>> Part 1: The grasshopper versus the elephant
>> Part 2: Tunnels and trenches
>> Part 3: The battle of Dien Bien Phu
>> Part 4: Bleeding the elephant
>> Part 5: Those are hills with a strong burning smell
It was Saturday morning, March 13. The sky was cloudy and the air was cool and damp. The entire forest was covered in shades of bluish grey. Monkeys could be seen resting quietly on the branches in the mist. In the trees covering the slopes of the surrounding circles of steep hills, flocks of mountain birds were chirping and singing. Some were spreading and preening their feathers.
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| Viet Minh’s supply route to Dien Bien Phu |
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| One of the aircrafts loaned by the CIA to French forces at Dien Bien Phu. |
Suddenly hellfire entered the valley, frightening away all the wild creatures.
With heavy artillery from the overlooking ridges, the Viet Minh began systematically shelling Muong Thanh airfield. By midday, three aircraft were on fire and others sustained crippling damage. Even more serious for the French was the damage to the runway, their lifeline. One French company and two tanks retaliated, while the Viet Minh continued with their attacks on the airstrips and the northern outpost Beatrice.
At half-past one in the afternoon, under the now intense blue sky and white clouds, the bombardment of Beatrice gradually increased in volume and went on for two hours without interruption. The French colonel in charge of this outpost and his deputy were killed in a direct hit on their bunker. The French liaison staff tried to call for artillery support but the communication lines were down. Suffering a crisis with their fuel systems from the night before, French troops failed to respond to the shockingly large scale of attacks.
At five-thirty, all the hills appeared prominently against an orange-red horizon. All of a sudden, the whole hillside of Beatrice was filled with several battalions of Viet Minh troops in light green uniforms and palm-leaf helmets. Each man and woman held a rifle with fixed bayonet. They had quietly emerged from the trenches around the foot of the hill. Stunned by the effect, the French tried to attack them with heavy mortar fire, but it was too late. They were outnumbered and the outpost was taken – an event so shocking to the French that it would cause a massive loss of morale.
At seven-thirty, as darkness fell, the Viet Minh achieved direct artillery hits on the French aviation fuel and napalm dumps. Above Beatrice, giant orange flames were rising rapidly and brightly lit the evening sky. The intense burning continued through the night.
By half-past ten, the temperature had dropped to bring freezing fog. In the dark of night, heavy shells fell all over the French outposts, ploughed up the earth, crumbled the dugouts, leveled the trenches, wrecked the weapons, and killed and wounded many of the French troops. The earsplitting sounds were accompanied by a mixture of red dust and acrid cordite fumes. Inside various command bunkers the earth was shaking violently. The bunkers were rocking and shifting back and forth, pieces of furniture were crashing into one another, objects were falling and flying from walls and ceilings, and people were falling on top of each other.
In the centre of the camp, a lieutenant colonel was taking a shower outside when the shells began to burst nearby. He ran naked toward his base to make a telephone call to his battalion commanders but the line had been cut off. The entire French soldiery had been forced – with great suddenness - to come to terms with the full impending horrors implied by the awesome weight of the Viet Minh’s artillery and its positioning. And this was only the very first day of the battle.
At midnight, the shelling stopped. Colonel Mac Ninh, now in command of Beatrice, sent a message to Colonel de Castries:
“Following orders from our superior, I inform you that at 8 o’clock tomorrow morning you and your people are allowed to bring in one un-armed platoon and ambulances to collect your wounded men. Someone must be holding a white flag before entering Him Lam (Beatrice).”
Colonel de Castries faced the crisis with little help from his commanders. Lieutenant Colonel Keller, Chief of Staff, suffered a nervous breakdown and would hide in the deepest dugout, wearing a steel helmet. Colonel Piroth went into a severe depression, leaving all artillery decisions to a deputy. Lieutenant Colonel Langlais, Chief of Operations, became confused and enraged. Even Miss Bourgeade had been badly injured.
The sun rose early on March 14.
The central camp was quiet and ghostly. French troops gazed silently at the massive destruction of the bombardment. The entire earth was pocked with deep craters. Broken vehicles, burst sand bags, shell cases, chairs, tables, lamps, boxes, tin cans… were scattered everywhere. The air was thick with a strong smell of burnt petrol and charring. A group of weary legionnaires were wrapping up dead bodies in ponchos before carrying them to a morgue behind the field hospital. The morgue was a simple dugout filled with plank coffins. It was completely full with bodies and more than a hundred corpses were placed on the bare ground. Many wounded were on lying on stretchers, waiting.
The chaplain of the Foreign Legion, Farther Trinquant, accompanied a medical officer and three vehicles under the Red Cross flag to pick up the bodies of legionnaires lying unburied in the open around the strongpoints. The Viet Minh had already removed their own casualties in the night.
Major Doctor Paul Grauwin requested a special aircraft to transport some seriously wounded men and Miss Bourgeade out of Dien Bien Phu for medical treatment. Colonel de Castries himself bundled his secretary into the aircraft against her will. She had refused to leave the terrain.
In the early morning of March 15, the Viet Minh took complete control of another northern outpost, Gabrielle. Several commanders showed more signs of confusion and depression. At midnight, Colonel Piroth committed suicide with a hand grenade.
Unable to transport the dead to the designated cemetery, on March 18, Colonel de Castries ordered that those killed in action were to be buried on the battlefield, in mass graves scooped by a bulldozer.
During a radio-telephone conversation with Major General Cogny on Macrh 19, Colonel de Castries informed him that the southern outpost Isabelle would be taken by the Viet Minh any time. Five days later, Lieutenant Colonel Keller was flown out of Dien Bien Phu quietly in an ambulance aircraft.
As the French crisis deepened, the US government moved urgently to support them. Under ‘Operation Vulture’, on March 24, American troops arrived with 60 bombers B-29 from the US Far East Air Force base in the Philippines. They started bombing the Viet Minh’s supply routes leading to Dien Bien Phu.
In three consecutive days and nights, the combined French and American forces mounted 750 heavy bombing raids on the Viet Minh’s zone, killing thousands of people – including women, children and elderly on bicycles.