Monday, January 07, 2019, 18:31 (GMT+7)
The art of forming battle array in the Southwest Border Defense War

40 years ago, under the leadership of our Party, our military and people decisively defeated Khmer Rouge invasion into our Southwest border provinces and fulfilled our honorable international duty. This victory left us many unique military art lessons, especially in the art of forming battle array.

Vietnam and Cambodia are 2 neighboring countries which have a lot of common characteristics in terms of history and culture. Vietnamese and Cambodian people used to work together for a long time to fight against common enemies to gain national independence and freedom. However, due to the instigation and intervention of international reactionary forces, since the late period of our patriotic war against American aggression, Pol Pot’s henchmen kidnapped and even murdered a number of Vietnamese soldiers and officers operating inside Cambodian territory, causing severe damages to the two nations’ friendship. Especially, after seizing power in Cambodia, Pol Pot – Ieng Sary regime had shown its true color as a brutal and inhumane force. They conducted widespread genocide all over the country; they also pursued a chauvinism foreign policy and launched an invasion into our Southwest border provinces. In contrast, Vietnamese people, after the reunification of the country, only desired peace and stability to rebuild the nation. However, brutal and blatant acts of aggression by Khmer Rouge forced us to once again take arms to defend our national sovereignty and territorial integrity; and together with Cambodian people, overthrow this genocidal regime to establish a people’s democracy. Our victory in Southwest Border Defense War (January 7, 1979) left us many unique military art lessons, in which the art of forming battle array was demonstrated in the following points.

First, proactively build border defense, gradually retake the initiative and conduct counteroffensive to gain a decisive victory. Ignoring international conventions and Vietnam’s peaceful gestures, on the night of April 30, 1977, Pol Pot’s troops launched an unprovoked invasion against Vietnam, conducting indiscriminate massacres and destruction against our people and infrastructure. As a result, on May 23, 1977, the Central Military Commission gave the following order to our armed forces in the South: “determinedly protect our sovereignty; any act of invasion by the reactionary regime of Cambodia shall not be tolerated”. The General Staff quickly instructed the Military Regions 5, 7 and 9 to reinforce our defense along the entire Southwest border; and made necessary preparation for armed services and branches to defeat the enemy.

Fully grasping the order and principles of the Central Military Commission and Ministry of National Defense, the Military Regions and local authorities in the South implemented propaganda activities to develop a clear understanding about the enemy’ nature and schemes among soldiers and civilians; and organized and mobilized onsite forces and resources for our defense in all areas. At the same time, local authorities initiated the construction of combat hamlets, villages, and communes; and conducted crackdown operations to suppress and eliminate domestic reactionary elements, preventing them from cooperating with foreign adversary forces to commit sabotaging acts. Along our Southwest border, armed forces units and local people actively utilized the terrain to build and reinforce defense structures, forming continuing and in-depth defense perimeters to fend off, defeat and destroy Khmer Rouge’s offensives and prevent the enemy from inserting small sabotaging units into our territory. In addition, Ministry of National Defense ordered strategic mobile units to cooperate with the Southern Military Regions’ contingents in defeating the enemy’s attacks along the border and recapture lost territories; and actively conducting counteroffensives on the Routes 07, 01, and 02, thereby causing severe damages to 5 Khmer Rouge divisions and completely destroying their plan to capture Tay Ninh Town.

Overall, despite initial setbacks due to the enemy’s aggressive activities and our units’ miscalculation in planning border defense, we basically managed to firmly hold all border areas, protect our civilians, and combine combat operations with building border defense forces and infrastructures. Also, our units actively utilized flexible tactics to destroy the enemy from distance and in close proximity, defeat their attacks at all scales and cause heavy losses to their units. Based on these results, we regained the initiative, reinforced our defense and made adjustments in our force deployment to form a solid defense array, ready for our subsequent counteroffensives.

