VENETIC

Attack on The Golfcourse

Anh Khê

3 September 1966

by W.S. McCallum

Camp Radcliff began operations in 1965, when it was little more than a flattish expanse of grass with hundreds of helicopters parked on it (hence the nickname “The Golfcourse”). By 1966, it had grown to become the largest helicopter airport in the world and, in addition to being the 1st AirCav’s base, was a major transport and operations hub which helicopters from all arms of the services flew into and out of.

Let’s take a tour of part of the airbase….

At 9.50 p.m. on 3 September 1966, the silence of the night was broken by a VC mortar barrage hitting the airbase…

Maintenance crews working on the runway are hit.

Out on the base’s perimeter, guards on duty at the various watch posts peer nervously into the darkness….

Through the intermittent noise of the exploding mortar shells, it is hard to make out what it is, but out there in the dark, the occasional strange noise can be heard coming from the other side of the perimeter fence, out beyond the mine field and barbed wire…

A VC Sapper raiding party is coming through the wire, en masse.

M16 and M60 fire erupts from the guard posts, and the VC start taking casualties.

The general alarm is sounded, with sirens howling and men back at the barracks reaching for their weapons, flak jackets and ammo belts before rushing out to meet the attackers.

But where are the VC? Hurried commands are given and a general rush to the sounds of the firing on the perimeter begins.

Under erratic fire due to poor night visibility, the first sappers have already begun penetrating the barbed wire and are expertly clearing marked paths through the minefield for the reinforcements waiting to the rear.

The US reinforcements split into two groups. One runs through the area where the two Hueys are being serviced to take up position in empty bunkers beside the runway.

The remainder of this group continues moving forward to provide support to the the handful of men manning the perimeter guard posts.

The other group moves forward through the helicopter park, anxiously looking this way and that, wondering if the VC are already in through the wire.

Aware of the need to protect the millions of dollars worth of military hardware parked in the various bays, these men take up defensive positions in empty bunkers on the edge of the parking area.

Help arrives in the form of a Duster.

It catches up with the infantry and follows them through the parking bays, searching for VC.

In the meantime, more and more VC sappers are working their way through the minefield. Occasionally they have to duck from the erratic firing coming from the perimeter guard posts, but they are taking very few losses whilst making slow but steady progress.

Other sappers do their best to keep the US sentries’ heads down, but the guard posts are well-protected and difficult to hit.

The US reinforcements by the parking bays are cautiously moving forward, taking up positions and lying in wait for the VC.

As are the infantry down by the runway.

While bullets and RPGs fired by their support teams fly overhead, various of the VC sappers have passed through the minefield and are breaching the fence.

They lose some men in the process, but losses are fairly light for this human wave assault.

The first sappers break through the fence and make a dash for the two central guard towers.

One stand is pinned by M16 fire from above, but the other two manage to evade and get close enough to hurl satchel charges.

The watch tower is KOed.

Making out moving figures at the foot of the flaming tower, the Duster crew rotate their turret and open fire.

The sappers take casualties under a rain of heavy fire and their advance is halted.

Help is on hand though; to their right, further sapper teams have broken through the fence. One of them opens fire on the Duster with an RPG-2.

Another KO! Fortunately the Duster is an open-topped vehicle, and the crew manage to bail out.

Not wasting any time, the RPG team and its support run forward to throw more satchel charges at the second watch tower.

Another KO!

These leading elements need support. With the defensive perimeter now broken, the VC Commander sends in more troops, including a flamethrower.

They run across the cleared, marked path through the minefield and break through the fence.

US troops fire back at them, but in the darkness their fire is erratic.

Under M60 fire, the first sappers assaulting the watch post on the hill by the parking bays manage to get through the fence. Will they be able to work their way around and knock out the machine gun post?

Unbenownest to them, more US support has turned up in the form of a heavily armed gun truck.

Much to the VC Commander’s chagrin, it takes up “hull down” position behind a helicopter bay’s protective wall, directly in the path of the sappers coming through the fence.

Once through the fence, the VC start taking hits from both the gun truck and US infantry awaiting them and their advance is stalled.

At this point, the VC Sapper Commander threw in the towel. Although he still had a full platoon in reserve and his overall losses were comparatively light (only several stands), he did not feel confident that he could break through the tight defensive semi-circle set up by the US Commander behind the now collapsing perimeter defence line and preferred to withdraw while he still could.

This was a “what if?” scenario. On the night of 3 September 1966, the VC attack was limited to a 5-minute mortar barrage that killed 4 soldiers, wounding another 76, and which damaged 77 helicopters. I wanted to see what would have happened if the VC had decided to come in through the wire and start throwing satchel charges, as the base’s defensive perimeter was comparatively light - watch towers (various of them not sandbagged), a security fence, and mines and barbed wire. I had visions of sappers running amok through the maze of parking bays, blowing up helicopters left, right and centre, but it was not to be.

Quite apart from the setting, this was a novel battle on various levels. For the first time, we used Crossfire’s engineering rules, covering the crossing of the barbed wire and minefield. The fence was treated as a barbed wire obstacle for game purposes. In addition, we play with the Incoming! supplementary rules which, curiously, did not feature satchel charges, so we treated them as per the rule for flamethrowers (satchel charges are carried by all VC Sappers, have a range of one base width when thrown, and cause a KO on the target structure and all its occupants when a 3, 4, 5, or 6 is rolled). We also used the night combat rules from the Hit The Dirt! supplement for the first time. These rules all worked smoothly, but had a marked effect on the game. The VC sappers got caught up on the obstacles and were held back by fire from only a handful of men in the watch posts, who were hard to hit with weapons fire due to poor visibility and the shelter provided by their bunkers. Conversely though, the defenders’ fire on the sappers caught in the open was erratic and highly ineffective due to the lower number of dice thrown (one less die per roll to hit) under the night combat rules. The US reinforcements were also notably slowed down by the night rules’ limitations on movement, although they managed to arrive in time to turn the tide.