I had arrived "in theater" in December of 1967, just in time for the beginning of the infamous 1968 Tet Offensive.  Nineteen sixty-eight would prove to be the bloodiest year of the entire war.  And the bloodshed would by no means be limited to Vietnam alone. As part of my initial chat and orientation with the Air Force Commander at Ramasun, I had been warned that there were bands of TC (Thai Communist) guerrillas operating in the area, and most of their activities took place under cover of darkness.  It was said that a bounty had been placed upon the heads of American GI's by the TC leadership.  It was made clear to each of us on arrival, should we ever find ourselves in Udorn when night fell, we were to remain there and not attempt to return to the post until morning, even if it meant missing our duty shift.   There would most certainly be a price to pay for missing a duty shift.  But it was far preferable to the one you might pay for traveling, unarmed, down that deserted road through the jungle in the dark.

That warning was one I took to heart, and I was determined I would not lose any of my men to such foolhardy behavior.  The normal tranquility and the friendly attitude that the vast majority of Thai's exhibited toward Americans could easily lull one into a false sense of security.  I strongly admonished all those in my charge to take the warning seriously.  We were told there were some in other units there who didn’t take it seriously enough.  I didn't know the men personally, and to this day, I don't know for sure whether the report was true, or if it was just intended to "put the fear in us."  But the gory details led me to believe it was true.  Reportedly, it was a terribly bloody, horrific scene.  Their taxi had been stopped midway between Udorn and Ramasun sometime late in the night.  When the light of day returned, they would be found laid out beside the road, nearly decapitated, their throats slashed from ear to ear.  The life’s blood had been drained from them and lay in great, congealed pools, caking the dust around their blanched, lifeless bodies.  Their hapless taxi driver lay alongside them.  They had not been robbed.  The guerillas had purposely left their belongings untouched.   For aside from the bounty they presumably collected, it was intended as a brutal, grisly message that they, the TC, were indeed present, and we shouldn’t get to feeling too comfortable about our security.

There was no way of knowing for sure how long their ordeal may have lasted.  Hopefully it was over quickly.  I can only begin to imagine the terror they must have felt, each one waiting his turn, watching helplessly as his friends were slaughtered like cattle, one at a time.  We were told it was the method of killing preferred by the guerillas, mainly because it was so de-humanizing.   It was the customary method used to slaughter their livestock.  The heartless bastards wouldn't dignify their victims by using a bullet if they didn't have to.  A razor sharp machete would do the job just as well!  I remember, as this account was related to me, the mental images that flashed through my mind - the guerillas in uproarious laughter, perversely entertained by the flailing and thrashing of their victims in the throes of death.  I never wrote about these things in my letters home.  I figured it would do no good, and would only worry them needlessly.

Six weeks after I arrived, just as I was beginning to feel fairly "at home" where I was, the war rapidly heated up.  On January 30th, the beginning of the Lunar New Year, or "Tet" as the Vietnamese called it, the NVA and the Viet Cong launched an all-out offensive against multiple major targets in South Vietnam.  At the same time, the Communist Pathet Lao of neighboring Laos, the Khmer Rouge of Cambodia and the Thai Communists, with the help of the NVA, stepped up raids against targets in their own countries.  The air base at Udorn was among those targets.

Countless bombing, reconnaissance, and combat support missions flew out of Udorn and other Thai bases that year, none of which would have been possible without the support personnel stationed there - the REMF's!  I remember the many times I stood at the end of the runway at Udorn, my heart swelling with pride as I watched the F-4 Phantoms taking off, tail on end, with afterburners blazing.  The Phantom was one great aircraft, and it was to become an icon of the Vietnam War.  In an explosive vertical climb, they’d disappear into the blue, then head eastbound over Laos and Vietnam.   "Loaded for bear", they were laden with air-to-ground and air-to-air rockets and bombs and bullets and Napalm.   Many of the brave men who flew those missions never returned, but their sacrifice was not in vain.  For the missions flown out of Udorn and other Thai bases were instrumental in saving the lives of untold thousands of our troops on the ground.  In addition to the lives spared by interdicting of supplies and troops flowing south from North Vietnam along the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Laos, the missions flown out of Thailand also played a significant role in support of ground combat operations in South Vietnam itself.

Udorn, Thailand: An F4 Phantom taxis out for a mission over Vietnam, sometime during Tet '68

The Siege of Khe Sanh and the role of superior American air power in the ground war....

