AID TO AFGHANISTAN

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP89B00236R000500040026-7
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 12
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 19, 2009
• Sequence Number: 26
• Publication Date: March 20, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Approved For Release 2009/08/19: CIA-RDP89B00236R000500040026-7p CA._
larch 20, 1985 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD - SENATE S 3353
the slanderer? Who is the one who is trying for that land. I have seen a new land where that a critical factor in their ability to
to cover up deeds like this?" our children will no longer be bound down continue with a reign of terror in Af-
As long as these things happen, and as by the yoke of racism. Let us fight for that ghanistan is the degree to which
long as we hear about it, it will be our re- land. I have seen a land where our people public opinion is aware-or unaware-
sponsibility to testify against the evil that is shall work and enjoy the fruits of their of the atrocities being committed
gripping this country. We will not refuse. labor. Let us fight for that land.
We will not stop doing this. I have seen a land where families will no there by Soviet troops. In this the So-
We will refuse to be intimidated. It seems longer be broken up, and where mothers viets have been quite successful: The
to me that the South African government and fathers will enjoy the love and the re- Soviet press, as we know, is all but a
thinks that these things that happen, these spect of their children. Let us fight for that joke; meanwhile, journalists from the
atrocities-yes, atrocities, Mr. Minister-will land. I have seen a land where the misery of international press have been warned
stop us from demanding our freedom. But relocation is no more, and where the graves that they will be shot on sight if found
the South African government must learn dug for little children who will tomorrow die in Afghanistan. Deprived of film foot-
foot-
that the time that they can avert a of hunger remain empty. Let us fight for
change-a fundamental change in South that land. age, the resistance in Afghanistan has
Africa-by merely reaching for a gun is I have seen a land where those of us who been all but ignored of late by the
over. We will no longer be silenced by fear, fight for freedom and for justice and for the electronic media.
or by intimidation, or even by the wanton self-respect of this country will no longer be On another level, the Soviet strategy
killing of our people. sent to prison, will no longer be tortured, differs from our r own
The demands are there and are clear: re- will no longer be threatened, will no longer in in Afghanistan Southeast diAsia the
lease the political prisoners; unban the orga- be shot on the streets of our nation, but will
nizations; scrap all these laws that have be rewarded with honor and with the pres- timeframe envisioned before victory is
made South Africa a hell for so many ence of justice. Let us fight for that-land. achieved. Whereas we are unaccus-
people to live in; stop killing our children And I have seen a land where we together tomed to prolonged military involve-
and our people on the street. Let us partici- will build something that is worthwhile, ments and tend to judge engagements
pate in an open, democratic society. Then that is faithful to what we believe. in terms of a "quick victory," the Rus-
there will be peace in this country. Let us not give that up, but make tonight scans take along-range view of history,
The state threatens to ban the organiza. a new dedication for that moment. Because assessing their involvement in Afghan-
Democratic and they threaten to ban the United I believe it does not matter what happens
Democratic Front. It will be a little difficult now. I believe that the freedom that we istan in terms of 20, 30, 40, even 50
because, I have often said, the UDF is the have struggled for and the freedom that we years. "Time changes everything," one
people of South Africa. They cannot ban have died for will become a-reality. You can official noted, "in another 10 or 20
the people. The UDF embodies the dreams make it happen. God bless you.* years, the new generation of Afghans
of the people of South Africa, and they? will view our presence differently."
cannot ban that dream. The UDF embodies ( AID TO AFGHANISTAN Mr. President, the goal of Soviet
and the just aspiration society. of Thethe people y ey cannot t ban that. an th? Mr. a free HUMPHREY. Mr. President, strategy in Afghanistan is not Pacifica-
They can do whatever they want; but the the current situation in Afghanistan, tion, nor merely subjugation; it is, to
determination of our people to be free will lwhere Soviet troops have entered their quote Ambassador Kirkpatrick, "the
remain and will become the real reality that fifth year of murderous occupation, complete transformation of Afghan so-
to me government all of compels us to devote all possible atten- ciety and politics," and to that end,
even it o seand ems his
have to face. ,they have already made substantial
the threats that we see will not really, in tion to that beleagured country. It is
the end, help the South African govern- not merely that the Soviets have em- Progress.' On the one hand, the Sovi-
ment. barked upon the goal of subjugating, ets have resorted to a military strategy
There are threats against individuals. I do and eventually, of absorbing Afghani- which the scholar Louis Dupree has
not know what the minister has in mind for stan into the Soviet empire. Signifi- termed "migratory genocide" and
me. I have just heard that I will be charged, cantly, they have selected as the "rubbleization"-essentially the de-
and over the last week the threats have means to that end the pulverization of population of Afghanistan through
come in more frequently than before. mass murder and the forced exodus of
Someone has called me up and said that Afghan society; the "rubbleization"of over one-quarter of the Afghan people
the system has many ways to get at you. an entire nation. and Iran.
.i. Pakistan n a a,._ I-A th
And they will do that. I do not know what It is fashionable in the West to de- to
Q--+. have
e
On
natter now f That pis no ion 116barked on a long-term program to
ger the most nom. Current ent estimates suggest that em
e
e
I
of
d
app e
-
s,,._.
..
--- ,,
=
Fhat our people are suffering for, wnat our .
____ and to remove the youth, 8 and 9-
eople are dying for. That is worthwhile. resources,, the Soviets have been
to the Soviet Union for a
ld
s,
et us not give that up. unable to conquer the country. The year-o
remains ineffective and Marxist "education." When these
Let us remember that no threats and no Af
han Arm
y
g
form of intimidation and no trick that the of questionable loyalty; the political properly educated Afghan youngsters
system can play on any one of us, including cadre is equally unreliable. Spreading come of age, they will be capable of
myself, can bring us to the point where we her resources, bleeding her army, sap- staffing such positions in Afghanistan
will be silent, where we will accept the situa-
tion as it is. Because if we do that, we might Ping her ability to maintain other as the necessary Soviets fill with indigenous help.
as well give up and die. worldwide commitments, it is contend-
We sometimes die a thousand times before ed, Soviet withdrawal from Afghani- Indeed, in a country where the educa-
we die. Because when we are afraid, we die stan is a certainty, not soon perhaps, tional infrastructure will have been
every day a little bit. We die in our human- but a certainty. decimated, these Soviet-trained quis-
ity, and we die in our determination, and we Mr. President, I think it is impera- lings will be the only Afghans capable
die in our self-respect. Let us not come to tive that we dispel once and for all this of overseeing the population.
that point. notion of a parallel between Afghani- Mr. President, it is for this reason
For it is clear. I have experienced - stan and Vietnam. Such illusions will that, when confronted with the Sovi-
this last t year something within the commu
nity pf the UDF that will remain with me as only blind us to the gravity of the ets' strategy of victory through the
long as I live. I have experienced support, threat which faces us in Afghanistan long-range transformation of Afghan
.and I have experienced a determination,. and can only discourage our willing- society, we must consider the many
and I have experienced a love for freedom ness to assist the Afghan people to the different ways in which assistance
that is a precious gift that we have. We degree actually necessary. The fact of may be rendered to the Afghan
must not give that up. This is what we have the matter is that there are great dif- people. The Wall Street Journal of
I to have continue seeeo n a work new for. South Africa. I have ferences between the two scenarios. March 15 contained a very informative
seen a land, not of apartheid, not of death, On one level, the Soviets have taken piece by Susan Garment on the efforts
not of chains, but a land of joy and a land of a lesson from the American experience. 'of the National Endowment for De-
freedom and a land of peace. Let us fight in Vietnam. The Russians understand mocracy in Aghanistan. Entitled
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? 40
a -3604 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD - SENATE March 2~,
"Fighting Culture Wars in Afghani- crats, hawks and doves. Surely the organiza- agencies could give such a clearly satf
Stan.' the artinla .iat i1e fho ..,..>b tnn'c nnlin;e .. .na __ _, . ..
- ?j yvu&lg V1gtL111G11- "?-"?"' --...uaa.6 .u11141W1 U159USL WILn
tion has undertaken in the preserva-? hostile dictators on the left and friendly dic-
tion of democratic ideas and principles tators on the right. IMPORTATION OF FISHING
around the world. In Afghanistan, It is something of a miracle that Endow- TACKLE
funds from the National Endowment k
ment eep thisl bunch on Gershman was able . Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, one
for Democracy have been used to write enough to spend any of that money Rep. industry affected by U.S. concessions
and distribute textbooks, train teach- Brown is so worried about. The labor move- to our trading partners is the fishing
ers and open schools in areas con- ment is the biggest single force in the En- tackle industry.
trolled by the freedom fighters. This dowment so far, because at the beginning While duties on fishing tackle im-
educational assistance is particularly only labor had pre-existing organizations al- ported to the United States have been
important if the next generation of ready engaged in the sort of work that the reduced, thousands of American jobs
fledgling Endowment wanted to support. have been lost to offshore production.
Afghans is to ward off the tyranny of Therefore, others on the board, Democrats
Soviet-educated administrators and at least as much as Republicans, were Today, most fishing tackle is produced
overseers. Additionally, the endow- always looking to take a whack at the abroad, where the standard of living is
ment has supplied the freedom fight- unions. The Democratic Party has been tus- much lower and Government subsidies
ers with portable video cameras, so sling over which ideas and people should are available. The result is that in
henceforth control it
that the
lit
rea
, so people from -the
y of Soviet terror in Af-
ghanistan can be recorded and dis- various Democratic factions have made
played before the world. trouble for one another. Realpolitik fans
Food, medicine, and the wherewithal ademocratic hink to see tank why nwGuatemala,
a
to defend themselves are all necessary while a certain sort of idealist has recom-
components of a comprehensive pro- mended projects like U.S. Soviet youth lead-
gram of assistance to the Afghan ership exchanges as the route to democratic
people. The maintenance of an indige- nirvana.
nous educational community is equally though, the Endowment has
y not only survived but has given support to a
important and deserves our attention. pretty consistently good list of projects.
Mr. President, I ask that Ms. Gar- Money has gone to help plan an interna-
ment's article be printed in the tional youth conference in Jamaica, to
RECORD, strengthen democratically based coopera-
The article follows: tives in Chile, to help support the ndepend-
FIGHTING CULTURE WARS IN AFGHANISTAN ent newspaper "La Prensa" in Nicaragua.
(By Susanne Garment) And, of course, there has been money for,
Afghanista
There is nothing like the thought of Consider the Endowment's most recent
hanging to concentrate the mind, and noth- effort in the face of the Soviet occupation
ing like a crisis to show what an organiza- of Afghanistan. Over the last few weeks
tion is or is not good for. This week the Na- expert witnesses have been testifying on the
tional Endowment for Democracy, a private current situation to the Congressional Task
but government
f
d
-
un
ed group recently es-
tablished to support the growth of democra.
cy throughout the world, went before a
House subcommittee for its annual appro-
priations hearing. Star of the occasion was
Republican Rep. Hank Brown of Colorado,
who accused the Endowment of wasting tax-
payers' money on things the rest of the U.S.
government was already doing. Clearly,
Rep. Brown was not taking his bearings
from the question of how to improve Ameri-
can performance in a crisis of democracy
like the current Soviet war against Afghani-
stan.
In the good old post-World War II days,
the U.S. gave a certain amount of covert aid
to political and cultural institutions that
promoted democratic, American-style ideas
In various countries. During the Vietnam
War, the belief spread among our opinion
leaders that we should not stick our self-in-
terested noses into other nations' sacredly
indigenous affairs in this way. The official
U.S. aid shriveled, and few private American
organizations were willing or able to fill the
breach.
But not everyone in American politics
.looked upon this purification as a good
thing. Thus it came to pass that Ronald
Reagan, in a 1982 speech to the British Par-
liament, proposed a new unit to take up the
job of watching out for the health of demo-
consistent idea of what the Afghans need
now. They need effective arms. They need
food in the face of the Soviets' deliberate
destruction of agriculture. They say they
also urgently need education, both within
the country and outside it. This request
would not naturally go to the top of a U.S.
policy maker's list. But the Afghans know
that the Soviets aim to pacify the country
in the long run by such devices as destroy-
ing the schools and taking the young chil-
dren away for Marxist education in the
Soviet Union. Such tactics may not bear
fruit next month but could destroy the cul-
ture of Afghan independence in the genera-
tion to come.
The Endowment has just awarded an edu-
cation grant to American Friends of Af-
ghanistan. The money will go to writing, re-
printing, and distributing textbooks In areas
controlled by freedom fighters; to training
Afghan teachers and sending them home to
reopen schools, and to give Afghans porta-
ble video cameras-plus training-so they
can bear witness to the invasion's impact.
