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derivative filename/jpeg
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363-04728.pdf
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Digital Object Identifier
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363-04728
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Title
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Marines' Great Effort: Securing Da Nang
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Description
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Article published in the New York Herald Tribune about securing the area around Đà Nẵng Air Base and the difficulties the Marine Corps faced due to guerilla warfare
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AI Usage Disclosure
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Draft transcripts were automatically generated via Google Document AI and are currently under review. Please report significant errors to Archives & Special Collections at archives@unl.edu.
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Transcript
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New York Herald Tribune
Wednesday, January 19, 1966
Viet Nam: Past and Present
Marines' Great Effort: Securing Da Nang
By Beverly Deepe
A Special Correspondent
DA NANG, South Viet Nam.
Last fall, the battle cry of
the U. S. Marines here was:
"We'll be in Hoi An by New
Year's Day 1966." Today,
they estimate it, will be New
Year's 1968.
Hoi An is a provincial cap-
ital, only 15 miles south of
the strategic air base of Da
Nang. The change in the Ma-
rines mood illustrates the
changing role of American
troops in Viet Nam - and
some of their problems.
"We
Je could
easily have
fought our way to Hoi An,"
one Marine said recently.
"But then, we would have had
to fight our way back. The es-
sential problem of this war
is not moving your front lines
torward. It is keeping your
rear covered."
units; Vietnamese paramili-
tary troops maintain security
in the villages; Vietnamese ci-
vilian teams distribute goods,
wage psychological warfare,
take censuses, and attempt to
undo the Viet Cong's existing
political devices and to bring
the villagers to the govern-
ment's side.
This is the last article in a four-part
series on the Viet Nam war appraising its
progress thus far and its prospects.
"The role of the U. S. Ma- Regional Forces company and
rines is like an egg," an of-
ficial said. "Our front lines,
on the rim of the area, are
the shell-but like a shell, the
lines can be broken. The vital
installation-the Da Nang air-
base is the yolk, and we also
defend that. The white is the
countryside, which we are try-
ing to pacify and solidify."
On Oct. 18, the Vietnamese
forces began their effort,
using one headquarters com-
pany and four understrength
line companies of the 59th
Regional Forces Battalion. A
The key to the proble.n lies civilian cadre of 327 persons
in getting and keeping the was moved in from provincial
support of the rural popula-headquarters. The Vietnam-
tion. Without it, most author-
ities believe the war could go
on for years.
So it was decided to halt the
Marines' advance until the
Vietnamese could win over the
local population. The decision
brought dissent from within
Marine Corps ranks. and
sneers from Army colonels,
who claimed "the Marines are
afraid to go out and find the
Viet Cong." But gradually, the
Marine effort outside Da Nang,
under the direction of Marine
commander Maj. Gen. Lewis
Walt, began to dovetail with
the work of the Vietnamese
government.
3D DIMENSION
"In a conventional war,
progress is measured by an
advancing front line," one
official explained. "But in this
war our outlying positions are
constant. Progress must be
measured in the third dimen-
sion. We must go down into
the population to dig out the
Viet Cong infrastructure and
then rebuild the local anti-
Communist government."
The result of this co-ordi-
nated effort was the Five
Mountain Villages Campaign,
less than 10 miles southwest
of Da Nang and 15 miles from
Hoi An. It is the principal cur-
rent pacification program and
a pilot case for the future.
"If this plan doesn't suc-
ceed here, it's not going to
succeed anywhere else in the
country," an official said.
"We'll really be in serious
trouble then."
The project already has run
into some serious trouble.
The five villages of the
campaign are subdivided into
19 hamlets, covering a 20-
square-kilometer area. In the
complex dwell 42,000 people,
of whom about 7 per cent
are believed to be related to
Viet Cong. Snuggled among
lush rice paddies, the villages
are surrounded by the five
peaks of mountains contain-
ing gray and salmon-colored
marble. "These marble moun-
tains would make a great
tourist attraction, but you'd
be killed going out there,"
one Marine said.
The pacification campaign
has three components: U. S.
