Vietnam: Up Front and At Home The Khesanh Trap
RAPHAEL, ADAM
Vietnam: Up Front and At Home The Khesanh Trap By Adam Raphael Last month, General Earle G. Wheeler, Chairman of the Joint Chi»fs of Staff, delivered a letter to President Johnson affirming that...
...Nor am I convinced they understand that to save 5,000 Americans by using a "nuke" would be to forfeit the righteousness with which they justify the war...
...Granted, President Johnson insists he will not accede to this pressure...
...True, they have a greater concentration of firepower than the French ever had at Dienbienphu...
...Conventional bombs and shells had little effect...
...General Wheeler says he doesn't think nuclear weapons will be necessary to defend Khesanh...
...It is further argued that they would not be directed against populated areas, and cannot be compared with Polaris, Minuteman, or the other nuclear weapons that weigh in the balance of power...
...these means are not available to the Marines today...
...Those who Adam Raphael recently returned from a three year stay in Vietnam, where he reported for cbs News...
...They were deep enough that even napalm left survivors...
...A large-scale airlift in the midst of battle could not be contemplated...
...should either authorize the use of nuclear weapons at Khesanh or withdraw...
...defeat every bit as bad as Dienbienphu...
...agree with him see a powerful argument for nuclear weapons: to destroy the enemy and save Khesanh without losing a single American life...
...Air power is its keystone, but it is insubstantial and undependable, as is the rest of the edifice...
...B-52s strike without warning from 35,000 feet...
...Neither were the French in 1954...
...But he does take very seriously his personal responsibility for the lives of the troops...
...The whole world would, I hope, cry out in shock...
...The other alternative is a massive offensive operation to dislocate the enemy and force him away...
...Marine garrison at Khesanh can and will be held...
...Close air support demands pinpoint bombing, impossible in cloud or fog...
...The alternatives to defense are withdrawal, which is not feasible here, or offensive action to forestall battle, which is impractical...
...There still attaches to nuclear power the stigma of Hiroshima and the sense that the very existence of these weapons is justified only to deter others from using them...
...A reasonable reaction to such an unprepossessing prospect, one might think, would be to withdraw, especially since Khesanh has lost its original strategic value...
...For if even one nuclear warhead is exploded there, shame, not pity, "striding the blast, or heaven's cherubim, horsed upon the sightless couriers of the air, shall blow the horrid deed in every eye...
...A helicopter assault (the First Cavalry Division...
...This specter has been raised by supporters and opponents of the war alike, the former to urge its consideration, the latter to condemn...
...It would be comforting to believe that he and General Wheeler had some other card up their sleeves, secret from the enemy and from us...
...To that end B-52s are saturation bombing around Khesanh now...
...In fairness to him, it should be noted that he began asking for them a year ago, when the North Vietnamese build-up in this area started...
...The Communists fought so fiercely that many Marines were convinced they were "hopped up...
...Langvei Special Forces Camp was overrun with Soviet tanks, their first appearance in the war...
...They were wrong...
...Many of the roofs were not log or sandbag but layer upon layer of mud and bamboo slats, which give yet do not give way on impact...
...Bombing will not work without a follow-up operation on the ground...
...Vietnam: Up Front and At Home The Khesanh Trap By Adam Raphael Last month, General Earle G. Wheeler, Chairman of the Joint Chi»fs of Staff, delivered a letter to President Johnson affirming that the U.S...
...The North Vietnamese troops who fought in Hue were equipped with AK-47 attack rifles that were the envy of the Marines, with their M-16s...
...While I hope beyond hope that the awesome force will never be used, there is no denying that such restraint at Khesanh may result in a U.S...
...But there is no way the garrison can get out without taking horrendous losses...
...Those who favor the use of nuclear weapons argue that they are smaller than some conventional weapons, only more deadly...
...The cities have not fallen...
...That begs the question...
...Our forces are fully occupied in defense...
...By the time the battle is joined it will be too late...
...It is terrible to gamble with lives, but we must gamble that they will not attempt to take Khesanh without a real victory elsewhere...
...The first the enemy knows they are there is when the bombs hit, literally out of the blue...
...Good weather, then, is the essential factor...
...Whatever military sense it might make, it would be political suicide...
...And there are no troops available for that...
...Before that there was no war there...
