Page 135 - The Viet-Cong Tet_Offensive_1968

Elernents in Long Hoa pagoda returned fire sporadically. They appar-
ently thought the defense of headquarters had been strengthened.

At dawn an MP car went out of carnp for a patrol It was
able to travel frorn Gate Nurnber One to Gate Nurnber Five without
encountering any enerny fire. Meanwhile the duty officer at JGS, Major
Nguyen Dang Chat,received a specific order frorn Major General Tran
Thanh Phong,the Chie{ of StaJf,for the deployrnent of troops for the
defense of this vital i"nstallation. However, Major Nguyen Dang Chat
was wounded in hi6 atternPt to deploy the forces'

At 0900 hours the following rnorning an airborne elernent
arrived at the headquarter6. One knew then that the Cornrnunist threat
had subsiCed. When the shooting started at Gate Nurnber Five,practi-
cally no one at JGS thougtt it was a Viet Cong attaik. It was fortunate
the Cornrnunists did not succeed in penetrating the cornpound at the
first try for such a developrnent would have consequences irnpossible
to predict.
Meanwhile during that nrght a two battalion force of Viet
Cong penetrated Hoc Mon frorn the north. At 0300 hours the intruders
began their attack on Chau Van Tiep carnp after setting fire to a nearby
school and village adrninistration o{fice.
The sentry, it was later learned, did not think they were
Viet Cong but he fired a warning shot into the air. The Ione shot trig-
gered a volley o{ bullets frorn the aseailants' That was the beginning
of the end for the intruders for a newly installed rnachinegun irnrnedi-
ately spit fire in their direction. Unable to resist,the Cornrnunists
spread along the rnoat line outside the carnp but, un{ortunately for thern,
the rnachinegun was set up to fire in that direction too. A total o{ 40
Viet Cong di.ed ln that contact while six of thern were caPtured. The
garrison troops captured ovet 30 weapons of all kinds. The defenders
casualties were two killed and five wounded.
'l
The following rnorning troops of the Quang rung Train-
ing Center undertook to rnop up the neighboring area and the soldiers
again killed a nurnber of Viet Cong.
As a rule each guard post c onsists of six soldiers but,
warned by headquarters of an irnpending enerny attack,each post was
reinforced before rnidnight with three additional soldiers and amachine-
gun. These reinforced guard posts caused the Viet Cong defeat but
probably another factor was the V.C. inaccurate assessrnent of our
force s.

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