GREEN BERETS AND BRAVE MINORITIES

A 'rong' house of the Jarai ethnic group, in Vietnam's highlands today

I’m riding in an SUV, an hour south of Pleiku in Vietnam’s highlands. As we pass through a government owned rubber plantation, the paved road runs out. We continue on, bumping along on a dusty, orange colored dirt road.

Watching the villages as we pass, I notice a distinct change in architecture.  I see some houses built in a more traditional style, raised up on stilts. Then I notice one house unlike all the others. We pass a tall, impressive wooden building with a very high, steeply sloped roof. Spikes with ethnic symbols protrude from the crest of the building, like lightning rods.

“That rong house,” my guide tells me. A rong house is a traditional highland building that is the center of ceremonial and cultural life in the village. This means we’ve entered Jarai territory.

Our driver slows, and we finally pull to a stop at the base of a low hill. I head for a dirt road leading upwards, and I’m surprised to see women’s underwear and a bra hanging from an overhead tree. My 

An old torn sandbag, left behind on the old base

guide tells me that this is from a local hill tribe. She says that when there is an older single woman hoping for a husband, she’ll hang those in a tree to improve her chances for marriage. That has to be one of the more amusing superstitions that I’ve ever heard.

Continuing up the hill, I learn why my driver didn’t drive me up any further. The earth here is almost like sand. What isn’t covered by grass or brush is a very fine, orange colored volcanic dirt.  It’s so fine, that the dusty orange earth is staining the cuffs of my pants as I walk.

Further up the hill, I find torn sections of brown burlap sticking up out of the orangey ground. “Here sandbags,” says my guide. These mark where old trenches and bunkers used to be. 

1960's view of the Green Beret's base of Plei Me (Photo: US Army)

This was a former US Special Forces camp, known as Camp Pleime.

Unlike the thousands of troops that were based on the sprawling Camp Enari in Pleiku, Pleime sheltered only a small detachment of specialized American troops. A Green Beret team operated here with ARVN soldiers, and 350 local Jarai militiamen. About 100 of the Jarai's family members also lived within the base.

This remote former Vietnam War era base, is now little more than a scrub covered hill. There used to be a cement blockhouse left here, but the government tore it down 10 years ago. There were also many shell casings scattered across the surface, but they've all been picked up by locals to sell for scrap. Like Camp Enari, there are few traces left of the former base that occupied this site.

In 1965, a North Vietnamese Army (NVA) attack here at Pleime, marked the beginning of a very bloody campaign that came to be known as the battle of Ia

Map showing Special Forces Camps (click to enlarge)

Drang. The attack at Pleime became a siege, and the battle in this region ragedoff and on for more than a month. Most of the heaviest fighting occurred only some miles west, towards the Cambodian border. Thousands died. The battle became immortalized in the 2002 Mel Gibson film, "We Were Soldiers". 

I step off the dirt road, but stay by the paths, as there are still some landmines around. The Vietnamese military had done a major search to remove mines around Pleime back in the 1980’s, but they didn’t locate all of them. Some locals were injured by old mines only two years ago.

Continuing up the path I pass a couple old bomb craters, and reach the top of the hill. I can see for miles around; this was a good location for an outpost. Looking at the surrounding scrub growth, I see that the top of the hill is fairly flat. This is where the Hueys would have landed.

In Pleime the battle highlighted the latest innovation in warfare: the US Army’s use of helicopters. After the NVA cut off the main road I had used to get here, they tightened their siege. But choppers were able to fly right over them, and bring in supplies and reinforcements by air. Among them was a certain Major Charles Beckwith, a near legend in the Green Berets. They survived, Pleime was held, and the siege was broken.

It’s sad to know that hundreds of young men died here, fighting over what has now become nothing but an insignificant, remote, scrubby patch of land. Pleime is now

Vietnamese memorial at Plei Me today

guarded only by pepper plants, and cashew trees. 

Out front on the road near a small memorial, stand two government propaganda signs. They claim that in their 'glorious victory', that the communists killed 2,974 enemy troops in this battle, and that 1,700 of them were American. As often happened 
throughout the war, both sides exaggerated the numbers of enemy dead, while minimizing the numbers of their own. But in the case of Ia Drang, reversing the numbers would be more accurate. By the end of the fighting for the valley, although hundreds of Americans and ARVN were dead, the number of NVA casualties was far higher. For the first time in South Vietnam, the NVA were on the receiving end of devastating B-52 bomb strikes.

