Losing Vietnam (25 page)

When the ARVN counterattacked with tanks, local Vietnamese civilian observers reported that the 341st NVA Division, when confronted with the unexpected reaction, suffered heavy losses, lost its “spirit,” broke formation, and fled in all directions.

Finally, the 325th NVA Division joined the battle, and the 18th Division had to fall back toward Long Binh. The 1st Airborne Brigade retrograded to the south to protect QL-15 and the key port of Vung Tau. This was well planned, well led, and well executed, resulting in only minor losses of men and equipment—unlike the debacles in MR-1 and MR-2. Xuan Loc was the last great battle of the war. The South Vietnamese stood and fought, and inflicted heavy casualties on the enemy. In this case they were well led by Lieutenant General Toan, Brigadier General Le Minh Dao, the 18th Division commander, and the regimental commanders and were well supported by the 4th Air
Division.
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Dao, the hero of the Battle of Xuan Loc, was one of eight South Vietnamese general officers who after the war were required to spend eighteen years in the dreaded communist indoctrination camps.

As an aside, years before, the 10th ARVN Division had been an inept organization. In some countries in Asia the number “10” has a negative connotation, so the joint staff changed the name of the division to the 18th ARVN Division. The formerly incapable outfit covered itself with glory in those final days.

On 20 April, during the battle for Xuan Loc, Lieutenant General Toan expressed great confidence in his corps' ability to repel the expected enemy attack, even with four new North Vietnamese divisions. He stated he had summarily executed more than one individual for cowardice. He attributed the failures in I and II Corps to leadership's not remaining with the troops during difficult times. He said that too many officers went to take care of their families rather than their troops. He left little doubt; he believed he could have held the highlands. He did not intend to give up Tay Ninh without a fight and planned to defend Bien Hoa along the Song Be River. This called for an attack out of Ham Tan north, then west along QL-1 to link up with forces attacking on an axis from Xuan Loc. He stated that III Corps would give a good account of itself in coming major attacks.
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Regardless of Lieutenant General Toan's confidence, the military situation appeared hopeless. III Corps faced sixteen enemy infantry divisions with supporting armor, artillery, and sapper units—in all about 115,000 combatants (see
map 6
). The majority of the reserve divisions in North Vietnam had been hastily deployed to the south. In early February 1975, there were seven divisions in North Vietnam, two of which were deployed to South Vietnam in preparation for the dry-season campaign. The 316th NVA Division moved to the B-3 front and was a key participant in the attacks on Ban Me Thuot, and the 341st NVA Division relocated to COSVN in Long Khanh Province in MR-3. In March, reacting to the RVNAF collapse in MR-2, the North Vietnamese quickly deployed the 312th NVA Division to MR-2 and the 320B NVA Division to MR-3. Then in April the 338th NVA Division, which had been in Thanh Hoa Province in North Vietnam,
deployed to Tay Ninh Province in MR-3 to participate in the attacks on Saigon. The enemy's much-improved lines of communication enabled these five major units to redeploy to South Vietnam in a period of weeks. (Recall that in August 1974 the USSAG study referring to a general offensive had stated that with reinforcements of up to five divisions the enemy would be capable of making significant military gains, possibly bringing about the downfall of the South. The December 1974 “USSAG Threat Assessment,” which was briefed to CINCPAC, had reiterated this conclusion.)

The unprecedented reinforcement by five reserve infantry divisions overwhelmed the valiant residual South Vietnamese forces, whose ranks the losses in MR-1 and -2 had severely depleted. Between November 1974 and April 1975, the communists had infiltrated more than a hundred thousand personnel, half of whom were destined for COSVN, so by 30 April there were 425,000 communist troops in South Vietnam.

After the fall of Ban Me Thuot, the political pot in Saigon started to boil. President Thieu had never been a popular leader. On 6 March 1975, prior to the withdrawal, former vice president Maj. Gen. Nguyen Cao Ky reportedly said that Thieu had lost the support of the armed forces and of the population. He claimed that the generals would not fight for the president and that General Vien was depressed and suffered from low morale. He also claimed Thieu was a lonely, friendless man who, although effective in the past, had served too long.
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Of course, there was a lot of politics involved in those statements; Ky was very ambitious.