Marines are assigned to se-
cure the outer limits of the
area, patrolling to prevent
the invasion by Communist
ese commander put them
through a two-week retrain-
ing course. They were joined
by five Vietnamese People's
Action Teams (PATS), of 10
persons each, who were re-
sponsible for census taking
and other activities.
To each village, the Viet-
namese commander sent one
one People's Action Team. In
each of the 19 hamlets, he put
a civilian cadre team."
"During the third week of
the campaign, a 50-man Viet
Cong platoon broke through
the Marine blocking position.
They were in our area shoot-
ing things up. They hit us
hard," an official related.
"Five Regional Force troop-
ers and several cadremen were
killed. Each of our armed
companies was understrength,
so we had 15-man platoons
where we should have had 35
men. Fighting against 50 Viet
Cong, of course, we lose
against those odds.
"Until that we were just
beginning to get the confi-
dence of the people-but after
that, the people clammed up
and wouldn't tell us anything.
And it also hurt the morale of
our cadre. One whole 11-man
team took off-but the district
chief talked them into coming
back," the official went on.
"Then, four nights later,
the same Viet Cong platoon
hit us again. They slipped in
between two Marine patrols,
attacked the Regional Force
and the fact that they were
not natives of the villages in
which they were working.
The PATS-equipped, paid,
and trained for political ac-
tivity and intelligence work by
an arm of the U. S. Central
Intelligence Agency-had their
own troubles. They were bet-
ter armed than the Vietnamese
troops, and the local com
mander wanted to use them
for military security. They re-
fused. One team defected and
another had to be transferred
headquarters unit of 17 men, because of local conflicts.
killed several civilian cadre
and kidnaped two women
working with a drama unit.
We haven't seen the women
since. One of the American
Marines saw action from 50
yards away but he couldn't
open up with his machine gun
he would have killed more
friendlies than enemies.
"Of course, the Marines
can't stop all small-unit infil.
tration. It would take Marines
shoulder-to-shoulder to do
that. And once you had that,
the Viet Cong would mortar
them from across the river,
which they've already started
doing," he said.
Since the late November
action, the Vietnamese and the
Marines have slighty rein-
forced the area. Now the
Marines are not only holding
the outer perimeter by exten-
sive patrolling, they also are
responsible for the securing of
the civilian cadre in 11 of the
19 hamlets. Vietnamese troops
defend the remaining eight.
By
TRY AGAIN
"we
mid-December,
started pacifying again and
things were moving slow, but
good," the official said. "The
people began giving us good
intelligence and were turning
in some Viet Cong. For the
first time, on a Sunday after-
noon, families from Da Nang
would come to the villages to
visit their relatives. More than
100 families moved back into
the area-but none of the
people were of draft age."
On one night in late Decem-
ber, however, the Viet Cong
launched four harassing at-
tacks. They hit the central
command post with mortars
and struck another People's
Action Team, killing several.
Gradually, the cadre force
fell from 331 to 304. Besides
attrition, there were substan-
tial problems with the cadre.
because of inadequate training
"The biggest headache is
that we can't move our Viet-
namese troops and cadre out
20-square-kilometer
of this
collection of hamlets until we
have villagers here who can
defend the area," the official
said. "There's not one young
man here between the ages of
10 and 38 whom we can re-
cruit. We've lost the middle
generation, and no one has
begun to find an answer to
that problem."
Before the Marines reach
Hoi An-with their backs pro-
tected-80 square kilometers of
land must be pacified. At that,
the Marine estimate of New
Year's Day, 1968, is not far
away.
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Date
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1966, Jan. 10
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Subject
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Đà Nẵng (Vietnam); Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Naval operations, American; Mặt trận dân tộc giải phóng miền nam Việt Nam; United States. Marine Corps; Guerrilla warfare; Security systems
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Location
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Đà Nẵng, South Vietnam
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Coordinates
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16.0438; 108.1997
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Container
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B4, F6
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Format
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newspaper clippings
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Collection Number
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MS 363
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Collection Title
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Beverly Deepe Keever, Journalism Papers
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Creator
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Keever, Beverly Deepe
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Copyright Information
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These images are for educational use only. To inquire about usage or publication, please contact Archives & Special Collections.
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Publisher
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Archives & Special Collections, University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries
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Language
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English
