Some speculate that the attacks were mounted to test the will of the new U.S. President Richard Nixon who retaliated by secretly bombing PAVN/VC sanctuaries in Cambodia the following month.

Unfortunately, the reporting was delayed and did not reach Long Binh until the morning of 22 February 1969, the day the defector warned the attacks were set to begin.

After sundown on the 22nd, elements of the VC 274th Regiment, 5th Division made their final preparations while occupying three hills along Highway 15 approximately three kilometers south of the base.

That evening, several ambush squads from the 720th Military Police Battalion, 18th MP Brigade kept watch along potential avenues of approach to Long Binh Post.

[1] In the early morning hours of 26 February, a force of approximately 400 men from the VC 275th Regiment, 5th Division, had infiltrated into the tiny village of Thai Hiep on the outskirts of Bien Hoa.

At that time, the air base security forces reported that they had lost contact with the enemy reconnaissance element which withdrew east toward Thai Hiep.

ARVN psychological operations units broadcast repeated loud-speaker appeals and warnings, and all of the remaining villagers and several wounded PAVN/VC evacuated out of Thai Riep.

On 18 February a Company F, 2nd Battalion, 1st Marines called in artillery fire on a group of PAVN/VC 5 km south of Marble Mountain resulting in 21 secondary explosions believed to be from detonating rockets.

A 70-strong VC force attacked the 2/1 Marines command post 6 km south of Marble Mountain losing 17 dead.

[4]: 99 Before dawn on 23 February, the first day of Tết, the PAVN/VC fired 25 122mm rockets at Da Nang's deep water port hitting an ARVN ammunition dump and a fuel tank farm at Da Nang Air Base and cause minor damage to an A-6A and six helicopters at the Air Base.

The last pocket along the An Tan ridgeline proved more difficult and Company L, 3/7 Marines suffered numerous casualties forcing it to withdraw.