Phnom-Penh Under Siege

AT the time of the cease-fire in Viet Nam, U.S. officials expected a de facto cease-fire in neighboring Cambodia toward the end of March. By last week, however, those hopes were long dead, and U.S. bombers were flying some of the heaviest raids of the war.

Phnom-Penh, the Cambodian capital, lay encircled by Communist forces. All five highways leading to the city were under siege, and three outposts along the road to the provincial capital of Takeo had been lost. More important, the Communists had severed, for the moment at least, the vital Mekong River supply route from South Viet Nam. A convoy of about a dozen ships, already ten days overdue in the Cambodian capital, was delayed in the Vietnamese port of Vung Tau while the Cambodian armed forces and U.S. bombers tried to clear the riverbanks of enemy rocket launchers.

In Phnom-Penh, residents were urged to cut down on their use of petroleum; the city was said to have only a three-day supply of gasoline on hand for private transport. To make matters worse, a fire destroyed one of Phnom-Penh's two electricity generators, blacking out half of the city and stilling the whirling fans and air conditioners in the midst of scorching 95DEG heat. If the harassing Communist blockade could not be broken, U.S. officials said, food, fuel and ammunition would have to be brought in by a U.S. airlift.

"Windows rattled, and the whole capital literally shook last night as bombs fell on Communist emplacements to the southeast along the Mekong River," TIME Correspondent Gavin Scott reported from Phnom-Penh. "Sleepless residents of the Le Phnom Hotel moved to rooms on the north side in search of peace and quiet. One marveled, 'This must be the only hotel in the world where you have to change your room because of B-52 raids.' "

Night after night, hundreds of B-52s and fighter-bombers from Guam and Thailand streaked across Cambodia to drop their enormous loads (up to 3,000 tons every 24 hours), sometimes striking to within 14 miles of the capital. The effectiveness of this massive effort could not be judged, since U.S. announcements have been deliberately vague, and Western journalists are unable to venture far enough from the capital these days to inspect the damaged areas.

Aside from the question of the raids' effectiveness, there was also considerable debate as to whether the bombing violated U.S. law. In contrast to Viet Nam, Cambodia is not a member of SEATO and has no defense treaty with the U.S. Lyndon Johnson used to cite the Tonkin Gulf Resolution as his authority to wage war in Indochina, but Congress repealed that resolution in 1971. Indeed, after the "incursion" of 1970, Congress specifically barred the use of U.S. combat forces in Cambodia. The final justification--that U.S. air raids defended American troops in Viet Nam--vanished when the last U.S. forces left Viet Nam two weeks ago. "Does the President assert--as kings of old --that as Commander in Chief he can order American forces anywhere for any purpose that suits him?" Senator J. William Fulbright demanded.

Just about. In the face of harsh congressional criticism, the Administration assigned a task force to find a legal basis for its strategy and finally argued that the bombing was merely a continuation of existing policy. "If the President had the authority to pursue the cease-fire agreements," Defense Secretary Elliot Richardson declared before a House subcommittee last week, "he has the authority to secure adherence for those agreements." The agreements call for "an end to all military activities in Cambodia and Laos," so if the Communists go on fighting, the U.S. can go on bombing. What it all amounted to, Richardson added, was a "winding up of a residual aspect of the war in which we have been engaged."

The intensive bombing campaign is also a measure of Washington's concern for the survival of the government of President Lon Nol, who is still partially paralyzed from a stroke two years ago. After a mysterious bombing of the palace grounds by a disaffected pilot last month, Lon Nol declared a "state of danger" and assumed full dictatorial powers, which did little to increase his popularity among war-weary Cambodians. U.S. officials argued that Lon Nol should get rid of his younger brother, Lon Non, who had become the regime's unofficial strongman. Last week Lon Nol bowed to pressure and accepted his brother's resignation, but the gesture means little, since Lon Non is expected to stay on as the ailing President's closest adviser.

From the U.S. point of view, the terms of the Paris agreement on Viet Nam make it extremely important that the Phnom-Penh government be saved from collapse. The danger is that if most of Cambodia should fall to the Communists, the North Vietnamese and their allies would be able to transport military reinforcements to Cambodia by sea, thereby substantially reducing their reliance on the Ho Chi Minh Trail. They would be able to 'claim that they were observing the letter of the Viet Nam and Laos cease-fire agreements, even as they built up immense military pressure on South Viet Nam.

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