Joint patrols with the Royal Thai Army
The 720th MP Battalion's joint patrol with the Royal Thai Army captures a practical side of the Vietnam War: allied troops sharing roads, risks and responsibility. A US military policeman checking a vehicle beside a Thai soldier was doing police work at a checkpoint or along a supply route, while also strengthening communication across separate chains of command. The scene was workaday, but cooperation of this kind helped keep personnel and supplies moving.
Formed in 1966 and deployed to South Vietnam later that decade, the 720th was a United States Army military police battalion serving in southern Vietnam. Its MPs supported American formations, guarded installations and routes, controlled traffic and liaised with local authorities and allied troops. Rather than remain confined to base duty, detachments worked where operations were taking place and where problems involving movement, access or public order required a trained response.
The archival record associated with the battalion includes an image of two military policemen at the American Embassy in Saigon taking a reflective pause after the Tet Offensive of early 1968. The embassy scene is not a portrait of a joint patrol, yet it matters. It records the strain carried back from contact with violence and the human presence behind military photographs. It also links battalion service to a defining crisis in the capital.
In Australia, Vietnam memories are often carried by family albums, Anzac Day ceremonies and institutions such as the Australian War Memorial in Canberra. The 720th was not an Australian unit, and Thailand's connection to Australia also has a specific basis: both belonged to the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization, while Australia maintained a small defence liaison and training presence in South Vietnam. The memorial project is independent and carries no official endorsement from the American military.
A shared security mission
Military police battalions combined policing duties with a readiness to support combat operations. Within the 720th, individual companies, platoons and detachments could be attached to larger formations or placed under operational control while the battalion retained administrative and technical supervision. On a joint patrol, an American MP might therefore serve alongside Royal Thai Army soldiers without either force surrendering its own command structure.
Photograph captions use joint patrol broadly. It can describe soldiers from both armies travelling or operating together, sharing a checkpoint or covering the same route; it need not imply a permanent combined unit. This distinction matters when reading captions. The image documents cooperation at a particular place and time, but it does not by itself reveal patrol strength, orders, duration or the exact attachment that produced it.
The geography made cooperation practical. In South Vietnam, roads, bridges, river crossings and market towns were strategic links between bases and provincial centres. Royal Thai Army formations brought familiarity with the routes, communities and conditions of the provinces where they served. US MPs contributed vehicle discipline, communications procedures and a policing chain able to act across several allied formations. Local Vietnamese officials and residents remained essential to understanding movement through the countryside.
What the patrols protected
Road security was an immediate task. Patrols looked for obstructions, checked bridges and junctions, reported damaged sections and helped control traffic around bases, airfields and convoy routes. Mixed patrols made it harder for an opposing force to identify a single national pattern. They could also move between tasks without requiring a fresh briefing, although language and command differences still had to be managed.
People and information required equal attention. MPs might screen vehicles and personnel, escort detainees, process people captured as enemy fighters and support the movement of civilians under military control. Royal Thai Army units normally pursued their own security missions and territorial responsibilities, so the joint value lay in shared observation, faster reporting and a unified presence rather than in pretending that every role was identical.
Local liaison was the part of the work least visible in a patrol photograph. Village leaders, district officers and Vietnamese security personnel knew who was moving through an area and why. MPs gathered information, investigated incidents and passed useful judgments to the appropriate unit. A quiet road check could therefore be both a security operation and a form of civil administration, with consequences for ordinary residents far from the front line.
The daily rhythm of field policing
Field routines were adapted to the mission rather than fixed by ceremony. Some patrols began before first light, while others moved in daylight to investigate a reported incident or accompany a convoy. MPs carried maps, radios, standard weapons and individual equipment. Vehicles, armoured support and medical evacuation were arranged according to the expected threat, the number of people involved and whether the patrol would remain in one area or make a long circuit.
Radio discipline linked the patrol to its headquarters and supported forces in the area. American units had established channels and reporting formats, while Thai formations maintained their own procedures. Interpreters, liaison officers, marked vehicles and agreed times helped bridge differences. Written and visual signals mattered when distance or interference reduced the clarity of voice communication. Questions about authority, information and the handling of detainees were settled before serious operations.
