The Vietnam War: II Trivia Quiz

Answer: General Frederick Karch

**General Nathan Twining was in the airforce. From 1953 until 1957 he was the Chief of Staff for the US Airforce
**Harkins was the first commander of MAC-V, he was eventually replaced by General Westmoreland.
**General Frederick Karch stepped ashore with the Marines on 8 March 1965. Instead of being greeted by gunfire and explosions they were greeted with flowers, banners and smiling people. Karch was photographed looking very unhappy with a garland of flowers draped around his neck. He stated that the photograph was the source of a lot of trouble for him and people would ask why he was not smiling. In response he was quoted as saying "If I had to do it over, that picture would have been the same. When you have a son in Vietnam and he gets killed, you don't want a smiling general with flowers around his neck as leader at that point."

Answer: Military Assistance Command - Vietnam

**MACV was the Military Assistance Command-Vietnam. It was based at the Tan Son Nhut Airbase. It was first established in 1962 and wound up in 1973. Over the years it was commanded by Generals Harkins, Westmoreland, Abrams and Weyand.
**MACV controlled all the US Military Forces that were in Vietnam and reported to the Commander in Chief, Pacific (CINCPAC).

Answer: Da Nang

**Pleiku is central highland region of Vietnam.
**Vũng Tàu is a port town about 125 km from Saigon (Now called Ho Chi Minh City). During the war Vũng Tàu was a Rest and Recreation (R&R) site for US troops. Australian troops were also based at Vũng Tàu.
**The former imperial city of Hué was the national capital city until 1945. It was one of the cities attacked during the Tet Offensive of 1968.
**Da Nang has one of the best beaches in Vietnam called China Beach. US troops also used China Beach as an R&R location.

Answer: Coral

**The Battle for FSB Coral (and later FSB Balmoral on 26 May) was the largest battle Australian forces were involved in during the Vietnam War. The firebase was located in the Bin Hoa area. FSB Balmoral was north of FSB Carol. A Howitzer used during the battle at FSB Coral can now been seen at the Australian War Memorial. 25 Australian soldiers died during the action. For those interested in the battle you can visit these websites for more information:
http://www.defence.gov.au/army/1rar/history.htm
http://www.awm.gov.au/encyclopedia/coral/

**The 101st Airborne Division took on the NVA during the Battle of FSB Ripcord in 1970. The 23 day battle was the last major confrontation between the forces of the USA and the NVA.

** FSB Crook was northwest of Tay Ninh city approximately four miles from the Cambodian border.

Answer: Vendetta

** HMAS Vendetta (II) became part of Australian naval history by becoming the first all-Australian ship to serve in a combat zone. She was commissioned on 26 November 1958. The Vendetta was the first and only 'Daring' Class Destroyer of the Royal Australian Navy to go to war.
**USS Canberra - The ships bell was presented to the Australian Government in 2001 as part of the 50th anniversary of the ANZUS Treaty (Australia, New Zealand, United States). It can been seen on display at the Australian Maritime Museum in Sydney, Australia. The Canberra was used for shelling enemy positions in both North and South Vietnam.
**USS New Jersey - At the time of deployment to Vietnam the USS New Jersey was the world's only active battleship.
**The USS C Turner Joy was involved in the Gulf of Tonkin Incident. She was named after Admiral Charles Turner Joy of the US Navy.

Answer: The Black Tigers

**The Black Tigers were considered to be among the most reliable South Vietnamese troops in Vietnam.

Answer: Ho Thi Que was captured by the enemy and executed at the end of the war

Ho Thi Que was indeed a woman. She fought alongside her husband, Major Le Van Dan, who commanded the unit. She was known as "The Tiger Lady" and "The Tiger Lady of the Mekong Delta". The VC named her "Madame Death".
She died after being killed by her husband, who shot her. The husband claimed self defence stating that she attacked him with a knife after seeing him with a younger woman.

