Though the DRV intelligence network had gotten wind of the operation two days earlier, a communication snafu meant that the information reached Bac Kan just as the French were launching the attack. Ho and Giap managed to get away, but with only minutes to spare. They were forced to leave behind arms and munitions caches as well as stacks of secret documents. One senior DRV official, the well-known scholar Nguyen Van To, was killed by paratroopers as he tried to escape.
