SAIGON DIARY

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000706940026-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 5
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 20, 2010
• Sequence Number: 26
• Publication Date: November 3, 1981
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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Any-1C:Li, 1':'h; ':ALL 5i't1J':1' JOUit!'IAL
GN F'ns'r_____ f 3 November 1981 7
Saigon Diary :
Vietnam Era Report,
Classified for Years,
Recounts Tet. Attack
Raid on American.-Embassy
By Viet Cong ,Was ,Omen
Of Vulnerabiht? of US
..
Waiting or -the Helicopters
On the night"of Jan:. 30; 1968, the
'Vietnamese communists launched their
-Tet offensive, a military campaign that
carried the Vietnam- war. from the
-,South Vietnamese., countryside into
cities and towns. Among the targets
was the American embassy-a block
,long, white-walled, concrete structure
near the center of Saigon.
I n strictly military terms the as
sault on the .embassy, and indeed the
L
roader offeni fild
sve,ae: The attackers
occupied the embassy com d and
caused considerable damage never
succeeded in entering..the building it,
self. All of the attackers were killed or
But the Vietnam war never. wa~ en-
41 h.
First of two articles. For the current
whereabouts of'-persons who figure
prominently in this ? account of the em-
bassy attack, see story on page22
told-and' many then ` still be-
lieved-that the war was being won.
How, then, could a supposedly ragtag
guerrilla army suddenly assault the
citadel and symbol of America's Pres-
ence in Vietnam, the very building
from which the daily war-progress re.
ports flowed?
Headlines and Images
"Viet Cong Invade-- American Em-
bassy." That Incident (and- those head-
lines and TV images), ? stuck._. in. the'
American public Consciousness, and no
future body counts, pacification plans,
presidential promises of, victory, or
even genuine military gains-could ever
quite dislodge it.. , - -. - -
The Vietnam, war had been waged
through much, of the 1960s and was to
bleed on for another seven years before
Saigon's final collapse. Bute the (1.Ss
war effort may well 'have. been
doomed-politically and psychological=.
ly-by the events. of -_that.:.january_
";What follows is the ac?ount of E. Al.
Ian Wendt, a foreign -"rvice officer
who was on duty at the. eonbassy that
night.. His report, written, soon after the
has cbeennobtained by sThe Wall Street
Journal and is being published in two
w
rt- ? ,- -. . .
a
The account was written merely as
one participant's chronology of the
night's events at the embassy. But it
also raises broader issues. the
.pa: cunCas OT the U.S. military machine
for the Tet offensive; the seeming
chaos of a command structure In which
generals (and the White.House) were
able to obtain Instant situation reports
from the embassy-while the embattled
defenders couldn't get military support
from colonels and malors a? few miles
'away; the very human reactions-from
clear heroism to considerably less-of'
i
ndividuals cauht i
g upn crisis; and the
piaiptive,' perhaps symbolic, Vietnam-
ese voice-that of the code clerk who,
in the-midst of battle, reported that he
was on overtime and asked to go home.
- This report, of .But history has aay course,
remaining rel-
evant. The Protection of American gov-
ernment facilities overseas, the reac-
tion speed of U.S. military forces, the
quality of American intelligence, the
l
.p
ay- of politics and psychology in war-
'fare-these are controversial issues in
Part one of Mr. Wendt's report ap-
pears below. Parenthetical notes of ex-
' planation and identification have been
i
nserted by thedit
eors.
I was asleep in room 433, the duty offi-
cer's quarters, when the building was
shaken by a loud explosion just before 3
a.m. I rolled out of bed and reached for the
telephone. Automatic-weapons fire broke
out. I called Mr. Calhoun at his home and
told him the embassy was under attack.
(John A. Calhoun-was a political officer in
the embassy.) As I was s
e
ki
p
a
ng another
, explosion tore into the building. Recalling
-the need for shelter from falling debris In
the
event of a bombli
exposon, I crawled un-
der the bed while talking to Mr. Calhoun.
I emerged from under the bed just as
(James A.) Griffin, who was. on duty in
communications, came in and asked what
was happening. I said .I was not sure but i
presumed the embassy was being attacked.
