more guerrillas and VCI members, while they weakened civilian confidence in the South Vietnamese Government by continued terrorism and propagan�da. Then, as Grinalds put it, "in July, when we final�ly stepped out, they could come in with their main force units and either act politically or militarily to . . . control the area."29

The enemy throughout I Corps appeared to be com�mitted to low-intensity warfare through terrorism and small hit-and-run attacks. Early in 1971, Lieutenant General Sutherland, the XXIV Corps commander, described the situation for the new commanding general of the 101st Airborne Division:

There has been a marked change in the enemy's strategy and tactics during the past year. Logistical problems and al�lied firepower. among other things, have made maneuver�ing of large enemy troop units impractical, if not impossible, and have caused emphasis to be shifted in the main to small unit and guerrilla tactics. Enemy units generally seek to avoid contact, . ., until they perceive a condition wherein a FWMAF [Free World Military Armed Forces] unit or installation becomes careless and vulnerable. Then they strike quickly and fade away again. Rarely will an enemy unit stand and fight, even against a small opposing force . ..30

As always, the Demilitarized Zone seemed to al�lied commanders to be the one area where the enemy could most easily shift suddenly from guerrilla tactics to large-unit warfare. As 1971 began, reports from a variety of intelligence sources indicated that the North Vietnamese might be planning to do just that. The enemy was moving more troops, weapons, and sup�plies into their Laotian base areas north and west of the DMZ, in easy reach of Quang Tri and Thua Thien, the two vulnerable northern provinces of MR 1. In response to these indications of a possible enemy offensive, by the start of the new year, MACV and XXIV Corps had begun planning a preemptive attack on the Laotian base areas. These plans, about which III MAP as yet knew nothing, were to culminate in one of the largest, most controversial allied offensives of the war.31