The Fall of Phuoc Binh

On a gray dawn ten years ago, five U.S. soldiers were killed and twelve wounded during a Communist commando attack on Phuoc Binh, the capital of Phuoc Long province. That marked the Viet Cong's first offensive against the picturesque hill town of about 25,000 people located 75 miles north of Saigon on a bend of the Song Be River. Last week, after a violent six-day siege of the city, the Communists finally captured Phuoc Binh. During the drive they also took a key crossroads and two airstrips, as well as every village and town in Phuoc Long province (see map). Though the Communists have made considerable territorial gains during the last decade of war, Phuoc Long is the first entire province they have conquered.

The Communist offensive began in mid-December, when the North Vietnamese 7th Division overran the district town of Due Phong on Route 14. Gradually moving southwest, the Communist forces captured a series of government outposts, eventually pushing South Vietnamese troops into the outskirts of Phuoc Binh. Just after the New Year, the North Vietnamese began a heavy shelling of Phuoc Binh, although they allowed civilians to escape along footpaths to the South.

Saigon was unable to provide much help for the 2,500 to 3,000 troops trapped in the besieged city. Because of heavy clouds, South Vietnamese air force planes at first failed to get off preliminary air strikes. Once Saigon did get some A-37 fighter planes into action, the pilots refused to fly below 12,000 ft. out of respect for the Communists' imposing antiaircraft arsenal. That, in turn, made it impossible for government helicopters carrying reinforcements to land within the city. In the end, the South Vietnamese were only able to put two Ranger companies totaling about 200 men into the battle. After two days of close fighting between outnumbered government troops and Communist tanks and sappers, Phuoc Binh was in North Vietnamese hands. By the time Saigon's air force belatedly started to bombard the area, destroying what remained of the small lumbering town, the Communist attackers had already withdrawn into their well dug-in and camouflaged shelters in the surrounding forests. Some 1,500 civilians and several hundred soldiers on both sides are believed to have died in the battle.

Ominous Change. Though Phuoc Binh itself is of little strategic importance to Saigon, the ease with which the Communists overran Phuoc Long province was a major psychological defeat. "Its fall showed that the central government in Saigon is quite weak," conceded one State Department analyst. "A year ago it would have gone in to defend or recover the place." Equally important, the offensive against Phuoc Long was an indication of an ominous change in the Communists' overall strategy in South Viet Nam. Since the Paris Accords, the Communists have concentrated on building up their hold on rural areas; now they seem ready to attack and conquer key administrative centers and major towns. Their apparent goal is to erode the political base of President Nguyen Van Thieu's Saigon government, forcing it eventually to resign or enter a coalition with the Provisional Revolutionary Government.

Within hours after the fall of Phuoc Binh, Communist forces drove a government garrison off the 3,000-ft. Nui Ba Den, or Black Virgin Mountain. Nui Ba Den is only seven miles from a far more important provincial capital, Tay Ninh (pop. 250,000). If the Communists can hold the mountain, they will be in a strong position to launch a Phuoc Binh-style artillery barrage on the city, thus making it the next target in the Communist effort to further weaken the Saigon government.

Saigon's reverses on the battlefield prompted President Ford to promise that he would ask Congress for $300 million in supplemental funds for new weaponry for Saigon, increasing the current $700 million already appropriated for 1975. Proponents of the request will surely argue that Saigon's shortage of ammunition and aviation fuel seriously hurt its cause in Phuoc Binh and will weaken its defense of other Communist targets. Administration spokesmen predicted that some emergency funds would be approved, but the heavily Democratic Congress, already preoccupied by recession, the oil crisis, and the confrontation in the Middle East, is bound to be reluctant to come once again to the aid of beleaguered South Viet Nam.

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