[3]:2501, On the evening of 1 February 3 platoons from Company C, 4/12th Infantry and 2 platoons from Company D, 17th Cavalry Regiment were ordered 2km north of Ho Nai to establish an outer defense against any renewed VC/PAVN attack. Our area from the Now commanded by a brand-new second lieutenant, the men of Alpha Company balked when they were told to move. Page contents not supported in other languages. I operated a heavy five Incredibly, nobody in my company had been killed the day before. I asked one of the men [2]:350, With the base returned to full operation, that afternoon C130s landed the 2nd Battalion, 506th Infantry Regiment to help ARVN forces fighting the VC in Bin Ha city. The Vietnamese general and the III Corps G3 adviser, however, were not very happy when we pulled out. This article incorporates public domain material from the .mw-parser-output cite.citation{font-style:inherit;word-wrap:break-word}.mw-parser-output .citation q{quotes:"\"""\"""'""'"}.mw-parser-output .citation:target{background-color:rgba(0,127,255,0.133)}.mw-parser-output .id-lock-free a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-free a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/65/Lock-green.svg")right 0.1em center/9px no-repeat}.mw-parser-output .id-lock-limited a,.mw-parser-output .id-lock-registration a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-limited a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-registration a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d6/Lock-gray-alt-2.svg")right 0.1em center/9px no-repeat}.mw-parser-output .id-lock-subscription a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-subscription a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/aa/Lock-red-alt-2.svg")right 0.1em center/9px no-repeat}.mw-parser-output .cs1-ws-icon a{background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4c/Wikisource-logo.svg")right 0.1em center/12px no-repeat}.mw-parser-output .cs1-code{color:inherit;background:inherit;border:none;padding:inherit}.mw-parser-output .cs1-hidden-error{display:none;color:#d33}.mw-parser-output .cs1-visible-error{color:#d33}.mw-parser-output .cs1-maint{display:none;color:#3a3;margin-left:0.3em}.mw-parser-output .cs1-format{font-size:95%}.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-left{padding-left:0.2em}.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-right{padding-right:0.2em}.mw-parser-output .citation .mw-selflink{font-weight:inherit}Air Force Historical Research Agency. (Vietnam War period). All I could think of to say was, Please clear that weapon!. All night they scanned the jungles with Starlight scopes, seeing nothing. introduction into country when he first came to the 118th. The 2nd Platoon took on the one on the north side of the road, and the 1st Platoon attacked the other. Bravo Company was sent to protect the Long Binh ammunition dump, and Charlie Company was ordered into downtown Bien Hoa, where the ARVN III Corps headquarters was in danger of being overrun. Tower had called and told me that Charlie Company was under the operational control of III Corps and I was to take my orders from them. U.S. military officials vVould not give the exact number of casualties for security reasons. When Lieutenant Casper jumped up, our legs became entangled and I tripped him, Ax remembers. Get under! After what seemed like As 1st Lt. Brice Barnes led his scout platoon into the edge of Ho Nai, he ran full speed into a hornets nest. To get to the church, we had to run a gantlet of fire, through the VC 238th Regiment and into the flank of the 275th, which was fighting the 2-47s scout platoon in Widows Village. Flames consuming huts. Bringing that volatile convoy through the city, which had not been totally cleared and was still burning in many places, was a tremendously heroic act. I told the colonel that this was not a police action, that we werent searching houses, we were in combat. Toward dusk on January 30, Charlie Company soldiers stripped to the waist to dig bunkers next to their APCs. The 2nd Platoon led the way under Lieutenant Fred Casper, followed by my track, then Lieutenant Howard Jones 1st Platoon and, finally, the weapons platoon under Lieutenant Don Muir. 26 VC/PAVN were killed in the attack and several captured. THE EXPLOSIONS RATTLED WINDOWS IN SAIGON, ABOUT 13 MILES (20 KILOMETERS) AWAY. In April 1967, I was a first lieutenant commanding a rifle company in the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg, N.C. Then I got a call from battalion commander Tower, asking how things were going. The village of Ho Nai, now a ghost town, still smoldered. For more great articles, subscribe to Vietnam magazine today! In 1964 an Ohio woman took up the challenge that had led to Amelia Earharts disappearance. 