Page 430 - The Viet-Cong Tet_Offensive_1968

Kien Hoa

Cn the rnorning of the 3rd day of Tet a BBC broadcast
frorn London announced that Kien Hoa town had been overrun by the
Cornrnunists. In reality, the Reds only took control of the townrs
comrnercial area while at the adrninistrative area, they were still
encircling governrnent civilian and rnilitary installatiors,

The tirne the Cornrnunists entered the town was
unknown, but the first outbreak of gunfire occured at 4 AM at the
1oca1 stadiurn where a governnrent artillery urrit was positioned.
The enerny offensive began with a barra.ge oi rnortar
fire into civilian anci rnilitary agencles particularly the provincial
adrninistrative o{fice and the cornrnand headquarters of the lOth
Infantry Divi sion.

As Kien Hoa had been facing a constant enerr,y threat
the bunker cornplexes built within the city were relatively so1id. This
explained why the enemy did not launch any rnajor assault on any of
the townrs strategic positions. Instead, frorn 4 AM until dawn, they
kept firing into those locations at scattered interval .
Lt, CoL Huynh Van Du, the province chief, was able
to rnaintain c ornrnunic ation s with all agencies and units under his
c ornrrrand. Also in town were Lt. CoI. Nguyen Tuong Dierr, cornrnander
of the loth Regiment and 70 other rnernbers of his staff. He was
ordered to rnove tlrc 3/10 Battalion and 4/lO Battalion frorn the out-
skirts into the city the next rcorning.
Col. Dien was anxious to know why the artillery unit
at the stadiurn rernained silent and unable to cornrnunicate with head-
quarters. At daybfeak, as the enerny gun{ire was extremely sporadic,
and probably thinking that the Cornrnunists had withdra\rn as usual,
he decided to dispatch a reconnaissance tearn on two ttucks and one
jeep equipped with rnachinegun to the stadiurn about 300 rneters {rorn
the regir-r-rental cornrnand headquarters. At halfway between the head-
quarters and the stadiurn, the rnen were caught by enerny gunfire.
Sorne were kitled or wounded. The others abandoned the vehicles and
ran back to the headquarters. CoI. Dierr then personnally went out
at thehead of another reconnaissance group, Upon reaching the
stadiurn he was fatally hit by enerny sniper fire frorn nearby civilian

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