The Cost of the War After It's "Over"

TO date the U.S. has expended 44,876 American lives and $120 billion on the Viet Nam War. If all goes according to the schedule Richard Nixon announced last week, the number of American troops left in Viet Nam as of Dec. 1 will be about 184,000. Precisely what happens after Dec. 1 has yet to be decided, of course, but some projecting into 1972, 1973 and even beyond is already possible. The White House ventures no predictions, but the men in the Pentagon and State Department who must carry out future policy are working on the plans.

If the slightly increased withdrawal rates announced last week by the President are maintained, U.S. troop levels will be down to 50,000 by late summer of 1972 and just over 25,000 on Election Day. After that, what U.S. military planners have in mind, starting perhaps by mid-1973, is an "Ethiopian-type mission"* of somewhere between 3,000 and 6,000 men. That would be a return to the kind of presence that the U.S. had in South Viet Nam at the beginning of the 1960s with its Military Assistance Advisory Group. Before that level is reached, there could still be logistical and support troops in Viet Nam, but once the numbers are in the "Ethiopian" range, the force would presumably be strictly advisory. Yet the cost will still be considerable.

THE COST IN MEN. By some time in 1972, while troop levels are still up around 35,000, U.S. casualties could dip to no more than five or six men a week, predicts one high-ranking State Department official. The South Vietnamese will by then be doing almost all of the ground fighting; the Americans will be limited to defense--the kind of routine local security provided by MPs at the gates and in the watchtowers.

Only for an interim period, ending perhaps in 1973, will American pilots continue to fly B-52, fighter-bomber and C-130 gunship sorties over the Ho Chi Minh Trail. Once these sorties cease, so will U.S. air losses. With further troop withdrawals in 1973, the U.S. may lose no more than a couple of men a month on the average, though enemy terrorists could well inflict heavy casualties in isolated attacks.

THE COST IN DOLLARS. The U.S. is turning over an awesome and expensive arsenal free of charge to the South Vietnamese, including 1,200 aircraft from U-17 trainers to F-5 jet fighters, enough to give the South Vietnamese the world's seventh largest air force by 1974 or 1975. The Vietnamese navy already has received nearly all of a fleet of 1,600 boats and ships; the ground forces are getting--among other things--640,000 M-16 rifles, 20,000 machine guns, 34,000 grenade launchers, 870 howitzers, 10,000 81-mm. mortars, 220 M41 tanks, 1,000 armored personnel carriers, 44,000 trucks and 40,000 radios. One official (and probably low) estimate puts the cost of this sort of giving over the past three years at $1 billion.

Maintaining the American forces will naturally become drastically less costly than it has been; it should fall from a peak of almost $30 billion in 1969 through the current $12 billion to $3 billion in fiscal 1973, and perhaps only $400 million a year once reversion to adviser-only status is complete.

U.S. military assistance to Indochina is now running at around $2 billion annually, with much the largest share going to Viet Nam. For advisers and military aid together, the U.S. check for Indochina is likely to continue at $2.5 billion a year at least, and perhaps much more. By comparison, the American forces in West Germany now cost $1.2 billion a year, though much of that is offset by $800 million in military purchases by Bonn from the U.S.; the price of American commitment in South Korea has been running well over $1 billion annually for military aid and maintenance of U.S. troops.

Washington is now so firmly committed to Vietnamization that U.S. planners in the Pentagon assume that withdrawal will continue no matter what happens in South Viet Nam. One of the political and psychological risks is that as long as Americans remain in Viet Nam even as advisers, the South Vietnamese can put part of the blame on the U.S. if things go awry in the war. There have already been recriminations over allegedly inadequate American support for the Laotian invasion. There is another risk as well: whatever happens, Americans will continue to pay an enormous emotional price for their involvement in Viet Nam.

*So called because there are roughly as many Americans in Ethiopia at a military communications center near Asmara--1,600 servicemen and an equal number of dependents.

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