CHAPTER 3

Vietnamese Marines and the Communist Insurgency

_Origins and Early Stages of Insurgency--Insurgency and the Vietnamese Marine Corps--Ancillary Effects on Marine Pacific Commands--American Decisions at the Close of 1961_

_Origins and Early Stages of Insurgency_

South Vietnam gave every outward indication that it had achieved a measure of overall stability in the two-year period following President Diem’s election in the fall of 1955. In early 1956 Diem felt strong enough politically to announce his government’s refusal to participate in the reunification elections scheduled for midyear. He based this position upon the argument that free elections were impossible in Communist North Vietnam. The proposed July election deadline passed without a serious reaction by North Vietnam. Equally encouraging was the fact that there had been no noticeable resurgence in the armed power of either the politico-religious sects or the Binh Xuyen. At the same time the American-backed South Vietnamese economy appeared to be gaining considerable strength.

[Illustration: _Lieutenant General Samuel T. Williams, USA, Commander, Military Assistance Advisory Group, Vietnam. (USA Photo SC494954)._]

The threat of invasion from the North had also been tempered somewhat by 1958. The MAAG, now headed by Lieutenant General Samuel T. Williams, U.S. Army, a commander respected as a tough disciplinarian, was beginning to reshape the former Vietnamese national forces.[3-A] Renamed the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN), the army now consisted of four field divisions (8,500 men each), six light divisions (5,000 men each), 13 territorial regiments (whose strength varied), and a parachute regiment. Although General Williams viewed this as merely an interim organization, it had provided the South Vietnamese army with a unified command structure based on sound organizational principles. The arrival of a 350-man U.S. Temporary Equipment Recovery Mission (TERM) in 1956, moreover, had freed U.S. Army advisors for assignment to each ARVN regiment. American officers were likewise reorganizing and helping train the small Vietnamese Navy (2,160 officers and men) and Air Force (4,000 officers and men). The Vietnamese Marine Corps continued to exist as a two-battalion amphibious force within the nation’s naval establishment. General Williams felt confident that by 1958 South Vietnam’s regular military establishment had been strengthened enough to discourage North Vietnamese leaders from seriously considering an outright invasion.[3-1]

[3-A] General Williams would head the MAAG until his retirement in 1960.

Backing these developing regular forces, at least on paper, were two generally feeble paramilitary organizations--the Civil Guard (CG) and the Village Self Defense Corps (SDC). The larger of these, the Civil Guard, existed within the Ministry of Interior and was funded and advised by the U.S. Operations Mission (USOM). Its 48,000 men, therefore, were not charged against the 150,000-man force level ceiling that regulated the size of Diem’s regular forces. Nor were the 47,000 members of the Self Defense Corps, even though this organization received limited amounts of U.S. military assistance funds for payroll purposes. In any case, serious shortcomings were evident in both the CG and the SDC. Organized into provincial companies directly responsible to the various province chiefs, the Civil Guard was entirely separate from the ARVN chain of command. Furthermore, American civilians under government contract had armed and trained the CG for police-type as opposed to military missions. The SDC, essentially a scattering of local militia units, was even weaker, having been organized at the village level into squads and an occasional platoon. Although the SDC units were subordinate to the respective village chief, the ARVN bore the responsibility for providing them with arms and training. More often than not the Vietnamese Army units gave their obsolete weapons to the SDC and showed little genuine interest in training the small units.[3-2]

Although a measure of stability was obviously returning to South Vietnam by 1958, one of the country’s more serious problems remained unsolved--the threat of subversion by Communist Viet Minh agents who had remained south of the 17th parallel following the Geneva cease-fire. Following the resolution of the sect crisis in 1955, Diem turned to neutralize this potential threat. Initially his army experienced some success with pacification operations conducted in former Viet Minh strongholds. While they did help extend government control into the rural areas of several provinces, such operations were discontinued in 1956.

Another policy initiated that same year seems to have nullified the moderate gains produced by the pacification campaigns. Acting both to eliminate Viet Minh sympathizers from positions of leadership at the local level and to extend his own grip downward to the rural population, Diem replaced elected village officials with appointed chiefs. The new policy, which threatened the traditional autonomy of the individual Vietnamese village, was immediately unpopular.

So was another government program which Diem implemented to undercut Communist strength throughout the country--the Anti-Communist Denunciation Campaign. Initiated in mid-1955 to discredit former Viet Minh, the denunciation campaign evolved into something of a witch hunt. By the late 1950s large numbers of Vietnamese with only minimal Communist connections were allegedly being confined in political re-education camps. Like the appointment of village leaders, the denunciation campaign served to alienate Vietnamese who might otherwise have supported the central government in its struggle for control of the rural regions.

Forced underground by the Anti-Communist Denunciation Campaign, Viet Minh agents concentrated on strengthening their political posture for the proposed general election in the period immediately following the Geneva Agreement. When the hope of reunification by plebiscite passed in mid-1956, the so-called “stay behinds” began rebuilding clandestine political cells in their former strongholds. Having retained their aptitude for the adroit manipulation of local grievances, the Communists gradually won support from rural Vietnamese who saw themselves threatened by the new government policies. In mid-1957, the Communists, who were now being labelled “Viet Cong” by the Diem government (a derogatory but accurate term which, literally translated, meant “Vietnamese Communist”) began assassinating government officials in several of the country’s rural provinces. Aimed at unpopular village chiefs, rural police, district officials, and school teachers, the Viet Cong’s assassination campaign was undertaken to erode the government’s contacts with the local populace and thereby enhance their own organizational efforts.

