Vietnam Conflict ‘Not Civil War’

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31115, 19 July 1966, Page 22

Vietnam Conflict ‘Not Civil War’

(New Zealand Press Association! INVERCARGILL, July 18. The conflicts in Laos, Cambodia and Thailand were all involved, either directly or indirectly, with North Vietnam’s desire to over-run South Vietnam, said two retired Army officers who have just returned from a 1 trip to South-east Asia on behalf of the Dominion executive of the R.S.A.

! They are Brigadier C. L. ’ Pleasants and LieutenantColonel J. R. Spence. Brigadier Pleasants said that the Vietnam war was not a civil war—the North Vietnamese were invading South ’ Vietnam just as the Germans 1 invaded Poland in the Second ! World War, or as the North ■ Koreans invaded South Korea 1 in the Korean War. A great deal of civilian assistance was needed in ! South Vietnam, he said. How- • ever, security had to be estabs lished before such assistance . could be freely given. 1 There were many defections from the South Vietnamese Army. These had been 600 , men a month, but the figure i was now about 200 a month. I The men were not desert- ; Ing to the north, but simply returning to their homes.

“They have no driving force, no spirit of nationalism,” Brigadier Pleasants said. Only three Viet Cong were needed to control each small village on the south Vietnam ■ coast The men consisted of a “sort of commissar,” a tax collector, and an executioner. North Vietnamese troops were entering South Vietnam at the rate of about 7000 a month, he said. Black-markets thrived in Saigon, and it was possible to buy anything that the United States PX stores offered on the streets of the city, even down to rations. He said that about 15 per cent of goods destined for American troops were pilfered, although guards were placed at warehouses and on trucks carrying the goods.