SPECIAL COMMUNIQUE ON THE NIXON ADMINISTRATION'S DECEMBER 18-29. 19 :1 2 BOMBING OF HAl PHONG PO PULATED AREAS The Apr il r6, r972 savage raid of US B.S2'S on Thuong Ly area and Phuc Lac hamlet (Hai Phong) was still fresh in the memory of the world public when, in the full scale blitz on the DRVN from December 18 to 29. 1972, the Nixon admi nistration once more committed new crimes of the dee pest dye against Hai Phong. This major seaport is North Viet Kam's second biggest city with a millenary history and also an important econom ic and cultural centre. With an area of over r,ooo sq. km, with its 3 large urban districts, 2 towns and 7 suburban districts, it was inhabited by over 1,080,000 people, mostly workers, handicraftsmen and farmers. The population density in some places reached 30,000 per sq.km. Previously, between April 16 and October I, 1972 US planes, B.S2'S included, flew thousands of sorties in
over 230 strikes on the city, during which about 5,000 bombs of various types were dropped, killing thousands of civilians, among them hundreds of women and children in Thuong Ly area and Phuc Loc hamlet. This time, the Nixon clique assaulted Hai Phong with even greater ferocity. According to preliminary figures, in a little over 10 days, 366 aircraft sorties including 45 B.52 and hundreds of F.IlI ones, dumped over 15,000 tons of explosive on nearly 250 places in 48 subquarters (i.e. a little less than one-half of the total of subquarters in the city proper) and bundreds of other places in 55 villages of the 7 suburban districts. Kien An and Do Son towns came repeatedly under fire. 305 people including 49 old-agers, lis women and 76 children were killed and 582 others wounded. Over 5,000 houses were wrecked, hundreds of t hem for the second or third time; as a result, over 5,000 families have become homeless and empty-handed. Hong Bang district, located in the Northeastern part of the city proper, composed of 31 sub-quarters with a population density of 1,500 per sq.km, feu a target to dozens of attacks including two B.52 carpet-bombings. US bombs rained on populous streets: Cu Chinh Lan, Hoang Zieu, Le Dai Hanh, Ho Xuan Huong, Minh Khai, Dinh Tien Hoang, Trang Trinh. Cho Sat, many places in Ha Ly area, along Quang Trung street where Chinese residents lived in large numbers... US large-size bombs also hit the park of the Municipal Theatre Square. One of these falling on a public shelter in the p,rk where many people h,d taken refuge, killed II of them includ ing 8 women and children. Not a few corpses were r I I
1t Ig n 1 " r I \ blasted to pleces. Nothing remained of 34-yeatold "its Phan Thi My's body as well as of her 6-yearold daughter's, Mr Tran Van Lam, N 66 Tran Phu street, having let bis daughter-in-law Vu Tbi Hien and tbe latter 's child have his place in tbe shelter, later found both of tbem dead. In Quang Trung street, a wbole stretcb of nearly I kilometre from sub-quarter 20 to Sat market, was utterly devastated. A bomb, shattering a public sbelter in sub quarter 20, killed 12 people. Among tbese, were 2 of tbe 4 members of tailor At's family; Mr At himself and his surviving cbild were botb seriously wounded. The body of a cbild about 6 years old was burled from the sbelter up on to the roof of a 3 storey house, two adult victims' were flung on the pavement and 7 otbers were crushed under tbe ruin and could not for a long time be pulled out. In Le Chan district, US aircraft bombed Nguyen Duc Canb street, An Zuong market, the An Zuong fish pond and Niem Nghia sub quorter. On the night of December 27, dozens of B.52's saturated a stretch of nea rly Ikm from Tan Lap sub-quarter, through An Zuong and Tien 130 sub-quarters to the workers' living quarters, Out of the 565 households which made up An Zuong sub quarter, Le Chan district, in the Southern part of the city, 153 were hit, with 31 people killed and 37 others injured. Mr Vu Van Chan's family of five was wiped out. A bomb dug a crater 24 feet in depth and 54 feet in diameter right in the middle of his home. Mr Chan's body wa s flung out of the shelter 22 feet away. One of his children, Mrs Vu Thi Coi, 6 months pregnant, had her belly slashed open and her
60 - baby ejected. 3 rows of houses were completely destroyed and 3 others badly damaged. in all. 180 compartments of the An Zuong workers' living quarter. Among the victims, were octogenarian Nguyen Van Son and his wife who were both buried under the rubble from +45 a.m. to 12.30 a.m. The ' latter was dea d long before she wa s unearthed. Con market (I.e Chan district). a crowded place, received dozens of demolition bombs which flatten ed nearly 100 of its stalls. Hundreds of demolition bombs and «Rockeyes» levelled large numbers of houses in Cau Tre area, the glassware factory, Lach Tray street, the Co"g Nlum cinema, Tran Nhat Zuat street, sub quarter 19, Cau Dat street, an over-populated area of Cilgo Quyen district. In sub-quarter 19 (Ngo Quyen district), in a single raid at 3.57 a.m. December 27, 29 people, including 13 women and 2 children, were killed and II7 houses destroy~d. The family of Mr.; Nguyen Thi Niem, 50, N 28. lane 58, Cau Dat street, had 4 of its members killed: the bodies of her husband and 2 children are still missing. Mrs Nguyen Thi Vien and her child, living at a friend's in Cau Dat street after their house in An Zuong had been erased by US bombs, were found dead under a smashed shelter. Mrs Nguyen Thi Ziem, 34, eight months pregnant, in Cau Dat street, received a bomb fragment which slashed open her belly and sent the foetus out. Her 3-year-old daughter was also killed on the s"me occasion.
