The War: On the Defensive

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From the battlefields along the Demilitarized Zone to the fearful capital of Saigon and southward, the allies last week were nearly everywhere on the military and political defensive, waiting uncertainly for the Communists' next blow and by no means confident that it could be wholly blunted. A full 25 days after the Communists first launched their general offensive, South Viet Nam was still a country taut with terror and riven by fire. In Hué, South Vietnamese and U.S. Marines were still engaged in the most desperate fighting of the war to drive the last of the North Vietnamese out of the ancient Citadel. At Khe Sanh, the pressure mounted on the waiting U.S. Marines, who underwent one of the most concentrated barrages of the war—1,307 rounds of shells in one five-hour stretch. Having promised to level Saigon in a "second wave" of attacks on South Viet Nam's cities, the Communists kept up a steady drumfire of rockets and mortars on the capital. And the U.S. command announced that for the week ending Feb. 17, a record number of 543 Americans died in combat, bringing to 2,200 the number of U.S. dead so far this year v. 9,000 in all of 1967.

The Fifth Column. The Communists' successful application of widespread pressure has forced a painful sequence of choices and consequences on the allies. Required to use all their armies to defend the cities and the line along the DMZ, allied commanders no longer have enough manpower to move out in pursuit of Communist battalions. They are thus unable to hit at their besiegers, or even put out sufficient reconnaissance patrols to determine the size and deployment of the Communist armies arrayed around them. Nor can the U.S. and the South Vietnamese be sure how many enemy forces, the remnants of the original wave of attackers, remain hidden inside the rings hastily thrown around the cities and towns. In Saigon, the problem is particularly acute, since the size and effectiveness of this fifth column might well determine the outcome of any major Communist thrust.

Pulling in to defend the cities, the allies have been forced to cede large areas of the countryside to the Communists. Except for the largest population centers, for example, the rich Delta is now almost entirely in Viet Cong hands. There is not a Delta road safe to drive on, by day or night. Massive quantities of supplies are moving through the Delta for the enemy buildup around Saigon, and U.S. reconnaissance planes now sight piles of enemy artillery shells flagrantly stacked out in the open. But people and goods cannot move in the Delta; fish rot where they have been caught, rice molders unharvested. In Soc Trang, the cost of food has risen 30%; in Vinh Long, the price of rice has soared tenfold.