AN UNDECLARED PEACE

PEACE is starting to break out in Saigon. Outside the South Vietnamese capital, the ceaseless patrolling and ambushing continued last week, although there was only limited contact. In Paris and Washington, wary allied and North Vietnamese diplomats maintained their watch on the peace talks. But Saigon, a subdued shadow of its old hedonistic self since the Tet offensive of February, was beginning to glitter once more.

Again the battered capital was overrun by fleets of snarling Honda scooters. Streets were jammed with more traffic than has been seen in months.

The noxious blue haze produced by thousands of honking, creeping cars, buses and trucks hung like fog over the city from early morning until late evening. Cinemas were packed, and hard rock boomed from juke boxes at bars like the Papillon, the Bunny and the Eden. Giggling bar girls sipped "Saigon Tea," at $1.69 a glass, while their G.I. boy friends tossed down "33" beer. The coffee shops along Tu Do Street were jammed once more, as were the city's myriad open-air markets. Saigon was coming alive, and it was the fresh prospect of peace that was responsible.

Coup Fever. The transformation began several weeks ago when the slackening of ground action became apparent. And although individual acts of terrorism continued, the threat of indiscriminate rocketing ebbed. No rockets have plummeted into Saigon, in fact, since Aug. 22. Despite a brief attack of coup fever last month, the government of President Nguyen Van Thieu displayed more and more confidence. Then the rumors of a complete bombing halt swept Saigon, the terror stopped, and peace fever prevailed.

First reactions were ebullient. "Any news concerning a bombing halt is a relief," said Banker Nguyen Xuan Oanh. "The conclusion is that the war will end." A farmer uprooted from his Mekong Delta paddies planned to "go to my rice again." Adding to the euphoria, the government pushed the 10 p.m. curfew up to 11 p.m. "We now talk," said a Saigon journalist, "of spending our next Tet in peace."

But behind the optimism there was concern. "Our relief," said Oanh, "is mixed with worries about what will happen to us in the future." There was the inevitable fear that a bombing halt might lead to a rapid pullout of U.S. troops, followed by capitulation to the foe. Some of the 200,000 Vietnamese civilians on American payrolls were beginning to worry about their jobs.

For and Against. For Thieu, the rumors that a settlement was closer created other worries. He believes that now is the time to pressure the enemy rather than concede anything, but he is being forced to accept the reality of the peace drive. There were reports of a new Buddhist-led peace movement, and he was likely to be the target.

Last week, in fact, workmen were erecting a barbed-wire fence around the National Assembly building, and the already massive palace guard is being built up still more. The barbed wire and the fresh guardsmen are not intended to bolster defenses against the Viet Cong. They are in preparation for what Thieu considers the inevitable, and probably bloody, demonstrations for and against peace.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.