page_title: Battle of Huế
section_title: Attack
hierarchical_section_title: Battle of Huế / Battle / Attack
caption_attribution_description: Map from the book U.S. Marines in Vietnam: 1968. Washington DC: Museums and Historical Division, U.S. Marine Corps, 1997.
context_page_description: The Battle of Huế, also called the Siege of Huế, was a major military engagement in the Tết Offensive launched by North Vietnam and the Việt Cộng during the Vietnam War. After initially losing control of most of Huế and its surroundings, the combined South Vietnamese and American forces gradually recaptured the city over one month of intense fighting. The battle was one of the longest and bloodiest of the war, and the battle negatively affected American public perception of the war.
  By the beginning of the North Vietnamese Tet Offensive on 30 January 1968, which coincided with the Vietnamese Tết Lunar New Year, large conventional American forces had been committed to combat operations on Vietnamese soil for almost three years. Highway 1, passing through the city of Huế, was an important supply line for Army of the Republic of Vietnam and United States forces from the coastal city of Da Nang to the Vietnamese Demilitarized Zone, the de facto border between North and South Vietnam only 50 kilometers to the north of Huế. It also provided access to the Perfume River at the point where the river ran through Huế, dividing the city into northern and southern parts.
context_section_description: In the early morning hours of 31 January 1968, a division-sized force of PAVN-VC soldiers launched a coordinated attack on the city of Huế. At 02:33, a signal flare lit up the night sky, and two battalions from the PAVN 6th Regiment attacked the western wall of the Citadel. Their objective was to capture the Mang Ca Garrison. Other objectives included the Tây Lộc Airfield and the Imperial Palace.
  At the Chanh Tay gate (16.474°N 107.561°E) on the west wall of the Citadel, a six-man PAVN sapper team dressed in ARVN uniforms killed the guards and opened the gate. Upon their flashlight signals, the 800th Battalion and several teams from the 12th Sapper Battalion rushed through the gate and headed northwest towards Tây Lộc Airfield. A 40-man assault team that was tasked with attacking Mang Ca through a sewer found the entrance blocked and moved around to assault the Huu Gate (16.466°N 107.568°E) at the southwest corner of the Citadel; they were engaged by an ARVN machine gun and lost 24 men before seizing their objective. The 802nd
  Battalion and a heavy weapons company had some trouble crossing the canal outside the southeastern wall, but entered shortly thereafter. The 806th Battalion, which was dug into a cemetery along Highway 1 near the western corner of the Citadel, dispatched a group of soldiers to capture the An Hoa Bridge, driving off the RF detachment guarding the bridge and opening a line of communication with the other PAVN-VC in the Citadel. Meanwhile, the team of thirty sappers who had scaled the northwestern wall overpowered the guards standing watch at the An Hoa and Hau Gates, then opened their doors to the infantry company waiting outside. The combined force then headed for the Mang Ca compound with the goal of neutralizing Trưởng's headquarters before it had time to organize the city’s defenders.
  At 03:40, ten minutes behind schedule, elements of the PAVN 164th Artillery Regiment fired a barrage of 122mm rockets into the new city from firing positions in the southwestern hills. PAVN soldiers also fired 130 82mm mortar rounds into the Mang Ca Compound the opening minutes of the battle. Meanwhile, 4 km to the west of the city the PAVN 416th Battalion, 5th Regiment, as well as a local force company and a recoilless rifle company, swarmed into the villages of Thon Que Chu and Thon La Chu (16.481°N 107.504°E). At Thon La Chu a South Vietnamese official who was a VC agent had earlier used aid money to build a three-story concrete and steel bomb shelter for local villagers and the command group of the Huế City Front used this as its headquarters. Meanwhile, the 416th Battalion began fortifying the twin villages with spider holes, trenches and camouflaged fighting positions.
  At 04:00 the PAVN reached the Tây Lộc Airfield, where 50 men of the Hac Bao reconnaissance company, reinforced by the 1st Division's 1st Ordnance Company, stopped the PAVN 800th Battalion. Although one battle account stated that the South Vietnamese "offered no strong resistance", the PAVN report acknowledged "the heavy enemy ARVN fire enveloped the entire airfield. By dawn, our troops were still unable to advance". The fighting for the airfield continued to seesaw, with first the ARVN having the upper hand and then the PAVN. Meanwhile the PAVN 802nd Battalion moved north of Tây Lộc to attack Mang Ca. Although the PAVN battalion penetrated the division compound, an ad hoc 200-man defensive force of staff officers and clerks staved off the assaults. Trưởng called back most of the Hac Bao Company from the airfield to bolster the headquarters' defenses, which kept division headquarters secure. At 04:40 sappers captured the Huu Gate and the command group of the PAVN 6th Regiment entered the Citadel. Outside the Citadel walls sapper teams failed to destroy the Bach Ho and Trường Tiền Bridges after being ambushed by RF troops. The 150 ARVN at Tây Lộc Airfield withdrew east through the city, avoiding PAVN forces and sneaked into the Mang Ca compound shortly after 07:00, just in time to help repulse another major assault from the 802nd Battalion. The re
caption: Hue: the initial dispositions
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