Still faced with the possibility of a conventional attack across the demilitarized zone, President Diem was reluctant to commit his regular military units to a problem which seemed to demand police-type operations. Seeing no clear-cut threat, he relied on the Village Self Defense Corps and the Civil Guard to maintain order in the provinces. Poorly led and equipped, and trained primarily in urban police methods, the paramilitary forces proved unable to prevent the diffuse terrorist attacks. In the 12-month period between July 1957 and July 1958, for example, some 700 more South Vietnamese officials reportedly died at the hands of Communist terrorists.[3-3]

The Viet Cong terror-propaganda campaigns continued apace throughout 1958. The occurrence of the first attacks on U.S. facilities in Saigon and the initiation of an anti-American propaganda campaign near the end of that year, moreover, indicated that the Communists were broadening the scope of their activities. By this time, the internal disturbances were beginning to assume the dimensions of a concerted guerrilla movement in several of the country’s more heavily populated regions, including parts of the important Mekong Delta. Near the close of 1958 President Diem finally began ordering regular military units into the provinces with instructions to eliminate the Viet Cong and restore government control.

The very nature of the enemy, however, tended to render such government operations ineffective. Essentially, the Viet Cong derived their strength from the clandestine political structure which agents had established in portions of the countryside. Interwoven into the social fabric of the hamlets and villages, this political infrastructure, as it later came to be called, served a dual purpose. It was both the machinery by which the Communists exercised control over the population and a vital base of support for the growing guerrilla forces, providing the Viet Cong with men, food, intelligence information, and refuge.

As the Viet Cong guerrillas were recruited from and lived among the local populace, outsiders found it virtually impossible to identify them. Their familiarity with the local terrain, their methods of operating in small groups, and massing for attacks mostly at night made locating them equally difficult. Even their patience seemed to enhance their ability to survive. Unwilling to engage a stronger military force and realizing that a specific government operation could not continue indefinitely, the Viet Cong normally would melt into their environment with the arrival of regular units. When the operation terminated and the regular government forces withdrew, the Communists would re-emerge, often stronger than before. In many cases the guerrillas could give real meaning to their anti-government propaganda once the local population had felt the weight of military operations in their particular community. Operating in this manner, the Viet Cong were able to husband their strength while simultaneously expanding their influence.

There was ample indication that the Communist movement was not wholly indigenous to South Vietnam. Indeed, evidence of increasing North Vietnamese support for the Viet Cong was becoming apparent near the end of the decade. In May 1959, the Central Committee of the North Vietnamese Communist Party publicly announced its intention “to smash” the government of Ngo Dinh Diem.[3-4] By the summer of that year the Viet Cong were being reinforced with men and limited quantities of equipment infiltrated from North Vietnam. Many of the Communist infiltrators, who at this early stage were entering Diem’s country across the DMZ and by sea, were southerners who had gone North with the Viet Minh in late 1954. Trained in political and military operations, these returnees added substantially to the Viet Cong’s discipline and technical capabilities.[3-B]

[3-B] A State Department publication released in 1965 placed the number of confirmed North Vietnamese infiltrators for the years 1959 and 1960 at 1,800. It also noted that an additional 2,700 North Vietnamese were estimated to have been infiltrated during this two-year period. The vast majority of these were thought to have been former residents of southern Vietnam. (Department of State, _Aggression from the North_, p. 33.)

So strengthened, the Communist guerrillas reportedly were operating in battalion strength (300– to 400-man battalions) in some areas by mid-1959. Throughout the country they had expanded their activities to include hit-and-run attacks on paramilitary posts, district headquarters, hospitals, schools, and agricultural stations. Like the assassination campaign which was underway concurrently in areas still controlled by the GVN, these attacks were conceived with political considerations in mind. By successfully raiding remote, poorly defended facilities, the Viet Cong was able to embarrass the central government while demonstrating their own strength to the local population. The raids, furthermore, produced weapons which enabled the guerrillas to operate without total dependence on the North.

By mid-1959 the security situation in the Republic of Vietnam had deteriorated to the point that much of the optimism formerly voiced by American and South Vietnamese officials had begun to disappear. The National Intelligence Estimate released in Washington during August accurately described the conditions which were settling over South Vietnam. This paper disclosed that the nation’s economy was beginning to falter noticeably and that President Diem’s government was growing increasingly unpopular. Furthermore, the estimate warned that harassment by the Viet Cong could be expected to intensify.[3-5]

As predicted, security conditions in South Vietnam did grow worse in the period following the August intelligence estimate. In the last four months of 1959 almost 200 assassinations were reported. In January 1960 another 96 civilians were killed by the Communists and in the following month the total reached 122. By the fall of 1960 the Viet Cong were strong enough to begin ambushing regular ARVN units in several provinces. Like their raids on fixed installations, their ambush tactics were resulting in frequent and demoralizing defeats for the government. Like the raids, they were also providing weapons and ammunition for the growing guerrilla forces.

By 1960 the government’s inability to contain the disturbing malaise was beginning to produce political tensions in Saigon. On 26 April a group of 18 distinguished Vietnamese political figures, including a number of former cabinet members, issued a public demand for President Diem’s resignation. Diem refused, eventually ordering the arrest of all who signed the manifesto.