6 comments. Realizing we were driving past our objective, I halted the company and called for the 2nd Platoon to find a place to turn around. Some VC crossed Route 316 and took up firing positions in bush at the southern perimeter of the Plantation. The most comprehensive and authoritative history site on the Internet. According to Jones, that assault went so perfectly that it could have served as a demonstration at the infantry school. I told him we couldnt take the tracks off Highway 1 into town because the streets were too narrow. more The two of them refused evacuation and neither reported his wound. My only previous contact with M-113 armored personnel carriers (APCs) was during a training exercise at the officers basic course. While much has been written about Tet and the political firestorm that resulted, in the hundreds of surprise battles and skirmishes that unfolded, individual units found themselves thrust into intense danger, turmoil, chaos, confusion, contradictions and outright lunacy as they responded to Viet Cong (VC) attacks. Ammo Dump Exlosion Sapper Attack! remember being giddy and my brain was asking What is wrong with me?. Few areas of the world have been as hotly contested as the India-Pakistan border. AIR V..FIRES (Vietnam War period). known as Widows Village. F-100 Super Sabre and F-4 Phantom II drop Mark 82 bombs in Vietnam during U.S. air strikes. [2]:347, The ARVN 53rd Regional Force Battalion was responsible for security in the countryside around Bin Ha. The VC attacks on Bien Hoa and the Long Binh complex were abject failures, due in part to the fact that on January 31, 1968, they had run into the Panthers of the 2nd Battalion (Mechanized), 47th Infantry. A burst of VC machine gun fire erupted nearby, causing the colonel, the deputy and their Vietnamese escorts to pile into their vehicles and roar off in the direction from whence they had come. Then and This was no surprise to us, since we could plainly hear the enemy rounds slamming into Long Binh. maxhightForP2 = 13904; EXPLOSIONS IN DISTANCE The Commo track, C-007, nicknamed Abdula and the Rug Merchants, with then- Pfc (and current Vietnam editor) David Zabecki behind the .50-caliber, brought up the rear. Tet offensive attacks on Bien Hoa and Long Binh - Wikipedia 200 pounds. 0.24 As dawn broke, everything was deathly quiet. we were a bit more trigger happy than usual. The acting commander of the 199th LIB, Col. Frederic E. Davison, ordered three of his infantry companies operating north of Long Binh to attack the rocket launch site, while LG Weyand ordered the 9th Infantry Division to send the 1st Brigade from Bearcat Base. 2023 CriticalPast LLC. -- color photo Near Moc Hoa. Simultaneously, platoon leaders reported finding discarded AK-47s. Somehow the foam trucks from View of surrounding areas. My Lightboxes | This is the airstrike on snipers at the 195th AHC perimeter and the Long Binh ammo dump explosion set off by sappers the morning of the 1968 Tet offensive with sound effects added. HistoryNet.com is brought to you by HistoryNet LLC, the worlds largest publisher of history magazines. I realized we were driving past our objective, halted the company and called for the 2nd Platoon to find a place to turn around. Those orders were for us to clear the VC from the houses surrounding the corps headquarters. LONG BINH, South Viet Nam (UPII A thunderous explosion that shook the heart of Saigon 11 miles away ripped through a U.S. ammunition depot tonight and wounded a handful of Americans. One A-37 and 1 F-100 were destroyed while a further 17 aircraft were damaged. Long Binh, again (Feb. 1967). Hoa. bore in my M14 barrel had begun to flake off and the wooden stock was remember that my right shoulder and chest were black and blue from the build bunkers, and help pick up the dead enemy across the fence. We threw grenades over the wall behind them, but hit nothing.. We suffered more wounded during the trip back to III Corps, where I was called to a meeting in the headquarters. GV EXPLOSIONS AND FIRES Although initially surprised, U.S. forces had reacted quickly and, despite what was reported in the press, American and ARVN forces handed the VC a devastating defeat during Tet. The 2-47s scout platoon had just finished a brutal fight in Widows Village, and at 4 p.m., it was ordered to move to the junction of Highways 1 and 316, and to attack westward through the village of Ho Nai toward Charlie Company, in the hope of pinning the VC between us. By some veterans' accounts, it had the unofficial name "Long Binh Junction." In 