First Battle Part 12

1. Dallek, Robert. Flawed Giant, Lyndon B. Johnson, 1960-1973, New York: Oxford University Press, 1998.

2. Shultz, Richard H. Jr. The Secret War Against Hanoi: Kennedy's andJohnson's Use of Spies, Saboteurs, and Covert Warriors in North Vietnam, New York: Harper Collins, 1999, p. 191. Hereafter Shultz.

3. Tonkin Gulf Resolution. House and Senate Joint Resolution, August 7, 1964. Was.h.i.+ngton, DC: Department of State Bulletin, August 29, 1964, p. 268.

4. Ford, Harold P. CIA and the Vietnam Policy Makers: Three Episodes 1962-1968, Hereafter Ford, Was.h.i.+ngton, DC: CIA Center for the Study of Intelligence, 1998, online edition, p. 7.

5. Ibid., p. 17.

6. Ibid., p. 22.

7. Currey, p. 245, note 1.

8. Shulimson, Jack, and Major Charles M. Johnson, USMC. U.S. Marines in Vietnam: The Landing and the Buildup, 1965, Was.h.i.+ngton, DC, U.S. Government Printing Office, 1978, p. 7. Hereafter, Shulimson.

9. JCS msg to CinCPac, dated March 6, 1965, quoted in Shulimson, p. 16.

10. Beschloss, Michael. Reaching for Glory: Lyndon Johnson's Secret White House Tapes, 1964-1965. New York: Simon and Shuster, 2001, pp. 214-15.

11. Ibid., p. 194.

12. Pentagon Papers, pp. 115-16.

13. Author interviews with the Bo Doi, the Viet Cong "Freedom Fighters," September 1999.

14. Pentagon Papers, pp. 120-21 15. Summers, Harry G. Jr. On Strategy: A Critical a.n.a.lysis of the Vietnam War. Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 1982, p. 92

CHAPTER 3.

1. Unless otherwise indicated, information for this chapter came from interviews with former members of 3d Battalion, 3d Marines, and 2d Battalion, 4th Marines.

2. McCutcheon, LtGen Keith B., USMC, "Marine Aviation in Vietnam 1962-1970" in U.S. Government Printing Office, The Marines in Vietnam, 1954-1773: An Anthology and Annotated Bibliography, 2d ed. Was.h.i.+ngton, DC 1985, pp. 266-68. Unless otherwise indicated, all information about the construction of the Chulai airstrip came from this source.

3. Conversation between the author and General Charles C. Krulak, USMC, son of Victor Krulak, July 1998.

4. Stars and Stripes, article, probably dated in July 1965. The author has the clipping but not the complete citation, which includes date.

5. Harry Reasoner, ABC Evening News, February 10, 1971 6. The information about VMA-225 came from correspondence between the author and former VMA-225 pilot Jules Townsend in 1992-1993.

7. Ibid.

8. Ibid.

9. Ibid.

CHAPTER 4.

1. Sch.e.l.l, Jonathan. "The Military Half: An Account of the Destruction in Quang Ngai and Quang Tin," in Reporting Vietnam, Part One: American Journalism 1959-1969. New York: The American Library, pp. 389-391.

2. Unless otherwise indicated, all information about the 1st VC, or Ba Gia, Regiment was obtained through a series of interviews with the Bo Doi, former members of the regiment, in September 1999.

3. Sources vary widely regarding the number of landowners and "rich" peasants who were executed during this reform. The numbers range from a low of 10,000 to a high of 100,000. In any event, Ho Chi Minh publicly announced that they had been overzealous in this project and made "many mistakes."

4. Shultz, pp. 84-90.

5. Corson, William R. The Betrayal. New York: Norton, 1968, pp. 140-142.

6. Taylor, Sandra C. Vietnamese Women at War: Fighting for Ho Chi Minh and Revolution., Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 1999. This is an account of the role of women in the war.

7. Olson, James S. and Randy Roberts. Where the Domino Fell: America and Vietnam 1945 to 1990. New York: St. Martins, 1991, pp. 67-68.

8. 1st Construction Site, the code name and original designation of the 1st VC Regiment, is the literal translation of the Vietnamese term Cong-truong.

