O SPREY Men-at-Arms PUBLISHING Army of the Republic of Vietnam 1955–75 Gordon L. Rottman Illustrated by Ramiro Bujeiro • Men-at-Arms • 458 Army of the Republic of Vietnam 1955–75 Gordon L. Rottman Illustrated by Ramiro Bujeiro • Series editor MartinWindrow FirstpublishedinGreatBritainin2010byOspreyPublishing Acknowledgements MidlandHouse,WestWay,Botley,OxfordOX20PH,UK 44-0223rdSt,Suite219,LongIslandCity,NY11101,USA TheauthorisindebtedtoSteveSherman,BillLaurie,Stéphane E-mail:[email protected] Moutin-Luyat,JoeTrevithick,andDrStephenD.Capps(CSMRet) forprovidingvaluableinformationandmaterials. ©2010OspreyPublishingLtd. 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RamiroBujeiro,CC28,1602Florida,Argentina ACIPcatalogrecordforthisbookisavailablefromtheBritishLibrary ThePublishersregretthattheycanenterintonocorrespondence ISBN9781849081818 uponthismatter. ebookISBN:9781849081825 Editor:MartinWindrow PagelayoutsbyMyriamBellDesign,France TypesetinHelveticaNeueandITCNewBaskerville IndexbyFinelineEditorialServices OriginatedbyPPSGrasmere,Leeds,UK PrintedinChinathroughWorldPrintLtd. 10 11 12 13 14 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Abbreviations used in text AFV armoredfightingvehicle ANV ArméeNationaleVietnamienne,1951–55 ARVN ArmyoftheRepublicofVietnam,1955–75 (pronounced“Ar-vin”) FORACATALOGOFALLBOOKSPUBLISHEDBYOSPREYMILITARY BAR BrowningAutomaticRifle ANDAVIATIONPLEASECONTACT: CEFEO FrenchFarEastExpeditionaryCorps,1946–55 OspreyDirect,c/oRandomHouseDistributionCenter, CTZ CorpsTacticalZone 400HahnRoad,Westminster,MD21157 DRV DemocraticRepublicofVietnam(NorthVietnam) Email: [email protected] JGS JointGeneralStaff MR MilitaryRegion OspreyDirect,TheBookServiceLtd,DistributionCentre, NLF NationalLiberationFront ColchesterRoad,FratingGreen,Colchester,Essex,CO77DW NVA NorthVietnameseArmy E-mail:[email protected] PF PopularForce RF RegionalForce OspreyPublishingissupportingtheWoodlandTrust,theUK’sleading RR recoillessrifle Woodlandconservationcharity,byfundingthededicationoftrees. RVN RepublicofVietnam(SouthVietnam) www.ospreypublishing.com VC VietCong(NLFarmedforces) ©OspreyPublishing.Accesstothisbookisnotdigitallyrestricted.Inreturn, weaskyouthatyouuseitforpersonal,non-commercialpurposesonly.Please don’tuploadthispdftoapeer-to-peersite,emailittoeveryoneyouknow,or resellit. OspreyPublishingreservesallrightstoitsdigitalcontentandnopart oftheseproductsmaybecopied,storedinaretrievalsystemortransmittedin anyformbyanymeans,electronic,mechanical,recordingorotherwise(except aspermittedhere),withoutthewrittenpermissionofthepublisher. Please supportourcontinuingbookpublishingprogrammebyusingthispdf responsibly. TITLEPAGESaigon,TetOffensive, February1968:anARVNRanger firesatenemymovement;note theAN/PRC-25radiocarriedon analuminumrucksackframe. (NguyenNgocHanh) ARMY OF THE REPUBLIC OF VIETNAM 1955–75 INTRODUCTION T heArmyoftheRepublicofVietnamwasoneofthemanyenigmas oftheVietnamWar.Foracountryofitssizeandpopulation,South Vietnam possessed one of the largest and best-equipped among comparable armies, but the ARVN was an organization of strikingly inconsistent capabilities. It had great potential, but for a wide variety of reasons it often failed to fulfil expectations. Nevertheless, there are many examples of operations, large and small, in which ARVN troops performed valiantly and effectively. The ARVN as a whole has been vilified,butatthesametimesomeofitselementshavebeenjustlypraised. There were many reasons for the ARVN’s grave overall inadequacies, which left a legacy to which no army would aspire. It has been criticized for being inefficient and unprofessional, unmotivated and ineffectual, guiltyofterribletreatmentofitsowncitizens,hobbledbyacumbersome command structure and weakened by an institutional unwillingness to fight, and its officer corps (particularly at senior levels) has been AnM60machinegunnerslithers throughthemudduringa condemnedasself-serving,politicallydevious,andcorrupt.Manyofthese trainingexercise.Despitethe chargesaretruetovarieddegrees;buttounderstandthemitisnecessary manpowerdemandsofextended tolookdeeper,intotheculturalandhistoricalbackgroundthatmadeany combatoperations,ARVNunits directcomparisonbetweentheARVNandUSforcesmeaningless. wererotatedthroughtraining Thesizeofthisbookdoesnotallowanalysisofthereasonsbehindthese programstoupgradetheir capabilities.