Word: hq
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...clamped on press censorship, prohibited meetings of more than five persons and sent troops swarming through the local capital to take over the secretariat, railway depot, radio station, powerhouse and telegraph and phone offices. For the first time in months East Pakistan quieted down and from Huq's HQ not a sound was heard, only the pacing of the troops outside his house where he was sequestered in house arrest...
...quiet comes. For almost eleven hours the tired armies get a rest. Early afternoon, the Communists slam in heavy strength against Bald Head, and edge the Moroccans off the crest. But De Castries is still confident. "Le moral de mes hommes est formidable," he says on the radio to HQ. "If you see my wife," adds De Castries coolly, "give her a kiss from...
...command post before it is wiped out. De Castries calls out staff officers, cooks, orderlies, switchboard operators for the infantry fight. Reports sift out that De Castries has issued the order: "I expect all the troops to die at the positions assigned to them rather than retreat an inch." HQ denies it, but Dienbienphu surely teeters at death's edge. Then De Castries counterattacks...
...tough foreign legionnaires, Frenchmen, North Africans, Thais, Cambodians and Vietnamese snatch back one outpost. At 0800, De Castries counterattacks again, and fails. At 1000, he goes in for the third time-and wins. But two hours later, De Castries has to withdraw. Says an HQ spokesman: "This is the most violent struggle of the war." All day the French hang...
More good news: reinforcements from Hanoi are dropped-tough paratroopers in red berets. Red gunfire slackens, and the Reds pull back 500 yards from Bald Head to regroup. The situation, says French HQ. is "serious, but less critical...