ARVN: Toward Fighting Trim

The U.S. had a Christmas gift for each of the men in South Viet Nam's 1st Regiment of the 1st Division, based just south of the Demilitarized Zone. It was the lightweight, fast-firing M-16 rifle, which packs far more punch than the older and heavier weapons that the ARVN (for Army of the Republic of Viet Nam) troopers had been carrying. The 1st Regiment soon had a chance to use them. During the Christmas truce, its scouts spotted a large North Vietnamese force moving into the Quang Tri coastal flats. As soon as the truce had ended, the ARVN moved to the attack, boxing the Communists into a four-sided trap with the help of a U.S. Marine blocking force. In a fierce day-long battle, the ARVN soldiers, using their new M16s, killed at least 100 of the North Vietnamese v. only 15 ARVN dead, while allied air, artillery and helicopters killed another 100. A day later, another ARVN battalion flushed a Viet Cong unit in Quang Ngai province to the south and killed 40.

For the ARVN, such victories are quite a change. It was not so many months ago that General William Westmoreland felt obliged to pass the word down the U.S. chain of command: if you can't say something good about the ARVN, don't say anything at all. The resulting silence was almost as damaging to the ARVN as the heavy shellfire of criticism it replaced. Of late, however, the ARVN has been doing some pretty effective firing of its own on the battlefields. Its performance has enabled U.S. officers to talk about the ARVN again, this time in terms of results and performances from the DMZ to the Delta, including victories in 37 of the ARVN's last 45 major contacts with the Communists.

Men in Mud Forts. Whether fighting well or poorly, the ARVN has always borne the brunt of the war in casualties. Last week Saigon reported that in the previous week 234 South Vietnamese soldiers and 166 Americans had been killed. In 1966, the U.S. lost 5,000 dead, the ARVN 11,500. This past year, government forces suffered 12,000 killed, the U.S. 10,000. South Vietnamese in uniform have, of course, always outnumbered American servicemen in Viet Nam. Today there are ten ARVN regular divisions, totaling some 321,000 men. Manning the vulnerable mud forts and watchtowers across the country are an additional 142,000 Regional Force (R.F.) troops and 143,000 P.F.s, or Popular Force militiamen.

The bulk of government forces is now assigned to pacification: 54 of the regular ARVN's 154 battalions, nearly all the R.F.s and P.F.s. It is not a task that the ARVN has yet mastered; in 1967, the Viet Cong killed more pacification workers than in 1966. The ARVN regulars constitute South Viet Nam's military spine, and on them the U.S. has expended its greatest training efforts. Those efforts, too, need improvement. Of the ten regular divisions, only three are considered "good" by U.S. commanders: the 1st in northernmost I Corps, and the 7th and 21st in the Delta. One division, the Delta's 25th, is rated virtually a disaster; the other six divisions range from "spotty" to "promising."

"Phantom Soldiers." As in any army, morale is largely the result of the quality of leadership. Good junior officers are lacking in the ARVN, which has been fighting for years and was virtually beaten in mid-1965 when the U.S. buildup began. Though a tough new law cut the desertion rate in half in 1967, it is still disappointingly high: more than one in ten ARVN soldiers go permanently AWOL, accounting for 70% of the ARVN's personnel losses. Draft dodging remains a national sport; even if caught, an affluent youth can buy his way out for $750 or less.

Some 20,000 "phantom soldiers" are still in the ranks--soldiers who have defected to civilian life but still remain on the active rolls in exchange for letting their officers pocket their pay. Graft runs right up the command line in many units. The going price for a province chief's chair can be $25,000, an investment quickly earned back via shakedowns of the local population and kickbacks on licenses and shipments of goods.

Taking Over Con Thien. Still, the ARVN today is a lot better than it used to be. One measure: it is doing more operating at night, denying the Viet Cong their sanctuary of darkness. When a big fight looms, as at Dak To, Westmoreland no longer hesitates to have the ARVN participate in the action-- and in the responsibility. The defense of Saigon is now largely in Vietnamese hands. Even more significantly, the U.S. Marines are beginning to turn over the task of manning the strongpoints along the Demilitarized Zone to the ARVN. Already the first units of the ARVN 1st Division are in place on the eastern anchor. Newly armed not only with the M-16 but also with M-60 machine guns (as will be all the ARVN this year), the Vietnamese 1st will soon take over Gio Linh, Con Thien and all the exposed positions where the Marines have taken such heavy casualties in the past year. This changing of the guard along the vital DMZ line is a measure of the new respect for the ARVN. It is also an earnest omen of the responsibilities that it must some day assume everywhere in South Viet Nam.

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