A key factor in the Route 4 operation was the support from American helicopters flying out of a fixed land base off Cambodia and from two United States Navy helicopter carriers in the Gulf of Siam. After publication of eyewitness reports of United States helicopters firing to support allied troops fighting the enemy, the United States command acknowledged it was providing more than just the interdiction of enemy lines that was being announced.

It was subsequently announced in Washington that the United States was prepared to provide all support short of ground combat troops and advisers to the South Vietnamese operating in Cambodia.

Questioned further about American support, a command spokesman said today that the United States began flying logistical missions in support of South Vietnamese in Cambodia last November. He said that only 14 such supply missions had been flown to date.

In response to a question about American training of Cambodians, the spokesman said that the United States had already spent $80,000 to train helicopter pilots and navy technicians and that $1.5-million has been allocated by Washington.

In the war in South Vietnam, the command reported eight Americans killed in the shooting down of two Army helicopters in Bienhoa Province outside Saigon. Elsewhere, war action was reported light.

## Cambodian Planes Aloft

PNOMPENH, Cambodia, Jan. 23 (Reuters)—Two Cambodian propeller-driven T-28 fighter-bombers circled over Pnompenh today in an apparent effort to reassure residents that the Government still had some air power.

The planes, believed to have come from Battambang, the country's second city in western Cambodia, were about all that remained of the Cambodian Air Force.

A virtual dusk-to-dawn curfew has been imposed on the capital.

## U.S. Copter Downed

SAIGON, Sunday, Jan. 24 (Reuters)—Vietcong gunners shot down a United States OH-6 spotter helicopter in South Vietnam's northern mountains yesterday, the United States command said today.

Two Americans were wounded in the crash after the small aircraft was hit over Quangtin Province, about 65 miles south of Danang, a spokesman said.