Meditations on the Vietnam War: Tet 1968


In late 1967 President Lyndon Johnson summoned General Westmoreland to Washington to address a public relations issue.  Support for the war in Vietnam was beginning to seriously waiver.  The news media, academia, and some prominent religious leaders were turning against the war.  Student anti-war protests were growing and garnering more attention.  Johnson, concerned about re-election in 1968, needed the general to work the public sphere and put a positive spin on the progress in the war.  Westmoreland's message was essentially that the US was winning the war and it would be won within about two years.

At the same time, Hanoi launched a series of attacks along the South Vietnam border with Cambodia and Laos in an attempt to draw US forces away from Saigon, Hue, and other population centers.  This was the first phase of a new North Vietnamese strategic plan.  As we have seen, after lengthy debate, the Politburo leaders felt that the time was right for a "national uprising" in South Vietnam.  For a variety of reasons, the North Vietnamese believed that a strong, nationwide attack primarily targeting ARVN forces and US military command centers would lead to a revolt among the South Vietnamese population, mass desertion in ARVN forces, and the fall of the Saigon government.

Neither side got it right.

Johnson beckoned his general to Washington in order to accentuate the positive for the American people. “Westmoreland performed perfectly throughout, never uttering a gloomy word.  ‘The ranks of the Vietcong are thinning steadily,' he assured a gathering at the Pentagon, and he promised a National Press Club audience that ‘we have reached an important point when the end begins to come into view.’  And he defied the Communists to stage a massive attack.  ‘I hope they try something,’ he told a Time interviewer, ‘because we are looking for a fight.’” (Karnow, page 514)

While the expectation for peace within the foreseeable future was promoted in America, the Politburo in Hanoi had grand expectations as well.  “[Newly elected South Vietnamese President] Thieu maintained himself in power…only by a system of ‘purchased support.’  Thieu could retain power only by holding the allegiance of the top military leaders.  These men were chosen for their political loyalty, not their soldierly competence, a practice guaranteeing corruption and incompetence.” (Davidson, page 532)    

Saigon held little loyalty or control over the country outside the major population centers; large sections of the rural population, coerced largely by family ties with the Viet Cong as well as by terrorism and bribes, supported (or at least tolerated) the VC.  Ho Chi Minh and his closest advisers believed that the people were ready to revolt against the South Vietnamese regime and that ARVN units would desert to their side if given the chance through a massive nationwide offensive.  US intelligence reported the build-up of PAVN forces in late-1967, but failed to acknowledge it politically or publicly.

“Westmoreland made a serious error in not warning the American people of the possibility of such an offensive.  He was aware of the buildup before the holiday, although the widespread attacks throughout South Vietnam had caught him by surprise.  His briefing officers at the Five O’Clock Follies often gave newsmen the idiot treatment and that did not enhance his prestige with the media.” (Morrison, page 403)

Planning for the Tet offensive began in May 1967.  The North Vietnamese called it Tong Cong Kich, Tong Khai Nghia (TCK-TKN), “General Offensive, General Uprising.”  In July Giap’s strategic adversary, General Nguyen Chi Thanh died either from a heart attack or from wounds suffered in a B-52 attack on his headquarters, depending on which side interprets the event.  By default, General Vo Nguyen Giap became the supreme military leader in North Vietnam.  As things turned out, this relatively unknown exchange of power was perhaps the turning point in America’s Vietnam War.

Giap’s plan was an evolution of phased attacks.  In Phase One North Vietnamese regular troops were to attack the border areas and remote portions of South Vietnam to draw American forces away from the population centers.  Phase Two would see the Viet Cong forces, reinforced and trained, attack the ARVN bases, American headquarters, all major towns and cities nationwide.  Main US combat forces were to be avoided.  The sheer magnitude of the attack was meant to demoralize ARVN troops and confuse the Americans, who would be tied down by NVA operations in the first phase.  Phase Two would be widespread assaults mostly by VC forces tied to a large-scale propaganda campaign designed to encourage ARVN desertion and revolt by the population. Phase Three would be a massive conventional attack upon the demoralized and disorganized ARVN and US forces.  This phase actually began before the other two were completed.  The large-scale threat to the marine base at Khe Sanh was the opening move of what was to become a nationwide set-piece battle.

