Word: viet
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...French airfield at Nasan, between the Red River delta and Laos, lay all but deserted within its ring of trenches and stout barbed wire. It had been by passed by the Communist Viet Minh forces on their way into Laos. Under the broiling sun the colonel in command, walking disconsolately along the airstrip, looked up as he heard the sound of air craft engines. Within seconds a C-47 airplane, its wings and tail riddled by Red ack-ack fire, rolled onto the runway. The pilot braked it to a stop and his passenger, a prim, neat little man wearing...
...back on the plane, Navarre asked the colonel: "What information do you have?" The colonel answered: "The government in France has fallen. I just heard it on the radio." "Well, that's better for them than for me," said Navarre disinterestedly. "But what information have you about the Viet Minh...
Navarre attacked by sea, land and air in the face of immense physical odds. High winds and storm clouds scattered his parachutists, rain delayed his infantry. By nightfall the villages were surrounded. But under cover of darkness the Viet Minh had filtered through the French lines, or disappeared into swampland hideouts. The battle pointed up the basic difficulty of valorizing the war in Indo-China: the Viet Minh are everywhere and nowhere; they wage war by sabotage, terror, propaganda and guerrilla action...
...examined by the Laniel cabinet: 1) continuing with the Navarre plan of fluid attack in the hope of finally wiping out the main resistance; 2) building up the native Vietnamese army to a point where it can take over the country's defense; 3) opening direct negotiations with Viet Minh Leader Ho Chi Minh, if he can be found...
...town of Langson (pop. 7,400), only eleven miles south of the China border. Quickly the soldiers slipped out of their chute harness, jogged through town, and headed for the deep limestone caves where the rebel armies of Ho Chi Minh had cached war materiel. Taken by surprise, the Viet Minh garrison fled. Systematically, the French set to work destroying enough Communist supplies to equip two Red divisions. In twelve busy hours, paratroopers burned 20,000 liters of gasoline, set off 5,000 tons of ammunition and explosives. They seized 200 machine guns and automatic rifles, 1,000 light machine...