...No talk of superior firepower, or close air support, or control of the peaks that overlook the base can eradicate the instinctive understanding that Khesanh lies in enemy territory and in jeopardy...
...So the pressure is to use them now, to prevent the attack...
...A year ago it was merely a forward supply depot for Marine operations...
...This is the grim background...
...He does not feel that both choices are out of the question...
...A third possibility is the use of tactical nuclear weapons...
...That is why he continues the bombing of North Vietnam, despite all the advantages of ending it...
...It is certainly an ace, but an ace that cannot be played...
...There is clear evidence that Khesanh is not defensible under adverse weather conditions, and the winter monsoon has another month to go...
...Remote-control, non-visual strikes are less accurate, and cannot safely be used where they are most needed, in tight, up against the wire...
...Without it the chances are that the Khesanh garrison will be devastated and even overrun...
...The worse the weather becomes at Khesanh, the greater the pressures on the President will be...
...Clearly the Communists planned the defeat of Khesanh as the coup de grace after seizing the cities—a political as well as military Dienbienphu...
...Later he declared: "We are not intending to sustain any Dienbienphu...
...Yet I have less confidence in them, since they allowed this situation to develop at all...
...This is the structure of defense at Khesanh...
...Reinforcements could come by road, but Route 9 is washed out in many places, and provides ample opportunity for ambush...
...There is a chance that the North Vietnamese will not attack, and it must be risked...
...Because of the enemy build-up in the area patrols are no longer conducted from the base, and anyway infiltration is hardly the issue at the moment...
...He was with the Marines at Khesanh...
...Theoretically, they can call on air support from Danang and Chulai superior to any the French could have dreamed of...
...The Marines cannot all be evacuated at a single stroke, and could not cover a piece-meal retreat...
...Besides, he will probably attack simultaneously Khesanh, Quangtri, Danang and Chulai...
...They have reinforcements—more than 20,000—only a few miles away at Quangtri and Phu-bai...
...President Johnson insists it will not happen...
...They are isolated, surrounded and outnumbered, eight-to-one...
...Airmobile, now at Quangtri is a likely relief force) needs a considerable area of clear land: the enemy has surely spied out all likely landing zones in the vicinity and has mortars zeroed in...
...The Marines at Khesanh know that what lies ahead is butchery...
...The danger, nevertheless, is that we would find ourselves in a game where all the cards in the deck are aces...
...Today the air, once scented by some of the loveliest wild flowers I have ever seen, stinks of cordite...
...There must be other weapons not yet revealed, and it would be folly to assume that the traditional American superiority of weaponry still holds when so many other rules have been broken...
...The enemy, knowing this, will surely not attack until certain that the bad weather will hold...
...The airstrip at Khesanh is exposed and constantly under fire...
...An officer of the Royal Laotian Army once informed me that the Vietminh had beaten the French by moving from place to place with supernatural powers...
...Although some of the enemy are only 100 yards from the Marine perimeter, the majority are far enough away for "Tac-nukes" to be effective without endangering Americans...
...As for firepower, the French at Dienbienphu were certain the Viet-minh could not have artillery...
...the Marines in turn, brutalized by the anguish of the battle and their own losses, savaged their enemy and took no prisoners...
...Last May, in good weather, it took the Marines two weeks to dislodge them from two hills, 861 and 881, where they had a clear line of fire on the base...
...Their bunkers were, and presumably still are, almost impregnable...
...The reinforcements recently requested by General Westmoreland cannot possibly come in time...
...In that case air support will have to come from the Seventh Fleet, at sea, or from Thailand, and reaction time will be lengthened...
...The North Vietnamese, infiltrating from Laos, passed peacefully by...
...Undetected for months, they dug trenches and tunnels, buried arms and ammunition, took sitings on the base to triangulate for mortars and artillery, and occupied every other strategic position in the area...
...The Marines attempted to block the natural routes through the valley, but the Communists walked calmly past them up the mountainsides to prepare for the present confrontation...
...Representative L. Mendel Rivers, Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, has said the U.S...
...To visit Khesanh, as I have, is to sense instantly how vulnerable it is...
...This brings us to the third option for offensive action: so-called tactical nuclear weapons...
...The same factors that make relief by road convoy difficult make withdrawal by road impossible...
...The valley below, fully secure, bustled with Montagnards and French coffee planters...
...This is unsettling but only partially effective...
Vol. 51 • March 1968 • No. 6