One of the only accurate ‘facts’ on the historical sign, is the date listed for the start of the battle, which was October 19th, 1965. After the siege was broken, it would be years before Pleime actually fell to the NVA. This was long after the hard nosed Green Berets had already left.

I look through an official English language government tourist booklet, that mentions Pleime. Among other things, they claim that the NVA won the battle through, “post encircling & re-enforcement beating”. Their version of the truth was about as good as their translation. You’d think that they would at least translate their propaganda into English that could be understood.

I head back down to the road, and a cart pulled by two oxen goes by, carrying a Vietnamese couple, and bags of produce. I get back to the main road, and head for the only two houses on the former base.  These belong to homesteaders, and their lighter skin gives them away as Vietnamese, not Jarai. Through my guide I ask them where they’re from, and she translates their reply, “they from North Vietnam.”

Homes of Vietnamese settlers, on what used to be Jarai land

Families like this are fairly common in what is now called Gia Lai province. In 1976 the communist government encouraged Vietnamese settlers from the north to move here and work on government rubber plantations. Although hill tribes made up the vast majority of the highland population, Vietnamese from the north began moving here en masse. With their American protectors gone, the Jarai and other ethnic groups who had fought on the US side lost a great deal of land, much of which still hasn’t been paid for.

There are 54 different minority ethnic groups in Vietnam, totaling more than 12 million people. Most of them suffer discrimination from ethnic Vietnamese, and the Vietnamese dominated government. The constitution is supposed to guarantee equal rights for all, but that doesn’t always carry over into daily affairs. Domination of the hill tribes by the Vietnamese has been going on for centuries, and in recent decades it has even worsened. Interestingly, ethnic minorities were actually better off when Ho Chi Minh was still alive. In North Vietnam, the Montagnards had zones of autonomy, but once Ho died, the communist government took their autonomy away. Many people belonging to these ethnic groups still don’t consider themselves Vietnamese.

Having seen enough of Pleime, we get back into our SUV, and head back towards Pleiku. Driving back along the dirt road, we pass a small herd of cows on the road. They are being herded along by a young Jarai boy, who I’m surprised to see is riding one of the cows bareback. I didn’t know it was even possible to ride a cow like a horse.

I’d like to stop here and talk to some Jarai villagers, but my guide is less than enthusiastic. In parts of the highlands, Vietnam requires all foreigners visiting minority villages to visit only with a permit. For the same reason, I’m driving out here with a government tour guide. An official publication calls the province, “the fertile land for the exploitation of tourist services”. That’s a good one. There’s plenty of exploitation going on here, but it has nothing to do with tourism, and the Montagnards aren’t happy about it. The reason that permits are required, is because there’s still conflict between the hill tribes and the government. When the war officially ended in 1975, government security forces moved in to assert their power across the highlands. Thousands of Montagnards had already been displaced during the war, and now they were losing their land. Suffering from discrimination, their communities were forced into socialism, threatening their traditional cultures. Those who objected were imprisoned and beaten. The situation of the hill tribes became desperate.

View from Plei Me. Hill tribe militias continued fighting the Vietnamese, years after US forces left.

So thousands of Montagnards, who had already been trained by the Green Berets, went back to war. They joined FULRO, a French acronym meaning United Front for the Liberation of Oppressed Races. Formed years earlier, this guerilla group fought the French, then the South Vietnamese, finally taking on the communists. FULRO fighters took a page from the NVA’s play book, by taking shelter across the nearby border in Cambodia. Ironically, the Vietnamese communists had fought for victory using guerrilla warfare, now they had a new guerrilla war fighting against them.

Virtually unknown to the outside world, armed resistance by FULRO continued on and off for years, all the way until 1992. The last survivors eventually surrendered their weapons to UN soldiers who were stationed in Cambodia. By that time, their fighters were almost out of ammunition, and their numbers had shrunk from 5,000, down to 400. This last group of holdouts was given asylum by their former patrons, the USA. They then resettled in North Carolina.

That wasn’t the end of the highland hostilities. In 2000, hill tribes outside Pleiku were demonstrating for more rights, some even demanding independence. There was some violence in the streets, but with security forces keeping out the press, the number of Montagnards killed or injured isn’t known.