Yes, this is a small effort compared with a
nice bunch of missile launchers. But there is
no doubt that the state of the spirit inside
Afghanistan and the state of opinion abroad
can be changed so as to affect Soviet calcu-
lations of what thi
s war is worth to them.
cratic Ideas. The speech turned into an orga- Two days ago the United Nations Human
nization that was finally declared official by Rights Commission in Geneva Issued its
Congress in November 1983. strongest resolution yet on Afghanistan,
At the beginning the project looked like a condemning Soviet torture, bombing of civil-
sure loser. It couldn't be secret anymore, of ians and destruction of agriculture. The
course. The projects the Endowment dealt vote followed a report last week from within
with would be-initiated and carried out by the U.N. bureaucracy accusing the Soviets
private organizations, so the government of torture and chemical warfare. Such U.N.
would not dirty its hands with operational actions would have been unthinkable a
details. The board would give voice to the decade ago. The small new Endowment is al-
whole howling range of American politics- ready beginning to give us a few bangs for
business and labor. Republicans and Demo- our bucks. Would, that more publicly funded
valued at almost $27 million. In 1984,
imports had risen to over $60 million-
an increase of 124 percent in just 4
years.
One of the few surviving U.S. manu-
facturers is the Shakespeare Co.,
which accounts for 800 jobs in my
home State of South Carolina. In
order to compete with foreign manu-
facturers, Shakespeare has had to
invest in research. and development to
improve their fishing rods. They have
also invested iin equipment to modern-
ize their manufacturing and to imple-
ment their innovative designs.
Further, in order to convince the
American consumer to buy American
products, Shakespeare is offering a
$50 U.S. savings bond with the pur-
chase of its newest line of fishing rods,
called the Liberty fishing rod. With
the sale of each of these innovative
rods, Shakespeare is making a dona-
tion to restore the Statue of Liberty. I
commend the Shakespeare Co. for the
efforts it has made and continues to
make to compete with foreign manu-
facturers.
Like many other industries in
ble of competing. The problem is
ernment not competing. While
as if those words had any relevance to
the present economic competition.
Unless_ our Government wakes up and
gets in the game with a trade policy
demanding reciprocity from our trad-
ing partners, this Nation will go the
way of England. And the commenda-
ble efforts of all our companies to pre-
pare for the competition will count for
naught because of a government
which refuses to enforce our trade
laws and refuses to join the fray. Let
us wake up before it Is too late..
PREVENTION OF NUCLEAR
EXCHANGES
e Mr. LUGAR. Mr. President, the
president of the American Society for
Public Administration, Mr. Bradley
Peterson, has written forcefully on the
need for the United States and the
Soviet Union to adopt measures de-
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40
March 19, 1985 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD - SENATE
ments. I pledge to serve. my country. now
and to prepare myself for the future. Al-
though, as a, student, I do not vote or pay
taxes, I can .. still support my country
through my present actions. I can exercise
my constitutional rights by keeping . in-
formed about important issues and voicing
my opinions by letter or petition to my gov-
ernment representatives. In addition; I can
provide important volunteer service for my
community. Through service clubs, I have
worked for the Salvation Army, Special
Olympics, and a shool for authistic children.
By serving the people of America, I am serv-
ing America herself. Working for my coun-
try now is extremely important; but, as na-
tionally acclaimed inventor Charles Ketter-
ing once said, "We should all be concerned
about the future because we will have to
spend. the rest of our lives there." For' my
generation, preparing for the future is criti-
cal, because soon America's future will rest
in our hands. We must educate ourselves
about our government and our future re-
sponsibilities as tax-paying, voting citizens.
As an individual, I also must realize my po-
tential so I can make a significant contribu-
tion to my country's welfare.
Finally, I pledge myself to make a strong
commitment to America. If I do not take my
pledge seriously, then it is worthless. Words
are easy to write and even easier to say, but
acting upon those words is much harder. I
cannot pledge myself to America and then
put off my service and education until later
or-completely forget about them. If I do,
then I am guilty of apathy, perhaps the
greatest threat to democratic America.
Instead of Indifference, I want to give my
country action. Therefore. I pledge myself
to uphold America's traditions, to work
during the present and for the future, and
to commit myself to fulfilling this solemn
promise. My pledge can make a difference In
my goals and actions and possibly the goals
and actions of others as well. After all, in
the words of Henry Emerson Fosdick, "De-
mocracy is based upon the conviction that
there are extraordinary possibilities in ordi-
nary people". I intend to unlock some of my
extraordinary potential by giving and living
SUPPORT FOR THE NON-COM-
MUNIST RESISTANCE IN CAM-
BODIA
? Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President
once
,
again war is raging in Cambodia, forc-
ing nearly a quarter million Cambodi-
an civilians to flee their homeland and
take refuge in Thailand. During the
past few months Vietnam, which has
occupied Cambodia since 1979 with an
army of approximately 170,000 troops,
has attacked and overrun Cambodian
resistance camps 'near Cambodia's
border with Thailand. The Vietnamese
first attacked the camps of the nation-
alist Khmer People's National Libera-
tion Front of former Prime Minister
Son Sann, then those of the Commu-
nist Khmer Rouge, and they have now
besieged the stronghold of a smaller
group loyal to Prince Norodom Sihan-
ouk. Most of the resistance forces, as
well as the civilian population under
their control,, have taken refuge in
Thailand.
The renewed fighting and. the de-
population of Cambodia by the Viet-
namese occupation army has aroused
little outrage or even concern here in
the United States. The bitter memory
of our. tragic military involvement in
Indochina has made many Americans
want to forget about that area and to
distance ourselves from its current
problems. Moreover, the situation in
Cambodia is complicated by the fact
that one part of the Cambodian resist-
ance is led by the notorious Khmer
Rouge Communists, who carried out
massive atrocities against the Cambo-
dian people under the Pol Pot govern-
ment.
Nevertheless, we should not forget
that there is another alternative to
the Vietnamese-dominated Heng
Samrin regime in Phnom Penh and
the Chinese-supported Khmer Rouge.
The non-Communist KPNLF has dem-
onstrated an ability to win the support
of the Cambodian population in the
areas that it controls. Moreover, its
guerrilla forces have been growing in
number while those of the Khmer
Rouge have been declining, despite the
much greater' material support which
the KR has received from China. Al-
though its camps in Cambodia have
been overrun by the Vietnamese, the
KPNLF guerrilla army was able to
escape with its weapons and to re-
group in Thailand.
As in Afghanistan, the Cambodian
people are the victims of a. foreign
Communist aggressor which is ruth-
lessly trying to subjugate and depopu-
late their country to further its own
strategic goals. No less then the
Afghan freedom fighters, the KPNLF
deserves our moral, political, and ma-
terial support. We must not forget
them.
I request that three articles describ-
ing the recent fighting in Cambodia be
inserted in the RECORD. The first by
Elizabeth Becker on the non-Commu-
nist resistance was published in the
Washington Post on January 13. The
second by William Shawcross ap-
peared in the Los Angeles Times on
January 20. And the third is a March 6
Washington Post report by William
Branigin on the Vietnamese attack
against the last remaining resistance
camp inside Cambodia.
I also request that the December
1984 preliminary report of the Law-
yers Committee for International
Human Rights on "Human Rights in
Kampuchea" be inserted in the
RECORD.
The material follows:
[From the Washington Post, Jan. 13, 19851
CAMBODIA'S NON-COMMUNISTS FIGHT BACK
(By Elizabeth Becker)
Indochina got back on the front page last
week, thanks to a particularly bloody Viet-
namese attack against a Cambodian en-
campment near the Thai border. This story
is no longer compelling to Americans, who-
humiliated by defeat-left the region a
decade ago. But the fighting.goes on, and-
irony of ironies-it has taken a turn in Cam-
bodia that Americans only dreamt of during
the years of their involvement.
It wasn't just any Cambodians the Viet-
namese attacked so brutally. It was the
camp of a group called the Khmer People's
National Liberation Front, which, despite a
name that eyokes the Vietcong, is a nation-
S 3193
alist, non-communist faction of apparently
increasing strength ' and popularity. They
are one of the two principal armies fighting
Vietnam's six-year occupation of Cambodia.
The other belongs to the Khmer Rouge. All
last year the Vietnamese said the chief ob-
stacle to their joining in peace talks was the
continued presence of the murderous
Khmer Rouge.. But recent events demon-
strate that Vietnam is not interested in
peace negotiations and that its greatest po-
litical concern is not the Khmer Rouge but
this nationalistic alternative to all forms of
Indochinese communism.
The KPNLF has become the "third
force"-neither communist nor corrupt-
that Americans searched for during all the
years of their involvement in Indochina.
Graham Greene's Quiet American died for
the third force. Until the end in 1975 some
American officials dreamt of its emergence
to save the region, and particularly Viet-
nam, from communism. Now, without any
military support from Washington, the
KPNLF has arisen to play that role in Cam-
bodia.
That the KPNLF has become a crucial
target for Hanoi's forces is beyond question.
Since they opened fire on Cambodian resist-
ance camps in late December, the Vietnam-
ese have virtually ignored the militarily su-
perior Khmer Rouge in order to shell and
burn the military camps and civilian villages
of the KPNLF.
The KPNLF army is barely two-thirds the
size of the Khmer Rouge armed forces; it is
ill-equipped; it has no major foreign power
backing to insure its survival above all other
Cambodian factions.
In spite of this, or perhaps because of it,
the KPNLF have nonetheless proven them-
selves in the past two or three years to be
the greatest political. threat to Vietnamese
plans to entrench its client state in Phnom
Penh. Something akin to a role reversal has
occurred in this third Indochina war being
fought in Western Cambodia.
Whereas in the first and second Indochina
wars communist guerrillas captured the
mantle of independence against foreign oc-
cupation and won admiration for persever-
ing in spite of all odds, the small KPNLF is
beginning to win a similar reputation in
Cambodia.
If the current war was strictly between
the Khmer Rouge and the Vietnamese im-
posed regime of Heng Samrin, the odds
would be far better for Hanoi. It would then
be a simple contest between two vying wings
of the same Cambodian communist party.
The people of Cambodia would have the
narrow choice between Pol Pot's brand of
Khmer communism, which led to the death
of well over one million Cambodians, or the
Vietnamese-style communism now adminis-
tered through the Heng Samrin regime that
makes Cambodia a near-colony of Vietnam.
But Son Sann, the leader of the KPNLF,
refused to leave Cambodians such limited
choices. A former prime minister of Cambo-
dia in the '60s, Son Sarin organized the
KPNLF around a platform espousing demo-
cratic ideals, a free, independent, nona-
ligned Cambodia and a sense of nationalism
tied to Buddhism. Unable to get support
from non-communist powers, the KPNLF
has had to rely on the Chinese. Peking gives
the lion's share of its military assistance to
its long-time ally the Khmer Rouge and
gives the leftovers to the KPNLF.
Perhaps because of this abandonment the
KPNLF has surprised all sides and made
deep inroads in occupied Cambodia, becom-
ing, in many respects, the Cambodian fac-
tion the others have to discredit. Although
it is small comfort, the punishing, brutal Vi-
etnamese attacks against their. camps over
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? .49
S 3194 CONGRESSIONAL. RECORD - SENATE
the past month are a tribute to the success
the KPNLF has had undermining the Viet-
namese occupation.
There is proof plenty that the KPNLF
rather than the Khmer Rouge are the chief
political opponents at the moment of the
Vietnamese occupiers and their Cambodian.
client-the Heng Samrin government.
The jails of the, Samrin regime are filled
with KPNLF followers, or people suspected
of supporting the KPNLF, not with Khmer
Rouge. On the contrary, the Samrin regime
has shown extraordinary leniency towards
the Khmer Rouge to whom they offered a
clemency program requiring no more than
one month's re-education before they are
welcomed back into the fold. They are seen
as wayward communists who need only be
shown "the true path", as the Minister of
Justice said, before becoming citizens with
full rights in the Samrin regime.
The KPNLF, on the other hand, represent
an entirely antagonistic political alternative.
Over a year ago, the Vietnamese stepped in
to eliminate suspected KPNLF followers in
the northwest and countermanded the
orders of the representative of the sup-
posedly independent Samrin regime.
When the Vietnamese or the Heng
Samrin regime are criticizing the KPNLF
they say that there is nearly no difference
between the KPNLF and Pol Pot's people.
The Vietnamese are capitalizing on the
KPNLF's entering into a loose coalition for
more than two years with the Khmer Rouge
and the tiny forces led by Prince Norodom
Sihanouk. They were pushed into the coali-
tion in a politically pragmatic move urged
on them by foreign powers-China, Thai-
land and the U.S.
