PACIFICATION IN SOUTH VIETNAM: A PRELIMINARY DAMAGE ASSESSMENT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP85T00875R001100130053-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 11
• Document Creation Date: December 21, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 18, 2008
• Sequence Number: 53
• Publication Date: April 25, 1972
• Content Type: IM

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Secret
DIRECTORATE OF
INTELLIGENCE
Intelligence Memorandum
Pacification in ~.S'outh Vietnam:
A Preliminary Damage Assessment
CIA
DOCUMENT SERVICES B!IANCH Secret
88
FILE, COPY No25. 0858/719272
A5l trTl,
DO NOT DESTROY
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SECRET
CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY
Directorate of Intelligence
25 April 1972
Pacification in South Vietnam:
A Preliminary Damage Assessment
1. When the Vietnamese Communists mounted the
Tet Offensive in 1968, government forces quickly
pulled back into defensive positions in the prin-
cipal towns, largely abandoning the countryside.
It was widely feared that the pacification program
had been dealt a severe and lasting setback. The
Communists were unable to sustain their offensive
beyond several months, however, and when their
weakened units withdrew into the hills, Saigon was
able to extend its influence among the population
beyond what it had been before. This precedent
demonstrates the haz,^.rd of drawing early conclu-
sions about the impact of the current enemy offen-
sive on the government's position in the populated
areas. Details are still. lacking on the rapidly
changing situation in a number of provinces.
2. South Vietnamese forces in some areas
have been reacting to the current enemy offensive
in the same way they did in 1968, pulling back
into static defensive positions. in general,
while damage and disruption to the government's
security and political apparatus so far is serious,
it appears far less severe than that suffered by
Saigon's forces in the first weeks of the 1968 Tet
Offensive. How the situation develops from here on
depends on a whole complex of factors: how the big-
unit battles turn out in the more remote border
regions, how well government territorial forces
stand up under pressure from small Viet Cong and
Note: This memorandum was prepared by the Office
of Current Intelligence and coordinated within CIA.
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North Vietnamese units, and how effectively both
sides assert political leadership in areas where
they have or achieve military predominance.
3. The present Communist offensive has thus
far caused less damage to the government's hold
over the population than the 1968 drive, in large
part because invading North Vietnamese regulars
have replaced local Viet Cong forces as the enemy's
main striking force. Moreover, many of the northern
units have staged their assaults in the border re-
gions, well away from population concentrations.
In four major areas, however, the Communists have
caused significant damage to pacification in the
last three weeks: in Quang Tri Province, along
the coast from Quang Nam to Binh Dinh provinces,
in Binh Long Province north of Saigon, and in Chuong
Thien Province in the Mekong Delta. In three of
these areas--Quang Tri, Binh Long, and Chuong
Thien--the damage appears to have been the work of
main-force units, largely made up of North Viet-
namese troops, which attacked from across the DMZ,
from Cambodia, and from the remote U Minh Forest in
the delta. Along the coast, local Viet Cong units,
reinforced by northerners, were the aggressors.
The Northern and Central Provinces
4. In Quang Tri, the North Vietnamese have
seized half of the province and axe claiming to
have set up "liberation governments." Most of the
people who lived just below the DMZ appear to have.
fled south, however, and the enemy controls largely
a battlefield that is subject to heavy allied bomb-
ing and shelling. Some 150,000 residents of Quang
Tri are refugees; many have moved as far south as
Hue, where they are living in temporary camps.
5. In terms of population control, the Com-
munists probably take greater satisfaction from
what their forces have done in the stretch of
coastal lowlands from Quang Nam to Binh Dinh. Sym-
pathy for the enemy has historically been strong
in that region, and Viet Cong influence has been
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harder to uproot there than anywhere else in South,
Vietnam. Enemy attacks in this area have been
heavy. The Communists have shelled and carried
out small ground probes against nearly every prin-
cipal town in the region, have overrun at least
one district capital in Binh Dinh, and have sur-
rounded several others farther north. The main
north-south highway, Route 1, has been cut in many
places, and government territorial forces have been
hit hard in a number of clashes. Several hundred
South Vietnamese regulars were sent into disorgan-
ized retreat when their base never a district town
in northern Binh Dinh came under attack. In Quang
Ngai Province, a number of South Vietnamese reg-
ular battalions were pulled out of the province
and sent to fight farther north, and a Viet Cong
main-force battalion has been moving from one gov-
ernment resettlement center to the next along the
coast, burning them to the ground. There are some
45,000 new refugees in Quang Ngai and at least
several thousand more in the provinces immediately
north and south. The Communists are trying hard
to take advantage of the disruption to recruit new
forces, gather supplies, and establish political
control mechanisms. Government forces are counter-
attacking at several points, but the Communists
clearly have the initiative.
6. These developments in the coastal provinces
illustrate how Communist main- and local-forca units
support one another. The thrusts by northern regu-
lars across the DMZ and into the central highlands
have drawn South Vietnamese regulars from the coastal
districts into these relatively remote battlefields.
From Quang Ngai Province alone, four out of seven
South Vietnamese Army battalions and three out of
five Ranger battalions have been pulled out to
fight in the north, leaving government territo-
rials pretty much on their own in many populated
districts. A similar situation exists farther
south, where many South Vietnamese regular forces
have been drawn into battle with invading northern-
ers, weakening the defenses of many districts near
Saigon and in the Mekong Delta.
