Friday, May 19, 1972
Diplomat: City Is Key To The War
By Brian Dewhurst
SAIGON (UPI) --"Whoever wins the battle for Hue can sit down at the Paris peace talks with a vital trump card," a senior diplomat said Wednesday."Hue is now the key to the war," he said.The diplomat said if Hue and Kontum fall, the North Vietnamese would control the northern plateau of South Vietnam and would be in a greater bargaining position in Paris..."And then it depends on whether the U.S. decisions are made by President Nixon, or candidate Nixon," he said.He said if Hue fell he believed the United States would be forced to reach some agreement on a coalition government."The next two months could be the most vital of the war," he said.The diplomat said he believed the North Vietnamese might have launched their March 30 offensive too early."They got the shock of their lives at An Loc," the battered province capital 60 miles north of Saigon, he said."They thought they could take it easily, but the South Vietnamese are still holding it. They are fighting well."He said the failure to swamp An Loc must have caused North Vietnamese leaders considerable embarrassment."They aren't doing that well, and the increased raids by the B52s are hurting them," he said."But if they take Hue, an entirely new complex will come over the war and the talks.""Diplomat: City Is Key to the War", by Brian Dewhurst, published in the Pacific Stars and Stripes, Friday, May 19, 1972 and reprinted from European and Pacific Stars and Stripes, a Department of Defense publication copyright, 2002 European and Pacific Stars and Stripes.