68 Tet Offensive

[klikster]

Thanks for the posts Klikster. Yes, you got the Early Bird Special coming over in 64-65. Hehehe. Your comments about your brother cracked me up. Yes, I can just see what would have happened if someone had come up to him in a bar and said "That was a real butt kicking you had at Khe Sanh." One of the fastest ways for the old 1st Cav guys to get into a fight with a Marine was to remind him that it took the 1st Cav to lift the seige at Khe Sanh. We would be quickly reminded that our help was not needed.

I got really lucky. After we rotated out, our camp was hit really hard as the prelude to the big battle with the 1st Cav in the Iadrang Valley. Our weapons Sgt and I had been on patrol and found a 7 ton cache of rice just out of mortar range of our camp. We destroyed the cache, whichour intell Sgt figured would delay an attack he figured was coming.

The attack that we missed was 2000+ Charlie .. and I would have been on the machine gun at the front gate .. which bore the brunt of the assault.

Sometimes .. we get lucky!

[Bossbrick]

1st Support Command, Da Nang, RVN

[adjan jb]

The Ominous Lesson Of Tet

The Vietnamese death toll after America's defeat 40 years ago is a terrifying pointer for the Iraq retreat

By Mike Marqusee

26/01/08 "The Guardian" - -- - Next week marks the 40th anniversary of an event that seemed to turn the world upside down. In the early hours of January 31 1968, soldiers of the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam and the army of North Vietnam launched what came to be known as the Tet offensive (it coincided with Tet Nguyen Dan, the lunar new year) against the US military and its local allies.

The insurgents struck simultaneously across the country, targeting more than 100 cities and towns in what the historian Stanley Karnow describes as an offensive "of extraordinary intensity and astonishing scope ... audaciously shifting the war for the first time from its rural setting to a new arena - South Vietnam's supposedly impregnable urban areas". Military installations, police stations, prisons, government offices and radio stations came under attack. Most spectacularly, a group of 19 commandos fought their way into the US embassy compound in Saigon, where they held out for six-and-a-half hours - long enough for the images of defiance to be broadcast around the world.

Hue, the ancient capital and the south's third-largest city, was only recaptured by the US after 25 days of house-to-house fighting. Atrocities against the civilian population were committed by both sides, and by the battle's end 116,000 of the city's population of 140,000 were homeless.

NLF and North Vietnamese casualties reached terrifying proportions. Perhaps a half - 45,000 - of the soldiers engaged in the initial offensive were killed. What is more, they were unable to hold any of the ground they had seized. The aim had been to spark a popular uprising in the South. When that did not materialise, partly because the communist party was weak among urban workers, the US's superior armaments prevailed.

The US counter-offensive was ferocious and indiscriminate. Urban areas held by the NLF were pulverised. Within two weeks, 630,000 civilians had been made refugees. On February 7, when the US recaptured the charred wasteland of what had been the town of Ben Tre, a US major told the press: "It became necessary to destroy the town in order to save it." Soon after, in the course of flushing out alleged collaborators in Saigon, the chief of South Vietnam's national police was filmed calmly shooting a bound prisoner in the head. This image also went round the world, further eroding US claims to moral purpose.

Years later, General Tran Do, one of the architects of the offensive, commented: "In all honesty, we didn't achieve our main objective, which was to spur uprisings throughout the South. Still, we inflicted heavy casualties on the Americans and their puppets, and this was a big gain for us. As for making an impact in the United States, it had not been our intention - but it turned out to be a fortunate result."

For an American public reared on a belief in US supremacy, Tet was a shock. For three years they had been assured that the war in Vietnam was being won. Now the disparity between US government claims and the reality on the ground became untenable. The antiwar movement was vindicated. In the New Hampshire primary, held on March 12, President Lyndon Johnson was embarrassed by the strong showing of antiwar candidate Eugene "Gene" McCarthy. On March 31, two months after Tet, he announced that he would not seek re-election and offered to open negotiations with the North Vietnamese, who accepted on April 3.

Tet caused fear and trembling in the corridors of power, but in the wider world the spectacle of the greatest power on earth defeated by an army of poor people inspired millions. The student revolts for which 1968 is famous took off in the wake of Tet, first in Germany and Italy, spreading subsequently to the US, France, Mexico and Pakistan.

However, the US war in Vietnam was to continue in its destructive fury for another four years. US policy did change after Tet - towards "Vietnamisation", in which reliance on air power increased. US casualties fell, from 16,000 killed in 1968 to 600 in 1972. On the other side the toll rose. Perhaps half the 5 million killed in the war, according to Vietnam government figures, perished during these post-Tet years.

Here is the ominous lesson for Iraq. There are few things as dangerous as an imperial power in retreat. Yes, the war is discredited and the major presidential candidates promise to reduce US troop numbers. None, however, seems prepared to abandon the mission in Iraq, which is also propped up by an array of corporate interests. As Vietnam showed, the alternative to a prompt and complete withdrawal is not a happy compromise, but prolonged devastation.

· Mike Marqusee is the author of Redemption Song: Muhammad Ali and the Spirit of the Sixties - mikemarqusee.com

[adjan jb]

Two Men, Two Legs, and Too Much Suffering: America's Forgotten Vietnamese Victims

By Nick Turse

TomDispatch.com

Thursday 24 January 2008

Nguyen Van Tu asks if I'm serious. Am I really willing to tell his story - to tell the story of the Vietnamese who live in this rural corner of the Mekong Delta? Almost 40 years after guerrilla fighters in his country threw the limits of U.S. military power into stark relief - during the 1968 Tet Offensive - we sit in his rustic home, built of wood and thatch with an earthen floor, and speak of two hallmarks of that power: ignorance and lack of accountability. As awkward chicks scurry past my feet, I have the sickening feeling that, in decades to come, far too many Iraqis and Afghans will have similar stories to tell. Similar memories of American troops. Similar accounts of air strikes and artillery bombardments. Nightmare knowledge of what "America" means to far too many outside the United States.

