It was a two-part battle which took place from November 14 to 18, 1965 at the la Drang Valley, South Vietnam. Strategically, however, the withdrawal meant little. [65] The fighting and shelling on 21 January resulted in 14 Marines killed and 43 wounded. The 1968 Battle of Khe Sanh was the longest, deadliest and most controversial of the Vietnam War, pitting the U.S. Marines and their allies against the North Vietnamese Army. The PAVN infantry, though bracketed by artillery fire, still managed to penetrate the perimeter of the defenses and were only driven back after severe close-quarters combat. Hundreds of mortar rounds and 122-mm rockets slammed into the base, levelling most of the above-ground structures. [170][140], One argument that was then leveled by Westmoreland and has since often quoted by historians of the battle is that only two Marine regiments were tied down at Khe Sanh, compared with the several PAVN divisions. Lownds also rejected a proposal to launch a helicopter extraction of the survivors. He made his final appearance in the story of Khe Sanh on 23 May, when his regimental sergeant major and he stood before President Johnson and were presented with a Presidential Unit Citation on behalf of the 26th Marines. [75] On 22 January, the first sensor drops took place, and by the end of the month, 316 acoustic and seismic sensors had been dropped in 44 strings. Then, on the morning of 6 February, the PAVN fired mortars into the Lang Vei compound, wounding eight Camp Strike Force soldiers. But only by checking my service record while writing this article did it become evident that I had participated in all three operations. [66] Hours after the bombardment ceased, the base was still in danger. Throughout the battle, Marine artillerymen fired 158,891 mixed rounds. Two Marines died. That was superseded by the smaller contingency plans. In March 1968, an overland relief expedition (Operation Pegasus) was launched by a combined MarineArmy/ARVN task force that eventually broke through to the Marines at Khe Sanh. [1] According to Brush, it was "the only occasion in which Americans abandoned a major combat base due to enemy pressure" and in the aftermath, the North Vietnamese began a strong propaganda campaign, seeking to exploit the US withdrawal and to promote the message that the withdrawal had not been by choice. U.S. Marines and their allies killed thousands of NVA, but to solve the riddle of Khe Sanh, you have to recount the numbers. [166] This view was supported by a captured North Vietnamese study of the battle in 1974 that stated that the PAVN would have taken Khe Sanh if it could have done so, but there was a limit to the price that it would pay. Early in the war US forces had established a garrison at Khe Sanh in Quang Tri province, in the . Find many great new & used options and get the best deals for The Hill Fights: The First Battle of Khe Sanh by Murphy, Edward F. (mass_market) at the best online prices at eBay! "[73], Nevertheless, ultimately the nuclear option was discounted by military planners. Cushman was appalled by the "implication of a rescue or breaking of the siege by outside forces. [29], During the second half of 1967, the North Vietnamese instigated a series of actions in the border regions of South Vietnam. Stubbe examined the command chronologies of the 1st and 2nd battalions, 26th Marines, plus the after-action reports of the 3rd Battalion, 26th Marines; 1st Battalion, 9th Marines; 1st Battalion, 13th Marines; and more than one dozen other units, all present at Khe Sanh under 26th Marine operational control. This caused problems for the Marine command, which possessed its own aviation squadrons that operated under their own close air support doctrine. 239240. The NVA continued shelling the base, and on July 1 launched a company-sized infantry attack against its perimeter. [122], In late February, ground sensors detected the 66th Regiment, 304th Division preparing to mount an attack on the positions of the 37th ARVN Ranger Battalion on the eastern perimeter. In fact, neither side won a resounding victory. Just days before, as the Army of the . [90], The Tet Offensive was launched prematurely in some areas on 30 January. [156] Correspondent Michael Herr reported on the battle, and his account would inspire the surreal "Do Long Bridge" scene in the film Apocalypse Now, which emphasized the anarchy of the war. On July 11, the Marines finally left Khe Sanh. By early 1967, the Marine position was reinforced to regimental strength. [12], General Creighton Abrams also suggested that the North Vietnamese may have been planning to emulate Dien Bien Phu. When the weather later cleared in March, the amount was increased to 40 tons per day. [152] The Marines occupied Hill 950 overlooking the Khe Sanh plateau from 1966 until September 1969 when control was handed to the Army who used the position as a SOG operations and support base until it was overrun by the PAVN in June 1971. For some unknown reason, the PAVN troops did not press their advantage and eliminate the pocket, instead throwing a steady stream of grenades at the Marines. Rod Andrew, Jr., a history professor at Clemson University and colonel in the Marine Corps Reserve, has written an easily read and thoroughly . By late January 1967, the 1/3 returned to Japan and was relieved by Bravo Company, 1st Battalion, 9th Marines (1/9 Marines). [12], Following the closure of the base, a small force of Marines remained around Hill 689 carrying out mopping-up operations. This fighting was heavy, involving South Vietnamese militia as well as U.S. Army MACV advisers and Marines attached to a Combined