A more serious effort to bring down the central government occurred in November when a group of military officers led by Colonel Nguyen Chanh Thi, the commander of a newly formed (1959) ARVN airborne brigade, staged an abortive coup d’etat in Saigon. Two companies of Vietnamese Marines joined Thi’s rebellious paratroops.[3-C] But the power struggle, which began in the early morning hours of 11 November, ended when units loyal to President Diem converged on the capital. Realizing that the balance had been tipped against them, the coup leaders fled the country and the incident was closed. While it had failed to bring down the Diem government, Thi’s attempted coup had revived the possibility of efforts by military leaders to seize control of the government and had injected a new element of uncertainty into South Vietnam’s already unstable internal situation.

[3-C] Vietnamese Marine participation in the abortive coup of 10 November 1960 is covered in greater detail elsewhere in this chapter.

Two other danger signals flashed across Southeast Asia shortly after the abortive coup. In January 1961, Communist leaders in Hanoi announced that the National Liberation Front (NLF) had been founded in the South on 20 December 1960 with the stated purpose of closely uniting the “various classes of the South Vietnamese patriotic population in the struggle against the Americans and Diem....”[3-6] In truth, the NLF emerged as a fully developed Communist political organization imported from North Vietnam for the purpose of controlling, directing, and coordinating the insurgency south of the 17th parallel. For American officials, the announced establishment of the NLF signified that Ho Chi Minh’s government had opted for the forceful reunification of North and South.

Elsewhere in Southeast Asia, another event led to further speculation that the war in Vietnam was about to enter a new phase. Backed by the North Vietnamese Army, Communist Pathet Lao forces seized control of the southeastern portion of the Laotian panhandle. Thus, the North Vietnamese obtained a protected corridor along South Vietnam’s northwestern border through which men and materiel could be infiltrated to the South.

The establishment of the NLF and the Communist takeover in southern Laos coincided roughly with approval in Washington of a comprehensive plan designed to help President Diem restore internal order. Designated the Counter-Insurgency Plan (CIP), this study had been ordered by President Eisenhower in early 1960. Developed by Lieutenant General Lionel C. McGarr, U.S. Army, the officer who had relieved General Williams as MAAG Chief, the completed CIP reached the White House shortly after President John F. Kennedy’s inauguration in January 1961. Significantly, its arrival came at a time when the Soviet Premier, Nikita Khrushchev, was publicly pledging his country’s support for “wars of national liberation.”

The plan presented for the new president’s consideration drew clear connections between the military and political aspects of the war in Vietnam. It included a conditional offer of U.S. support for a 20,000-man increase in the regular South Vietnamese military forces and a 32,000-man increase in the size of the Civil Guard. These military and paramilitary increases were to be dependent upon President Diem’s agreement to effect major reforms in his military and political apparatus--measures which American officials in Saigon considered necessary for the success of any counterinsurgency effort.

President Kennedy approved the main provisions of the Counter-Insurgency Plan on 28 January 1961 and negotiations on the package opened with Diem two weeks later. But the talks soon deadlocked on the issue of political and military reforms. Meanwhile, with the discussions in Saigon dragging on inconclusively, the situation in the provinces continued to worsen. A National Intelligence Estimate released in March estimated that Viet Cong military strength had reached 10,000 men. Furthermore, the number of violent incidents reported in the country had risen to 650 per month. Even worse, it was estimated that 58 percent of South Vietnam was under some degree of Communist control.[3-7]

Convinced that the situation was becoming critical and fearing that it might soon become hopeless, President Kennedy approved a new program of military assistance to the Diem government on 29 April. Inspired in part by Kennedy’s desire to increase Diem’s confidence in the new U.S. administration, the 29 April program did not require concrete pledges of reform from the South Vietnamese. In its specifics, however, the new package was similar to the CIP. It contained provisions for supporting a 20,000 man increase in the Republic of Vietnam Armed Forces (RVNAF)--a move which would raise the ceiling on the South Vietnamese regular forces from 150,000 to 170,000. Another provision approved the use of Military Assistance Program appropriations for the Civil Guard and Self Defense Corps and expanded the MAAG’s responsibility to include training and equipping these forces. Under the 29 April plan, the paramilitary forces were to be transferred from Diem’s Ministry of the Interior to his Ministry of Defense. In order to meet its increased advisory responsibilities, authorization was given to increase the size of the MAAG by 100 men to a strength of 785. This provision allowed the first enlargement of the group since the introduction of the Temporary Equipment Recovery Mission in 1956.[3-D]

[3-D] With the dissolution of TERM in the late 1950s, the International Control Commission had granted permission for the MAAG to maintain a strength of 685 men. When the logistics personnel departed Vietnam, new advisor billets were created within the MAAG’s table of organization.