The siege of Khe Sanh was one of the most famous, and it was the most prolonged battle of the '68 Tet Offensive.  At the town of Khe Sanh, located near the DMZ and six miles east of the Laotian border, twenty thousand North Vietnamese troops had overrun the town and were threatening to take the Marine Base, where six thousand American Marines were stationed.  With a major battle involving street to street and house to house fighting going on at the same time in the old capital city of Hue, General Westmorland could not afford to pull US troops from Hue to further reinforce Khe Sanh.  Still, in Westmoreland's estimation, Khe Sanh was of great strategic importance, because of its location.  Aside from the fact it was being used as a fire base from which to shell the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Laos, if the North Vietnamese gained a foothold there, it would become a staging area and jumping off point for a major invasion of the South.  And, if Khe Sanh were to fall, it would be a tremendous boost to the morale of the North Vietnamese.  For they were hoping to score a decisive victory there akin to their resounding victory at Dien Bien Phu that had ended their war with the French, fourteen years earlier.  In what was to be the heaviest air bombardment effort of the war, F-4 Phantoms, F-105 Thunderchiefs, B-52 bombers and others flew thousands of sorties out of Thailand, in concert with missions out of Danang and Guam.  Day after day, week after week, they held the communists at bay, daily dropping more than 1300 tons of high explosives, white phosphorus, and Napalm in the jungles that surrounded the base, even up to the wire at the base's very perimeter.

There were heavy losses among American troops stationed there, and it must have been hell for them, living for so long on the cusp of death every moment of the day and night.  Two hundred were killed and many more were wounded by incoming artillery and mortar fire.  Living in bunkers for weeks on end, the brave troops stationed there fought gallantly and "gave ‘em hell", dishing out all the Communists wanted and more with their own artillery, mortar, and automatic arms fire.  But had it not been for the massive air support, it might well have ended in the massacre of all the US troops there, because of the sheer overwhelming numbers of NVA.  I guess it must have been hell for the Communist troops too, with the unrelenting fire and death raining down upon their heads from the American warplanes. I remember seeing footage of the strikes, and they were indeed impressive - absolutely awesome in their destructive power!

The B-52 missions were called "Arc Lights" because of the strings of bright flashes seen from the air on the night missions.  And whether daytime or night, they were especially effective at stemming the tide of NVA that was attempting to overrun the base. They struck absolute terror into the hearts of the enemy, and with good reason.  The bombing campaign at Khe Sanh had been dubbed "Niagara" by General Westmoreland, who said he envisioned the B-52 bombs falling like the water from Niagara Falls.  It was a most appropriate analogy. Each plane carried 108, 500-pound bombs.  "Carpet bombing" from 30,000 to 40,000 feet, a single air strike of six B-52's would completely devastate an area one-half mile wide by two miles long, killing virtually everything in its path.  The bombing runs were made 'round the clock in all kinds of weather, and when the bombs were dropped, there was nowhere for the enemy to hide.   Many of the NVA casualties occurred when the bunkers and caves in which they sought refuge collapsed under the tremendous pounding of the B-52 strikes.

Losses were far greater on the Communist side than on ours.  And there was evidence of mass desertion among some of the demoralized North Vietnamese units.   One enemy notebook recovered after the siege was over indicated that 300 troops had deserted from one unit in the face of the bombing.  To this day, Hanoi has never released an official count of NVA killed there.  Estimates range up to 16,000 killed, an indication of just how badly North Vietnam wanted to occupy that base and how much they were willing to pay to win it.  But in April, after seventy-seven days of siege had passed, with their forces decimated, the Communists finally were forced to face the reality of their defeat and withdraw from Khe Sanh.  Quoting General Westmoreland, "It was the fire of the B-52's that basically broke their backs."

Yes, it was America's air power that made the difference at Khe Sanh and prevented another Dien Bien Phu.  But I don't wish to oversimplify here and imply that it was the B-52's alone that kept Khe Sanh from falling.  The braveness with which the Marines themselves defended the base cannot be overstated.  But the Communists controlled the entire area around Khe Sanh on the ground.  It was the C-123 and C-130 cargo planes and the helicopters flying in and out that kept the supply lines open.  They were the "heart" that pumped the life's blood of "beans and bullets" that was so vital to the survival of the band of American defenders there.  As such, the transports and helicopters became prime targets for the Communist troops surrounding the base.  But in spite of the heavy ground fire from the enemy, they continued flying their missions.  And they succeeded in keeping the garrison supplied, in spite of the fact the NVA had cut all of the roads into and out of the area.

Credit must also go to the forward air controllers, flying in their small light aircraft and those who dropped and monitored electronic sensors in the area.  It was they who helped keep track of enemy movements and helped direct the strike aircraft to their targets' location. They were largely responsible for the deadly effectiveness of the B-52 air strikes.  But the fact remains, as General Westmoreland stated, it was the overwhelming destructive power of the B-52's that demoralized and finally broke a very persistent, tenacious enemy's will to continue the seige.