But, just as the Johnson administration miscalculated how to best prepare the American people to support the war effort in 1968, Giap’s ambitious plan was based on a number of miscalculations.  “Like Napoleon and Hitler before them, the North Vietnamese had crossed a bridge of reality and were lost in that seductive but ultimately destructive, land where fantasy has become fact.  To this fantasy was added an almost mystical faith in the efficiency and power of their concept of the ‘Great Uprising.’  To Ho and the others the Great Uprising of August 1945 was a particularly Vietnamese phenomenon which in a few days saw the Vietnamese people rise up and sweep the Vietminh to total victory over the Japanese and the French.” (Davidson, page 448) 

“The Tet offensive had actually started in September 1967, when Communist troops launched a series of attacks against a string of isolated American garrisons scattered across the highlands of central Vietnam and along the Laotian and Cambodian frontiers.  Westmoreland had just told a group of American correspondents in Saigon that ‘a sense of despair’ pervaded enemy ranks as their losses mounted, but his description of them scarcely fit the facts.  Deployed in regiments and even divisions, the Communist forces were equipped with superb new Soviet automatic rifles, flamethrowers, and backpack radios as well as mortars, rockets, and big antiaircraft guns, and they struck with extraordinary precision.  Their first target was Conthien, a small U.S. Marine fire base located atop a barren hill south of the porous boundary separating the two Vietnams.  Then they hit Locninh and Songbe, a pair of American outposts near the Cambodian border north of Saigon.  And, in early November, they began the largest engagement of the war to date, a battle that raged for twenty-two days around Dakto, a dense jungle region in the mountains above Pleiku.” (Karnow, page 538)

Next came the Siege of Khe Sanh, which NVA forces attacked on January 21, 1968, some ten days before the “official” start of the Tet offensive.  Once again, according to Davidson, this was neither a primary attack nor a diversion.  The NVA attacks on the marine base were intended to set up the capture of the base as Phase Two gave way to Phase Three of TCK-TKN.  Visions of Dien Bien Phu danced in Giap’s head.  The persistent attacks on Khe Sanh were to sync up with later victories elsewhere in South Vietnam to deliver America a demoralizing defeat just as the French experienced in 1954.

“The Communist troops hammered the marine positions with rocket, artillery, mortar, and small-arms fire.  The ammunition depot and fuel supplies blew up.  There was a fierce fight on Hill 861 which the marines finally cleared with heavy casualties on both sides.  On the same day, an NVA battalion overran Khe Sanh village, which was about two miles from the base. 

“On 21 January, General Westmoreland ordered Operation Niagara to be executed.  This operation, which had been in the planning and reconnaissance stage since early January, envisioned that Khe Sanh would be defended not only by the marine garrison, but by a mighty waterfall of firepower composed of B-52’s tactical air, artillery, and mortars. This awesome striking power would be targeted by an expanded intelligence effort utilizing all intelligence collection devices, included newly arrived acoustic and seismic sensors.” (Davidson, page 558)

“On 5 February, an enemy battalion attacked Hill 861A in concert with heavy shelling of the combat base.  The NVA unit penetrated the defensive perimeter of the marine outpost on 861A, but the marines counterattacked and drove the Communists out of the position, killing over 100 of them.

“On 7 February, the Special Forces camp at Lang Vei, five miles southwest of Khe Sanh, was destroyed by an NVA battalion using Russian PT-76 light tanks, the first enemy use of armor in South Vietnam.  On 8 February, a combat outpost of the 1st Battalion, 9th Marines, southwest of Khe Sanh, was partially overrun by an NVA battalion.  Marine counterattacks, supported by heavy artillery fire, restored the position and killed 150 NVA soldiers.  Giap’s plan for the reduction of the marine combat base was now evident.  The 325C Division would drive in the marine outposts to the north of the base and attack the camp from the north and west.  The 304th Division would attack along the axis of Lang Vei / Khe Sanh village and then make a final assault on the base from the south and the east.