I quickly dressed, gathered up my few per-
sonal- possessions, and withdrew into the
communications room next door, which was.
safer th
an the duty r and h
oomad more tele-
phones. Neither of us could know the extent
of the attack or whether the rivet Cong were
already in the building. One of-our first re-
actions, therefore, was to close the. vault
door to the communications room, t ;::?.:,,
STAT
Endangered Lives
? I called Mr. Calhoun's residence, and- by
that time Mr. (David 1.) Carpenter of the
political section and Mr. (Gilbert HJ Shein-
baum, the ambassador's aide, had reached
the residence and set up a command post. I
reported that I had moved into the commu-
nications room and should be called on ex-
tension 321 or 322: I-told them I would pass
information on to them as soon. as I obtained
it. I understood they would undertake to
alert others; both in Saigon and elsewhere.-
It is worth noting that I had left the duty of-
ficer's -manual. in ambassador (Ellsworth
Bunker's) outer office on the third floor. I
was' not in the habit of taking it with me to
the duty officer's quarters, for I knew that
much of the information in it was out of
date. Even had this not been so, it contained
little that would have helped in the crisis
that had suddenly burst upon us...
Automatic-weapons fire continued, inter-
spersed with periodic louder explosions that
we took to be rockets or mortars. All of the
shooting and explosions seemed very near;
so much so that we feared not only that pen-
etration of the embassy was inevitable but
that our lives were in imminent danger. In-
deed, we thought our only hope lay in secur-
ing the vault door to the code room and sim-
ply staying inside. We knew it would take a
very heavy charge to blow that door, but we
did not exclude the possibility that the Viet
Cong were capable of doing it.
We next called the extension of the Ma-
rine guard on the ground floor inside the
embassy. I personally thought he must be
dead.. To my surprise, he answered, and al-
though he was obviously very harassed, he
was quite coherent. This was to be the first
of many conversations with Sgt. (Ronald
W.) Harper, who, despite his . predicament,
remained virtually our only source of infor-
mation-on what was happening in the com-
pound.
Harper told us the VC (Viet Cong) were
inside the compound but not in the embassy
building itself. He said- he could hear them
talking outside the building. He did not know
how many of them there were. A, few min-
utes later Harper told us he had a wounded
Marine on the ground floor. He asked us to
come and get him.
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Considerable Damage
With trepidation, I went downstairs In the
elevator and stepped onto the ground floor.
With the aid of Sgt. Harper, I picked up the
wounded Marine and put him on the eleva-
tor. Griffin then came down and helped me
assist him to the fourth floor. (Then, and al-
ways thereafter, we locked the elevators in
place so that they could not be called down
to the ground floor had the VC gottea,,into
the building.) A hurried and fearful glance
at the ground floor revealed that consider-
able damage had already been done. The
situation of. the one remaining Marine
looked bleak. We carried the wounded man
Into the fourth-floor duty room and placed
him on the bed I had been sleeping in. He
was covered with blood but did not appear
to be critically wounded. His leg seemed
broken and he was obviously suffering from
shock. Unfortunately, none of us had any us-
able knowledge of first. aid, and there was.
little we could do for him. He kept asking
for a corpsman. We tried to call the 17th
field hospital but could not get through. We
gave the wounded man some water. and two
Bufferin tablets, and I took his .38 revolver.
It was the only weapon I had and I. was to
carry it with me for the next 5'4 hours.
I called Calhoun's residence and passed
on the above. I should note here that our
communications all were working normally.
I called Calhoun's residence on many occa-
sions and always got through except when
the line was busy, which it frequently was.
I next called Dr. (Harold .1) Holleran. -
the embassy physician,. and told him we
needed medical assistance. He said that in
view of all the shooting the' best thing he
could do was stay home.
At this point, to my knowledge, the fol
lowing people were in the building: myself,
Griffin. Sgt. Harper, Fisher (an Army com-
munications man) and three OSA communi-
cations personnel, a total of seven, not In-
cluding the wounded Marine. (OSA, which
stands for Office of the Special Assistant,.
was the- name the Central. Intelligence
Agency went under in Vietnam.)
Waiting for a Chopper
About 4 a.m., Maj. Hudson, `called. We
gave him an account of the situation as we
saw it. He had already heard about -the
wounded Marine and said a Medevac heli-
copter would arrive shortly to evacuate him.
We were to take him to the roof and wait for
the chopper. Only the Marine guard- on the
ground floor, however, had keys to the two
doors through which one must pass to get
from the sixth floor, where the elevators
end, to the roof. We called Harper and told
him we needed the keys. He said someone
should ride the elevator downstairs, stay in
the corner of it so as not to be directly in the
line of fire, and he would throw the *keys in.
Fisher accomplished this task and was back
in a few minutes.
