COMMUNIST REACTIONS TO THE ENTRY INTO CAMBODIA OF TROOPS FROM SOUTH KOREA, INDONESIA, OR NATIONALIST CHINA

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP79R00967A000200020011-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 7
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 17, 2006
• Sequence Number: 11
• Publication Date: May 28, 1970
• Content Type: MEMO

Approved Fosgelease 2007/03/06 : CIA-RDP79R00964#000200020011-9
28 May 1970
SUBJECT: Communist Reactions to the Entry into Cambodia of
Troops from South Korea, Indonesia, or Nationalist
China
1. Availability of Such Forces. The South Koreans have
already indicated general interest in sending troops to Cambodia
and would be prepared to do so provided the US paid the costs and
then some -- as in South Vietnam. The Indonesian position is
ambiguous. Top active-duty generals strongly desire the US
weapons and equipment they assume would accrue from any Indonesian
troop commitment to Cambodia. But Foreign Minister Malik and
others are against any such commitment except as part of some
international peacekeeping force acceptable to the other side,
or at least to the Soviets. They give high priority to the
maintenance of some vestige of "neutrality" for Indonesia in
order to continue dealing on a reasonably friendly basis with
the European Communists and the left-leaning Arabs and Africans,
and to avoid forfeiting any Asian support for their regional
leadership ambitions. President Suharto is the focus of these
opposing tendencies; he appears to lean toward Malik's view
GROUP I
Excluded from automatic
downgrading and
declassification'
25X1
Approved For Release 2007/03/06 CIA-RDP79R00967A000200020011-9
 Approved Fo elease 2007/03/06 : CIA-RDP79RO096 000200020011-9
SECRET 25X1
though he may be telling President Nixon something else. The
Nationalist Chinese continue to feel that the US, in opposing
the Asian Communists in Indochina, has been fighting the wrong
opponent in the wrong way in the wrong place. Taipei has not
been eager to join the fray, but would see great political
advantage -- and considerable military arms fallout -- in
responding to a US request to send troops to Cambodia.
2. Communist Reactions. South Korean forces are already
heavily committed in South Vietnam and a shift of some ROK units
to the Cambodian front would represent no radical alteration of
the balance of forces in Indochina and would probably engender
little tangible response from the Communist side. The dispatch
of large additional ROK forces from South Korea itself would
greatly concern Hanoi, which probably considers ROK units to
be effective fighting forces. Hanoi would probably feel com-
pelled to improve its own military position, including rein-
forcement of its units, in those areas of Cambodia viewed as
essential to Communist prosecution of the war in South Vietnam
- e.g., the northeastern provinces. Hanoi would probably not
call.for'Chinese troop assistance; it would not wish to forfeit
it, own predominance in the area or risk a larger war in which
SECRET/
25X1
Approved For Release 2007/03/06 CIA-RDP79R00967A000200020011-9
 Approved Foelease 2007/03/06 : CIA-RDP79R0096000200020011-9
SECRET)
North Vietnamese interests were subordinated to those of Peking.
In any case, Hanoi would expect, and would probably receive, a
negative response from a generally cautious Peking. Hanoi would
call upon the brethren in Pyongyang to re-open their 1967-68
campaign of sporadic armed harassment of South Korea in hope
of deterring further ROK troop movements into Indochina; and the
North Koreans might oblige.
3?
The entry of Indonesian combat contingent would not
cause much concern in Hanoi in the first instance. Judging them
unlikely to be effective against experienced VC/NVA units, the
Communists would see little reason to respond militarily in any
significant way. And while Hanoi, Peking, and even Moscow would
fulminate against the Suharto government, the Indonesians are
out of reach, unless one counts the few armed Communist dissi-
dents' languishing in remote regions of Borneo. Of course, if
and
the Indonesians proved aggressive/effective in the field, Hanoi
would feel compelled to counter the buildup as in the South
1a
The dispatch of Nationalist Chinese troops to Cambodia
would generate the greatest immediate-apprehension in Communist
capitals. In addition to concern over any military impact they
- 3 -
Approved For Release 2007/03/06 - 7A000200020011-9
 Approved Fo elease 2007/03/06 : CIA-RDP79R0096ZA000200020011-9
SECRET]
might in time develop, the Nationalist forces would be viewed as
evidence of US willingness to move ever more boldly in Indochina,
accepting the risk of a sharp Communist Chinese reaction in
pursuit of its objectives.
