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For educational purposes
This episode covers the US Operations which try to seek and destroy the Vietcong and induce them into set piece battles in various areas between Saigon and Cambodia in 1966-67.
This episode covers the US Operations which try to seek and destroy the Vietcong and induce them into set piece battles in various areas between Saigon and Cambodia in 1966-67.
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01:01In January 1968, NLF guerrillas, backed by North Vietnamese troops, launched a full-scale offensive against the cities and towns
01:11of the South.
01:13For two years, they had been cautious, avoiding big battles.
01:18But at Thet, the Vietnamese New Year, they staked everything on one all-out bid for victory.
01:45The Thet offensive was one of the most stunning surprise attacks ever launched by an army.
01:51More than 80,000 guerrillas and North Vietnamese troops were thrown against the forces of the South Vietnamese government and
01:59their American allies.
02:04The battles were on a scale which no one had imagined the Viet Cong could achieve.
02:10The fighting even spilled into the American embassy in Saigon.
02:25The Thet offensive turned into a military catastrophe for the Viet Cong.
02:32In clashes of shocking violence, the guerrillas lost most of their best fighters.
02:41But in one of the greatest ironies in the history of war, the Viet Cong's military defeat turned into a
02:49political victory.
02:53It was a victory that would change the whole course of the war in Vietnam.
03:16American forces in South Vietnam had spent 1966 massively building up their numbers.
03:24Men and supplies poured in.
03:28Bases, airfields, and port facilities were expanded at a frantic pace.
03:40By the start of 1967, the Americans had 389,000 troops and were ready to go on the offensive.
03:56The American aim was to defeat the NVA and NLF force by now numbering nearly 128,000.
04:08For seven years, the NLF had been fighting to overthrow the government of South Vietnam and reunite the South with
04:15the North.
04:17The North was backing them with supplies and men and had sent units of the North Vietnamese army to fight
04:24inside the South.
04:34American commanders wanted to take on the enemy's big units, the battalions and regiments.
04:41If U.S. forces could destroy them faster than they could be replaced, the war would soon be over.
04:57In fact, the American strategy had quickly run into trouble.
05:01After early battles in which enemy regiments had suffered heavy casualties, they had avoided head-on clashes.
05:09Instead, the Viet Cong meant to stick to hit-and-run and ambush.
05:27The Viet Cong's tactics caused American casualties to rise sharply.
05:36Instead of big battles, there were snipers, booby traps and surprise attacks.
05:43The Americans grew increasingly frustrated as they mounted countless search-and-destroy operations, took casualties, and still failed to find
05:52important guerrilla units.
06:00The commander of American forces in Vietnam, General William C. Westmoreland, was determined to make the Viet Cong fight big
06:08battles.
06:08Only then could superior American firepower be used to the full.
06:25One answer, Westmoreland believed, might be to attack in force into the Viet Cong's traditional base areas.
06:35These, he was sure the Viet Cong would fight to defend.
06:54By 1967, there were strong American marine forces based in the heavily populated coastal areas of northern South Vietnam.
07:07In the Central Highlands, there were army units, including the Air Cavalry Division.
07:15However, the greatest concentration of U.S. Army strength was in the Saigon area, and it was there, between the
07:22capital and the Cambodian border, that the Americans launched their biggest operations.
07:37The Viet Cong base areas targeted by the Americans were the Iron Triangle, only 20 miles from the capital, Saigon,
07:45and War Zone C, near the Cambodian border.
07:53Along with War Zone D, these areas held strong NLF regional forces and the elite 9th Division.
08:06Supplied down the Ho Chi Minh Trail from North Vietnam, the bases were springboards for attacks in and around Saigon.
08:16In January 1967, the Americans launched Operation Cedar Falls into the Iron Triangle.
08:28Between February and May, Operation Junction City swept War Zone C.
08:43In Cedar Falls and Junction City, up to 25,000 Americans and South Vietnamese Army troops swept through the NLF's
08:52base areas.