Weather shaped the day as much as the enemy. Heat, monsoon rain and flooded ground slowed vehicles, damaged roads and altered the routes a patrol could cover. Equipment had to be kept serviceable in dust or mud, and maps became less reliable when tracks disappeared. Such constraints explain why a mission that appears brief in a caption could occupy much of a day and why cooperation with a force familiar with local conditions was valuable.
Patrols also faced ambush, sniper fire, mines and booby traps, although periods of routine work were often more common than continuous fighting. The medical response was correspondingly mixed: first aid in the field, a radio call for evacuation and preparation to receive casualties at a secure point. MPs had to protect the response as well as the people in it, because a road used to carry help could also become a place of danger.
Service in a wider war
The February 1968 Tet Offensive tested security arrangements across Saigon and other major centres. American MPs were involved in access control, perimeter work, evacuation and the protection of people and installations as fighting disrupted normal life. The embassy photograph shows the quieter aftermath: two servicemen apparently taking stock after the crisis. Their reflective posture carries more force because the building behind them had become a scene of combat and confusion.
The 720th's wider service continued through the changing campaigns of 1968 and 1969. Its MPs worked with formations including the 1st Infantry Division and supported operations across the southern theatre, while allied patrols such as the one with the Royal Thai Army extended practical cooperation beyond American units. These assignments show how military police functioned within combined operations: specialists preserved order and access while line formations retained responsibility for the main battle.
The Thai contribution deserves its own place in the history. Royal Thai Army personnel deployed under the national command of their own government, and their service carried the political meaning of another nation supporting South Vietnam. For Australian readers, the scene is also a reminder that the war was experienced through several allied perspectives. A small Australian defence presence in Saigon operated within that larger network rather than beside an entirely American or Thai system.
Reading the record from Australia
Canberra's Australian War Memorial and the catalogues of state libraries are natural starting points for families tracing Vietnam service. Search records under 720th MP Battalion, 720th Military Police Battalion and the name of a service member. Australian collections may describe Saigon under the name used at the time; today it is Ho Chi Minh City, and older captions can therefore look inconsistent with modern maps. Recording both names prevents needless confusion.
Commemorative language also varies. Australian family histories often place individual stories within the broader story of Anzac and the Vietnam generation, sometimes under the familiar phrase “Our Vietnam”. Australian English usage often refers collectively to “the military police”, while unit captions use “military policemen” for individual soldiers and identify a patrol through its battalion, platoon or detachment. Royal Thai Army is an army designation and should not be confused with the Royal Thai Police, a separate organisation.
Good archival reading keeps the known, the inferred and the unknown apart. The embassy caption can support an association with the 720th and the aftermath of Tet, but it cannot supply a patrol date or prove that every pictured scene occurred on the same day. Captions should be checked against unit logs, signal messages, after-action reports and photographs. Thai records may preserve a different perspective on a joint operation, making cross-checking more important, not less.
| Aspect | 720th MP Battalion | Royal Thai Army patrol partner |
|---|---|---|
| National formation | US Army military police battalion within the American corps structure | Royal Thai Army formation under Thai command |
| Typical duties | Policing, traffic control, route security, installation access and liaison | Combat and territorial security, local patrols, liaison and protection of communities |
| Joint patrol contribution | Vehicle checks, route clearance, convoy support, escorts and incident reporting | Local knowledge, patrol presence, access control and contact with local authorities |
| Coordination | US radio procedures, reporting channels and military police specialists | RTA command arrangements, communications and knowledge of the assigned area |
| Shared outcome | Safer routes, controlled movement and faster communication between allied units | |
| Archive trail | US logs, photographs, maps and after-action reports | Thai unit records, maps and local accounts with varying public availability |
Taken together, these details turn a joint-patrol image into a record of cooperation rather than a simple scene of soldiers standing beside vehicles. The Americans supplied military police structure; the Thai soldiers sustained allied presence and local understanding; and both worked to keep movement possible through an unstable country. For Australian historians, preserving that combined story honours a wider form of service—one that sat within, but was not identical to, Australia's own Vietnam history.
