A veteran Security Police sergeant took over
when the officer in charge at the point of attack was killed defending
Biên Hòa.
For most of 1967, North Vietnam
held its--and the Viet Cong's--military operations in the South at a
low level in order to accumulate supplies for the massive Tet offensive
that was to begin the night of Jan. 30-31, 1968. The goal of the offensive
was as much political as military: to shatter the confidence of South
Vietnam's citizens in their government and to fuel the fires of antiwar
sentiment that burned with increasing intensity in the United States.
A hundred cities and more than 20 Air Bases were attacked simultaneously
by some 84,000 enemy troops in violation of a 36-hour truce for celebration
of the Vietnamese New Year. Saigon, the capital of South Vietnam, was
a prime target. To capture it, enemy forces had to neutralize the two
great Air Bases--Biên Hòa and Tan Son Nhut-near the city. Two infantry
battalions and a reinforced infantry CO were assigned the task
of penetrating Biên Hòa's defenses and destroying US and VNAF aircraft
and facilities. Their carefully planned surprise attack was to follow
a heavy barrage of rocket and mortar fire. But surprise was not to be.
Gen. William Momyer, commander of Seventh Air Force, doubted that North
Vietnam would honor the truce. All his units were on alert, with outposts
reinforced, when the attack on Biên Hòa came.
At 3 a.m., on Jan. 31, rockets and mortar shells began to fall on
the flight line. SSgt William Piazza, a member of the 3rd SPS serving his second volunteer tour in Vietnam, was
leader of a resupply team on the north side of the base. As the barrage
lifted, the command center radioed a team (Def 6) responsible for the
east end of the base, where the infantry attack was concentrated, to
reinforce Bunker Hill 10, a large concrete bunker at the east end of
the runway. About 30 men commanded by a captain were under attack there
and would soon run short of ammunition. The team was stopped by sniper
fire before it could reach the bunker.
Piazza immediately ordered his men to fall back to a safe position.
He then picked up the leader of Def-6 and drove his truck, loaded with
ammunition, through a curtain of enemy fire to the bunker. A few minutes
after he arrived, the enemy again attacked the bunker from three sides
with rockets, automatic weapons, and small arms. Piazza climbed out
of the bunker and returned fire with a 40-mm grenade launcher until
very close support fire from a helicopter gunship forced him back inside.
There he discovered that the captain in command had been killed. Piazza
assumed command of the defending force as "all hell broke loose,
and Control could not get anyone on the radio.
As the night wore on, a C-47 Spooky gunship that had lighted the area,
enabling Piazza to direct fire from the bunker, apparently ran out of
flares. Piazza again left the shelter of the bunker to light the area
with hand flares. He continued to direct the defense until Army reinforcements
arrived after daylight. Then, after the wounded had been evacuated from
the bunker, Piazza and four other men remained until evening without
food, water, or reinforcements, spotting targets for the Army troops
and providing supporting fire. When the east end of the base had been
cleared, 139 enemy lay dead and 25 had been captured.
Although several aircraft were destroyed or damaged by rockets, enemy
infantry and sappers never penetrated the base beyond Bunker Hill 10.
The citation for the Silver Star presented to Piazza by Momyer summed
it up: "An untold number of lives and literally hundreds of
millions of dollars of aircraft and other materiel had been saved"
through the gallant defense of the base, led at Bunker Hill 10 by Sergeant
Piazza.
The Tet offensive was soundly defeated at Biên Hòa and throughout South
Vietnam. Of the 84,000 enemy troops thrown into that failed gamble,
some 45,000 are believed to have been killed and another 24,000 wounded.
It was not, as some journalists of that day reported a military defeat
for the US and South Vietnam. The negative political repercussion of
those reports in this country is another story.
