July 6, 1964 - General Maxwell Taylor (right), the new U.S. Ambassador to South Vietnam, arrived in Saigon today amid stringent security precautions.
A crude terrorist bomb was thrown at the American Embassy yesterday.
In his arrival statement, Taylor pledged vigorous implementation in the months to come of a program to defeat the Communist Viet Cong insurgents.
He assured the Vietnamese of “our unstinting support in your struggle against the forces of aggression.
“There is no time limit on that commitment,” he declared.
The bomb tossed at the U.S. Embassy failed to go off, but the man who threw it was not apprehended.
Two other grenades exploded in widely separated sections of the capital.
In related news, 300 South Vietnamese troops, with their backs to flaming barracks, fought off waves of Communist guerrillas making a savage assault today on a U.S. Special Forces camp in the central highlands.
Casualties on both sides ran high, with two Americans killed and four wounded among them. An Australian military adviser also was killed.
The guerrillas launched the attack under cover of a barrage of white phosphorous mortar shells that set buildings ablaze.
Americans at Nam Dong reported that they had counted 49 Communist dead on the barbed wire around the camp.
The two U.S. dead brought the toll of American combat fatalities since late 1961 to 151, with two others missing and presumed dead. Ninety-six other Americans have died in accidents in South Vietnam.
Support this project at patreon.com/realtime1960s
Commenti