A Matter of Time?

As U.S. air strikes to the North mounted in fury last week, the Viet Cong were moving closer and closer to control of the whole top third of South Viet Nam. An atmosphere of siege prevailed in Hue, South Viet Nam's third largest city, where the population dared not leave the city limits. From Quinhon to the 17th parallel, the countryside swarmed with cocky Viet Cong units--some operating in battalion and regiment strength, many now openly wearing olive-drab uniforms and fatigue hats rather than the civilian-style black "pajamas" that once gave them military invisibility.

Within the past month, hard-core Viet Cong battalions have captured 70 of the 82 government-defended hamlets in Hoai Nhon district. Hoai Nhon (pronounced why none) is the strategic key to control of Binh Dinh province. And if Binh Dinh, with its highways, harbors and airbases, falls, South Viet Nam is effectively decapitated.

Frustrated & Fatalistic. In this game of dominoes, the key piece was a tiny hamlet named Bongson--which in Vietnamese means "paradise." To its garrison of South Vietnamese defenders it appears more like a death trap. Hemmed in on one side by mountains, on the other by the sea, Bongson focuses a railroad, a river and the north-south coast highway, Route 1, into a single, strategic target. Last week Viet Cong campfires cast a brazen glow on the hills outside of town, while in Bong-son's main fort--rimmed with barbed wire and booby traps--soldiers and civil guards had grown so accustomed to attacks that they did not even stop eating when Communist snipers began firing. To them it appeared only a matter of time before they would be wiped out.

Attempts by government troops to reopen Route 1 between Bongson and the next province to the north are repulsed with an ease that borders on flippancy. A nine-day push by two battalions of South Vietnamese marines cleared a bare seven miles at the cost of six dead (including one U.S. adviser)--after which the hard-won stretch of roadway was abandoned for lack of artillery support. Frustrated and fatalistic, Saigon finally began contemplating sending a full marine brigade into Bongson--but no one knew if even that many troops could hold it.

Target: Elephants. The steady Communist pressure in the Bongson area was beginning to be felt at Danang--only 120 miles to the north, and the site of the airbase from which most of the U.S. air strikes into North Viet Nam are mounted. At week's end, Viet Cong main-force units attacked in strength just 40 miles southwest of Danang, pinning down three battalions of South Vietnamese and killing a regimental commander. He and five aides were found burned to death in an ambushed armored personnel carrier.

Danang, with its airfield, deep-water port facilities and 100,000 population, its U.S. and Vietnamese attack bomb ers, assault helicopters and transports, is a prime target. The three Hawk antiaircraft batteries clustered at Danang since February, with their 36 antiaircraft missiles, add to the target potential of the Danang aviary. From their own strongholds on Monkey Mountain, just west of the base, the Viet Cong are in a good position to clip the claws of those raptors.

Danang's 25-mile perimeter is patrolled by the so-called "Special Sector," made up of Vietnamese Rangers and U.S. Special Forces, which on two occasions in the past month has surprised Viet Cong units within mortar range of the airstrip. Last week one flustered patrol reported "enemy" activity, and Danang's artillery opened up--on a herd of 15 wild elephants.

The Doom Club. Danang itself is ominously quiet. The white sand beaches on Tourane Bay are deserted; pedicabs and taxis have given way to Jeeps and deuce-and-a-half trucks. Danang's populace doesn't bother to look up at the Skyraiders and jets bellowing off the runways en route to another strike north. Military men stick to their posts. Bars and brothels go dead at night, leaving girls to play cards and dance with each other; little children with wild eyes pick one another's pockets. Even in the "Doom Club," a hangout for U.S. officers, there is no singing. The busiest spot in town is a shop that sells lucky charms to G.I.s. Its slogan: "No V.D., No V.C., Buy from Kim Chi."

The main topic of conversation in Danang last week was the impending arrival of two battalions of U.S. marines to help defend the airbase perimeter. But with the stepped-up Viet Cong offensives throughout the country, especially around Bongson and Danang, even they may not be enough to keep the strategically vital northern third of the country from falling to Communist arms. The U.S. air strikes to the North --no longer tit-for-tat but now steady, measured assaults on Viet Cong supply lines--must be backed up by success on the ground within South Viet Nam if Washington's policy is to succeed. After all, hitting the North loses its meaning if the South falls.

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