08:54There were hundreds of firefights and several major NLF attacks with assaults by thousands of guerrillas.
09:07But the Americans never did succeed in trapping any of the big units.
09:14The Viet Cong regiments melted away into forests and swamps, or over the border into Cambodia, where the Americans were
09:22forbidden to follow.
09:36Even though U.S. commanders had failed to provoke the big battles they wanted, they were more optimistic than before.
09:46They had done massive damage to the Viet Cong's installations and had captured huge amounts of supplies.
09:57Cedar Falls and Junction City alone had killed nearly 3,000 guerrillas.
10:12U.S. forces had also blunted an enemy initiative further north, where the war was between the Americans and the
10:19North Vietnamese Army.
10:34North and South Vietnam were separated by a demilitarized zone, inside which troops were not supposed to operate.
10:47South of the zone, the American defense against the North Vietnamese Army was a string of fire bases.
10:55Khe Sanh, the Rock Pile, Camp Carroll, Cam Lo and Dong Ha along Route 9, and the newly built Kan
11:04Tien and Giao Lin.
11:10All were controlled by Special Forces units and later the 3rd Marine Division, which constantly swept the surrounding area.
11:18Between January and May 1967, two North Vietnamese divisions, operating out of the DMZ, launched heavy bombardments of these bases.
11:28Ground assaults at Kan Tien and Khe Sanh were only driven off after massive aerial bombardments.
11:34Afterwards, the Marines continued to patrol aggressively.
11:50The increased North Vietnamese activity on the DMZ triggered an American plan to reinforce the whole area.
12:02More Marines were moved up, and Army units were redeployed from other parts of South Vietnam.
12:15Meanwhile, in the Central Highlands, the Americans intercepted North Vietnamese Army units moving in from Cambodia.
12:26In late May 1967, there were nine days of continuous battles which left hundreds of North Vietnamese soldiers dead.
12:40While American ground operations were piling on the pressure in the first half of 1967, the U.S. air campaign
12:48against North Vietnam had also been stepped up.
12:55The aim of the bombing was to force the North to stop supporting the war.
13:01In fact, the bombing and the massive ground assaults were having exactly the opposite effect.
13:15Far from giving up, North Vietnam was preparing to unleash the biggest offensive of the war so far.
13:41Time and again, Ho Chi Minh, the aging North Vietnamese president, had proclaimed that the Vietnamese people were prepared to
13:49fight for 20 years.
13:50He insisted they would pay any price to reunite Vietnam and drive out the Americans.
14:05Privately, however, Ho and most of the Hanoi leadership had come to believe that the war could not go on
14:12in the same way for much longer.
14:21The problem was not just the casualty rate in the South, estimated by the Americans to be at least 5
14:27,000 troops dead every month.
14:29Such losses could be sustained for a long time yet.
14:33The biggest fear was that the safe base areas in Laos and Cambodia, or perhaps even in the North itself,
14:40might soon be invaded by the Americans.
14:52There were also worries about how well the morale of the population would stand up to a bombing campaign that
14:58might go on for years.
15:06The North's leaders foresaw that they might have to negotiate with the Americans sooner or later.
15:14But before that happened, they were determined to make one more attempt to win the war on the battlefield.
15:23In July 1967, the Politburo, led by Party First Secretary Li Duan, proposed an all-out offensive in South Vietnam,
15:32timed for early 1968.
15:48Up to recently, command of the war effort in the South had been divided between General Giap, who controlled the
15:55North Vietnamese Army's campaigns, and General Tan, who ran the war further south.
16:03And there had been disagreement between them about the planned offensive.
16:07But just as preparations got underway, General Tan died of heart disease in a Hanoi hospital.
16:13For years afterward, it was thought in the West that he died as the result of an American bombing raid
16:19on his southern headquarters.
16:23As well as the loss of a charismatic leader and the shock to the Viet Cong's command, it was an
16:29ironic turn.
