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On the evening of 31 December 1965, however, Hissem (DER 400) detected a small trawler heading for shore off the Ca Mau Peninsula. When the trawler's master knew the allies had spotted his ship, he turned it around and headed north, aborting the mission. The first concrete success of the new program occurred in May 1966 when Market Time forces intercepted and destroyed another infiltrating trawler on the coast of An Xuyen Province. The vessel's recovered cargo consisted of mortar and small arms ammunition manufactured in the People's Republic of China during 1965. Again in June, Task force 115 units tracked a steel-hulled vessel that fired on Coast Guard cutter Point League (WPB 82328) before running aground on the south coast of the Mekong Delta. In addition to the damaged ship, the Vietnamese-American defense force captured over 100 tons of munitions destined for the Viet Cong. In December 1966, the Coastal Surveillance Force detected another trawler headed for Binh Dinh Province and forced it to abandon its mission. On the first day of the new year, Swift boats from Coastal Division 13 and Coast Guard cutter Point Gammon (WPB 82304) gave chase to a Communist vessel, compelling the crew to blow up their ship near the mouth of the Bo De River. Completing the year's tally, in March and then in July, Market Time aircraft, ships, and craft prevented two steel-hulled trawlers from landing their cargo on the beaches near Quang Ngai. During this lucrative period of the Market Time patrol from January 1966 to July 1967, many enemy junks and sampans were destroyed, captured, or forced to abort their missions. Most American and Vietnamese patrol vessels now were deployed to coastal waters and functioned with relative efficiency. The combined patrol force inspected or boarded over 700,000 vessels in South Vietnamese coastal waters. From July to the end of 1967, the allies detected no trawlers attempting infiltration. Then, in February 1968, in an apparently desperate attempt to supply Viet Cong forces fighting for survival in the aftermath of the Tet Offensive, the enemy dispatched five ships into South Vietnamese waters. Nearing his destination, the master of the first ship gave up the attempt and shaped course for home. Task Force 115 units forced another ship aground near Danang, where the crew scuttled her. Under fire from American vessels off Ca Mau, a third trawler exploded and sank. The allies forced another ship to beach northeast of Nha Trang and then destroyed her with gunfire. The last ship, spotted from the air out to sea, reversed course and returned north. Following this serious setback for the enemy the Market Time patrol did not discover another infiltrating trawler until August 1969. |
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< | Crewmen of a large Mark V - 45' Picket Boat assigned to Inshore Undersea Warfare Unit 51, based at Vung Ro on the central coast, question Vietnamese civilians about their cargo. |
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A Vietnamese Navy - Mark V Picket Boat - Displacement: approx. 10 tons - Length: 45 feet - Beam: 9 feet - Draft: 3 feet - Propulsion: 2 diesel engines - Speed: 25 kts - Crew: 1 officer + 5 enlisted - Weapons: 2 twin .50 Browning machineguns plus - personal side arms A purpose-built design used for harbor patrol. The first of these boats was delivered to the Inshore Undersea Warfare Group ONE in 1967. The IUWG had five detachments: IUWU-1 Vung Tau, IUWU-2 Cam Ranh Bay, IUWU-3 at Qui Nhon, IUWU-4 at Nha Trang, and IUWU-5 at Vung Ro. Twenty-four picket boats were turned over to the Vietnamese as part of the Accelerated Turn Over to Vietnam (ACTOV) program. This boat is an improved Mk V of the type delivered to the Navy in 1952 by the Hacker Boat Company of Mt. Clemens, MI. |
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> A Navy explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) diver of the Stable Door operation surfaces after searching for enemy swimmers who might attempt to mine one of the allied merchant vessels anchored behind him. | |
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> The merchant ship Green Bay lies on her starboard side at the pier in Qui Nhon after mining by a Communist sapper. The threat to the allied logistic lifeline from enemy saboteurs was real. | |
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> Armed with a Thompson submachine gun and sidearms, U.S. and Vietnamese sailors prepare to board and search a fishing junk. Thousands of such investigations occurred before the patrol force discovered Communist war material. | |
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> "Swift Boat 16" by John Steel | |
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> An enemy ship, one of five intercepted by Market Time forces during early 1968, was later sunk near Nha Trang. | |
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Aside from this crisis-related gamble at Tet, by 1968 the North Vietnamese were deterred from the use of this avenue of seaborne infiltration as a major means of supply. The Coastal Surveillance Force was increasingly effective at intercepting larger vessels and even the more numerous but low cargo capacity junks and sampans. Other factors contributed indirectly to the success of Market Time. From November 1966 on, the Sea Dragon operation off North Vietnam reduced the enemy's coastal traffic. At the same time, the Communists developed less costly and more efficient means for supplying their forces in the South. Beginning in December 1966, and with the tacit agreement of Prince Norodom Sihanouk, the Cambodian head state, the enemy began using the port of Sihanoukville in the supposedly neutral country as a secure transshipment point for munitions destined for the Mekong Delta battleground. Not wanting to widen the war, President Johnson refused to authorize any allied operation to close the port to Communist shipping. In addition, the Ho Chi Minh Trail had become a well-established supply complex that sustained Viet Cong and North Vietnamese units in the I and II Corps Tactical Zones. Nonetheless, the Market Time patrol accomplished it primary mission by deterring the enemy's use of the sea to support the political-military offensive against South Vietnam. |
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