American Strategic Deception Bureau

　Some officers and journalists who loved to enjoy life simply got a lot of wine from somewhere, and used US dollars to summon a large number of bold Vietnamese girls in Nha Trang. They happily held a celebration banquet in the seaside villa left by Emperor Bao Dai, eating and drinking to their heart's content, and had a great time.

　But what they didn't know was that the arrival of the 1st Marine Division itself had already caused a huge uproar on the battlefield in Vietnam...

　-

　Chu Lai Port, the southern border of Quang Nam Province, in northern South Vietnam

　(Historically, South Vietnam split Quang Nam into two provinces in 1962, with the southern part designated Quang Sin Province. A few years later, Quang Sin Province was abolished and re-merged into Quang Nam. However, it's unclear how the provincial boundaries were drawn at the time. So, let's assume that Quang Nam has never been divided in this worldline!)

　This is a small fishing port located on the coast of South China Sea with poor infrastructure and a small population.

　However, because Highway 1 passed by it, after Ngo Dinh Diem established the South Vietnamese regime, he chose Chu Lai as the base for the Second Division of the South Vietnamese National Army. In accordance with the "family members accompanying the troops" system of the South Vietnamese regular army, tens of thousands of officers and soldiers of the Second Division moved here with their families.

　With such a huge influx of population and the spending power brought by the salaries of so many soldiers, Zhu Lai prospered rapidly and became somewhat like a town.

　However, the abnormal prosperity brought about quickly by war and the army will also disappear at an even faster speed in the war.

　Now, the Second Division originally stationed in Chu Lai has collapsed in the civil war, and the remaining troops have been fighting hard in Da Nang for days.

　However, their opponents, the armed forces of the South Vietnam Liberation Front, traveled thousands of miles from faraway Saigon to the outskirts of Chu Lai!

　Oh my God, most of the 20,000 to 30,000 residents in the city are family members of South Vietnamese officers and soldiers!

　If they had fallen into the hands of the Viet Cong, how many would have been sent to the Gulag labor camps and how many would have been shot directly?

　Unfortunately, the Second Division of the South Vietnamese Army originally stationed in Zhu Lai had either been destroyed or was fighting elsewhere, leaving Zhu Lai with an empty city plan.

　Although a group of military cadets who had escaped from Dadao, armed with a major-general's commission from Zun Shiding, had recruited retired soldiers from all over Zhulai and had managed to put together a security team, and then quickly repaired fortifications on Highway 1, the sight of this disorganized military scene was still unsettling.

　In short, when the red, blue and gold star flag of the Viet Cong suddenly appeared on the road outside the city, all the citizens of Chu Lai fell into extreme panic.

　But what they didn't know was that the Vietcong outside the city were just as panicked as they were...

　"Nha Trang... has fallen! Our retreat has been cut off by the Americans landing at sea?!"

　In the Viet Cong troops outside Chu Lai, a political officer held up a telegram from the South, his lips turning pale. "What should we do now?"

　"What else can we do? Of course, we must block the news and continue the offensive! Completely destroy this reactionary puppet regime!"

　The commander of this northbound expeditionary force, Major General Le Zhongxun, who had just been dispatched to the southern battlefield from the General Staff Headquarters in Hanoi this year, snatched the telegram, glanced at it briefly, and tore it up. Then he said decisively, with an impassioned look on his face, "We are now less than a hundred kilometers away from our friendly forces in the north! As long as we reach Da Nang, we can liberate the entire country and join forces with our comrades in the north! The Americans can only flee like the French!"

　Comrades! Now is the final battle to liberate the country! Let's fight again, and take Da Nang! Capture Zun Shiding alive!

　After saying these words that he himself did not believe, he looked back at the mess of civilian trucks, cars and buses that had been forcibly confiscated along the way, as well as thousands of people who did not even have uniforms, but only had bandages tied on their arms.

　A mob with a red cloth as its symbol...

　Except for a small number of veteran troops brought from the Viet Cong headquarters in Cu Chi County, the vast majority of the remaining people were South Vietnamese deserters and "activists" recruited in recent days - including a considerable number of "lumpen proletariat" such as thugs and gangsters.

　In short, they are all fence-sitters who change with the wind and have no loyalty or awareness at all.

　In this situation, if we continue to advance vigorously and persist in attacking, perhaps we can make them follow us ignorantly.