(NguyenNgocHanh) charges, but they can be briefly summarized. The fledgling Republic of Vietnam suffered from a lack of national solidarityandofachievablepoliticalgoals,andwas failed by self-serving politicians and commanders atnationalandlocallevels.Itwasrivenbydiffering cultural and religious traditions – partly born of the influx of North Vietnamese refugees at the time of partition in 1954–55 – and by a long “warlord” tradition of local power-brokers. It was weakened by the legacy of the French colonizers; bythebroadgulfbetweentheuneducatedpeasant population and the French-developed upper classes;and–paradoxically–bytheovershadowing presenceoftheAmericans. The American–Vietnamese relationship This last was as responsible for the contradictory characteroftheARVNaswerethemyriadofother reasons. In its development of the ARVN from a hodge-podge of individual colonial units into a potentially powerful army the US did many 3 things right, but there were things it did wrong. Militarily the main problem area was tolerating a dual command system rather than establishing a true combined operational command of all US, Vietnamese, and Free World forces. There was, of course, a degree of coordination and integration between the American and Vietnamese commands,buttherelationshipwascumbersomeandbarelyresponsive. The psyche of the Vietnamese people was barely understood by the vast majority of Americans, whose habits of mind were formed by an utterlydifferentworld.EvenwhenseniorUSofficersanddiplomatsdid study local attitudes their understanding remained limited, and could seldom be adequately incorporated into policy or decision-making. The Americans’ “can-do” determination to get the job done, and done ARVNRangerstrudgethrough right, was beyond the comprehension of many Vietnamese, products aswampaccompaniedbyaUS of a fatalistic Asian culture; conversely, the Americans were frustrated advisor;theseAmericanswere that a people whom they were trying to help showed little inclination authorizedtoweartheuniform andheadgearoftheunittowhich toinvestthemselvesintheirownnationalcause. theywereattached.Ranger An American advisor assigned to an ARVN unit would try to inflict advisorswereallgraduatesof his new ideas, but typically he would be gone in a year, to be replaced theeight-weekUSArmyRanger byanotherwithdifferentideas,whiletheunit’sARVNofficerswouldstill Course.NotetheuseofM1or be there, trying to cope. The Americans often rushed changes and M2carbinesandM1Garand rifles,probablydatingthisphoto expansions through before the Vietnamese were ready for them. The before1966/67. development of Vietnamese officers, NCOs, and technicians capable ofrealleadershipandofabsorbingunfamiliar doctrine and new equipment – and thus, the creationofexperiencedcadresaroundwhich toformnewunits–couldneverkeepupwith the pace of expansion. All this was in the midst of a vicious, large-scale war against a well-trained and resolute enemy, in very difficult terrain and climatic conditions, in a countrywithbarelydevelopedinfrastructure. Among the Vietnamese there was a widespread feeling of “Why fight, if the Americans are willing to do it for us?” As LtGen Nguyen Cao Ky would write: “Always emphasizing the role of the Americans inVietnam,theytransformedtheVietnamWar into a conflict between the United States and North Vietnam, relegating the people, the government and the armed forces of South Vietnam to a subordinate role. The government of South Vietnam thus became, in the eyes of the people of Vietnam andoftheworld,apuppetregimeservingthe interestsofAmericanimperialists.” Thisbredanationalinferioritycomplexthat