Re: [GZG] Colonies cooling down :)

On Wed, May 14, 2008 at 3:26 PM, Enzo de Ianni <enzodeianni@tiscali.it>
wrote:

>>2) The PAVN was well-trained and equipped with artillery and armor by
>>the Soviets and the Chinese.
>
> You mean that being trained by a Third World army whose war
> experience (in a conventional war, at that) was 15-20 years old and
> whose equipment was, at the time, among the worst, was enough to
> confront a First World army and his technological edge? That such
> units equipped exactly like the UNITA or FRELIMO from Mozambico or
> Angola could fight, and even locally win, against American line,
> elite or even Special Forces? Then, I think, you have proven my point
> efficiently.

The PAVN's cadre had experience in conventional warfare--Dien Bein Phu
was NOT overrun by black-pajama'd guerillas, but besieged and torn
apart by artillery.  The Soviets had experience in conventional
warfare, and remained a credible threat for decades.  China's
"guerilla" war in the latter stages was a conventional military
conflict in which the PLA won, decisively.

UNITA and FRELIMO are insurgents.  PAVN was a light-infantry dominant
conventional army that fought using infiltration tactics not THAT much
different from those of any other light infantry and most notably used
by German infantry in WWI (cf a certain major who used a battalion of
light infantry to capture half an Italian corps).  But they were not a
militia.

> To complete the explanation, my idea of militia is a part-time
> military organization whose members get a modicum of training, from
> time to time, during their musters,

Again, this does not describe the PAVN or NLF Main Force battalions.

>>Name an instance.
>
>  From "The Rise and Fall of an American Army by Shelby L. Stanton
> (usually regarded as a good and informed source, last I heard):
> page 166 - "a company of the 2d Battalion, 503d Infntry (Airborne),
> clashed with the 6th Battalion,24th NVA Regiment in one of the most
> violent battles of the Vietnam War. That morning, Company A left its
> night positions in the triple canopy jungle and began threading its
> way down a steep ridgeline. ... The point squad collided with a North
> Vietnamese Army force and the battle quickly engulfed the
> parachutists. Artillery fire crashed down and helicopter-delivered
> rockets pierced the green foliage. All failed to check the assault...
> At eleven o'clock all contact was lost with the forward platoons.
> Then a band of disheveled, wounded troopers stumbled in the company
line..."

Are you speaking of the Battle of the Slopes, fought near Dak To 18-22
June 1966?

Found the AAR online.  Primary Sources For The Win.

http://www.skysoldier.org/BattleofSlopesAfterAction1.php

By this standard the Germans won the Battle of the Bulge when the
106th Infantry Division was overrun.  At the end of the day, doesn't
sound much like a defeat to me.  Especially not if you strip a lot of
the slanted language your source uses.

You're also kind of missing the point in that the action was against a
regular regiment of the PAVN, not militias or guerillas.

The second snippet has not enough identifying information to be useful.

In regards to Prarie II, the fight you give a snippet of as well, a
MAJ Sheridan, who took command after LTC Orhanesian was killed, is
quoted as saying he, "encountering large numbers of well-equipped NVA
troops. In my year in Vietnam, I had never seen this number of NVA
troops in the open"

He also states that, "The enemy continued to alternately shell and
[attempt to] overrun our small position the remainder of the night.
Lieutenant Colonel Ohanesian died around midnight as it was impossible
to secure a landing zone. Sergeant Major Wayne N. Hayes died about the
same time of wounds suffered in hand-to-hand combat and grenade and
mortar blasts. Constant artillery, night air strikes within 50 meters
of our position and the courage of the Marines on the ground finally
took their toll and the NVA withdrew."

http://www.echo23marines6569.org/OperationPrairie2.html

John M. Atkinson
-- 
"Thousands of Sarmatians, Thousands of Franks, we've slain them again
and again. We're looking for thousands of Persians."
--Vita Aureliani

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