CHAPTER 13
By the time the rescued Marines were returned to the RLT-7 CP about twenty-five correspondents showed up to be briefed about the operation. New Zealander Peter Arnett cornered the young man who had been crying on the radio and asked him questions about events of the previous day. Then, without a word to anyone else, Arnett went off and filed a story that alleged that the Marine Corps had lost, that it had failed to rescue its people, and that the Marine leaders did not have a true grasp on the combat situation at hand on August 18.
Captain Richard Johnson, a member of the 3d Marine Division operations staff, filed a second story that differed substantially from Arnett’s. He did so at the request of Col Don Wyckoff, the III Marine Amphibious Force operations officer, because so many queries came in as a result of Arnette’s piece.
Captain Johnson and some other officers arrived in Saigon to brief General Westmoreland and his staff on the morning of August 21. Afterwards they were asked to brief the correspondents at the Saigon press center. In addition to Johnson the Marines were represented by Major Williamson, the 3d Marine Division intelligence officer; a squad leader from Hotel Company, 2/4; an F4 pilot; and an aerial observer, all of whom had participated in the operation. The briefing went well until Arnett, at the very end, shot his hand up and asked Johnson why he disputed his (Arnett’s) version of the story. Johnson related what actually happened and pointed out that he (Johnson) had been within a few hundred meters of the incident, whereas Arnett had been nowhere near the battlefield.
Arnett shot back that Johnson was a liar and challenged him to meet him (Arnett) at the Associated Press office, where he would produce documentary evidence of what happened. Because of the exchange of words the head of the Saigon press center terminated the briefing. Johnson and the others were caught in the crush of other correspondents who approached them to ask questions, including at least one who apologized for Arnette’s actions.
It took Johnson about fifteen minutes to break away and get to the Associated Press office, which they found locked. There was no sign of Arnett. They found this curious, because most press offices were open twenty-four hours a day.
Johnson never encountered Arnett again, but the reporter won the Pulitzer Prize and established his reputation with this article, whose authenticity the Marines still question.
“Marines Trap 2,000 VC” was one headline of many that hit front pages across the nation. It was, indeed, a promising time for America’s effort in Vietnam. President Lyndon Johnson was so ecstatic he sent a message to Generals Westmoreland and Walt that said in part, “I extend my heartfelt thanks and congratulations to the units under your command which have achieved a clear cut victory against the 1st Viet Cong Regiment at Chulai. This nation is deeply proud of its fighting sons. They will have the continued, united, and determined support of their people at home.”
And for a while they did. The anti-war demonstrations and teach-ins had not yet begun, and they wouldn’t reach a crescendo until after the Tet Offensive of early 1968. In the aftermath of Starlite optimists on Westmoreland’s staff, in the administration, and in the Congress visualized American troops rooting out and killing or dispersing large numbers of enemy soldiers in a short period of time.
The Marines had passed their first big test in Vietnam. Moreover, they tested on the battlefield the combined helicopter and amphibious doctrine they had studied for more than a decade. The success of Starlite renewed their faith in their ability to operate effectively in “any clime and place,” and against any enemy.
Just a few weeks after Operation Starlite the Marines launched Operation Piranha against what was supposed to be the “remnants” of the 1st Viet Cong Regiment, which were thought to be on the Batangan Peninsula, about eight miles south of the Starlite battlefield.
Once again Col Peat Peatross and Navy Capt William McKinney were the commanders of the landing forces and the amphibious task force. The operation also included LtCol Charles Bodley’s 3/7 and LtCol Joseph E. Muir’s 3/3. This time our Vietnamese allies were included. The 2d Battalion, 4th ARVN Regiment, and the 3d VNMC Battalion were landed by helicopter in the southern portion of the battlefield. Compared to Starlite, where the planning was done instantly and the execution followed quickly, the conditions of Piranha permitted more extensive preparation. This time there was a thirteen-day interval between the time the warning order went out and the time of the landing, on September 7.
The operation was but a moderate success when compared with its predecessor. Allied forces claimed 178 VC killed and 20 weapons captured. The allies suffered two Marines and five South Vietnamese killed.1
The fairly low level of activity could be attributed to several factors. One difference was the fact that the Marines had a long time to plan Piranha. The extended planning phase meant a smoother operation, but it also increased the likelihood of intelligence leaks by our allies. On Starlite, only two high-ranking Vietnamese generals were notified of the operation before its execution. Because of extensive South Vietnamese participation in Pirhana, a lot of them had to know about the effort during the planning stages, which increased the likelihood of information falling into enemy hands.
Perhaps the most important reason for the so-so result was that the Viet Cong had gained an enormous appreciation of the Marines’ ability to project power from the sea as a result of Starlite. Never again in the course of the war did they permit their units to tarry on the coastal plain. When they had a job to do near the water, they came in and did it, and then they fled inland again. Although they developed good antiaircraft techniques and weaponry during the war they had neither the ordnance nor the expertise to thwart an amphibious landing force.
It took a long time for American forces to gain an appreciation of the resilience of the Viet Cong. At the conclusion of Starlite the allies wrote off the 1st Viet Cong Regiment as a fighting force. A mere four months later, several Marine battalions, including 3/3, once again met the full-strength regiment near Chulai in Operation Harvest Moon. The Americans were mystified by the regiment’s ability to reconstitute itself. The Marines did not know that they had encountered only half of the regiment on Operation Starlite. Nor did they have an understanding of how the VC could replenish their losses by reaching down into local guerrilla and regional force units for new men. The Ba Gia Regiment would be written off many times, but it endured throughout the war. Many thousands of Viet Cong who belonged to this unit were killed over the years, but the unit always bounced back. It was assigned as part of the 2d North Vietnamese Army Division in early 1966 and ranged back and forth between its familiar foundation in Quang Ngai Province and the Que Son Valley, to the north. At the end of Operation Swift in September 1967 the 1st VC Regiment was judged to be “unfit for combat” by allied intelligence2. Yet the regiment continued a vigorous program of fighting U.S. Marine and U.S. Army units and, after the withdrawal of American troops, against ARVN units.
The reaction to Operation Starlite among the allies was not altogether unalloyed cheer. There was grumbling to Westmoreland from ARVN officers on the Joint General Staff who resented that ARVN units had not been included. Walt later stated that Generals Lam and Thi knew of the operation and concurred with his decision to operate on a basis of secrecy.
The 1st VC Regiment’s “Victory at Van Tuong” “demonstrated what was necessary to defeat the Americans” and the unit received the “1st Class Medal of Liberation” and the pennant of “Valor, Steadfastness, Good Combativity and Swift Destruction.”3 After the end of the war the government of Vietnam constructed memorial pavilions around the tank and amtrac that were destroyed on Operation Starlite. Plaques in Vietnamese and English inform the visitor that they were just two of the many vehicles destroyed by the freedom fighters.
Starlite was a watershed for both sides. The U.S. continued to pour men and materiél into the war effort in the belief that Starlite was the beginning of a reversal of fortune in Vietnam. Ironically, Starlite, a Marine victory, reinforced General Westmoreland’s notion that carrying the fight to main force enemy units was the key to success in Vietnam. This belief helped keep pacification, the Marines’ focal point, in a secondary role.
For their part, the Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese Army, realized that the days of “special war” and the prospects for a quick victory had evaporated. They settled in for a long struggle. It would take them nearly a decade to achieve their aims. The Bo Doi told the author that before Starlite they feared American mobility and fire power, and were not sure how to handle with it. The operation taught them, however, that they could adapt to deal with the Americans just as they had adapted to deal with the French.