“But something went wrong with the plan.  Around 10 February, Giap began to withdraw NVA units from the Khe Sanh area and from other portions of the DMZ to reinforce his beleaguered troops at Hue.  Two battalions of the 29th Regiment of the NVA 325C Division and the entire 24th Regiment of the NVA 304th Division were moved from Khe Sanh to Hue, a total of five battalions.  From 8 to 22 February, the NVA continued their pressure on Khe Sanh using artillery, mortars, machine guns, and snipers, but there were no major ground assaults.  On 23 February, Khe Sanh combat base received the record number of incoming rounds for a single day – 1,307.  Colonel Lownds believed that a major NVA ground assault was imminent, and he was right.

“During the early evening hours of 29 February, the acoustic and seismic sensors along Highway 9 indicated a major troop movement by the NVA 304th Division toward the combat base from the east.  Immediately the fire support control center called for maximum fire against the area.  The resulting United States firepower was in truth a Niagara of explosives and steel as artillery, radar-equipped fighters, and B-52 bombers struck at the NVA attackers.  At 2130 on 29 February, a battalion of the NVA 304th Division assaulted the area held by the ARVN 37th Ranger Battalion.  Hit by the concentrated firepower, the attack was smashed before it got to the defensive wire.  A second attempt by another NVA battalion at 2330 was similarly destroyed.  A final attack launched at 0315, 1 March, met the same fate.  This regimental-size attack was the largest ground assault of the Khe Sanh siege.” (Davidson, pp. 559 – 561)

“…Giap intended Khe Sanh to be the climactic battle of his campaign, which was to follow the successful execution of Phase II (the attack on the cities).  Giap realized in early February, however, that Phase II had failed abjectly.  The necessary foundation for his climatic Phase III battle, therefore, had failed to materialize, so he changed his mind about overrunning Khe Sanh.” (Davidson, page 564)

Westmoreland was partially insightful as to Giap’s plan.  The American general thought Khe Sanh was the main attack and that all the rest of the Tet offensive was primarily an attempt to draw US marines away from Khe Sanh to respond to other North Vietnamese assaults – so that the weakened base could then be more heavily attacked and captured.  Such an outcome would have been an American disaster, a Little Big Horn for the 20th century.  Westmoreland was right to see the importance of Khe Sanh to Giap, but he did not understand that the base’s importance was not in the present but in the future and dependent upon other victories that never came as the North pursued victory in TCK-TKN.  Until the rest of South Vietnam was in chaos, Khe Sanh was a side show.  

The 6,000 marines stationed in Khe Sanh were expecting a much larger attack that never came.  From a strategic perspective this was a victory of North Vietnam.  By not reducing the size of the garrison, American troops were actually out of position and could have been better used against other, more threatening, attacks.  But, as it turned out, this did not matter.  The Tet offensive would go down as a brutal strategic military defeat for North Vietnam.  General Giap’s plan failed on almost every account, making Khe Sanh superfluous.  

The failure of Tet in 1968 was far from obvious in the first few days of its execution.  The sheer size of the offensive surprised everyone, including Westmoreland.  The American public was disturbed by the nationwide impact of the PAVN forces.  They had been told repeatedly the last few weeks that victory was at hand, that North Vietnam was suffering grievously.  And yet here they were, attacking literally everywhere.  It was shocking to middle America.

NLF and North Vietnamese units fought the Americans and ARVN for control of forty-four provincial capitals, five of six major cities, and sixty-four district capitals.  The most intense fighting lasted about two weeks, and most areas the Americans and the South Vietnamese repulsed the attackers.  The fighting lasted longest in the old imperial capital of Hue.  Vietcong troops captured Hue and held it for more than three weeks.  For the first ten days the U.S. commanders gathered reinforcements to retake the city.  During that time the pro-government citizens of Hue lived in terror.  After raising the NLF banner over the ancient citadel in the center of town, the revolutionaries released all of the inmates of the city jail, many of whom had been held for secretly helping the Vietcong.  The victors also went on a rampage of vengeance, gunning down more than two thousand civic leaders, policemen, and ordinary citizens whose neighbors turned them over to the revolutionaries.  When the American marines and ARVN forces finally retook the city on February 23, they found a moonscape of charred remains of wooden buildings, rotting corpses, and starving abandoned animals.” (Schulzinger, page 259)