16:29Now, Japp was solely responsible for planning the entire campaign.
16:57Since he had first dispatched combat troops to South Vietnam, the U.S. President Lyndon Baines Johnson,
17:03had been determined to limit the war's impact on the American people.
17:08He had refused to call up the reserves and had never pushed for any formal declaration of war by Congress.
17:17Despite mounting casualties, the U.S. never officially declared war on Vietnam.
17:26Up to now, Johnson's approach had seemed to pay off.
17:30There was some anti-war feeling, but nothing so serious as to threaten the President's policy.
17:40However, the toll of American combat casualties, now running at more than 6,000 killed, wounded, and missing every month,
17:48was hardening opposition.
17:50The draft call had been increased, yet so far no real attempt had been made to get the American public
17:57support for the war or its aims.
18:16Divisions were beginning to open up between the President's military and civilian advisers.
18:24The Joint Chiefs of Staff wanted more damaging targets for the bombing campaign against the North.
18:32A widening of the ground campaign into Laos, Cambodia, and possibly North Vietnam, and a big increase in troop levels.
18:45On the other hand, the Defense Secretary, Robert McNamara, strongly opposed escalating the war.
18:58McNamara believed that widening the conflict would run a real risk of drawing in Communist China or the Soviet Union.
19:09He also believed that the war might be a long one, and that if the American people were to support
19:14it, the cost would have to be kept down.
19:17That meant no wider war, and a big effort to prepare the South Vietnamese Army to take over more of
19:24the fighting.
19:34In the face of contradictory advice from his military and civilian advisers, President Johnson's reaction was to compromise.
19:46The bombing war would be intensified to include a whole range of targets which would hit the North Vietnamese war
19:53effort hard.
19:58On the other hand, there would be no expansion of the ground war.
20:02The army would get fewer than 50,000 extra men, and the reserves would not be called up.
20:14On September 29th, 1967, President Johnson took a step closer to those advisers who were arguing against escalating the war.
20:25At San Antonio, Texas, Johnson declared that the U.S. would stop bombing North Vietnam if Hanoi promised not to
20:32take advantage of the ceasefire.
20:40There was no response from Northern leaders.
21:03The great offensive meant to change the course of the war was to begin with full-scale Viet Cong attacks
21:10on cities,
21:11headquarters, and radio stations all over South Vietnam.
21:17The shock of the offensive would cause the South Vietnamese Army to collapse.
21:26Government troops would be encouraged to mutiny, and some might even be persuaded to turn their guns on the Americans.
21:37At the same time as the military offensive, the signal would go out for a nationwide uprising by the people
21:44of South Vietnam.
21:45It would be led by the secret youth leagues and workers groups already in place in the cities.
21:57The government would be overthrown, and a new NLF-led regime would call for the Americans to leave.
22:10NLF planners believed that with the world looking on, the Americans would have little alternative but to go.
22:21The success of the general offensive depended on the Viet Cong avoiding the overwhelming firepower of American forces.
22:30Fortunately, the cities and towns were garrisoned by the much less formidable South Vietnamese Army.
22:41Still, General Japp meant to take no chances.
22:45Large numbers of American troops would be drawn away from the populated areas by carefully planned diversions.
23:10In the last months of 1967, the North Vietnamese Army meant to attack government troops at Song Bay...
23:20...and the American base at Dock Toh.
23:26The U.S. Marine outpost at Con Tien would also be hit.
23:32And forces would be massed around Kha Sanh.
23:36An elite NLF regiment would also hit the South Vietnamese Army garrison at Loch Ninh.
23:45The attacks near South Vietnam's borders would draw American forces away from their main base areas and deep into the
23:53interior.
23:56The general offensive and uprising would then begin.
24:02The Viet Cong would attack the national capital, Saigon.
24:07Most of the country's 44 provincial capitals and over 100 other towns.
24:16The last phase would happen at Kha Sanh.
24:20There, the NVA would win a major victory over the United States in a huge set-piece battle that would
24:27destroy the American will to carry on the war.