However, it was true that the president's orders to evacuate the highlands had severely damaged the morale of senior officers. The officers of the badly battered 22nd ARVN Division were rumored to be openly calling President Thieu a traitor and warning that he had better leave the country before they returned to Saigon—threatening to kill him when they got there. A field-grade officer at the joint staff said that those people with whom he had daily contact were overjoyed by the 8 April bombing of the presidential palace, but they were sad because the pilot missed the president.
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Clearly, the inevitable major loss of military and civilian morale and support resulted from the withdrawal and defeats.

There were many rumors and counterrumors being aired. Many
blamed President Thieu for the rapidly deteriorating situation. Prime Minister Tran Thien Khiem put the blame elsewhere. On 22 March, in a discussion with several close associates, he attributed the public loss of morale to the U.S. failure to provide military assistance.
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He believed the American Congress's attitude had created a terrible crisis in South Vietnam. But beyond what happened to Saigon, he thought that the “American sell-out” would have continuing effects in other parts of the world. Now the United States could no longer hide its lack of bravery in foreign policy with an elaborate facade. Khiem, the Vietnamese people, and a large segment of the military believed the United States had betrayed and deserted them.
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Yet, the postmortems on the demise of South Vietnam almost always heaped the blame on President Thieu for his untimely order to evacuate and on Major General Phu for his lack of planning and the poor execution of the II Corps retrograde. Actually, Truong's performance in MR-1 was just as bad. There, too, was a lack of planning and a failure to exercise initiative, as well as a breakdown in leadership. On 21 April, in his farewell speech upon resigning, President Thieu would insist that the generals had failed him. This was certainly the case in MR-1 and -2.

President Thieu's decision to evacuate the northernmost provinces was ill conceived and at the time unnecessary. The friendly losses at Phuoc Long and Ban Me Thuot were not that great. There was little pressure on Pleiku and Kontum. The enemy attack on MR-1 was containable. The RVNAF probably could have held off the offensive as it had done in the past. To attempt to withdraw under pressure with no advanced planning was just ridiculous. The joint general staff, which had consulted with the Americans on all previous military matters, kept this momentous decision totally secret. Many Americans thought General Vien should have spoken up against this ridiculous presidential decision. And he should have. And so should have Lieutenant General Truong. But within the Vietnamese culture, that would have been difficult for them to do. Indeed, some of President Thieu's generals had failed him—the withdrawals from MR-1 and -2 were poorly planned and executed. But his own decision caused the debacle. The effects of such a withdrawal were well known—the refugee problem, the massive troop desertions to assist families, which would greatly reduce
unit effectiveness, and the tremendous loss of morale. No, the faulty implementation can be laid on a few generals, but the ill-fated, poorly considered decision was President Thieu's alone.

On 2 April, the Vietnamese senate adopted a resolution holding President Thieu responsible and asking him to form a more inclusive cabinet. Some thought that a broader group might have the influence to initiate negotiations with the communists. According to rumor, the senior generals had lost faith in President Thieu after the disasters in MR-1 and MR-2 and wanted him to resign. This I seriously doubt. Vien had told me that in a conversation he had with General Le Quang Luong, the airborne division commander, speaking to Luong as a father to a son, he said “as an old man” he did not hate anyone and believed it was morally wrong “to mess around in domestic politics” and that those who want to use one element of the army against another to “play those kind of games” open the gates to defeat. Vien went on, “While we were fighting among ourselves, the communists would come in and destroy both sides.”

