the When Tet Offensive was launched by North Vietnamese forces on January 31, 1968, it marked the turning point for America's involvement in the Vietnam War . The all out attack was viewed at the time by the US military as being a failed "all or nothing" bid to overrun the American-backed South. Even though the North Vietnamese forces suffered massive casualties, and gained a relatively small amount of territory from the attack, it was a political victory that forced the Americans to the bargaining table. The attacks signified the beginning of the end of American involvement in Vietnam, because as the offensive continued, Americans tired of the widespread attacks. The American media also played a substantial role in the exacerbating the effect of the offensive on the American public's opinion of the war, which eventually fell so low that politicians had no choice but to recall the troops from battle . The Tet Offensive was planned so that in military defeat, political victory would eventually be reached. Although this seems illogical, the North Vietnamese commanders knew that Americans were not interested in involvement in extended conflicts. In the words of Pham Van Dong, the successor and a close aide of Ho Chi Minh, "Americans don't like long, inconclusive wars and this is going to be a long, inconclusive war" (Oberdorfer). The beginning of the offensive was marked by a buildup of Vietcong forces in the Laotian panhandle of the demilitarized zone. The forces threatened the US marine base in Khe Sanh, which was strategically important for stopping enemy infiltration down the Ho Chi Minh trail, as well as serving as a staging post for operations (Tucker). The US command felt that holding the Khe Sanh base was important, but was worried that the 6,000 Marines in the base would be overrun by the 20,000 NVA troops who were surrounding them.
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In the early hours of January 21, 1968, Khe Sahn came under mortar and rocket fire, which intensified as the morning continued. The president at the time, Lyndon Baines Johnson, was worried that the battle at Khe Sahn would turn out like the battle at Dien Bien Phu, where 13,000 French troops were besieged and overtaken by 50,000 NVA troops. Although the estimated numbers of NVA surrounding the Khe Sahn base were higher than in reality, General Westmoreland assured commanders in Washington that the base was prepared for the attack . In preparation for the attack, supplies and ammunition were continuously being airlifted into the base until anti-aircraft fire became too intense for the airlift to continue. However, attacks on Khe Sanh proved to be a diversion; the major attacks in the Tet Offensive occurred elsewhere. The attacks to come would shock US commanders as the North Vietnamese would shift the campaign from the rural Northern region to the urban South, a region that was thought to be safe. Dozens of major locations, including in Saigon and Hue, were infiltrated by approximately 80,000 NVA soldiers (MSN Encarta). The soldiers were able to evade detection when crossing into the cities by dressing as ARVN Military Police, National Police, or civilians. To arm the guerilla troops, weapons were smuggled into the cities using carts disguised as containing innocuous products. A common tactic was for the NVA to use funeral processions to disguise the importation of arms into the cities where the attacks were to take place (MSN Encarta). In the early morning hours of January 30, 1968, the eve of Vietnamese New Year, the surprise attack commenced at Nha Trang and eleven other cities, as well as multiple allied military bases and airfields. The next night, the main attack occurred in eighteen cities
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throughout Vietnam, but shortly thereafter the attacks were quelled in all but Saigon and Hue, where the battles continued for weeks. The battle for the imperial city of Hue is known as one of the bloodiest and most costly battles of the Tet Offensive, resulting in over 3,000 civilians slaughtered and over 100,000 residents displaced. The North Vietnamese troops moved throughout the city, assassinating civilians suspected of collaborating with American forces. In efforts to dislodge the NLF troops, American artillery pounded every corner of the city. The indiscriminate barrages of artillery fire were responsible for the majority of the civilian deaths, as well as demolishing countless historical sites and architectural wonders (Republic of Vietnam). The attack at Hue began as on January 31 as NVA rocket and mortar fire pounded the city, while 10,000 ground troops moved in. The South Vietnamese troops in charge of the city's defense were taken by complete surprise. Soon after the initial attack, most of the city, including the old French fortress at the city's center, was taken by the North Vietnamese troops . The allied troops stationed in the city were outnumbered, and reinforcements were called in. Marines soon arrived, and encountered heavy house-to-house fighting and battles in the streets, however the Marines were not used to urban warfare and found the fighting extremely difficult . American troops encountered booby-trapped houses, snipers hiding in buildings, and hidden machine gun bunkers. At first, American policy attempted to protect the many historic temples and buildings in the city; however the policy was eliminated after it became too restrictive and hindered the success of the troops (Republic of Vietnam). With the help of constant shelling from American ships and artillery, Hue was slowly retaken street by street until the NVA troops completely withdrew on February 24. 3
