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Guerrilla Tactics. In December 1965, Ho Chi Minh and the North Vietnamese leadership ordered a change in a way the war in the South was to be fought. From now on, the Vietcong would avoid...
Viet Cong (VC), the guerrilla force that, with the support of the North Vietnamese Army, fought against South Vietnam (late 1950s–1975) and the United States (early 1960s–1973). The name is said to have first been used by South Vietnamese Pres. Ngo Dinh Diem to belittle the rebels.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Guerrilla warfare. Guerrilla warfare is the art of using knowledge of the landscape to avoid open battle with the enemy and to launch raids and surprise attacks, before disappearing back into the undergrowth.
- Support from peasants. The Vietcong won the ‘hearts and minds’ of the South Vietnamese peasants. They would offer to help them in their daily work and also promised them land, more wealth and freedom under Ho Chi Minh and the communists.
- Tunnel systems and traps. The Vietcong had a hidden system of tunnels stretching over 200 miles. There were hospitals, armouries, sleeping quarters, kitchens and wells underground.
- Foreign support. The Vietcong and North Vietnam were supported by the Soviet Union (USSR) and China who supplied money and weapons.
- Overview
- Firepower comes to naught
Although Johnson and his advisers had painstakingly examined the question of committing military forces to Vietnam—how many should be sent and when—they had given little thought to the question of what the troops might do once they arrived. In contrast to the tightly controlled air war in the North, conduct of the ground war in the South was largely left to the leadership of General Westmoreland. Westmoreland commanded all U.S. operations in the South, but he was reluctant to press for a unified U.S. and South Vietnamese command despite the questionable capabilities of many South Vietnamese generals. Instead, the two allies depended on “coordination” and a continuation of the existing advisory relationship, with every South Vietnamese army unit larger than a company having its complement of U.S. advisers. At the top of the hierarchy, Westmoreland himself served as senior adviser to the chief of the Vietnamese Joint General Staff, Gen. Cao Van Vien. The chronic political instability in Saigon seemed finally to have abated with the installation in February 1965 of a government headed by the army general Nguyen Van Thieu as head of state and air force general Nguyen Cao Ky as prime minister. This arrangement, backed by most of the top military commanders, lasted until 1968, when Ky was eased out of power, leaving Thieu in sole control.
Whatever the status of the South Vietnamese forces, they were clearly relegated to a secondary role as U.S. troops and equipment poured into the country. To support these forces, the Americans constructed an enormous logistical infrastructure that included four new jet-capable air bases with 10,000-foot (3,000-metre) runways, six new deepwater ports, 75 tactical air bases, 26 hospitals, and more than 10,000,000 square feet (900,000 square metres) of warehousing. By the fall of 1965, U.S. Marines and soldiers had clashed with NVA and VC main-force troops in bloody battles on Cape Ba Lang An (also called the Batangan Peninsula), southeast of Da Nang, and in the Ia Drang valley in the central highlands. The U.S. forces employed their full panoply of firepower, including air strikes, artillery, armed helicopters, and even B-52 bombers, to inflict enormous losses on the enemy. Yet the communists believed they had more than held their own in these battles, and they were encouraged by the fact that they could easily reoccupy any areas they might have lost once the Americans pulled out.
Westmoreland’s basic assumption was that U.S. forces, with their enormous and superior firepower, could best be employed in fighting the enemy’s strongest units in the jungles and mountains, away from heavily populated areas. Behind this “shield” provided by the Americans, the South Vietnamese army and security forces could take on local Viet Cong elements and proceed with the job of reasserting government control in the countryside. Meanwhile, the regular forces of the Viet Cong and the NVA would continue to suffer enormous casualties at the hands of massive U.S. firepower. Eventually, went the argument, the communists would reach the point where they would no longer be able to replace their losses on the battlefield. Having been ground down on the battlefield, they would presumably agree to a favourable peace settlement.