naturally infected the ARVN. Virtually everything the army used, from mosquito repellent and boots to rifles and artillery, was made in the USA. It was not difficult for VC propagandists to convince ARVN soldiers that 4 they were “imperialist puppet troops,” since itwasnotfarfromthetruth.Regardlessofthe fact that it was their country that was at stake, manycouldnottrulyfeelthatitwas“theirwar.” AcommonAmericanperceptionwasthatthey did not have the will to fight to preserve their country, and many US soldiers were resentful not only of the ARVN’s apparent ineptitude but of their lack of motivation. While Vietnamese forces were engaged over a much longerspanoftimethanUSforces,thereisstill an obvious differential in casualty rates: US – 47,424 killed in action and 313,616 wounded; ARVN–atleast185,528KIAand499,026WIA. The American soldiers themselves had little praise for the ARVN, IntherubbleofSaigon, but the reality was that most of them seldom worked closely with the aRangercovershisbuddywhile hereloadsM16magazines.The Vietnamese. Combined operations might see US and ARVN battalions Tetcounter-offensiveagainstthe on the same battlefield, but they operated separately, and Americans coordinatedVCattacksonSouth seldomsawtheARVNinaction.Whentheydidseetheminthefieldthey Vietnam’scitiesinFebruary1968 often presented a sad image, with apparently poor discipline and wasoneoftheoccasionswhen unmilitarybearing(notthatallUSunitscouldclaim“elite”status,byany unitsoftheARVNGeneral Reserveperformednotablywell. means). To Americans the South Vietnamese soldier was “Marvin the (NguyenNgocHanh) ARVN”or,sarcastically,“MarvelousMarv,”andovertheradiotheywere “Victor Novembers” (the phonetic alphabet for Vietnamese) or simply “little people.” The cultural gulf was so wide that to Americans the Vietnamesewereoftenbeyondallunderstanding. The country, and the enemy The Republic of Vietnam (RVN) was a roughly crescent-shaped country measuringsome700milesnorthtosouthandbetween40and130miles wide. It was bordered to the east and south by the South China Sea, tothewestbyLaosandCambodia,andtothenorthbythe17thParallel andtheDemilitarizedZone(DMZ)dividingitfromNorthVietnam–the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRV). From the DMZ down to the Saigonareainthesouththecoastwasedgedbyafertileplainwheremuch of the population lived. Inland were the Central Highlands of rugged, forested mountains enclosing a central plateau, which sloped off to the south in a piedmont of rolling, wooded terrain. The southernmost quarterofthecountrywascoveredbythelow,flatMekongDelta.Roads and railroads served the coastal plain, and some roads reached into the interior, but for the most part the inland transportation system was very sparse. The ARVN and Free World forces used every means available – tracked and wheeled vehicles, watercraft, fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters – to take the fight to their elusive enemy, who used the vast forests, swamps and rugged hills to hide their movements, but mostly theterraindemandedexhaustingphysicaleffortbymeninboots. Besidestheterrainandclimatethereweretwoenemies.TheNational Front for the Liberation of South Vietnam (Mat tran Dan toc Giai phong mienNamVietNam)orNLFwasapoliticalorganizationthatsuperimposed its own parallel government on RVN territory. Its insurgent military arm was the People’s Liberation Army, PLA (Quan Doi Giai Phong); they were usually called the Viet Cong or VC, a contraction of Dang Viet Nam Cong San (Vietnamese Communist Party).1 Although born of the Viet 5 Minh that had fought the French in 1946–54, the PLA had formally been created in October 1960. The other enemy was the People’s Army of Vietnam, PAVN(QuanDoiDangDan), more commonly known as the North Vietnamese Army, NVA – the army oftheDemocraticRepublic ofVietnam,theCommunist state established in 1954 when France withdrew from her former colony ofTonkin.2 Both of these forces