Second, seize the opportunity, actively switch from defense and counteroffensive operations to total offensive and fulfill our international duty. After using several regular mobile divisions to drive Khmer Rouge units out of our territory and conduct counteroffensive operations deep inside their staging areas, weakening their combat capability, forcing them to completely withdraw from our Southwest border areas and take defensive positions along the border line, we managed to create a strong foothold for our units to continue to push ahead border defense activities. At the same time, the uprising of the revolutionary force in Cambodian Eastern Military Region had created a widespread anti-Khmer Rouge movement all over the country. In many critical areas, the uprising force was able to establish bases of operation and expand its armed forces. At the same time, distrust and purging activities caused severe rifts inside Khmer Rouge leadership, and its armed forces were dispersed to deal with our counteroffensives along the border and Cambodian uprising force’ operations. Base on strategic appreciation, we made necessary adjustments for 3rd and 4th Corps which were fighting in Tay Ninh area, reinforced 9th Corps’ area of operation with 2nd Corps; dispatched 5th Division (Military Region 7) to North Ka Tum; and deployed several economic building units to critical areas along the Southwest border to be prepared for combat actions. Besides, Armed Police Command and onsite armed forces in border areas conducted unit redeployment and built and strengthened all border defense structures. In addition, General Department of Military Logistics established a new supply network; specialized arms quickly dispatched their combat units in all directions; and communication network connecting corps and military region commands with border outposts and strongpoints was enhanced with additional personnel and materials, etc. These were extremely important adjustments which helped us to create advantageous conditions to effectively fight against the enemy in all areas. As a result, we proactively defeated many major Khmer Rouge offensives and successfully defended our national sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Third, closely combine our offensive with Cambodian people’s uprising activities for a total victory. The combination between our patriotic war to defense national sovereignty and Cambodian people’s war for national liberation was the most significant feature of the Southwest Border Defense War 1979. After determining that Pol Pot – Ieng Sary reactionary force was the primary target of our military actions, our Party leadership concluded that if we did not completely eliminate this evil regime, not only Cambodian people’s revolution would suffer, but also our national security would constantly be threatened. This meant we must simultaneously fight to defend our country and fulfill our international duty which was to help Cambodian revolution cause. However, to do this, we must wage war in general and form battle array in particular in a flexible and creative way. That said, when we fought the enemy on our soil, our main tool to drive them out of our territory was our military. But when we operated in Cambodian territory, we must work closely with Cambodian uprising force to defeat the enemy. This was a very unique characteristic of our military strategy which was applied to the Southwest Border Defense War.

Keeping in mind that helping our ally is self-help, our military and people actively and simultaneously built border defense, defeated the enemy’s offensives and provided support for Cambodian revolutionary force in all aspects. From May to November 1978, Vietnam helped Cambodian revolutionary armed forces to establish 15 battalions, 05 battalion command frames, dozens of party organizations and party work teams, etc. As a result, on December 2, 1978, Khmer United National Front (FUNK) was founded and announced its revolutionary charter with 11 articles, in which it clearly stated its commitment to unify all Cambodian patriotic organizations to overthrow Khmer Rouge and establish a people’s democracy; and asserted its determination to fight alongside Vietnamese people against the common enemy.

Another notable characteristic of our art of forming battle array was that, during our counteroffensive and offensive phases, we heavily focused on strengthening Cambodian revolutionary force’s capability and building its foothold, helping it to be able to hold its own in long term. That said, answering the distress call from Cambodian people and basing on favorable military, political and diplomatic conditions, our military closely cooperated with Cambodian revolutionary armed forces in launching a full scale offensive to completely eliminate Khmer Rouge, one of the most brutal and inhumane regime in human history, and revive the nation of Cambodia.

Southwest Border Defense War ended long time ago, but the art of forming battle array which was applied by our military to this conflict still provides us with many valuable lessons in building provincial/municipal defensive zones and strengthening our people’s armed forces to be able to defend our Socialist Motherland in any situation.

Senior Colonel, Dr. Truong Mai Huong, Deputy Director of the Vietnam Military History Institution

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