General McGarr’s advisory group began implementing President Kennedy’s 29 April program during the summer of 1961. But the increases in the government’s regular and paramilitary establishments and in the size of the MAAG failed to arrest the trend of warfare on South Vietnam’s battlefields. The remainder of 1961 was characterized by increasingly aggressive guerrilla operations and the steady growth of Viet Cong military forces. In August, for example, the ARVN reported 41 major armed attacks on its units. The following month brought 450 Viet Cong-initiated incidents, including several involving multi-battalion forces of over 1,000 guerrillas. In mid-September, for example, an estimated 1,500 Viet Cong overran Phuoc Vin, the capital of Phuoc Thuan Province, and held the town for an entire day before escaping unmolested into the countryside.[3-8]

Equally alarming was the rapid rise in the Viet Cong’s overall strength. Increasing numbers of Communist troops were now being infiltrated over recently opened trails through Laos. Curving southwestward out of the North Vietnamese panhandle, these infiltration routes enabled the Communists to bypass the demilitarized zone which separated the two Vietnamese states and continue their southward movement down the length of Laos and into Cambodia. From sanctuaries within these countries the North Vietnamese could easily infiltrate into South Vietnam by using trails through the rugged mountains. Relying primarily on these routes, over 3,750 North Vietnamese infiltrators reportedly entered South Vietnam during 1961. Successful recruiting in the South served as another source of manpower for the Viet Cong. Well propagandized, the steady cadence of victories greatly enhanced the Viet Cong’s prestige and thereby made recruitment less difficult. By the end of 1961 infiltration from the North and recruitment in the South had swollen the Viet Cong regular military forces to an estimated 25,000 men.

_Insurgency and the Vietnamese Marine Corps_

At the end of 1958, when President Diem began ordering his regular military forces into action against the Viet Cong, the Vietnamese Marine Corps was a two-battalion infantry force organized within South Vietnam’s naval establishment. The 1,837-man corps was still commanded by Major Le Nhu Hung. Hung maintained his headquarters at the Cuu Long Navy Yard, an installation situated on an estuary near the Saigon-Gia Dinh boundary. Although they continued to maintain barracks at Nha Trang and Cam Ranh Bay respectively, the 1st and 2d Landing Battalions were now being rotated to crude little camps near Bien Hoa, a town located about 20 miles northeast of the capital. Lieutenant Colonel Wilkinson, who had replaced Lieutenant Colonel Wilkes as Senior Marine Advisor in mid-1958, operated out of the MAAG headquarters in Saigon but maintained an office in the VNMC headquarters at Cuu Long. Wilkinson’s two assistants, Captains Gary Wilder and Dale N. Davis, lived with their battalions.

Elements of Hung’s Marine Corps were among the first regular government units committed to the counterguerrilla effort. The 1st Landing Battalion was ordered into action by the Joint General Staff in the closing weeks of 1958. After deploying from Bien Hoa, the battalion spent nearly two months searching for Viet Cong in a mosquito-infested region of An Xuyen, South Vietnam’s southernmost province. Primarily, the Vietnamese Marines conducted company and platoon-sized patrols through rugged mangrove swamps in search of guerrillas. When the operation ended in late January 1959, the Vietnamese commanders reported that their units had killed and captured several Communist guerrillas and political leaders. Their troops had also reported finding a suspected guerrilla training camp which contained small quantities of food and some weapons. The Vietnamese Marines suffered no casualties during their deployment. Adhering to prevailing USMAAG policy, the U.S. Marine advisors did not accompany the unit into combat. Unable to observe the operation, the American advisors could not accurately assess the battalion’s tactical proficiency.

[Illustration: _Lieutenant Colonel Frank R. Wilkinson, Jr., USMC, Senior Marine Advisor. (USMC Photo A229373)._]

A few months after this initial operation, both VNMC battalions were deployed against the Viet Cong--the 1st again to An Xuyen Province and the 2d to Vinh Binh Province south of Saigon on the seacoast. So deployed, both units came under the operational control of the respective province chiefs. In widely-scattered actions fought during May, the 1st Battalion and a Civil Guard unit claimed to have inflicted over 200 casualties on the Viet Cong. In Vinh Binh Province, one company of the 2d Landing Battalion reported killing 18 guerrillas and capturing over 100 more. Again, U.S. Marine advisors were not present and therefore could not assess the accuracy of these reports. In any case, these were the final combat operations for the Vietnamese Marine Corps as a two-battalion force.

Obviously, U.S. and Vietnamese authorities in Saigon were giving increased attention to the growing internal threat. Still, they had yet to initiate any sweeping changes in the orientation of the RVNAF. Indeed, in early 1959, the entire ARVN was in the final phase of a reorganization program which would culminate by midyear in the formation of seven divisions of uniform size (10,500 men each), five territorial regiments, and an airborne brigade (formed from the old Army parachute regiment). Under the new organization the seven standard divisions were to be deployed in or near population centers throughout the country and were to be organized under two corps headquarters, one (I Corps) located at Da Nang, and the other (II Corps) located at Pleiku in the Central Highlands. A third provisional corps headquarters had also been formed in Saigon for activation in the event of a national emergency.[3-E]

[3-E] By 1961 the third corps headquarters would be activated and geographic boundaries of all three corps would be delineated to facilitate the coordination of the government’s military efforts against the Viet Cong. These military-geographic subdivisions were termed corps tactical zones (CTZ).

One of the MAAG’s reactions to the emerging guerrilla threat was to urge that President Diem transfer the Civil Guard to his Ministry of Defense. This adjustment, General Williams pointed out, would permit the MAAG to train and equip the CG for a mobile counterguerrilla mission. But it also entailed raising the 150,000-man force level ceiling. When both the Diem government and the U.S. Embassy objected to the proposed transfer, the MAAG turned to another alternative: the strengthening and use of the regular units whose assignment to counterguerrilla operations would not seriously disturb the country’s counterinvasion potential. The Vietnamese Marine Corps, whose infantry battalions had already participated in several operations against the Viet Cong, fell into this category of units to be bolstered for the counterguerrilla role.

