At noon on 30 March 1972 three North Vietnamese divisions, with two regiments of tanks and 130 mm guns firing from across the Demilitarized Zone, fell on the newly raised ARVN 3rd Division while it was halfway through swapping its regiments between the old American firebases. The "ring of steel" was gone in two days. On Easter Sunday Camp Carroll, the key of the western line, surrendered with 1,500 men and its 175 mm guns, while at Đông Hà the 20th Tank's M48s shot up the armoured column coming down Highway 1 and Captain John Ripley spent three hours under the bridge placing the charges that dropped it at 16:30. For three weeks the division, two Marine brigades, three Ranger groups and the tanks held the Cửa Việt River and broke a tank attack at Firebase Pedro. On 27 April the offensive came on again in the rain: Đông Hà fell on the 28th, the line crumbled onto Ái Tử and then the Thạch Hãn, whose bridges were blown with the Marines' guns still on the far bank, and on 1 May, between countermanded orders, the division dissolved. Its column down Highway 1 was shelled into the "Highway of Horror"; the last helicopter left the Citadel at 16:35 with the North Vietnamese inside the walls. The 369th Marine Brigade held the Mỹ Chánh, and the province north of it stayed lost until the summer's counter-offensive.
Battle plan · Vietnam War (Easter Offensive)
First Battle of Quảng Trị
- 30 March 1972
- Quảng Trị Province, from the DMZ to the Mỹ Chánh
- North Vietnamese victory
The armies
People's Army of Vietnam, Trị–Thiên front (B5 Front)
Lê Trọng Tấn · Lê Quang Đạo · Hoàng Đan (304th Division) · Nguyễn Hữu An (308th Division)
| Unit | Arm | Men |
|---|---|---|
| 308th Division (36th, 88th and 102nd Regiments)Nguyễn Hữu An | Infantry | 9,000 |
| Independent regiments of the B5 Front (27th, 31st and 246th) | Infantry | 6,000 |
| Tanks of the northern wing (202nd and 203rd Tank Regiments: T-54s, Type 59s and PT-76s) | Armour | 600 |
| Artillery north of the Bến Hải (130 mm guns) | Artillery | 2,500 |
| 304th Division: 9th and 24th Regiments and division troopsHoàng Đan | Infantry | 6,000 |
| 66th Regiment, 304th Division | Infantry | 2,500 |
| Tanks of the western wing | Armour | 450 |
| Artillery of the western wing (38th and 84th Regiments; 122 mm and 130 mm) | Artillery | 2,000 |
| 324B Division: regiments south of the city | Infantry | 4,000 |
| Naval sapper Group 126 and local battalions (Cửa Việt) | Light infantry | 800 |
| In this plan | 33,850 |
Army of the Republic of Vietnam, I Corps in Quảng Trị
Hoàng Xuân Lãm (I Corps) · Vũ Văn Giai (3rd Division) · Nguyễn Trọng Luật (1st Armored Brigade) · Nguyễn Năng Bảo (147th Marines) · Ngô Văn Định (258th Marines)
| Unit | Arm | Men |
|---|---|---|
| 3rd Division headquartersBrig. Gen. Vũ Văn Giai | Commander | — |
| 2nd Regiment, 3rd Division | Infantry | 2,400 |
| 56th Regiment, 3rd DivisionLt Col Phạm Văn Đính | Infantry | 2,200 |
| 57th Regiment, 3rd Division | Infantry | 2,200 |
| Regional and Popular Forces, Gio Linh and Quảng Trị sectors | Infantry | 4,000 |
| Artillery group at Camp Carroll (26 pieces, 105 mm to 175 mm) | Artillery | 700 |
| Divisional and corps artillery at Đông Hà and Ái Tử | Artillery | 1,500 |
| 147th Marine Brigade: headquarters, 8th Battalion and artillery (later the 1st, 4th and 8th)Lt Col Nguyễn Năng Bảo | Infantry | 2,000 |
| 4th Marine Battalion, on Sarge and Nui Ba HoMaj. Trần Xuân Quang | Infantry | 632 |
| 258th Marine Brigade: 3rd, 6th and 7th Battalions and artilleryLt Col Ngô Văn Định | Infantry | 2,800 |
| Firebase Pedro garrison: the 1st, then the 6th Marine BattalionMaj. Nguyễn Đăng Hòa | Infantry | 700 |
| 369th Marine Brigade (from 4 April)Col. Phạm Văn Chung | Infantry | 3,000 |
| 20th Tank Battalion (M48s)Lt Col Lý | Armour | 600 |
| 1st Armored Brigade: headquarters and the 17th Armored Cavalry (M41s and M113s)Col. Nguyễn Trọng Luật | Armour | 1,500 |
| 11th Armored Cavalry Squadron (M113s) | Armour | 500 |
| 1st, 4th and 5th Ranger Groups (from 5 April) | Infantry | 4,500 |
| In this plan | 29,232 |
What the sources report
| PAVN | ARVN | |
|---|---|---|
| Strength, this plan | 40,000 (30,000–45,000)The 304th, 308th and 324B Divisions, three independent regiments of the B5 Front, two tank regiments with about 100 tanks, five artillery regiments with 130 mm guns, and sappers | 30,000 (17,000–35,000)The 3rd Division (2nd, 56th and 57th Regiments), the 147th and 258th Marine Brigades, the 1st Armored Brigade with the 20th Tank; the 369th Marines and three Ranger groups came in April, and Regional and Popular Forces held the coast. CDB90 counts 17,000 for the division alone |
