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Republic of Vietnam National Police

South Vietnamese police (1955–1975) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Republic of Vietnam National Police
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This article is about the South Vietnamese police. For the current police of Vietnam, see Vietnam People's Public Security.

The Republic of Vietnam National Police – RVNP (Vietnamese: Cảnh sát Quốc gia Việt Nam Cộng hòa), Police Nationale de la République du Vietnam or Police Nationale for short (Vietnamese: Cảnh sát Quốc gia – CSQG) in French,[1] was the official South Vietnamese national police force from 1962 to 1975, operating closely with the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) during the Vietnam War.

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History

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The Republic of Vietnam National Police was officially created by President Ngô Đình Diệm's national decree in June 1962, integrating all the existing internal security and paramilitary agencies raised by the French Union authorities during the First Indochina War between 1946 and 1954, into a single National Police Force who answered to the Directorate General of National Police (Vietnamese: Tổng cục cảnh sát quốc gia – TCCSQG). These included the Vietnamese section of the indochinese Sûreté Générale secret police, the Saigon Municipal Police, elements of the colonial National Guard of South Vietnam (French: Garde Nationale du Viet Nam Sud – GNVS, or Vệ binh quốc gia Nam Việt Nam – VBNV in Vietnamese), a rural Gendarmerie force or 'Civil Guard' (French: Garde Civile), the combat police (French: Police de Combat) and various provincial militia forces made of irregular auxiliaries (French: Supplétifs).

Transferred to South Vietnamese control in 1955, all the aforementioned security units were integrated in the early 1960s into a new national police force with the exception of the Civil Guard, which was placed under the authority of the Ministry of Defence. The CSQG had an initial strength of only 16,000 uniformed and plainclothes agents, being essentially an urban constabulary with no rural Gendarmerie component to counter the threat posed by the increasing Viet Cong (VC) insurgency in the countryside.[2]

The National Police under Diệm 1955–1963

Main article: Battle of Saigon (1955)

Even before the official creation of the National Police, President Diệm was quick to employ the security forces inherited from the French in repressing both internal political dissent and organized crime. Throughout the late 1950s and into 1960, they helped the Vietnamese National Army (VNA) in suppressing the Hòa Hảo and Cao Đài militant religious and political sects, with approximately 25,000 armed militiamen, and the smaller but better organized Bình Xuyên Saigon-based gangster group.[3]

The final years 1971–75

The CSQG strength peaked in February 1971 at 103,859 personnel – including 3,144 female agents, mostly engaged in clerical work[4] –, 4,450 vehicles and some 830 motorcycles of various types. However, out of this total only 27,565 officers and enlisted men were of career status, the remainder being on contract, daily paid or floating assimilated.[5] Plans were drawn late that year to further expand the Police to 124,050 and later to 160,000, though the actual authorized strength in 1973 stood at about 130,000 men and women.

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Structure

The CSQG was organized at national level with logistical and administrative support from Saigon, but individual police departments were under the operational control of the provincial police chiefs. All components of the Police system were administered directly by the Directorate General of National Police (TCCSQG) at the National Police Headquarters in Saigon, which also provided technical or combat support for law-enforcement and other internal security duties throughout the Country. The Directorate General was headed by Sub-Brigadier general Nguyễn Ngọc Loan, who led a staff comprising a deputy director and six assistant directors for administration, personnel and training, intelligence, operations, Field Forces and scientific police. By the late 1960s, the Vietnamese National Police was organized into nine major specialized departments or 'branches', which were:

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Training facilities

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All instruction and management of training facilities fell upon the Personnel and Training Directorate (Vietnamese: Ban nhân sự và đào tạo) at National Police headquarters in Saigon. Recruits first underwent the basic 12-week course, which consisted primarily of weapons handling, tactics, Taekwondo and drill, ministered at the main CSQG Training Centre (Vietnamese: Trung tâm đào tạo CSQG) located at Rach Dua, near Vũng Tàu. After finishing the course, the best-qualified students were selected to be sent for officer training to the National Police Academy (Vietnamese: Học viện cảnh sát quốc gia) at Saigon, where they attended advanced instruction programs at all levels, which comprised:

  • Officer promotion courses up to and including the rank of Lieutenant colonel;
  • Administrative and staff training;
  • Senior officer seminars;
  • Judicial Police training for officers and NCOs;
  • Instructors' courses at both officer and lower rank levels.

Those recruits with lower qualifications went instead to the Non-commissioned Officer (NCO) School run by the ARVN at its Combat Training Centre (Vietnamese: Trung tâm huấn luyện chiến đấu) in Da Lat, co-located to the namesake South Vietnamese Armed Forces Military Academy, where they received special training that would enable them to graduate as Police NCOs.