Everyone has changed sides so often in
the continuing war for Cambodia It is easy
to get lost in the thicket. Only one leader-
Son Sann-has refused to completely
change sides and join the enemy. Prince
Norodom Sihanouk, the most famous of
Cambodians, has changed sides so many
times he has come to represent little more
than himself and a vague Khmer national-
ism. He fought against the Khmer Rouge
when he was leader of Cambodia but when
he was deposed in 1970 he went over to the
Khmer Rouge side and used his consider-
able reputation to encourage Cambodians to
come with him.
The Khmer Rouge rewarded him by put-
ting Sihanouk under virtual house arrest
after they came to power and `announced
their own government. Yet, today, Sihanouk
is far closer to his Khmer Rouge associates
in the coalition than to Son Sann, whom he
openly distrusts.
The Heng Samrin regime is led by and
filled with Khmer Rouge who fought under
Pol Pot and helped run his horrible regime:
They joined with the Vietnamese when it
was clear that they were next, in line in Po1
Pot's execution lists.
It is within this muddy, bloody context
that Son Sann stands out even further.
During the civil war, from 1970 to 1975, Son
Sann refused to support either the criminal-
ly corrupt and inept regime of Lon Nol's
Khmer Republic or its enemy, the commu-
nist front of the Khmer Rouge nominally
headed by Sihanouk. As a result, Son Sann
was threatened with arrest by Lon Nol,
snubbed by the U.S. Embassy in Phnom
Penh and threatened with death by Sihan-
ouk in Peking.
A man of the 'third force' with no side to
support, Son Sann returned to Paris and the
life of an obscure exile whose mind is fixed
on events in his homeland. When the Viet-
namese were looking around for a candidate
to head a puppet regime should they over-
throw Pol Pot, they. sent an intermediary to
Son Sann to ask if he would join them. Son
Sann said no, largely that two wrongs would
not make a right and that he was opposed
to any plans for a Vietnamese occupation of
Cambodia even if it would mean,the end of
the monstrous Po1 Pot. regime.
When the Vietnamese succeeded, Son
Sann moved from Paris to a base on the
Thai-Cambodian border and set about trans-
forming a tired band of refugees, newly ar-
rived overseas Cambodians and young re-
cruits Into a military and political resistance
force.
Through painstaking effort the KPNLF's
army and political staff grew despite en-
emies on all sides. When Son Sann's army
started in 1979 it had some 1,000 members.
The Khmer Rouge, under Pol Pot, had
nearly 80,000 soldiers. The Vietnamese occu-
pation force numbered 200,000.
Yet today the numbers are revealing. Pol
Pot's Khmer Rouge, despite the vastly supe-
rior aid, number around 35;000 soldiers
while Son Sann's KPNLF is thought to be
between 15,000 and 20,000 soldiers.
Their appeal and propaganda reach deep
inside Cambodia and into the government.
KPNLF operatives have their own impres-
sive intelligence network. When Cambodi-
ans defect from the Heng Samrin regime,
dejected that the Vietnamese are still in
control of the country, they join the
KPNLF forces if they decide to remain in-
volved in their country's war.
The KPNLF is overshadowed, however, by
the chimera of the Third Force of Vietnam,
by the extraordinary fame of Sihanouk and
the battlefield reputation of the Khmer
Rouge. Soh Sann, a former financier who is
supremely self-confident and patient, is,
however, uncharacteristically modest and
shy for the leader of a guerrilla movement.
Son Sann's unlikely demeanor and his age
of 73 years undoubtedly contributed to the
early and consistent American position to
refuse granting military aid to the KNPLF.
Son Sann expected the opposite. But the
U.S. would have no part in his military
plans. The Carter administration decided to
give Its tacit support to the rearming and re,
grouping of the Khmer Rouge under Po1
Pot. They saw no future for the KPNLF.
The Khmer Rouge, on the other hand, were
proven military leaders, fighters who could
go head to head with the Vietnamese. Both
armies benefitted from American aid to ref-
ugees along the border.
The Reagan administration continued the
Carter policy although it has given greater
political support to the KPNLF as it has
grown in strength and influence. It was
under the Reagan administration that
China, the U.S., and the Association of
Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) put un-
resistable pressure on Son Sann to join in a
coalition with Sihanouk and the Khmer
Rouge. Son Sann believes he was promised
military support from the U.S. in return for
joining this unholy alliance but that sup-
port never came.
But the U.S. has abdicated its military in-
terest in the Indochina region to China. The
Chinese are responsible not only for nearly
all the armaments sent to the Cambodian'
factions fighting the Vietnamese but Peking
Is also the major guarantor of direct mili-
tary'assistance should Thailand be attacked
by Vietnam in the midst of the current war.
Morover, it appears that the lesson the
U.S. believes it has learned from the last
Vietnam War is that in Indochina commu-
nists are better fighters than non-commu-
nists. The Pentagon has repeatedly fought
against any American military assistance.to
another 'third force' in! Indochina, particu-
larly not to the.KPNLF:
. Although that decision went against Son
Sann's wishes, the results may have been to
the benefit rather than e the detriment of
March 19, 1985
the KPLNF. If history is any judge, the
KPNLF has done far better without U.S.
military assistance than those resistance
groups who received American aid. One
need only remember the Kurds,' the anti-
Castro Cubans and the rebels in Angola who
received direct or indirect American aid so
long as an American enemy could be bled by
their forces but lost that aid when Washing-
ton found their resistance inconvenient.
Some of the Cambodians in the non-com-
munist resistance are keenly aware of the
high proce of American military assistance.
They are veterans of the corrupt Lon Nol
regime which from 1970 until its defeat in
1975, was underwritten by the U.S. Up until
the last weeks the U.S. gave uncritical sup-
port to Lon Nol despite all-evidence that he
was losing the war through corruption and
neglect as surely as the Khmer Rouge were
winning it.
For all of these reasons American military
assistance to the KPNLF is not the auto-
matic answer some have put forth. The
KPNLF has emerged as the most independ-
ent Cambodian force fighting in what could
be seen as a three-cornered war for Cambo-
dia. The Khmer Rouge are discredited not
only for their murderous regime but for
their long-standing allegiance to and de-
pendence on China. The Vietnamese call
them a puppet of China and the Cambodian
people see a germ of truth in the charge. Of
course the Heng Samrin regime is regularly
called a puppet of Hanoi, a charge that also
sticks..-
The KPNLF, the orphans of the war,
cannot be portrayed as any country's client.
True, the resistance does depend on the ex-
pensive goodwill of Thailand for a safeha-
ven and dependable supply route; and with-
out Chinese military supplies it would have
languished with little chance to prove its
military ability. Moreover, by joining in the
loose coalition with Sihanouk and the
Khmer Rouge, the KPNLF has tainted its
reputation. But compared to the other
groups fighting in the war, the KPNLF can
hardly be accused as acting as a stand-in for
a major foreign power.
Son Sann is adamant that he is not inter-
ested in massive military aid, nothing that
even vaguely resembles the scale of aid
given the old Lon Nol regime. He is equally
uninterested in the American interference
that went along with the aid. Rather, he
has a modest shopping list of equipment he
wants shipped to his troops-nothing more
or less.
It is questionable whether the U.S. is ca-
pable much less willing to give even limited
supplies without demanding a price that
would diminish the appeal of the KPNLF.
As of this week, the question is of utmost
importance. The Vietnamese have destroyed
all of the major KPNLF camps including
their headquarters at Ampil. Moreover the
Vietnamese have changed tactics. Besides
destroying camps, they have stationed
themselves in what appear to be permanent
bases smack up against the border to pre-
vent the KPNLF from returning to Cambo-
dia. The Vietnamese apparently want to cut
off the KPNLF from their routes inside
Cambodia-routes they have used success-
fully to harass Vietnamese troops, organize
their followers around the country, gain
new recruits and circulate propaganda
against the Vietnamese occupation.
Those KPNLF activities have proved too
effective against the Vietnamese occupiers.
They hope to stamp out, the non-communist
resistance and leave the ' Cambodians with
the choice of either the Khmer Rouge or
their Heng Samrin regime.
The next stage is crucial.. Have the non-
communists suffered a military defeat that
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March. 19, 1985 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD - SENAR
will leave them incapable of regrouping and
expanding? How should the U.S. and other
sympathetic powers respond without jeop-
ardizing the KPNLF? Is the KPNLF the last
gasp of the dream of a third force or has it
emerged as the powerfully attractive inde-
pendence fighters that somehow suivive for-
eign occupiers as other Indochinese guerril-
las before them, including those who fought
with Ho Chi Minh?
[From the Los Angeles-Times, Jan. 20, 1985]
WAR, DISRUPTION, DEATH: CAMBODIA'S
ENDLESS AGONY
(By William Shawcross)
LONDON.-Along the Thai-Cambodian
border right now, close to 200,000 people are
huddling from the sun by a tank ditch, their
only shelter blue strips of plastic draped
over sticks, their only food and water pro-
vided, like the plastic, by the United Nations
every day. Their only expectation, more
war, more disruption, more death.
They are Cambodian refugees, the latest
Cambodian victims of two refusals. Viet-
nam's refusal to accept any compromise in
its attempts to dominate all of Cambodia
and the refusal of China, Thailand and
their allies to let Vietnam get away unhar-
assed with the sad little country that Cam-
bodia has so long been and so long probably
will be.
In April, Vietnam will be celebrating the
10th anniversary of its victory over the
United States. Scores of U.S. reporters and
TV crews have been invited. But the Viet-
namese are unlikely to allow them to wit-
ness its failure to achieve a similar victory
in neighboring Cambodia, where its five-
year effort to suppress all opposition cli-
maxed in recent weeks with massive attacks
on the camps of the main non-communist
resistance group, the Khmer People's Na-
.tional Liberation Front, or KPNLF, along
the Thai border. These dry season attacks
have become annual events, but this year
the assault has been especially virulent.
Vietnam invaded Cambodia at the end of
1978 to overthrow its former allies, the
Khmer Rouge. Their leader, Pol Pot, had
ruled Cambodia with appalling brutality
since April, 1975. More than 1 million of
Cambodia's 7 million people are thought to
have died under their rule. The Khmer
Rouge also continually attacked Vietnamese
positions and villages over the country's
mutual, long-disputed border. It was this,
not the abuse of human rights within Cam-
bodia, which persuaded the Vietnamese to
invade.
After the Vietnamese army drove the
Khmer Rouge from Phnom Penh, Vietnam
installed a puppet government. This regime,
headed by Heng Samrin, a former Khmer
Rouge officer, is still in power, sustained by
between 160,000 and 200,000 Vietnamese
troops. But although Hanoi and its new ally
control most of Cambodian countryside and
population, the resistance to them appears
to be growing.
This is because for many Cambodians lib-
eration from the Khmer Rouge in 1979 has
now become occupied by the Vietnamese.
The Heng Samrin regime is far less brutal
than the Khmer Rouge, which attempted to
return Cambodia to what it called Year
Zero, turning the country into a vast agri-
cultural gulag.
Nonetheless, the Heng Samrin govern-
ment is Marxist-Leninist and has become in-
creasingly dogmatic since 1979. And real
power is in the hands of the Vietnamese,
who have advisers in every ministry and
every provincial administration.
Now there are three resistance groups
based close to or along. the Thai border: the
Khmer Rouge, the KPNLF and a group led
by Cambodia's former, ruler, Prince Noro-
dom Sihanouk. They are linked in a 'loose
coalition government led by Sihanouk. It is
this government, not that of Heng Samrin,
that is recognized by the United Nations.
All three groups exist because supplies are
brought through Thailand, which has pro-
tested most' strongly the presence of Viet-
namese troops in Cambodia. Thailand has
always seen Cambodia as a buffer between
it and Vietnam.
But the Khmer Rouge, with 35,000 troops,
have a problem of recruitment. They are
still widely feared. The KPNLF, by contrast,
has no record of brutality. As a non-commu-
nist group, it attracts Cambodians disillu-
sioned with both the, Cambodian and the Vi-
etnamese versions of communism.
The third group, also non-communist, is
that of Sihanouk himself. It numbers only
about 5,000 troops and is therefore less sig-
nificant than the KPNLF.
Sihanouk is also by now a less effective
leader than the leader of the KPNLF. This
is Son Sann, a frail, modest 73-year-old
former prime minister of Cambodia, who
left the country in the 1960s because of his
disagreements with the prince.- Until the
late '70s, Son Sann remained in exile in
Paris. When the Vietnamese invaded Cam-
bodia. They approached him to lead their
puppet regime. Instead he began to try to
construct his KPNLF out of the refugees
who had fled to the Thai border. By the end
of 1984, Son Sann had a force of about
20,000.
