The War: Thunder from a Distant Hill

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Until recently, most of the opposition has come from intellectuals and the young, from college professors and clerics. But now the ranks have been swelled by apolitical businessmen and uneasy politicians eying the antiwar sentiment in the polls, thinking about 1968. Congress is in a rebellious mood, and the insurrection is fast spreading from Democratic ranks, where opposition to the war was previously centered, to the Republican side of the aisle. "The war is behind all of our problems," says a member of the House. "It's a millstone around our necks."

Just about everybody blamed his hang-ups on the war—from civil rights leaders, who saw it siphoning funds from the blighted cities, to profit-minded merchants, who saw it increasing pressure for a tax increase. All at once, too many Americans found it too much to bear—or at least began to wonder whether it was worth it. Senate Minority Leader Everett M. Dirksen worried: "There's fatigue in the country."

Cork in the Bottle. By no coincidence, it was fatigue in France in the wake of Dienbienphu that finally propelled French arms out of Indo-China 13 years ago. Would Con Thien induce the same mood in the American public? "The enemy is fighting for American public opinion," says U.S. Commander General William C. Westmoreland, "and he is willing to pay a dear price to influence it. This is the way he expects to win the war—it is the only conceivable way he could win it."

But Con Thien, plainly, is not Dienbienphu. The French garrison was 76 min. by air from its supply sources, isolated in a narrow valley over 200 miles from the French stronghold at Hanoi. The French were hemmed in and, after the 56-day Viet Minh siege began, had to be resupplied by parachute drops through dense antiaircraft fire. Con Thien can be resupplied within six minutes by helicopter from Dong Ha, ten miles to the southeast, or by land from Cam Lo, seven miles to the south, when the road is not washed out. The French conceived of Dienbienphu as "the cork in the bottle," designed to stop Viet Minh movements into the fertile Red River delta and Laos. But the garrison was ringed by hills that General Vo Nguyen Giap's artillerymen, who outgunned the French 5 to 1, used to murderous advantage.

Con Thien, by contrast, rising nearly 500 feet above sea level, is the most commanding point all the way to the DMZ. It is supported not only by Marine and Army artillery but also by B-52 Stratofortresses, each packing 60,000 lbs. of bombs, U.S. warships bristling with 5-and 8-in. guns, and clouds of fighter planes. Westmoreland described the bombardment of suspected Red gun positions as the heaviest concentration of firepower "on any single piece of real estate in the history of warfare."

Dienbienphu was a last, desperate gamble to win a decisive victory after seven years of war. If Con Thien was set up somewhat by chance, it nevertheless has a clear-cut tactical purpose. Sitting astride invasion routes from the North, the 1,200-man garrison is there to prevent, or at least slow down, a southward surge by the estimated 35,000 North Vietnamese regulars positioned in and around the DMZ. Poised to meet this threat are eight South Vietnamese airborne and eight Marine battalions strung along the DMZ; in all of I Corps, the