The battle for Saigon was host to some of the most famous scenes of the Vietnam War, and is the hallmark battle of the Tet Offensive. Saigon, the South Vietnamese capitol, was filled with government buildings that became the focus of the NVA attacks; the brunt of the NVA's force centered on the American Embassy, the headquarters of the ARVN, the Tan Son Nhut Air Base, the South Vietnamese Naval Headquarters, President Thieu's office, and the National Radio Station (Tucker). Thirty-five battalions of undercover Viet Cong living in the city attacked these six locations simultaneously, overpowering allied troops stationed inside . The Tet Offensive depended on the element of surprise, and the major reason for the success of the attacks can be linked to several American intelligence failures. In the fall of 1967, four months before the attacks, American and South Vietnamese troops had captured attack plans from enemy troops; however the plans were largely disregarded and quickly forgotten about (Jeffery). In addition to attack plans, allied troops had tape recorded discussions from agents, had obtained information from prisoner interrogations, and intercepted several messages that pointed to large scale attacks which would attempt to cause popular uprisings in major cities and the South Vietnamese capitol (Jeffery). Although there were four accurate reports of the enemy's impending attack, commanders never saw the specific information because lower level intelligence personnel had written off the reports as propaganda. In a move that may have saved the city from being completely overrun by NVA troops, General Westmoreland had ordered Saigon's defenses to be strengthened after a briefing indicating an attack on the city by General Phillip Davidson, the MACV Intelligence Assistant Chief of Staff (Jeffery). Still, the diversion attacks served their purpose and most of the American attention was drawn to Khe Sahn.
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Contributing even more greatly to the intelligence failure was the mindset of American commanders to think in terms of American troops. The US military analysts did not realize that the Vietnamese New Year was approaching, and many ARVN soldiers were taking leave . The absence of troops severely weakened many of the ARVN divisions, and the timing of the attacks greatly contributed to the success of the NVA attacks. The attack on Saigon became the backdrop for some of the most famous moments of the Tet Offensive, and the attacks proved to be extremely influential in accomplishing the North's objectives. The two most memorable moments in the battle include the Pulitzer Prize winning photograph of a Viet Cong prisoner being executed by a South Vietnamese officer, as well as the guerilla attack on the American embassy. The American embassy, secure as it was, made an excellent target for the North, considering the embassy was a public symbol of American presence in Vietnam. In the embassy attack, nineteen North Vietnamese guerrilla troops used explosives to blast their way into the compound around 2:45 AM on January 31. The troops stationed inside the embassy were taken by surprise because they had not been informed of the attacks on Saigon, which, at that point, had been taking place in for over an hour (MSN Encarta). The lack of communication greatly contributed to the success of the attacks by not raising the level of defense in the embassy. After blasting a hole through the outer wall of the facility, four American Military Policemen were killed, along with a Marine and a South Vietnamese employee; an image featured on the front page of the New York Times showed five dead Americans, and helped bring the event into the eye of the mainstream media (Schmitz). The remaining troops stationed at the embassy withdrew into the main building, and waited for
