Organization: Vietnam Insight
Editor: Chan Tran
Address: PO Box 7826, San Jose, CA 95150, USA
Phone: (408) 226-2261
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Date:         Thu, 19 Nov 1992 11:06:57 PST
Comments:     <Parser> W: FROM field duplicated. Last occurrence was retained.
From:         Vietnam Insight <vinsight@NETCOM.COM>
Subject:      VI: FULRO in Vietnam

***********
The Defiant Struggle
***********

FULRO in Vietnam
Except from the Far Eastern Economic Review September 10, 1992


When North Vietnamese tanks smashed through the gates of the president
palace in Saigon on 30 April 1975, it marked only the formal imposition
of Hanoi's control over former South Vietnam.  For several years after
the war in the south officially ended, Hanoi's security forces were
still having to contend with armed opposition by various resistance
groups.  The most persistent of these was the Montagnard Fulro guerilla
group.

When the Central Highlands town of Ban Me Thuot fell to the North
Vietnamese army in early 1975, there were rumors that the communist
forces enjoyed Fulro's support.  Those reports were apparently untrue,
though a Montagnard faction was linked to the communist National
Liberation Front and may well have provided some supports.  But Fulro,
which had once fought the Saigon regime for autonomy of the Central
Highlands treated the Hanoi with the same measure of distrust.

Since 1975, Fulro has remained a shadowy group whose existence is
occasionally recalled in travellers' account of ambush or sabotage in
the Central Highlands or cryptic Vietnamese reports about "enemy
activities."

For a number of years after the fall of Saigon, the hill resort of Dalat
and Ban Me Thuot, remained off-limits to foreigners for security
reasons.  After Vietnam's invasion of Cambodia in late 1978, the ousted
Khmer Rouge sought to make common cause with Fulro in their fight
against Vietnamese.

In 1984 Hanoi announced that Fulro has been virtually wiped out, with
358 members killed, 1,734 arrested and 600 weapons seized.  But the
movement clearly was far from finished.  In 1989 Hanoi radio reported
that troops ha been sent to guard the site of a hydroelectric project in
Gialai-Kontum province " against sabotage by elements of Fulro. "

In early 1990, the Vietnamese army newspaper Quan Doi Nhan Dan reported
that between 1985 -90 provincial police mounted 63 raids that killed 102
Fulro members and captured another 167.  In the same period, some 10,000
Fulro collaborators were said to have surrendered to the authorities.

The newspaper also said that in response to these operations, Fulro had
changed its tactics by " splitting into small groups implanted in
villages and hamlets and setting up sanctuaries in the forest."  Fulro
also tried to "control and use local officials and the paper reported
officials of 254 hamlets were found to be cooperating with the
guerillas.

Vietnamese press reports this year suggest the problem is not yet over.
In June, Vietnam's communist party secretary-general Do Muoi visited the
Central Highlands and recalled that the " enemy " had carried out "
sabotage on many occasions."

UNIFIED RESISTANCE EFFORTS

This is not the first time Hanoi is forced to go back on its claim of
eliminating an opposition force.

In 1989 Hanoi announced it had crushed a major resistance force named
the National United Front for the Liberation of Vietnam (NUFRONLIV). In
1992 Hanoi blames NUFRONLIV for its "reactionary" plot to overthrow the
regime.

Despite Hanoi's security effort, the political situation in Vietnam is
far from stable which is reflected in the waves of dissident arrests
and increased public warnings of insurgent activities.

The Central Highlands of Vietnam, regarding as the resistance
stronghold, has been closed off-and-on for tourists. Accounts from the
local people reveal that it is not only the Fulro forces that is active
here. Hanoi knows it but never admits that the popular movement against
its rule can no longer be singled out as ethnically motivated for Hanoi
propaganda purposes, but has united under the common cause for freedom
and this strength is growing with oppression and time.


--
Vietnam Insight (vinsight@netcom.com)
Chan Tran, editor
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