Son Sann, consistent and courteous, is an
unlikely guerrilla leader. He maintains that
U.S. officials promised him military assist-
ance if he formed the coalition with the
Khmer Rouge. If so, that promise has not
been fulfilled.
The Chinese, Vietnam's principal enemy,
have been generous with arms shipments to
their Khmer Rouge ally and niggardly with
the KPNLF and Sihanouk. So when the
recent massive Vietnamese attacks, KPNLF
forces were routed quickly from their settle-
ments. They may have moral support from
much of the outside world, but they do not
have the means to defend themselves.
The Vietnamese have been at such pains
to destroy the KPNLF bases and infrastruc-
ture precisely because of the KPNLF's polit-
ical successes at home and abroad. After the
first KPNLF camp was destroyed in Novem-
ber, the Heng Samrin regime's minister of
defense sent a message of congratulations to
the troops involved. He said they had "to a
large extent succeeded in blocking enemy
infiltration into the interior."
The Vietnamese have captured many
KPNLF infiltrators. Indeed most political
prisoners inside Cambodia are associated
with the KPNLF. Captured Khmer Rouge
prisoners, as strayed communist comrades,
are treated remarkably leniently by the Vi-
etnamese-one month's reeducation is
standard. It is the KPNLP people who are
tortured and killed.
Vietnam's other consideration is to de-
stroy the credibility of the KPNLF Interna-
tionally. The increasing political success of
the KPNLF has been an important factor in
enabling Western governments and the
Assn. of Southeast Asian Nations to support
the coalition in which the Khmer Rouge are
the dominant military partners.
Whether the KPNLF will be able to grow
must depend on the level of support it gets
from the outside. Son Sann has appealed
for more help from the United States-not
large-scale military assistance as was given
by Washington in the early 1970s with dis-
astrous consequences to the right-wing
regime in Cambodia, but for enough materi-
al so that his. forces can better resist Viet-
namese fire power. In recent days, KPNLF
S 3195
leaders have also said they may abandon
their fixed bases along the Thai border in
favor of guerrilla infiltration of Cambodia-
just what the Vietnamese are trying to pre-
vent.
Whether pressure from the front and the
Khmer Rouge (whose camps have yet to be
hit in the current offensive) will ever be
enough to force the Vietnamese to a com-
promise is not clear. Vietnam has said that
it will leave Cambodia only when "the
threat from China" is lifted. That "threat"
has been variously described as aid to the
Khmer Rouge, assistance to resistance
groups in Laos and military pressure along
Vietnam's northern border with China.
Until and unless there is some sort of rap-
prochment between the Soviet Union, Viet-
nam's principal ally, and China, that seems
unlikely to happen. For China, the present
stalemate has obvious benefits. As for the
Reagan Administration, it has been content
to follow the Chinese line. All governments,
including their own, have misused Cambodi-
ans for years now. There is no reason to
suppose that this is about to change. But it
is an issue which should remain at the fore-
front of the Vietnamese 10th anniversary
celebrations.
[From the Washington Post, Mar. 6, 19851.
VIETNAMESE FORCES ATTACK LAST RESISTANCE
STRONGHOLD IN CAMBODIA
(By William Branigin)
BANGKOK, March 5.-Vietnamese forces in
Cambodia today turned their guns on the
last resistance base still intact on the Cam-
bodian side of the border with Thailand, at-
tacking guerrillas loyal to Prince Norodom
Sihanouk at a northern stronghold opposite
the Thai village of Tatum, resistance and
Thai military sources said.
The Thai military resported later that
about 800 Vietnamese soldiers had crossed
the border in the area of the fighting. Thai
troops backed by artillery were battling to
dislodge the intruders from three hills in
Thai territory, the military said. No other
details or confirmation were immediately
available.
He said guerrilla defenders inflicted
"quite heavy casualties" on the Vietnamese,
who had not yet penetrated the camp's
"first line of defense" about seven miles
from its headquarters. Mealy said fighting
also was going on farther inside Cambodia,
about 17 miles from the Green Hill camp,
and that guerrillas had found the bodies of
some Vietnamese soldiers and taken their
weapons.
Thai military sources confirmed that the
Vietnamese had begun a long awaited oper-
ation against the camp but said they had no
details of the fighting. No estimates of casu-
alties on either side were available.
The Thai military charged that Vietnam-
ese artillery shells landed in Thailand's
Surin Province when gunners overshot the
Green Hill camp.
Vietnamese shelling was also reported on
Cambodia's western border with Thailand,
north of the Thai. town of Aranyaprathet.
Refugees from Cambodian resistance settle-
ments overrun earlier in the current Viet-
namese offensive were forced to flee two
evacuation sites and move farther into Thai-
land, according to reports from the border.
Since the Vietnamese began their offen-
sive in November, they have overrun or
forced the evacuation of all major border
camps of the communist Khmer Rouge and
the anticommunist Khmer People's Nation-
al Liberation Front, the two largest factions
in a three-party coalition of Cambodian re-
sistance groups fighting the six-year-old Vi-
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S 3196 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD - SENATE
etnamese occupation of their country. Si-
hanouk, 63, is president of the coalition.
Until now, the smallest faction, the Armee
Nationale Sihanoukiste, Loyal to the former
Cambodian monarch, had been spared in
the offensive. In a recent interview, Sihan-
ouk said the Vietnamese either planned not
to attack his forces in an effort to sow suspi-
cions of a "secret deal" between him and
Hanoi, or were merely saving his camp for
"dessert" in their current campaign.
In launching a drive against the Sihanouk
faction, which claims 10,000 fighters but
poses no serious military threat to the. Viet-
namese, Hanoi's forces apparently hope to
deny the resistance coalition any last claim
to a "liberated zone" on Cambodian soil.
Since November, the Vietnamese have
'forced practically the entire 250,000 Cambo-
dian population of this zone along the
border to flee into Thailand. Those evacuat-
ed include about 32,000 civilians who fled
Green Hill and nearby camps during Viet-
namese attacks in April 1984 and gathered
at a site called Camp David, about nine
miles north of the border.
Currently, according to western relief offi-
cials and resistance sources, there are no ci-
vilians left in the Green Hill camp. Sihan-
ouk has said the camp is defended by about
5,000 of his fighters, with the rest of his
guerrilla force operating inside Cambodia.
Sihanouk is scheduled to return to Bang-
kok later this week from a tour of Australia
and New Zealand, then fly to Canton,
China. Sihanouk, whose uneasy coalition
government is recognized by the United Na-
tions, has called, on Chinese leaders to re-
lieve Vietnamese pressure on the resistance
by teaching Hanoi a "second lesson," remi-
niscent of the 1979 Chinese invasion of sev-
eral northern Vietnamese provinces.
Mealy said the "defense ministers" of the
three resistance factions agreed in a meet-
ing Sunday that Khmer Rouge and Khmer
People's National Liberation Front guerril-
las would aid the Sihanoukists if their
Green Hill camp were attacked.
The attack came as Australian Foreign
Minister Bill Hayden was preparing to visit
Hanoi to seek a solution to the Cambodian
conflict.
HUMAN RIGHTS IN KAMPUCHEA: PRELIMINARY
SUMMARY OF FINDINGS AND CONCLUSIONS
December 1984
(Prepared by the Lawyers Committee for
International Human Rights)
PREFACE
This interim report is based on a human
rights fact-finding mission to Kampuchea'
by the Lawyers Committee for Internation-
al Human Rights. The mission,. which took
place from October 30 until November 14,
1984, was the first human rights fact-find-
ing trip to that country in at least the past
fifteen years. The delegation was led by
Floyd Abrams, a partner in the New York
law firm Cahill Gordon & Reindel who is a
constitutional law expert and leading first
amendment attorney. He was joined by
Diane Orentlicher, deputy director of Law-
' We use the term "Kampuchea" to refer to the
nation long known as Cambodia because the former
denotation Is common to both the People's Repub-
lic of Kampuchea, which controls the interior of
the country, and the Coalition Government of
Democratic Kampuchea, which controls border re-
gions and holds the country's seat at the United
Nations. We note that two of the three parties to
the Coalation, the Khmer People's National Libera-
tion Front, led by former Prime Minister Son Sarin,
and the National United Front for an Independent,
Neutral. Peaceful and Cooperative Cambodia, led
by Prince Norodom Sihanouk, still refer to the
country as Cambodia.
yers Committee, and Stephen Heder, an aca-
demic expert on Kampuchea..
The investigation focused on practices
both in the interior of Kampuchea, in areas
administered by the People's Republic of
Kampuchea (PRK), which is led by Heng
Samrin and supported by Vietnam, and in
border regions administered by the Coali-
tion Government of Democratic Kampu-
chea (CGDK).
Despite repeated requests by the Lawyers
Committee to the government of the Peo-
ple's Republic of Kampuchea over a period
of several months, the group was not grant-
ed permission to visit Phnom Penh and
other areas under its control. Accordingly
the delegation's investigation of practices in
the PRK is based primarily on interviews
with persons who recently fled from the in-
terior to border regions which the delegates
were allowed to visit.
The delegates were granted extensive
access to areas controlled by the Khmer
People's National Liberation Front
(KPNLF), the larger of the two non-commu-
nist parties to the CGDK. For reasons of
time and logistics, the group did not seek
permission to visit areas administered by
the other non-communist party to the coali-
tion, which Is led by Prince Norodom Sihan-
ouk.
Mr. Abrams and Mn Orentlicher were per-
mitted to visit Malai-Makhoeun, an area
controlled by Democratic Kampuchea (DK);
which governed Kampuchea under the lead-
ership of Pol Pot from 1975 until 1979. Mr.
Heder was denied permission to visit this
area. While in Malai-Makhoeun, the two del-
egates met twice with Ieng Sary, who served
as Foreign Minister under Pol Pot, and sev-
eral other DK leaders. The delegation's con-
clusions about current, conditions in DK
areas are based on interviews with persons
who recently fled its, control, as well as in-
formation gathered during the visit of Mr.
Abrams and Ms. Orentlicher to Malai-Mak-
hoeun.
In addition to Kampucheans living in
border regions, the delegates met with Kam-
pucheans who had left the border areas. and
taken refuge in the holding center in Khao
I Dang, Thailand, administered by the
United Nations High Commissioner for Ref-
ugees. They also met with relief workers on
the border who have daily contact with
Kampucheans living near the border; offi-
cials of private and international organiza-
tions involved in the relief effort based in
Bangkok; United States officials, including
the U.S. Ambassador to Thailand, John
Gunther Dean; journalists and others in a
position to provide background information.
The overview they provided could not, of
course, compensate for the gaps left by the
delegates' inability to visit the PRK, and
other limitations on their inquiry. Accord-
ingly, the information they obtained is-not
comprehensive, even on the issue of current
human rights conditions in Kampuchea.
Nevertheless, a clear pattern of violations
emerged from the individual testimonies
that the mission judged to be reliable.
Those patterns are the subject of this inter-
im report.
A more complete report on the delega-
tion's visit will be published by the Lawyers
Committee in early 1985.2
INTRODUCTION
Six years after the Vietnamese invasion
precipitated the collapse of Pol Pot's
regime, an era of retrospection over its ex-
ceptional brutality appears, most belatedly,
to have begun. A serious film and a number
'The final report will address human rights con-
ditions in areas administered by the PRK, the DK
March 19, 1985'
of. book-length accounts. by journalists and
academics have recently appeared or will
soon be released, each attempting to deepen
our awareness and understanding of the
savage and tragic events that took place in
that period. What occurred then involved
mass murder on a scale rarely encountered
in the history of mankind. To refer to those
acts as "human rights" violations suggests
anew the limitations of our language to de-
scribe the undescribable.
Violations- of the nearly unprecedented
scale and gravity of those committed in the
mid-70's demand a full historical and legal
accounting.' But in undertaking this investi-
gation, our purpose was to examine the
human rights of Kampucheans today, a sub-
ject that also deserves our attention.
The undertaking required us to overcome
a pervasive reluctance within the interna-
tional community to scrutinize current
human rights problems in Kampuchea,
problems that pale before the overwhelming
brutalities of Pol Pot's rule but which are
nonetheless all too real. The reticence is un-
derstandable, but at some point must stop
holding away. The breadth of the violations
that occurred under the DK regime justifies
neither ignoring current realities nor con-
,eluding that nothing better or be hoped for
Kampucheans.
CONDITIONS IN THE PEOPLES REPUBLIC OF
KAMPUCHEA
The rule of law is not respected in any se-
rious sense in the People's Republic of
Kampuchea. For the hundreds or perhaps
thousands. of political prisoners who inhabit
its jails, beatings are commonplace. and
more sophisticated forms of torture usual.
Their rights suffer from the virtually com-
plete absence of a functioning legal process.