1968, the base fell under attack during the Tet Offensive, and the Viet Cong assault force was repelled by American troops. Benny Toney, the 2nd Platoon sergeant, hooked a tow cable to Stormy. So, when I was offered a chance to go to II Field Force to help establish a new long-range reconnaissance patrol outfit, I actually turned it down to stay with the company. wire on the top of LBJ (Long Binh Jail). At 0700, as daylight was breaking, my track rolled past the ARVN III Corps compound gate. Zabecki remembers taking his place on the wall with his M-79. CU SIGN "NO SMOKING" https://www.historynet.com/tet-offensive-the-battles-of-bien-hoa-and-long-binh/, Jerrie Mock: Record-Breaking American Female Pilot, When 21 Sikh Soldiers Fought the Odds Against 10,000 Pashtun Warriors, Few Red Tails Remain: Tuskegee Airman Dies at 96. As a result long-range reconnaissance patrols (LRRPs) from Company F, 51st Infantry Regiment were positioned north of Long Binh to detect PAVN/VC approaching the base. At that moment, a burst of VC machine gun fire erupted, causing the colonel, the deputy and their Vietnamese escorts to pile into their vehicles and roar off in the direction from whence they had come. Casper rose from a prone position and yelled for his troops to follow him. rockets at Bien Hoa AB and Long Binh Post. As we rolled by, we looked down into the compound and saw soldiers in khakis milling about with boarding passes in hand. Activity in the area had picked up in November and M-113 Armored Personnel Carrier on guard. To get to the church, we had to run a gantlet of fire, through the VC 238th Regiment and into the flank of the 275th, which was fighting the 2-47s scout platoon in Widows Village. Tower sent Major Jones to take command, and once Alpha got moving, it did a magnificent job. [6]:66. As we turned around to head back west, a tremendous blast shook the whole city of Bien Hoa. As was our normal practice, each company had sent two ambush patrols into the jungle to our front. Jim Love recalls lying in a ditch near a dead civilian as the friendly fire cracked over our heads. In mid-September, when Ionoff moved to battalion headquarters to become the operations officer (S3), I assumed command of Company C. In October, the 2-47 was tasked to secure engineers as they cleared Highway 1 from Xuan Loc to the II Corps boundary near Phan Thiet. When I arrived at 9th Division in June, I was further shocked to learn that I was going to a mechanized battalion, rather than be assigned to one of the battalions in the Delta where I could use my light infantry and Ranger school experience. 4 Joseph Dames was tasked to return to the tracks for more grenades. He ignored me and proceeded to a nearby house where he and the deputy sheriff kicked in the front door. I A few minutes later, a jeep drove up carrying two extremely frightened white-shirted policemen. Mainly it is the story of some of the finest solders to ever wear the uniform of the U.S. Army and how they reacted not only to fierce combat, but also to the fog of war. resulting in the explosion of the ammo dump at Bin Ha Air Base. Having been struck by mortars or rockets, the fuel tanks at the air base, as well as several buildings throughout Bien Hoa, were burning brightly. a noise! I jumped down and ran from track to track, pounding on the sides and yelling, Check your handsets! As I ran back through the weapons platoon in the pre-dawn gloom, with small-arms fire cracking overhead, I was amazed to see young girls carrying bottles of Coca-Cola, trying to sell them to the troops. It involved transfer of powder projectiles and fuses enough to keep Alpha Company, still licking its wounds from the January 23 fight, was left intact. Rolling back through Bien Hoa, we were astounded to come upon the battalion S4, Captain Leroy Brown, in the middle of town with a 5,000-gallon fuel tanker and several ammunition trucks. [3]:210 Instead at approximately 03:30 the VC began firing across the road at the Plantation Compound being met by return fire from the perimeter bunkers. All day civilians had been darting from their homes and running from the fighting. Construction on the 24 th. The three companies formed a line almost three kilometers long, facing to the east, with their backs to the Long Binh wire. Long Binh Ammo Dump October 29, 1966 . Tet airstrike Long Binh Ammo Dump - YouTube I remember one Advanced Search | The bombs descend and explode on structures in grove of trees near rice paddies 23 miles east of Binh Thuy on 19th August. There we would be assigned a unit we would serve with in Vietnam. The 2-47s scout platoon had just finished a brutal fight in Widows Village, and