Jun
14
2010
Operation Plan 34A was a classified US program of covert military actions against North Vietnam. It called for raids to be carried out by South Vietnamese commandos inserted deep withing enemy territory, operating under American orders, and sabotage against North Vietnamese coastal and island installations. Operation Plan 34A was officially initiated in 1961 by the Central Intelligence Agency, but, in 1964, the program was transferred to the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam Studies and Observations Group (SOG) during Operation Parasol/Switchback. The SOG was the cover name for a multi-service unconventional warfare task force under the direct guidance and control of the Pentagon.
After a series of operations, in which South Vietnam commandos were captured after insertion into North Vietnam, Studies and Observations Group shifted the emphasis of its activities to maritime operations. A small fleet of fast patrol boats was acquired for use in the landing of small action teams and the offshore bombardment of small North Vietnamese military facilities, such as radar installations. The pace of these operations accelerated between June and July 1964.
During the time Operation Plan 34A was being implemented, the US Navy carried out electronic surveillance called Operation Desoto. It was conducted by destroyers operating along the coast of North Vietnam. Although the two sets of operations were at least nominally independent of one another, the attacks carried out by the patrol boats provoked responses by the North Vietnamese military that were monitored by the American destroyers, thus providing very useful intelligence on DRV military capabilities.
On August 2, 1964, the USS destroyer Maddox came under attack by North Vietnamese naval patrol boats in the Gulf of Tonkin. This attack, and the ensuing naval actions, came to be known as the Gulf of Tonkin Incident. President Lyndon Johnson seized the opportunity to secure passage by the U.S. Congress of the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution on August 7, 1964. This resolution led to a dramatic escalation of the Vietnam conflict.
Jun
14
2010
Seek and Destroy, or S&D, is a military strategy which was used intensively by the US forces during the Vietnam War. This military tactic entailed inserting ground forces into hostile territory, searching for the enemy, destroying them, and then withdrawing immediately afterwards. Thus, the Seek and Destroy strategy envolved the use of Special Forces, or other highly trained troops, as it was the result of a new weapon, the helicopter, which resulted in a new form of warfare, the fielding of air cavalry, and was thought to be ideally suited to counter-guerrilla jungle warfare.
The complementary conventional strategy, which consisted in attacking and capturing an enemy position, then fortifying and holding it indefinitely, was known as Clear and Hold or Clear and Secure. In theory, since the traditional methods of "taking ground" could not be used in this war, a war of attrition would be used, eliminating the enemy by the use of "searching" for them, then "destroying" them, and the "body count" would be the measuring tool to determine the success of the strategy of Seek and Destroy. It is common practice among military forces to enforce strict rules on a search and destroy mission.
It became an offensive tool, crucial to General William Westmoreland’s second phase. In his three phase strategy, the first consisted of slowing down the Viet Cong Forces; the second was to resume the offensive and destroy the enemy; the third was to restore the area under South Vietnamese government control. The Zippo missions were mainly assigned to the second phase around 1966 and 1967, along with operations “Clear and Secure.”
Seek and Destroy missions envolved sending out units of US troops from a fortified position to locate and annihilate Vietcong units in the countryside. These missions consisted in stealthily hiking out into enemy territory and then setting an ambush in the brush, near a suspected Viet Cong trail. To spring an ambush on the enemy the use of fixed Claymore Antipersonnel Mines was required, crossing lines of small arms fire, mortar support, and possibly additional artillery support called in via radio from a nearby firebase.
