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he did not go into detail. For the last few months the Khmer Rouge had been less active militarily. Instead they had been caching arms and undertaking political campaigning. If the Chinese and the Thais were to withdraw their support it was possible that the Khmer Rouge could be reduced to a small guerilla force which would pose no serious threat to a demo- cratic government in Cambodia. He did not think, in answer to our question, that it would be sufficient to remove the top leadership. While many of the Khmer Rouge soldiers would return to their village life, there remained a large number of trained cadres. He thought that at the end of the day Hun Seng and Sihanouk would have to "defeat the Khmer Rouge".
4.
From the US point of view it was clear that as movement towards Vietnamese withdrawal from Cambodia increased, the Americans would have to get more active diplomatically but the Administration were absolutely opposed to opening an interests section. Childress was dismissive of the growing pressure from the Hill (particularly in the Senate) on this issue. The Administration were more favourably inclined to setting up a technical office which would concentrate on issues such as POW/ MIA, resettlement of re-education camp detainees, etc, but if the US were to open an interests section it would open the flood- gates (for eg Japanese businessmen) to go into Vietnam. An interests section implied a commitment to move towards establish- ment of diplomatic relations. The US were not ready for this. He added that in any case the Vietnamese recognised that if an interests section existed in Hanoi then they would have far fewer high level contacts with the US (such as the one with General Vessey in New York) than they have become accustomed to.
5. On a personal note, Childress clearly enjoys the company of Thach. He has known him for 8 years and they get on well together. After one of their recent meetings he said that General Vessey had sent Thach (at his request) a collection of books on economics including one on Friedman's theories. When he had dined with him in New York yesterday, Thach had announced to Childress that he had read the books with interest and had concluded that he was a monetarist!
6.
Discussion of the Philippines is recorded separately.
Sally O'Brien
Sally O'Brien
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