i US aircraft also dropped dozens of demolition bombs and ca nisters of «Rockeyes» on the Hai Phong harbour where many foreign merchant ships were moored. Two demolition bombs falling on the deck of the Josef Conrad (Poland), destroyed all its riggings, killed 4 people including the secopd captain, and wounded 4 others. The Kilinski (Poland), Kinseng (Great Britain), ;l<iitshurin (USSR), Hongqui 149 (People's Republic of Cbina) were all damaged, Hoa Lien primary school (in the city proper), Thi Duong primary school, Thai Son elementary school (Kien An). the Viet Na m - Czechoslovakia friendship hospital, Nha Ba temple, An Zuong market..., all came under attack. Were also bombed such enterprises as lhe cement plant, the rice-mill, the water works, the spaghetti factory, the January 6 wood processing factory, the woodwork company, the Bach Dang shipyard, the An Zuong swimming pool. US planes struck at 9 portions of river and sea dikes.. The Thuong Ly subordinate dike had a long section damaged. Meanwhile, B.52's and US tactical aircraft also conducled extermination raids on hundreds of places in 55 suburban villages. Many localities were repeatedly blitzed. Scores of B.52 's unloaded hundreds of bombs on Dong Tien, Dong Lam, Trang Cat, Dong Giang villages... The small TrUJlg Lac hamlet, Thuy Trieu village, Thuy Nguyen district, composed. of only 70 dwellings, received as many as 74 bombs which killed 26 people and obliterated all the houses. My Due village (An Thuy) was attacked 8 times in 4 nights.
- bn December Ii alone, US aircraft caused over 50 casualties and wrecked hundreds of dwellings there. Those were the heinous crimes committed by the Nixon clique in a new, exceedingly cruel war escala tion. The deliberate massive use of B.S2's in saturation raids on population centres, economic, cultural and social establishments in large cities to massacre civilians and destroy all their property has left no one in doubt about their obduracy, wickedness and bad faith. But who sows the wind rea ps the whirlwind. US weaponry can in no way bend the iron-like determina tion to resist of the Hai Phong people and of the whole Vietnamese people. Together wit h the armed forces and people of the entire country, the armed forces and people of Hai Phong fought back with great courage. In 12 days from December 18 to 29, they knocked down 17 US planes, induding 4 B.S2 S and I F.IlI, raising US losses in aircraft over Hai Phong up to December 29 to 317. Hai Phong January z, [972.
From May 8 to Octoher 'S, '972, the town was over 50 here. by t he escala.. uration al and civilone in faith. d. US minawhole s and and rage. 0wn sing ber SPECIAL COMMUNIQUE ON THE BLOTTING-OUT OF BAC GIANG TOWN BY US AIRCRAFT (December 18-30, 1972) Bac Giang. capital of Ha Bac province, a political, cconomic and cultural ccnter covering 180,000 sq. m., dwelled by 42,000 people (population density: over 9,000 per sq. km), is composed of 8 quarters: Qnang Trung, Ngo Quyen, Tran Phu, Le Loi, Tien Giang, Zan Chu, Minh Kbai and Dong Tien and 2 suburban villages: Da i\lai and Tho Xuong. subject to '7 air attacks which took a toll of 37 killed, 58 wounded and 625 houses demolished or seriously damaged. In particular, since December 18, 1972, the US aggressors day and night set strategic B.52'S upon Ha Bac province ami its capital with an unprecedented ferocity and on an ever larger scale. Against Bac Giang town alone, they ftew 74 aircraft sorties, including 54 8.52 ones, in 16 raids, showering 2,650 demolition and blast
localities such as Nui and Chuac hamlets (Tan Son con- ing ral 8 to ilian and elises, arhe gh U d is, civilians (a mong them 29 women and children) and injuring 36 others. Of the 7 members of lifr Thu's family in Tien Giang quarter, 6 were killed. Mr Thu was seriously injured. A US bomb smashed the shelter of Mr Lac's family, killing 5 of its 6 members and gravely wounding Mr Lac. US hardware also killed many pregnant women, babies in their cradles and orphaned many children. Next, at 0.50 a.m. December 2I, in another raid on Bac Giang,9 B.S2'S flying in 3 groups, saturated stretches from the Southern part of Ha Vi hamlet to the stadium, from Thong Nhat street to Le Loi and Tran Phu quarters and from Xau hamlet, Da Mai village, to Bun sluice, with over 200 tons of bombs, destroying hur. dreds of houses and causing dozens of casualties. As far as the whole province of Ha Bac is concerned, from December 18 to 30, 1972, 45 sorties of strategic B.S2'S and 108 sorties of tactical jets dropped 4,S26 bombs of different kinds on Luc Nam, Son Dong, Luc Ngan, Lang Giang, Que Vo, Yen Zung, Yen Phong, Tien Son and Viet Yen districts and Bac Giang town, killing over 200 people and wounding 207 others, mostly women and children. Apart from the erasure of Bac Giang town, US aircraft blotted out many populous areas in the province such as : Xam and Leo hamlets (Tan Thinh village), Than, Dong Khuon, Dong No, Bai Mia and Yen Ninh hamlets, Yen My and Quang Thinb villages (Lang Giang districtl, Heavy destruction was wrought upon many