For the first few days of February 1968, South Vietnam was up for grabs.  The entire country was under massive PAVN pressure.  Soon enough, however, the attacks were squelched by US and ARVN forces.  Only in Saigon and at Hue did heavy fighting continue after the first week.  These cities became the main events for the Tet offensive, with Hue taking center stage.  If Hue fell and Saigon remained under siege then Giap would have unleashed a far greater assault on Khe Sanh and win the war through the utter demoralization of American willpower.  As it was, the Viet Cong in Saigon and Hue were eventually wiped out, the assault on Khe Sanh never occurred, and yet, absurdly, America’s willpower to continue the war nevertheless dissolved at the precise moment when Giap’s plan was decisively beaten.

“The Vietcong achieved total surprise everywhere.  Even President Thieu took no significant action when he first learned the news because he did not believe his own intelligence reports.  At the time he was holding a reunion with his wife’s family in My Tho.

“Saigon’s early risers could not believe their eyes when Vietcong troops in palm-leafed hats and black rubber sandals established themselves in some of the city’s vlocks.  Few had believed the communists would launch an offensive against the cities and towns during the Tet holiday.  Urbanites were perfectly shocked because they had not seen much of the war.” (Morrison, page 389)

“A major battle was fought in Saigon February 11.  With the support of one United States unit, the South Vietnamese Rangers wiped out a high-level command post the Phu Lam communal temple.  After this battle, that cost the lives of six high-ranking communist officials, fighting in the city declined.

“Fighting resumed February 17, however, as a new series of attacks erupted.  Rockets caused heavy destruction at Tan Son Nhut and the nearby Military Assistance Command headquarters.  This fighting lasted until early March and was highlighted by bitter fighting inside Saigon and Cholon.

“In Washington, the Joint Chiefs urged President Johnson to authorize air strikes against Hanoi and Haiphong.  They also pressured him to call up the reserves, but McNamara approved only a 10,500 increase for Vietnam and refused to call up the reserves.  In early March, Westmoreland was still seeking 206,736 more men, but only got 22,000.

“After March 7 there was relative calm in Saigon that lasted until May 5 when fighting broke out again.  Countrywide the situation was greatly improved except in Hue where fighting still raged.  There the loss of civilians was high, including the massacre of approximately four thousand people who became victims of communist atrocities committed during the twenty-five days the city remained under their control.” (Morrison, page 393)

The most successful aspect of the PAVN Tet Offensive was the capture and control of large sections of the traditional imperial city of Hue.  “The Lunar New Year’s day passed without incident amid traditional celebrations.  But the North Vietnamese struck at 3:40 A.M. the following morning with fierce preparatory fire of rockets and mortars.  By the morning of the next day, despite desperate resistance, Hue had practically fallen under enemy control with the exception of the key military and governmental headquarters.  By 8:00 A.M. the flag of the National Liberation Front flew on the Midday Gate’s flagpole.

“The commander of the Vietnamese 1st Division ordered his troops to retake the city, and his forces were joined by available U.S. forces.  In addition, Brigadier General Ngo Quang Troung ordered the 9th Airborne Battalion back from Quang Tri.  With a United States airlift they landed at Mang Ca while others were brought in.  Tay Loc airfield inside the Citadel was retaken after two days of heavy fighting as United States Marines were placed on full alert.

“The communists had overrun the principle prison and had freed 2,000 prisoners. Some of whom were used as laborers while the others were given arms to replace combat losses.  The Vietcong quickly consolidated their control of the city.  They divided it for defense purposes, placing each section under control of a Revolutionary Committee.  Civilians were required to register with the committee and turn in weapons, ammunition and radios.  Many civilians were asked to report again and evidently were murdered, including those on the Vietcong’s black list.” (Morrison, page 395)

“The stubborn resistance of the communists inside the Citadel lasted until February 21 when their situation became desperate.  Three United States Air Cavalry battalions made a concerted drive against the La Chu area northwest of Hue and occupied it, thus severing all communications and re-supply activities between the Citadel and the outside.