Persons suspected of supporting resistance
activity are typically arrested without
charges being made, imprisoned without
being sentenced or convicted, and kept in
jail for indeterminate periods.
Physical integrity
Persons detained on suspicion of support-
ing resistance. activities are routinely tor-
tured in the early weeks of their detention.4
During interrogation sessions; denials of the
interrogator's- charges are- simply not ac-
cepted. Instead, confessions are forced from
recalcitrant prisoners.5 One prisoner de-
scribed an interrogation session in the fol-
lowing terms:
"When I arrived [at the prison in Battam-
bang City] they asked me whether it was
true or not that I was a. Sereikar [i.e., non-
communist resistance] agent . . . . And
when ... I said I was not a Sereikar agent,
they beat me. and used electric wire on me
as well and I have marks in three places. I
was beaten with a truncheon, and a metal
pipe which they had cut down to a length of
about one meter so that it was easy to use,
and they covered my head with a plastic bag
of the type used here for containing rice. At
that time, because I couldn't stand the pain,
I let myself confess that I really was a Serei-
kar agent."
' The Cambodia Documentation Commission is,
under the supervision of David Hawk, working
toward such an accounting.
' While most-but not all-of the prisoners we
interviewed admitted to some form of resistance ac-
tivity, all were accused of it in the course of interro-
gation. We met no prisoner accused of a common
crime. A recent defector from the Phnom Penh
police force told us that such prisoners are also tor-
tured.
-.The prisoner testimony we received indicated
that confessions served to avert harsh treatment
during interrogation, but not to mitigate the length
of detention.
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Beatings-with truncheons, metal pipes or
rifle stocks-appear to be the most common
form of torture. Several prisoners described
how they were beaten while suspended from
the ceiling, their arms trussed up behind
their back. As the above-quoted testimony
indicates, beatings are often supplemented
with other forms of torture: electric shock;
the "plastic bag" treatment; blowing lye
powder in the prisoners' faces and tighten-
ing metal contraptions around their heads.
The beatings are often brutal. One former
prisoner described his Interrogator's re-
sponse when he refused to indicate who was
involved with him in resistance activities:
"While I was still stubbornly refusing to
talk about my faction, thy guy who had his
foot up on the table kicked me right in the
side, and I fell off the chair. And then he
picked up the electric cable and whipped me
on the back. And then he had me sit back
up again, and then he said to me, 'I'm only
going to ask you one more time, who's in
this with you?' But I remained stubborn and
wouldn't answer. And then he stomped on
my instep with the boot, ripping open a
wound, and I still have a scar. And he ripped
off my shirt and then grabbed me by my
chest hairs and pulled them out with such
force that I was lifted up out of the chair,
and I began to bleed. . . ."
In this and other cases, the delegates ob-
served scars that backed up claims of tor-
ture.
Although we received few reports of pris-
oners dying as a result of torture, we heard
many accounts of prisoners dying from mal-
nutrition or untreated diseases. One prison-
er held for 26 months at the Kandal provin-
cial jail claimed that three prisoners had
died of disease in that period, three more by
hanging themselves, and two from beatings
administered during interrogation. Other
former prisoners routinely reported deaths
In detention due to hunger or illness.
Arrest and detention
Among recently-released prisoners from
various regions of the interior whom the
delegates interviewed, a strikingly consist-
ent pattern of arbitrary arrest, interroga-
tion and detention emerged. Persons were
taken into custody without warrant, formal
charges, or any other form of legal process.
At no time were they brought before a
judge or other judicial authority. Indeed,
the concepts had no meaning to the former
prisoners who were interviewed. They were
interrogated at some point within the first
weeks of their detention, and the process of
interrogation was typically repeated several
times in the ensuing weeks or months.
Sentencing as such is rare in the PRK, at
least with respect to political prisoners. The
typical political prisoner begins detention
with no idea how long It will last, and is en-
lightened on this point only'by his actual
release, often several years later.
Convictions by a judicial organ appear to
be a rarity, afforded to only a select minori-
ty.of prisoners in the interior. Although the
PRK has established People's Revolution-
ary Tribunals to try cases, only one of the
former prisoners interviewed by the delega-
tion had been sentenced by such a tribunal.
He was not present during the proceeding;
he was advised of it afterward, but even he
was not told how long his sentence would
be.
A number of former prisoners, civil serv-
ants and police from the PRK were, howev-
er, aware of several public tribunal proceed-
ings in important political cases in which
sentences were broadcast by the govern-
ment. Recent defectors from the Phnom
Penh police force were also aware of secret
tribunal proceedings in which lengthy
prison sentences or executions were ordered
In common criminal cases of a serious
nature.
During the early stages of detention, pris-
oners are frequently kept in foot shackles at
all times when they are not actually being
interrogated. One former prisoner described
this condition in the following terms: "The
shackles were attached to a cement plat-
form about 300 centimeters high. My feet
were placed through them and I sat on the
ground with each foot held in shackles.
There were ten of us shackled in there in
two rows facing one.another."
Another common experience during this
period is being held in a "dungeon." These
unlit, windowless cells typically form one
section of a prison. In some, the "dungeon"
is also "shackle cell." A prisoner held in "T-
3," a prison in Phnom Penh, described his
experience in the dungeon there:
"The [Vietnamese] led me into a dungeon
which was about a meter and a half wide
and two meters long. And at that point they
put iron shackles on my feet, leaving my
feet dangling off a platform.... They put
me in with [another prisoner] and just left
me there.... [T]his cell was No. 10, build-
ing A-3...." 6 -
After several months of detention in these
cells, prisoners are usually transferred to
"daylight" cells in the same prison to serve
the bulk of their sentences; some are trans-
ferred to lighted cells in another detention
facility apparently designed to hold 'long-
term detainees.
'For some, the only indication of their im-
pending release is yet another, final trans-
fer to a "correction" facility. One, known as
Trapeang Phlong or "T-5," is located in the
district of Ponhea Kraek, Kampong Cham
Province, about 7 kilometers from the Viet-
namese border, and is directly administered
by the Ministry of the Interior.? Another
correction facility, "T-4," reportedly exists
at Prey Sa on the outskirts of Phnom Penh,
and is administered by the Phnom Penh
police.8 Prisoners who spend time in such
facilities engage in labor and undergo politi-
cal instruction:?
Responsible authorities
A variety of administrative and military
units in the PRK appear to be empowered
to detain suspected offenders. Most promi-
nent in the civilian sphere are the uni-
formed police, known in Khmer as the no-
korbal, which operate under the authority
of the Ministry of Interior. The Ministry ap-
parently also operates a separate network of
plainclothes police whose agents have au-
0 Another former prisoner described his introduc.
tion to the dungeon at T-3 in strikingly similar
terms:
"They handed me a set of foot shackles and led
me off to the Ministry of the Interior section [of T-
3]. And then they took me into a dark room known
as A-6 which was really quite dark and it was
maybe a meter and a half wide and there were two
persons lying there,' another guy and me. Immedi-
ately upon my arrival they unlocked the shackles
and put me in them."
T-5 is reportedly guarded by Vietnamese as well
as Kampucheans.
? One prisoner described a brief period of deten-
tion at a place designated as a "correction facility"
in S'ang, a district in Kandal Province, which he
said was administered by Vietnamese. But unlike
other accounts of correction facilities, this person's
time in Sang was not his final phase of detention.
? A prisoner held at the Bakan district prison in
Posat Province also described political instruction,
though he did not describe the facility as a correc-
tion center:
"We studied politics ... [T]hey taught us that if
we wanted to go West to the soil where the pars
(non-communist resistance forces] were there
wouldn't be anything there for us to eat. They said
if you go West you'll see that these pares are just
the same as Pol Pot ....
S3197
thority to arrest suspects, particularly polit-
ical suspects. Several military units also
take suspects into custody; these appear to
be particularly active in the countryside.
A substantial number of ranking adminis-
trative posts in the Ministry of Interior, the
nokorbal and the plainclothes police are ap-
parently held by Kampucheans who have
spent much of their adult lives in Vietnam,
and former cadres of Democratic Kampu-
chea's East Zone who sought refuge in Viet-
nam in 1978 to avoid being 'purged. Their
duties and those of their subordinates are
carried out with the close participation or
supervision of "Vietnamese experts" (cham-
neankar). It appears that, at least Phnom
Penh, Vietnamese security units sometimes
take political suspects Into custody on their
own authority before turning them over to
PRK administration. In the detention cases
presented to us, Vietnamese personnel were
often involved in the interrogation process
as well, either directly or as observers.10
A striking indication of Vietnamese in-
volvement is the designation of several pris-
ons by the letter "T," followed by a number.
When we asked prisoners what the "T"
stood for, none knew. We later learned that
it stood for "trai," a conventional Vietnam-
ese communist party term for "(prison)
camp."
"Going West"
We note that many of the recent arrivals
from the interior left for reasons other than
experiences of political persecution. Some
had left because of quiet dissatisfaction
with what they considered Vietnamese
domination of Kampuchea or the political
program of the PRK. Others left to escape
military conscription or corvee-type labor.
Perhaps the largest number had come to
the border for primarily economic reasons:
because of food shortages or to engage in
trade. Still others came in search of rela-
tives.
But if their reason for leaving did not
entail political persecution, the act of leav-
ing often did. Movement through the PRK
is controlled by a pass system, and persons
who are taken into custody because they
lack the proper passes and are going west-
ward-in the direction of non-PRK zones-
are often presumed to be at least supporters
of anti-PRK or anti-Vietnamese activities.
Ordinary citizens apprehended in their jour-
ney west are generally detained briefly, and
then sent home. Indeed, the only prisoner
testimony we received in which torture was
not mentioned involved such cases. Persons
with governmental or military postings and
others who for one reason or another are
thought to support resistance activity are
likely to undergo the experiences of arrest,
interrogation, torture and detention de-
scribed earlier.
With a recent escalation of military activi-
ties in Kampuchea, pass system controls
seem to have tightened. Several recently re-
leased prisoners indicated that a substantial
portion of the prison population consisted
of persons apprehended whistled "going
West."
10 Thus. for example, one prisoner who was first
arrested in April 1981 was interrogated in Prey
Veng, the capital of the province of the same name,
by a "Vietnamese expert" known as Deuk. During
one interrogation session with Deuk, no Khmer
were allowed to be present. The same prisoner was
again arrested in Phnom Penh in January 1984. His
arresting team included six "Vietnamese experts"
from "7708," which he described as a sort of Viet-
namese special branch unit in Phnom Penh. He was
interrogated by a 7708 "expert" named Long.
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S 3198 " ONGRESSIONAL RECORD - SENATE March 19, 1985
CONDITIONS IN DEMOCRATIC KAMPUC14EA
To much of the world the word "Cambo-
dia" evokes a single image: the mass, sense-
less murders of Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge.
Though in control of the nation only three
and one-half years, they left a deep and
lasting scar on the world conscience. Serious
estimates of the death toll range from one
to two million; by any count, the brutalities
represent a horrifying almost incomprehen-
sible chapter in modern history.
Routed by the Vietnamese of 1979, the
government of Democratic Kampuchea
(DK), as the Khmer Rouge regime officially
known, no longer controls the country. In
1979 its leaders retreated to regions near
the Thai border, which now serve as the
rear base of military activities against the
Vietnam-backed government in Phnom
Penh. These areas are also home to what is
estimated to be several hundred thousand
civilians, whom the DK authorities govern
as residents of "liberated zones."
Today, in the areas we investigated, it
would appear- that the murderous practices
of the mid-1970's are no longer the order of
the day. But severely restrictive controls
over daily life remain a pervasive reality of
DK society, and allegations of occasional in-
stances of brutality and deaths during de-
tention persist.
Punishable offenses
Activities as personal as marriage and as
simple as moving from one village to an-
other are the subject of state control. Re-
strictions on these acts are enforced by
terms of detention. Prisons in Democratic
Kampuchea, which the authorities call "in-
struction halls," 11 are filled with hundreds
of persons who vilolated 'such taboos as
taking photographs or trading with the
Thais.
The control extends to speech as well. Ac-
cording to one person who recently fled an
area of DK control, offenses include "speak-
ing out in any way that adversely affects
the government * * ? for example, people
who say that Socialism will be made again.12
He asserted that it is a serious offense to
"attack the leadership" by saying that
"things are being done the way Pol Pot used
to do things." 13
leng Sary described several instances in
which persons had been jailed for making
disparaging comments about the war effort
against the Vietnamese. He said that it is a
political offense to say things like-"the (Vi-
etnamese] are attacking no one and we
won't be able to defeat them," or that
"there's no point in dying in the fight be-
cause there's no way we'll ever win, that it's
[KPNLF leader] Son Sann who is going to
win- ? ?"
