U.S.-Trained Viet Tribe in Open Revolt

Item

derivative filename/jpeg

363-04802.pdf

Digital Object Identifier

363-04802

Title

U.S.-Trained Viet Tribe in Open Revolt

Description

Article published in the New York Herald Tribune about the rebellion of American-trained and equipped Montagnards at Ban Mê Thuột, pages 1 and 13

Transcript

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- Page 1
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U.S.-Trained
Viet Tribe in
Open Revolt
By Beverly Deepe
A Special Correspondent
SAIGON.
A company of mountain tribesmen, trained, equipped
and supervised by the elite United States Army Special
Forces, revolted yesterday and seized a government radio
station in the provincial capital of Banmethuot. They
broadcast appeals for tribal autonomy for nine hours be-
fore withdrawing.
At the same time, another tribal unit organized to fight
the Communist Viet Cong took over the distric head-
quarters town of Duc Lap, three miles from the Cambodian
border, in Quang Duc Province.
The Saigon government sent an airborne battalion to
recapture the town, but it was reported still in the rebel
tribesmen's hands late yesterday.
The mountaineer uprisings, first of their kind reported
during the anti-Communist war in South Viet Nam, were
regarded with utmost seriousness in Saigon. Reliable sources
said they indicated extensive penetration by the Viet Cong
into the multi-million-dolla, American-backed program to
win the loyalty of the mountain tribes and train and arm
them to fight the Reds.
Viet Cong agents were presumed to have inspired at
least the revolt at Banmethuot, where the rebels waved a
red flag with three gold stars, reminiscent of the Viet Cong's
red-and-blue banner with one gold star. The Viet Cong has
long tried to stir up the tribes against the government by
promising them national autonomy.
THE SCENE
Banmethuot, 180 miles northeast of Saigon, is the
capital of Darlac Province in mountainous central South
Viet Nam. Quang Duc, scene of the other "montagnard"
(mountaineer) uprising, borders Darlac on the south.
These uplands are inhabited by roughly one million
montagnards, a conglomeration of primitive tribes of vary-
ing ethnic origin and speaking different dialects. Some
live under almost Stone Age conditions. Farmers and
hunters, they live in huts or thatched longhouses, and their
weapon is the crossbow. They are traditionally antagonistic
to the lowland Vietnamese, who in turn look down on
them as savages.
Early in 1962, however, crack American Special Forces
teams began moving into the montagnards' "high plateau,"
where Viet Cong infiltration was already widespread, to
win the countaineers as allies and train them in the
use of modern weapons and guerrilla war.
The program, known as Civilian Irregular Defense
Groups, or CIDG, was designed to check Viet Cong in-
filtration across the Laotian and Cambodian borders and
over the high plateau. It has had both signal successes
and setbacks.
The participants in yesterday's revolt at Banmethuot
were about 500 members of the Rhade tribe who were being
More on VIET TRIBE, P 13
U. S.-Trained Viet Tribe Revolts
(Continued from page one)
trained in Special Forces camps around the provincial
capital. While some seized the radio station, a platoon of
the rebels took up positions on a bridge leading into Ban-
methuot to prevent interference.
They then began broadcasting appeals to other tribes-
men to ignore the administration of the Saigon government,
charging that government officials had mistreated montag-
nards and taken away their lands to give to colonizers
from the lowlands.
Premier Nguyen Khanh, who only a year ago was corps
commander in the Banmethuot area, hurriedly left his
week-end residence and flew to the corps headquarters,
where he broadcast appeals to the tribesmen to go back to
their camps. American officers in the area, who have had
considerable success in winning the confidence of the mon-
tagnards, also urged the rebels to withdraw. After nine
hours, they did so.
American Special Forces officers have known for some
time that Viet Cong agents were planted among their tribal
trainees. The Viet Cong have staged a number of heavy
attacks on the camps where the montagnards are trained,
sometimes helped by traitors inside the installations. In
some cases, the camps have been overrun while in others
the attackers have been held off in bloody fighting.
The desertion rate from the CIDG also has been high..
But yesterday's was the first incident in which montagnard
troops openly rebelled in the cause of tribal autonomy, with
which the Reds have sought to woo them.
The montagnard training program is slated for expan-
sion. Forty U. S. Special Forces teams of 12 men each are
now working with the minority groups, but the number is
expected to rise to 50 under the current 5,000-man buildup
of U. S. military advisers in South Viet Nam.

Date

1964, Sep. 21

Subject

Montagnard (Vietnamese people); Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Campaigns--Central Highlands; Ban Mê Thuột (Vietnam)

Location

Saigon, South Vietnam

Coordinates

10.8231; 106.6311

Container

B4, F6

Format

newspaper clippings

Collection Number

MS 363

Collection Title

Beverly Deepe Keever, Journalism Papers

Creator

Keever, Beverly Deepe

Copyright Information

These images are for educational use only. To inquire about usage or publication, please contact Archives & Special Collections.

Publisher

Archives & Special Collections, University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries

Language

English