www.csua.org/u/j97 -> en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tet_offensive
The offensive began spectacularly during celebrations of the Lunar New Year, and sporadic operations associated with the offensive continued into 1969. The Te>'t Offensive can be considered a crushing military defeat for the Communist forces, as neither the Viet Cong nor the North Vietnamese army achieved any of their tactical goals. Furthermore, the operational cost of the offensive was dangerously high, with the Viet Cong essentially crippled by the huge losses inflicted by South Vietnamese and other Allied forces.
social revolution which would begin in the countryside and end in a nationalist urban uprising. This strategy had informed an operational doctrine of gradual intensification of ground warfare, and the development of the Viet Cong's capacity for operational warfare. With the local RVN-aligned village elite as their primary enemy in a fundamentally social war, early efforts in the south were aimed at villages and large farms. The intent of this strategy was to swing the rural population to supporting the National Front for Liberation, thereby socially isolating the urban elite, and winning the allegiance of urban leftists and discontents. This form of war produced what amounted to a bloody stalemate where neither side was able to gain any real advantage over the other. The reaction of the rural population was often to flee the countryside for the cities as refugees. The involvement of US ground forces greatly changed the strategy of North Vietnam. Rather than any kind of revolutionary conflict or irregular war, the conflict turned into small-unit battles between regular army units on both sides. Starting in the 1950s, North Vietnam began sending units of its army south.
United States Marines became the first American combat troops to land in South Vietnam, adding to the 25,000 US military advisers already in place, and four days later President Johnson announced the number of US troops in Vietnam would be increased from 75,000 to 125,000. The combined forces of US infantry, artillery and air-power inflicted steady losses on the Viet Cong, but as these losses were consistently made up with replacements from North Vietnam, nothing really changed. From the American perspective, the first several years of the war involved an ever greater commitment of forces in the name of stabilizing the situation in Vietnam. The US Military and Defense Department told the public that the war was a matter of destroying the insurgency in the countryside. The military focused on "body counts" as a metric for progress in the destruction of the insurgency.
The high level commanders were convinced of their success, and were all too happy to share the opinion with reporters. the war would never be ended due to direct military action, but it would be reduced to such a low level that the ARVN could deal with any remaining problems. By late 1967 the momentum seemed to be with the US Unbeknownst to the leaders in the south, there was a growing body of politicians in the north that shared these views and called for dialog to end the war. This resulted in a massive purge, leading to the arrest and imprisonment of over 200 North Vietnamese officials. The US bombing campaign over North Vietnam had allowed the more extreme elements of the government to both whip up patriotic feeling and to crush any dissent within the ruling party.
Gip had long advocated primarily using guerrilla tactics against the US and South Vietnam, whereas Thanh had supported general main force action. Overriding Gip, the North Vietnamese leadership decided that the time was ripe for a major conventional offensive. They believed that the South Vietnamese government and the US presence were so unpopular in the South that a broad-based attack would spark a spontaneous uprising of the South Vietnamese population, which would enable the North to sweep to a quick, decisive victory.
South Vietnam to close those regions to American observation. Following this, a second phase of widely dispersed attacks by the Viet Cong directly into the major centers of the country would cause the collapse of the government and would prod the civilians into full-fledged revolt, and with the government overthrown, the Americans and other allied forces would have no choice but to evacuate, leading to phase three attacks by the Viet Cong and PAVN against elements of the isolated foreign forces. The offensive involved simultaneous military action in most of the larger cities in South Vietnam and attacks on major US bases, with particular efforts focused on the cities of Saigon and Hue>'.
The Khe Sanh assault drew North Vietnamese forces away from the offensive into the cities, but North Vietnam considered the attack necessary to protect their supply lines to the south.
edit ARVN and US readiness In the days immediately preceding the Offensive, the preparedness of both the ARVN and the US military were relatively relaxed. North Vietnam had announced in October that it would observe a seven-day truce from January 27 to February 3, 1968, in honor of the Te>'t holiday, and the South Vietnamese army made plans to allow recreational leave for a large part of its force. US and ARVN military intelligence observed signs of a major military buildup in the months before the Offensive.
n Bin Phu2 in the 1950s, which had preceded scheduled negotiations as a means of improving the Communist bargaining position. While military intelligence saw that offensive operations were being planned, it did not detect that the offensive would be national in scale and aimed at cities.
Enlarge Map of South Vietnam showing some of the major targets of the Te>'t Offensive. Also shown is Khe Sanh, where the attack predated Te>'t. Fighting began to the south on January 29 as a number of Viet Cong units attacked prematurely in four provincial towns. The rest of the NLF/PAVN attacks began on the night of January 30-1.
Rather, they had six primary targets within the city: the headquarters of the ARVN, President Thieu's office, the American Embassy, a Vietnamese Air Base and their naval headquarters, and the National Broadcasting Station. A total of 35 battalions attacked these targets, Many of the troops were undercover Viet Cong who lived and worked in the city. The radio station was considered an important target by the Communists. Ch Minh announcing the liberation of Saigon and calling for a "General Uprising." The building was taken and held for six hours, but they were unable to broadcast as the power had been cut off as soon as the station was attacked. By early February, the Communist high command realized that none of their military objectives were being met, and they halted any further attacks on fortified positions. Sporadic fighting continued in Saigon until March 7 Some sections of the city were left badly damaged by the combat and US retaliatory air and artillery strikes in particular.
US Embassy was especially significant in the public's perception of the US military's control over the situation. At 2:45 AM on January 31, Nineteen Viet Cong commandos attacked the embassy. Although VC attacks had been taking place in Saigon for over an hour, the guards at the embassy had not been informed of this and had not been reinforced.
The few remaining American guards withdrew into the embassy building and locked the doors. Although the Viet Cong had an ample supply of explosives, they did not press their attack. Both officers in charge of the Viet Cong squad had been killed in the initial assault and the remaining guerrillas milled aimlessly around the grounds. Eventually American reinforcements arrived, and in the morning, six hours after the attack began, MPs retook the embassy compound.
With the bodies of the dead Viet Cong still scattered about and amid rubble from the badly damaged embassy building, General Westmoreland gave a press conference inside the compound. He assured the skeptical press that the enemy had never entered "the embassy itself," and spoke of the allies returning to the offensive.
Nguyen Van Lem was captured by South Vietnamese national police, who identified him as the captain of a Viet Cong assassination and revenge p...
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