Another significant area of control in-
volves contact with outsiders. One recent
defector told us that it is a crime in the DK
area he fled to "make contact with the Thai
or with. humanitarian organizations to talk
about work matters, especially if the conver-
sation is considered to have political impli-
cations." Other defectors made similar
statements. Even such indirect contact as
listening to the radio broadcasts of the non-
communist parties to the CGDK are pro-
scribed.
Efforts to make contact with the Thai for
purposes of trade appear to account for a
significant portion of the prison population
in DK zones about which we obtained infor-
mation. Crossing the Thai border in order
to leave DK control permanently is appar-
ently regarded as a more serious offense.
Shortly before our visit, a group of 582
persons managed to escape Sector 32, and
now live in a KPNLF camp at Sarnia. Fifty-
eight people who attempted to flee with
them were captured by DK authorities;
some, but not all, of this group were report-
edly detained for attempting to flee."
During our visit to Malai-Makhoeun, we
raised with Ieng Sary the matter of the 58
who were prevented from leaving. He prom-
ised to make an inquiry into their status,
and to "do his best" to obtain permission
from the "Battlefield Committee" with ju-
risdiction over them for them to join their
families in Sarnia.
More generally, he denied that people are
prevented from leaving or jailed for doing
so. Acknowledging that persons caught
trying to flee have been jailed, he said that
they were detained for "political offenses"
committed before leaving.
Against this background, we regard as a
significant step the DK authorities' willing-
ness to allow a human rights delegation to
visit villages. Such acceptance of interna-
tional scrutiny of human rights conditions
would be welcome in any context; it seems a
particularly significant gesture on the part
of an authority that has placed strict con-
trols on contacts between those it governs
and the rest .of the world. Our gratitude
must be tempered, however, by the DK
leaders' refusal to admit the entire delega-
tion.
Physical security
While it is widely agreed by defectors that
deliberate killing and torture are no longer
common in the DK zones.we investigated, it
is frequently reported that some prisoners
are sent to work in areas where mines pose a
threat to life. Sources differ on the degree
of intent involved, but tend to agree on the
basic facts. Thus, one person held in a
who are hated by the cadres, by the
guards."
'It seems clear that prisoners have been
killed by mines in these areas where they
were sent to work. When we presented these
reports to leng Sary, he did not dispute this,
but claimed that the deadly mines had been
swept into areas where prisoners worked by.
a series of floods in the past year.
Perhaps the most that can be said about
this practice is the view of one recent defec-
tor from Sector 32:
"I can't figure out whether they take pris-
oners out to work in areas where there are
mines because they intend to kill them or
just because of negligence. It's clear, howev-
er, that they know there are mines there
and don't care."
The infrequency of such reported inci-
dents suggests that state-sponsored killing is
no longer the most important form of social
control in the DK areas we investigated. In
those areas there appears, in fact, to be a
policy of restraint with respect to violations
of physical security.' 5
Though we heard some reports of beat-
ings during, interrogation in one DK
prison,16 we were more often told that this
does not take place. A knowledgeable recent
defector from DK control told us that he
had never heard of any beatings or any use
of electric shock or use of plastic bags, that
sort of thing. They don't do things like this
because it would be politically counter-pro-
ductive. According to what I understand,
there are orders from above, circulars, pro-
hibiting the use of torture.
Another source indicated that threats are
employed during interrogation, even though
torture may be rare.
It may well be that such threats, ampli-
fied by the implicit threat that memory
cannot fail to supply, are sufficient to main-
tain the desired level of control. As one
recent defector put it, "the only manifesta-
tion of opposition there has ever been is our
escape."
The Lawyers Committee on International
Human Rights is' a public interest law
center that promotes compliance with inter-
nationally recognized human rights law and
legal principles. It was founded in 1975. Its
Chairman is former federal judge Marvin E.
Frankel, its Executive Director is Michael
H. Posner and its Deputy Director is Diane
F. Orentlicher.?
'' One recent defector described the political in-
struction in DK prisons as follows:
"There is political study in both (prisons] 80 and
81. A section of the Military Police goes in to give
political instruction. The instruction consists of
specific instructions like not to listen to the radio
or have contact with foreigners, and things like
that. More generally, the instruction consists of
raising the problems of the prisoners' shortcom-
ings. They also talk about the Resolution not to
make Socialism or Communism again. And they say
that 'those past events' and the loss of life that oc-
curred during them didn't come about because of,
Ta Pol Pot, but because of persons infiltrated [by
the Vietnamese]. They say that Ta Ti Muoy [liter-
ally 'grandfather number one' this term of respect
refers to Pol Pot] is a good leader and a good man.
They even give warnings that they will take into
custody anyone who blames Pol Pot for what hap-
pened, because, they say, all of us are Khmers, and
we should not blame one another."
"This refers to repeated declarations by the DK
leadership that it will never revert to its past poli-
cies of "Socialism" and "Communism."
"We also learned of one person who had been
detained for "doing agitation in the ranks of the
army" because he said that in another sector
"things were freer, more liberal, while in Sector 32
things were being done Communist style."
TRIBUTE TO RAOUL
WALLENBERG
? Mr. SARBANES. Mr. President,
more than 40 years have passed since
the disappearance of Raoul Wallen-
berg, the extraordinary young Swed-
region under DK control, told us:
"While I was there, some of the prisoners
who went out to work stepped on mines. Six
stepped on mines, and three were killed and
the three others were wounded. I don't
know whether the guards intentionally had
these six step on mines or not."
Another 'person held in the Sector 32
prison for minor offenders alleged that
"prisoners who are hated are killed by put-
ting a mine somewhere and then forcing the
prisoners to work where the mine has been
put. They do it this way so that no one can
say that people are beaten to death and
thrown out as garbage, like they were in Pol
Pot times. This is done only to prisoners
" One week after the large group fled, a smaller
group of some 60 people made an unsuccessful at-
tempt to leave.
" These observations are limited to border areas
under DK control that we investigated, and not to
practices of DK soldiers fighting in the interior. Be-
cause we were unable to visit the interior, we could
not investigate reports that DK soldiers have at-
tacked civilians there in the past year.
16 A person who had been detained at the Sector
32 prison for minor offenders ("Ta Scum's place")
told us of reported abuses at the Sector 32 prison
for major offenses ("Ta Chan's place"):
"There is said to be mistreatment at Ta Chan's
place. For example, if, upon first arrival, you can't
dig out the really big tree stumps they want you to
dig out, they don't give you your food ration. Only
when you finally get it out will you be fed. Also, at
first there are said to be some beatings during in-
terrogation, beatings aimed at getting you to tell
them who it was that convinced you to run away.
Sometimes, they say, the beatings lead to death. A
friend of mine who was held'there told me this. I
also heard that there were others, but I don't know
any other names. At Ta Seum's place, no one was
ever beaten to death, or even beaten at all."
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March 19, 1985 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD - SENATE
in 1983 and 9.8 billion square yards
last year. This level of imports pene-
tration is equivalent to the loss of 1
million American jobs.
The Reagan administration has been
unable to address this trade problem.
In his 1980 campaign for President,
Ronald Reagan noted the importance
of the textile/apparel `industry and
promised to relate import growth to
domestic market growth. This pledge
was reaffirmed by Chief of Staff
James Baker in a December 1981
letter concerning the approaching ne-
gotiations for the renewal of the MFA.
Again in October 1982, the President
affirmed that promise and maintained
that the just completed MFA negotia-
tions would limit the growth of tex-
tile/apparel imports to a level well
below the rate of growth in the domes-
tic market.
The actual record has been com-
pletely different; imports have contin-
ued to increase at a rate greatly in
excess of domestic market growth.
The President's commitments go un-
fulfilled and the erosion of American
manufacturing jobs continues.
This legislation will enable the Presi-
dent to keep his promise. It addresses
the problem simply by enforcing exist-
ing agreements under the MFA to
limit import growth of textiles, appar-
el, textile products and man-made
fibers to the level contemplated in the
1981 MFA agreements.
In 1985, imports from the major ex-
porting nations-those with more than
1.25 percent of the U.S. market-will
be limited to the approximate 6 per-
cent growth levels provided for in the
MFA. In future years, imports from
these countries will be allowed to in-
crease 1 percent.
In 1985, imports from the smaller
exporting countries-those with less
than 1.25 percent of the U.S. market-
will be allowed to grow 15 percent
above the 1984 level. In future years
import growth from those nations will
be limited to 6 percent.
There are those who will say that
this is unreasonable, trade restrictive
legislation that will violate our inter-
national treaty obligations. But the
textile and apparel industry already
operates under an existing, GATT con-
sistent, regimen of trade restrictions.
All this legislation would do is enforce
existing agreements; agreements
which other MFA signatory nations
currently enforce to limit the growth
of textile and apparel imports.
We can no longer stand by while ex-
isting trade laws are circumvented;
while imports flood into the United
States, factories close, and our workers
are sent to the unemployment lines.
The major textile and apparel pro-
ducing nations operate today under a
system of import controls. Other na-
tions have enforced their laws giving
effect to MFA negotiated agreement;
they maintain their domestic indus-
tries in accordance with established.
rules of international trade. We owe
no less to our workers in the textile
and apparel industries.
Mr. THURMOND. Mr. President, I
ask unanimous consent to add the dis-
tinguished Senator from Alaska to
this bill who is now presiding over the
Senate, Mr. MURKOWSKI. We are very
please to have him join on this bill.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. With-
out objection,. it is so ordered.
RECOGNITION OF THE
MINORITY LEADER
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The
distinguished minority leader is recog-
nized.
Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, it is my
understanding that my time under the
standing order has been reserved.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The
Senator is correct.
Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, I thank
S 3087
linkage. Soviet frustration over the
military stalemate In Afghanistan has
the Soviet leadership groping for le-
verage in other areas of foreign policy.
They will find none. The Soviet Union
must decide to negotiate in earnest
with a. view toward complete with-
drawal from Afghanistan. No other
mix of issues will produce stability and
certainty for Soviet policy in that
region.
I ask unanimous consent that two
articles entitled "Gorbachev Warns on
Afghan Aid" from the Washington
Post of March 16 and "Afghan Town
Under Siege" from the Washington
Post of March 17 be reprinted in full
at the close of my remarks.
There being no objection, the arti-
cles were ordered to be printed in the
AFGANISTAN: REC / ` .
DEVELOPMENTS cc 'i
Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, two arti-
cles apearing in the Washington Post
recently provided insights into the sit-
uation in Afghanistan. The Washing-
ton Post of Sunday, March 17, chron-
icles the seige of a Communist garri-
son in the town of Barikot, near the
Afghan-Pakistani border. This is yet
another example of the Soviet-backed
(By Dusko Doder)
Moscow, March 15.-The new Soviet
cow's sternest warning to date to Pakistan
for its support of Afghan rebels, and well-in-
Signals that Moscow considers linking the
question of Nicaragua to Pakistan's policy
toward Afghanistan appeared designed to
ghanistan by controlling small garri-
soned towns that serve as fortress is-
lands in a sea of Afghan freedom
fighters. This strategy has doomed the
Soviet occupation army to 5 years of
humiliation and indecisive warfare
which has left Afghan resistance
forces in control of two-thirds of the
country.
The report from Barikot followed a
March 16 article describing the recent
meeting between Pakistani President
Zia ul-Haq and the new Soviet leader,
Mikhail Gorbachev. The Post reports
that the Soviet leader took that occa-
sion to warn the Pakistani President
that support for the Afghan resistance
was regarded as support for aggression
against a Soviet ally, Afghanistan.
Gorbachev's meeting with President
Zia and the Soviet press followup were
unusually harsh. The only bright spot
came in President Zia's observation
that "both sides seem to be aware that
the problem does not admit of a mili-
tary solution." If the Soviets indeed
have come to this realization, it would
be reason for hope.
But there was a dangerous and seri-
ously counterproductive theme 'that
was reported in connection with the-
meeting. The Soviet leader seems to
have made an explicit link between Af-
ghanistan and Soviet policy toward
Nicaragua.
The Soviet leadership should be
under no illusions that the United
States accepts such a linkage. More-
over, they should understand that the
Congress will not countenance that
Gorbachev's warning came yesterday
during his meeting with Pakistani President
Mohammed Zia ul-Haq and Foreign Minis-
ter Sahabzada Yaqub Khan, who were here
A report on the meeting by the official
news agency Tass included extraordinarily
harsh language. It said the Gorbachev and
Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko
gave the Pakistani leaders "a frank, princi-
pled assessment of the policy conducted" by
"Aggressive actions" against Afghanistan,
a. Soviet ally whose government is main-
tained by about 100,000 Soviet troops, are
being carried out from Pakistan's territory,
the Tass report continued. "It was also
stressed that this cannot but affect in the
most negative way Soviet-Pakistani rela-
sion" against a Soviet ally and warnings of
possible dire consequences of his actions
the unusual step of associating himself with
these charges during his meeting with the
Moscow's growing frustration with the five-
year-old military stalemate in Aghanistan
considering the possibility of encouraging
anti-Zia elements in Pakistan, presumably
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CONGRESSIONAL RECORD - SENATE
by providing arms and other assistance to
separatists in border areas such as Baluchi-
stan.
