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A second Marine company was sent west to outflank Trung An, and soon was pinned down itself in the village of An Hoa. The fire was so heavy that rescue and supply choppers were driven off, and soon the Marines were without food or water, sucking bamboo for moisture. A third company finally broke through and managed to pull its casualties back into a nearby church. All that day mortars crashed around it, but none hit the roof. Even so, it was more than 40 hours before enough helicopters could get in to evacuate all the wounded. The next morning, the Marines blew up all the gear and extra ammunition that they could not carry and fought their way clear, carrying their dead in litters. Then the assault continued northward, though some 40% of the Marine force was killed or wounded*—many from mortar fire from the DMZ.
The assault on the DMZ itself began on the eve of Ho Chi Minh's 77th birthday. Dawn broke over a formidable invasion fleet steaming slowly off the coast. Two cruisers and five destroyers turned broadside to begin the softening-up bombardment of the shore line in the heaviest concentration of naval gunfire since the Korean War, while the amphibious assault boats swarmed in. Waves of troop-packed helicopters rose from the deck of the carrier Okinawa. The amphibious troops and their tanks, tractors and guns came ashore, meeting with little resistance. For the heliborne assault forces, it was another story.
Free Bombing Zone. The first landing zone, Goose, was only a mile south of the Ben Hai River. It was an enemy hornets' nest, and only 75 Marines were unloaded before they came under withering fire. The rest of the Marines sped to the secondary landing zone, Owl, and disembarked easily, but the men at Goose simply dug into the sand dunes and waited for their buddies on the beach to catch up with them. Then the advancing Marines hit the hole-to-hole kind of fighting that they have become accustomed to in recent weeks. Snipers would begin spitting at the Americans; when the Marines went after them, they turned out to be decoys that led the U.S. troops into machine-gun fire.
The Marines not only had an estimated two companies of North Vietnamese to cope with but also the civilians living in the DMZ. Part of Hickory's mission is to remove the estimated 11,000 villagers living in the DMZ and resettle them farther south, thus creating a free bombing zone in the buffer strip; the South Vietnamese force that moved up Route 1 had part of the same mission. The Marine force that helicoptered in north of Con Thien faced little opposition, but it quickly uncovered proof of Hanoi's plans for a major offensive out of the DMZ: a vast depot of North Vietnamese equipment ranging from rockets, mortars and antitank mines to rice and medical equipment.