In our resistance war against the U.S., despite being the very first operation of our regular force in the South, Binh Gia Offensive Winter – Spring 1964 – 1965 was a resounding success, making an important contribution to the failure of the enemy’s strategy of “Special War”. This was an operation with high combat performance, and unique and creative military art features, it also left many valuable lessons, notably the art of force utilisation, which need to be further studied and applied in the cause of defending our Fatherland.  

At the beginning of the period of 1961 – 1963, thanks to the fierce resistance movement of our People and Military in the South, the U.S. and its puppet regime’s position was seriously weakened. In order to salvage this situation, they stubbornly stepped up military actions with a plan proposed by Mc Namara to escalate their “Special War” in Vietnam, exploiting their military advantage and employing the strategy of “using Vietnamese to fight Vietnamese” to suppress and defeat our revolutionary movement in the South.

To counter the enemy’s plan, in December 1963, the Central Party Committee held the 9th Plenum to set out guidelines and principles for the leadership of the revolution in the South, clearly concluding that: “we must take advantage of the current favourable situation and concentrate our force to win decisive victories in the coming years”. The Politburo ordered the Central Military Commission and the Ministry of National Defence to prepare a strategic plan to seize the opportunity to defeat the puppet military before the U.S. increased their troops in the South. Realising this policy, the Central Office for South Vietnam identified the following tasks: build a strong regular force and organise large-scale concentrated military actions to step-by-step destroy the puppet regime’s main force, removing the fundamental element of the U.S. Imperialists’ strategy of “Special War”, creating a new development for our revolution. To concretise the above tasks, the Party Committee and the Military Command for the South decided to conduct Binh Gia Offensive in the Southeast area. After a month of constant fighting, despite being a newly-organised force, with high fighting spirit and the application of our unique military art, our regular troops eliminated a large proportion of the enemy force, destroyed many “strategic hamlet” and liberated a huge area, turning the balance of force and the battlefield situation into our favour; at the same time, marking the development and maturity of our regular force in the South, especially in terms of organisation, operational capability and the ability to employ military art; and most notably the art of force utilisation.

First, concentrate our force to form an “iron fist” to completely destroy each enemy battalion. The reality of the revolution in the South before the Operation showed that we had a very good opportunity but had not been able to build a strong onsite regular force able to conduct concentrated military actions to inflict complete destruction on each of the enemy detachments. Therefore, force concentration for the formation of an “iron fist” to completely eliminate each enemy battalion and cause serious casualties to enemy brigades and divisions, creating a new and favourable situation for us was an urgent task. Following the direction of the Party Central Committee and the Central Military Commission, for the first time on the Southern battlefield, we concentrated a large force including 02 infantry regiments (the 761st and 762nd Regiment), the 80th Regional Artillery Unit, the 500th and 800th Battalions of the Eastern Military Region, the 186th Battalion of the 6th Military Region and the 445th Company of Ba Ria Provincial Command, and local troops and guerilla units of districts in the area of operation, 7000 troops in total for the Operation. Before the Operation, infantry regiments and support battations of the Southern Command were secretly deployed to the main battlefield of Ba Ria and urgently conducted combat organisation and preparation, and ready for the fight.

To create numerical advantage, the Southern Command decided to concentrate our force in the main offensive direction for key and decisive engagements. The beauty of our art of force utilisation was that we only used a proportion of our regular units, local troops still played the main role in attacking enemy positions. We focused on encircling and attacking enemy in communes and hamlets; regular regiments were mainly deployed in positions convenient for our manoeuvrability. We employed creative and flexible tactics and fighting methods to completely destroy enemy battalions exposing their weaknesses or mobilising to relieve their allies. In the main offensive direction (Ba Ria – Long Khanh), the 762nd, in coordination with local troops of Ba Ria, conducted a mobile ambush on Route 2 and destroyed the enemy’s 3rd Amoured Squadron (a strong mobile detachment of the Saigon regime); the 761st Regiment, with the support of Ba Ria’s 445th Local Company, in a short time, won 2 key battles, eliminating the 33rd Ranger Battalion and the 4th Marine Battalion of the enemy (2 units of the enemy strategic reserve force) in Binh Gia. The success of the Operation showed that, only the effective use of “iron fist” of regular troops and the concentration of force in the main offensive direction, toward main objectives, can allow us to defeat and destroy the enemy’s regular force. Especially, for the first time in the war, we managed to completely destroy armoured battalions and squadrons of the enemy strategic reserve force, making an important contribution to the defeat of their “Special War” strategy.