That point seemed very distant to most Americans as the war continued into 1966 and 1967. Washington declared that the war was being won, but American casualties continued to mount, and much of what the public could see of the war on television appeared confusing if not futile. Because Westmoreland’s strategy was based on attrition, one of the ways to measure progress was to track the number of enemy killed. The resultant “body count,” which was supposed to be carried out by troops during or immediately after combat, soon became notorious for inaccuracy and for the tendency of U.S. commanders to exaggerate the figures. A Program for the Pacification and Long-Term Development of Vietnam (PROVN), a study commissioned by U.S. Army Chief of Staff Harold K. Johnson and published in 1966, raised serious questions about Westmoreland’s approach. It proposed that U.S. efforts should be concentrated on providing security and stability for the rural population in South Vietnam and suggested that attrition would not work as an effective counterinsurgency strategy. At the time of its publication, PROVN was largely dismissed by military commanders, and the continued emphasis on overwhelming firepower and “search-and-destroy” missions amounted to an almost wholesale rejection of its recommendations.
In the provinces just north and east of Saigon, some large-scale operations such as Cedar Falls and Junction City, involving up to a thousand U.S. troops supported by hundreds of sorties by helicopters and fighter-bombers, were mounted to destroy communist base areas and supplies. Though yielding large quantities of captured weapons and supplies, they were ultimately indecisive, because the U.S. forces would invariably withdraw when they had completed their sweeps and in due course the Viet Cong and NVA would return. In order to deny the NVA and Viet Cong the use of dense forest to conceal their movements and to hide their supply lines and bases, the U.S. Air Force sprayed millions of gallons of a herbicide called Agent Orange along the Vietnamese border with Laos and Cambodia, in areas northwest of Saigon, and along major waterways. Agent Orange was effective in killing vegetation—but only at the price of causing considerable ecological damage to Vietnam and of exposing thousands of people to potentially toxic chemicals that would later cause serious and sometimes fatal health problems.
Along the DMZ separating North and South Vietnam, the Americans established a string of fortified bases extending from just north of Quang Tri on the South China Sea westward to the Laotian border. These bases were part of a system that also included electronic warning devices, minefields, and infrared detectors designed to check infiltration or outright invasion from the North. The North Vietnamese, pleased to find that the strong-point obstacle system was within range of their artillery, carried out periodic attacks by fire and ground forces against U.S. outposts at Con Thien, Gio Linh, Camp Carroll, and Khe Sanh.
Although Johnson and his advisers had painstakingly examined the question of committing military forces to Vietnam—how many should be sent and when—they had given little thought to the question of what the troops might do once they arrived. In contrast to the tightly controlled air war in the North, conduct of the ground war in the South was largely left to the leadership of General Westmoreland. Westmoreland commanded all U.S. operations in the South, but he was reluctant to press for a unified U.S. and South Vietnamese command despite the questionable capabilities of many South Vietnamese generals. Instead, the two allies depended on “coordination” and a continuation of the existing advisory relationship, with every South Vietnamese army unit larger than a company having its complement of U.S. advisers. At the top of the hierarchy, Westmoreland himself served as senior adviser to the chief of the Vietnamese Joint General Staff, Gen. Cao Van Vien. The chronic political instability in Saigon seemed finally to have abated with the installation in February 1965 of a government headed by the army general Nguyen Van Thieu as head of state and air force general Nguyen Cao Ky as prime minister. This arrangement, backed by most of the top military commanders, lasted until 1968, when Ky was eased out of power, leaving Thieu in sole control.
Whatever the status of the South Vietnamese forces, they were clearly relegated to a secondary role as U.S. troops and equipment poured into the country. To support these forces, the Americans constructed an enormous logistical infrastructure that included four new jet-capable air bases with 10,000-foot (3,000-metre) runways, six new deepwater ports, 75 tactical air bases, 26 hospitals, and more than 10,000,000 square feet (900,000 square metres) of warehousing. By the fall of 1965, U.S. Marines and soldiers had clashed with NVA and VC main-force troops in bloody battles on Cape Ba Lang An (also called the Batangan Peninsula), southeast of Da Nang, and in the Ia Drang valley in the central highlands. The U.S. forces employed their full panoply of firepower, including air strikes, artillery, armed helicopters, and even B-52 bombers, to inflict enormous losses on the enemy. Yet the communists believed they had more than held their own in these battles, and they were encouraged by the fact that they could easily reoccupy any areas they might have lost once the Americans pulled out.
