

In this backward, superstitious frontier region, where it often is difficult to separate fact from propaganda, four developments can be observed which together point to trouble ahead:

There are more North Vietnamese regulars in Laos than ever before, not counting those passing through to fight in South Vietnam. Of less significance for the moment, China has sent small armed detachments into two northern Laos provinces, Nam Tha and Phong Saly. Peking is actively sponsoring a classic Communist liberation front move-: ment in Thailand. This is apparently directed from the South China province of Yunnan. American military activity in Laos has greatly increased. This is generally disguised as military aid but the camouflage is transparent, particularly in outlying areas. Americans are using at least three air bases in ThaiI land to bomb North Vietnam and Communist Laos. An American supply base at Korat, Thailand, can fully equip and move, within hours, up to one combat division after the troops have arrived by air with little more than their personal weapons and toothbrushes. The strong infusion of North Vietnamese fighting men quite recently into the often unenthusiastic ranks of the Pathet Lao, military arm of the Laotian Communist movement, was clearly necessary. The Lao people, however closely indoctrinated, have little taste for the enduring tenacity and selfsacrifice demanded of jungle guerrillas. Supply Route During the last six months the number of defectors has risen sharply. More significantly, whole villages have

! decamped overnight to Government areas, simply because Vietnamese have replaced Pathet Lao in control; in general the Lao people distrust Vietnamese, whatever their politics, China and the North Vietnamese have an important immediate stake in Laos. In spite of the continuous flurry of peace feeler reports, diplomatic envoys who have visited Peking and Hanoi recently state that both nations want to see the Vietnamese war go on. In the view of Western analysts in Vientiane, the capital of Laos, the recent upsurge of Viet Minh-Pathet Lao activity in central and southern regions of the country was planned largely to check Government probes towards the vital road system. A second reason was the urgent need for rice from the river plains to feed the jungle forces.

There has been some terrorism across the Mekong in Thailand, but on a much smaller scale than claimed in Bangkok and Vientiane, and it has not involved regular North Vietnamese units. Over a period of months some 20 village headmen or other local officials in Thailand’s arid, neglected north-east region have been shot. Ethnically many people living along the Thai bank of the Mekong are Lao, and Pathet Lao agents have been active among them for some years. The presence of 35.000 North Vietnamese, who fled to the region when fighting broke out between the Viet Minh and the French in 1946, complicates the problem. They swelled small Vietnamese colonies that had been long established in four Thai river-crossed provinces: Ho Chi Minh spent some time proselytising compatriots in this region as long ago as 1927. On November 1, 1964, Peking announced the formation of a Thai Independence Movement. Then on January 1, 1965, again ahead of Hanoi or anyone else, the Chinese proclaimed the birth of a second clandestine movement, the Thailand Patriotic Front. For a time this duality caused some puzzlement. But it was cleared up recently by a secret communique distributed in Thailand stating that the Movement had become part of the Front.-

Classic Pattern This organisation follows the classic pattern, and its Chinese voice talks of such component parts as farmers’ “self-liberating groups,” students’ organisations and those representing intellectuals. But they do not enjoy much support in tolerant Thailand, where the most outrageous revelations of official corruption quite recently fascinated the public for weeks on end, but apparently caused little deep indignation. Given this political climate, it is interesting to speculate why the Communists announced the formation of a revolutionary front in Thailand at this time. In South Vietnam the National Liberation Front was not formed until 1960, only after the Viet Cong had deeply infiltrated every stratum of the new republic in the south, and raised powerful, disciplined guerrilla forces. Possibly the Chinese are reacting to greatly increased American military activity in Thailand, as well as in Laos, which in turn reflects a far more militant Thai attitude towards external Communist forces than is usual in Bangkok. The Thais continue to guard their sovereignty with the utmost zeal. They will not lease military bases to the Americans or enter into a “status of forces” agreement, although there are now close

I to 10,000 American troops in the kingdom. | But closely-guarded Thai air bases, such as the big complexes at Udon and Übon. from which most American Air Force attacks on North Vietnam and Communist Laos are launched, are today American in all but name. There are more American fighter-bombers at Korat, the station of the United States Army 9th Logistical Command. From here two American engineer battalions and Thai Army engineers are completing a strategic highway south to the Gulf of Siam, bypassing congested Bangkok, leading to the Thai naval base at Sattahip, now being greatly enlarged with American help. Near this base two runways big enough for the B-52 bombers of the Strategic Air Command are being built. Up-country, in the vulner- ■ able north and north-east, a ' series of “security-roads” are ' being pushed out to the Laos I border, mostly by American firms of contractors. Thai local governments, using | equipment supplied by the ; American aid programme are improving or extending secondary roads in 11 provinces in border regions. American officials in Vientiane and Bangkok will not discuss the possibility or feasibility of an American thrust across Laos from Thailand by ground or airborne troops with the purpose of cutting the Viet Cong’s lifeline from North Vietnam: indeed they look pained when the subject is mentioned. But neither will they confirm the regular bombing by American planes from bases in Thailand of the strategic Communist road network in Laos, although the young commander of the Royal Lao Air Force, General Thao Ma, is ready to provide correspondents with all the details at his Savannakhet headquarters.

Certainly the Americans are now largely ignoring the Geneva Agreement on Laos, but not to the extent that North Vietnam has through continuous violations in which Russia and China are deeply implicated. But by now the question has become entirely academic. Of more compelling interest is the fact that the basin of the Lower Mekong has become the scene of great preparation by both sides. Roadbuilding by both the Americans and the Chinese, for instance, has been going on. Explosive action seems inevitable before very long.