In 2001, loss of ancestral forests led to protests across not only Gia Lai Province, but also Daklak Province to the south. Tensions had been building over religious restrictions for some hill tribe Christians, and another spark of the demonstrations was the arrest and subsequent beatings of two Christian brothers in the area. All three of the major hill tribes were involved. Roads were blocked, vehicles were overturned, and a post office and telephone building were damaged. The violence spread to Pleiku. All foreign journalists were barred from the region, so the number of deaths from the government crackdown was kept secret. 

An oxcart passes through the former Plei Me Special Forces Camp

In 2004 during Easter Week demonstrations violence erupted again, and an unknown number of Christian highlanders were killed and injured by government forces. Besides using firearms, Vietnamese police captured many protestors using electric shock batons. By now protests had earned attention from Human Rights Watch, which stated, “Vietnam’s policy of repression of Montagnard Christians is only fueling the unrest.”

Hundreds fled across the border to nearby Cambodia, only to find they faced possible deportation to Vietnam, and lengthy prison terms. Under pressure from the Vietnamese government, Cambodia denied asylum to the Montagnards, while preventing UN refugee officials from giving them access, a violation of international law. When more Montagnards fled to Cambodia in 2008, A Montagnard Christian named Y Ben Hdok was beaten to death in police custody.

In recent years, sporadic arrests and persecution have continued. While keeping a lid on information related to human rights, the government is attempting to keep away outside influences. One result is less tourism in the highlands than there is in other provinces. Unfortunately for the Montagnard peoples, the oppression goes on. Since government policy in this region is unlikely to change, it’s only a matter of time before there is unrest in the highlands once again.

HIGHLAND TOWN OF PLEIKU

Arriving at Pleiku Airport in the Central Highlands

I’m airborne again, only this time I’m not flying on a big comfy jet. Today I’m only in a two engine propeller plane, just a puddle jumper really. This trip will be much different then my earlier destinations. On Vietnam’s coast I had plenty of tourists to keep me company, but there are few westerners where I’m headed. I’m about to enter a more remote region of Vietnam. The seatbelt sign comes on, and we start our descent near the southern end of the Truong Song Mountains. I'm arriving in Pleiku, in the central highlands.
 
Looking out the window, it's not what I expected. I thought I’d be surrounded by rugged mountains, but there are only a few mountains off in the distance. The altitude here may be higher, but topography around Pleiku is mostly low rolling hills. It’s not as green as I was expecting either. The trees around the airport are all young, since this area was so defoliated with Agent Orange during the war.
 
Touching down, I look across the empty tarmac. There are no other planes or jets in sight. This was once the military airport known as Pleiku Air Base, run by US and Vietnamese Air Forces. The largest and busiest airport in the highlands, it was once loaded with planes and helicopters. Now there’s only one vacant government helicopter sitting off to the edge of the airfield. There is so little traffic, that one whole section of tarmac is no longer maintained, and has grass and weeds growing up through the cracks. Pleiku is in a poor province, so there are few flights to the highlands these days. In the new terminal, I spot a tall older westerner with a faded US flag on his cap. Approaching him, I can make out three tattoos on his aging forearm shaped like military medals. I introduce myself, and meet Larry, a friendly American war veteran from North Carolina.

“I came back to have a look with my girlfriend,” Larry tells me. He was an Army soldier here in 1969, and he’s glad he came back. He had been visiting some of his old haunts further south. He was surprised at what he found, so many old buildings had been torn down, removed for new construction and businesses, “Like Bien Hoa,” he said, mentioning another large, former air base. “Today it’s an industrial area. Everything is changed, it’s hard to find some of the places where we were before.”

Pleiku today is more developed than during the war years

I’m relieved to meet two other Americans here, but they soon hop into a taxi and depart. Pleiku doesn’t get many foreign visitors. I grab a late taxi, load up, and head out. Leaving the airport, we drive by barracks now occupied by the Vietnamese Army. It’s a sleepy looking facility, and all the soldiers I see walking about are unarmed. The only activity I see is a platoon of enlisted men doing calisthenics. With their dark green pants and white t-shirts, they look like a recruiting film. 

The taxi drops me at my hotel, after checking in, I head back out the doors to get to know this highland town. Pleiku was once a group of humble villages of the Jarai minority tribe. Then French colonists arrived, and it grew to be the provincial capital. The French referred to the Jarai and the rest of the hill tribe minorities as ‘Montagnards’, meaning ‘mountain people’, and the name stuck.