weresoresolute,proficient, and formidable that the ARVNgenerallyfounditself Hanoi,1954:Paratroopersofthe hard-pressed even to contain them, but on many occasions, either with ArméeNationaleVietnamienne or without US support, ARVN elements did prove capable of defeating 3rdAirborneBattalion(in NVA/VC efforts. Despite the self-serving, corrupt and incompetent Vietnamese,TD3ND,orin commanders found at all echelons, even within poor-quality divisions French,3eBPVN)onparade, there were many officers of just the opposite material. Unfortunately, ledbytwoNCOsoftheunit’s Frenchcadre.Theestablishment there were occasions when officers who performed well were punished ofanANVbataillonaéroporté orremoved,forshowinguptheinadequaciesofothers.Thereweresome was12Frenchand22 divisions with extremely good reputations, especially the 1st Infantry, Vietnameseofficers,58French Airborne, and Marine Divisions; others were considered effective and51VietnameseNCOs,and at different periods, when they were led by high-quality commanders. 67Frenchand618Vietnamese enlistedmen.(ECPA) Somedivisionsneverroseabovethepoorormarginalstandard,buteven withintheseformationsthereweresometimesunitsthatperformedwell; this was especially true when Vietnamese commanders and their USadvisorsdevelopedeffectiverelationships. EVOLUTION OF THE ARVN Between December 1946 and spring 1954 the French Far East ExpeditionaryCorps(CEFEO)hadattempted–latterly,withUSmaterial and financial aid – to hold on to France’s colonial Indochinese Union (Vietnam,LaosandCambodia),against,inVietnam,theCommunistViet Minh insurgent movement born during its World War II occupation byJapaneseforces.3ThemainarenaofthewarhadbeenNorthVietnam (Tonkin), where in March–May 1954 a catastrophic defeat at Dien Bien PhufinallydestroyedFrance’snationalwilltofight.OnApril27,1954,the internationalGenevaConferencegrantedIndochinaindependencefrom France; the French were to evacuate North Vietnam, with subsequent 1 SeeOspreyWarrior116:VietCongFighter 2 SeeWarrior135:NorthVietnameseArmySoldier1958–75;andElite38:TheNVAandVietCong 3 SeeMen-at-Arms322:TheFrenchIndochinaWar1946–54.TheFrenchhadcolonisedSouthVietnaminthe 6 1860s,andCentralandNorthVietnaminthe1880s. elections both North and South to determine the future status of the two supposedly transitional states. About 800,000 largely Roman Catholic refugees fled south, with US assistance, before French withdrawal from the NorthinOctober1954.SouthVietnam,carved out of Cochinchina (French South Vietnam) and about two-thirds of Annam (Central Vietnam), was established as an independent nationbytheGenevaAccordsonJuly21,1955. The elections never took place. In the North, Ho Chi Minh’s Viet Minh ruthlessly purgedalldissentingelementsandestablished the Communist DRV. In the South, the Republic of Vietnam (Cong Hoa Mien Nam Viet Nam) was declared on USandFrenchadvisorsinspect October26,1955,whenPremierNgoDinhDiemseizedcontrolthrough aUS-equippedVietnamese a rigged referendum. Diem pressed for the departure of the remaining NationalArmyunitin1955; thetroopsarearmedwith CEFEO troops sooner than had been anticipated, preferring the M1Garandrifles,butstill US backing that he had already been negotiating, and all French forces weartheplasticlinersofFrench lefttheRVNbyApril1956.AlthoughtheCIAhadbeenactivethroughout M1951steelhelmetsandM1947 theseevents,thefirstUSmilitaryadvisorsarrivedonFebruary12,1955. treillisdecombatfatigues.Note At that point America inherited a then-latent but soon widespread (center)aUS-supplied2.36in M9A1bazooka.Othercrew- guerrilla war, and responsibility for the remnants of an untrained, servedweaponsthatwould under-equipped,poorlymotivatedarmythatwas“national”innameonly. besuppliedincludedthe3.5in M20A1bazooka,the57mm L’Armée Nationale Vietnamienne M18A1and75mmM20recoilless From the first, the French had recruited both units of Indochinese rifles,and–lateinthewar,to selectedunitsonly–the90mm auxiliaries (supplétifs), and local volunteers to bulk out regular