The Sunset War

By day the rice fields stretching south of Saigon seem quiet enough as farmers in conical hats go about their tasks of burning off the stubble of the last harvest or deepening the myriad canals in expectation of the first rains. At sunset the war begins.

Diseased Part. Last week, six years after Viet Nam was partitioned, the Communists were stepping up their guerrilla activities. For the first time since 1954, the Reds are operating in bands of more than 50 men. Some are old Red cadres left behind at the time of partition; others are newly infiltrated guerrillas sent down from North Viet Nam through neighboring Laos or Cambodia, or put ashore from small fishing boats in the Gulf of Thailand. Their total strength is now estimated at 3,000 to 5,000 men, concentrated in the swampy Mekong Delta--"a diseased part of the body," one U.S. observer calls it. It is a secret, hushed war of stealth and secrecy, since the government of President Ngo Dinh Diem suppresses all news of new murders or incidents. The Reds' special targets have been civil officials, and in recent months they have managed to murder an average of ten a day. One government administrator is still stubbornly at work, although he was shot six times by the Communists and left for dead. For safety, village chiefs from small hamlets move each night to a common dormitory in one of the larger villages.

Strangers driving through the region have been stopped by armed Communists and warned off the roads at night unless the license on their car is on the approved Red list. Last month, as a careless army detachment moved up one of the canals in boats, it was ambushed by Reds and 26 soldiers were slain.

In recent weeks the Red terror has spread from the rice fields into the capital city of Saigon itself. Streets are deserted by 9 o'clock at night, and people are huddled behind shuttered windows straining to hear the sound of explosions. Next day facts and rumors are traded: a car is reported to have been shot up by Reds in the city's outskirts; a plastic bomb is said to have been hurled into a cafe; a police roundup is claimed to have netted hundreds of suspects. The 2,500 U.S. citizens living in South Viet Nam have been "advised" not to expose themselves needlessly by traveling at night.

Rural Cities. The harassed government has fought the Red domination of the countryside by building "agrovilles"; peasant families have been moved from their homes scattered along either side of the canals and resettled in rural "cities" provided with electricity, hospitals, schools and central markets.The aim: to group the peasants in units large enough for self-defense. So far, only 17 agrovilles are completed or under construction, and there is strong peasant opposition to leaving their traditional thatched homes, despite the obvious danger.

The government claims that the stepped-up terrorism is the Communist reaction to the success of Diem's efforts to raise peasant living standards. U.S. officials, reflecting on the $1.2 billion that Washington has poured into South Viet Nam in the past six years, say that much more must be done. Once the government wins the peasants' wholehearted support, the Red guerrillas can be isolated and put out of action.

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