24:39General Jap was sure that surprise would be the key to a successful offensive.
24:44His plan was to choose the one time when no attacks would be expected.
24:49The New Year Festival of Tet.
25:00In previous years, an informal ceasefire over the holiday had seen vast numbers of South Vietnamese Army troops on leave,
25:08celebrating with their families.
25:14Although an attack during Tet would be deeply offensive to much of the population, it would be certain to catch
25:21the enemy totally unprepared.
25:44Now that Washington had refused to widen the ground war, General Westmoreland was forced to carry on trying to win
25:51in the same way as before.
25:54His forces would continue to mount relentless offensives meant to cause the guerrillas such losses they would have to give
26:01up.
26:19Meanwhile, there was another war to be fought too.
26:25The NLF still controlled a quarter of the villages in Vietnam.
26:35Attempts by the South Vietnamese government to get back control of the rural areas had been going on for years.
26:43Various pacification programs had tried to win the people's support and root out the NLF political organization.
26:50The campaign had failed dismally, in part because it was poorly coordinated with the American war in the field.
26:57And because successive Saigon regimes and the CIA had alienated the people with thousands of assassinations of suspected NLF sympathizers.
27:09It was also in this year that the Phoenix program of assassinations began.
27:15Washington was now insisting that the two efforts, pacification and the bigger war, had to be pulled together to make
27:22one grand strategy.
27:34American military planners had always seen the main force Viet Cong in the interior of South Vietnam as the biggest
27:42danger.
27:47They threatened the populated areas with attack and, the Americans believed, they supplied men, food and weapons to the local
27:55guerrilla units.
28:02In the new plan, the American role would still be to keep main force Viet Cong away from the populated
28:09areas.
28:11However, there would now be more emphasis on what happened behind the American shield.
28:19The village guerrillas would be driven out by the South Vietnamese army and militia.
28:25Local security would be strengthened and pacified areas would spread out until they encompassed most of the populated regions of
28:33South Vietnam.
28:46American strategists were convinced that if the US military effort and the government's pacification program could be made to work
28:53together, they could win the war against the Viet Cong.
29:03To succeed, they would have to get the cooperation of sometimes skeptical military commanders.
29:14They would also have to do something about the huge number of different American agencies supporting pacification projects.
29:27All American support for pacification and its multimillion dollar budget was now placed under one man.
29:35Robert Comer was given the rank of ambassador equal to a four-star general and made Westmoreland's deputy.
29:52Everyone knew that Comer faced an enormous task, but in Saigon and Washington, there was real optimism.
30:00It looked like the United States at last had a strategy that could deliver a solid victory in Vietnam.
30:28For the Tet Offensive, North Vietnamese leaders had decided to rely on Viet Cong guerrillas for most of the fighting.
30:36rather than the regular army.
30:41They believed that the people of the South
30:44would be more likely to join the revolt
30:46if the offensive was led by Southerners.
30:53It would also reassure the NLF leadership inside the South
30:57who had a real fear that their role in the war
31:00would be taken over by Hanoi.
31:08By late 1967, the NLF and the North Vietnamese Army
31:13together fielded 128,000 main force troops in South Vietnam,
31:19most of them in 152 infantry battalions.
31:27There were also hundreds of thousands of regional and local guerrillas,
31:32male and female, who would play a major part in the Tet Offensive.
31:43Although the Americans believed that local Viet Cong guerrillas in the villages
31:48were supplied and supported by the main force units,
31:51the opposite was usually the case.
31:53It was the village guerrillas who supported the main force battalions.
32:06They collected rice taxes from the local farmers,
32:09built up supplies,
32:11and provided scouts and screening forces for the big units.
32:28All communist military forces in the southern part of South Vietnam
32:33were controlled through the Viet Cong's mobile headquarters,
32:37the central office for South Vietnam.
32:45operations further north were commanded from a North Vietnamese Army headquarters
32:50inside the demilitarized zone.