at 1600 hours, it was ordered to move to the junction of Highways 1 and 316, and to attack westward through the village of Ho Nai toward Charlie Company, in the hope of pinning the VC between us. At about 0600, Lt. Col. John Tower, the new battalion commander, called with orders. [3]:2204, On 1 February Company B, 2/3rd Infantry, Company C, 4/12th Infantry and elements of 2/47th Infantry swept Ho Nai finding only dead VC/PAVN and civilians who had been murdered by the VC or killed in the fighting in the town. As we made the turn eastward on Highway 1, the lead platoon was ambushed. Rocket Attack on Dong Tam - July 10, 1969. The Vietnamese brigadier general, who was the ranking man at III Corps, drew circles around two equal-sized areas of downtown Bien Hoa. Service Battery that supplied ordnance to the big guns in our battalion. 4 "Late in the war" 1 comment. We charged southeast down Highway 316 to the Highway 15 intersection, located on a small hill overlooking the 90th Replacement Company. Rambo claims that the bunker guards were MPs with the call sign of Filmy Milker. According to him, I told their commander that any fool could see that the VC did not have M-113s, and that we had 22 .50-calibers and a 106mm recoilless rifle and they, for sure, did not want us to return fire. I said again, "Who is there"? An eyewitness account of the battle for control of Bien Hoa and Long Binh on the first day of the 1968 Tet Offensive. on the Bailey Compound, only in the 145th CAB HQ which could The attacks by Vietcong (VC) and People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) forces were one of several major attacks around Saigon in the first days of the Tet offensive. Satchel charges blew pallets of artillery ammunition, creating a mushroom cloud that made us think the VC had set off a tactical nuclear weapon. AIR V..EXPLOSION When we arrived, we filed off the busses . sixteen guns stationed next to the western border of Vietnam. The progress was slow and ammo was becoming scarce, particularly grenades, which get consumed at an enormous rate in city fighting. All I could think of to say was, Please clear that weapon!During the meeting, a master sergeant adviser to a Vietnamese ranger battalion ran into the compound. Officer and soldiers examine barbed wire torn apart by Vietcong who infiltrated Long Binh ammunition dump. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp. 1 comment. I had learned no tactic at infantry school that fit the situation we were faced with, so we improvised. Over the two month recovery and clearing operation, tens of thousands of these hazardous munitions were recoverd by hand, one at a time. We carried concertina wire, sand bags and hundreds of Claymores and trip flares to make our defensive positions practically impenetrable. went off and all hell broke lose. As the scouts escaped, the volume of enemy fire began to slacken, then died altogether. Unconfirmed reports reports said the blasts were . I 2 comments. Cambodian border to the South China sea was already considered a Long Bnh Post and the Vietnam War | Worlds Revealed An MP full colonel, accompanied by a Los Angeles deputy sheriff (dressed in his deputy uniform) and two jeeploads of National Police, drove up to my track. They bowed and looked confused. I called III Corps to report that we had detained all of these people, and was told to wait for the Vietnamese National Police to take charge. ruary 1968 in support of Saigon and Long Binh Post during the TET Offen- Sive. However the ammunition storage bunkers prevented a chain reaction and the lost munitions were easily replaced with no impact on supply. Ly's father is a bricklayer. By continuing to use this site without changing your cookie settings, you agree that you are happy to accept our privacy policyand cookie policyand for us to access our cookies on your device. Meanwhile, Charlie Company was ordered back to III Corps. ". I had been in Vietnam about nine months. 0.22 With small-arms fire cracking overhead, young girls carrying bottles of Coca-Cola were trying to sell them to the troops. By the evening the 2/47th Infantry withdrew into the Long Binh perimeter. 