The sources here suggested that an Amer-
ican military action against Nicaragua
would provoke a serious effort to topple the
Zia government.
On Wednesday, Gorbachev received Nica-
raguan President Daniel Ortega, and Tass
reported that they "vigorously condemned
the U.S. policy of interference in Latin
American affairs" and agreed on the need to
"sharpen international efforts ... for a just
political settlement."
Diplomatic observers here noted that by
linking the problem of Afghan insurgency
to America's pressure on Nicaragua, the new
leadership seemed to be signaling that It is
capable of inflicting real damage on U.S. in-
terests in an area close to Soviet borders.
Washington has longstanding ties with
Pakistan dating from the CENTO alliance
of the 1950s and is currently supplying Zia's
government with advanced combat jets and
other weapons under a $3.2 billion aid pack-
age concluded after the Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan.
U.S. sources here said that for nearly a
year there have been cross-border raids
from Afghanistan into Pakistan as well as
artillery shelling of Pakistani positions from
Afghan territory.
There is little doubt that Gorbachev
would like to find a way out of the Afghan
impasse. The Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan
has complicated Moscow's relations with
China, the Moslem countries and the West.
The Afghan war is also becoming increas-
ingly unpopular in the Soviet Union, al-
though discontent is rarely voiced In public.
An earlier article in Pravda, the Soviet
Communist Party newspaper, included more
explicit charges against Zia's regime and as-
serted that the CIA was maintaining a
"number" of bases and camps in Pakistan to
train and equip Moslem insurgents who are
subsequently sent into Afghanistan
Pravda also said that "American instruc-
tors" are training Zia's police forces to be
"used in-the restless North West Frontier
Province of Pakistan." This border province,
which has become a logistical base for the
Afghan rebels, includes an area where
ethnic separatists, traditionally supported
by successive governments in Kabul, have
sought to establish an independent state
called Pushtunistan.
Pravda also charged that all weapons des-
tined for use by the Afghan rebels are pass-
ing through the Pakistani port of Karachi.
The Gorbachev-Zia meeting appears to
have brought Soviet-Pakistani relations to a
new low.
Zia was here for the third time in less
than 21/2 years. In November 1982, when he
attended Leonid Brezhnev's funeral, Zia was
received by incoming leader Yuri Andropov,
who gave him a warm welcome and sought
to enlist his support for a political settle-
ment on Afghanistan.
Andropov's proposal sought to end all in-
surgent activity from Pakistan's territory
before diplomatic talks on an eventual with-
drawal of Soviet troops. This initiative came
to naught and the Afghan problem has re-
mained stalemated diplomatically as well as
militarily.
Zia came to Moscow again In February
1984 for the funeral of Andropov and re-
mained in the city an extra day hoping to
meet Chernenko. However, Zia was given a
cold shoulder and left without seeing the
new Soviet leader.
This time. Zia was among more than 25
foreign distance dignitaries received by Gor-
bachev. The new Soviet leader's words in his
meeting with Zia, as summarized by Tass,
stood in stark contrast to the overall cancill-
atory and friendly tone of Gorbachev's dis-
cussions with all other visiting politicians.
[In Islamabad, Zia told a news conference
that he held two "business-like" meetings
with Gorbachev and that Afghanistan, "as
expected, figured largely" in the talks, the
Associated Press reported.
[Despite "obvious differences of percep-
tion," Zia said, ... "both sides seem to be
aware that the problem does not admit of a
military solution."]
Gorbachev also met yesterday with Af-
ghanistan's Communist president, Babrak
Karmal, and they jointly condemned "con-
tinued aggressive actions by outside forces"
against Afghanistan, according to Tass. The
news agency provided no other -details on
the substance of the talks.
The Kremlin sent troops into Afghanistan
In December 1979 to back up Babrak after
the ouster of rival Communist Party leader
Hafizullah Amin.
[From the Washington Post, March 17,
1985]
AFGHAN TOWN UNDER SIEGE
REBEL FIRE BREAKS SILENCE
(By Anthony Davis)
BARIKOT, AFGHANISTAN.-Between dawn
and dusk, Barikot is a ghost town.
Along the deserted streets of this garrison
settlement on the Afghan-Pakistani border
signs of habitation are visible-a row of
Army trucks parked by an empty airstrip,
laundry spread out to dry in a back yard, a
few cows wandering untended. But for
hours at a stretch no human movement is to
be seen.
Sporadically, the eerie stillness hanging
over a seemingly dead town is broken by a
short burst of heavy machine-gun fire as
Moslem guerrillas dug in on the ridges over-
looking the settlement open up on a sus-
pected target. Then the echoing gunfire dies
away, and the silence of the mountains re-
turns.
The guerrillas, or mujaheddin, have had
Barikot and its Kabul government garrison
encircled since September in a bid to cap-
ture the border town at the head of the
Konar Valley. Barikot's land links with the
capital have been cut for more than two
years.
. Today the siege shows few signs of reach-
ing an early end, and it is' becoming an in-
creasingly volatile flash point on the trou-
bled border. In recent months, Pakistan has
lodged repeated charges of Afghan Air
Force overflights of its territory and several
incidents of bombing of the Pakistani town
of Arandu, about a mile across the border
from Barikot. Kabul has retorted with coun-
tercharges of stepped-up Pakistani support
for the mujaheddin and of shelling of Bari-
kot from Pakistan.
In comments to journalists in Peshawar
Friday, Pakistani President Mohammed Zia
ul-Haq described the increase in violations
of Pakistani airspace as "unhealthy,"
adding that Kabul should realize that there
is a limit to Islamabad's tolerance.
[Zia, who was in Moscow for the funeral
of Soviet leader Konstantin Chernenko
Wednesday, was issued a stern warning
about Pakistan's support for the Afghan
rebels by the new Soviet leader, Mikhail
Gorbachev, the Soviet news agency Tass re-
ported Friday.]
During the winter months, Soviet and
Afghan government troops have made a
concerted effort to push up the Konar
Valley-a perennial focus of anti-Kabul re-
sistance-apparently with a view to both
breaking the siege of Barikot and establish-
ing stongholds along the valley that would
hamper guerrilla infiltration and supply.
With the coming of spring, the valley that
March, 19, 1985
runs parallel to the Pakistani border is be-
coming one of several major supply conduits
from Pakistan to the resistance across Af-
ghanistan.
The winter offensive appears to have
failed dismally. A large Communist force
that began advancing from Jalalabad in
mid-December succeeded in reaching
Chaghasarai, the provincial capital of
Konar, and later pushed on as far as the
town of Asmar, meeting resistance at sever-
al points. But in February the advance
stalled amid heavy fighting just beyond
Asmar, about 25 miles short of Barikot.
In late February and early this month,
posts established following the Communist
advance were destroyed piecemeal by muja-
heddin groups operating In the now largely
depopulated valley.
"The situation is back much as It was at
the beginning of winter," noted-one western
diplomat. The guerrillas have built well-
camouflaged bunkers and gun emplace-
ments on ridges dominating the town on
both sides of the valley. Barikot is now
wholly reliant on resupply from the air. But
with the resistance fielding an impressive
concentration of heavy machine guns on the
heights, that is becoming an increasingly
hazardous undertaking.
According to mujaheddin of the Pesha-
war-based National Islamic Front of Af-
ghanistan, the last supply drop came more
than one month ago as transport helicop-
ters under heavy fire from the heights
under heavy fire from the heights dumped
food and ammunition without even touch-
ing. Despite covering fire from attack heli-
copters and bombing by jets, one transport
was downed, crashing just clear of the air-
strip.
With the failure to lift the siege by land
last month, repeated attempts have been
made in recent days to knock out mujahed-
din bunkers on the mountaintops to facili-
tate the ferrying in of supplies by air. Pre-
dictably, the stepped-up air attacks have re-
sulted in further charges from the Pakistani
government of overflights and bombing of
Arandu. For their part, the Kabul authori-
ties contended late last month that hun-
dreds of men had crossed the border to
attack Barikot, one of a string of similar ac-
cusations dismissed by Islamabad as "ficti-
tious."
Both sides' charges appear to have consid-
erable justification, however. On tuesday
MiG23 jets supported by Mi24 and Mi8 heli-
copter gunships could be seen bombing and
rocketing mujaheddin positions around Bar-
ikot, and, at the end of their attack runs,
clearly overflyirig Pakistani territory.
Guerrillas later said that machine-gun fire
from the helicopters had hit houses on the
Pakistani side of a narrow mountain stream
in the Arandu Valley that marks the border.
But less easy to gauge was whether the
overflights were deliberate or more or less
inevitable, given that majaheddin positions
overlooking Barikot are about a half-mile
from the border.
The following day, according to Islama-
bad, Afghan jets dropped 37 bombs on the
Pakistani side of the border, and on Thurs-
day another raid reportedly killed two per-
sons near Arandu.
It is clear that under cover of darkness,
large groups of guerrillas are moving
through Arandu to cross the stream and re-
inforce positions around the Kabul govern-
ment's beleaguered garrison.
"Some of our groups are fighting inside
more or less permanently," said Mohammed
Ayub, a commander from the Asmar area.
"But many others will go in from the camps
to fight for two or three months and then
return to their families as other mujahed-
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March 19, 1985 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD - SENATE
din take over." With the snows melting fast,
increasing numbers of .fighters are now
moving back into Afghanistan.
Around Barikot itself, the siege drags on
at an almost medieval pace. Guerrillas while
away the time ? sniping at an occasional
Afghan Army soldier emerging from cover.
On one afternoon a group of guerrillas
were observed around a new Chinese heavy
machine gun. They were greatly amused as
they terrified a man foolhardy enough to
attempt to drive a stray cow back into a pen.
Clearly visible through binoculars-and the
machine gun's telescopic sights-the man fi-
nally lost his nerve and sprinted for cover as
bullets peppered the ground around him. He
escaped unscathed, but others have been
less lucky.
For Barikot's population-a force of about
1,200 soldiers, 300 militia and 2,000 or 3,000
civilians-conditions are deteriorating. Ac-
cording to accounts from the besieged town
reaching the guerrillas, food prices have spi-
raled, meat is now rarely available and
morale is low. During the day, the popula-
tion remains Indoors, emerging after dark to
go about normal business, including working
in the fields within the defense perimeter.
Any use of lights invariably attracts guerril-
la fire.
Nor does the garrison exert itself much in
its own defense. Outposts on the lower
slopes keep attackers at a distance, but
there are no attempts to venture beyond the
town's defenses and try to dislodge the guer-
rillas from their positions on the heights.
On their side, the guerrillas display little
determination to bring the siege to an end.
Mirroring the situation around hundreds of
Afghan Army and Soviet posts across Af-
ghanistan, the resistance effectively has
succeeded in bottling up Communist troops
and gaining a tactical initiative. But lack of
heavier weapons and, in many cases, of po-
litical direction results in an inability to ex-
ploit the advantage.
At Barikot, the guerrillas cite mines laid
around Communist defenses as the main
reason for the current standoff. But an ele-
ment of lethargy is discernible, too. In con-
trast to aggressive assaults through mine
fields witnessed last year in the Panjshir
Valley; there is little evidence at Barikot of
readiness to risk casualties in a concerted
effort to seize the town.
But the underlying weakness of the resist-
ance in'the Konar Valley is its solidly tribal
composition, which inhibits the establish-
ment of a unified command and makes mili-
tary coordination difficult. Around Barikot,
at least five major Peshawar-based mujahed-
din parties are represented by different
Pushtu tribal groups.
Pushtu tribal allegiances remain para-
mount and effectively preclude the emer-
gence of the sort of regional commands that
have proved highly effective in the ethnical-
ly Tajik and Uzbek provinces of northern
Afghanistan, where society is not tribal.
One tribe here would never accept the
leadership of a man from another," noted
one Peshawar-based analyst, himself from
the Konar Valley, a bastion of Pushtu con-
servatism.
Such as it is, coordinated military deci-
sion-making around Barikot and Asmar is
arrived at by means of a jirga or assembly of
tribal leaders. The result is generally more
talk than action. Even when it does occur,
coordinated military action hinges mainly
on intertribal competitiveness, no one tribe
wishing to have its honor stained by appear-
ing less warlike than its rivals.
