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"Operation Velvet Hammer" was scratched before the buccaneers ever left training camp, but not before Gritz had squandered $40,000 raised from N.L.F. members. A subsequent "Operation Grand Eagle" also fizzled out prematurely. Says Tom Smith, one of Gritz's many disaffected recruits: "I wouldn't cross the street with this guy. He's suffering from the early stages of 'burning a bush' complex." Yet when Gritz rented a $1,000-a-month base in the remote northeastern Thailand town of Nakhon Phanom last fall, he was able to attract more than a dozen operatives, some desperate to recover the danger and exhilaration they knew in Viet Nam. Their impossibly romantic venture also seduced some improbable sponsors. Taken with Gritz's dashing charisma, William Shatner paid almost $15,000 for Gritz's life story; Litton Industries, Inc., provided $800,000 worth of radio equipment, which Gritz later tried to sell back to them for $31,000; Clint Eastwood reportedly contributed $50,000.
Gritz contends that his escapades have been conducted with Pentagon data and CIA support. But while the U.S. embassy in Bangkok is often willing to trade information with freelancing irregulars, the Government in Washington insists that it scrupulously dissociates itself from such adventurism. Small wonder. "At one point last year," complains a U.S. diplomat, "we had over 30 Viet Nam veterans preparing trips to Laos."
Though President Reagan personally addressed the N.L.F. at a special conference in January to demonstrate his sympathy, the Administration's stated policy is to seek the return of any missing U.S. servicemen through diplomatic pressure. Concludes Daniel O'Donohue, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs: "When private Americans try to force their own solutions, our government-to-government efforts are jeopardized." — By Pico Iyer. Reported by Victoria Butler/Bangkok and Ross H. Munro/Washington