Undercover Armies - CIA FOIA - Central Intelligence Agency

C05303949
GOING THE WAY OF VIETNAMD
There seem to have been mirror-image perceptions of the importance of the
Plain of Jars. An NVA military history prefaces a discussion of Operation
I Ithis way: ,
The Plain of Jars was a strategic area, an extremely important location
not just because of its vital military, political, and economic
influence on the life or death of all nationalities in Laos, both in the
short-term and over the long-term, but also because it was a strategic
theater in the resistance war against the American imperialists
throughout the Indochinese peninsula. It was an extremely important
supporting theater, intimately connected to the preservation of
the security of the Vietnamese-Lao border area and our strategic
supply line from our rear area in North Vietnam to support all the
theaters in the war against the Americans.
The Americans considered the Plain of Jars as the key to Laos ...
By taking the Plain of Jars, the United States hoped to change the
balance of forces in its favor, to maintain the upper hand militarily
to resolve the situation in Laos, to support the implementation of the
"Vietnamization" doctrine in South Vietnam, to threaten the western
border of North Vietnam', and to carry out a strategy of "long range
defense" to protect the US-Thai line of defense along the Mekong
and tO""the nerve center of Yang Pao's bandit army at Long
Tieng.
'
I
This account mistimes the entry I
lintonortheast Laos,
and ignores what we have already seen to be the adventitious quality of Yang
Pao's victories in 1969. But it may well represent a genuine estimate of the
importance of the Plain of Jars. It may also reflect a belief that Washington
intended the irregular operations of that period to create a decisive strategic
advantage capable of serious damage both to the DRV's territorial integrity
and to its ability to support the war in South Vietnam. D
3s
Hanoi's approach to the war in northeast Laos can also be seen as reflecting,
at least in part, a doctrinal preoccupation with maintaining an offensive
posture. This can, at times, look like nothing more than a rhetorical tic, as in
General CHap's description of the NVA reaction, necessarily defensive, to US
bombing and commando raids on North Vietnamese territory:
We have' turned the enemy's attacks ,into passive reactions to our
attacks; neutralizing or reducing the effects of his attacks, while our
side constantly has aggressively taken the initiative in attacking the
enemy. 36
3S Dao Trang Lich, Do VanNhai, andTranThu, Northwest: Historyof the ResistanceWarAgainst
the Americansto Save the Nation (1954·1975),trans. Merle Pribbenow, 2680
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