Staff Sgt. Arsenault's Heroic Month in Vietnam (MAY 1972)
By 1972, the United States had already begun its slow withdrawal from South Vietnam and was preparing the country to take responsibility for its own combat operations. As early as 1967, the Military Assistance Command-Vietnam had established the Civil Operations and Rural Development Support (CORDS) program to “win hearts and minds” and to heighten security and legitimacy of local governments. Theoretically, this would help neutralize communist influence in the rural provinces.
Advisory teams in the provinces advised and trained the Regional Forces (RF) charged with defending the villages against communist infiltration missed by Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) forces. These teams were typically comprised of two American officers, three or four American senior noncommissioned officers, and a South Vietnamese interpreter. They coordinated U.S. air and artillery support when necessary, oversaw civil affairs, and established communication networks. Since 1969, Team 43 had been operating with CORDS in Hau Nghia Province. Located between the Cambodian border and Saigon, this province was considered one of the most contested regions in South Vietnam.
In late March 1972, the 28-year-old Arsenault, a Massachusetts native, arrived in Saigon and was assigned to Team 43. A light weapons infantryman skilled in close combat, Arsenault was thrilled to be on his first Vietnam deployment after years of being denied assignment to the warzone. As Team 43’s operations intelligence sergeant, Arsenault advised the province’s RF units on planning combat and intelligence operations. The Province G-2, then Capt. (later Col.) Stuart Herrington, described the sergeant as “heavyset, gentle, and blessed with a good sense of humor.” Arsenault taught himself the Vietnamese language, making him “an instant hit with the people.”
About the time of Arsenault’s arrival in country, North Vietnamese forces launched what became known as the Easter Offensive and, by May, had overrun ARVN positions in the northern provinces. Meanwhile, in Hau Nghia, on 11 May, three North Vietnamese Army (NVA) regiments advanced into Duc Hue and Trang Bang districts. The following three weeks of fighting, Herrington later wrote, “culminated in the withdrawal of the bloodied invaders,” and earned the provincial forces “the reputation of being the best in Vietnam.”
During one confrontation, on 12 May 1972, Sergeant Arsenault volunteered as the radio telephone operator for an RF unit on a combat operation against entrenched NVA forces in Duc Hue. The fight evolved into close combat, and Arsenault and the rest of the lead element were flanked by eight NVA soldiers. The intelligence sergeant’s aggressive counterattack “with grenades and his M-16” allowed the RF unit to overrun the enemy’s position. For his inspiring “calm and courage under fire,” Arsenault earned a Silver Star.
Two weeks later, on May 26, Arsenault and Capt. (later Col.) Francis “Ed” Schwabe, a 1969 West Point graduate who had joined Team 43 about the same time as Arsenault, accompanied an RF unit on a reconnaissance-in-force mission. The unit encountered another entrenched enemy force near a graveyard alongside the road. Seeing a flash from the firing of an 80mm rocket-propelled grenade, Arsenault knocked Schwabe out of the way and took the full force of the round, dying instantly. The team’s interpreter pulled a dazed Schwabe out of danger behind a grave marker, and after recovering, the captain organized the RF to return fire. Under fire himself, Schwabe retrieved Arsenault’s body, called in airstrikes, and withdrew the unit from contact. Schwabe received a Silver Star that day, while Sergeant Arsenault was awarded a posthumous Distinguished Service Cross for his sacrifice. His death brought tears to many of the Vietnamese, which Herrington called “no small tribute in a district where death in battle had become an everyday event.”
The NVA regiments pulled out of Hau Nghia Province in mid-July, but the fight for control there would continue, even after all American troops were withdrawn from South Vietnam. Arsenault’s body was returned to the U.S. and laid to rest in Mount Zion Cemetery in Webster, Massachusetts.
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Article by Lori S. Stewart, USAICoE Command Historian. New issues of This Week in MI History are published each week. To report story errors, ask questions, request previous articles, or be added to our distribution list, please contact: TR-ICoE-Command-Historian@army.mil.
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