"Do you really want to publicize this thing," Nguyen asks. "Do you really dare tell everyone about all the losses and sufferings of the Vietnamese people here?" I assure this well-weathered 60-year old grandfather that that's just why I've come to Vietnam for the third time in three years. I tell him I have every intention of reporting what he's told me - decades-old memories of daily artillery shelling, of near constant air attacks, of farming families forced to live in their fields because of the constant bombardment of their homes, of women and children killed by bombs, of going hungry because U.S. troops and allied South Vietnamese forces confiscated their rice, lest it be used to feed guerrillas.

After hearing of the many horrors he endured, I hesitantly ask him about the greatest hardship he lived through during what's appropriately known here as the American War. I expect him to mention his brother, a simple farmer shot dead by America's South Vietnamese allies in the early years of the war, when the United States was engaged primarily in an "advisory" role. Or his father who was killed just after the war, while tending his garden, when an M-79 round - a 40 mm shell fired from a single-shot grenade launcher - buried in the soil, exploded. Or that afternoon in 1971 when he heard outgoing artillery being fired and warned his family to scramble for their bunker by shouting, "Shelling, shelling!" They made it to safety. He didn't. The 105 mm artillery shell that landed near him ripped off most of his right leg.

But he didn't name any of these tragedies.

"During the war, the greatest difficulty was a lack of freedom," he tells me. "We had no freedom."

A Simple Request

Elsewhere in the Mekong Delta, Pham Van Chap, a solidly-built 52 year-old with jet black hair tells a similar story. His was a farming family, but the lands they worked and lived on were regularly blasted by U.S. ordnance. "During the ten years of the war, there was serious bombing and shelling in this region - two to three times a day," he recalls while sitting in front of his home, a one-story house surrounded by animal pens in a bucolic setting deep in the Delta countryside. "So many houses and trees were destroyed. There were so many bomb craters around here."

In January 1973, the first month of the last year U.S. troops fought in Vietnam, Pham heard the ubiquitous sound of artillery and started to run to safety. It was too late. A 105 mm shell slammed into the earth four meters in front of him, propelling razor-sharp shrapnel into both legs. When he awoke in the hospital, one leg was gone from the thigh down. After 40 days in the hospital, he was sent home, but he didn't get his first prosthetic leg until the 1990s. His new replacement is now eight years old and a far cry from the advanced, computerized prosthetics and carbon fiber and titanium artificial legs that wounded U.S. veterans of America's latest wars get. His wooden prosthetic instead resembles a table leg with a hoof at the bottom. "It has not been easy for me without my leg," he confides.

When I ask if there are any questions he'd like to ask me or anything he'd like to say to Americans, he has a quick response. He doesn't ask for money for his pain and suffering. Nor for compensation for living his adult life without a leg. Nor vengeance, that all-American urge, in the words of George W. Bush to "kick some ass." Not even an apology. His request is entirely too reasonable. He simply asks for a new leg. Nothing more.

Ignorance Means Never Having to Say You're Sorry

I ask Nguyen Van Tu the same thing. And it turns out he has a question of his own: "Americans caused many losses and much suffering for the Vietnamese during the war, do Americans now feel remorse?" I wish I could answer "yes." Instead, I tell him that most Americans are totally ignorant of the pain of the Vietnamese people, and then I think to myself, as I glance at the ample pile of tiny, local potatoes on his floor, about widespread American indifference to civilians killed, maimed, or suffering in other ways in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Even those Vietnamese who didn't lose a limb - or a loved one - carry memories of years of anguish, grief, and terror from the American War. The fall-out here is still palpable. The elderly woman who tells me how her home was destroyed by an incendiary bomb. The people who speak of utter devastation - of villages laid waste by shelling and bombing, of gardens and orchards decimated by chemical defoliants. The older woman who, with trepidation, peeks into a home where I'm interviewing - she hasn't seen a Caucasian since the war - and is visibly unnerved by the memories I conjure up. Another begins trembling upon hearing that the Americans have arrived again, fearing she might be taken away, as her son was almost 40 years earlier. The people with memories of heavily armed American patrols disrupting their lives, searching their homes, killing their livestock. The people for whom English was only one phrase, the one they all seem to remember: "VC, VC" - slang for the pejorative term "Viet Cong"; and those who recall model names and official designations of U.S. weaponry of the era - from bombs to rifles - as intimately as Americans today know their sports and celebrities.

I wish I could tell Nguyen Van Tu that most Americans know something of his country's torture and torment during the war. I wish I could tell him that most Americans care. I wish I could tell him that Americans feel true remorse for the terror visited upon the Vietnamese in their name, or that an apology is forthcoming and reparations on their way. But then I'd be lying. Mercifully, he doesn't quiz me as I've quizzed him for the better part of an hour. He doesn't ask how Americans can be so ignorant or hard-hearted, how they could allow their country to repeatedly invade other nations and leave them littered with corpses and filled with shattered families, lives, and dreams. Instead he answers calmly and methodically:

"I have two things to say. First, there have been many consequences due to the war and even now the Vietnamese people suffer greatly because of it, so I think that the American government must do something in response - they caused all of these losses here in Vietnam, so they must take responsibility for that. Secondly, this interview should be an article in the press."