32:54For the Tet Offensive,
32:56the NVA would deploy elements of the 341st Division,
33:02supported by Viet Cong sapper battalions just below the demilitarized zone.
33:11Three more divisions and a regiment
33:14would be deployed around the U.S. Marine Base at Kha Sanh.
33:20Further south,
33:22two divisions,
33:23supported by Viet Cong sappers and artillery units,
33:26were spread out along the coast
33:28and another was deployed in the central highlands.
33:37The Viet Cong fielded three formations of divisional strength
33:41all within 75 miles of Saigon.
33:46Countrywide,
33:48they also had 30 independent main force battalions
33:51and more than 60 regional and local battalions.
33:56Altogether,
33:57the equivalent of 10 divisions.
34:09During 1967,
34:11American fighter bombers would fly 53,000 attack sorties
34:15against the Ho Chi Minh Trail.
34:20Their aim was to cut off the flow of forces and weapons
34:24from the north to the southern guerrillas.
34:30In spite of the massive scale of the bombing campaign,
34:34it was having little real impact
34:37on the Viet Cong's build-up for the Tet Offensive.
34:42The area the bombers had to cover was vast
34:46and the Viet Cong were experts at camouflage.
34:53In the month of July, 1967,
34:58480 trucks made the long and arduous journey
35:01from North Vietnam to the south.
35:04By the end of the year,
35:06traffic would soar to 3,000 trucks a month.
35:10In fact,
35:11on the eve of the offensive,
35:13many Viet Cong and North Vietnamese army units
35:16would have a surplus of modern weapons and equipment.
35:40The North Vietnamese army
35:42and most Viet Cong guerrillas
35:43were well-equipped with light infantry weapons,
35:46including the superb AK-47 Kalashnikov assault rifle.
35:56They also had a range of medium and heavy machine guns.
36:08Because American aircraft were always on the prowl,
36:11almost everything had to be carried by porters
36:14often at night.
36:16That meant the most valuable weapons
36:18were those that had the hitting power
36:20but could still be transported easily.
36:31The Soviet-made rocket-propelled grenade launcher,
36:34the RPG-2,
36:36and its replacement, the RPG-7,
36:38were lightweight and highly effective
36:41against armor and bunkers.
36:46Designed to be fired by one man,
36:49the rocket had a range of more than 500 meters.
36:57For much longer ranges,
36:59the Chinese 75-millimeter recoilless rifle,
37:02the Type 52,
37:03was an accurate and powerful weapon.
37:05It was able to fire high-explosive shells
37:08over 6,600 meters.
37:11And with a high-explosive armor-piercing shell,
37:14it was effective against armor at up to 800 meters.
37:20Its big disadvantage was that if its crew needed to move fast,
37:25it was a cumbersome weapon to manhandle.
37:32In the rugged terrain of South Vietnam,
37:35mortars were by far the most useful of all heavy weapons.
37:42The NLF and the North Vietnamese Army had thousands,
37:46and they were the perfect combination of hitting power,
37:49range, and portability.
38:12Although Viet Cong forces in the South
38:15were estimated by the Americans
38:16to have lost more than 60,000 men in 1967,
38:19they had still managed to keep up their overall numbers.
38:24Thousands of North Vietnamese Army troops
38:27had been sent down the Ho Chi Minh Trail
38:29to join the guerrillas,
38:31and they now accounted for more than one in five Viet Cong.
38:43The guerrillas also operated a draft in the villages.
38:47Because men younger than 20
38:49were not called up by the South Vietnamese Army,
38:51most teenagers were still at home
38:53and made up a huge pool of potential recruits.
39:08Local NLF guerrillas were given only a basic minimum
39:12of infantry training.
39:13Later on, though,
39:15if they were recruited to a main force unit,
39:17they could get up to a month of advanced instruction.
39:25There were also dozens of training centers
39:28spread all over South Vietnam,
39:31running long courses for squad and platoon leaders,
39:34operators of crew-served weapons,
39:36and radio men.