I quote here the words of Sam Weaver, a Thai based forward air controller, whose O-2 flew low over the terrain right after one of the B-52 "Arc Light" missions had unleashed its deadly load.  His first hand eyewitness account gives a hint of what it must have been like for those on the ground when the bombs rained down from the unseen aerial menace, thirty thousand feet above the jungle canopy.

And the words of Steve Long, former Air Force POW in Hanoi, further attest to the adverse effect the B-52's (BUFF's) had on enemy morale: "I had the unfortunate experience of being on the other end of the Buff strikes. Well, at least I was in the same county (hectares?). I watched a few propaganda films and I can tell you this: The Vietnamese feared no other weapon as much as they did the Buff arc light. Their defense? When they heard the bombs approaching, they laid down on their bellies facing a tree and hung on until the bombs went away!"

I do have to feel sorry for anyone, even the enemy, who had to endure the ferocity of such bombardment.   I saw the aerial reconnaissance photos of the area after the siege was over, and I swear it looked like the face of the moon!  The once dense, lush tropical jungle had been virtually turned into toothpicks, and there was nothing left to see but miles and miles of bomb craters.  The location of the Marine base in the photos was obvious.  It was the only area left uncratered by the B-52's.

It was the widespread destruction wrought by the carpet bombing used at Khe Sanh and other places that caused the demonstrators at home to protest it so vehemently as an unneccessarily destructive and inhumane act. But the fact is, that carpet bombing was responsible for saving the lives of many thousands of our troops on the ground. The tropic jungle has long since grown back and renewed itself, and the jungle wildlife has long since repopulated that forest environment. Today, there is scarcely a trace left of the battle that took place there, outside of a shrine erected by the Vietnamese to memorialize their dead. But the lives of those brave men who defended Khe Sanh could never have been replaced. Ask their families. I'm sure they would much rather have their loved ones remembered as brave defenders who won the battle than as brave defenders who fought to the death in a modern day Alamo.

Ironically enough, even after all the effort spent, the ordinance expended, and lives lost in the battle to hold Khe Sanh, in the summer of '68, the US forces were directed to pull out and leave the base to be reclaimed by the jungle.  But it would be have to be occupied and defended with American blood many more times before the war's end.

After the war was over, the former Secretary of Defense, Robert S. MacNamara, testified under oath that as early as late 1965 he was convinced in his own mind "the war could not be won militarily."  Even so, most students of that war will say that it was the Tet Offensive of 1968 that was the "turning point" in the war.  But that was only because of the politics of the war, not because we had lost the round militarily.  We had won every major battle of the offensive.  But the Tet Offensive did make it clear that more American troops would be needed to keep all of the bases occupied and properly defended.  But that year, General Westmoreland’s request for additional troops was denied by congress and the administration, mainly because of growing resistance to the war by the American public.  The political "tug of war" at home dictated a policy of restraint.  But it was this very policy of restraint and limited troop commitment that often necessitated taking the same ground over and over - ground which had been hard won only a day, or a week, or a month before, then abandoned.  And each time it was retaken, it would have to be purchased anew with the blood of more young American men!  Is it any wonder so many troops became disillusioned?  "What the hell are we doing here?...fighting a war, or playing games??" 

It was becoming increasingly apparent, we were playing games - political ones.  For the painful, ugly truth of it was, the war was being run entirely by the politicians.  Far removed from the bloodshed and death, they withheld authority from their field commanders to manage the war in a way necessary to accomplish the goal of defeating and crushing the Communist menace from the North.   Meanwhile, they sat safely back home in Washington DC and moved pieces around the board in what seemed to be a cavalier game of "War Monopoly" with one finger constantly on the pulse of public opinion.   In fact, there was no real strategy to WIN the war; the only strategy was aimed at maintaining the "status quo." It was an ill conceived plan from a military standpoint. The whole thing was micro-managed and tightly controlled by the politicians, led by LBJ, and was based upon the political scene on the home front at the time.  LBJ was reported to have often bragged to his aides, "Those boys can't hit an outhouse without my permission."  Such is the arrogance borne of power.  Far from being humbled by it, how proud he seemed to be of the control he wielded over the lives of others!

Even prior to Tet '68, public mood in America had already been made sour enough by one political miscalculation after another.  Johnson was worried about growing complaints by minorities that the rich were able to keep their children from the draft by sending them to college.  The allegation was, the sons of the rich could wait out the war by becoming "professional students."  The reality was, as in my case, many of the middle and upper class either were drafted or volunteered for service in the Armed Forces, before attending college.  In fact, the actual demographics of the war showed that the burden had been pretty evenly distributed among the social classes on a percentage basis.  But in the politics of the day, as always, what counted most was perception.  In this case it was the perception that most of the burden of war was being unfairly placed upon the poor. 