For greater security, we had In the
meantime moved the wounded Marine into
the code room. Had the VC broken into the
building. as we expected theyptight at ato
time, we would not have had enough time to
rescue him in room 433.
We then set about the cumbersome job of
getting the wounded man up to the roof.
Fisher, who was armed with a .38 revolver
and a shotgun, opened the doors to the roof,
while I and another man, whom I had not
seen before and who turned out to be the
OSA duty officer, carried the Marine into
the. elevator, up to the sixth floor and then
up two more flights of stairs to the roof.
When the Medevac chopper failed to appear,
we took him back to the sixth floor and
placed him next to the stairwell on the
blood-soaked mattress that had been in
room 433. The Marine resisted leaving. He
was still in shock and insisted on talking to
the captain of the Marine guard unit. We let
him talk to Maj. Hudson, of MACV (Military
Assistance Command Vietnam) COC
(Command Operations Center), who ordered
him to leave.
At this point, two men; Fisher and one
OSA communicator, remained in a stairwell
just below the roof waiting for the chopper.
The OSA communicator had a snub-nosed .38
revolver and a two-way.radio to the OSA
duty officer, who, I noted later, carried a 9
mm. Beretta submachine gun.
Maj. Hudson had said the chopper would
arrive in about 15 minutes. After a half-
hour, we called Maj. Hudson and told him
there was no sign of the chopper. He said it
had been driven away, and even hit, by en-
emy, fire. This event occurred about 5:30
a.m., and it was the first time any chopper
had even- tried to land. Sending another
chopper- would take more time, the major
said, since it would have to come from Long
Binh. Tan Son Nhut's operations had been
curtailed by the military activity there.
A Request for Lights
Maj. Hudson then informed us that two,)
choppers were on the way, one Medevac and1
one chopper carrying ammunition. It was
essential, he said, that someone be on the
roof,.with the wounded Marine, to guide in
the choppers. Whichever one landed first
was to evacuate the wounded Marine. Maj.
Hudson also said the pilots were having
trouble finding the roof in the dark and
asked than the lights be turned on. None of
as knew where, the lights were. , Griffin
called Harper downstairs ? who explained
where the switches were. Griffin and I both
went to the roof, so that the code room was
empty, and its inner cage door locked. We.,
were no longer locking the. vault door, inas-`
much as .the VC, so far as we knew, were
not in--the building. Had the enemy broken.l
into the building with the specific purpose of
entering the code room as soon as possible,
they might have succeeded. ? It would have
been possible to enter the stairwell from the
ground- floor, go up to the fourth floor, and
blow the steel door providing access to that','
floor.' They -would then have bad to break, j
. open. the wooden door inside the vault area..
We assumed the enemy had no such precise
objective but rather would have attempted
.t9.b1ow.up;tJte,wholebuilding,;2 ,; i... !},
We were relying on Harper's periodic as- I
surance that the VC were not in the build-
ing, and we assumed they could not have
gotten in without his knowing it. The main
reason we left the vault door open, however,
was that we could not have kept MACV COC
regularly informed of the situation on the
roof, both with regard to enemy fire and the
whereabouts of the choppers, had we had to
lock the vault every time we left the code
room.
While we both were on the roof, Griffin
put on the lights. It took a while to locate
the right switches and see exactly what was
lit up. We flashed the lights several times,
while Fisher sat in the middle of the toof
and described an are with an electric Ian=f
tern. These activities were according to
Maj. Hudson's-Iastfuctions He also had
warned us to get pft.the roof itself as a chop-
per. came near,.. since if the first one was
carrying ammunition and drew enemy fire,
it would hover, drop its ammunition,. and.
move out. The lights we had turned. on,were
red, white, and blue runway-type lights and
described the exact area of the roof. We
called Maj. Hudson- and so informed him.
He instructed us to leave the lights on: We
did. Nonetheless, according to the major,
the choppers were having some trouble find-
ing their way in. It still was dark, despite
the flares that filled the skies.
I estimate that the wounded. Marine was
kept on a mattress on the sixth floor for
about an hour. Once we were told that the
Medevac and ammunition choppers were on
their way, we carried him to the roof itself,
where he waited another 45 minutes until
the first chopper finally arrived..
'To Be Continued)
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there the People Involved Are Now.