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North of Saigon
7. The North Vietnamese have seized control
of the northern part of Binh Long Province and have
turned the rest into an active war zone. As in
Quang Tri, much of the population from the occupied
districts appears to have fled southward. Some
people were trapped in the enemy-occupied northern
district
Farther south in
Military Region 3, main-force Communist troops
have recently begun to strike hard into northern
Binh Duong Province, bringing heavy pressure against
several towns and bases. Meanwhile, local Viet
Cong cadre and units have been given urgent in-
structions to step up harassing actions in the more
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heavily populated provinces closer to Saigon in
coordination with enemy big-unit attacks along the
border. Small groups of Viet Cong and North Viet-
namese forces have been marauding through some of
these provinces in recent days. The pressure has
had an appreciable psychological impact; villagers
are more apprehensive about what lies ahead.
9. Recent events'in Long Khanh Province north
east of the capital are probably typical. Communist
units there have taken advantage of the shift of
South Vietnamese regulars to the threatened border
provinces by shelling and harassing government out-
posts and spreading propaganda among the villages.
In one village, the people were forced to turn out
for a celebration of North Vietnamese "victories"
in Quang Tri Province; in another, they were forced
to listen to lectures warning that Communist units
supported by tanks would soon be marching on their
province and into Saigon itself. The people in
these villages are said to have been frightened by
these actions, especially in view of the inability
of local territorial forces to prevent them.
Worry in the Delta
10. In a short time, the Mekong Delta has
changed from the most secure and prosperous part
of the country to a source of considerable ap-
prehension to South Vietnamese commanders. The
main threat to pacification in the delta is not
resurgent Viet Cong forces, although they have
sharply stepped up harassing attacks in many dis-
tricts, but rather North Vietnamese main-force
reinforcements which have recently moved into the
delta region in strength. The balance of opposing
regular forces in the delta has shifted signifi-
cantly in recent weeks as a result of the infil-
tration of two North Vietnamese regiments from
Cambodia into the upper delta, the movement of
two more North Vietnamese regiments in Cambodia
to positicna just west. of C'.rAu Doc Province, and
the departure of the South Vietnamese 21st Divi-
sion to fight north of Saigon. Formerly, there
were only six main-force enemy regiments fighting
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in the delta; now there are ten which pose an im-
mediate threat to the region. So far, Communist
gains have been largely limited to peripheral areas.
Ranking South Vietnamese officials insist that they
will be able to prevent any serious deterioration,
but no one is claiming that the job will be easy,
especially now that government forces in the area
have been reduced,
11. South Vietnamese commanders in the delta
are particularly concerned about the situation in
Chuong Thien and the problem of dealing with the
new North Vietnamese regiments. The enemy forces
that have caused the most direct and serious damage
to government population control in the delta, as
indicated earlier, are the two Viet Cong regiments,
heavily reinforced with northern troops, that have
moved out of the U Minh Forest into Chuong Thien
Province, overrunning outposts and generally over-
whelming local government forces. Even before the
current offensive, Chuong Thien was one of the
least secure provinces in the country. Now, the
reports say, the Communists are extending their
influence northward out of Chuong Thien into Phong
Dinh Province, where they could threaten the re-
gional capital of Can Tho.
1.2. The two northern regiments that have been
infiltrating the upper delta have also caused sig-
nificant damage, overrunning goveznment outposts
and attacking settlements along the Kien Tuong -
Kien Phong border. So far these units have been
operating in a sparsely populated region, but South
Vietnamese commanders in the delta are concerned
that they will continue south into Dinh Tuong, one
of the most heavily populated and richest provinces
in the delta. The South Vietnamese are moving reg-
ular units to head off this threat before the North
Vietnamese can get into position to support local
Viet Cong attacks in Dinh Tuong.
13. The two northern regiments that have
moved opposite Chau Doc Province in the extreme
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southeast of Cambodia have had a direct effect on
t'-:ie situation in the delta, even though they still
are outside the borders of South Vietnam. Antic-
ipating that these units would push on into the
delta, the South Vietnamese have sent into Cambodia
nearly all of the regular forces they normally as-
::ign to border defense--a division of Rangers
heavily reinforced with tank units. These forces
have been involved in heavy fighting with tb.%
North Vietnamese in recent weeks. The South Viet-
namese have prevented the North Vietnamese from
pushing =across into Chau Doc, but have taken
serious losses themselves, and they have been un-
able to prevent the other northern regiments from
slipping into the delta farther east.
14. In the other parts of the delta, Com-
munist forces have been carrying out widespread
harassing attacks. A number of outposts along
the southern edges cf the U Minh forest in An
Xuyen Province and at scattered iccations else-
where have fallen under enemy control and there
are persistent reports indicating 25X1
that the Communists are planning a major assault
against the capital of Kien Hoa Province. Since
the night of 7-8 April, however, when the number
of attacks shot up dramatically, the level of
Communist activity has leveled off considerably.
15. Government security forces and officials
in many populated districts have been hit, but in
most districts they are still intact, and there
does not. appear to have been any general abandon-
ment of the countryside. Indeed, in. many delta
provinces, local security forces are operating ag-
gressively. Some of the regional force units there
are being regrouped into larger units to cope with
the growing Communist main-force threat; others are
containing the enemy's local forces fairly effe.;-
tively. The pattern or activity suggests that the
native Viet Cong in the delta, while still dangerous,
are a much less formidable threat to the government
than they were in 1968. As in most other parts of
the country, the outcome of the battles between the
main-force units of both sides will play a major
role in determining who controls the delta.
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