Shock for a Symbol

The huge U.S. military base at Cam Ranh Bay has long been hailed as proof of American determination to stay in Viet Nam. Swiftly constructed at a cost of more than $100 million by Army engineers in the heady days of the 1965-66 buildup, the complex has 70 miles of roads, a jet airfield, a port handling ocean freighters and one of the Army's largest supply depots anywhere. Cam Ranh Bay was considered so safe that Lyndon Johnson paid two visits there.

It was a haven in an ugly war. White sand beaches stretch far at Cam Ranh. Off-duty Americans surf on the gentle swells and snorkle into secluded coves to watch brilliantly colored fish and huge lobsters. There are lighted tennis courts, and at the nurses' Saturday-night dances, the boogaloo and the popcorn are popular. As President Nixon began to disengage U.S. troops from Viet Nam, Cam Ranh acquired new importance as a possible exit or rear-guard enclave for departing American forces.

Then one night last week the war came to Cam Ranh Bay. Obviously tipped off about the base's security arrangements, a squad of Viet Cong guerrillas managed about midnight to slip past trip flares and guard posts on the northern perimeter. Once inside, they unerringly made their way to the army hospital. After hurling satchel charges at ward doors and windows, the guerrillas fired automatic rifles into the long, low buildings. Dashing through the darkness, the Viet Cong also blew up a chapel and a water tower. In all, the attack damaged 19 buildings. Most of the 732 patients were carried out or managed to scramble to safety. Even so, the toll was two Americans killed and 98 wounded, some gravely. The Viet Cong escaped without losing a man.

That afternoon Viet Cong bomb squads struck again. In Saigon they drove a shabby bomb-laden Citroen up to a U.S. language school for Vietnamese servicemen. As they fled the auto, the guerrillas gunned down three Vietnamese sentries. Then the car exploded, killing another nine Vietnamese and injuring 67 persons, including 28 U.S. Air Force men.

The Cam Ranh and Saigon raids were not random attacks but deliberately planned to cause heavy casualties and political impact. Elsewhere there were isolated outbursts of fighting, the sharpest since mid-June, including a battalion-sized battle near the DMZ. The respite in major ground action continued into its eighth week, but it was clearly a selective lull.

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