I sit there knowing that the chances of the former are nil. The U.S. government won't do it and the American people don't know, let alone care, enough to make it happen. But for the latter, I tell him I share his sentiments and I'll do my best.

Nguyen Van Tu grasps my hands in thanks as we end the interview. His story is part of a hidden, if not forbidden, history that few in the U.S. know. It's a story that was written in blood in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos during the 1960s and 1970s and now is being rewritten in Afghanistan and Iraq. It's a story to which new episodes are added each day that U.S. forces roll armored vehicles down other people's streets, kick down other people's doors, carry out attacks in other people's neighborhoods and occupy other people's countries.

It took nearly 40 years for word of Nguyen Van Tu's hardships at the hands of the United States to filter back to America. Perhaps a few more Americans will feel remorse as a result. But who will come forward to take responsibility for all this suffering? And who will give Pham Van Chap a new leg?

----------

[farang prince]

Thank you for your two newspaper articles Adjan JB. I have read hundreds of similar stories from many wars, going back to the Civil War. They are heart-wrenching. I assume you have never had to fight in a war. You are lucky. Virtually every soldier that I have talked to...going back to my Granddad for fought in WWI and my father who fought in WWII and my friends who were with me in Vietnam and vets that have come home for Iraq and Afghanistan all hope and pray that they have fought in the LAST war that will be fought. Unfortunately, mankind hasn't learned their lessons from the past.

Edited January 28, 2008 by farang prince

[adjan jb]

"... I began growing nostalgic for the war"

"I could protest as loudly as the most convinced activist, but I could not deny the grip the war had one me, nor the fact that it had been an experience as fasciniting as it was repulsive"

"In spite of everything, we felt a strange attachment to Vietnam and, even stranger, a longing to return"

"Anyone who fought in Vietnam, if he is honest about himself, will have to admit he enjoyed the compelling attractiveness of combat"

These are excerpts from A Rumor of War by Philip Caputo (which I'm currently reading)

Did any of you have similar emotions ? If yes, could you elaborate ?

Edited January 29, 2008 by adjan jb

[farang prince]

"... I began growing nostalgic for the war"

"I could protest as loudly as the most convinced activist, but I could not deny the grip the war had one me, nor the fact that it had been an experience as fasciniting as it was repulsive"

"In spite of everything, we felt a strange attachment to Vietnam and, even stranger, a longing to return"

"Anyone who fought in Vietnam, if he is honest about himself, will have to admit he enjoyed the compelling attractiveness of combat"

These are excerpts from A Rumor of War by Philip Caputo (which I'm currently reading)

Did any of you have similar emotions ? If yes, could you elaborate ?

1. "I began growing nostalgic for the war."

I never grew nostalgic about war because I was in three others before I retired from the Army. I was seriously wounded midway through my second tour in Vietnam and it took almost 18 months to be rehabilitated and cleared for active duty again. By that time the Army had other plans for me that didn't include a third tour in Nam...they sent me to run a training program at Ft. Polk, LA. I had been very critical of the quality of training our young soldiers were getting before they shipped to Vietnam and made the mistake of putting my thoughts in a memo that went through our chain of command. Obviously I displeased someone because when I was cleared to return to active duty, I had a ticket to Ft. Polk. After a couple of years in purgatory I was able to return to the 1st Cav, but by then the war was winding down.

2. "I could protest as loudly as the most convinced activist, but I could not deny the grip the war had on me, nor the fact that it had been an experience as fascinating as it was repulsive."

I never protested against the war in Vietnam. I would never even consider doing it because to do that would be to dishoner 58,000 fellow vets who did not come home alive. At the same time, I was very critical of the MACV command and their strategy about how they prosecuted the war. But that criticism stayed in house (and got me in a lot of trouble, such as my orders that sent me to Ft. Polk.). Was combat as fascinating as it was repulsive? Well, you have to experience combat to understand just how repulsive it can be. The sights, sounds, smells all overwhelm the senses. The first time I was in combat was 24 Oct 67 and my platoon was tasked with searching a small village for rice and weapons caches. To approach the village, we had to go through the rice paddies because the small road on top of the dyke would make us easy targets. So from 500 meters out we sloshed through paddies. The heat and humidity were overwhelming. I was walking slack (about five meters off the pointman's right or left shoulder), which was the normal position for the grenadier in the platoon. The sweat was rolling down my face, getting in my eyes. It was hard to maintain balance. And the fear made my mouth dry as a lump of clay in Death Valley. And then suddenly when we were about 150 meters away from the village, the air and ground exploded. I immediately dropped down face first in the shit-infested water of the rice paddy, filled with human waste and water buffalo dung. It was either that or die. The rounds were passing within a couple of feet of my head. I had no idea where the shots were coming from. But some of the old heads in the platoon knew where the shooters were and they directed defensive fire at a tree line. I felt very helpless because my M79 launcher could only fire 40mm rounds about 110 meters with any degree of effectiveness. My platoon sergeant ordered me to flank to the right with a squad of guys. We crawled through the water and I was hoping that the automatic weapon that had us pinned down could not lower the muzzle any more and rake us with fire. We were able to close to about 100 meters and were taking small arms fire from the trench line on the right. I was able to fire four HE rounds with my M79 and one of them luckily landed right in front of the bunker opening and killed everyone inside. Three guys had been able to flank around the trench line on the left and they crawled up and started firing down on whoever was inside. Then we all started charging the bunker and trenches. But by the time we got there, everyone inside was dead. There were only eight of them. The whole firefight took less than 20 minutes. When I looked back, I could see the medic and a couple of other guys bent over someone in the rice paddy. It turned out to be our M60 machine gunner's assistant. He took a round in the abdomen when the firing first started. They lifted him out on a dustoff chopper about 10 minutes later but I was told later that he was already turning gray and wasn't going to make it. I remember standing there on top of the bunker and looking down at the bodies of the four people I killed and thinking how young they were. Looked like kids. And as I was standing there, my legs started to shake and I had to sit down. The adrenaline was wearing off. My stomach started to flip upside down and I started to shit myself uncontrollably. I was so damned embarassed. But the platoon sergeant came over to me and said, "Good job Mac." And other guys came by and tapped me on the shoulder. After that I was accepted by the guys in the platoon. I had done my job...four enemy soldiers were dead...and maybe some of the guys in the platoon were alive because I did my job. Now, that was 40+ years ago. And I remember everything in stark detail...the sights, the smells, the noises, the fear. In the course of the next 19 months I was in more than 30 firefights. And I can remember every one of them...and relive them over and over in my sleep. But that doesn't mean I'm fascinated by it...rather I am repulsed by it. But that's the way it is.

