CBS Finds GI's In Cambodia

CBS News charged yesterday that it had seen American ground troops, with Army rifles and U.S. combat boots but otherwise wearing civilian clothing, standing on the ground at Phnom Penh airport in Cambodia on Tuesday.

A spokesman for the U.S. command in South Vietnam admitted that "15 to 20 U.S. personnel in civilian clothes were on the ground about an hour while the damaged helicopters were rigged to the CH47s." He neglected to give any reason for the civilian appearance of the troops.

CBS said that the group of American personnel "carrying combat boots, but otherwise dressed in civilian clothes" had been brought to Phnom Penh in the giant CH47s which were airlifting two small UH1 Huey helicopters which had been damaged in fighting in Cambodia.

The spokesman from the U.S. command said that the helicopters which had been damaged had been given to Cambodia under the U.S. military aid program and would have to be repaired in South Vietnam.