Securing Saigon

The sweaty Saigon night resounded last week with the thud of distant artillery fire, and the midnight stars were occasionally dimmed by the glare of lofting phosphorus flares. In a war in which there is no front and no enemy lines, the capital of South Viet Nam is right in the middle of the battle --a garrison without walls in a countryside alive with enemy bands. Says Air Force Lieut. Colonel Grove Johnson, head of U.S. security at the huge Tan Son Nhut airport: "It's like defending a stockade in the days of the Indian wars."

Viet Cong terrorists enter Saigon al most at will and control scores of villages in the province of Gia Dinh, which completely surrounds the city. Enemy troops and equipment move freely into the Saigon area along infiltration trails from the Mekong Delta to the south and by motorized sampan along the Saigon River from the north. Eight Viet Cong battalions operate within a radius of 25 miles of the capital, extorting food, supplies and money from fright ened merchants and others among greater Saigon's 2,200,000 population.

Despite reverses elsewhere, the Viet Cong have sharply increased their activity in and around the capital. Terror ist incidents have more than doubled in the past year, and Allied troops began averaging more than three contacts a day with enemy units operating in Gia Dinh province. In November, the V.C.

celebrated South Viet Nam's National Day by lobbing 75-mm. recoilless-rifle shells into downtown Saigon. Last month a 25-man sabotage squad slipped through the heavily guarded perimeter of Tan Son Nhut, nearly reached a parking apron filled with warplanes be fore they were discovered and shot down. As it turns out, the Viet Cong made a mistake by pressing the city so hard: they jolted the U.S. high com mand into action.

Fading Away. Assigning top priority to making Saigon secure, the U.S. last month committed three combat battal ions to Operation Rang Dong, a long-range, large-scale drive that sent 2,500 U.S. troops against Viet Cong forces operating in the three provincial districts south and east of the city. Last week, to clear the Communists out of the area to Saigon's north, American forces launched the largest offensive of the war to date, sending 28 battalions and 34 batteries of artillery into the 25-sq.-mi. wedge known as the Iron Triangle, a notorious Communist strong hold ever since the days of the French.

Composed of jungle, paddyfields and a network of concrete bunkers just 20 miles northwest of Saigon, the Iron Triangle also conceals scores of Viet Cong military base camps, supply depots and field hospitals, all connected by miles of underground tunnels. Intelligence reports indicated that it was the headquarters of the Viet Cong's Fourth Military Region, which commands Communist activities in and around Saigon and had placed practically all hamlets in the area under Communist control. The U.S. has bombed the place repeatedly in the past 18 months but the only previous venture of U.S. troops into the area in force was frustrated when the Viet Cong simply faded into the jungle.

Blocking Forces. Last week's drive, known as Operation Cedar Falls, was different. Before the main attack force of U.S. battalions made its sweep, the entire triangle was surrounded to cut off escape routes. Battalions of Vietnamese army regulars and U.S. troops were stationed along the perimeter to serve as blocking forces, and fleets of barges fitted out with "quad-fifties" (clusters of four .50-caliber machine guns) patrolled the rivers. But the object of the operation was not simply to trap Viet Cong, even though 286 were killed and 64 captured during the week. This time the Americans were bent on destroying the Iron Triangle as a Communist base.

To that end, they brought in 60 bulldozers to clear wide swatches of the jungle that served the Communists as cover. They confiscated tons of food and equipment, overran and demolished scores of V.C. installations, ranging from an underground hospital to a regimental base camp. They also decided upon a more drastic step: to raze all hamlets in the area, resettling the 8,000 or more inhabitants elsewhere, where the V.C. could no longer rely on them for information, food and shelter. The removal of the villagers will also make future identification easier: henceforth, anyone found there is almost bound to be a professional V.C.

Sealed Off. The destruction of Ben Sue, a Saigon River village complex that supported the Viet Cong, was typical. It took only a minute and a half for 60 helicopters to descend on the village with a battalion of the U.S. 1st Division. While loudspeakers warned residents to stay in their homes, infantrymen quickly sealed off the town, catching many of its Viet Cong defenders by surprise. The villagers were assembled and the men between 15 and 45 led off for questioning. Within three days, Ben Sue was deserted, its people and their possessions loaded aboard boats and shipped twelve miles downriver to a refugee camp until they can be permanently relocated. Shortly after they left, torches were put to their homes. After Operation Cedar Falls ends, it will be a long time before the Viet Cong, or anyone else, will be able to use the Iron Triangle again.

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