Around Barikot at present, there is talk of
a jirga to decide details of a final assault on
the embattled and dispirited Communist en
slave. But observers are not holding thei
breath waiting for the big push.
WEST VIRGINIA: A PATRIOT'S
'STATE
Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, at one
point during the Revolutionary War
when America's fortunes were at their
.lowest and most desperate. ebb, George
Washington declared:
Leave me but a banner to plant upon the
mountains of Augusta, and I will rally
around me the men who will lift our bleed-
ing country from the dust, and set her free.
Augusta was the name by which
West Virginia was known in those
days. The fierce patriotism that Wash-
ington had discovered in those pioneer
West Virginians-was already an innate
character-a trait that . has proved
itself again and again throughout our
country's history.
Measured by population and geo-
graphic size, West Virginia is not one
of our larger States. Yet, in conflict
after conflict, the people of West Vir-
ginia have set records in responding to
America's calls for defenders and in
sacrificing their lives to keep our coun-
try free and secure.
During World War II, for example,
West Virginia ranked fifth among the
States in the percentage of its male
population participating in the Armed
Forces, second in the 'percentage of
casualties, and fourth in the percent-
age of deaths.
In the Korean war, West Virginia
was first in the percentage of male
population participating, first in the
percentage of casualties, and first in
the percentage of deaths.
During the Vietnam era, West Vir-
ginia ranked second highest among
the States in the percentage of male
population participating and first in
the percentage of deaths.
In fact, no other State has sent such
a consistently high percentage of its
young men to war. As in George
Washington's lifetime, West Virgin-
ians have traditionally placed the de-
fense of freedom above personal con-
siderations and comfort.
I call attention to West Virginia's
strong patriotic heritage-not to deni-
grate the patriotism of our sister
States, but to define more clearly the
meaning of patriotism itself.
In recent years, too often, jaded so-
phistication and cynicism have made
light of patriotism and sometimes held
the idea of sacrificing for the Nation's
good up to mockery and satire. More
deplorably, from time to time, newspa-
per and television'reports surface of
American citizens who have sold sensi-
tive national defense secrets to foreign
agents, and of commercial contractors
who, as a matter of no apparent con-
cern and common practice, have liter-
ally fleeced the Government out of as-
tounding amounts of money on de-
fense contracts or for consultation
work.
Nations do not long survive and
flourish where the citizens have no
understanding of or love for their her-
itage. And no cou ntry can long remain
free and strong where the pursuit of
S 3089
selfish interest. is the most valued and
admired principle of the land.
That is why I call attention to and
commend the sacrifices of West Vir-
ginia to our country's security. I am
deeply proud to represent a State with
such a tradition-a State whose citi-
zens understand the words of Rudyard
Kipling:
THE HERITAGE
Our fathers in a wondrous age,
Ere yet the earth was small,
Ensured to us an heritage,
And doubted not at all,
That we, the children of their heart,
Which then did beat so high,
In later time should play like part for our
posterity.
Then, fretful, murmur not .they gave so
great a charge to keep,
Nor dream that awestruck time shall save
Their labor while we sleep.
Dear-bought and clear, a thousand year
Our father's title runs.
Make we likewise their sacrifice,
Defrauding not our sons.
Mr. President, I yield any remaining
time I may have to Mr. PROXMIRE.
RECOGNITION OF SENATOR'
PROXMIRE
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr.
GRAMM). Under the previous order, the'
Senator from Wisconsin [Mr. PROx-
MIRE] is recognized for not to exceed
15 minutes. -
Mr. PROXMIRE. Mr. President, I
thank the Democratic leader.
WILL OUR MILITARY POLICIES
PROMOTE NUCLEAR PROLIF-
ERATION?
Mr. PROXMIRE. Mr. President, last
January NBC News reported that spe-
cial U.S. forces throughout Europe
and this country have been training
with a nuclear explosive that fits into
a soldier's backpack. At 58 pounds it is
heavy. It would take strong soldiers in
good shape to carry it a few miles. But
what a punch it delivers; each of those
58 pounds carry an explosive force
equivalent to 10 tons of TNT! NBC es-
timated that each of these back packs
would carry an explosion 250 times
more powerful than the bomb that
blew up the marine barracks in Beirut
and killed more than 200 American
service men. Obviously, this is quite an
addition to the arsenal of any com-
mando unit. NBC says that the Green
Berets based in Germany are trained
to use these "nukepacks" to destroy
airports, dams and other vital targets
behind enemy lines. The bomb is re-
ported to have been part of the NATO
arsenal and war plans since 1964. Now
NBC reports, that not only have
Green Beret units been trained in
using these nuclear explosions, but
units from Great Britain, Belgium,
Holland, Greece, Turkey, Italy, and
West Germany have learned how to
use these tactical nuclear weapons.
Furthermore, Navy Seal teams have
undergone training in the under water
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S3090 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD - SENATE
use of these explosives in demolition
exercises in Scotland, the Philippines
and Puerto Rico. Other training in the
"nukepack" use has taken place in
South Korea, Okinawa, and in several
sites in this country.
Mr. President, the. widespread dis-
persion of these small nuclear weap-
ons into so many different countries
suggests a far more likely scenario for
the beginning of World War III, which
would be the last War, than any pre-
emptive strike from the Soviet Union.
What would be the reaction of the
Soviet Union if somewhere along the
many miles of border between free
Western Europe and Communist East-
ern Europe, the Green Berets or an
American trained commando team de-
ployed and detonated some of these
nuclear devices in response to a Soviet
conventional attack? Would the Sovi-
ets stop at once, "Cry Uncle" and ask
for terms of surrender? Or would they
call our bluff and raise the ante with a
nuclear strike of their own some-
where? Of course they might view this
use of nuclear weapons against them
as the sure beginning of the first all-
out nuclear war, World War III,
assume the advantage would lie with
the country that instituted the first
preemptive strike and let go with an
all-out nuclear assault on every target
they could reach in the United States.
No one, possibly even the Soviet lead-
ers themselves, knows for sure .how
they would react. But the consequence
of the detonation of the mininuclear
bomb as an act of war with its relative-
ly little 10 tons of TNT punch could
be the worst catastrophe in world his-
tory.
Mr. President, the NBC revelation of
the very widespread training and de-
ployment of these mininuclear weap-
ons throughout so many parts of the
world, tells us how very thin and tenu-
ous is this. superpower peace and how
very likely it is that unless we find
some way of controlling these back-
pack nukes, somewhere, sometime,
someone will begin to use these devas-
tating little weapons. In fact, William
Arkin in his concluding comments on
NBC News said this:
There is clearly a consensus within the
U.S.'mIlitary that these weapons have some
military usefulness in wartime and, there-
fore, most likely would be used In any con-
flict.
If Arkin is right, the use of these
small nuclear explosives might be no
farther away than the first U.S. Initia-
tive in Central America that runs into
difficulties. After all, this is where our
commandos are most likely to have
the first call for their services.
The NBC report was carried to mil-
lions of Americans in prime evening
news time. The American people are
now on notice about the prospect that
our country may be ready at any
minute to take the first small but infi-
nitely dangerous step toward fullscale
nuclear war. As Members of the Con-
gress of the United States, we have a
duty to ask: Is this "back-pack nuke"
policy worth the obvious and terrible
risk it poses? What steps has this
country taken to prevent the prolif-
eration of this cheap, but powerful
new instrument of military power
from falling into the hands of Iran,
Libya, Syria, and any number of other
countries that have made a career out
of terrorism?
Here is one little grabber that
should get our attention. Consider: In
1987, on January 25, the President of
the United States is scheduled to give
his State of the Union Message to the
Congress in the presence of the Joint
.Chiefs of Staff, the Vice President, the
President's Cabinet, the Supreme
Court, and both Houses of Congress.
In short, as usual, all the policymakers
of our country will be gathered in one
section of the Capitol building. At
about 8 p.m., a little Volkswagen sport-
ing a House of Representatives tag-
fake, of course-is waved ahead by the
guard as it drives up to park at the
Capitol steps on the House side. A
man steps out of the car. He carries a
detonating device. He has concealed
three nuke packs under some clothing
in the back seat of the Volks. The man
walks to the Metro subway, a few
blocks away, travels 5 or 6 miles in any
one of several directions on the
subway.
At 9 o'clock, the President enters the
House Chamber. At 9:05, he begins to
talk. At 9:15, the Volkswagen driver,
from his safe position 5 or 6 miles
away, sets off the three nuke' packs
with their equivalent of 60,000
pounds-30 tons-of TNT. The Gov-
ernment of the United States is de-
capitated. It has totally disappeared.
Of course, back-pack nukes may be a
certainty of the future no matter what
we do, and they may be used against
us. But there are precautions we can
take and we should certainly insist on
far more convincing public justifica-
tion than we have had so far on the
military "consensus" NBC has report-
ed that they would "most likely be
used in any conflict."
Mr. President, I ask unanimous con-
sent that excerpts from the NBC News
report I have quoted be printed at this
point in the RECORD.
There being no objection, the ex-
cerpt was ordered to be printed in the
RECORD, as follows:
EXCERPT
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 10, 1985.
Tom BROKAW. You could call it Nukepak.
It is a nuclear weapon that fits more or less
into a soldier's. backpack. Each nukepak's
force is roughly one-twelve-hundredth that
of the bomb that crushed Hiroshima. On
this program last week, we reported that
American forces have one hundred nuke-
paks in West Germany alone; and, as Fred
Francis reports tonight, some Germans find
that upsetting.
FRED FRANCIS. The existence of backpack
nuclear weapons surprised the West Ger-
mans. (German Commentator) It has
become a point of debate, as NBC News re-
ported last Thursday, that there are one
hundred of the portable bombs on German
soil. Opposition politicians are furious. Sev-
eral newspapers charge the United States
March 19, 1985
with taking too free a hand In Germany's
defense; and one paper claimed that Ger-
mans don't know what's going on in their
own country.
The 58-pound bomb, called a special
atomic demolition munition, has been part
of NATO's war plans since 1964. The Green
Berets based outside Batholtz are prepared
to use the very low-yield nuclear bombs to
destroy airports, dams, and other vital tar-
gets behind enemy lines. The bombs are det-
onated with a timing device.
The backpack weapon these men will
carry is two hundred and fifty times more
powerful than the bomb which blew up the
Marine barracks in Beirut. The Green
Berets outside Batholtz are not the only sol-
diers in Europe with this special nuclear ex-
pertise. NBC News has learned that units
from Great Britain, Belgium. Holland,
Greece, Turkey, Italy, and West Germany
have been taught how to use the backpack
explosives.
Military analyst William Arkin questions
whether such weapons are really a deter-
rent.
WILLIAM ARxiN. Special atomic demolition
munitions are the product of the 1950's
when we were nuclearizing every component
of our armed forces and even created nucle-
ar landmines. They should be withdrawn
from Europe.
FRANCIS. The backpack nuclear mission is
not unique to Europe and the Green Berets.
Navy Seal teams,- who, among other things,
practice underwater demolitions, have
trained with the small nuclear charges.
Those Navy Seal teams are based in Macra-
,hanish, Scotland; Subic Bay, the Philip-
pines; Roosevelt Roads, Puerto Rico; and
Little Creek, Virginia.
In addition to Batholtz, West Germany,
the Army's nuclear teams are in Wee Jung
Bu, South Korea; and Fort Devons, Massa-
chusetts. The Marines, too, have nuclear
ordnance platoons in Okinawa, Camp Le-
jeune, North Carolina, and 29 Palms, Cali-
fornia.
In Europe, the weapons would also be
used if Warsaw Pact troops overan NATO
positions. Under one of NATO's operational
plans, numbered 4304, the Green Berets are
called Stay Behind Forces, who would de-
stroy targets that might be useful to. the
enemy. Fred Francis, NBC News, the Penta-
gon.
FRANCIS. The opposing generals say the
commandos' place should be where it has
always been, preparing for the big war.
That's the mission of Special Forces in
Batholst, West Germany. In a big war, they
would drop behind Soviet lines and organize
resistancemovements.
The Special Forces are trained in Europe-
an languages, customs, and in sabotage. Spe-
cial Forces carry backpacks, identical to this
one. It weighs about 58 pounds, and it's
called a special, atomic demolition munition,
SADEM, for short; or, in soldier's jargon, a
back-pack nuke.'There are one hundred of
these back-pack nuclear weapons in West
Germany.'
The back-pack nukes would be set off by
remote control to destroy targets such as
airfields and Soviet command sites. Military
analyst William Arkin uncovered the docu-
ments about the use of SADEMs in Europe.
WILLIAM ARKIN. There is clearly a consen-
sus within the U.S. military that these
weapons have some military usefulness in
wartime and, therefore, most likely would
be used in any conflict.
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