N. Vietnam Army Remnants Hunted

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31144, 22 August 1966, Page 13

N. Vietnam Army Remnants Hunted

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright)

SAIGON, August 21.

United States Air Force jets flew 20 sorties yesterday in support of Australian infantrymen hunting 40 miles south-east of Saigon for the remnants of a Communist battalion the Australians repulsed on Thursday in their biggest battle of the war.

The Communist battalion. which spokesmen initially identified as a 600-man Viet Cong unit, turned out to be a reinforced North Vietnamese army battalion estimated at more than 1000 men.

launch a full-scale assault on the Anzac base. It planned to strike between the New Zealand batter)’ and an adjoining Australian artillery battery. These plans were revealed to intelligence officers by one of the three captured North Vietnamese soldiers. The wounded man said his force knew there were barbed wire entanglements in this section, but they considered it was a weak link in the base perimeter as they thought it was not as closely patrolled as other sectors The big attack, with mortars. grenade launchers, machine-gun fire and automatic rifles, was to be launched about 3 o’clock on Saturday morning. Instead, while moving towards the Australian task force base, the North Vietnamese struck the Australians’ delta company of the 6th Battalion in a rubber plantation.

After a bitter, bloody battle lasting from before dusk until nearly midnight, the outnumbered delta company, supported by heavy artillery fire from four batteries, decimated the North Vietnamese force, which then broke contact Although outnumbered nearly nine to one. the Australian company’s injuries were officially classed “light to moderate." The man who called in the artillery screen around nearly three sectors of the practically surrounded delta company was Captain Morrie Stanley, of Papakura. Auckland,

This was the farthest south that Hanoi regulars are known to have penetrated. General William Westmoreland the United States commander in .Vietnam, congratulated the Australians on the result of their four-hour battle.

New Zealand gunners joined other artillery in throwing in a curtain of artillery fire to support the outnumbered and almost surrounded Australians. If the delta company had not met the advancing North Vietnamese regular unit, the results could have been far more serious for the task force base camp. If the enemy force had broken through the camp nerimeter wires, thev would have tried to overrun both the New Zealand and the adjacent Australian batteries In any event, in an attack within the base itself, the Anzacs’ artillery firepower would have been severely limited if the perimeter wires had been penetrated As it happened, although things were really serious at times for the surrounded delta company, the engagement was much better foueht in the rubber plantation, where all the power of the artillery could be used to full effect. The artillery also knocked out the big enemy mortars early in the engagement—so saving many more allied casualties.

“Your troops have won a most significant victory over the enemy and one of the most spectacular in Vietnam to date.” General Westmoreland said. The North Vietnamese force was on the way to