3. "In spite of everything, we felt a strange attachment to Vietnam, and even stranger, a longing to return."

That is very true. I lost my youth in Vietnam and I've always wanted to go back and find it. But I'm afraid it has disappeared the same way the base camps and the firebases and the LZ's have disappeared back into the jungles. Each Veterans Day, the survivors of my original platoon all get together for what we have named "Rollcall." We have a conference call and it gives us a chance to catch up on what everybody is doing. And then we have "Rollcall" for the platoon and toast the members who are no longer with us. Nine of the original 29 were killed in Vietnam. Another five have died of various causes in the last 40 years. We want to go to Vietnam this year to visit some of our old haunts...but I doubt many of them are still there. Camp Evans has disappeared. LZ English is not there anymore. I don't know about Khe Sanh. But Hue and Quang Tri are still there and worth visiting. As Rees, one of my closests friends said, "Maybe we can put the ghosts to rest there." It's worth a try.

4. "Anyone who fought in Vietnam, if he is honest about himself, will have to admit he enjoyed the compelling attractiveness of combat."

The only people who found combat attractive are those people who survived and have short memories. There isn't anything exciting about combat. But the longer you were in it, the better you became at it. If FNG's were able to survive for their first three months, they had a very good chance of going home. Obviously Caputo has a short memory...and doesn't remember the screams from wounded comrades and the desperate fear you felt during every minute you were out in the field. He has committed the cardinal sin of romanticing war...and there ain't nothing romantic about it.

Edited January 29, 2008 by farang prince

[BIZOTIC]

The 40th anniversary of the 68 Tet Offensive will take place on 31 January. How many Thai Visa posters were there? I was with the 1st Cav in the Bong Son at the time. Anyone else in RSVN at the time? Let me know.

Hi..2BN.1st Marines....Con Thien DMZ

Welcome BIZOTIC. You definitely got close to the wire didn't you? Had a good buddy who was a corpsman in the 1st Marines. Only survivor of an ambush that wiped out his platoon. He managed to play dead to survive. That was mid-67 as I recall. Eddie Gallegos was his name. Great guy.

Yes a little bit close to the wire...That was on my second tour..First tour 3rd Recon Bn. Delta Company....Maybe your friend was on Operation Medina..Quangtri

[adjan jb]

The first time I was in combat was 24 Oct 67 and my platoon was tasked with searching a small village for rice and weapons caches. To approach the village, we had to go through the rice paddies because the small road on top of the dyke would make us easy targets. So from 500 meters out we sloshed through paddies. The heat and humidity were overwhelming. I was walking slack (about five meters off the pointman's right or left shoulder), which was the normal position for the grenadier in the platoon. The sweat was rolling down my face, getting in my eyes. It was hard to maintain balance. And the fear made my mouth dry as a lump of clay in Death Valley. And then suddenly when we were about 150 meters away from the village, the air and ground exploded. I immediately dropped down face first in the shit-infested water of the rice paddy, filled with human waste and water buffalo dung. It was either that or die. The rounds were passing within a couple of feet of my head. I had no idea where the shots were coming from. But some of the old heads in the platoon knew where the shooters were and they directed defensive fire at a tree line. I felt very helpless because my M79 launcher could only fire 40mm rounds about 110 meters with any degree of effectiveness. My platoon sergeant ordered me to flank to the right with a squad of guys. We crawled through the water and I was hoping that the automatic weapon that had us pinned down could not lower the muzzle any more and rake us with fire. We were able to close to about 100 meters and were taking small arms fire from the trench line on the right. I was able to fire four HE rounds with my M79 and one of them luckily landed right in front of the bunker opening and killed everyone inside. Three guys had been able to flank around the trench line on the left and they crawled up and started firing down on whoever was inside. Then we all started charging the bunker and trenches. But by the time we got there, everyone inside was dead. There were only eight of them. The whole firefight took less than 20 minutes. When I looked back, I could see the medic and a couple of other guys bent over someone in the rice paddy. It turned out to be our M60 machine gunner's assistant. He took a round in the abdomen when the firing first started. They lifted him out on a dustoff chopper about 10 minutes later but I was told later that he was already turning gray and wasn't going to make it. I remember standing there on top of the bunker and looking down at the bodies of the four people I killed and thinking how young they were. Looked like kids. And as I was standing there, my legs started to shake and I had to sit down. The adrenaline was wearing off. My stomach started to flip upside down and I started to shit myself uncontrollably. I was so damned embarassed. But the platoon sergeant came over to me and said, "Good job Mac." And other guys came by and tapped me on the shoulder. After that I was accepted by the guys in the platoon. I had done my job...four enemy soldiers were dead...and maybe some of the guys in the platoon were alive because I did my job.