It was against this background that the VNMC was enlarged again in mid-1959. This latest expansion was generally accomplished in accordance with the staff study prepared by Lieutenant Colonel Croizat some three years earlier. On 1 June, after both Marine battalions had returned from their combat assignments in the Mekong Delta, a 3d Landing Battalion was formed at a camp just outside the Cuu Long Navy Yard. This new unit, manned primarily by troops transferred from amphibious elements then being phased out of the reorganized ARVN, was built around a small nucleus of seasoned Marine officers and noncommissioned officers. Transferred from the 1st and 2d Battalions, most of these Marines had seen combat against the Viet Minh, the sects, and the Viet Cong.

Another development saw a fourth rifle company added to each Marine infantry battalion. In turn, the old heavy weapons companies were abolished. The 81mm mortars and 57mm recoilless rifles were reorganized into platoons within the battalions’ headquarters and service companies. New weapons, two 60mm mortars, and personnel to man them were added to each Marine rifle company. These adjustments raised the strength of the infantry battalions to around 900 officers and men and provided the Vietnamese Marine Corps with a basic organizational structure which its infantry battalions would retain throughout the coming decade.[3-F]

[3-F] A side-effect of this reorganization was the modification of the VNMC’s table of equipment. The most important change saw the Vietnamese Marine riflemen exchange their M-1 carbines for the heavier M-1 rifle, the weapon with which the ARVN infantry forces were equipped.

Concurrent with the formation of the 3d Battalion and the modification of the organizational tables, the VNMC was formally designated the “Marine Corps Group.” Now numbering 2,276 officers and men, the Vietnamese Marines were formed into a group headquarters, a group headquarters and service company, a 4.2-inch mortar battery, and the three infantry battalions.[3-G]

[3-G] The Vietnamese Marine Group continued to be known as the Vietnamese Marine Corps (VNMC) in spite of its formal redesignation.

As important as the VNMC’s expansion, reorganization, and redesignation was the dramatic change in its role within the Vietnamese armed forces. On 1 June the Joint General Staff directed the Vietnamese Marine Corps and the newly formed ARVN airborne brigade to assume the mission of the general reserve force for the entire RVNAF. So assigned, the Vietnamese Marine Corps became a “force in readiness”--a service directly responsible to the Joint General Staff for any assigned ground warfare mission.[3-9]

[Illustration: VNMC (MARINE GROUP) TABLE OF ORGANIZATION AS OF 1 JUNE 1959

AUTHORIZED STRENGTH 2,276]

The Vietnamese Marine battalions and elements of the ARVN airborne brigade (also garrisoned near Saigon) were ordered into action against the Viet Cong with increasing frequency after being designated the RVNAF general reserve. Usually, the Marine battalions, like their airborne counterparts, were assigned to operate in a particular province for a specified time period. In such assignments the battalion commander was directly responsible to the province chief who, in most cases, was a military officer. The province chiefs sometimes utilized the Marines in conjunction with their Civil Guard units. It was not uncommon for the Vietnamese Marines to find themselves conducting operations in the most rugged and inaccessible regions of the province to which they were assigned. In such deployments the Marine battalions often bore the brunt of hostile action or suffered the physical hardships associated with living and fighting in the most adverse swamps and jungles.

[Illustration: _Vietnamese Marine riflemen traverse mosquito-infested swamps of the Ca Mau Peninsula on August 1961 operation. (Photo courtesy of Lieutenant Colonel Michael J. Gott, USMC.)_]

In connection with their continuing campaign to transform the Vietnamese Marine Corps into a truly elite fighting organization, the U.S. Marine Advisors encouraged the Vietnamese Leathernecks to take pride in the difficult and dangerous missions now being assigned. In a related effort intended to generate _esprit de corps_ throughout the service, Lieutenant Colonel Wilkinson proposed that the Marine Corps adopt an official emblem and a distinctive uniform. These suggestions produced results when a board of Vietnamese officers selected an emblem design similar to that of the U.S. Marines. Shortly thereafter the VNMC adopted a light weight, black and green “tiger stripe” camouflaged utility uniform similar to that formerly worn in Indochina by French commando units. Although designed and procured primarily for use in steamy tropical jungles, the colorful uniform came to be worn in garrison with a dark green beret. Along with the newly adopted emblem, which was worn as a patch over the left breast pocket, this uniform became the distinguishing mark of the Vietnamese Marine and his U.S. Marine advisor. Together, the uniform and emblem did much to set the VNMC apart from the other South Vietnamese armed services.[3-10]

Lieutenant Colonel Wilkinson instigated another change during this same period which did much to improve the effectiveness of the Marine advisory program. Since the sect rebellion of 1955 American policy had prohibited all U.S. military personnel from participating in combat with South Vietnamese forces. Because the prevailing restrictions prevented his assistants from accurately assessing the combat capabilities of the Vietnamese Marine battalions, Wilkinson requested that they be allowed to accompany their units into action. After some study, General Williams, still the MAAG Chief, approved this request with the stipulation that the U.S. Marines were to act strictly as non-participating observers.[3-11] This privilege was not extended to other MAAG personnel. Wilkinson and his assistants, therefore, became the first American servicemen to witness actual combat operations against the Viet Cong. So through an informal and relatively unknown arrangement, a handful of Marine advisors were able to insure that principles being stressed in training were being applied in combat. Now operating alongside the Vietnamese Marines in action, the advisors were also able to obtain a better appreciation of the terrain and enemy and a more thorough understanding of the frustrating problems being encountered by the VNMC units.