E. Allan Wendt was an economic-com-
niercial officer in the U.S. embassy in Sai-
gon in 1968. He still is in the State. Depart-
ment. Until recently he served as an eco-
nomic officer at the American embassy in
Cairo. He now is acting deputy assistant
Secretary of State for international energy
policy. He won a. State Department award
for heroism for his actions during Tet.
John A. Calhoun was a political officer
in the embassy in 1968. He served as the
U.S. ambassador to Tunisia from 1969 to
1972. He is retired.*
James A. Griffin was a communications
man in the embassy. He remains with the
State Department and is stationed at the
U.S. embassy in El Salvador.
David J. Carpenter, a political officer in
the embassy, retired from the State De-
partment in 1980.
Gilbert H. Sheinbaum, a political officer
in the embassy in Saigon, is principal offi-
cer at the U.S. consulate in Cebu, Philip-
pines.
Ellsworth Bunker was the U.S. ambas-
sador to South Vietnam. He is retired and
living in Vermont.
Sgt. Ronald W. Harper was a Marine
guard at the Saigon embassy. He won the
Bronze Star for heroism as a result of his
activities during the siege. He left the Ma-
rines in 1970 and now is a partner in an ap-
pliance store in Willmar, Minn.
Dr. Harold J. Holleran was the embassy,
says he is retired.
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ARTICLE APPEARED
ON PAGE 1 _ WALL STRE?T JOURNAL
4 November 1981
Saigon Diary
In Vietnam Embassy,
Waiting to Be Rescued.
Was Frustrating Work
Account of '68 Siege Recalls
Military Gaffes, Botching
Of Messages, Final Calm.
`Stay Till the Shooting Stops'
on Jan. 30, 1968, Vietnamese commu-
nists attacked the American embassy in
Saigon. For several hours they- held the
embassy grounds, inflicting injury and,
damage and trapping a small group of U.S.
military and diplomatic personnel within
the embassy. The assailants failed ever to
enter the building, and all of them ulti-
mately were killed or captured. -
An account of the event-a "memo-
randum for the record "-was submitted on
For the current whereabouts of per-
sons introduced in part two of this ac-
count of the embassy attack, see story
on page 24.
Feb. 20, 1968, by E. Allan Wendt, a foreign-
service officer on duty during the siege.
His report, part two of which appears be-
low, was classified for years and recently
was obtained by The Wall Street Journal.
Part one appeared yesterday.
The, Wendt memo is compelling reading
as history, and it may also have meaning
today bearing on the protection of Ameri-
cans abroad, on the ability of U.S. military
forces to react effectively in an emergency:
and on the quality of American intelli-
gence.
The concluding part of Mr. Wendt's re-
port appears here as he wrote it., with par=
enthetical notes of explanation supplied by
Journal. editors.
On one of my many trips to the roof-I
would say at about 6:15 a.m.-I saw an
armed Marine guard on the floor below the
roof crawling around on his belly with a ri-
fle. I asked him bow he. had gotten there,
since I had assumed there was only one
functioning Marine guard in the building,
namely, the one on the ground floor. He re-
-plied that he had been there all the time.
Not feeling Inclined to ask him what he had
been doing, I hurried, back to the fourth
floor code. room -to, report on the.situation to
MACE ..-(MWtary-Assistance-Comtttand Viet-
nam) COC (Command Operations Center)
and Mr.. Cai)tpun?s residencee;A half-hour
later, when I returned: to the roof. -I was told
a chopper. finally had 't'tt'red, offloaded
threeof? M-18 tracer=aminunitfon..and(
Marine.:-17
evacuated. the wounded
of the Special Assistant, a cover name for
chopper had left the.ammunltion in the mid-
dle of the helipad. Realizing that its pres-
.ence there would hamper the arrival of
other choppers, Griffin and the OSA commu-
nicator crawled out to the middle of the heli-
pad and retrieved the ammunition. While
they were in the middle of the roof, a chop-
per came in as if to land but could not be-
cause of enemy ground, fire.,
"Some Rational Purpose
I might have questioned the emphasis on
ammunition, since we . had . only , the. few
weapons described above and, in'any case,
no M-16&'In my preoccupation, however, I
simply assumed this move had some ra-
tional, though' as yet unfathomed, purpose. I
considered- that the- ammunition might be
for later troop arrivals; . but I rejected this
idea. thinking they, would, certainly : bring
more than enough of their own. I place these
events at about 6:45 a.m., nearly four hours
nation, I also discovered upon returning to
the roof that both the armed Marine guard
and the Army soldier had left with the chop-
per. -The OSA man on the roof had no idea
men-Griffin, the OSA communicator, who
remained just below the roof practically the
entire time, and me. The OSA duty officer
was also in the building, but I had only seen
him when he helped me carry the wounded
Marine from the code room to the sixth
floor. There were also two other OSA com-
municators, one of whom I once saw in the
ball of the fourth floor. Later I learned he
the nuisance calls.
