Weapons Used During the War
The aircraft ordnance used during the war included precision-guided munitions, cluster bombs, and napalm, which is a thickening/gelling agent generally mixed with petroleum or a similar fuel for use in an incendiary device. It was initially used against buildings and later primarily as an anti-personnel weapon that sticks to skin and can burn down to the bone. Communist forces were mainly armed with Chinese and Soviet weaponry. The Soviet AK-47 was widely regarded as the best assault rifle of the war, due to its ability to continue to function even in adverse, muddy conditions. It was not uncommon to see U.S. Special Forces fighting with captured AK-47s. Other weapons used by the Viet Cong included the PPSh-41 submachine gun , the Scorpion vz. 61 submachine gun, the DShK heavy machine gun and the Stechkin APS machine pistol. While the Viet Cong had both amphibious tanks and light tanks they also used human-powered vehicles such as bicycles to transport munitions. Bicycles carried up to 400 pounds of weight and were thus effective in transporting munitions. The M60 machine gun GPMG (General Purpose Machine Gun) was the main machine gun of the US army at the time and many of them were put on helicopters, to provide suppressive fire when landing in hostile regions. The Claymore M18A1, an anti-personnel mine, was widely used during the war. Unlike a conventional land mine, the Claymore was a command-detonated and directional, meaning it is fired by remote-control and shoots a pattern of metal balls into the kill zone like a shotgun.
By: Rachel E.