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144 Muõ Ñoû 72
There were “too many to count”, he said. But he was positive no one was
able to escape.
He is Le Xuan Thuy, a 22-year-old North Vietnamese Army draftee and
he was speaking not of the ARVN (Army of the Republic of Vietnam)
soldiers his regiment did battle within Quang-Tri fve months ago but of
civilian refugees who lost out in
their bid for safety in the North’s invasion of the South last Easter.
The slaughter, he told a press conference in Saigon on September 8, was
the major factor why he decided to defect to the South. He made it last
‘July 31 and for the frst time. a skeptical western press confrmed drom
the horse’s mouth” the truth of
the NVA massacres on Highway 1 heretofore treated only lightly as unsub-
stantiated claims”.
Defeeiors there have been, but none with as crucial a story as Thuy, a ra-
dio operator of the 4th Battalion, 2nd Regiment of the North Vietnamese
Army’s 324th Division which executed the slaughter.
Allied offcials, as early as August, protested both at the forum of the Paris
peace talks and in offcial statements to the press, about the slaughter of
“1,000 to 2,000” innocent refugees feeing beleaguered Quang-Tri but the
charges were met with deafening silence by the North Vietnamese.
An unbelieving western press abetted the situation and was it not for Thuy,
the crime would have been consigned to limbo. In part, it was probably the
monstrosity of the slaughter, its magnitude that prompted open skepticism
even among the hard-bitten Saigon press corps.
AMBUSH SET UP
Thuy, a short, medium built fellow who could not keep still as he faced the
press, recalled that his division took up positions 100 to 150 yards from
Highway 1 on April 28. Only a year earlier, he was drafted into the NVA.
The following day, his battalion commander told them that anyone mov-
ing southward from Quang-Tri was “the enemy”. From that date to May 3,
just before and after the fall of Quang Tri city, many soldiers and civilians
were pouring south out of the fallen city. It was then that the slaughter
Nhöõng ngöôøi vôï lính - Vaän nöôùc, phaän ngöôøi
There were “too many to count”, he said. But he was positive no one was
able to escape.
He is Le Xuan Thuy, a 22-year-old North Vietnamese Army draftee and
he was speaking not of the ARVN (Army of the Republic of Vietnam)
soldiers his regiment did battle within Quang-Tri fve months ago but of
civilian refugees who lost out in
their bid for safety in the North’s invasion of the South last Easter.
The slaughter, he told a press conference in Saigon on September 8, was
the major factor why he decided to defect to the South. He made it last
‘July 31 and for the frst time. a skeptical western press confrmed drom
the horse’s mouth” the truth of
the NVA massacres on Highway 1 heretofore treated only lightly as unsub-
stantiated claims”.
Defeeiors there have been, but none with as crucial a story as Thuy, a ra-
dio operator of the 4th Battalion, 2nd Regiment of the North Vietnamese
Army’s 324th Division which executed the slaughter.
Allied offcials, as early as August, protested both at the forum of the Paris
peace talks and in offcial statements to the press, about the slaughter of
“1,000 to 2,000” innocent refugees feeing beleaguered Quang-Tri but the
charges were met with deafening silence by the North Vietnamese.
An unbelieving western press abetted the situation and was it not for Thuy,
the crime would have been consigned to limbo. In part, it was probably the
monstrosity of the slaughter, its magnitude that prompted open skepticism
even among the hard-bitten Saigon press corps.
AMBUSH SET UP
Thuy, a short, medium built fellow who could not keep still as he faced the
press, recalled that his division took up positions 100 to 150 yards from
Highway 1 on April 28. Only a year earlier, he was drafted into the NVA.
The following day, his battalion commander told them that anyone mov-
ing southward from Quang-Tri was “the enemy”. From that date to May 3,
just before and after the fall of Quang Tri city, many soldiers and civilians
were pouring south out of the fallen city. It was then that the slaughter
Nhöõng ngöôøi vôï lính - Vaän nöôùc, phaän ngöôøi
