Monday, May 1, 1972
Reds Circle Quang Tri With A Ring Of Fire
"Incoming! Incoming!" an anxious GI cried out early Thursday as he slapped his palms against the barracks walls at the U.S. military compound at Quang Tri.It took a second or two for the American soldiers to realize what was happening, to pull themselves out of dreams of danger into the reality of it.North Vietnamese artillery, mortars and rockets exploded around them, but most rounds landed on the outskirts of Quang Tri, the northernmost major city in South Vietnam.The 80 American GIs at the compound, mostly advisers, hurriedly laced their combat boots, zipped up their flak jackets and stuck helmets on their heads.They could hear shells ripping into the Quang Tri combat base, three miles north of the city, and the suburb of La Vang, a mile to the south. Stray rounds tore into Quang Tri itself, a city of 25,000 people, rattling doors and windows at the tiny American compound.A warning siren began to wail as the soldiers stumbled sleepily through rain to man the soaking, green-sandbagged bunkers just inside the barbed wire perimeter."Do you think this is it?" they asked. "Are they really coming? Can we hold out?"Many of the American soldiers were veterans of the start of the current Communist offensive March 30 when an estimated two North Vietnamese divisions moved south and overran the government's northern defensive line.The Communists stopped at the Cua Viet River, seven miles north of Quang Tri, but sent thousands of artillery rounds each day into the combat base during the first week of the offensive.The heavy shelling forced the U.S. advisers to abandon the combat base and move south to the relative safety of cramped quarters in Quang Tri City.Now, they were wondering whether they would have to go through the nightmare of screaming rockets, mortars and artillery all over again.Sketchy reports began filtering into the compound. A North Vietnamese infantry regiment was attacking from the southwest. Another infantry regiment was coming from the northwest. A Communist artillery regiment was in charge of the shelling.One report said the Communist had blown up the bridge over the Thach Han River, cutting off Quang Tri City from the embattled combat base. A reporter hitchhiked over to the bridge, a half mile southwest of Quang Tri, to take a look.The gray wooden span, built by U.S. Navy Seabees two years ago, was still standing, but towering clouds of gray-black smoke could be seen to the south over the combat base, headquarters for South Vietnamese Marines.The reporter hitched a lift in a South Vietnamese ambulance, sitting in a puddle of blood, onto the outskirts of the smoking combat base.Artillery rounds were whistling into the base every few seconds, knocking apart buildings as though they were made of matchsticks. One shell set off a giant fire, apparently after hitting some fuel dumps. Another caused a deafening roar after it seemed to hit an ammunition dump.The shelling kept getting worse with the rounds falling all over the sprawling base, forcing the reporter back outside. Thick gray clouds hung low in the sky, keeping most U.S. and South Vietnamese jets grounded. It was perfect weather -for a Communist attack.A South Vietnamese artillery captain drove by in a jeep and offered a lift back to Quang Tri city. The captain, coming from Dong Ha, a black battered shell of a city seven miles north of Quang Tri, said North Vietnamese ground troops were hitting government soldiers hard. He said he saw at least one government and one Communist tank knocked out in early fighting.Thousands of South Vietnamese civilians lined the streets of Quang Tri, all their belongings tied up in blanketed bundles resting on their heads and shoulders."They want to leave, go down south, but we have been ordered to keep them here," a police officer said. "No civilians are allowed to leave."Some U.S. soldiers speculated the civilians were being forced to stay in the city to keep the North Vietnamese from attacking Quang Tri."They're short of hostages," on GI said. "The North Vietnamese might not hit us too hard if they know a lot of civilians will also get killed."More reports came in. The headquarters of the South Vietnamese infantry regiment southwest of Quang Tri fell back to the Thach Han Bridge under pressure. North Vietnamese troops cut Highway 1, the only escape route south to safety. Communist tanks were slicing across the flanks of the government Marine brigade and Ranger group west of northwest of Quang Tri.U.S. soldiers at the advisers compound began packing their rucksacks and cleaning their little-used rifles just in case. If the Communist advance kept on, they would have to be pulled out, possibly under fire."They'll fly us out by chopper if it gets too bad," on GI said. Another added, "we could march to the sea and get picked up by American ships." A third said "maybe they'll reopen the road and we can get out by land."They sat and smoked and talked, trying to keep their minds off the fighting, but failing. It was just a matter of waiting, waiting for news from the battlefield.If the South Vietnamese troops pushed back the advancing Communists, the GIs would all joke about their worries the next day over cans of cold beer. If not, well..."Reds Circle Quang Tri With a Ring of Fire", by Stewart Kellerman, published in the Pacific Stars and Stripes on Monday, May 1, 1972 and reprinted from the European and Pacific Stars and Stripes, a Department of Defense publication copyright, 2002 European and Pacific Stars and Stripes.