Wednesday, May 30, 1972
Jets Rain Death On Attackers
by Spec. 4 Ken Schultz
MY CHANH, Vietnam --U.S. Air Force fighter bombers reacted quickly to a North Vietnamese ground attack here early Saturday and halted the Communist advance less than 300 yards from the South Vietnamese Marine defenders.The jets streaked in only 15 minutes after the Communist attack started, and broke the back of the assault with their deadly accurate bombing.Two battalions from the North Vietnamese Army's 66th and 88th Regiments, driving from the west, pushed within the Marines' primary defenses as jets placed a protective shield of ordnance between the ARVN and Red troops.One jet dropped a 750-pound bomb so close to South Vietnamese troop positions that it was feared several Marines had been killed. Field reconnaissance later in the day confirmed that only NVA soldiers had been hit, and that their casualties were heavy.The ARVN division command estimated that at least 40 NVA soldiers were killed in the close-in fighting Saturday and that many more dead as a result of air strikes. Marine casualties were listed as light.There was some mortar and artillery fire leveled against the Marines before the attack began, but it was not a real threat, according to the American adviser to the Marines here."They just tip us off that an attack is coming by the artillery. The heavy stuff goes on while the troops are getting into position," said the American Marine captain.As the tide of the battle turned against the Communists, spotter planes detected troops carrying antiaircraft guns and heavy equipment northward about a mile from the battle on Highway 1, the adviser said.The ARVN command reported that four tanks were knocked out in a skirmish in the area of My Chanh. Four South Vietnamese troops were killed and 12 wounded in the action.But the fighting that has been raging near this village 20 miles northwest of Hue for the past week, although not giving much ground to the South Vietnamese, has been chopping up Communist forces."Jets Rain Death on Attackers", by Spec. 4 Ken Schultz", published in the Pacific Stars and Stripes Tuesday, May 30, 1972 and reprinted from European and Pacific Stars and Stripes, a Department of Defense publication copyright, 2002 European and Pacific Stars and Stripes.