39:46To make sure the guerrillas understood
39:48what they were fighting for,
39:50all training courses included political instruction.
39:59Most Viet Cong attacks planned for the Tet Offensive
40:02were to be led by elite sapper commandos.
40:05Their job would be to launch the initial assaults,
40:09blasting their way into enemy headquarters and bases.
40:16Most sappers were part of well-trained main force battalions,
40:21but for Tet,
40:22the Viet Cong would also heavily rely on local sapper units,
40:26men and women recruited inside the cities.
40:30Many drove pedicabs,
40:32cyclos and taxis,
40:33or were chauffeurs and delivery men,
40:36and knew their way around the streets
40:38like no one else could.
40:47During the year,
40:49as casualties had mounted
40:50under the intense pressure
40:51of the American onslaught,
40:53the morale of the Viet Cong
40:55had suffered badly.
40:59But news of the planned general offensive
41:02quickly revived the confidence of the guerrillas.
41:05Political officers worked hard
41:07to persuade the troops
41:08that the campaign would bring the victory
41:11they had fought so long to win.
41:17In the run-up to Tet,
41:19the rate of desertion from Viet Cong units
41:22fell away almost to nothing.
41:41By late 1967,
41:44there were almost half a million
41:45American military personnel
41:47in South Vietnam.
41:56Of these,
41:57only one in seven
41:59were combat troops.
42:00The rest were the support personnel
42:02needed to run a military machine
42:04that relied on high-tech weaponry
42:07and consumed vast amounts of supplies.
42:13By now,
42:14American forces in Vietnam
42:16were expending 45,000 tons of ammunition
42:20and burning 60 million gallons of fuel
42:23every month.
42:27Almost everything came from the United States,
42:30and when it arrived in Vietnam,
42:32there was a massive problem
42:33of storage and distribution.
42:36Huge numbers of men
42:37were tied up
42:38just handling the supply traffic.
42:51protecting the dozens of big American installations
42:54scattered all over the country
42:56and securing major road links
42:58was another enormous drain on manpower.
43:05During 1967,
43:07the new American emphasis on pacification
43:10had led to more attention than ever
43:12being paid to improving
43:13the South Vietnamese armed forces.
43:22The armed forces
43:24now numbered
43:25more than 340,000 soldiers,
43:27and there were also
43:28nearly 300,000 regional troops
43:31and other militia.
43:37The South Vietnamese
43:38also had a small navy
43:40for coastal and river patrols
43:42and an increasingly effective air force.
43:50Its pilots were now flying
43:52a quarter of all combat sorties
43:53inside South Vietnam.
44:09The South Vietnamese army
44:11had divided the country
44:12into four tactical zones,
44:14one for each army corps.
44:20The most northerly zones
44:22each deployed two divisions.
44:24while the zones further south
44:27each had three.
44:29The South Vietnamese air force
44:31had five fighter squadrons
44:33and the navy
44:34a force of coastal patrol boats.
44:39The Joint General Staff's reserve
44:42was an airborne division
44:43and two marine brigades.
44:49For easy coordination,
44:51the American military assistance
44:53command Vietnam
44:54had created a marine amphibious force
44:57and two field forces
44:58to match three of the South Vietnamese
45:01army's tactical zones.
45:07All together,
45:08the forces deployed
45:10two marine and seven army divisions,
45:13two brigades,
45:14an armoured cavalry regiment
45:16and a special forces group.
45:22As well as the Americans,
45:24there were two Korean army divisions
45:26and a marine brigade,
45:28three Australian battalions,
45:30and contingents from New Zealand,
45:32the Philippines,
45:33and Thailand.
45:45During 1967,
45:47the Americans had launched
45:48their first combat operations
45:50in the extreme south of Vietnam.
45:53Up to then,
45:54the maze of rivers and canals
45:56in the Mekong Delta
45:57had been left
45:58to the South Vietnamese Army.
