The Discreet U.S. Presence

As the first test of the Nixon Doctrine, Cambodia's struggle for survival is showing mixed results. The doctrine calls on Asian nations to help themselves --and one another--in stemming aggression. Yet Cambodia's neighbors, with the exception of South Viet Nam, have so far failed to offer a convincing riposte to a Communist challenge that has been intensifying since Prince Norodom Sihanouk was ousted more than four months ago. Their reluctance was all too clear last week, when Sihanouk's successor, Premier Lon Nol, paid his first visit to Bangkok as Cambodian head of state. After months of pleading for immediate help from a government that is even more anti-Communist than his own, the best that he could get was a vague promise from Thai Premier Thanom Kittika-chorn that some 3,000 Thai troops would be going to Cambodia "around the end of August."

The other side of the Nixon Doctrine, which offers U.S. assistance to Asian nations in the form of supplies rather than troops, has proved a greater success. That ubiquitous talisman of an American presence, the C-ration kit, is readily available at any cigarette stand in midtown Phnom-Penh. At Pochentong Airport, five or six planes land each day carrying up to five tons of American materiel. Still the U.S. presence in Cambodia is, for the most part, limited and discreet. "We don't need another client state," says one U.S. diplomat in Phnom-Penh. "Whether we can pull this effort off, of course, remains to be seen. But we are light-years away from where we began in Viet Nam."

Combat Help. U.S. support has come chiefly in the form of an $8,900,000 military-aid program. More than half has been spent on ammunition and rifles for Cambodia's ill-equipped army, which at one point was posting guard teams to stand duty without weapons. U.S. funds have also been used to equip six battalions of Khmer Krom mercenaries (ethnic Cambodians from Viet Nam), provide much-needed radio communications, buy 40 military trucks and trailers, and send about 10,000 Cambodian troops to Thailand and South Viet Nam for military training. Says Jonathan (Fred) Ladd, 49, a former Green Beret colonel who was called out of retirement to oversee arms aid: "It's a very modest program, primarily for maintaining a defensive capability."

One element of the program not mentioned in Ladd's inventory is U.S. combat assistance from the air. American pilots have been observed flying spotter planes over Communist positions and directing Cambodian artillery fire by radio. Plane crews that want to fire at enemy targets themselves must radio their home bases in South Viet Nam or Thailand for permission; it is regularly given. The pilots are not anxious to talk about their role. Recently a reporter visiting a group of Cambodian officers at their headquarters overheard an American pilot's radio transmissions and asked to talk to the man. "Tell him I'm here on military business," snapped the pilot. "And that I'm unarmed. And what the hell is he doing down there?" With that, the conversation ended.

Credit Rating. On his desk, Ladd has a direct telephone line to a Cambodian army liaison. Though he maintains that the Cambodians' plans are "surprisingly sophisticated," he admits that "if I think their priorities are dumb, I tell them." He is awaiting delivery of a helicopter that will enable aid officials to observe the Cambodian army in action, and the military attaches at the embassy have just acquired a C-47 for a similar purpose.

The U.S. role in Cambodia is expected to increase in several other ways. Though Congress has not yet appropriated any aid funds for Cambodia in the fiscal year that began July 1, program officials are assuming that "we have a credit rating with Congress" and hope to bring in some $30 million worth of military supplies during the next six months. Last week Charles Mann, head of the economic-aid program in Laos, arrived in Phnom-Penh to begin studies that will lead to a renewed economic mission in Cambodia. Already the staff attached to the U.S. mission has grown from 11 to more than 50. Later this month, the U.S. will officially raise its diplomatic status in Phnom-Penh from mission to embassy level. At that time, the embassy will move from its present cramped quarters, which housed the servants of a large villa before the U.S. took it over, to a half-block-long building on Norodom Avenue. The man in command, succeeding Charge d'Affaires Lloyd Rives, will be newly appointed Ambassador Emory ("Cobey") Swank, 48, who was Ambassador Llewellyn Thompson's second in command in Russia as deputy chief of mission and is now one of the State Department's ranking Soviet experts. He also served as Washington's No. 2 man in Laos from 1964 to 1966.

Settling the Conflict. The increases in floor space and funds hardly betoken U.S. involvement on the scale of Viet Nam or Laos. In fact, the appointment of Sovietologist Swank may indicate that the U.S. is acutely sensitive to Moscow's difficult position in Cambodia as a result of Peking's sponsorship of Sihanouk, and that Washington is keeping alive its hope that Moscow may yet help in settling the conflict in Indochina. There is evidence that the Cambodians are not anxious, either, for the U.S. presence to grow too noticeable. "If the Americans send in troops, that could affect our political situation adversely," says one Cambodian official. "As it is, we know the Americans are here, but you don't see them very much--and that is good."

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