| Losses, this plan | 6,600 (4,619–10,000)About 2,000 killed and 4,619 wounded in the Quảng Trị phase by the PAVN's own count, and some 60 tanks and armoured vehicles | 14,300 (10,000–27,000)CDB90's figure for the 3rd Division. 1,500 captured at Camp Carroll; the 1st Armored Brigade lost 1,171 men, 43 M48 and 66 M41 tanks and 103 M113s; 140 guns were lost; Hanoi claimed 27,000 casualties and 3,388 prisoners |
| Strength, Wikipedia | 45,000+~100 tanks and APCs | Regular Force: 40,000Regional Force: ~100,000600 tanks and APCs400 aircraft and helicopters |
| Casualties, Wikipedia | Unknown killed4,619 wounded~60 tanks and APCs destroyed | 1st Armored Brigade: 1,171 casualties43 M48, 66 M41 tanks, 103 M113s APCs20th Tank Regiment: 57 M48 tanks140 artillery piecesPAVN claim: ~27,000 casualties (3,388 captured)1,870 vehicles, 340 aircraft and helicopters, 225 artillery pieces and mortars destroyed194 artillery pieces and mortars, 56 armour vehicles were captured |
Infobox figures from “First Battle of Quảng Trị” on Wikipedia (revision 1375790239), CC BY-SA 4.0.
In the CAA Database of Battles
CDB90 no. 654, “Quang Tri”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.
- Fighting
- 696 hours
- Winner
- the attacker
- Terrain
- Flat, Mixed
- Weather
- Dry, Temperate, Spring, Tropical
- Defender’s posture
- Prepared defense
- Front width
- 44 km (attacker)
| Force | Strength | Losses | Horse | Guns | Plan and outcome |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| North Vietnamattacker | 30,000 | — | 0 | 100 | Frontal attack; Breakthrough |
| South Vietnamdefender | 17,000 | 14,300 | 0 | 78 | Withdrew with heavy losses |
Attacker’s advantages none recorded
CDB90 (US Army Concepts Analysis Agency, 1990), tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold; data under ODC-BY 1.0.
Plans and pictures
Notes
On this reconstruction
A campaign of five weeks is drawn like a battle. Each block is a regiment or brigade, placed where the accounts put its main body at the end of each phase, and often stands for battalions spread over several kilometres. Bases with published coordinates stand at them; Khe Gio, Nui Ba Ho, Holcomb, A-1, A-3, C-1, C-2, Barbara, Anne and Jane are placed from the histories' descriptions and may be a kilometre or two out. The North Vietnamese order of battle follows the Vietnamese and American accounts, the 308th and the B5 Front regiments from the north, the 304th from the west, the 324B's regiments south of the city at the end, but where a regiment stood on a given day is seldom recorded, and its positions here are inferred from the bases it attacked. Strengths are approximate; the ARVN losses are CDB90's figure for the division, with the armour and gun losses Truong gives. The hours are approximate, from the order of events in the accounts.
Sources
- Charles D. Melson and Curtis G. Arnold (History and Museums Division, HQ US Marine Corps, 1991), U.S. Marines in Vietnam: The War That Would Not End, 1971–1973 · public domainChapters 3–6: the Marine brigades and their advisers hour by hour, from Nui Ba Ho to the Mỹ Chánh.
- Lt Gen Ngo Quang Truong (Indochina Monographs, US Army Center of Military History, 1980), The Easter Offensive of 1972 · public domainThe ARVN side: the 3rd Division's dispositions, I Corps' orders and the collapse of 28 April – 1 May.
- US Army Concepts Analysis Agency; tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold, CAA Database of Battles (CDB90), no. 654 · ODC-BY-1.0Strengths, losses, front width, hours of fighting and outcome in machine-readable form.
- Wikipedia contributors, First Battle of Quảng Trị · CC-BY-SA-4.0With the articles on the 3rd Division, the 20th Tank Regiment, the firebases and the shelling of Highway 1.
- Vietnamese Wikipedia contributors, Chiến dịch Trị Thiên · CC-BY-SA-4.0The North Vietnamese order of battle, the three "Storms" and the losses as Hanoi counts them.
- Wikidata (CC0) and OpenStreetMap contributors, Landmark positions · ODbL-1.0Rivers, coast, roads, towns and the bases that have coordinates.
Facts gathered from Wikidata (CC0), Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0) and Wikimedia Commons (licence per file); the plan and its text are timeastra’s own.