Westmoreland’s basic assumption was that U.S. forces, with their enormous and superior firepower, could best be employed in fighting the enemy’s strongest units in the jungles and mountains, away from heavily populated areas. Behind this “shield” provided by the Americans, the South Vietnamese army and security forces could take on local Viet Cong elements and proceed with the job of reasserting government control in the countryside. Meanwhile, the regular forces of the Viet Cong and the NVA would continue to suffer enormous casualties at the hands of massive U.S. firepower. Eventually, went the argument, the communists would reach the point where they would no longer be able to replace their losses on the battlefield. Having been ground down on the battlefield, they would presumably agree to a favourable peace settlement.
That point seemed very distant to most Americans as the war continued into 1966 and 1967. Washington declared that the war was being won, but American casualties continued to mount, and much of what the public could see of the war on television appeared confusing if not futile. Because Westmoreland’s strategy was based on attrition, one of the ways to measure progress was to track the number of enemy killed. The resultant “body count,” which was supposed to be carried out by troops during or immediately after combat, soon became notorious for inaccuracy and for the tendency of U.S. commanders to exaggerate the figures. A Program for the Pacification and Long-Term Development of Vietnam (PROVN), a study commissioned by U.S. Army Chief of Staff Harold K. Johnson and published in 1966, raised serious questions about Westmoreland’s approach. It proposed that U.S. efforts should be concentrated on providing security and stability for the rural population in South Vietnam and suggested that attrition would not work as an effective counterinsurgency strategy. At the time of its publication, PROVN was largely dismissed by military commanders, and the continued emphasis on overwhelming firepower and “search-and-destroy” missions amounted to an almost wholesale rejection of its recommendations.
In the provinces just north and east of Saigon, some large-scale operations such as Cedar Falls and Junction City, involving up to a thousand U.S. troops supported by hundreds of sorties by helicopters and fighter-bombers, were mounted to destroy communist base areas and supplies. Though yielding large quantities of captured weapons and supplies, they were ultimately indecisive, because the U.S. forces would invariably withdraw when they had completed their sweeps and in due course the Viet Cong and NVA would return. In order to deny the NVA and Viet Cong the use of dense forest to conceal their movements and to hide their supply lines and bases, the U.S. Air Force sprayed millions of gallons of a herbicide called Agent Orange along the Vietnamese border with Laos and Cambodia, in areas northwest of Saigon, and along major waterways. Agent Orange was effective in killing vegetation—but only at the price of causing considerable ecological damage to Vietnam and of exposing thousands of people to potentially toxic chemicals that would later cause serious and sometimes fatal health problems.
Along the DMZ separating North and South Vietnam, the Americans established a string of fortified bases extending from just north of Quang Tri on the South China Sea westward to the Laotian border. These bases were part of a system that also included electronic warning devices, minefields, and infrared detectors designed to check infiltration or outright invasion from the North. The North Vietnamese, pleased to find that the strong-point obstacle system was within range of their artillery, carried out periodic attacks by fire and ground forces against U.S. outposts at Con Thien, Gio Linh, Camp Carroll, and Khe Sanh.
In the Vietnam War, most communist units (including mobile NVA regulars using guerrilla tactics) spent only a limited number of days a year fighting. While they might be forced into an unwanted battle by an enemy sweep, most of the time was spent in training, intelligence gathering, political and civic infiltration, propaganda indoctrination ...
By asking military strategists to simultaneously fight a war and build a nation, senior U.S. policymakers had asked too much of those crafting military strategy to deliver on overly ambitious political objectives. In the end, the Vietnam War exposed the limits of what American military power could achieve in the Cold War era.
VC and PAVN battle tactics comprised a flexible mix of guerrilla and conventional warfare battle tactics used by Viet Cong (VC) and the North Vietnamese People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) to defeat their U.S. and South Vietnamese (GVN/ARVN) opponents during the Vietnam War.
