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Area of Vietnamese naval operations in the South (chart)

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Vietnamese forces in the Rung Sat

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President Diem and USS Los Angeles

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XI

Backdrop To The Stage

From early times history reveals that maritime influence and the application of naval power played decisive roles in shaping the destiny of states in the Indochinese peninsula. This chapter seeks to provide insight as to how control over the region hinged on riverine warfare and amphibious operations along the coast. In particular, French experiences in the nineteenth century provide a useful background for the understanding of strategic possibilities during the Vietnam conflict in the twentieth century and of the role of naval operations at sea and on inland waters during that struggle. Early history also provides background on enduring factors which would complicate the Vietnam conflict-such as the frequent reoccurrence of warfare between north and south, sources of other conflicts between diverse groups within the area, and relationships with China.

Furthermore, the course of history has frequently demonstrated Vietnam's strategic importance. Lying along the South China Sea, on a massive peninsula jutting down between Malaya and China, Vietnam occupies a key position alongside one of the densest shipping lanes of the world. Historically, the relatively narrow span of navigable water beween the southeastern coast of Vietnam and the "dangerous ground" further to the east has been the main trade link between Europe, Africa, the Middle East, South Asia, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaya, Thailand, and Cambodia on the one hand, and China, Japan, the Philippines, and additional East Asian countries on the other. Ships in this lane also proceed between Southeast Asia and North America.

This was the route used by the great Chinese fleets of the Ming dynasty in the first part of the fifteenth century, when China sent seven large seagoing expeditions to exert influence over such far away places as the Persian Gulf, the Red Sea, and the east coast of Africa. Heading south and west from China on the winds of the northeast monsoon of fall and winter, these impressive ships made landfall at Cu Lao Re, an island off the central coast

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of present-day Vietnam, and then stopped in Qui Nhon,' later to become a major port for logistics and the location of a small base for coastal patrol craft of the United States Navy. With the coming of the southwest monsoon in the spring, these fleets headed back downwind with their cargoes and with tribute-bearing emissaries to pay homage to the Chinese emperor. During these return voyages, the ships made landfall at Cape Varella (Ke Ga) on the coast of Vietnam, and once again put into the harbor at Qui Nhon.

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Vietnam's geography made the area particularly susceptible to the influence of seapower. Even when the many indentations and promontories are not included, the coast measures some 1,500 miles from the Chinese border in the north to Cambodia in the south. As narrow as thirty miles at one point, the S-shaped strip of land that now comprises Vietnam has an average width of only eighty miles. Many rivers wind their way from the mountains down to the sea.

One of these rivers is the mighty Mekong which rises 2,500 miles upstream in the Himalayan Mountains of central Tibet. With a drainage basin larger than the state of Texas, the Mekong proceeds through Yunnan Province of China, forms the border between Laos and Burma and most of Thailand, traverses Cambodia, and at Phnom Penh divides into two arms extending to the South China Sea-the Mekong and the Bassac. Crisscrossed by innumerable waterways, almost the entire region south of Saigon and much of Cambodia consist of a vast delta, the "rice bowl of Asia," formed by the accumulation of silt brought down by the Mekong and its tributaries. Extensive regions of the delta are inundated during the summer months as a result of heavy tropical rains caused by moisture brought from the Indian Ocean by the southwest monsoonal winds. Inland waterways form the main highways in this area for the movement of produce, goods, and

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The Ming fleet is said to have totaled, at its peak, 400 warships, 400 armed "grain-conveyance" ships, 250 great "treasure ships," each carrying 500 men, 3,000 other merchant ships and 2,500 smaller coastal warships. Sixty-two of the ships were reportedly over 500 feet long and 200 feet wide, designed for long voyages with four decks and watertight compartmentation, and equipped with sails which permitted tacking into the wind. Whatever the specifics, these were impressive ships for their day. Charles P. FitzGerald, The Southern Expansion of the Chinese People (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1972), pp. 87–126; Clark G. Reynolds, Command of the Sea; The History and Strategy of Maritime Empires (New York: William Morrow and Co., 1974), pp. 102–04.

* For an account of the expeditions, see Ma Huan, Ying-Yai Sheng-Lan: The Overall Survey of the Ocean's Shores, trans. by Teng Ch'eng-Chun (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1970).

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