integration of indigenous Guinean Africans into the Portuguese military forces which fought PAIGC. Until the 1950s, the Portuguese military forces permanently stationed in Guinea included a small force of locally recruited African colonial soldiers (caçadores indigenas), commanded by white officers; non-commissioned officers were a mixture of whites, overseas soldiers (African assimilados), and native or indigenous Africans (indigenato). Spínola planned – and fought with Lisbon – to abolish the distinction between and discrimination among metropolitan soldiers and local recruits, undertaking instead to create a regular and coherent African army whose structure mirrored that of the metropolitan army. Africanization fostered a large increase in indigenous recruitment into the armed forces. By the early 1970s, an increasing percentage of Guineans were serving as non-commissioned or commissioned officers in Portuguese military forces in Africa. Elite local troops were trained at Portuguese Centres for Commando Instruction, including inside Guinea, where the first such centre was established in 1964, but in many cases in Angola. The Portuguese forces recruited Africans mainly from among the populations of the territories they controlled. In particular, members of the Fulbe ethnic group were over-represented in the Portuguese army, partly because many Fulbe lived in eastern regions which were controlled by Portugal until late in the war and where local chiefs had "generally amicable" relationships with the Portuguese. Portuguese recruitment was also assisted by colonial propaganda, coercion, and the offer of salaries to conscripts. Under Spínola, the Portuguese also created two elite special forces contingents composed of African combatants and engaged in counterinsurgency. The Special Marines (Fuzileiros Especiais Africanos) were created in 1970 and by 1974 numbered 160 men in two detachments; they supplemented other Portuguese elite units conducting amphibious operations in the riverine areas of Guinea which attempted to interdict and destroy guerrilla forces and supplies. The more prominent African Commandos (Comandos Africanos) began operating in 1972 and comprised 700 men in three battalions by 1974. The African Commandos were manned entirely by Africans and carried out special combat operations in neighbouring Senegal and Guinea-Conakry as well as inside Portuguese Guinea. The Commandos were especially well known for carrying out helicoptered commando raids on so-called liberated villages under PAIGC control – Spínola's "version of the US Army's 'search and destroy' operations in Vietnam" – and in liberated areas they were "widely hated for their brutality and ruthlessness". In addition, at the outset of the war, Portugal recruited local militias –