Calls Received
.At this point, I should mention some of
sequence, and I do not remember exactly
when they came in. They were handled by
Griffin and by me. Frequently, we .were
both talking'at the. same time on extensions
321 and 322
pound,-which was in' turn surrounded by'
U.S: MPs (military police) and Vietnamese
police, none of-whom, however, had broken
the compound.) I- said. we had been prom-
iced a reaction force but none had arrived,
This-was about 5 a.ni.
State' Department operations center called
and' asked for a sitrep (situation report),
Mr : Habib called pn. another occasion
trying to reach Mr. (John A.) :Calhoun. All,
calhoata.' i(teleploneI natmber y ystili
we could do.was ;provide .the pperator with
another- occasion, Mr. Habib called and
spoke first to Griffin and then to me. As we
were speaking. another rocket thudded into
AA Vietnamese policeman called and
asked for one of the OSA men. I could not
find him. When I called over to OSA com-
munications from inside the code room, no
one answered. I told the policeman to -call
another number Griffin had given me.
Control, an OSA number that I did not know.
The same person, I believe, also asked
about the destruction of. cryptographic
equipment.
A Request to Leave
About. 7:30 Mr. Kidston. of. USAID (U.S.
Agency for International Development)
called on the phone in room 433. 1 had an ur-
gent call from MACV at the time and could -
n9t continue the conversation. An American
female communications employe called and
asked about the destruction of communica-
tions equipment. She was appalled to learn
that I was in the code room by myself and
kpew nothing about the equipment. I ex-
plained I had been asked by MACV COC and
Mr. Calhoun to remain there and handle in-
.cpming and outgoing calls, which were nu-
merous. Griffin was then up on the roof. We
t(ok turns at these activities. Sometimes we
were both on the roof, leaving no one in the
code room.
unclassified communications room on the
ground floor called and asked for permission
to go home. He said he had been working
many hours and was tired. I told him I was
sbrry. but he would have to stay where he
tas until the shooting stopped.
About 5:30 a.m., more-than an hour be-
fore. he arrival of the ammunition chopper;
Shortly afterwards, Colonel, Fuller called
f$ om.- Second Field - Force Victor in Long
from the 101st airborne. In subsequent con-
r rsations with Maj. Hudson, to whom we
here talking about the same force..
"iting Relief
;,.,Many' conversations with Maj. Hudson
through to him to report on the latest devel-
wpments. Long after the ammunition chop-
V'e there, since they had been dispatched"
16r was surprised 'to learn that .none had
hoppers had come, although they. could be
een- orbiting a considerable distance away.
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f Where the People Involved Are Now
Philip Habib in 1968, was deputy assis- in a house within the embassy compound.
tant Secretary of State for East Asian and He is retired from the foreign service and
Pacific affairs. He recently served as the
President's- personal representative to the
Middle Eastvand earlier this year helped
negotiate the cease-fire along the Israeli-
Lebanese border. He lives in Belmont,
Calif.
Gen. John H. Cushman was the com-
manding officer of the 2nd brigade, 101st
airborne division.of the U.S. Army. He is
retired and living in Bronxville, N.Y.
Col. George Jacobson was mission coor-
dinator at the embassy in Saigon. He lived
fteir, he asked us to-Wd the ne while he'
?C,11ecked on the choppers. Unfortunately, he
Could not call them directly, so coordinating
all our information. in one conversation
brpved nearly impossible .1 7
,; Sometime afterthe"air,rifle platoon was
to have landed, we called Maj. Hudson and
leaded with him somewhat despairingly for
rFe14A from the ground. Finally,- he said a
mechanized infantry unit with heavy armor
wws on its way. We asked how long it would
rake. He said the unit was on the outskirts of
the city and moved slowly. It never arrived.
In the meantime, we kept passing out
this-information to Mr. Calhoun's residence,
to the Marine guard downstairs, and occa-
~ionally to Washington. Twice Gen. (John
V.) Cushman (commanding officer, 2nd bri-
,gade, 101st airborne) called and asked for a I
report, which we provided as best we could.']
