Friday, April 28, 1972
Red Advance Chills A Pacified Province
BONG SON, Vietnam (AP) --Few areas in Vietnam have seen bloodier and costlier efforts to keep out the Communists than Binh Dinh. The hard-won achievements of Americans, Koreans and South Vietnamese in this coastal province of a million people now threaten to crumble overnight.North Vietnamese troops have methodically pushed down from their mountain hideouts into at least three densely populated coastal districts. The advance elements have reached the doorsteps of the district towns of Bong Son and Tan Quan, and they have been almost unopposed.The South Vietnamese Army units are sitting apprehensively in a handful of dilapidated base camps from which American troops once launched continuous operations into the countryside. But there was no sign of any offensive patrols today.As a result, no one knows how many enemy there are or where they are."They are coming cross the river, they are coming down the hills, they are everywhere. That I know." Said Maj. George H. Watkins of Bellaire, Tex., the American adviser to the Bong Son district.Watkins said his district chief told him today he expects to die in Bong Son."I'll stay with the district chief," the young adviser said.South of Bong Son lies Landing Zone Salem, knocked out by a 12-hour enemy attack. At noon today the ammunition dump was exploding, the flashes easily visible from a helicopter 2,000 feet above.Americans reported the base was lost in the early afternoon, all its artillery destroyed in the fighting. Some survivors were trying to make their way out to safe ground. There were no Americans at the base.The highway lifeline to the northern districts of Binh Dinh -Route 1 -has been severed by an enemy who does not even bother to blow the bridges. He has just been chasing away the confused, isolated defenders.Civilians attempting to flee south from Bong Son were stopped this morning at North Vietnamese checkpoints. Men of military age, some of them deserters from government units, were reported taken into the hills. The women and children were sent back to the town.Except for the attack on Salem, there have been no big battles since the fall last week of Hoai An district, west of Bong Son. The Vietnamese army apparently is not taking the fight to the enemy."Local commanders seem to have the hope that everything will go away," an American close to the scene said."It's like a typhoon watch. Everyone knows it is coming, everyone knows it does damage. But you always hope it will hit the next town, not you."The situation is tragic for tens of thousands of local militiamen, schoolteachers and village officials who committed themselves to the government cause. They were persuaded to take a stand against the Communist after American and Korean troops broke the backs of the same North Vietnamese units that are now pouring back down from the hills.The local militia volunteers and government workers were promised that the North Vietnamese would be held in the hills no matter what the cost. This pledge is not being kept. The Vietnamese army in Binh Dinh shows no intention of stemming the North Vietnamese floodtide. Thousands of bewildered militiamen have given up. Some are throwing their weapons away and trying to get over the passes to the south.About 1,000 men are missing in Hoai An, and thousands of others in Bong Son, Tan Quan and Phu My districts are fighting desperately for their lives without any hope of help. Their destiny can only be death or capture.Except for smoldering Salem, northern Binh Dinh looks almost placidly peaceful from the air. Nowhere can be seen the armadas of helicopters and fighter-bombers that characterized the war in the province up to a year ago. The government response seems paralyzed."The North Vietnamese army is psyching us out," said one American adviser. "They have limited forces. We need a victory badly. We just can't convince Saigon of the importance of this."One embattled district chief has asked five times for reinforcements. Each time he has been told that none is available.But if massive American air support and naval gunfire were provided from the other battle fronts, it would be hard to use.Few targets could be pinpointed. Since nobody is looking for the enemy, nobody knows where he is. It is a throwback to 1965 before American combat troops arrived, when the government held only a few district headquarters in Binh Dinh and the enemy was "everywhere out there and sometimes even in here," as an adviser at the time put it.The North Vietnamese are probably in a hurry to occupy the land and get back among the people because the rice crop is ripe and ready for harvesting. Unlike previous years, the Binh Dinh countryside looks untouched by war, and everywhere farmers can be seen reaping the harvest, apparently oblivious to the worsening war.American here believe that if the North Vietnamese get a good portion of the present crop, it would enormously relieve the strain on their supply lines stretching all the way from Laos across towering mountains to the coast. In Hoai An district alone, several thousand tons of rice are ready for harvest when the Communist take over.The immediate future of Binh Dinh looked glum to everyone interviewed in the past few days. From shopkeepers in the city of Qui Nhon, who are putting up sandbags and hiding their family treasures, to the lonely handful of American advisers at Bong Son, the picture is the grimmest since 1965.In a few months that year the Communist gained control of most of the province.It took a succession of American infantry units to turn the tide.The few Americans left in Binh Dinh agree that it will take far more effort to do the job again than is being shown now.An even bigger question is whether it will ever be possible to win back the confidence of the people who trusted allied protection."Red Advance Chills a Pacified Province", by Peter Arnett and Horst Faas, (AP) published in the Pacific Stars and Stripes on Friday, April 28, 1972 and reprinted from European and Pacific Stars and Strips, a Department of Defense publication copyright, 2002 European and Pacific Stars and Stripes.