Word: giap
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...more of the 120,000-man North Vietnamese force that pushed into South Viet Nam has been killed or wounded-primarily by air strikes -and that all but 100 or 200 of the approximately 600 tanks with which the Communists began the offensive have been destroyed. "If I were Giap," declared one American general, "I'd begin to wonder how I was going to extricate myself...
Partly because of the attrition caused by the bombing raids, and partly because of the deliberate caution of North Viet Nam's General Vo Nguyen Giap. Communist main-force attacks have recently been replaced by a campaign of probes, sapper assaults and artillery barrages. The Communists' failure to follow up initial advantages suggested that they might indeed be running out of steam, but the situation in the three main trouble spots remained ambiguous...
What have the North Vietnamese accomplished in the current offensive? They have failed so far to capture Hue -although it is still not certain that seizing the city was one of Giap's basic strategic goals-but they have otherwise scored some substantial gains. They have badly hurt the South Vietnamese forces to the extent of 70,000 casualties. They have, moreover, re-established the presence of their own army inside South Viet Nam, thereby defeating ARVN'S two-year effort to keep the North Vietnamese regulars bottled up in Cambodia and Laos. Between April 1 and August...
...were the North Vietnamese really running out of steam? To be sure, the elements of eleven divisions that General Vo Nguyen Giap has in South Viet Nam have been slow to capitalize on their successes in the Central Highlands and in the northern provinces. NVA tanks and artillery challenged the scanty defenses of Kontum last week, and the long-awaited attack on that vulnerable Highlands city might not be far off. But there was no sign of the expected push on Hué, the former imperial capital 24 miles south of Quang Tri, which is believed by allied strategists...
...past offensives, Giap rotated his regiments in and out of the fighting. This year there has been no rotation to rest areas, and units are receiving replacement troops right on the battlefield. At times, Giap's commanders have let 3,000-man regiments fight down to 400 or 500 men before pulling them back to refit. Giap, moreover, has been uncharacteristically reckless in his use of tanks. A U.S. officer in Saigon who saw tank duty in World War II says: "I never saw the Germans or ourselves expend armor at a rate comparable to the North Vietnamese. Last...