　But if they retreat in the middle of the battle and turn back south... I'm afraid that these people will fall apart along the way before they even encounter the US military!

　So, since there is no choice, let’s keep moving forward!

　Even if we are defeated by a stubborn enemy, at least it is more valuable than being defeated without a fight!

　Looking at the city of Chu Lai ahead on the road, Major General Le Zhongxun, deputy commander of the South Vietnam Liberation Army, sighed helplessly.

　Speaking of which, when he set out from Saigon ten days ago, he never imagined that he could actually hit the target so far...

　Uh, they almost conquered the entire country of South Vietnam from south to north!

　——As a North Vietnamese general who had just been transferred from the General Staff in early March this year and sent to South Vietnam as deputy commander, when Major General Le Zhongxun arrived in the South to take office, the Southern Viet Cong headquarters in Cu Chi had already begun preparing to launch a general attack on Saigon.

　Therefore, under such circumstances, Major General Le Zhongxun, the deputy commander who was suddenly parachuted in, was naturally marginalized in the South Vietnam Liberation Army Headquarters. He was subjected to a lot of cold words and was considered to be someone who came to the banquet "at mealtime" specifically to take advantage of the situation, gain merit, and gild himself.

　And Le Zhongxun had no part in the founding war of "Red South Vietnam" that occupied Saigon and defeated 10,000 American troops.

　It was not until the capture of Saigon that Major General Chen Wenguang, commander-in-chief of the armed forces of the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam, allocated a small force of 300 people to the angry Li Zhongxun, and asked him to advance along Highway 1 to the central region of South Vietnam, mobilize the underground party along the way, and take over cities and defeated soldiers.

　As for where the fight would end? Who could predict that? Naturally, they would stop and ask for reinforcements after encountering a tough opponent they couldn't defeat!

　According to the Viet Cong central leadership, Le Trung Xun's small force, relying on recruiting defectors along the way, would be considered quite successful if they could reach Phan Thiet, 200 kilometers from Saigon. With a bit more luck, they could probably advance to Phan Rang, the last capital of the Champa Empire at the time of its demise.

　As a result, it took Li Zhongxun only more than a week to advance nearly a thousand kilometers and almost penetrate the entire territory of South Vietnam from south to north.

　Not only that, the number of soldiers under his command increased twenty times, from a mere 300 backbone soldiers to an army of 6,000 in ten days!

　Some of them were underground Viet Cong members and rural guerrillas mobilized along the way, more were defeated South Vietnamese army soldiers and former regime police who surrendered with the crowd, some simple left-wing passionate young people, and rogue speculators who wanted to take advantage of the chaos to make a fortune.

　Le Zhongxun accepted anyone who was willing to tie a red cloth on his arm and stand under the red, blue and gold star flag of the Viet Cong.

　With such a complex team that seemed to be growing like a snowball, Li Zhongxun was like an ancient bandit leader, rushing along Highway 1, relying on looting and requisitioning supplies to solve logistics problems, forcibly confiscating cars from the city and requisitioning drivers to achieve mechanized transportation, and relying on the fact that he did not encounter any decent organized resistance in the front, which enabled him to advance thousands of miles with great momentum.

　In this way, this mob fought through Phan Rang and Nha Trang, passed through Cam Ranh Bay and Qui Nhon, and now finally arrived at the gate of Quang Nam Province.

　Li Zhongxun knew very well what kind of people were under his command, and he also knew that the rolling snowball could not be stopped, let alone rolled back.

　If we continue to move forward, the worst outcome will be a defeat, and we may even be able to create a miracle; but if we turn around and retreat, we will shamefully collapse without a fight.

　There is even the possibility that a traitor will appear and try to use his head as a "Vietnamese leader" to ask for a reward from the Americans and reactionaries!

　For a truly determined cadre of the Vietnam Workers' Party, he would rather suffer a complete defeat than end up in such a shameful way.

　After so many years of guerrilla warfare and the massacres perpetrated by the Diem regime, could the Vietcong still be afraid of defeat? Or of the loss of lives?

　The slogan "We are willing to sacrifice an entire generation to liberate the motherland" is not just talk, but must be put into action!