Near the end of March, President Ford directed Gen. Frederick C. Weyand to the Republic of Vietnam to conduct a fact-finding mission. The president could not have picked a more knowledgeable person for the job. Weyand concluded that the current military situation was critical and the probability of the survival of South Vietnam was marginal at best. He believed the country was on the brink of total military defeat and noted that the United States went to Vietnam to assist the South Vietnamese people and he believed we owed them that support. Besides immediately increasing military aid, he suggested that the best option for saving the country would be the reintroduction of U.S. military power to supplement the Vietnamese capabilities—particularly air power and naval gun support. However, he recognized the legal and political limitations of such a course of action.
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Late on 21 April, in a nationally televised ceremony, President Thieu resigned and Vice President Tran Van Huong assumed the presidency. Immediately after Thieu's resignation, the sixteen North Vietnamese divisions surrounding Saigon generally stood in place and there was a definite lull in the fighting. Some say the enemy was making plans, resupplying its forces after their long movement southward and gathering information about the friendly defensive positions. Others believe that
there were high-level intergovernmental discussions going on to reach a political settlement. That evening the American embassy contacted USSAG, requesting a plane to take President Thieu and his wife to Taiwan, and the president left the country.

In April the intrigues within Saigon were at a feverish pitch. Gen. Duong Van Minh, for one, aggressively attempted to convince the leaders and members of the general assembly that if he were installed as president he would be able to broker an accommodation with the communists—after all, he said, his brother was a Viet Cong general with access to the highest levels of communist leadership. Vien informed me that around 20 April Minh called him and requested a meeting, which was held in Vien's office at the JGS compound. Minh was effusive and friendly as he attempted to convince Vien to join his crusade. However, Vien flatly denied support. In relating this meeting to me, Vien said he did not trust Minh, and rightfully so. At the time of President Ngo Dinh Diem's overthrow in 1963, Vien had been the commander of the airborne division stationed in Saigon. The coup planners, led by Minh, thought that Vien would remain loyal to President Diem and consequently put out instructions to have him assassinated. Then and now, in 1975, Vien had always been a loyal military man with no political ambitions. He recently had been asked several times to join in the overthrow of President Thieu, and he always refused to be a part of such efforts. Nonetheless, it soon became known in Saigon that President Huong would resign and that the general assembly was prepared to appoint Minh president, hoping he could broker a truce with the communists. Faced with this situation, Vien believed he could not be loyal to Minh. Therefore, true to his principles, he prepared his resignation and took it to Huong, who signed his retirement papers. That done, Vien turned over his JGS command to his deputy, Lt. Gen. Dong Van Khuyen, and departed Vietnam on 27 April. Few people outside of the joint staff were ever aware of this event.
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On 26 April the communist attacks began again, and there could be no doubt that they had elected to gain a total military victory and not a diplomatic solution. The next day, the general assembly voted to grant the presidency to General Minh. Rumors were rampant that the communists would be willing to negotiate with Minh—but like all the other rumors, these had no substance.
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The enemy attack on Saigon
continued. Obviously, the situation was hopeless, and it was time for the United States to evacuate. The end had come.

In early 1974 the responsibility for preparing a noncombatant emergency and evacuation plan for South Vietnam was initially assigned to the American embassy in Saigon. Headquarters USSAG had the responsibility of preparing the same plan for Phnom Penh. Both plans obviously required air assets, and therefore Headquarters USSAG had to be intimately involved in the planning process. Our staff completed the detailed planning necessary for Phnom Penh, with the close coordination of the American embassy in Phnom Penh. However, we could not obtain the desired cooperation—nor, really, any interest in the matter—from the embassy in Saigon because it was reluctant to undertake any activity which, if leaked, could upset the Vietnamese.
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Consequently, we asked CINCPAC to attempt to transfer the authority and responsibility for evacuation planning for Vietnam to Headquarters USSAG. On 10 April 1974, CINCPAC asked us to develop a contingency plan (CONPLAN) in support of CINCPAC CONPLAN 5060 for the evacuation of South Vietnam.

Shortly afterward, I called in our operations personnel who had successfully completed the Cambodia evacuation plan—Col. Ed Bronars and Lt. Col. Joseph Lutz. Bronars was a marine who eventually was promoted to lieutenant general and became the deputy chief of operations for the Marine Corps, and Lutz was a savvy army armored type. Lutz was due to rotate in August, and I told him that the evacuation plan had to be completed before he rotated or, because of his expertise, we would have to hold him over. They asked what was so urgent, and I responded that I believed Vietnam could fall before Cambodia. Consequently, we established a planning schedule that provided for the submission of a draft CONPLAN to CINCPAC by 15 July 1974.