Saigon Quiet, Hue Shelled

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31678, 14 May 1968, Page 17

Saigon Quiet, Hue Shelled

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter—Copyright)

SAIGON, May 13. Viet Cong guerrillas have switched their sights from Saigon to the north and shelled Hue, according to a South Vietnamese military spokesman.

As the week-long fighting round Saigon died down, the Communists fired 24 mortar rounds into the inner citadel of Hue last night and also hit a school, an airfield, the An Hoa gate to the city, and a Government post nearby. The spokesman said four civilians were killed and 14 wounded, but troop and police casualties were very light. The dusk attack was the heaviest that Hue, the former seat of Vietnamese emperors, had undergone since American and South Vietnamese troops re-occupied it late in February. Hue was under Viet Cong control for nearly a month after the Tet offensive and. in battle for repossession.

most of the city was des troyed and thousands of people made homeless. A police spokesman in Saigon said the situation in the capital was quiet today, only a few hours before peace talks were due to begin in Paris American planes continued to bomb targets on the outskirts of Saigon last night, mostly south of the “Y” bridge, where pockets of Viet Cong resistance are still holding out. The police spokesman said an American . military officer was shot dead by the Viet Cong in a Saigon street yesterday afternoon. South Vietnamese troops reported finding the bodies of 287 Viet Cong and North Vietnamese seven miles southwest of Saigon yesterday morning. American and South Vietnamese generals declared today that the main Viet Cong thrust against Saigon had been crushed.

Large numbers of Viet Cong had been trying to withdraw during the last 48 hours, aftei losing 5200 killed or captured since the attack on the capi tai began nine days ago, they added. “Small attacks, terrorism and harassing attacks by the Viet Cong are still possible, but the main thrust has been crushed,” said a report issued by General Le Nguyen Khang, commanding general of the South Vietnamese 3rd Corps. Tactical Zone, and Lieuten ant-General Johnathan Seaman, commanding general of the 2nd United States Field Force.

‘Twenty-six Viet Cong battel ions, which could consist of about 10,500 men, were due to attack the city area, but well over half were attacked outside the capital’s military district,” their report said. This grim list of statistics was issued today at the end of the nine-day attack on the capital: 104.000 refugees, 10,700 homes destroyed; 114 civilians died in hospital. 2702 civilians wounded; 5270 Viet Cong killed in Saigon and the provinces around it; 399 Viet Cong taken prisoner: 416 American and South Vietnamese forces dead.