　Therefore, when he learned that the 1st Marine Division of the United States had landed in Nha Trang and cut off the retreat of his expeditionary force, Le Zhongxun did not hesitate at all and decided to continue pushing the snowball forward, ruthlessly ramming all the enemies in front of him until this mob collapsed on its own.

　Moreover, although he didn't know how far he could reach, Major General Li Zhongxun felt that he was confident of taking down Zhu Lai in front of him.

　"Don't worry. See the chaos on the road ahead? The reactionaries' defenses are about to be overwhelmed by their own refugees, even before we even have to attack! We just need to make a few loud noises and we'll scare them all away!"

　He encouraged the crowd, saying, "All right, everyone, prepare for battle! To defeat the reactionaries and liberate the entire South, attack!"

　-

　On May 12, Fili on Haiyun Ridge was surprised to learn that the southern part of Quang Nam Province

　The marginal base of the Second Division, Chu Lai, was captured by the Viet Cong!

　That Viet Cong guerrilla force, which seemed to have sprinting legs, really fought their way into Quang Nam Province from Saigon in the far south!

　What the hell is going on? The 1st Marine Division has already landed in Nha Trang, so why are these Viet Cong still rushing north like mad dogs?

　What’s even more infuriating is that the cadets and security team who were said to have “set up a strong defense line” in Zhu Lai couldn’t even hold it for half a day!

　I led the American and Miao soldiers to block five divisions of the North Vietnamese regular army on Haiyun Ridge, and have not allowed them to advance even a single step south. How is it that you, the military academy students of the South Vietnamese regime, cannot even stop a group of rabble who have run nearly a thousand kilometers north?

　In this way, Fili returned to Da Nang with a lot of anger, and discussed with General Zun Shiding how to deal with the matter. He also met the defeated general who retreated from the Zhu Lai front, or the long-distance runner - Captain Chen Yuquan, who escaped five or six hundred kilometers from the Dadao Military Academy to Da Nang.

　As for why a military academy student was suddenly promoted to captain and led his classmates into battle? It was because the principal and instructor who had originally fled with them disappeared along the way, and the American advisor also deserted and found a boat, reportedly heading across the sea to Hong Kong.

　In the end, only a group of military cadets took a truck to Da Nang, and were then sent to Zhu Lai for garrison by Zun Shiding, who was worried about the lack of available personnel under his command. Because Chen Yuquan was the leader of this group of military cadets, he was appointed as the captain of the Zhu Lai security team.

　Truth be told, Tran Ngoc Quan actually did a pretty good job in Chu Lai. Whether it was conscripting veterans or digging trenches and building fortifications, everything seemed to be done in a proper manner. But in the end, it was all for naught. As soon as the Vietcong flag appeared on the horizon, a refugee crisis erupted in Chu Lai, and Highway 1 and the various side roads were crammed with trucks, buses, motorcycles, and cars filled with panicked civilians.

　The soldiers who had just been recruited in Zhulai could not help but start to worry about the safety of their families when they saw the refugees pouring out of Zhulai and fleeing in all directions. First, some people deserted one after another, and then whole squads and rows of soldiers fled their positions to find and protect their families.

　The military academy students who escaped from Dadao were unfamiliar with Zhulai and lacked prestige. They were unable to intercept the deserters and could only get anxious.

　Finally, when the Viet Cong really came charging forward with slogans, only Captain Chen Yuquan, his classmates, and at most a hundred local militiamen were left. They held their position for two hours, but the enemy outnumbered them by at least twenty times. Soon, they could no longer hold on and had to abandon Chu Lai and retreat in a hurry.

　Then, before Da Nang could adjust its deployment, new bad news came from the south: the Viet Cong continued to advance along Highway 1. The red, blue and gold star flag had been raised in Sam Chee, a central city in Quang Nam Province. The Viet Cong's vanguard troops could almost see Hai Van Ridge from the south!

　Now, the coalition forces on the Haiyunling defense line are about to be kicked in the ass by the Viet Cong in the south! This is really outrageous!

　Author's words: PS: An counterintuitive survey result, according to the latest data, the number of single fathers in our country is more than four times that of single mothers.

　That is to say, there are four times as many mothers who don't want children as fathers who don't want children.

　Isn't it said that in divorces, courts tend to award children to the mother? Why is it that the father gets four times as much as the child?