It was a myth, but in late 1967, in an attempt to "make the draft more equitable", Johnson lifted the deferment for college students, making most of them immediately eligible for the draft.  Thereafter, college campuses would no longer be a safe haven for those who sought to avoid induction into the military!  But Johnson's attempt to placate dissatisfied minorities backfired on him.  That decision by the President, unwittingly was political suicide for him.  The violent public reaction resulting from the ending of the college deferment was immediate and widespread.  It caused him to tire quickly of this nasty little war.  I think it was that, coupled with the hugely negative reaction by the media and the public to the '68 Tet Offensive, that finally caused him to throw in the political towel.

As far as I am aware, the average troop had no special love for LBJ, but as Commander in Chief, he was our leader.  I remember, it came as somewhat of a shock to us that year, when on March 31st, we were informed our Commander in Chief, Lyndon Baynes Johnson, had announced he would not seek re-election to the Presidency, because of the public's rapidly growing disapproval of the war.  It was anything but a confidence builder for us who were already there.  One more blow to the morale of America’s military forces, it only reinforced the feeling of being sent over and abandoned!  It seemed the Commander in Chief had tired of the adversity and given up the fight on a personal level.  And in the wake of the '68 Tet Offensive, his refusal to send the additional troops needed just completed our sense of abandonment.  It was one more betrayal heaped upon a growing pile of betrayals.  It seemed to say to us, "Yes, I'm bailing out, but you have to stay.  Furthermore, we're not sending you any additional help.  Make do with what you have!"  Would that we could have backed out of our commitments as easily as politicians did theirs!  In truth, the causes of all wars are at their core political.  But the conduct of war itself, is something best kept out of the hands of politicians!

The siege at Khe Sanh had been but one of many bloody life and death struggles for turf that took place in South Vietnam, during the '68 Tet Offensive.  The battles for Hue and Saigon and Pleiku and many others come to mind.  The US was victorious in all of those battles.  Indeed, the US won every major battle of the entire war!  But the escalation of the war that year served only to further galvanize opposition to it back home.  Taking due note of the political climate in the U.S., Ho Chi Minh and his Generals had hoped to score at least a few military victories from the broad Tet Offensive, thereby gaining additional psychological and political advantage.  The Viet Cong had hoped that the people in the South, seeing their victories, would come over to their side, rise up, and help them to overthrow the Saigon government.  This just did not materialize for them.  Any ground the Communists had managed to take in the early days of the offensive by virtue of surprise, was quickly recovered, once American forces reacted.  Militarily, the Communists were soundly defeated.  Although the Tet Offensive was a resounding failure for them from a military standpoint, it had a much greater psychological effect on the American people than the Communists had dared hope, especially in light of their military defeat.  One huge reason for that was the profoundly negative spin put on the Tet Offensive by the media.

I have to wonder what the outcome of World War II might have been under similar circumstances, with a media largely opposed to the war fanning the flames of anti-war sentiment at every opportunity, and a public unwilling to pull together and make the sacrifices necessary to win it.  Would Europe still be under the domination of jack booted Nazis today?  How many more millions of innocents would have been slain by a madman?  Would all of the Pacific nations and Asia be controlled by the Japanese Imperialists?  Would America even exist as we know it today?  I think not.  Granted, World War II and the Vietnam War were two vastly different wars.  But it's difficult not to make some comparisons, at least in the way in which they were handled.  There is plenty of blame to go around, but I contend, the outcome of both wars can be credited in large part to the way they were treated by the mainstream media.

The predominant media take on the Tet Offensive was that the North, rather than being defeated, was a long way from giving up the fight.  But actually, the real truth was later found to be just the opposite!  The '68 Tet Offensive had been a kind of "last ditch effort" for them.  By their own admission, the failure of the Tet Offensive had the Communists thinking that their interests might best be served by suing for peace.  But the American public’s exaggerated reaction to the video of a handful of Viet Cong troops inside the US embassy grounds in Saigon, and to the numbers of American KIA's incurred during Tet made Ho Chi Minh rethink the advisability of seeking peace.  It became apparent to him, they only need hold out long enough for all remaining support for the war to crumble in the US.  They would ultimately prevail and snatch victory from the jaws of defeat!  This was indeed as much a psychological war as it was a military war.  It was absolutely a war that turned on the mindset of the American public, which was in turn, largely molded by the media spin!

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