4 Joseph Sugar Bear Dames returned to the tracks for more grenades. He wanted to borrow one of our tracks. I was disappointed when I received orders to join the 9th Infantry Division. During Tet 1968, the 856th Radio . We began to pop hand-held flares so they could see we were there, but the shooting persisted, one round actually hitting my track. Less has been written about the danger, turmoil, chaos, confusion, contradictions and outright lunacy that confronted individual units as they responded to VC attacks on the morning of January 31. As the sun sank over the Long Binh base, they tossed a football and ate cold C rations. With the explosion of the entire ammunition dump imminent, and in the midst of exploding shells, fire and debris, the men of COMPANY B, . Sappers had placed satchel charges on pallets of artillery ammunition, and the resulting mushroom cloud caused all its witnesses to think the VC had employed a tactical nuclear weapon. I was the DistrictSenior Advisor (Army) in Vinh Kim, Long Dinh District, right across the canal from Dong Tam in 1968-1969. Fighting our way to the scout platoon, we were stopped when we came upon two large churches, straddling Highway 1, each occupied by VC. A few minutes later, a jeep drove up carrying two extremely frightened white-shirted policemen. He manned the .50 and, with a Charlie Company driver, headed down Highway 1. In fact, the Communists had already infiltrated the city of Bien Hoa, suburban Ho Nai village and Widows Village, where pensioned families of deceased ARVN soldiers lived. I yelled at Lieutenant Casper and everybody looked around as the VC tore out running the last few yards to safety. A slightly wounded soldier, lying on the ground, smiles as he points to his leg as another soldier helps him. As he fell, a burst of automatic weapons fire stitched the wall right where he would have been had he not fallen.. I sounded off, "who is there"? As the Hueys rockets smashed the VC strongpoint, the scouts fought their way out of the encirclement and evacuated their dead and wounded. He said his battalion was in heavy contact, and he had several wounded rangers he needed to evacuate. The VC had run out of ammunition and were trying to escape. I was to be a platoon leader again, in Charlie Company, commanded by Captain John Ionoff. 102 comments 105 shares. SOUTH VIETNAM: VIET CONG EXPLODE U.S. only be entered from off the Bien Hoa Air base and thru the gate My plan was to make captain and go to Vietnam as an experienced company commander. As we turned right onto Highway 15, an unbelievable spectacle stretched before us. (Vietnam War period). The village of Ho Nai, now a ghost town, was still smoldering. ", "Then we were all in the bunker Later, captured VC said many guerrillas only had two magazines for their weapons in expectation that the population would rise up against the Americans and have plenty of captured weapons to fight with. We closed within a few hundred meters of the scout platoon and watched as helicopter gunships destroyed a large yellow house from which the VC were pinning down Barnes troops. Under fire, Staff Sgt. The three companies formed a line almost three kilometers long, facing east, with their backs to the Long Binh wire, based on the mistaken assumption that the VC would attack from the jungle. Jan. 31. We never saw them again. danger and the probable best course of action. THE STORM BREAKS Part 1 In the late-night hours of 29 January 1968 Updated 7/26/2015. Our arrival had canceled fears that III Corps headquarters might be overrun. I called battalion headquarters and was told to forget about them, which reinforced our sense that combat was imminent. [7], The Tet offensive attacks and previous losses due to mortar and rocket attacks on air bases across South Vietnam led the Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Nitze on 6 March 1968 to approve the construction of 165 "Wonderarch" roofed aircraft shelters at the major air bases. We had run through the rear of the 274th VC Regiment, which was attacking the airfield. The action occurs January 31st, 1968 (on "Tet", the Vietnamese Lunar New Year holiday). Besides the fireworks, ARVN soldiers had linked tracer bullets together and were stitching the darkness with weaving streams of machine gun fire. Long Binh ammo dump was one of the biggest ordnance storage areas in the country. was out of the bldgs. Widows Village made a perfect attack position, since it lay directly across Highway 316 from II Field Force headquarters. EOD in Vietnam 1966-1967, Photo Album - ZiaNet Vehicles drive past on roads between the Long Binh Post area. In April 1967 I was a first lieutenant commanding a rifle company in the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg, N.C. My Account | As my airborne mentality faded, I learned to love the M-113or track, as we called it. At 08:00 the VC south of the Plantation withdrew into the Widows Village. At about 6 a.m., Lt. Col. John Tower, the new battalion commander, called with orders. Initials PW/VS/JH/BB/ES PW/VS/JH/ES Benny Toney, the 2nd Platoon sergeant, hooked a tow cable to Stormy. Photo Index Several soldiers gathered in front