Specialists such as field policemen, patrol boat crewmen, vehicle drivers (this category included squad car, armoured car and Jeep drivers, and motorcyclists), radio operators, medics, mechanics, and clerks were trained in various other National Police and Armed Forces' schools. More specialized training was also provided to selected male and female personnel assigned to the other CSQG branches. River and Coastal Police boat crews were trained at the Marine Police Training Centre (Vietnamese: Trung tâm huấn luyện cảnh sát biển) co-located at their Phú Xuân HQ, near Huế.[6] Field Police personnel – including officers and NCOs – underwent eight weeks' of training in paramilitary skills at the police training Centres of Malaysia and the Philippines. Instruction covered subjects such as jungle warfare, intelligence-gathering operations, law-enforcement and riot control techniques. To upgrade their capabilities, squads and platoons were returned periodically to these training centers for six weeks of unit refresher training, but for most CSDC companies and battalions posted in the provinces their refresher course actually took place in-country at the regional training centers.

Foreign assistance

Additional military "on the job" training was provided to Field Police units in the field by U.S. Mobile Training Teams[7] or by Australian advisors from the Australian Army Training Team Vietnam (AATTV).[8] Selected officer students attended specialized courses at the International Police Academy in Washington, D.C. while other students were sent to the Royal Malaysian Police Field Force Special Training Centre (Malay: Sekolah Latihan Pasukan Polis Hutan; SLPPH) at Kentonmen, Ulu Kinta, Perak in Malaysia to attend advanced specialized police and instructor's courses. After graduation, some of these new National Police officers upon returning to South Vietnam would them be posted as Field Police instructors at the Police training centres to pass on their skills to CSDC recruits.[9]

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List of National Police Directors-General

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Nguyễn Văn Lễ, 1968.

List of National Police Commanders

Weapons and equipment

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The CSQG was lightly armed by military standards, but heavily armed by conventional police standards. Initially, most of its weaponry was surplus French and U.S. World War II/Korean War-vintage. From 1969, rifles, carbines and submachine guns began to be replaced by assault rifles and although the latter became the CSQG's primary weapon, it never displaced entirely the earlier weaponry.[10] Police units had no crew-served weapon systems such as mortars or any other indirect fire weapons.

Vehicles

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Australian MP and South Vietnamese motorbike policeman in Saigon, 1967.
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Uniforms and insignia

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The Traffic Control Police agents were given an all-white cotton service uniform consisting of a long-sleeved shirt and trousers, worn with a matching white peaked cap; the shirt had dark blue removable shoulder boards and badges and other insignia were in silvered metal.[26]

Headgear

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Cap badge of the National Police of the Republic of Vietnam, 1960–1975.

Field Police troopers were given a black beret, worn French-style pulled to the left with the National Police cap badge placed above the right eye.[27]

A US M-1 Helmet liner painted in shiny black, marked with white-and-red stripes at the sides and the initials "TC" (Vietnamese: Tuần Cảnh – patrol) was worn by National Police constables assigned patrol duties or riot control in urban areas.[28]

Footwear

Black leather low laced shoes were perscribed to wear by uniformed Police agents assigned patrol duties on urban areas. Black leather combat boots were provided by the Americans who issued both the early U.S. Army M-1962 'McNamara' model and the M-1967 model with 'ripple' pattern rubber sole, standard issue in the ARVN. Field policemen generally wore the highly prized U.S. Army Jungle boot and black canvas-and-rubber Japanese-produced Indigenous Combat Boots or green canvas-and-rubber Vietnamese-produced "Goalong" tropical boots, replaced by commercial plastic and rubber flip-flops and leather peasant sandals while in garrison. Some individuals had zippers put into the insides of their Jungle boots so that they could be laced permanently in a fancy 'airborne' pattern, while the wearer could get into and out of his boots quickly and easily by using the zipper.[29][30]

Rank insignia

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Captain Nguyen Van Diep

1955–1962 ranks

  • Tổng kiểm tra – Controller General
  • Kiểm tra – Controller
  • Quận trưởng – Commissioner
  • Biên tập viên – Redactor
  • Thẩm sát viên – Inspector
  • Cảnh sát viên – Patrolman/Patrolwoman

1962–1971 ranks

1971–1975 ranks

Insignia

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Shoulder patch of the National Police of the Republic of Vietnam, 1960–1975.

Regarding the placement of insignia, the Field Police (CSDC) had a system of its own, originally adapted from their dress uniform. Most CSDC troopers wore no insignia on their field camouflage uniforms while on operations, or sometimes just their Company patch in either cloth or metal versions in a pocket hanger following the French model suspended from the right shirt pocket.[31]

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See also

Endnotes

References

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External links

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