Where did it happen ? In the Bong Son plain ?

[IMA_FARANG]

The 40th anniversary of the 68 Tet Offensive will take place on 31 January. How many Thai Visa posters were there? I was with the 1st Cav in the Bong Son at the time. Anyone else in RSVN at the time? Let me know.

Was in a communications site in Saigon, about 2 blocks from the U.S. embessy at the time. Spent about a week acting as Sgt. of the guard posting/checking guards around the compound. Went into the embessy to look for one of our people that was missing. Turned out he was put on a helicopter to Bien Hoa. The story that they never got inside the embessy bldg is bull-crap. I saw the blood trails and the damage from the firefight inside the embessy bldg myself. The Marines and the 516th MP were the ones that saved the embessy. One MP officer used a RPG to blow out the locked rear gate of the embessy to attack the VC in the embessy from the rear, which enabled the Marines to get out of the embessy bldg.

the 101st made a helicopter landing on the roof of the embessy bldg, but they were there only at the end of the fighting.

[IMA_FARANG]

Phang Rang AB, 35th CES 68-69

You guys logged in some serious flight time during Tet 68. Actually I thought Tet 68 was a major screw-up on the part of the North Vietnamese. They sacrificed countless Viet Cong cadres in hopeless attacks on heavily fortified base camps and cities and it was the first time the NVA came out in the open in force. They were decimated by our firepower.

But even though it was a tactical blunder, they still won a strategic victory because they convinced Walter Cronkite that the war was no longer "winnable." And when Cronkite went on CBS to make his "learned" pronouncement, it strengthened the anti-war movement and eventually led to our withdrawal from Vietnam.

There are a lot of interesting things about the Tet Offensive, in 1968.

It was a major military for the Americans and ARVN.

General Giap even publicly stated that it would take 10 years to recover the casualties of the South Vietnamese Communists, VC.

Here is what some people think:

It's been documented that the North was considering a peace deal just prior to the Tet Offensive.

But the South Vietnamese were asked to "sacrifice" during the TET Offensive. Obviously the Offensive took place in South Vietnam

With such high Southern casualties, it would make it easier for the Northerners to take over, hold the administrative positions, government posts, etc.

The Southern VCs were squeezed out off all of the important jobs and political and governmental opportunities by the Northerners. The northerners own the nice plots of land, and expensive properties, which they stole from the Southerners.

And yes, farangprince, Cronkite made many innacurate statements about the Tet Offensive. Public opinion, not the battlfield.

Wrong Turn, these are some interesting theories. In reality, there is no doubt that the Tet Offensive in 68 decimated the ranks for the VC. They were never a viable military organization after that and eventually were absorbed into the ranks of the NVA. There is conjecture on whether this was a deliberate effort on the part of the NVA to co-opt the VC. My gut instinct is that this was in fact what was planned. What the NVA didn't plan on was the reaction of the South Vietnamese, who did not rise up in support of the NVA's offensive. Years later, I am still haunted by the faces of South Vietnamese civilians who were caught in the terrible cross-fire of dueling armies in Hue, Quang Tri, and other cities across South Vietnam. Someone once said "The first casualty of war is innocence." During Tet 68 that was undoubtedly true. The attrocities committed by the NVA and VC during Tet 68 on the South Vietnamese civilian population were unbelievable and sickening for those of us who saw the aftermath.

Tet 68 was also the first time that the NVA had attacked at battalion and regiment strength. Giap clearly overestimated his troops' capability. They took horrendous casualties.

What is little known is that the NVA repeated their mistakes for Tet 69 and sent five NVA divisions down the southern terminus of the Ho Chi Minh trail with the idea of attacking and overrunning Saigon. In one of the few times when military intelligence got it right, they picked up indications of a major attack and airlifted the 1st Cav intact from CTZ I down to the Fishhook and Angel Wing areas along the Cambodian border in CTZ III. Over a four-month period, the 1st Cav, 1st ID and 4th ID fought a series of major battles with the NVA in this area and ended up destroying the 5th VC Division and the 1st NVA Division. As a result, the coordinated attack on Saigon never took place. It was costly. The 1st Cav alone lost more than 500 KIA, and more than 3,000 wounded.

Your absolutely right about the attrocities committed upon the southern civilian population. From the NVA point....well it was war, and you were either for them or against them...no such thing as civilians to them. My friend was at Bien Hoa airbase during the Tet offensive. Almost nobody has ever told the story of how the VC marched the local villagers living just outside the perimeter fence thru the mines and claymores to clear the path to attack the base. Must have been at least 30 women and children used by the VC to clear a path so they could attack the base. The choice the locals had was to try to get thru the mines, or be executed by the VC. My friend was in the defenders. They had no choice but to shoot down the locals to get at the VC behind them. It was rather nasty. Real war is always nasty.

[waterdog]

"... I began growing nostalgic for the war"

"I could protest as loudly as the most convinced activist, but I could not deny the grip the war had one me, nor the fact that it had been an experience as fasciniting as it was repulsive"

"In spite of everything, we felt a strange attachment to Vietnam and, even stranger, a longing to return"

"Anyone who fought in Vietnam, if he is honest about himself, will have to admit he enjoyed the compelling attractiveness of combat"

These are excerpts from A Rumor of War by Philip Caputo (which I'm currently reading)

Did any of you have similar emotions ? If yes, could you elaborate ?

