SAIGON: The Viet-Cong attacked Saigon in the early hours of this morning [Jan 31] and seized part of the US Embassy. American Military Police tried to storm the embassy as dawn brolce, but were driven bacl( by heavy outbursts of fire from the embassy building.

There is a helicopter landing pad on the roof of the modernistic new embassy building, but helicopters trying to land there were driven off by ground fire from the compound itself.

The attack on the US embassy was apparently made by the Viet-Cong commando teams.

One group blasted a hole in the thick concrete wall which surrounds the windowless embassy and moved into the embassy grounds. Later in the morning US troops recaptured the embassy from the guerrillas after helicopter-borne forces fought their way down. Rockets smashed the big wooden doors of the US embassy. The whole inside of the ground floor was smashed and pieces of marble were everywhere. The embassy seal had been shot to pieces. The US embassy was only opened last October. Agencies