CEFEO M67and106mmM40A1RRs. units. In 1953 these Indochinese in French regular ranks numbered (CourtesyPaxtonWilliams) some53,000–asignificantfigure,givenatotalCEFEOregularstrength of about 175,000 – and this “jaunissement” (“yellowing”) had brought someFrenchunitsupto50percentlocalmanpower. Separately from the CEFEO, the Vietnamese National Army, ANV (Quan doi Quoc gia Viet Nam) had been instituted by the French in July 1951, nominally under the control of a new Vietnamese Ministry of Defense. The USA undertook to provide material aid for the new force, though equipment deliveries were delayed by the simultaneous demands of the Korean War. The ANV was never an army in the true sense, however, but merely a collection of individual battalions and companies. For the first year or two the original units were incorporatedwithinFrenchregimentsandledbylargecadresofFrench officersandseniorNCOs.Fromwinter1952/53theseunitsweresplitoff as ANV battalions, while many others were formed from scratch, most of them with at best a handful of French advisors. Illiteracy and local prejudices denied promotion to many of the most battle-wise junior leaders – often from ethnic minorities – from the pre-existing auxiliary units. The combat performance of the ANV in 1951–54 was extremely patchy, ranging from the admirable to the pitiful; it often reflected the ethnic composition of particular units, in an army conscripted from among the whole diverse population of the peninsula. By the end of1953theANVclaimedastrengthofsome160,000men,infourpurely “paper” regional divisions, but in fact there were no higher echelons 7 of command other than a few two-battalion mobile groups; for major operations individual units were simply attached to French formations in temporary task forces. There was a military academy for training officers, but there was noNationalArmyheadquarters, indigenous general staff, or logisticsorganization.4 Many of the ANV units were disbanded as the French withdrew,leavingSouthVietnam with a shadow of an army that theAmericanshadtotransform into something capable of ARVNinfantrymencarryalitter performing internal security and conventional defensive missions. casualty.Whiletheirwebgear The first US proposal in the spring of 1954, before complete French ismostlyUSissue,theleftmost withdrawal was anticipated, was to consolidate the existing 80-plus manstillhasaFrenchcanteen, battalions – many of them tied down in static security duties – into four identifiablebyitswidemouth. “light” and three “field” (medium) divisions, plus a reserve of eight NotethattheycarryGarand rifles(“SungTruongM1”).After battalions.ItwasproposedtodetachsomeoftheFrenchandexperienced theUStookoversponsorship Vietnamesetroopsfromexistingbattalionsascadresfornewmobileunits, fromtheFrenchin1955the tobeledbytheFrenchandequippedbytheUS.(Thisunderlinesamajor USweaponsofWorldWarII contrast in French and American control and training of Vietnamese andKoreanWarvintagethathad units. The French used almost exclusively their own officers and senior beensuppliedbyMAAGforthe oldANVcontinuedtobeissued NCOs to lead the units, while the Americans would later attach advisors inlargernumbersandvariety, toARVNunitsthatwereledbytheirownofficers.Bothmethodshavetheir withFrenchtypesbeing pros and cons: the American method was intended to yield long-term graduallyrelegatedtomilitia benefits by letting Vietnamese officers lead and learn for themselves forces.Superiorinmanycases, ratherthandoingitforthem,whichisonlyashort-termsolution.) theUSweaponswere,however, nomorecompatiblewith Vietnamesestature.Theaverage Army of the Republic of Vietnam Vietnamesewas5ft1in–5ft4in America’saimsweretoestablishtheindependenceofVietnam;tocreate tall(1.57–1.63m)andweighed a central military administration, and to standardize the command 110–122lb(50–55kg);USsmall of the Vietnamese Army; and to organize tactical divisions out armsweredesignedformen atleast4intallerand20–30lb of the existing