“Two South Vietnamese Ranger battalions increased the strength of the attackers and the Imperial Court was retaken February 24 and the National Liberation Front’s flag was brought down, ripped to tatters and the Republic of Vietnam’s flag run up in its place.  For the first time in twenty-five days the yellow and triple-red-striped flag fluttered triumphantly in the breeze.  This battle ended the communist’s occupation of Hue.  It had been the most fierce, bloody and destructive of all battles during the offensive.  The communists had committed sixteen battalions or almost the equivalent of two infantry divisions.  They lost more than 2,000 killed in Hue alone.” (Morrison, page 396)

“In large part the allied victory at Hue was due to the men of the South Vietnamese 1st Division who held on to their headquarters in the Mang Ca compound and from there continued to direct operations from the outside.  The compound proved a vital base to receive reinforcements and an excellent staging for counterattacks.  The South Vietnamese troops, although few in number, had demonstrated high morale and fought superbly despite repeated calls from the communists to surrender.  The gallant fight put up by the 81st Ordnance Company, with only eighty men, fought off repeated attacks for fifteen days as the enemy sought to obtain their stock of 1,400 M-16 rifles.  They even moved their stock before the compound was overrun.” (Morrison, page 397)

“If the Americans and their allies were napping before the Tet upheaval, the Communists also blundered.  ‘We have been guilty of many errors and shortcomings,’ their initial appraisal of the campaign confessed, deploring such deficiencies as their failure to inspire the South Vietnamese population to rebel or their inability to rally Saigon government soldiers and officials to their banners.  Many North Vietnamese and Vietcong troops were plainly disenchanted by the realization that, despite their enormous sacrifices during the campaign, they still faced a long struggle ahead.  Official reports expressed alarm at the erosion of morale among those who had ‘lost confidence’ in the Communist leadership and had become ‘doubtful of victory, pessimistic, and display shirking attitudes.'” (Karnow, page 544)

The desertion rate among the Viet Cong soared, essentially ending it as a cohesive threat to South Vietnam for months to come.  Yet, this fact was immaterial.

“The communists had lost every battle in Vietnam but they had won a resounding psychological victory in the United States.  On April 3, 1968, they agreed to discuss an armistice and immediately took advantage of the peace talks to improve their military position while they pushed their political warfare through propaganda. Thus the United States missed a golden opportunity to deal a death blow to an enemy in agony.” (Morrison, page 402)

“…most Americans were dispirited because they felt that President Johnson was not prosecuting the war dynamically enough.  Their attitude, summed up succinctly, seemed to say: ‘It was an error for us to have gotten involved in Vietnam in the first place.  But now that we’re there, let’s win - or get out.'

“A survey conducted in November 1967, for example, indicated that while 44 percent of Americans favored a complete or gradual withdrawal from Vietnam, 55 percent wanted a tougher policy – and they included a handful who advocated the use of nuclear weapons.  In February 1968, while the Tet offensive was raging, 53 percent favored stronger military operations, even at the risk of a clash with the Soviet Union or China, compared with only 24 percent who preferred to see the war wound down.  Interestingly, much the same sentiment prevailed after the war: a study carried out in 1980 found that 65 percent of Americans believed that ‘the trouble in Vietnam was that our troops were asked to fight a war that we could never win.’

“During the six weeks following the initial Communist attacks, public approval of [President Johnson’s] overall performance dropped from 48 percent to 36 percent – and, more dramatically, endorsement of his handling of the war fell from 40 percent to 26 percent.  The country’s trust in his authority evaporated.  His credibility – the key to a president’s capacity to govern – was gone.

