Cambodia Can Hold Off Rebels, Hanoi Aide Says

On the eve of what the Vietnamese are calling the final withdrawal of their troops from Cambodia after a decade of costly warfare there, a senior Vietnamese officer expressed confidence Tuesday in the Cambodian government’s ability to withstand an expected onslaught by resistance groups based in Thailand.

But the official, Gen. Nguyen Van Thai, deputy director of the political department of Vietnam’s Defense Ministry, refused to rule out the possibility that Vietnam will return to Cambodia if the Communist Khmer Rouge, which ruled Cambodia from 1975 to 1978, threatens to return to power.

“In case of the threat of the genocidal regime coming back, I think the state of Cambodia will be able to call on the international community for help,” Thai said. He added that Vietnam will not decide until it is asked.

Thai announced a schedule for the final phase of the troop withdrawal, which he said involves about 26,000 men. They will begin pulling out Thursday, he said, using four border crossings, river boats and ships, and the last man is to be out next Tuesday.

No ‘International Control’

Several hundred journalists have gathered in Vietnam and Cambodia to observe the withdrawal, but Vietnam has failed to achieve its goal of having an “international control mechanism” in place to monitor the withdrawal for the world community. Talks on setting up a monitoring group broke down last month in Paris, and Thailand has charged that Vietnamese troops are being left behind disguised as Cambodian soldiers.

The Vietnamese, who invaded Cambodia in December, 1978, have expressed hope that completion of the withdrawal will prompt the United States to end its diplomatic boycott and establish relations with Vietnam. But the Bush Administration is demanding that Vietnam help arrange a political settlement in Cambodia as the price for recognition.

Thai said that more than 25,000 Vietnamese have died in fighting the Khmer Rouge and that an equal number have been seriously wounded since the invasion in 1978. He said the Khmer Rouge had killed 30,000 Vietnamese along their common border in the years from 1975 to 1978.

Most of the Vietnamese who fell in Cambodia were killed in action, he said, many of them as the result of land mines planted by the resistance. A sizable number died from the effects of malaria.

Surveying the current military situation, Thai refused to give exact figures for the Cambodian government forces, other than to say that the militia totals 300,000 men. He said the coalition of resistance forces based in Thailand consists of 50,000 people, including 39,000 fighting men, of whom 23,000 are fighting in Cambodia.

He said the strongest units are those of the Khmer Rouge, with 17,000 fighters, of whom 13,000 are in Cambodia. Followers of the deposed Prince Norodom Sihanouk were said to have a force of 12,000 troops, including 7,000 in Cambodia, and the strength of the rightist Khmer People’s National Liberation Front was put at 10,000 men, with 3,000 in Cambodia.

“We believe the Cambodian government will be able to defend themselves,” Thai said. But he added that if the Khmer Rouge continues to receive assistance from China, “then there might be trouble, and fighting could continue without end in Cambodia.”

He acknowledged that the fighting in Cambodia had surged in August, at a time when efforts to arrange a political settlement appeared to be collapsing in Paris.

Stalled on Khmer Rouge Issue

The talks broke down largely over the question of the participation of the Khmer Rouge in a future government. The government of Premier Hun Sen has refused to consider any role for the Khmer Rouge, which it accuses of killing more than 3 million people during its 3 1/2 years in power.

The Vietnamese withdrawal has been carried out in stages over several years, gradually reducing a force that once stood at more than 200,000 men.