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reinforcements to arrive. However, the nineteen guerrillas held the outer part of the compound for the next six hours, wandering around the embassy yard until American reinforcements came and killed them. The significance of the attack on the embassy was downplayed by General Westmoreland, who gave little attention to the event . Even so, the attacks stunned the US officials in the White House, as well as the American public. After capturing the attention the of American media, the attack on the embassy became the symbol of the Tet Offensive for Americans and made a considerable contribution to the American anti-war movement . American reporting in Vietnam, especially of the Tet Offensive, became increasingly valuable for the North Vietnamese leadership. The anti-war movement was spurned by the graphic images of battle the media was portraying, and helped create widespread dissention which eventually led to the withdrawal of American troops. The coverage was also a way of exposing the lies told to the public by administration officials, and set a strong precedent embracing skepticism of government accounts of progress; a skepticism that remains today as the current administration's portrayal of the war contrasts strongly with the more realistic and brutal image of the war that many Americans see as truth. The type of reporting in Vietnam helped to expose the outright lies of the Johnson administration about the progress of the war by showing front line battlefield imagery for the first time. Every American with a TV who watched the news saw firsthand how horrible the battles actually were. Stanley Karnow, Time-Life's Pulitzer Prize winning correspondent to Asia, expressed the newfound importance of television news on the public opinion of the war; "Dead bodies lay amid the rubble and rattle of automatic gunfire as dazed American soldiers and
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civilians ran back and forth, trying to flush out the assailants. Americans at home saw the carnage wrought by the offensive" (Karnow). Reporters embedded in army units gave live updates on the progress of troops against the North Vietnamese, and because of the instantaneous nature of the broadcasts it was harder for American military leaders to misrepresent the outcome of the battles. Even so, the military commanders still found ways of manipulating their words and the data they would release to make it seem as if the casualties were less severe than in reality. For much of the Vietnam War the American media relied too heavily on the U .S. Government for information, creating a system that gave the government nearly complete control of the press . For example, the NY Times used government sources when they reported a second attack on a US destroyer in the Tonkin Gulf which was recently revealed to be false in a recent FOIA request (Jeffery). The reliance on questionable government sources led to reporting that was often filled with faulty statistics, inaccurate reports of battle outcomes, and a false view of the war. When the Tet Offensive launched, the American media made some exaggerated claims in regards to the impact on U.S. forces. The press was often criticized as portraying the Tet Offensive in an overly negative light, which to some extent was true . The sheer numbers of the Tet were extremely favorable for the U.S., with NVA casualties ranging in the 35,000 range while the allied forces lost only 4,500 troops in the offensive (Tucker). The North Vietnamese casualties, although extremely high, did not cripple its military operations, and the Viet Cong troops that were lost in battle were quickly replaced by North Vietnamese substitutes. Still,
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American reports of the widespread attacks shocked the public, who saw the Tet Offensive as a victory for the North (Schmitz). Although the offensive was a substantial loss of military troops for the North, the military objectives were second in importance to the political goals of the movement . The first goal was to break the deadlock in the war and make politicians in the U.S., whose uncertainty of the war was becoming more evident, push for a withdrawal of troops. The tactical disaster of the Tet Offensive became a political victory by making clear to the American public that there was no "light at the end of the tunnel" for the Vietnam War, proving false the official claim. With the help of the American media attention it brought, the Tet "ignited an explosion of dissent" (Stanley Karnow). The growing anti-war sentiment was bolstered by the waves of negative news coverage, and President Johnson's approval ratings sank to new lows; Johnson's approval ratings dove from 40% in 1967 to around 26% in March of 1968 (Tucker). Hopes of a quick war sharply diminished after observing the breadth of the North Vietnamese attacks, bringing to light questions about the accuracy of previous intelligence reports that had indicated progress was being made. The second political objective General Giap designed the Tet to accomplish was to incite popular uprisings in the Southern cities. For this reason, the national radio station in Saigon was considered a primary target when the invasion of the city commenced . The initial plan of the takeover was to broadcast messages over the radio which announced the liberation of Saigon, and to call for a general uprising against the South Vietnamese government . However, that objective failed when the power to the radio station was lost in the attack, and the massive uprisings the Northern commanders desired did not materialize.
