Jack Heslin
GENERAL LY TONG BA COMMENTS ON THE DEFENSE OF CU CHI 1975
"I was commander of the ARVN 25th Division in Cu Chi. I was chief commander of ARVN armor before then. Then at the end of 1974, they asked me to take command of the 25th Division, I replaced a Col. Toan, who had been commander of the Division. I was five months, then, with the 25th Division.
The 18th Division was fighting at Xuan Loc with Le Minh Dao. We were blocking the highway from Saigon to Tay Ninh. On the morning of the 28th of April, the early morning, on the 29th I lead my last task force in Ben Tre, but I had no more troops, nothing more to do, the rest of my men were spread out. I wanted to group my remaining forces together. I wanted to put what was left of my division together and continue to fight. I asked General Toan to let me put my division back together, give it back to me, and the Communists continued to attack us. But our ARVN soldiers they didn't worry about the jungle, we continued to fall back and to fight them. We continued to fight them as we backed up.
One tactic I applied, I just moved back, I said don't worry about it, just do it, and make them pay dearly for everything.
My men continued to try to maneuver and fight and counterattack. But the soldiers were finally infected by the lying and psychologically eventually they were worn down in the fighting. The soldiers had a kind of sickness, a mental sickness. They were infected by the idea, the soldiers of ARVN, they had been lied to. They were in a bad situation. To fight a good war, they could not be led by a man like General Thieu. Americans were not helping them anymore and their own government was not helping them either.
Some of my soldiers finally started to run."
Jack Heslin <jgheslin@gmail.com >
Carolina Shores, NC 28467 , NC United States - Tuesday, January 20, 2026 at 15:54:20 (EST)