“More important, perhaps, Johnson was abandoned by the vocal elements of the population – the media commentators, business executives, educators, clergymen, and other ‘elites,’ whose voices resonated more forcefully in Washington than did those of Middle America.” (Karnow, page 546)

Walter Cronkite made a hurried tour of Vietnam in February 1968 and shortly thereafter on national television dolorously called Tet an American defeat, saying on 27 February that ‘the only rational way out will be to negotiate, not as victors but as honorable people.’  President Johnson watching this program lamented to his press secretary, George Christian, ‘If I’ve lost Cronkite, I’ve lost middle America.’

“There is an interesting epilogue to Cronkite’s broadcast of 27 February, 1968.  During his preparation of the broadcast, Cronkite visited one of the senior American field commanders.  After the customary briefings on American and South Vietnamese successes, Cronkite told the general that he would not use any of the material just presented to him.  He went further, saying that he had been to Hue and seen the open graves of the South Vietnamese civilians murdered by the NVA troops and that he (Cronkite) had decided to do everything in his power to see that this war was brought to an end – a peculiar and reverse reaction to an enemy atrocity.” (Davidson, page 486)

In light of the pervasive defeatist mindset suddenly strengthening throughout the nation, President Johnson soon unexpectedly announced he would not seek reelection, something that seemed to reinforce the feeling of defeat throughout America.  The anti-war protests in America were emboldened by the carnage of the Tet offensive.  The fact that Giap’s strategy had failed completely, and that, with the exception of Hue, all the fighting throughout South Vietnam was quickly contained at horrific cost to PAVN forces simply did not register either with America’s cultural elites or with Middle America.

It is ironic that the North Vietnamese agreed to peace talks after TCK-TKN, something Westmoreland’s search and destroy operations and McNamara’s graduated pressure failed to do.  It was only in the face of massive defeat that Hanoi sought negotiations, not to end the war but to buy time to regroup.  McNamara’s disillusionment and Cronkite’s pessimism peaked at precisely the moment when PAVN was the most demoralized and disrupted.  In what is perhaps the ultimate absurdity of the war, the United States reduced pressure on its badly wounded adversary and pursued negotiations when North Vietnam was at its weakest point since the war began.  America did not possess the willpower to intensify the war effort, to drive the wounded NVA/VC completely out of South Vietnam.  The Viet Cong were largely destroyed, the United Sates was emotionally exhausted.  Despite horrific casualties and utter defeat across the entirety of South Vietnam, it was the Battle for Hue that most affected the understanding of the American public.  And it was in this fact that Hanoi saw its chance for rest and recuperation.

“Basically, the Vietnamese armed forces did most of the fighting and most units fought well.  Not one army unit broke under intensive pressure, or defected to the North Vietnamese.  In the first phase of the attacks the communists lost 32,000 killed and 5,800 captured.  By the end of the second phase in May another 5,000 died.  The communists failed to hold any city except for Hue and that was only for twenty-five days.  The general uprising which they had confidently counted upon to achieve success did not occur.  It was a military defeat for North Vietnam and even the Vietcong headquarters admitted that they had failed to seize a number of primary objectives and had to been able to destroy any South Vietnamese units.  Most galling of all was the fact the people of South Vietnam had refused to join in the uprising.  The fighting did disrupt pacification in the countryside, however, generating 600,000 new refugees.” (Morrison, page 403) 

PAVN forces launched another “mini-Tet” in May and again in October.  These were smaller scale versions of the January 31 offensive and were equally ineffective, though these attacks were indicative of the amazing resilience of the Viet Cong.  They also managed to create about 200,000 more refugees, however.  Perhaps it was here, in the area of “hearts and minds,” that North Vietnam staved off total defeat.  The mixed efforts by Washington and Saigon to pacify the countryside were disrupted by the offensives.  Saigon lost even more control than it possessed before Tet due to the failure of the pacification efforts, which were negatively impacted by the large scale destruction wrought while defeating PAVN initiatives.  

The simple fact remained that most of the Vietnamese people felt disassociated from President Thieu’s government.  That was something killing tens of thousands of NVA/VC in 1968 didn’t solve. To that extent America’s military triumph at TCK-TKN was meaningless, the war was about something else entirely. 

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