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The psychological effect on the South Vietnamese population was profound, and seeing attacks taking place in the streets of the cities they lived in, many of the South Vietnamese people lost confidence in their government. They came to realize that even with American support the Southern government could not protect its people from the North. A feeling of hopelessness was common in the South Vietnamese military, and defection rates rose from 10.5 to 16.5 per thousand soldiers during the Tet (Arnold). The effects of the Tet Offensive were made permanent through songwriting, and several classic Vietnamese songs were written about the terror of the fighting, serving to immortalize the event in the nation's culture. As the offensive progressed, American military commanders began to feel more and more hopeless about the prospects of winning the war, and on February 20th General Westmoreland requested an additional 206,000 troops for Vietnam. The request came along with a report by a U.S. General sent to determine troop requirements; the report noted that North Vietnamese troops operated freely in the countryside, and the allied troops had very limited control of the territory outside of the cities (Jeffrey). The report argued that the additional troops were needed to secure the country through a newfound American offensive push. The group of commanders evaluating Westmoreland's request decided that any further troop increase could easily be matched by the North, and channels for negotiation must be opened . After the first phase of the Tet, President Johnson began negotiations for peace with the North Vietnamese. The Paris peace talks began on May 13, 1968, however disputes about official recognition of the North Vietnamese Liberation Front quickly sidetracked the discussions. Hubert Humphrey, the 1968 Democratic candidate for president, called for negotiations towards a peace agreement, but South Vietnamese President Thieu held he would 9
not negotiate with Communists. The peace talks stalled because neither side would give in to any demands of the other, however in 1973, political pressure from Congress forced allied nations back to the bargaining table. On January 23, 1973 the Treaty of Paris was signed by all involved nations, marking the end of U.S. military involvement . The U.S. withdrawal was followed by a renewed offensive by the North, eventually overtaking the South Vietnamese government, which was significantly weaker without U.S. support. The Tet Offensive played a substantial role in the Vietnam War's outcome, serving as the catalyst for American withdrawal. The strategy of the North proved to be successful at accomplishing the broader political goals General Giap had in mind . Despite heavy military losses, by displaying the NVA's strength and ability to overtake heavily defended cities in the South, the North Vietnamese were able to prove the power of their military and its ability to strike anywhere. Furthermore, the widespread media coverage the Tet received helped to successfully spark American dissention against U.S. involvement in Vietnam, making way for massive protests and rallies that became the symbol of the era . By making clear to military commanders and politicians that the war was going to be drawn out and difficult, the Americans and their South Vietnamese allies were driven to the bargaining table. The political success out of a military failure is one of the most unique aspects of the Tet Offensive; and even though the North Vietnamese lost many thousands more troops than the allied forces in the attacks, the offensive proved to be the deciding factor in determining the outcome of the Vietnam War .
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Works Cited Arnold, James R. The Tet Offensive 1968. Westport, CT: Praeger, 2004. Gilbert, Mark J., and William Head. The Tet Offensive. Westport, CT: Praeger, 1996. Jeffery, Keith. United States. Air Force. The Uncertain Oracle. 21 Apr. 2007 <http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/army/uncertain.pdf>. Karnow, Stanley. Vietnam: a History. 2nd ed. New York: Penguin, 1991. Mintz, S, comp. Digital History. 21 Apr. 2007. University of Houston. 21 Apr. 2007 <http://digitalhistory.uh.edu/database/article_display.cfm?hhid=519>. Oberdorfer, Don. "Tet: Who Won?" Smithsonian Magazine Nov. 2004. Republic of Vietnam. Embassy of Vietnam. Vietnam Bulletin. Apr. 1970. 21 Apr. 2007 <http://www.saigon.com/regions/hue/>. Schmitz, David F. The Tet Offensive: Politics, War, and Public Opinion. 1st ed. New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2005. Tucker, Spencer C. The Encyclopedia of the Vietnam War. New York: Oxford P, 1998. "Vietnam War." MSN Encarta. 2007. Microsoft Corporation. 21 Apr. 2007 <http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761552642_2/Vietnam_War.html>.
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