46:08Now the Mobile Riverine Force,
46:10a brigade of the U.S. 9th Division,
46:12had moved in
46:13to help fight the NLF
46:14for control
46:15of the richest rice-producing area
46:17in Vietnam.
46:33The Mobile Riverine Force
46:35was unique in the U.S. Army.
46:38Not since the American Civil War
46:40had the army deployed
46:41a completely amphibious force.
46:48It had its own base,
46:50a man-made island.
46:57Navy boats carried the troops
46:59into action
46:59and provided escorts.
47:04Heavy firepower
47:06was carried by armored vessels
47:07named monitors
47:08after their Civil War forebears.
47:15During the Tet offensive,
47:17the Mobile Riverine Force
47:19would see heavy fighting.
47:30In the Mekong Delta
47:32and the other heavily populated parts
47:34of South Vietnam,
47:35the government army
47:36would bear the brunt
47:38of the Viet Cong's
47:39planned defensive.
47:42Some South Vietnamese formations,
47:44Ranger, Marine,
47:45and Airborne units,
47:47and a handful of infantry divisions
47:48were professional,
47:50dedicated,
47:50and well-led.
47:51They knew their battleground
47:53and their enemy.
48:03But six of the army's
48:0511 divisions
48:06were in poor shape,
48:07suffering from corrupt
48:09and incompetent officers,
48:11desertion,
48:12and obsolete equipment.
48:31At the center
48:32of American military doctrine
48:34was the idea
48:35that troops
48:36should be maneuvered
48:37to fix the enemy
48:38in position
48:38so that firepower
48:39could be unleashed
48:40to destroy him.
48:53In defense, too,
48:55heavy firepower
48:56played a critical part.
48:57Every American infantry division
48:59in Vietnam
49:00could call on
49:01massive support
49:02from aircraft
49:03and sometimes
49:04from long-range artillery.
49:10Divisions had
49:11their own artillery as well,
49:12mostly 105-millimeter weapons,
49:14and the divisions
49:15always set up fire bases
49:17before every operation.
49:25Each company
49:27also had its own mortars.
49:36Tanks were used
49:37by almost every American division
49:39in Vietnam.
49:40The most important
49:41tank unit
49:42was the 11th Armored Cavalry Brigade.
49:49All of them used
49:51the M48,
49:52a 44-ton vehicle
49:53with a 90-millimeter gun.
49:58In spite of early doubts
50:00about how tanks
50:01might fare in Vietnam,
50:02their firepower
50:03and armor
50:04were invaluable
50:05for securing roads
50:06and escorting convoys.
50:14The Marines
50:15also deployed
50:16the Antos,
50:17a weapon originally designed
50:19as a tank destroyer.
50:20The Antos
50:21mounted six
50:22recoilless rifles
50:23and during the Tet battles
50:25would prove invaluable
50:26for clearing buildings
50:27and destroying fortifications.
50:42of all the armored vehicles
50:44deployed in Vietnam,
50:45the most useful by far
50:47was the M113
50:48armored fighting vehicle,
50:50known to American troops
50:51as the track.
50:57The M113
50:59of all the armored vehicles
50:59it was so vulnerable
51:00to mines
51:00that its crew
51:02usually sat on top,
51:03but it was extremely
51:04heavily armed.
51:08Tracks mounted
51:09several weapons,
51:09including at least
51:11one .50 caliber machine gun,
51:13a weapon too heavy
51:14to carry on foot.
51:21The .50 was incredibly
51:23destructive,
51:24able to cut a tree
51:25in half
51:26hundreds of yards away.
51:35The weight of firepower
51:36that a track could deliver
51:38and the vast amounts
51:39of ammunition
51:40it could carry
51:40saved American units
51:42from being overrun
51:43time and time again.
51:50One weapon highly valued
51:52by the crews
51:52of armored vehicles
51:53and by foot soldiers
51:55was the M79
51:56grenade launcher
51:57called the Duper
51:58from its sound.