Between 6:30 and ,,Maj.- Hudson:Called
to say that there could. be no landing before-
daylight because of poor visibility; despite
the roof lights being on.
living in Reston, Va.
Maj. Hillel Schwartz, who in 1968 was a
paratrooper with the 101st airborne divi-
sion, retired from the Army in 1976 as a
lieutenant colonel; he lives in TacQma.
Washington.
' Gen. William C. Westmoreland, com-
mander of the U.S. Military Assistance
Command in Vietnam, lost the Republican
primary for governor of South Carolina in
1974. He lives in retirement in Charleston,
S.C.
Maj. Hud nn apparently based' on con-
versatfons_,wtth'Sgt. Harper, had drawn up a
battle plan that he said we were to convey
to..- the "platoon commander immediately
upon the arrival of troops on the roof.
Thee plan was for the troops to deploy
down' the, *stairwells on each side of the
building, rather than go down the elevators,
These doors were locked from the outside
and could be pushed open outwards.
The atmosphere in the code room was
one of generally unrelieved tension mixed
ically, another rocket round would hit the .
wall to remind us of our plight. There were
'lulls in the firing, but they never lasted long.
Greeted. by Paratroopers
ing. We waited, always wondering why there'
Eventually, dawn broke. Maj. Hudson
said the situation had become critical. We
readily agreed. He said the latest plan was
to gas the VC inside the compound and then
land troops on the roof. The gas choppers
were to be sent right away. We immediately
called Sgt. (Ronald W.) Harper and told him
of this plan. He pleaded with us to stop the
use of gas, since by this time (about 7:30),
the U.S. MPs had fought their way Into the.
compound. We would be gassing our own
men. I called Maj. Hudson back at once. Af-
ter a 15-minute delay, he said the gas proba=
bly would be used anyway. At one point; be
said not to worry, that the cavalry was corn-,
ing. I had heard so much about the air cav-
alry that I thought he was being serious.. -
In the meantime, Mr. (Gilbert)`" Shein
baum, who had been receiving regular re-
ports from us. had told us of (Cot. George)
Jacobson'spresence in his house at the rear
of the compound. (He was mission coordina-
tor at the embassy.) Viet Cong were either
in or near the 'house. We assured, him we
would so inform the paratroopers as soon as
they arrived on the-roof.. T I . ,
back up to the roof. The OSA communicator
had gone back. to his code room, so the roof
paratroopers in full battle dress from the
101st airborne division. They carried M-16s.
M-79 grenade launchers, hand grenades, and
knives. I asked for the platoon commander.
me a hand grenade, which I declined. He
plained that we knew of no VC in the build-
ing. While the major took some notes, I de-
scribed the building briefly, repeated
MACV's deployment instructions, and in-
formed him of Col. Jacobson's situation in
the rear of the compound. I also urged him
to watch for the one Vietnamese employe on
the ground floor. Maj. Schwartz, fearing
there actually might be VC-in the building,
deployed his men so as to'secure it floor by
ground and obtain the very latest informa-
tion. He then rejoined his men. I called
Sheinbaum to say the troops had landed and
were deploying through the building. Two or,
Hoa Army. In each case, a general officer of
the "Army wanted urgently to speak with
Maj. Schwartz. I said he was engaged in-se-
curing the embassy and could not be
said he needed to know exactly how many
Ups And Downs'
I then made several more trips to the
About 45 minutes after Maj. Schwartz had
relayed this information to Carpenter. I then
As I was surveying the damage to the
ground floor, someone told me Gen. ? (Wil-
liam C.) Westmoreland (commander of the
to see me in the Marine guard's office. I
went there, and Gen. Westmoreland said his
advice was that the embassy,be cleaned up
work by noon. He then said he wished to
through a -flash call to Mr. Habib in the
White House situation room. As soon as Mr.
Habib was on the line, Griffin went down-
meantime, I told Mr. Habib the embassy
had been relieved and there were?19 dead
VC in the compound. I . also relayed Gem
Westmoreland's advice. After severer min-
Everything that happened after the para-
troopers reached the ground- floor,-by which
time all. the Viet Cong had already' been
killed for captured);. is well known to many
others. The above, account is written from
i the vantage.point . of. those inside the em
bassy. There are, of wise, other accounts,
each one conveying..'a different part of the
picture. The only thing I would like to add is
high praise for those- with whom I;- worked
inside the embassy throughout the siege.
Griffin, in particular, shared all the, tasks
and never flinched oz.. failed throughout the
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