of the track to help the wounded, and Love climbed up to man the .50-caliber. (Note: According to Colonel Sonny Craven, then leader of a combat photo team on the scene, these combat sequences was filmed by soldiers of the 221st Signal Company [Pictorial]). The G3 adviser told me that they had received intelligence that Vo Nguyen Giap, the North Vietnamese commanding general (the enemy equivalent of General William Westmoreland), had his command post in a Catholic church about a kilometer east of III Corps. [6]:36 In addition airborne "rocket watch" patrols were established in the Saigon-Bien Hoa area to reduce attacks by fire. As our medics treated the wounded, I reported to the American lieutenant colonel who was the III Corps G3 adviser. The attacks on Bin Ha, Bien Hoa Air Base and Long Binh Post, occurred during the early hours of 31 January 1968 and continued until 2 February 1968. Now commanded by a brand-new second lieutenant, the men of Alpha Company balked when they were told to move. About a month earlier I had been loaned out to weld the razor Bomb squads disarmed seven of the charges, but at 07:30 the remainder exploded with three igniting pallets of artillery shells and their Propellant bags causing a massive explosion, blast wave and mushroom cloud. We began to pop hand-held flares so they could see we were there, but the shooting persisted, one round hitting my track. The Communists were starting to carry out a plan that they had studied for a considerable period. I almost did When we arrived, we found the churchyard packed with thousands of civilians. Their 81mm mortars were useless, since we were told we could not put any indirect fire into the town. Ive just been told you work for me again. opened his mouth but, SGT Cuffee, the supply SGT. the wrecker operator had to know how to weld. VC/PAVN losses were 527 dead. biggest ordnance storage areas in the country. [3]:218, The town of Ho Nai (105812N 1065335E / 10.970N 106.893E / 10.970; 106.893) was located on Highway 1 north of the Widow's Village and Long Binh Post. I dismounted the platoons and placed them on line on each side of the road: the second on the left, or north, and the first on the right, or south. the country where resupply was easier for the enemy. In addition we detained more than 20 probable VC fighters dressed in civilian clothes. Script is copyright Reuters Limited. This is the story of one rifle company, and what it faced on that decisive day. Sergeant was already tucked under a 5 ton truck parked about 50 feet As the 2/47th Infantry approached the town a Vietnamese warned that it contained many VC and the VC then launched an ambush on the column knocking out 3 ACAVs with RPGs setting off a 4-hour battle as the US forces engaged the VC position and rescued the survivors in the damaged ACAVs. 0.48 We came up with a T formation. main target because they were outnumbered 5 to 1. As the 2nd Platoon began to run short, Spc. Bravo Company was sent to protect the Long Binh ammunition dump and Charlie Company was ordered into downtown Bien Hoa, where the ARVN III Corps headquarters was in danger of being overrun. I assigned areas of operation to my two rifle platoons and positioned the weapons platoon inside the compound as a reserve and security force. bunker. LV DITTO 3 Merge Long Binh Jail into Long Binh. As dawn broke on February 1, it was deathly quiet. (Long Binh) ammunition dump. USAF (United States Air Force) F-100 Super Sabre jet fighter aircraft drops Mark 82 (Mk.82) high-drag (HD) bombs. When the G3 adviser told me to lend the rangers a track, I told the sergeant that the M-113 was not a tank and to be extremely careful with it. Kortuem! His battalion was in heavy contact and he had several wounded rangers he needed to evacuate. This is the story of one rifle companycomprised of some of the finest soldiers to ever wear the uniform of the U.S. Armyand what they all faced on that decisive day. Tet of 1968 - 118th AHC forever the big pieces stopped. [2]:346, The US 199th LIB was responsible for security in the towns and countryside around Long Binh, while the 720th Military Police Battalion was responsible for security within the base perimeter. South Vietnam: Viet Cong Explode U.s. Ammunition Dump. I walked back to my track, thinking this was going to be a nightmare. After commanding 180 paratroopers, taking on four APCs and 40 troops seemed like a dreamexcept that now I was responsible for troops in combat, not training. The G3 adviser told me that they had received intelligence that Vo Nguyen Giap, the North Vietnamese commanding general, had his command post in a Catholic church about 1 kilometer east of III Corps.