The invasion of Cambodia

On April 14th 1970 the ARVN made a first incursion, on April 29th Lt. Gen. Do Cao Tri led his 12,000 men on the Pico de Loro (see map). But it was on 1st May 1970 when General Robert Shoemaker sent the order to advance on the Pico de Loro and hook to the officers stationed at the border with Cambodia. While some took it with resignation, most were happy to beat the Viet Cong sanctuary, and especially the Vietnamese, to avenge all the dead that Cambodians that had been sent floating down the river Mecong.

The raid was preceded by major bombings that caused many deaths among the peasantry which, ultimately, was terrible for the pro-Western government of Cambodia, as the communist guerrillas achieved legitimacy and gained more volunteers for victory. Nixon was aware of the impact those actions would bring, but as he himself had declared, he would rather lose the re-election to become the first president to lose a war.

The raid on the hook was met with some resistance from sporadic groups, as was the custom, and disappeared into the jungle after a brief firefight. The resistance was increasing by the EVN. Soon the artillery emplacements of EVN were captured and 100 cars of exploration was shipped to Sheridan if they encountered resistance.

Using all the firepower to overcome resistance they looted the town taking everything they could. Cambodians reported that there was an entire city in a jungle guerrilla. They were able to enter what they call ‘The City’ consisting of thatched cottages they found 400 caches and 180 harboring medical supplies, food, clothing, in addition to 480 rifles and 120,000 cartridges.

Between the two raids they found 4793 individual arms, 730 mortars, 7,285 rockets, 124 trucks, three million rounds of rifle and nine million kilograms of rice in addition to extensive documentation. On June 30th the soldiers returned to their bases.

Throughout the raid they killed 354 Americans and wounded 1689. The vRNA said they lost 866 men and wounded another 3274. Moreover, the President claimed to have captured supplies and weapons for a year and killed 11,349 enemies. For Nixon it was like a Christmas present and ordered the deployment of 31,000 more troops into Cambodia to destroy everything.

However, the famous headquarters of EVN for South Vietnam (the COSVN) did not show strong U.S. protests, the Kent State being the hardest of all. However these attacks and U.S. bombing encouraged the people against their government, who could not or would not defend them, and inflamed the already bloody fighting of the Kjemeres Reds for years and had managed to establish a base of operations in the north of the country.