9. Currey, pp. 83.

10. USMACV Log No. 6-59-65, translation of a doc.u.ment captured on May 31, 1965, after the first battle of Ba Gia.

11. Interrogation SIC Report 171/65 dated August 27, 1965.

12. USMACV Interrogation Report, Log Number 9-161-65, Control No. 180665, dated September 24, 1965.

13. USMACV, J3, Daily Staff Journal, May 29-31, 1965.

14. Ibid.

15. Ibid.

16. Ibid.

17. Shulimson, p. 51.

18. USMACV Interrogation Report, Log Number 9-161-65, Control No. 180665, dated September 24, 1965.

19. USMACV Interrogation Report, Log No. 9-406-56, Control No. 1807-65, undated.

20. Ibid.

21. Ibid.

22. Pamphlet published by the Veteran's Liaison Committee, Ba Gia Regiment, Military Region V, undated and furnished the author by one of the Bo Doi, Colonel Tran Nhu Tiep.

23. USMACV, J3, Daily Staff Journal, July 5-7, 1965.

24. USMACV Interrogation Report, Log Number 9-161-65, Control No. 180665, dated September 24, 1965.

25. Lanning, Michael Lee and Dan Cragg. Inside the VC and NVA: TheReal Story of North Vietnam's Armed Forces. New York: Fawcett Columbine, 1992, pp. 94-95.

26. USMACV J2 Log. No. 9-205-65 dated July 3, 1965.

CHAPTER 5.

1. Shulimson, p. 69. According to Colonel Charles Williamson, USMC (Retired), the intelligence was actually gathered by the Intelligence (G-2) staff of the 3d Marine Division but was appropriated by the staff of its parent unit, the III Marine Amphibious Force which claimed it as its own. Interview between the author and Colonel Williamson, March 2001.

2. 4th Marines Command Chronology, August 1965.

3. USMACV Interrogation Report Log No. 9-161-65, Control No. 180665, dated September 24, 1965.

4. Shulimson, p. 70.

5. Ibid.

6. Tape of MajGen Oscar F. Peatross, USMC. Oral History Collection, Headquarters U.S. Marine Corps, Division of History and Museums. Hereafter Peatross.

7. Ibid.

8. Shulimson, p. 70.

9. Peatross.

10. Data on Peatross from History and Museums Division, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, file on MajGen Oscar F. Peatross and Blankfort, Michael, The Big Yankee: the Story of Evans Carlson and the Raiders. Boston: Little Brown, 1947.

11. Peatross.

12. Ibid.

13. Peatross, Oscar F., "Victory at Van Tuong: An Application of Doctrine," U.S. Naval Inst.i.tute Proceedings, September 1967.

14. Peatross.

15. Shulimson, p. 72.

16. Peatross comments on Shulimson draft ma.n.u.script, dtd 7Jun71.

17. Shulimson, pp. 70-71.

18. Fall, Bernard B. Street Without Joy Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole, 1961, p. 78.

19. Shulimson.

20. Shulimson, p. 72.

21. Ibid.

22. Logbooks from USS Bayfield, Cabildo, and Vernon County, 17-18 August 1965.

23. Currey, p. 56. When the Chinese Communists standardized their equipment along Russian lines after the Korean War they sent most of the U.S.-made weaponry captured from the Kuomintang and the South Koreans to the North Vietnamese. The Viet Cong augmented this with equipment captured from the ARVN.

CHAPTER 13.

1. Shulimson, p. 87 2. Teller, Maj Gary L., LtCol Lane Rogers, and Keith V. Fleming, Jr. U.S. Marines in Vietnam: Fighting the North Vietnamese, 1967. Was.h.i.+ngton, DC: History and Museums Division, Headquarters, Marine Corps, 1984, p. 119.

3. "Van-Tuong, A Glorious. Victory (Van Tuong-Mot Chien Cong Oanh Liet)." This is a chapter from a book written by one of the Bo Doi, Col Tran Nhu Tiep. He refused to let me have a copy of the entire book, saying that it was still cla.s.sified material. He did, however, copy several pages for my use.

CHAPTER 14.

1. Arnold, Hugh M. "Official Justifications for America's Role in Indochina" Asian Affairs, Sep/Oct 1975, p. 31.

2. Lewy, Gunter. America in Vietnam: New York: Oxford University Press, 1978, pp. 446-447.