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Heavy Fighting in South Vietnam

By VVAW

The heaviest fighting seen since the Jan. '73 ceasefire was signed has been raging for months in S. Vietnam in areas surrounding the nation's two largest cities, Saigon and Da Nang. In direct violation of the Paris Agreement, the Thieu regime had set up some 10,000 illegal outposts on PRG territory from which it has been launching thousands of sweeps, shelling attacks, 'pacification' raids, and land-grabbing operations; many of which were of division and multi division size. The response of the Vietnamese people to these attacks has been severe. In fierce counterattacks, troops of the National Liberation Front (NLF) have retaken literally hundreds of the Saigon outposts in the past several months, inflicting extensive damage to Thieu's forces.

In an area some 19 miles southwest of Da Nang, NFL troops have dealt the Saigon forces one defeat after another in battles around the town of Duc Duc and the district capital of Thuong Duc. NFL forces also succeeded in cutting the strategic Rt. #1 near Qui Nhon, Saigon's major link to the north. Then, on August 7th, Saigon suffered an even more serious defeat when the NFL captured Thuong Duc.

About the same time in an area west of the district town of Ben Cat, 25 miles north of Saigon, liberation forces inflicted extensive damage on Saigon troops in an engagement that had begun on May 17th with what the NY Times called the heaviest fighting seen since January '73. The Times also quoted a western diplomat in Saigon as saying "in some ways I don't blame them. At some point they say 'enoughs enough.'" On Aug. 15th near the town of Phu Cuong, 20 miles north of Saigon, the NLF captured a number of Saigon outposts in what government sources called the "closest major fighting had come to the capital in more than two years." The next day NLF tanks advanced to within 15 miles of Saigon, "closer to Saigon's city limits than they ever had."

Noting the mounting NLF victories, the Times admitted on Sept. 3rd that "uncounted outposts have been given up in Quang Ngai and Quang Nam provinces under heavy pressure" from liberation troops. But as a western diplomat pointed out in the dispatch, "the communists are just taking back what they consider to be theirs." Despite the impossibility of maintaining the Thieu regime in the long run the US still seems determined to go down with the sinking ship. President Ford had already made it clear that he will continue Nixon's disastrous policies in Indochina no matter what the cost may be. In a omnimous reflection of this decision, the PRG mission in Paris reported on Aug. 6th that American pilots were still flying combat missions over liberated territory in direct violation of the Paris agreement and that they recently killed over 300 people near Loc Ninh. But as the PRG also noted in condemning Ford for his decision, "whoever asks for the indefinite pursuit of US aid to the Saigon regime identifies with the lies of Nixon and puts his feet into the quicksand of Vietnam." The US has no other recourse left-either get out now or follow the Thieu dictatorship down to total defeat.

IMPLEMENT THE AGREEMENTS! END ALL AID TO THIEU AND LON NOL!