After some premature attacks on Jan. 30, the offensive began in earnest in the early morning hours of Jan. 31, 1968. About 84,000 NVA and VC troops took advantage of the cease-fire customary during the Lunar New Year celebration, called Tet in Vietnam, to mount more than 150 simultaneous assaults in the South. Many South Vietnamese troops were on holiday leave, and the Communist forces initially enjoyed widespread success. Within days, however, most of the attacks in the smaller towns and hamlets were turned back. Heavy fighting, however, continued at some places in almost all of South Vietnam’s regions, including Saigon, and subsequent phases of the offensive would extend into the early fall months of 1968.
Gen. William Westmoreland, the top general in South Vietnam as head of the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, declared in a statement on Feb. 6 that “the enemy’s treacherous military and terrorist offensive has failed to attain its objective, for which he has paid, and will continue to pay, a tremendous price.” Westmoreland seemed to be saying that the failed Communist attacks represented the “last gasp” of a losing cause.
Americans stunned by the scope and ferocity of the offensive, however, saw not a victorious military but a government that had misled them about allied progress in the war. In November 1967, Westmoreland had raised expectations when he said that Americans were winning the war. What people watched on their television sets every night during the Tet Offensive said otherwise.
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