Word: arvn
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...face into the sand with his foot. I ordered them to stop, but with me just standing there looking, they proceeded to slit the woman's throat. I asked the lieutenant what the hell was going on, ordered him to get out of the area and take the ARVN with him, and they left...
...throat" of the Ho Chi Minh Trail. Then they pulled back from the deserted town to occupy part of the nearby valley floor and some coyly named fire bases in the surrounding hills ("Sophia," "Liz" and "Lollo" for Actresses Loren, Taylor and Lollobrigida). Hilltop hopping by helicopter, other ARVN forces sought to cut off important enemy supply routes, chiefly Route 914, the last major supply road with a dense cover of foliage. There are main routes farther west, such as Route 23, but they are more exposed to observation and bombing...
American pilots have already flown an impressive number of helicopter sorties in Laos (more than 26,000), but the 600 choppers assigned to Lam Son have been sorely taxed for several reasons. For one thing, Communist mines and ambushes have upset plans to supply the main ARVN column (10,000 men) on Route 9 by road. In combat, ARVN commanders have often been unable to spell out their needs in comprehensible English when faced with real trouble. Hill 31 was overrun largely because the first Cobra gunships on the scene carried no armor-piercing rockets: the ARVN officer who radioed...
...South Vietnamese commanders hope, most of the kinks have been worked out of Lam Son. Certainly, Saigon has not overlooked anything that might improve ARVN's chances in the fighting to come. Vice President Ky has even commissioned Vietnamese composers to fashion songs celebrating ARVN bravery, nobility and sacrifice. Whether they will be tunes of victory, too, remains to be seen...
...Laos last month, practically all 250 members of two companies of the ARVN 6th Airborne Battalion were killed or captured. Their loss has never been reported. One Vietnamese official said privately of ARVN officers: "They want to see how much the correspondents know before they provide the figures. The ratio is almost always said to be five enemy killed to one government soldier killed. We never get the real figure...