The first half of 1960 brought changes in both the leadership of the Vietnamese Marine Corps and the U.S. Marine advisory program. In May President Diem relieved Major Hung as Senior Marine Officer. His replacement was Major Le Nguyen Khang, an officer who spoke fluent English and who had been the first Vietnamese Marine graduated from the U.S. Marine Amphibious Warfare School at Quantico. A capable and inspiring officer who had formerly commanded a landing battalion in combat against the Viet Cong, Khang was to head the VNMC for over three years. The following month Lieutenant Colonel Clifford J. Robichaud relieved Lieutenant Colonel Wilkinson as Senior Marine Advisor. Like Khang, Robichaud had seen combat previously. A former master sergeant, he had been commissioned during World War II and had fought as an infantry unit leader on Guadalcanal and later in Korea. Like all U.S. Marines assigned as advisors to the VNMC after 1960, Robichaud was scheduled to serve only a one year tour in South Vietnam.

[Illustration: _Vietnamese Marine Corps Emblem._]

Combat assignments against the Viet Cong continued to dominate the VNMC’s activities during the remainder of 1960. With Communist forces now capable of battalion-sized operations in some areas, the Joint General Staff began deploying government forces to the provinces in multi-battalion strength. By late 1960 the Vietnamese Marines were conducting two-battalion operations controlled by a task force headquarters. Khang, now a lieutenant colonel, normally commanded these Marine task forces.

[Illustration: _Colonel Clifford J. Robichaud, USMC, Senior Marine Advisor. (USMC Photo A25342)._]

It was during one such operation, in which the 1st and 2d VNMC Battalions were operating together in the provinces south of Saigon, that elements of the 3d Battalion became involved in the abortive coup of November 1960. The power struggle began in the early morning hours of the 11th while the U.S. Marine advisors were attending an informal celebration of the Marine Corps birthday at Lieutenant Colonel Robichaud’s quarters in Saigon. At the appointed hour Colonel Thi’s rebellious paratroops, accompanied by the 3d VNMC battalion commander and two Marine companies from Cuu Long, moved into the capital on trucks and seized the Joint General Staff Headquarters. The remainder of the 3d battalion, led by the battalion executive officer, who was unaware of his superior’s intentions, moved to the presidential palace and established protection for Diem. Word of the coup, meanwhile, had reached Khang at his field headquarters in the Mekong Delta. Led by the Senior Marine Officer, the 1st and 2d Battalions returned to Saigon by truck convoy and immediately joined the two Marine companies already around the palace. For several hours the possibility existed that Khang’s Marines might clash with Thi’s paratroops or even with the two rebellious Marine companies of the 3d Battalion. But pro-Diem units soon began converging on Saigon in such numbers that the coup collapsed. Thi and his associates fled the country, whereupon Diem appointed new officers to command the insubordinate units. With loyalists in charge throughout South Vietnam’s military and naval services, the incident was closed. Both the airborne brigade and the VNMC resumed their functions as the RVNAF general reserve.[3-12]

By the summer of 1961 the USMAAG, now headed by General McGarr, was ready to implement the 20,000-man expansion of the RVNAF as authorized in the package approved by President Kennedy the previous spring. Included in this U.S. program were plans to increase the size of the Vietnamese Marine Corps by over 1,000 men. This expansion got underway in July when the initial steps were taken to form a fourth infantry battalion and a 75mm pack-howitzer battery--additions which were to raise the authorized strength of the VNMC to 3,321 officers and men. The transfer of ARVN artillerymen provided the personnel necessary to man the pack-howitzer unit, which formed near Thu Duc, a small town about 13 miles north of the capital. Officers and noncommissioned officers were drawn from the three existing VNMC battalions to form a nucleus for the new infantry battalion while its ranks were filled gradually by recruitment. This 4th Battalion was organized at Vung Tau, a coastal resort town situated on Cape St. Jacques about 40 miles southeast of Saigon. Lieutenant Colonel Robert E. Brown, a World War II veteran who replaced Robichaud as Senior Marine Advisor in August, was on hand to assist with this latest reorganization of the VNMC.

While the new Marine units were forming the JGS ordered the Vietnamese Navy and Marine Corps to conduct an amphibious assault against a suspected Communist stronghold near South Vietnam’s southern tip. The objective area was a portion of the U Minh Forest, an extensive inundated region located along the western coast of the Ca Mau Peninsula. Because it was inaccessible by land, the forest had served as Communist base area since the French Indochina War. The concept of operation called for the Marines to land at daybreak, move inland through the mangrove swamps, and hopefully push Viet Cong elements into ARVN units which would have established a blocking force inland from the beach. Captains Michael J. Gott and James S. G. Turner, two U.S. Marine advisors, embarked on board two World War II vintage Vietnamese Navy LCIs (landing craft, infantry) at Saigon with the 1st and 3d Battalions respectively.

