Undercover Armies - CIA FOIA - Central Intelligence Agency

C05303949
IN THE SHADOW OF VlETNAC
Laos until the efficacy of current operations had been established, and Westmoreland
accused him of "fiddling while Rome burns."J9D
Sullivan had already staked out his own position on jurisdiction over
southern Laos. Vientiane would be in charge, and its main tool would be the
Kha irregulars. By mid-1965-six months into Sullivan's tenure-eareful
recruiting among several tribes had brought their strength to about 2,400
men. Half of these were devoted to what the station now called consolidation
operations, building onl ~uccess at Ban Houei Kong in 1963 to
extend government control from the Se Done Valley to the entire Bolovens
Plateau. The deployment of the other 1,200 Kha responded more directly to
Westmoreland's demands for information on and action against North Vietnamese
traffic along the Corridor, east of the Se (River) Kong, and on the
river itself. 40 0
Consolidation on most of the plateau and in the Se Done Valley was
encountering only feeble Pathet Lao opposition, usually in the form of a small
home guard. This was replaced, as the irregulars approached the Se Kong, by
vigorous communist resistance from substantial Pathet Lao units, often reinforced
by North Vietnamese. The result was a sometimes deadly cat-andmouse
exercise in which the station tried to set up durable observation posts
. on the river and on the major roads and trails beyond it. 41 D
The launch base east of Saravane was hit in early August 1965 when some
300 North Vietnamese and Pathet Lao overran the camp, killing II defenders·
and wounding 14. Among the wounded were two who were captured and
questioned in poor Lao by "tall ... light skinned" interrogators heard speaking
Vietnamese among themselves. Each was then shot, once each in the
right leg and left arm; the ,two lay helpless until a relief force rescued them
three days later!'D
The relief force was led by Lt. Col. Vuk Daraseng, one of the few Kha integrated
into the Laotian establishment. His status as a fairly senior FAR officer
tempted his Agency contacts to see him as the Vang Pao of the Kha, and he
became the focus of propaganda efforts aimed at bringing more tribesmen to
the government side.
I a promising young officer on his first
tour and in charge of Corridor operations, saw expansion of the village
defense program as a prerequisite to improving access to the trails east of the
"Vientiane Embassy Telegrams 651 (15 December 1965 and 703 (3 January 1966), both FRUS
1964-1968, 426n, 432-33; Vletnam War Almanac,36.
"F======~=======:I--L---------,
"r----,----;-----------------------c--..J
SE1"'TIIMR
7";5