Thursday, May 18, 1972
Soviet Warships Off N. Vietnam
by Fred S. Hoffman
WASHINGTON (AP) --Four Soviet warships have been sighted in the South China Sea, in position to move into waters off Vietnam if ordered to do so.Military sources, reporting this Tuesday, indicated no great concern over the possibility that the Russian Navy might be planning to counter the U.S. mining of North Vietnamese ports.But it was noted that a 6,000-ton Kresta class cruiser and three destroyers had paused southeast of Red China's Hainan Island after steaming from the Sea of Japan.Some sources said the Russians might be trying to exert pressure on the United States in this way.The Soviet flotilla was reported about 200 miles from Da Nang, a major U.S. base in South Vietnam, and some 300 miles from the North Vietnamese coast.It's position is right about where the Russians for some time have maintained a sea anchorage for their Pacific fleet naval units.There were no minesweepers with the Soviet naval force, the sources said. The Russian Navy does have minesweepers with its Pacific fleet.Pentagon officials reported Tuesday that about half the 25 Communist tankers and freighters enroute to North Vietnamese ports when U.S. mines were laid last week have changed course and are heading elsewhere.The remainder of the 25 cargo ships still are spaced out along thousands of miles of sea lanes reaching back to Soviet and East European ports, officials said.None of the ships bound for North Vietnam has approached any closer than a couple of hundred miles from Haiphong, North Vietnam's principal port, according to the latest reports reaching here.Officials said also no incoming vessels have been hailed by U.S. and South Vietnamese "notification" destroyers posted in the Gulf of Tonkin last week to warn merchantmen of the mine fields blocking approaches to seven North Vietnamese ports.Although U.S. patrol aircraft are keeping watch, officials indicated they do not yet know where the dozen or so diverted tankers and freighters are headed now. But there is no sign yet that any are bound for South Chinese ports.Communist diplomats in Europe last week hinted strongly that freighters and tankers bearing food, petroleum products, trucks, weapons and ammunition to support North Vietnamese forces might make end runs around the mine barrier and land their cargoes in two South Chinese ports, Pakhoi and Tamhsien.Such supplies would have to be transshipped via Chinese trains to be carried down into North Vietnam.Defense officials are not able yet to decide why the Russians and other Communist countries have chosen not to challenge the mine barrier.There is some belief that Moscow, whose initial response to the mining was unexpectedly mild, still may be pondering direct action in the future. But Pentagon officials say they do not expect any such test prior to President Nixon's visit to Moscow next week.Meanwhile Pentagon officials report the North Vietnamese have made no effort on their own to sweep the mines.Talking with newsmen before leaving for a NATO meeting in Europe, Secretary of Defense Melvin R. Laird said that the new stepped-up air and sea interdiction effort, code-named Linebacker, is exerting pressure on North Vietnam's supply flow which "will have a long-term influence on the strategy and tactics which can be used" by Hanoi's forces."Soviet Warships Off N. Vietnam", by Fred S. Hoffman, published in the Pacific Stars and Stripes, Thursday, May 18, 1972 and reprinted from European and Pacific Stars and Stripes, a Department of Defense publication copyright, 2002 European and Pacific Stars and Stripes.