[Illustration: _Captain Michael J. Gott, infantry advisor to the Vietnamese Marine Corps, discusses tactical plans with Vietnamese officers. (Photo courtesy of Lieutenant Colonel Michael J. Gott, USMC)._]

A series of problems arose on the morning of the operation to delay the landing for several hours. When the Marines finally came ashore late in the morning they failed to locate any enemy forces. Captain Gott, who accompanied the 1st Battalion for the duration of the operations ashore, later recounted the difficulties. He noted, for instance, that no U.S. Navy advisors were embarked on board the Vietnamese ships. As a result, the relatively inexperienced Vietnamese sailors encountered technical difficulties with their navigational aids, and the ships arrived at the objective area late. Inexperience on the part of the Vietnamese Marines and sailors in debarkation techniques compounded the delay. Once ashore, outdated French maps and dense mangrove jungle combined to retard the Marines’ progress inland, thus allowing the Viet Cong ample time to melt away. Gott concluded that some of the difficulties encountered after the landing phase of the operation might have been offset by the presence of observation aircraft. As it was, the Marines’ visibility was restricted throughout the operation by thick mangrove vegetation. Thus a combination of unforeseen factors had rendered this particular operation ineffective.[3-13]

[Illustration: VNMC (MARINE GROUP) TABLE OF ORGANIZATION AS OF 1 AUGUST 1961

AUTHORIZED STRENGTH 3,321]

A similar landing was repeated in the same area the following month. Again the participating Marine units failed to engage Viet Cong forces. Vietnamese Navy and Marine officers complained that there were no enemy troops in the area and that the government’s intelligence was inaccurate. Whatever the reason, the results of these two unsuccessful offensives typified the problems which plagued most South Vietnamese ground forces throughout the country during the 1960–1961 period. The Communist guerrillas, aided by difficult terrain, a well-developed intelligence network, and sometimes by the local population, could usually evade government units whenever escape was desirable. Because the Marines normally operated in unfamiliar areas where the Viet Cong political apparatus was strong, their units were particularly frustrated. In regions such as the U Minh Forest intelligence information simply did not flow upward from the people. Instead, in such Communist-controlled environments, the local Vietnamese served the Viet Cong, warning them of strengths, locations, and movements of Marine units.

While combat deployments such as the Ca Mau landings highlighted the remainder of 1961, the Marine battalions nevertheless spent the majority of their time in non-combat assignments. During such periods the battalions occupied their respective base camps around Saigon and Vung Tau, awaiting orders from the Joint General Staff. Even though held in reserve, they frequently were called upon to provide security detachments for vital points such as bridges, naval facilities, and communications installations. Most U.S. Marine advisors tended to oppose such assignments, contending that they detracted from the overall readiness of the battalions and disrupted much needed training. The utilization of the VNMC units in static security roles also conflicted with the advisor’s continuing efforts to convince the Vietnamese Marine that he belonged to an elite, offensively oriented strike force. Still, despite the protestations of the American advisors, the JGS persisted in dispersing VNMC detachments in and around the capital.

Although its battalions were sometimes being frustrated, both in their attempts to accomplish unit training and in their attempts to fix Communist troop formations, the VNMC’s involvement in the war effort was forcing improvement of the service in other areas. Frequent inspections by U.S. advisors revealed that the Vietnamese were placing more emphasis on the care of individual equipment and weapons. Replacement items were being requisitioned with more promptness and unit commanders were beginning to show increasing concern about the slow receipt of requested supply items. The replacement of worn-out World War II trucks with new vehicles removed a long-standing source of trouble in that it greatly reduced the time consumed in performing major mechanical repairs on the older vehicles. Even the frequent deployments of the VNMC battalions were helping to improve the overall combat readiness of the service by preparing a solid core of small unit leaders and troops for operations against the Viet Cong.

_Ancillary Effects of Marine Pacific Commands_

At the same time the intensified conflict in South Vietnam was forcing improvement on the VNMC, it was having a similar but less direct effect on U.S. Marine commands in the Pacific. In early 1961 Lieutenant General Alan Shapley, the Commanding General, Fleet Marine Force, Pacific (FMFPac), approved a plan to assign individual Marines from his scattered commands to temporary duty in Vietnam. The purpose of this program, which became known as On-The-Job Training (OJT), was to allow Marine officers and noncommissioned officers to obtain first-hand knowledge of the complex nature of the conflict being waged in South Vietnam. Beginning in May 1961 small groups of officers and noncommissioned officers from various FMFPac commands were sent each month to observe the counterguerrilla techniques being developed and employed in Vietnam. Although the OJTs were normally “in country” for only a two-week period, the program was gradually producing a pool of small unit leaders somewhat acquainted with the situation in the Republic of Vietnam by the end of 1961.[3-H]

[3-H] The OJT program would be suspended briefly near the end of 1962 but would be reinstituted in the first months of 1963.

[Illustration: _Vietnamese Marines wade ashore from a Vietnamese Navy Landing Ship, initiating a search for Viet Cong on the Ca Mau Peninsula. (Photo courtesy of Lieutenant Colonel Michael J. Gott, USMC)._]

The major Marine command to feel the impact of the war in Southeast Asia during the early 1960s was the 3d Marine Division, a 20,000-man combat-ready force headquartered on Okinawa. In addition to its participation in the OJT program, the 3d Marine Division began altering its conventional amphibious orientation. Major General Donald M. Weller, the division commander, provided the initial impetus for this shift away from a purely conventional posture. Weller, who in early 1961 had commanded a task force headquarters formed in response to the deteriorating military situation in Laos, anticipated that his command might be committed to combat somewhere on the Southeast Asian mainland. He therefore instructed his staff to begin studying possible counterinsurgency training programs which would help “turn the entire orientation of the division toward the type of intervention [which] we would be faced with in Southeast Asia.”[3-14]

[Illustration: _Vietnamese Marines advance from concealment during search operations on the Ca Mau Peninsula. (Photo courtesy of Lieutenant Colonel Michael J. Gott, USMC)._]

Major General Robert E. Cushman, holder of a Navy Cross and a future Commandant of the Marine Corps, assumed command of the 3d Marine Division in September 1961 before General Weller’s objectives could be fully realized. The new commanding general immediately convened a Counterguerrilla Warfare Study Group to consider the problem. This study group framed a set of recommendations for Cushman in late 1961. His approval of their proposals led to the creation of an Infantry Unit Training Course and a Command and Staff Training Course early the next year.

