The Lure of the Lonely Patrol: Forcing the Enemy to Fight

The single U.S. patrol, a thin line of 1st Division infantrymen, moved warily through the jungles of Tay Ninh province one humid morning last week. Deep in Viet Cong territory, the lonely Americans posed a tempting target. Finally, at high noon, the Viet Cong yielded to the temptation. Under cover of a furious mortar assault, they attacked in force. Almost immediately, U.S. artillery that had been covering the patrol's advance opened up on the hitherto-hidden Viet Cong mortar emplacements. Within minutes, Allied planes were bombing and strafing the enemy attackers. Besieged by shells and 40 lethal air strikes, the battered Viet Cong broke off contact and retreated with their dead.

This incident, which took place as part of Operation Junction City, was an expert execution of the newest Allied infantry tactic of the war. In essence, the tactic consists of a mating of one of warfare's oldest fundamentals--deep patrolling--with modern technology: massive air and artillery firepower at instant radio command. It has proved a lethal union. Not until the beginning of 1967 did the U.S. have sufficient troops in Viet Nam to put the new tactic to use on a widespread basis. The three months since have witnessed fighting of a scope and scale unequaled in the war, producing Communist deaths at a rate that, if it keeps up, will mean 80,000 enemy killed during 1967.

Under the Fan. The tactic was evolved to cope with an enemy adept at hiding in his own terrain and reluctant to fight unless the odds appeared overwhelmingly in his favor. In past wars and the earlier days of the Viet Nam conflict, the U.S. conducted patrols for reconnaissance and intelligence purposes only. Engagement with the enemy was to be avoided for the sound reason that a patrol seldom consists of a unit much larger than a 30-man platoon, and often is as small as a squad of ten men.

Now U.S. mobility and firepower have so changed the context that the U.S. patrol is never really alone. It thus can probe aggressively deeper and deeper into Viet Cong sanctuaries until the Viet Cong are forced to come out and fight. Helicopters lift artillery batteries forward to keep an advancing patrol always in range of the "fan," or radius, of the gun's shells. Jet fighter-bombers always stand ready to be up and over any target in South Viet Nam within minutes in support of an attacked patrol. If neither shells nor bombs are enough, the helicopter can also bring infantry reinforcements to the rescue.

Possible & Potent. Typical of the results of the new tactic was an earlier Junction City battle in Tay Ninh. A U.S. deep patrol of platoon size flushed out what appeared to be two enemy companies on a heavily jungled hillside. Within two minutes of the first exchange of shots, more than 30 U.S. artillery pieces, all moved up the previous day to cover the patrol, were pounding the enemy. But the two Viet Cong companies proved to be two battalions instead, and the U.S. platoon was hard pressed when, 15 minutes after the artillery opened up, the first fighter-bombers attacked. Still convinced that he had a major chance to wipe out a U.S. unit, the enemy commander committed a full regiment to his attack. Meanwhile, the U.S. was helilifting in reinforcements. Within three hours, the Viet Cong regiment was being chewed to pieces not by a single platoon but by a full brigade of G.I.s. Final count: 581 Viet Cong dead.

Deep patrolling is, of course, a dangerous tactic, and its application has accounted for a good part of the surge in Allied as well as Viet Cong casualties. Some squads have been wiped out on deep patrol and some platoons so badly mauled that they could no longer operate as units. The Viet Cong and North Vietnamese have themselves countered with fresh tactics, including deep patrols of their own. But the enemy's main thrust has been at forward U.S. artillery batteries that make American deep patrols both possible and potent. In recent weeks the Communists have launched frantic attacks at U.S. forward fire bases from Camp Carroll along the Demilitarized Zone to Bong Son near the eastern coast. When mortaring, though, they have only two minutes to do their damage: that is just how long it takes U.S. guns to zero in on them and begin raining down their whistling packets of death.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.