Waiting for the Thrust
Khe Sanh, the imperiled northern position where some 6,000 U.S. Marines
are surrounded by 40,000 NVA regulars, waited wearily through another
week for what General Westmoreland still believes will be the largest
battle of the war. Though the big enemy push failed to materialize on
several predicted dates, the massed Communists were indeed closing in.
“I see no reason to believe that they'll stop now,” said Khe Sanh's
commander, Colonel David E. Lownds, 47. With new NVA bunkers spotted
only 300 yards from Marine lines, corpsmen with stethoscopes knelt on
Khe Sanh's red clay to see if the enemy had tunneled underneath, as
occurred around Dienbienphu. So far, they have heard nothing
suspicious. Trying to discourage an all-out attack, U.S. warplanes pummeled the
foggy hills around Khe Sanh in the most concentrated bombing campaign
of the war. More than 7,500 fighter-bomber sorties and 100 B-52 strikes
have unloaded at least 120 million pounds of bombs around the besieged
bases in the past three weeks—more explosive force than the two
A-bombs dropped on Japan. They triggered more than 2,000 secondary
explosions, signifying direct hits on ammunition or fuel dumps. But
North Vietnamese artillery, mortars and rockets still peppered Khe Sanh
at a rate of at least 100 rounds daily, killing an average this month
of two Marines a day and wounding many others. Mortar Bait. For the surrounded Marines at Khe Sanh, life is dreary
days of digging deeper in their trenches and bunkers, ducking incoming
fire, and cleaning and recleaning the M-16 rifles they expect to use
against the NVA's 304th and 325-C Divisions. “Mortar bait!” they scream
as big transports lumber onto the metal runway. Then they dart into
bunkers, knowing that the planes usually attract “incoming.” The
Marines just sit and wait to be attacked, primarily because seeking out
the enemy could cost more lives and casualty-consciousness has been
drummed into every commander. The fact that they do not patrol means
that Khe Sanh's original purpose—to interdict enemy infiltration—has
been abandoned. As the tension builds, Marines manning the misty
perimeter, their eyes wet with straining, sometimes begin to imagine
phantom attackers coming through the gathering dusk. Whether the NVA masses will ever at tack Khe Sanh became a matter of
growing doubt and deepening divisions. Some ranking officers wondered
if the enemy buildup there was only a diversion for the urban offensive
further south or for a bypass thrust at Quang Tri or Danang. There was
also a dawning realization that, for all President Johnson's warning
against another Dienbienphu, Khe Sanh could be overrun by overwhelming
human-wave attacks. A top U.S. general in Saigon reckoned that the base
could be taken by 25,000 men in concerted assaults, “but a hell of a
lot of them would stay on the wire.”
