Page 375 - The Viet-Cong Tet_Offensive_1968

their houses on or even before schedule. The peoplers virtue of tradi-
tional hard-work and rnoral endurance added to this achievement and
saved the 1ocal adrninistration sorne difficulties and troubles.

D. LESSONS LEARNED

The greatest advantages enjoyed by the enerny before and
during the offensive were derived frorn the long Tet truce and the lif-
ting of the curfew on Tetrs Eve. These actions resulted in a lack of
vigilance arnong outpost garrisong, checkpoint security rnen and the
fun-loving populace, This state o{ affairs led to sharp drops in the in-
flow of intelligence reports. The enerny took advantage of all these
things to secretly rnove his cornbat troops, sapper and political agents
into the city to launch the surprise raids on rnilitary and governrnent
agencies. This allowed thern to inflict heavy casualties upon sorne
nonvigilant garrisons and to take over populated areas aknost without
firing a shot. The reduced garrison strength, resulting frorn excessive
Tet horne leaves which were granted by cornrnanding officers, also
accounted for the enerny successes in the early hours of the o{fensive
and for the inability of the defenders to conduct the counter attacks.
Cornbat weary troops just back frorn the battle fields for a rest were
ordered to launch counterattacks which challenged their depleted
strength.
The enerny also rnade enough serious rnistakes to rnake
their offensive a rniserable flop. First, he was so openly confident in
his victory that he underestimated the defendersr will and ability to
react and defeat hirn. Second, overestirnated his popular support to
such a degree that he thought he could hold the socalled anti.-govern-
rnent rnas6 rallies in town. Third, he assurned the Khanh Hoa sector
cornrnand to be the only nerve center of the province. Consequently
he believed that its seizure would irnrnediately dernoralize the other
governrnental arrny units into surrendering or defecting, Fourth; rnany
of the enerny field cornrnanders doubted the feasibility of the offensive
plan and therefore there was a serious lack of coordination arnong
enemy as sault units.

The fourth point was verified by the testirnony of al1
twelve enerny officers captured, including Huynh Tuong, Nha Trang
(enerny) deputy political cornrnissar and Khanh Hoa politicat cornrnis-
sar. This 40-year-o1d, fr ailly built C ornrnuni s t cornrnander told his
captors and reporter Hong Duong that he had never believed that take-
over of Nha Trang City was possible with the rnodest assault force of

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