5. Whether or not Thai, South Korean, Indonesian troops
had preceded the Chinese Nationalists into Cambodia, Hanoi would
fear that the US was building toward a massive coalition of anti-
Communist armies designed to secure Cambodia and use it as a
stepping-stone to Communist-held areas further north,-- in Laos
and, perhaps, North Vietnam itself. Hanoi would deem it necessary
to deter-any further buildup of GRC or other third-country forces,
preferably without wholesale expenditures of its own manpower. To
this end, and in cooperation with Peking, Hanoi would seek to
raise the spectre of a Chinese Communist military response. At
a minimum, the presence of Chicom forces in northwestern Laos
would be publicized. Numbers of Chinese "volunteers" might
-appear in a combat role in northern Laos or even in southern
.Laos and Cambodia; Again, Hanoi would probably not press for
any larger influx of Chinese lest this add to the very escala-
tion of Allied effort it had hoped to deter.
25X1
Approved For Release 2007/03/06 : CIA-RDP79R00967A000200020011-9
 Approved.6or Release 2007/03/06 CIA RDP79R67A000200020011-9
SECREO/
6. For Peking,.the Nationalist deployment into Cambodia
would also signal a possible buildup for US moves further north
in Indochina. Peking might even see it as heralding an attack
on southern China itself by GRC forces in concert with the US.
Certainly, it would be viewed in Peking as confirmation of an
inalterable US hostility toward the mainland regime. The
Chinese Communists would believe it essential to respond with
more than propaganda. This feeling would be reinforced by a
desire to appear resolute in the eyes of other Communist countries
and of the world at large.
contingent presently in northwestern Laos. They might think it
7. Peking's actions would be those which held some promise
of deterring a further GRC buildup in Cambodia and discouraging
any US-GRC plans for ground movement toward Laos., North Vietnam,
or China itself. Yet they would be those which Peking believed
carried the least risk of precipitating a direct confrontation
with the US. Such actions might include overt troop and air-..
craft deployments to coastal areas opposite Taiwan.;. harassment of
CRC air and sea units in the Taiwan strait area; and shelling
of the Offshore Islands. The Chinese Communists would certainly
reinforce their forces along the Laos border and might add to the
6ECRET~
Approved For Release 2007/03/06 : CIA-RUP79R00967A000200020011=9
 Approvedsr Release 2007103106 DIA-fDP79RO1AO00200020011=9
SECRLZ
useful to go so far as to announce the dispatch of "volunteers"
to areas further south in order to make their signals alwar
clearer to the US. In any event, with Taipei directly involved
in the Indochina conflict, Peking would become even more opposed
than before to a negotiated settlement.
8. The primary Soviet concern in the event of a Chinat
deployment into Cambodia would be that the situation was evolving
into one in which Moscow could exercise little or no influence.
The Soviets would also perceive the likelihood of further losses
in their competition., 4th Peking for influence in Hanoi. The
enhanced possibility of a direct $ino-US confrontation would
generate mixed feelings. While de tghted at the vanishing
chances of a Sino-US rapprochement" the USSR would be appre-
pensive concerning its _mm ehanWee, of avoiding, tnvcl. event in
any all-out Sino-US war.
9. pagwalftg Regarding "Token" Forces. if the troop
input of any or all of these three countries is in the form of
token contributions of manpower for some politically useful
international force, the Communist reactions herein discussed
would be riubstantial].y muted. Certainly, if third-country
elements are too small, to have military impact, Hanoi will
-6-
Approved For Release 2007/03/06 : CIA-RDP79R00967A000200020011-9
 Approvech it Release 2007/03/06 CIA'-!RDP79RO,Q067A000200020011-9
feel no need to respond.in kind. Moreover, if South Koreans
or Indonesians, however numerous, confined themselves to static
defense duties in government-held zones, Hanoi would. still,
in all likelihood, see no compelling reason to modify its over-
all strategy in Cambodia. We do not believe that Hanoi's plans
require the overthrow of the Lon Nol regime or seizure of all
Cambodian territory at some early date. But the entry of the
Nationalists in large numbers, however deployed, would result
in genuine alarm in Hanoi and Peking,, and lead to the reactions
noted earlier.
SECRET)
Approved For Release 20'07/03/06 : CIA-RDP79R00967A000200020011-9