Before my reply, please check out this excellent interview with Caputo if you are interested and have not already read it: http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/cold.war/episo...erviews/caputo/

Caputo's comments ring true. I know a number of former Marines who "extended" and others who signed waviers to go back for another tour, including myself. After the rush of combat, stateside duty can be extremely boring. Life can be extremely boring.

Some VN vets began returning to Viet Nam as early as the late 80's. I was among them and made several more returns before going to live there. Other veterans were already living there. Looking for answers, trying to make peace with Viet Nam and with ourselves.

[adjan jb]

[

Before my reply, please check out this excellent interview with Caputo if you are interested and have not already read it: http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/cold.war/episo...erviews/caputo/

Caputo's comments ring true. I know a number of former Marines who "extended" and others who signed waviers to go back for another tour, including myself. After the rush of combat, stateside duty can be extremely boring. Life can be extremely boring.

Thanks for the link.

From the interview:

On war:

"As wretched, awful and savage as any war can get, all wars have this element of thrill and excitement in them, I think without which probably everybody in combat would probably kill themselves. That can't be denied."

"it was like choreography... In all, it was sort of like if this was choreography, I was the dance master -- except this was literally a dance of death."

In Long Time Passing: Vietnam and the Haunted Generation By Myra MacPherson, some vets made similar comments about the weariness, the boredom. A lot of them said they were numb.

The idea sounds crazy for someone, like me, who has never been in combat (though I accidentally got caught in a skirmish around Siem Reap in 1993) : life after war can be boring !

On the other hand, it's understandable. In a very short time, soldiers experience a wide range of emotions. To the utmost. They are forced by circumstances to visit some dark inner territories where non-combatants never venture. They take part in such extraordinary events that, after such a (bad) trip, life can only be boring.

Anyway Farang Price had a different experience

Any good book to recommend me ? Something on a par with The Things They Carried, Dispatches, Going After Cacciato and A Bright Shinning Lie.

Edited January 29, 2008 by adjan jb

[jenniferjuniper]

Thanks for your reply Farang Prince and for taking time out to relate your experiences. Personal accounts from whichever side are always sobering.

I caught a lot of stuff by Tim Page who made a name for himself taking photos and chances until a landmine nearly killed him. He's still a casualty and seems as hooked on Nam now as he ever was. Nam was the biggest thing that ever happened to him and in a way it has become his life to the point that nothing could fill the void when it all ended.

I remember his quote about how war is glamour...the sun going down, helicopter gunships dancing overhead exploding ordnanace among the swaying palms with him in the middle of it all snapping shots like some crazed choreographer blessed with the immortality of callow youth.

[farang prince]

Thanks for your reply Farang Prince and for taking time out to relate your experiences. Personal accounts from whichever side are always sobering.

I caught a lot of stuff by Tim Page who made a name for himself taking photos and chances until a landmine nearly killed him. He's still a casualty and seems as hooked on Nam now as he ever was. Nam was the biggest thing that ever happened to him and in a way it has become his life to the point that nothing could fill the void when it all ended.

I remember his quote about how war is glamour...the sun going down, helicopter gunships dancing overhead exploding ordnanace among the swaying palms with him in the middle of it all snapping shots like some crazed choreographer blessed with the immortality of callow youth.

Hi Jennifer. Never ran into Tim Page while I was in RSVN, but I am familiar with his work. We had Peter Arnett and Eddie Adams from The Associated Press with us in Quang Tri during Tet 68. Eddie Adams took the Pulitzer Prize winning photo of the VC sapper being shot in head in Saigon during Tet 68. He and Arnett stayed with us for about a day, then moved on to some Marine units in Hue. We also had John Laurence and Dan Rather from CBS with us at different times.

Vietnam is a very beautiful country and if you are not fighting to stay alive, I'm sure that the beauty can be appreciated. As I've mentioned before, combat overwhelms an individual's senses. I remember in one engagement we had F-100's flashing by at treetop level to drop some napalm. I don't think I've ever seen anything sexier than those 100's flashing in to drop their bombs. It looked like three phallic symbols travelling at high speed. But at the time I was only thinking that I hope every Zip on the other side of the treeline was going to be fried. Ten years later as I dreamed of that bombing run, I was amazed at how beautiful it looked.

There is nothing more spectacular than watching some Hueys or Cobras making a wonderfully choreographed rocket attack on a dug-in NVA or VC position. The 4th of July pales in comparison. Or the weird-looking curving trajectories of the tracers fired at night from a "Spooky Kid" gunship. Perhaps years later you can appreciate it. But in wartime, there is no time for romantic thoughts. Your senses are overwhelmed. They shut down. You keep your mind on your business and as we always used to say, you make yourself small.

Edited January 29, 2008 by farang prince

[farang prince]

Phang Rang AB, 35th CES 68-69

You guys logged in some serious flight time during Tet 68. Actually I thought Tet 68 was a major screw-up on the part of the North Vietnamese. They sacrificed countless Viet Cong cadres in hopeless attacks on heavily fortified base camps and cities and it was the first time the NVA came out in the open in force. They were decimated by our firepower.

But even though it was a tactical blunder, they still won a strategic victory because they convinced Walter Cronkite that the war was no longer "winnable." And when Cronkite went on CBS to make his "learned" pronouncement, it strengthened the anti-war movement and eventually led to our withdrawal from Vietnam.