　Chapter 244: The Battle of Hoi An and the Future General Dawn Island

　May 13, 1963, Hoi An Ancient Town, Quang Nam Province, Vietnam

　Hoi An Ancient Town, located 30 kilometers south of Da Nang, near the mouth of the Thu Bon River, was already a renowned seaport of the ancient Champa Kingdom, known as the "Great Sea Port," as early as the 5th century AD. Champa envoys embarked from here on their pilgrimage to China.

　Later, the Champa Empire declined and was conquered by the Vietnamese. However, as a crucial route for Chinese merchant ships sailing to the West, Hoi An remained prosperous. Merchant ships from China, Japan, Southeast Asia, Persia, and Arabia frequently entered and exited Hoi An Harbor. During the Age of Exploration, Western powers such as the Dutch, Portuguese, British, and French also established trading posts in Hoi An Harbor, resulting in the emergence of numerous European-style buildings.

　Coupled with the local Southeast Asian-style Buddhist temples and monasteries, Hoi An has become an international commercial port with a strong cultural flavor.

　Even more remarkable is that by the end of the 18th century, Hoi An Harbor was practically abandoned due to silting. While the city fell into desolation and desolation, the ancient buildings were preserved intact, neither destroyed by war nor demolished to make way for high-rise buildings.

　Therefore, UNESCO listed the ancient city of Hoi An as a cultural heritage in the World Heritage List.

　Until the 21st century, Hoi An Ancient Town, with its blend of diverse cultures, remains a famous cultural tourist destination in Vietnam.

　Of course, the reason why our protagonist, Fili, appeared in the ancient town of Hoi An, which is rich in history and culture, was obviously not for tourism.

　It’s because the Viet Cong’s “task force” has already reached the outskirts of Hoi An!

　Then, Hoi An is 30 kilometers south of Da Nang and Hai Van Leng is 20 kilometers north of Da Nang.

　The northern part of Hai Van Ling was occupied by North Vietnam, and the southern part of Hoi An was also invaded by the Viet Cong.

　In other words, the actual territory of Zunshiding's "Guangnan Kingdom" is now only the 50-kilometer coastal plain from Haiyunling to Hoi An. It has been beaten to a size that is almost the same as the Gaza Strip under the rule of "Hamas" in later generations!

　This makes Zunshi Ding and the Vietnamese

　How could the US military commander, Commander-in-Chief Philip, not be anxious about this?

　If they continue to lose like this, they will really be driven out to sea by the Viet Cong!

　Therefore, when he learned that Sam Chee, a transportation hub in central Quang Nam Province, had fallen and the Viet Cong was still approaching Hoi An, Ferry immediately mobilized two companies of US Marines guarding Da Nang Airport, plus a company of "Green Berets" US special forces who had just arrived on a transport plane, and rushed to Hoi An in a hurry to save the situation - at any cost, the Viet Cong could not be allowed to take over Da Nang Airport from the ground!

　Sonthithin also summoned the presidential guard he had just formed and recruited men from the Catholic militia in Da Nang, gathering more than 500 people to go to Hoi An.

　In fact, Firi originally wanted to draw a group of Laotian Miao soldiers from the Haiyunling defense line to provide emergency assistance.

　Unexpectedly, the North Vietnamese Army across Hai Van Ridge seemed to be maintaining close contact with the Viet Cong to the south, effectively coordinating their tactics. Just as Fili was thinking this, the rumble of artillery fire rang out from the Hai Van Ridge defenses. Immediately, General Vang Pao called to report that the North Vietnamese Army had chosen not to attack at night, but had instead launched a daytime assault on the defenses, braving the heavy bombardment of American aircraft.

　Although Vang Pao expressed his confidence that with the support of US air power, he could repel the North Vietnamese army's daytime offensive, he was obviously unable to take care of both ends.

　There was no other way. Since the defenders on Haiyun Ridge could not move, they could only rely on the troops gathered from the rear and the reinforcements that had just been airlifted in.

　The subsequent troop deployment process was also a disaster, as tens of thousands of war refugees and vehicles piled high with luggage had already blocked all roads south of Da Nang. Many people even went directly to the airport to wait for their flights, causing chaos throughout Da Nang.

　In order to prevent the reinforcements he sent to stop the Viet Cong from being blocked on the road by the restless refugees, Firi had to mobilize all the existing helicopters at the airport to airlift the American special forces company to establish a defensive position on the banks of the Thu Bon River to prevent the Viet Cong's armed forces from rushing into Hoi An.

