B-52s & Green Berets

More bad news for the Viet Cong came last week from nearby Thailand, which announced its readiness to base U.S. B-52s on Thai territory. Flying unseen and unheard at 40,000 ft. or more, the big B-52s have struck more terror into the enemy than almost any other weapon. But they have been limited until now by the necessity of hauling their 60,000-lb. bomb loads from Guam on a 5,200-mile, twelve-hour round trip. The Thai decision will place the bombers within a scant hour's distance of practically any Communist concentration in South Viet Nam, enabling each B-52 to make several sorties a day instead of one.

The Thai welcome to the B-52s is only the latest open admission of cooperation with the U.S. in fighting the Communists, reversing a long Thai reticence about publicizing their role in the war. The Thais already permit other U.S. fighter-bombers to fly from four bases in Thailand; they are readying a 2,400-man fighting force to join the Allies in Viet Nam later this year. Their increasing willingness to participate is a case of enlightened self-interest. Communist insurgency in the Thai northeast (TIME, Jan. 20) is growing in intensity, and the Thais are getting considerable U.S. help in combatting it. The Thai government thus did not hesitate last week to make clear its reasons for inviting the B-52s: "For common defensive purposes with the view to extinguishing the fire of aggression started by the Communists in South Viet Nam, and to prevent it from spreading further."

Bangkok About-Face. American preventive aid to Thailand covers a broad front. A 365-man Special Forces company is training Thai companies in counterinsurgency as well as in preparation for fighting in Viet Nam. The USIS produces a colorful spectrum of propaganda for the Thais' own distribution, from pictures of the King and Queen to anti-Communist soap operas and comic books. The CIA trains security and civic action pacification teams for use in remote villages. The U.S. has provided the Thais with equipment ranging from helicopters and shotguns to radios and movie projectors. All of this is a part of the campaign to strengthen the impoverished northeast provinces so that they will be able to defend themselves against both Communist blandishments and Red terrorism.

Because Communist insurgency is on the increase, the backbone of the Thai effort is the army, which is now being prepped in guerrilla counterwar in three upcountry field camps by a company of U.S. Green Berets. Last week TIME Correspondent Louis Kraar visited the camp at Pak Chong, becoming the first U.S. newsman permitted to see the Green Berets in action in Thailand. Led by Lieut. Colonel R. H. Bartelt, 40, a Viet Nam veteran with a decade of Green Beretmanship, the Special Forces arrived in Thailand last October from Okinawa, where they had trained intensively in Thai language, customs and the local insurgency problem. They came ready to fight alongside the Thais in the northeast, but U.S. officials, notably Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, decided against any direct American fighting in Thailand.

Snipers & Mantraps. The Thais were initially skeptical that the Green Berets would be of much use fighting by proxy--as instructors. But the first Thai companies that the U.S. graduated scored such instant successes against insurgents that Bangkok did an about-face: it has asked the Special Forces to quadruple the number of Thais in training until all 150 companies in the Thai army have run the U.S. course. The Thai soldiers themselves were quickly won over by the toughness and expertise of the Green Berets, three-fourths of whom, like their commander, learned their professionalism the hard way in action in Viet Nam.

At the field camps such as Pak Chong, the Thais are put through a grueling 35-day, 67-hour-week routine that teaches them everything from how to avoid guerrilla ambushes to the art of winning over suspicious villagers. The first attempts at civic action are tried in villages near the camps, working with the village headmen in sanitation, security and medical care. But the major thrust of the U.S. effort is relentlessly rugged combat training.

Typical of the thoroughness of the Special Forces is a model village they have constructed at Pak Chong for practicing search-and-seizure tactics. Its hazards are real and in earnest. When the unsuspecting Thai trainees come through the gate, snipers and mantraps of sharpened pungi stakes greet them. Targets suddenly pop up. As the Thais raise their rifles, the earth nearby explodes from hidden mines--a sequence that has caused many Thai soldiers initially to drop their rifles in fright. But there is more to the Green Beret village than shooting. The Thais learn the guerrilla's subtleties: an escape tunnel beneath the village huts, a cache of arms buried under the little shrine of a phi spirit house, which all but Thai Communists might consider sacrosanct. The Thais value their tough training all the more because each graduating company is immediately sent into the northeast to meet the real foe face to face.

Boondocks Warfare. The U.S. and Thailand consider the nation's insurgency problem as part of the same Southeast Asian struggle gripping South Viet Nam. So, too, does North Viet Nam. The proof may be seen in Hoa Binh, some 50 miles outside Hanoi, where the North Vietnamese are training 150 Thais at a time. Like Pak Chong, Hoa Binh is a school for boondocks warfare. There, the North Vietnamese teach Communist Thais the arts of weaponry, propaganda and sabotage before sending them back to make trouble in Bangkok's backyard.

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