There are a lot of interesting things about the Tet Offensive, in 1968.

It was a major military for the Americans and ARVN.

General Giap even publicly stated that it would take 10 years to recover the casualties of the South Vietnamese Communists, VC.

Here is what some people think:

It's been documented that the North was considering a peace deal just prior to the Tet Offensive.

But the South Vietnamese were asked to "sacrifice" during the TET Offensive. Obviously the Offensive took place in South Vietnam

With such high Southern casualties, it would make it easier for the Northerners to take over, hold the administrative positions, government posts, etc.

The Southern VCs were squeezed out off all of the important jobs and political and governmental opportunities by the Northerners. The northerners own the nice plots of land, and expensive properties, which they stole from the Southerners.

And yes, farangprince, Cronkite made many innacurate statements about the Tet Offensive. Public opinion, not the battlfield.

Wrong Turn, these are some interesting theories. In reality, there is no doubt that the Tet Offensive in 68 decimated the ranks for the VC. They were never a viable military organization after that and eventually were absorbed into the ranks of the NVA. There is conjecture on whether this was a deliberate effort on the part of the NVA to co-opt the VC. My gut instinct is that this was in fact what was planned. What the NVA didn't plan on was the reaction of the South Vietnamese, who did not rise up in support of the NVA's offensive. Years later, I am still haunted by the faces of South Vietnamese civilians who were caught in the terrible cross-fire of dueling armies in Hue, Quang Tri, and other cities across South Vietnam. Someone once said "The first casualty of war is innocence." During Tet 68 that was undoubtedly true. The attrocities committed by the NVA and VC during Tet 68 on the South Vietnamese civilian population were unbelievable and sickening for those of us who saw the aftermath.

Tet 68 was also the first time that the NVA had attacked at battalion and regiment strength. Giap clearly overestimated his troops' capability. They took horrendous casualties.

What is little known is that the NVA repeated their mistakes for Tet 69 and sent five NVA divisions down the southern terminus of the Ho Chi Minh trail with the idea of attacking and overrunning Saigon. In one of the few times when military intelligence got it right, they picked up indications of a major attack and airlifted the 1st Cav intact from CTZ I down to the Fishhook and Angel Wing areas along the Cambodian border in CTZ III. Over a four-month period, the 1st Cav, 1st ID and 4th ID fought a series of major battles with the NVA in this area and ended up destroying the 5th VC Division and the 1st NVA Division. As a result, the coordinated attack on Saigon never took place. It was costly. The 1st Cav alone lost more than 500 KIA, and more than 3,000 wounded.

Your absolutely right about the attrocities committed upon the southern civilian population. From the NVA point....well it was war, and you were either for them or against them...no such thing as civilians to them. My friend was at Bien Hoa airbase during the Tet offensive. Almost nobody has ever told the story of how the VC marched the local villagers living just outside the perimeter fence thru the mines and claymores to clear the path to attack the base. Must have been at least 30 women and children used by the VC to clear a path so they could attack the base. The choice the locals had was to try to get thru the mines, or be executed by the VC. My friend was in the defenders. They had no choice but to shoot down the locals to get at the VC behind them. It was rather nasty. Real war is always nasty.

That's righteous IMA Farang...I witnessed a young woman (who turned out to be the daughter of a village chieftain) being forced down a 'bunny trail' towards FB Jay in the Dog's Head bend just off the Cambodian border. There were 8 sappers about 15 yards behind her and they were waiting to see what would light up if she tripped a claymore or warning flare. As it was, we had an LP set up just off the trail and we let the woman pass and then initiated the claymores against the sappers. The woman was distraught that we had killed the sappers because she said her two children were being held by some VC in the ville which was about two clicks away. I never knew what happened to those kids when the VC found out the sappers were hamburger. But this just underscores the terrible situation S. Vietnamese civilians found themselves in during the Vietnam War. If they cooperated with the Americans, the VC would come in and kill the village elders. If they cooperated with the VC, then they had to deal with us. A Faustian choice.

[Globeliner]

Fascinating post FP. Respect to all that were there. I believe there were inexcess of 6 million Vietnamese killed, not the 5 million previously stated.

[jenniferjuniper]

The sheer horror of the suffering is unimaginable to most of the West and their stoicism in its face must be because of the Buddhist faith underpinning their daily existence. Faustian perhaps but in their world ultimately there was no Mephistopheles, only release and maybe rebirth.

I look at my wife and know who is the stronger and therein lies my salvation ( or insurance! ).

Farang P, do you get down to Bourbon St., Washington Sq.? If so, maybe catch you up sometime ......

[farang prince]

The sheer horror of the suffering is unimaginable to most of the West and their stoicism in its face must be because of the Buddhist faith underpinning their daily existence. Faustian perhaps but in their world ultimately there was no Mephistopheles, only release and maybe rebirth.

I look at my wife and know who is the stronger and therein lies my salvation ( or insurance! ).

Farang P, do you get down to Bourbon St., Washington Sq.? If so, maybe catch you up sometime ......

Thanks so much for the invitation JJ. I'll take you up on it. My Mom passed away a couple of weeks ago and I'm taking care of her estate. Then I've got a six-month commitment to do some training overseas. Then I'll definitely be in the mood for a cold one. See you then.

[farang prince]

Fascinating post FP. Respect to all that were there. I believe there were inexcess of 6 million Vietnamese killed, not the 5 million previously stated.