　At the same time, several A-1 Skyraider attack aircraft took off from Da Nang Airport and carried out ground bombing on the Viet Cong convoy on Highway 1 to hinder its rapid advance. Even if many tragedies of mistakenly bombing refugees occurred in the process, it was too urgent to care about it at the moment.

　As for the task of launching an air strike on the North Vietnamese regular army north of Hai Van Ridge and blocking its offensive, it can only be handed over to the two aircraft carrier battle groups in the South China Sea.

　Finally, Ferry personally led the Marines from Da Nang Airport, plus a few scattered American instructors and soldiers, a total of more than 300 people, and took a speedboat from Da Nang Pier to the sea, bypassing the congested roads, and drove directly into Hoi An Town from the mouth of the Thu Bon River to strike a heavy blow against the Viet Cong!

　-

　Fortunately, perhaps because the airstrike had a good deterrent effect, or perhaps because of the extraordinary performance of the "Green Berets" special forces, the US military successfully blocked the vanguard of the Viet Cong outside Hoi An, preventing this thousand-year-old ancient city with rich cultural heritage from becoming a battlefield.

　But in the following battles, Firi finally fully experienced the difficulty of dealing with the Viet Cong guerrillas.

　Previously at Hai Van Ridge, because it was a positional battle with a clear distinction between the enemy and us, the coalition forces only needed to fire at the opposite side of the trenches and barbed wire, eliminating every North Vietnamese soldier who rushed over and preventing them from breaking through their own defense line, and that would be considered a success.

　However, on the battlefield outside Hoi An, the Viet Cong guerrillas had neither uniforms nor conspicuous identification. As long as they took off the red cloth on their arms and blended into the crowd, in the eyes of Americans, they could not be distinguished from ordinary Vietnamese refugees.

　Only when these Viet Cong guerrillas approached them and took out their hidden weapons and opened fire fiercely did the Americans realize that they were enemies!

　Initially, Firi had his men identify the refugees' genders. If they were all strong men, there was a high probability of a problem and they would need to be on high alert. However, if there were women among the refugees, it probably wouldn't be a big problem...

　But he soon discovered that this trick didn't work! The Vietnam battlefield didn't let women go away! There were many female Vietcong among the enemy!

　Moreover, these female Viet Cong were as ruthless as the men when playing with guns and killing people!

　Not to mention, there are some people among the Viet Cong wearing South Vietnamese Army uniforms, who can disguise themselves as friendly reinforcements...

　As a result, the US military became increasingly nervous and almost accidentally attacked General Sonmushi Yoshida who came to reinforce with his guards!

　Furthermore, the Thu Bon River, which flows through Hoi An, isn't a large river; an average person could swim to the other side with a wooden tub. Unable to distinguish between enemy and civilian populations, the US troops defending the river could only block the road but were unable to prevent the refugees from swimming across.

　——Even if the soldiers were allowed to fire freely at the river, it would be impossible to block the river that is more than ten kilometers long, right?

　Fortunately, although the unfamiliarity of security warfare caused the US military to be flustered, the enemy's fighting spirit seemed weak. They often fled in fear at the first sign of weakness, showing no reluctance to fight the US military with their lives. Therefore, the extremely small number of US troops were able to hold out.

　The two sides battled for over an hour along the Thu Bon River outside Hoi An. The US blockade was repeatedly ambushed and disoriented by surprise attacks and artillery fire. It wasn't until the Hoi An security team arrived to reinforce them that Zun Shiding and Phi Li finally devised a somewhat workable interrogation method.

　——Hoi An is a place where overseas Chinese live in Vietnam, and the locals are still

　They can speak some Chinese; the residents of Da Nang are mostly Catholic and know a bit of French. If a refugee can't speak a word of French or Chinese, they are likely to be suspicious and need to be searched thoroughly...

　Although to be honest this method is not very reliable, because there are also quite a number of overseas Chinese in the Vietnamese Communist Party’s underground party.

　However, the Viet Cong on the other side did not seem to be a fully trained special forces team, but a mob of all kinds of people. Their so-called disguise could only deceive the Americans at best. But in the eyes of the locals, they were more conspicuous than fleas on a bald head.