Intelligence and Security Operations of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam Ministry of National Defense

_s-&eREF
Ho Chi Minh’s aid and sponsorship during the French Resistance War and
became known as the Khmer Viet Minh headed by Son Ngoc Minh. In Iylay
1949, PAVN established under COSVN a Khmer Front which ‘was organized
into several military regions. Enemy proselytizing sections were established
under their political staffs, and CDV staff officers proceeded to direct the
development of Son Ngoc Minh's Khmer Liberation Army (KLA) enemy
proselytizing branch. Following the July I954 Geneva Accords on Indochina,
about 2,500 PAVN and about 2,000 KLA personnel were withdrawn to North
Vietnam, where KLA personnel were put into compartmented training sites.
The North Vietnamese civilian and military services proceeded to develop
their covert“ structures in Kampuchea, and trained and dispatched an
unknown number of ethnic Vietnamese and ethnic Khmer agent assets to
Kampuchea. KLA cadres began filtering into‘ northern Kampuchea by 1960.
Between 1960 and 1965, several hundred KLA personnel weretrained at
PAVN facilities. Political training included instruction by CDV staff officers.
During this period, an unknown number of KLA enemy proselytizing cadres
were trained by the CDV. In 1966, the Lao Dong Party Central Committee
established under its direct control an entity designated Group P-86 to handle
Hanoi's aid to the Khmer Communist Party (KCP) and its now known
Kampuchean People’s Liberation Army (KPLA). Based in Hoa Binh Province,
P-36 was subordinate to the Central Committee’s Organization Department
headed by Politburo member Le Duo Tho. Although not involved in
specialized professional training programs, the P-36 Training Office made all
arrangements for such training by the appropriate parent agency. KPLA
enemy proselytizing cadres were trained by the CDV. By 1967, over 3,000
KCP and KPLA cadres were processed through the P-36 system, an unknown
number of whom were enemy proselytizing cadres who became the nucleus of
the KPLA enemy proselytizing branch. All were dispatched to COSVN for
service with the KCP/KPLA in Kampuchea.
The I8 March . 1970 overthrow of Khmer Chief of State Norodom
Sihanouk created a new operational environment for the PAVN services in
Kampuchea and in their liaison advisory relationships with the KCP and its
KPLA. Within hours, COSVN and its PAVN/SVNLA received orders from
Hanoi to support the KCP/KPLA with whatever means was necessary to
topple the American-backed Lon Nol government, including the use of
PAVN/SVNLA troops and the assignment of advisory personnel. On 27
March, COSVN Directive No. 6 instructed lower echelons to establish liaison
with and to send advisory groups to their KCP/KPLA counterparts. By late
March 1970, political and military advisers began reporting for duty across the
Vietnamese border with the KCP/KPLA.
In May 1970, COSVN Military Proselytizing Section (MPS) Chief Tran
Van Du returned to COSVN from Hanoi with 70 CDV personnel. All were
given additional training and indoctrination by the COSVN MPS on specific
problems they would encounter in South Vietnam and Kampuchea. Of the 70,
45 were assigned to COSVN MPS units in Kampuchea. Most were agent
handlers. This marked thebeginning of CDV COSVN MPS forward command
operations in Kampuchea, where COSVN MPS units were tasked with
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