USAID doing COIN in Thailand in the late 70s?

[MountainRunner]

Andrew Natsios apparently made a comment at the Jan 31 SR conference in DC saying USAID did COIN in Thailand in the late 1970s.

Does anybody know what programs he was referring to?

[AFlynn]

I don't know, but I might be able to talk to someone who does.

[Mike in Hilo]

I was in USAID/Guatemala at the time, and don't know either...since the Asia Bureau was in another world, bureaucratically...Maybe this long-winded reply will shed some light. I assume he used the term COIN very broadly. A paper posted on this site a couple of weeks ago described in detail Royal Thai Gov't anti-communist COIN in NE Thailand under General Prem during that timeframe. Logically, USAID would have focussed its development efforts to assist the economy of the targeted area in a complementary effort. Typically, this may have been what we called an "area development program," which would usually include infrastructure construction (anything from roads to irrigation to schools--and if schools, would include teacher training), and for direct assistance to peasant farmers, there would typically be a program providing access to ag credit, and if agronomically appropriate, introduction of higher value crops. I doubt there was a more direct COIN effort, since USAID's organizational culture since at least the CORDS days viewed COIN with an less than rational phobia. USAID viewed the support it was forced to provide to CORDS (personnel and associated costs) as an albatross hanging about its neck, and after CORDS, tried mightily to fire its handful of FSOs (like yours truly) who were selected to stay on in CORDS's successor outfit, the Embassy's Special Assistant to the Ambassador for Field Operations (SAA/FO) program.

The USAID line was that they ought only do pure economic development.
(--This is not necessarily the same as COIN--ex.: Nhon Trach District, Bien Hoa Province, RVN, 1969 0r '70, was recognized by USAID for leading the country in acreage under IR high-yielding rice. The early IR rice was poor quality and the Vietnamese generally refused to consume it, using it for animal feed when they did plant it. We soon found out that the reason for the USAID success in Nhon Trach was that the NLF [VC] had told the peasants to plant the high yielding rice because "our forces need rice." Feeding the insurgents is not COIN.)

In fact, when USAID/Guatemala proposed a project in 1976 modelled on the development aspect of the Vietnam RD Cadre activity, that would have had teams of trained cadre organize Guatemalan villagers to do community development projects, USAID/Washington turned down the proposal with a vengeance. Said one of the LA Bureau honchos, with obvious disdain, at the review meeting at which I was present, "We don't do that sort of thing."

[John T. Fishel]

Mike--

An interesting footnote to your Guatemalan story is that by the 80s the Guatemalan Army had created its Civil Affairs units that organized their Polos de Desarrollo (Development Poles) program - sort of strategic hamlets with a heavy dose of development, PSYOP, and controlled local militia called Patrols/Patrollers. As i recall, the Guatemalans credit the idea to training in Taiwan - they also disparaged US style civic action. Nevertheless, the idea appears to have come indirectly from US and UK sources and looks like a military executed example of much of what AID was responible for in CORDS and what you described as proposed for Guatemala in 76.

BTW, for those who don't know, the Guatemalans won their civil war, because of the things they did right - not because of the brutal things they did wrong.

Cheers

John

[John T. Fishel]

There is an outstanding book, LOW INTENSITY CONFLICT: OLD THREATS IN A NEW WORLD, Edited by Edwing G. Corr and Stephen Sloan, Westview, 1992 - out of print but Amazon can get 8 copies - 7 are under $10, one is $32+. One chapter, by Robert F. Zimmerman, is on Thailand. Zimmerman was AID. He addresses the role of AID in COIN there and concludes that its effect - of the entire effort - was mildly and indirectly positive but hardly decisive. He quotes from the FY 75 "Mission Strategy Memorandum":

"Perhaps the most serious weakness in the U.S. effort stems from the quality of the U.S. advisory input, particularly in the field. The fact is that the skills required to advise Thai on counterinsurgency - including language, area knowledge, and sufficient level in advisory role to gain RTG [Royal Thai Government] confidence - are scarce and it has not been our policy to devlop them or to encourage successful practitioners to stay until the job is done."

In the immortal words of Bob Dylan, "When will they ever learn, oh, when will they ever learn?"

[MountainRunner]

Mike and John,
Great (inside) information.

The Dylan quote reminds me of the Twain (?) quote: the problem with history is that it repeats itself. Or was that Will Rogers?

[MountainRunner]

Thanks to Henrik for sending me the link to State's archives for SE Asia,


A couple of nuggets to share from the Thailand PDF(1.16mb, 393p):

In a letter from our Amb to DASoS regarding support, 10 April 1969:

At the opposite end of the spectrum,
the Thai don’t want our direct military involvement in their insurgency,
although they certainly are counting on our continued contribution
through MAP and AID to the support of their own counter-insurgency.
There is, unfortunately, an ambiguous middle area between an invasion
and the insurgency and I think it is here that our most difficult
policy problems lie.

But better is 22 Jan 70 memo from SecState Rogers to Nixon (p100 of the archive):

That you approve the continuation in FY 1970 of the A.I.D. program
in Thailand, consisting primarily of advisory and financial support
of Thai police and developmental measures to prevent the growth
of Communist insurgency in the North and Northeast, at a total obligational
level of approximately $30 million of grant funds. No PL 480
assistance is proposed.

Our assistance to Thailand plays a three-fold role by: (1) providing
actual resources to help carry out Thailand’s counterinsurgency effort;
(2) promoting greater Thai attention and resource allocation to
counterinsurgency measures and providing us an opportunity to influence
the direction of this Thai effort—the primary aim of our program;
(3) demonstrating continuing high-level interest in Thailand.

This memo is very rich in linking COIN/AID. Have to go offline but suggest checking out the memo for yourself, extracted from the larger PDF and posted here. There may be more in State's archives...

[DraconianObservations]

The FRUS volume covering the period until 1972 shows how US AID did COIN-related stuff that may supplement the earlier posts. Just scroll down, open "Thailand" and search for "AID": http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ho/frus/nixon/xx/

Dracobs