52:05The Duper's range
52:06was up to 250 meters
52:08and its explosive shell
52:10would kill
52:10within 15 feet
52:11of the blast.
52:13a good grenadier
52:15could hit a target
52:16the size of an open window
52:17at 100 meters
52:18and fire a shell
52:19every three or four seconds.
52:40for the South Vietnamese
52:41conscript soldier
52:421967 had begun
52:44to show some signs
52:46that army life
52:47might become bearable.
52:49food and accommodation
52:50improved slightly.
52:55Amongst the professionals
52:56and the better units
52:57at least
52:58confidence was high.
53:02Many officers
53:04and NCOs
53:04had been at war
53:05for years
53:06and were both tough
53:07and tactically skilled.
53:12but in spite of this
53:13the desertion rate
53:15continued to rise.
53:21While the South Vietnamese
53:23conscript served
53:24four years
53:25the United States Army
53:26had stuck to its policy
53:28of bringing soldiers home
53:29after one 13-month
53:31tour of duty.
53:32It was effective
53:34in preventing
53:35combat fatigue
53:37but the decision
53:38was having
53:39a real impact
53:40on the battlefield.
53:44Units were
53:45constantly losing
53:46experienced men
53:47who were replaced
53:49by newcomers
53:50unable to spot
53:51booby traps
53:52and ambushes
53:53and not yet used
53:55to Vietnam's
53:56punishing climate.
54:01officers served
54:02only six months
54:03in combat
54:04and new arrivals
54:05had a very high chance
54:07of being killed
54:08or wounded.
54:09Drop back
54:10about five meters
54:11five meters
54:15American combat units
54:17in the field
54:18were almost always
54:19seriously under strength.
54:22With operations
54:23running all the time
54:24and the men
54:25perpetually short of sleep
54:27exhaustion
54:28was beginning
54:28to till on morale.
54:34So too was boredom
54:36and sometimes disillusion.
54:38Returning again
54:39and again
54:40to the same places
54:41on exhausting
54:42search and destroy
54:43sweeps
54:44often seemed
54:45utterly pointless.
55:12in the early autumn
55:13of 1967
55:14as communist forces
55:16were building up
55:17for the Tet Offensive
55:18the internal divisions
55:20that had plagued both sides
55:21throughout the war
55:22began to come to a head.
55:29In Hanoi
55:30200 senior officers
55:32were arrested
55:33in a crackdown
55:34on opponents
55:35of the Tet strategy.
55:39In Washington
55:40Robert McNamara
55:42the increasingly
55:42disillusioned
55:43defense secretary
55:44had lost the confidence
55:46of the president
55:46and would soon resign.
55:53As for Johnson himself
55:55he faced
55:56a presidential election
55:57late in 1968
55:58and there was already
56:00opposition from within
56:01his own Democratic Party.
56:07Meanwhile
56:08on the streets
56:09opposition
56:09to American involvement
56:11in Vietnam
56:11was growing more
56:12and more vocal.
56:18As Johnson's popularity
56:20slipped to an all-time low
56:21he clung to his belief
56:23that the public
56:24could be persuaded
56:25to back his conduct
56:26of the war.
56:32He embarked
56:33on a huge public relations campaign
56:35in which Washington
56:37and Saigon
56:38pumped out masses
56:39of information
56:39all supporting
56:41the line
56:41that the war
56:42was being won.
56:48President Johnson
56:49toured military bases
56:51around the country
56:52and even recalled
56:53General Westmoreland
56:54from Vietnam
56:55to add his weight
56:56to the argument.
57:02Speaking to one
57:03influential gathering
57:04after another
57:05Westmoreland
57:06assured his listeners
57:07that the end
57:07was almost in sight.
57:13What the general
57:14did not know
57:15was that halfway
57:16around the world
57:17in the forests
57:18and mountains
57:19of South Vietnam
57:20the first phase
57:21of the communist offensive
57:22had already begun.
58:05been a large part of the
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