Walking through Pleiku now, I see few hill tribe folk. People I encounter are ethnic Vietnamese, who have moved to Pleiku in droves. The villages are long gone and the downtown is modern, by Vietnamese standards. Compared to crowded and polluted Ho Chi Minh City, it’s much more orderly, clean and pleasant. There are few old homes, most of buildings around me are relatively new. In this highland town where most homes had only one story, there are now countless apartment buildings. These changes weren’t just due to urban planning, it was also due to the war's destruction.

Can she really drive in traffic?

When the communists began advancing across the highlands in 1975, there was a chaotic, emergency migration eastward towards Vietnam's coast. Soon after the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) began to rocket and shell Pleiku, the South Vietnamese Army (ARVN) retreated from the city. When the civilians realized what was happening, the population of Pleiku fled with them in fear. To deny the communists use of Pleiku, departing ARVN torched many buildings, further adding to the destruction. As packed columns of military and civilian vehicles headed for the coast, they were attacked by the NVA, killing not only at the retreating ARVN, but also fleeing civilians. The panicked evacuation was horrendous, and thousands died in the chaotic exodus. It was the most tragic and costly retreat of the war.

In the 1980’s much of Pleiku was rebuilt, partly with Soviet aid, and today the population is triple what it was during the war years. This is mainly due to the influx of so many Vietnamese who moved here from the northern provinces, since the conquering government of the north encouraged them to move here.

Kpa Klong, who fought the Americans

It was a long road back, but Pleiku has been rebuilt. As part of the government’s changes in the south, Pleiku is now referred to as ‘Gia Lai’ on many official maps.

Looking around the commercial district I see few cars, and as I saw in HCMC, many locals use motorbikes as if they are pickup trucks. Outside the market, I watch one woman pack her small motorbike with a load of nine foot long stalks of sugar cane. I wonder how she’s going to make it through traffic with such a wide, oversized load. The police seem to have less visibility here than in other parts of Vietnam. That doesn’t mean that they aren’t around, since there are plenty of plainclothes police. Perhaps they keep a low profile to please the minorities. 

As I check out Pleiku, I notice that most traces of the former American military  presence are gone. Even most American made buildings have vanished. I do spot one bit of historical evidence, when I stop at a local hardware store. Piles of gear are stacked outside on the sidewalk, and among a pile of chains and springs, are old US Army ammunition cases. They may be discolored and rusty, but they’re still waterproof.

Walking through a town square, I come to a statue dedicated to Kpa Klong, a Montagnard fighter who died in 1975. Wearing a loin cloth and carrying a carbine, he’s about to throw what looks like a pipe bomb. From one of the local hill tribes, he used to fight the Americans. Friezes on the statue’s pedestal show him gunning down American soldiers, and attacking an American tank using only a hand grenade.

 

A dog guarding a tank? Really??!

Kpa Klong and his village may have joined with the communists, but the reality is that most hill tribes sided with the Americans during the war. The highland minorities have suffered discrimination from the majority Vietnamese for centuries, and the US ideas of equal rights and democracy appealed to them. They desired to continue practicing their own religions and languages, so they had no love for communists, and still don't. The Americans also provided arms to the Montagnard militias, giving them their own means for self-defense. It’s sad, but true that many Vietnamese refer to the highland minority peoples as savages, even today. Not surprisingly, occasional unrest and uprisings in the highlands against the Vietnamese government have continued.

I stop at the Gia Lai Museum, to find the doors locked and the lights off. After finding a staffer, she opens the front door to show me why it’s so quiet. Artifacts and boxes are piled up everywhere, the museum is closed for renovations. Before I leave I walk behind

The remains of a US made Huey helicopter, and a spotter plane

the building, and I’m startled by a furry yellow dog barking at me from behind a chain link fence. Strangely, the dog is tied to an M-41 tank, with a .30 caliber machine gun mounted on top. A dog protecting a tank! Piled in among other wreckage around it are an old howitzer, and the remains of various American made aircraft, including an A-6, two Huey helicopters, and two spotter planes.

As I check out all the wreckage, the dog never stops barking at me. He’s the junkyard dog, for a military junkyard. Since the museum is closed, I imagine that his barking at me now, is probably the most excitement that this dog has had all week. 

I head back to my Pleiku hotel. Time for Vietnamese cuisine.  Next stop, a local restaurant.