Conducted in Okinawa’s rugged Northern Training Area, the infantry course prepared rifle companies from the various infantry battalions for participation in counterguerrilla warfare. The instructors, graduates of either the Jungle Warfare School in Johore, Malaya, or the new Army Special Warfare School at Ft. Bragg, North Carolina, placed much emphasis on the origins and nature of guerrilla movements, small units tactics, and night operations. The training syllabus for this course included several live firing exercises designed for individual Marines and fire teams. Some of these exercises required the Marines to negotiate “jungle lanes” equipped with pop-up targets. The week-long infantry course culminated with a two and one-half day field operation for the individual infantry platoons.

The Command and Staff Training course was somewhat less rigorous, being designed primarily to prepare battalion staffs to support their companies in a counterinsurgency environment. Less than 10 hours in length, this course was based primarily on lectures and map exercises.

At General Cushman’s direction, the division G-3 (Operations Section) began stressing the significance of counterinsurgency training at all echelons of the division. Unconventional warfare training soon became an integral part of the training schedules at every echelon. Under this program the various infantry battalions were required to conduct an extended battalion-sized counterguerrilla operation, and to report to the G-3 on the progress of their efforts.[3-15]

The FMFPac On-The-Job Training program and the 3d Marine Division’s new approach to training complemented each other in several ways. Whereas the OJT program helped create an awareness of counterguerrilla operations among individual Marine officers and noncommissioned officers, the division’s training programs achieved the same results at the staff and battalion level. At points the two programs overlapped to the further benefit of the 3d Marine Division. Attuned to the nature of guerrilla warfare and the problems involved in countering the guerrilla, the officers and noncommissioned officers who returned from OJT assignments in Vietnam provided assistance in planning and supervising the division’s counterinsurgency training programs. Short of actual commitment to combat in a guerrilla-type environment, it is doubtful that any other combination of training could have better prepared the 3d Marine Division for a future assignment in Vietnam.

_American Decisions at the Close of 1961_

The progressive erosion of the government’s strength and the steady growth of the Viet Cong during 1961 prompted President Kennedy to dispatch his special military advisor, General Maxwell D. Taylor, to Vietnam in mid-October. Taylor, who had retired in the late 1950s after having served as Chief of Staff of the Army, carried the following instructions from the president:

I should like you to proceed to Saigon for the purpose of appraising the situation in South Vietnam, particularly as it concerns the threat to the internal security and defense of that country and adjacent areas. After you have conferred with the appropriate United States and South Vietnamese authorities, including the Commander in Chief, Pacific, I would like your views on the courses of action which our Government might take at this juncture to avoid a further deterioration in the situation in South Vietnam; and eventually to contain and eliminate the threat to its independence.[3-16]

Like other American officials who had visited Diem’s republic during the course of the year, General Taylor returned to Washington convinced that South Vietnam was in grave danger. In a report delivered to President Kennedy in November, the general outlined his formula for salvaging the situation. This included the broad recommendation that the United States abandon its existing policy of strict military advice and begin cooperating with the Vietnamese in a form of “limited partnership.” The American role in such a partnership, Taylor explained, would be to provide “working” advisors and “working” military units to aid South Vietnam’s military forces.

General Taylor’s report offered several specific proposals for implementing such a program. Among these were recommendations that three U.S. Army helicopter companies and approximately 6,000–8,000 American ground troops be deployed quickly to the Republic of Vietnam. The helicopter units would support the government’s ground operations but the American ground forces were to be used only in a defensive posture. Taylor believed that their presence would underscore the United States’ determination to stand by South Vietnam. A side-effect of this display of determination would be to stimulate the morale of the republic’s armed forces. He added that in order to support such a build-up, it would be necessary to restructure and increase the size of the USMAAG.

President Kennedy’s consideration of Taylor’s proposals resulted in a compromise decision which cleared the way for more intense American involvement in the Vietnam conflict. After securing Diem’s approval in early December, Kennedy authorized the Department of Defense to expand its advisory and assistance programs. To enhance the effectiveness of the advisory program, he removed some of the official restrictions under which most U.S. military advisors had operated since 1955. One important change would allow all advisors to accompany their Vietnamese units into combat. At the same time President Kennedy decided against ordering U.S. ground forces into the war zone; however, he instructed the Secretary of Defense, Robert S. McNamara, to prepare plans for such a contingency. He also approved General Taylor’s recommendation that American helicopter units be sent to support the RVNAF. The arrival of the first of these reinforcements just before 1961 ended, signalled the beginning of a new and more dynamic phase of American military participation in the struggle to preserve the independence of South Vietnam.