Answer: The first Buddhist Monk to self-immolate

**Nguyen Van Cu did bomb the Presidential Palace on 27 February 1962 in a skyraider plane. He fled to Cambodia and returned to Saigon after the war only to be arrested and sent away for re-education.
**Xuan Thuy headed the first North Vietnamese delegation at the Paris Peace talks and was assisted by Le Duc Tho
**General Le Nguyen Vy was deemed to be one of the few South Vietnamese generals that were incorruptible. He killed himself rather than surrender to the NVA
**Thich Quang Duc decided to self-immolate as a protest against President Diem of South Vietnam. 30 more nuns and Buddhist monks followed Duc's lead and did the same.

Answer: Thailand

Thailand was an ally of the US and let US bombers operate from their airbases. Thailand was also a member of SEATO (Southeast Asia Treaty Organisation).

Answer: The Street Without Joy

The name was adopted by French Soldiers when they were fighting the Viet Minh. During the Vietnam War it was swarming with Viet Cong. Bernard B. Fall was a war correspondent and was killed on the "Street Without Joy". His final words into a tape recorder were, "We've reached one of our phase lines after the fire fight and it smells bad--meaning it's a little bit suspicious ... Could be an amb--".

He then stepped on a mine.

Answer: Operation Keystone

Operation Keystone was used in conjunction with the name of a bird that was allocated to each major ground unit about to be withdrawn. For example:
-Operation Keystone Robin was the withdrawal of the 3rd Marine Division.
-Operation Keystone Blue Jay, Operation Keystone Eagle, etc.

Answer: PSYOPS

**PSYOPS operations used many tactics including leaflet drops and loudspeaker recordings. More than 50 billion leaflets were dropped over Vietnam.
**Recordings of prisoners and those from the Chieu Hoi (Open Arms) program were broadcast from speakers mounted to aircraft.
**Recordings of the 'Wandering Soul' (Eerie sounds designed to represent souls of the enemy dead and play on superstitions) were played to strike fear into the VC/NVA.
**The Chieu Hoi program was designed to encourage defections from the VC/NVA onto the allied side.

Answer: Robert F. Kennedy

**Martin Luther King was assassinated on April 4, 1968 in Memphis, Tennessee.
**John F. Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963, in Dallas, Texas.
**Malcolm X was assassinated on February 21, 1965. He was shot once with a shotgun and then 16 times with a handgun.
**Robert F. Kennedy was originally a supporter of President Johnson's position, he later called for negotiations to end the war in an honourable manner.

Answer: Milhous

"Tricky Dick", as his nickname was known, was the 37th President of the USA. He took over the reins of Lyndon B Johnson (LBJ). Prior to that he was the Vice President for Eisenhower and supported military intervention in Vietnam. He was responsible for the "Vietnamization" of the war and authorised secret bombing missions in Cambodia.

Answer: A US soldier desperately trying to find a heartbeat on a dead friend on Hill 881

**In 1967 Toshio Sakai took the picture entitled "Dreams of Better Times" that portrayed a soldier sleeping while another soldier keeps watch during a monsoon downpour.
**Nguyen Kong (Nick) Ut took the photo of the naked child after a napalm attack on June 8, 1972. Ut was born in Long An, Vietnam and started taking photographs at the tender age of 16 for Associated Press.
**At 21 years of age French photographer, Catherine Leroy, arrived in Vietnam. She was the only accredited journalist to take part in a combat parachute jump during Operation Junction City. Her most famous photograph is called "Corpsman In Anguish" and was taken in 1967. It shows Vernon Wike on Hill 881 near Khe Sanh desperately trying to find a heartbeat on a dead friend. This photo did not earn her a Pulitzer Prize but still remains a famous photo of the war. She was captured by the NVA during the Tet Offensive and after talking her way out of a sticky situation she returned with photos of the NVA in action.
**Eddie Adams took a photo of a South Vietnamese Police Chief (General Nguyen Ngoc Loan) executing a VC suspect during the Tet Offensive. The suspect was Nguyen Van Lem who had just finished executing the families of South Vietnamese police officers. Nguyen Loan ended up in the US managing a pizza shop.