Xuan Loc (All Out Defence of Capital City)

ARVN airborne last fight

By the April 14^th, 1975, Xuan Loc was held by the entire ARVN 18th Division, 1st Airborne Brigade, three Ranger battalions and two tank task forces. North Vietnamese Army losses were well over 1200 men, 30 T-55 tanks and over 200 weapons had been captured including a 37mm gun, ten mortars, several recoil less guns and 25 B-40 grenade launchers. The South Vietnamese Air Force had flown two resupply missions into the besieged town; on 12 April, CH-47 helicopters brought in 93 tons of artillery ammunition and on the 13th, 100 tons. The VNAF reactivated some A1-E fighter-bombers and used a modified C-130 transport to drop 15,000-pound bombs (flown in by the U.S. Air Force) on enemy positions. These airplanes flew against some of the most intense antiaircraft fire of the war

While not very far away and far away countries were watching the young soldiers with ARVN Airborne last fight in (now Ho Chi Minh City) Saigon perimeter, miles away, in Saigon, frantic activity prepared for the expected worse, despite the events at Xuan Loc. The inner defenses of Saigon were manned by territorials and a few regular formations, some of which had been recently reconstituted. Three Ranger groups were on the western approaches. The new 8th Ranger Group had its 1,600-man force near Phu Lam on the edge of Saigon where Route 4 enters the city from the Mekong Delta. Southwest of Phu Lam on Route 4 near Binh Chanh was the 6th Ranger Group, recently reorganized with about 2,600 men. North of the city was the newly organized 9th Ranger Group with about 1,900 men protecting Hoc Mon District only five kilometers north of Tan Son Nhut Air Port and Tan Son Nhut Air Base. Each group had four 105-mm. howitzers but little fire-direction equipment, and all were short of radios and machine guns. After a week of resisting all NVA attacks, the 18th Division and others were ordered to start withdrawal to Trang Bom and Bien Hoa. NVA force was growing rapidly. Elements of five NVA divisions were now in Long An and southwestern Hau Nghia: the 3d, 5th, 8th, and 9th Infantry Divisions and the 27th Sapper Division. Additionally, the 262d Antiaircraft Regiment and the 71st Antiaircraft Brigade had batteries near the Long An-Hau Nghia boundary

Once Xuân Lộc fell on 21 April 1975, GEN Theiu resigned the same day, the NVA battled with the last remaining elements of III Corp Armored Task Force, remnants of the 18th Infantry Division, and depleted ARVN Marine, Airborne and Ranger Battalions in a fighting retreat that lasted nine days, until they reached Saigon and NVA armored columns crashed throughout the gates of South Vietnam's Presidential Palace on 30 April 1975 led by victorious NVA GEN Van Tien Dong, effectively ending the long war

NVA GEN Van Tien Dung

REF: Encyclopaedia Britannica

GEN Van Tien Dung (born May 1, 1917, Co Nhue, French Indochina—died March 17, 2002, Hanoi, Vietnam), was one of North Vietnam’s greatest war heroes—a soldier’s soldier who rose to become commander in chief of the North Vietnamese army and lead the final Ho Chi Minh Campaign that captured and occupied Saigon, South Vietnam, in 1975. As a young man, Dung was arrested by French colonial authorities for his Communist Party activities, but he escaped from prison and in 1947 joined GEN. Vo Nguyen Giap’s High Command staff, Dung proved to be an able logistic planner. He was named chief of staff of the People’s Army of Vietnam in 1953 and succeeded Giap as commander in chief in 1975. After the reunification of Vietnam, he served (1980–87) as defense minister. Our Great Spring Victory, Dung’s memoir about the last days of the Vietnam War, was published in 1976.