Second, organise skirmishes in a wide area, forcing the enemy to stretch thin their force. Binh Gia Offensive had a relatively large area of operation. Thanks to the people warfare posture already built and developed strongly, the use of synergised combat power of the three types of force, and the concentration of “iron fists” for major destruction of the enemy force in the main offensive direction, we planned to use local troops and guerillas to step up combat coordination activities. Before the Operation, in order to distract and deceive the enemy, creating a favourable condition for our preparation activities and preserving the element of surprise in the main offensive direction, the Southern Command decided to launch a wave of attacks by local troops throughout the battlefield with the focus on the area of the 6th Military Region and the Eastern Military Region. Accordingly, in the coordinating direction (Hoai Duc, Tanh Linh), we used the 186th Battalion to capture Me Pu strategic hamlet to lure enemy reinforcement from Hoai Duc and Route 1; causing heavy casualties to 01 security company, 01 civilian defence company, and the reinforcing troops of La Gi Sub-section, and further damaging 02 other security companies; we also used the Regional Command’s artillery force to strike Bien Hoa Air Base, causing heavy damage and limiting the enemy’s ability to provide air support. Along with that, we stepped up activities to destroy “strategic hamlets” on Route 15 and around Long Dien and Dat Do areas, and resistance activities of the masses were also increased, forcing the enemy to disperse their forces to deal with them, creating favourable condition for our troops to secretly cross Dong Nai River into staging positions right on schedule. Thanks to that, in the main offensive direction, local troops of Long Khanh District, with the support of regular units, inflicted heavy damage to 01 enemy train convoy; local troops of Ben Cat District conducted an assault against Loi Ho Commando Battalion; the armed forces of Binh Thuan Province attacked Thien Giao Sub-section, destroying 01 enemy company; the 800th Battalion carried out a raid against Binh Son Commando Camp, destroyed Tam An and Phuoc Tho Outposts, and assisted the local civilians in dismantling many “strategic hamlets”. The organisation of widespread engagements against the enemy enabled the Operation Command to form a robust offensive posture, destroy and wear down a part of enemy force, isolate enemy units in the main attack area, and hinder their ability to support each other, forcing them to disperse their forces in a wide area, and allowing us to concentrate our units to attack the main targets.

Third, correctly assess the situation, promptly make force adjustments, flexible in transforming combat posture, and create synergised combat power to destroy the enemy. The combat method chosen by the Operation Command was “attack point to destroy reinforcement”, taking the destruction of the enemy outside their fortifications as the main objective, employing flexible tactics and fighting methods to defeat the enemy’s “helibourne” and “armour-bourne” tactics. It was expected that the development combat situation would be very rapid and complicated, even unpredictable. Therefore, it was essential for us to have strong situation awareness, and make force adjustments and posture transformations in a timely manner to deal with the enemy tactics. The reality of the Operation showed that, regarding force organisation and utilisation, the Operation Command deployed the 762th Regiment in the Southeast of Nui Nghe (west of Route 2) to deal with the enemy’s land force attempting to rescue and relieve Binh Gia. As expected, the enemy carried out Binh Tuy 33 Operation using the 3rd Armoured Squadron to clear the area along Route 2 to Binh Gia, Duc Thanh. However, the enemy did not manoeuvre into our ambush, therefore the 762nd Regiment could not attack them. Therefore, the Regiment quickly mobilised its force, set up formation in the east of Nui Nghe, conduct recconnaisance to monitor the enemy’s movement from Duc Thanh; once the enemy moved into our ambush, the Regiment immediately launched attacks to the front and from behind enemy convoy, encircling and isolating their formation; and after 01 hour of fighting, we destroyed the entire armoured squadron. After completing the objective, it was anticipated that the enemy would send more troops to the site to conduct casevac and continue their attack; therefore, following the principle of “the former battle enabling the latter battle”, the 761st Regiment quickly manoeuvre from Binh Gia to the South and Southeast of Quang Giao, promtly adjusted formations, battle plan and prepare for the next engagement, this led to the complete destruction of the puppet 4th Marine Battalion, causing great resonance throughout the battlefield. These victories clearly demonstrated our ability to correctly analyse and assess the enemy’s situation, accurately anticipate combat scenarios, firmly grasp the opportunity, organise and adjusting forces in a timely manner, conduct rapid combat deployment, quickly transform combat posture to seize the initiative, and deal “critical, serious blows” to the enemy, completing assigned tasks.

The Victory of Binh Gia was brilliant milestone in our resistance war against the U.S. for national salvation, marking an oustanding maturity of regular units of the Liberation Army of South Vietnam and an important development of our operational art. This victory left many valuable lessons about the art of force organisation and utilisation, which need to be studied and applied futher in the cause of national defence today.

Colonel, Dr. NGUYEN VAN PHUC, 1st Infantry College