Although hard numbers are pretty impossible to come by, I have a hunch you are right Globeliner. And I know that more than 600,000 civilians and military were wounded. hel_l, that number climbs by the day as people die of Agent Orange-related cancers or detonate old land mines or booby-traps.

[farang prince]

1st Support Command, Da Nang, RVN

Hey Boss, damned near missed you in that flurry of posts. Welcome brother.

[farang prince]

Where did it happen ? In the Bong Son plain ?

Yes, it was in the Bong Son plain near Dai Dong. October was rice harvesting season in the Bong Son and so the 1st Cav was tasked with making sure the rice went to the local villagers and to market, instead of to the NVA and VC. To accomplish this, the powers-that-be had created "mini cav" missions...rifle platoons that would be dropped into villages to sweep for large caches of rice and weapons. We were under the control of a flight leader who was in a chopper overhead directing the mission. Usually there would be another platoon that was in ready reserve to be airlifted in if the original platoon got into trouble. These were dangerous little missions because firefights usually didn't last much longer than 10 to 20 minutes and so you couldn't bring in air support or even call in an artillery fire support mission fast enough to avoid some casualties. This was all part of Operation Pershing, which was a continuation of our clearing operations in the Bong Son. To show you how deadly this area was, we lost more than 800 men KIA in 1967 and another 250 some-odd killed in non-combat situations (usually air-related accidents). Add on more than 4,000 wounded and you get a clear picture of how nasty the Bong Son was. But we were very effective. When Tet 68 hit, the Bong Son plains had the least amount of VC and NVA activity of any other province in S. Vietnam.

[mouse]

Not to hijack your post Farang Prince. But, if anyone interested in contributing a short story to a book that I am interested in publishing. I have a two page story of my own that I would include. The printing I would do through my own publishing company and the profits could go to something like the VFW or an orphanage or the like. You tell me! Email or PM through the board or visit http://www.cruisebooks.net/rvn.html for more information.

[farang prince]

Not to hijack your post Farang Prince. But, if anyone interested in contributing a short story to a book that I am interested in publishing. I have a two page story of my own that I would include. The printing I would do through my own publishing company and the profits could go to something like the VFW or an orphanage or the like. You tell me! Email or PM through the board or visit http://www.cruisebooks.net/rvn.html for more information.

No problem Mouse. I have been mentioned in several books on Vietnam and I really believe more veterans need to have their voices heard. When we returned to The World, many vets buried their stories and only relived them in their dreams. Now telling their stories can be both instructive and cathartic.

Edited January 30, 2008 by farang prince

[adjan jb]

Where did it happen ? In the Bong Son plain ?

Yes, it was in the Bong Son plain near Dai Dong.

This was all part of Operation Pershing, which was a continuation of our clearing operations in the Bong Son.

There are some good pictures on www.vietnamphotography.com

[farang prince]

Where did it happen ? In the Bong Son plain ?

Yes, it was in the Bong Son plain near Dai Dong.

This was all part of Operation Pershing, which was a continuation of our clearing operations in the Bong Son.

There are some good pictures on www.vietnamphotography.com

Thank you for the link, Adjan JB. I hadn't seen these photos before, but boy do they bring back memories of the Bong Son Plain, especially the series on the ambush of a platoon from the 1/8. The pics give you a very good idea of the terrain that confronted us in the Bong Son and also how dangerous a sweep was through the rice paddies. I was with the 2/5 of the 1st Cav in my first tour and the 2/12 in my second tour, where I was a platoon sergeant. Sgt. Musial was one hel_l of a good platoon sergeant, but no different from most of the platoon sergeants that we had in the 1st Cav.

I was particularly interested that SSgt Musial was getting some M79 rounds from one of his fallen platoon members. Grenadiers (which is what I was in my first tour) were prime targets of NVA and VC snipers during an ambush because we carried a variety of 40mm rounds (High Explosive and White Phosperous and 40mm cannister rounds) and could deliver the ordinance very accurately on a target that was wthin 100 meters away. After the Ia Drang Valley campaign in 1965, the 1st Cav eliminated their weapons companies and thus did not take mortars into the bush on patrol. They were just too damned heavy and unwieldly and the M79 grenade launcher replaced them. The beauty of the M79 is that is was very durable, didn't jam and was easy to use. It was so instinctive to aim and fire, that the grenadiers usually broke off the sights because they would get tangled up with "wait a minute vines" or other underbrush. I got so good with it that in an ambush, I could take a quick glance to guage the distance to target, lay on my back, and fire a round over my shoulder and lay a round right on top of the target. Even when I became a platoon sergeant and carried an M16, I also continued to sling my M79 over my shoulder. Best damned combat weapon during the Vietnam War.

[farang prince]

Just had an email for an old platoon member from B/2/5 1st Cav. We lost another platoon member to cancer. I suspect Agent Orange has struck again. Larry Duran...RIP buddy.

[beammeup]

I recently had the pleasure of touring through Vietnam, from Hanoi to Saigon. The scars are still visible. I did a tour of the DMZ where we went to Khe Sanh (a coffee plantation now with a small war memorial museum), the rockpile and Con Thien as well as the tunnels at Vin Moc across the DMZ. I was reading a rumour of war at the time so a very thought provoking tour, the effects of agent orange are still visible some of the hills are still completely bare. The visitors diary at Khe Sanh was also an eye opener. One ex pilot wrote a very moving page were over the course of 2 tours their he figured he was responsible for hundreds of thousands for deaths, he seemed to be struggling with why. The temples at My Son and the Cham art at the Cham Museum in DaNang really inspire the imagination and give a feel for the exotic beauty that many of the vets must have experienced when their.