galaxy of independent battalions. Their primary concern heavier.Apartfromtheirgreater was not insurgency, but the risk of a Korean-style invasion from North weightandsometimessharper Vietnam. There were other threats beside the Communists, however. recoil,thebuttstockswereoften The new regime in the South also had to contend internally toolongforcomfortableaiming. with militant religious and political sects such as the Cao Dai and (CourtesyPaxtonWilliams) Hoa Hao, with perhaps 25,000 armed men in all, and the much smaller but well-organized Binh Xuyen bandits; these factions would have to be repressedthroughthelate1950sandinto1960. In 1955 US advisors first recommended a 100,000-man army. RVN officialsfelttheneedforlargerforces,sincetheNorthVietnamesewere expanding their own, but the US government was reluctant to fund 4 The1stDiv,inthesouth,had9bns,butthe2nd,inCentralVietnam,only4;the3rdDivhad9bnsinthemain cockpitofthewar,thenorthernRedRiverDeltaregion,andthe4th(Mountain)Div,alsoinCentralVietnam,hadits fullauthorizationof7bns.Forlocalsecurity4guardregts,4mountainguardbdes,andmanyindependent 8 companieswerescatteredthroughoutthecountry. a larger army – at that time the Frenchwereexpectedtoremain in-country. Lieutenant-General JohnW.O’Daniel,commanding US Army, Pacific, led a mission to Vietnam to assess the situation, and proposed a 150,000-man army (including 8,000 naval and air personnel). At that time Washington held the view that the ARVN need only be an internal security force,buttheprospectofalmost immediate French withdrawal then demanded a defensive capability to face any external attack. O’Daniel recommended fourfieldandsixlightdivisions,plus13territorialregimentsforinternal VietnameseNationalArmytroops security, the latter to be formed into three or four additional light demonstratecrewdrillonFrench divisionsifrequired. 81mmM1927/31mortars.The US81mmM1mortar,license- The increase was approved by Washington in August 1955, and the builtfromtheFrenchmodel, concentration of units into divisions was ordered. However, when the wasvirtuallyidenticalbuthada ANV’stransformationintotheArmyoftheRepublicofVietnam(Quan smallerbaseplate.Otherheavy LucVietNamCongHoa,QLVNCH)wasdeclaredonDecember30,1955, mortarssuppliedduringthewar thenewVietnamesegovernmentcouldnotevenpayitsarmy.Theinflux includedthe81mmM29and 4.2inM2andM30.(Courtesy of refugees from the North had provided a source of additional PaxtonWilliams) manpower,butdrafteesintendedtobeplacedinthereserveswerebeing released from their already inadequate two months’ training after just five weeks. While the Americans strove to instill the concept of battalionsbeingpermanentlyassignedtoregimentsanddivisions,some units were inactivated, others amalgamated, and new ones raised, and ANVartillerymenserving the105mmM2A1howitzer duringthistime-consumingprocesssomeunitswereneverfullyformed. (redesignatedtheM101A1 Besides tactical and equipment training, in 1956 a major US effort in1962).Originallyeachfield had to be made to recover, check and redistribute the loaned divisionhadasinglebattalion US equipment turned in by the departing French; this required the of105mmhowitzerswiththree instruction of Vietnamese in modern logistical and maintenance four-gunbatteries;batteries wereincreasedtosixgunsin management techniques. In 1956 US advisors and key Vietnamese 1963,andaseconddivisional officers also developed plans for establishing a professional school battalionwassoonadded. system–officerandstaffschools,technicalschools,andbranchtraining (CourtesyPaxtonWilliams) schools – to be fully developed over the coming years. During this period ARVN officers began to be sent to the US to attend advanced schools, and this would continue throughout the war (for example, more than 700 ARVN officers attended theUSArmyArmorSchool). COMMAND STRUCTURE The army command structure under President Diem was basically a shambles, with conflicting, duplicated, and overlapping chains of command. 9