Action Company platoon. [59], During the rainy night of 2 January 1968, six men dressed in black uniforms were seen outside the defensive wire of the main base by members of a listening post. If that failed, and it did, they hoped to attack American reinforcements along Route 9 between Khe Sanh and Laos. "[136], Regardless, on 1 April, Operation Pegasus began. As the relief force made progress, the Marines at Khe Sanh moved out from their positions and began patrolling at greater distances from the base. For example, I served with a Marine heavy mortar battery at Khe Sanh during the siege. Westmoreland believed that the latter was the case, and his belief was the basis for his desire to stage "Dien Bien Phu in reverse. [167], Another theory is that the actions around Khe Sanh and the other battles at the border were simply feints ands ruse meant to focus American attention and forces on the border. The explanations given out by the Saigon command were that "the enemy had changed his tactics and reduced his forces; that PAVN had carved out new infiltration routes; that the Marines now had enough troops and helicopters to carry out mobile operations; that a fixed base was no longer necessary. 1st Marine Aircraft Wing records claim that the unit delivered 4,661 tons of cargo into KSCB. But Pisor also pointed out that 205 is a completely false number. One had to meet certain criteria before being officially considered KIA at Khe Sanh. At dawn on 21 January, it was attacked by a roughly 300-strong PAVN battalion. At least 852 PAVN soldiers were killed during the action, as opposed to 50 American and South Vietnamese. As far as PAVN casualties were concerned, 1,602 bodies were counted, seven prisoners were taken, and two soldiers defected to allied forces during the operation. [67], At the same time as the artillery bombardment at KSCB, an attack was launched against Khe Sanh village, seat of Hng Ha District. The Battle of Khe Sanh began on January 21, 1968, when forces from the People's Army of North Vietnam (PAVN) carried out a massive artillery bombardment on the U.S. Marine garrison at Khe Sanh, located in South Vietnam near the border with Laos. Further information on the bombing campaign: Further information on the electronic sensor system: Westmoreland's plan to use nuclear weapons, President Johnson orders that the base be held at all costs, Operation Charlie: evacuation of the base. Historians have observed that the Battle of Khe Sanh may have distracted American and South Vietnamese attention from the buildup of Viet Cong (VC) forces in the south before the early 1968 Tet Offensive. Subscribe to receive our weekly newsletter with top stories from master historians. See also Pisor, p. 108. [35], American intelligence analysts were quite baffled by the series of enemy actions. The battalion was assaulted on the night of 23 January by three PAVN battalions supported by seven tanks. The Hill Fights (also known as the First Battle of Khe Sanh) was a battle during the Vietnam War between the People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) 325C Division and United States Marines on several hill masses north of the Khe Sanh Combat Base in northwest Qung Tr Province . The Marine defense of Khe Sanh, Operation Scotland, officially ended on March 31. Marine Khe Sanh veteran Peter Brush is Vietnam Magazines book review editor. "[106] At the end of January, Tompkins had ordered that no Marine patrols proceed more than 500 meters from the Combat Base. Military History Institute of Vietnam, pp. [48][Note 4], Not all leading Marine officers, however, had the same opinion. [158] The question, known among American historians as the "riddle of Khe Sanh," has been summed up by John Prados and Ray Stubbe: "Either the Tet Offensive was a diversion intended to facilitate PAVN/VC preparations for a war-winning battle at Khe Sanh, or Khe Sanh was a diversion to mesmerize Westmoreland in the days before Tet. Contribute to chinapedia/wikipedia.en development by creating an account on GitHub. [70] The Marines and ARVN dug in and hoped that the approaching Tt truce (scheduled for 2931 January) would provide some respite. The attack on Khe Sanh, however, proved to be a diversionary tactic for the larger Tet Offensive. Both sides have published official histories of the battle, and while these histories agree the fighting took place at Khe Sanh, they disagree on virtually every other aspect of it. [132], On 2 March, Tolson laid out what became known as Operation Pegasus, the operational plan for what was to become the largest operation launched by III MAF thus far in the conflict. On 19 June 1968, the evacuation and destruction of KSCB began. Cushman, the new III MAF commander, supported Westmoreland perhaps because he wanted to mend Army/Marine relations after the departure of Walt. The North Vietnamese lost as many as 15,000 casualties during the siege of Khe Sanh. A 77 day battle, Khe Sanh had been the biggest single battle of the Vietnam War to that point. [61] To cover a defilade near the Rao Quan River, four companies from 2/26 were immediately sent out to occupy Hill 558, with another manning Hill 861A. Due to the nature of these activities, and the threat that they posed to KSCB, Westmoreland ordered Operation Niagara I, an intense intelligence collection effort on PAVN activities in the vicinity of the Khe Sanh Valley. On April 15, Operation Pegasus ended and Operation Scotland II began. The pallet slid to a halt on the airstrip while the aircraft never had to actually land. A press release prepared on the following day (but never issued), at the height of Tet, showed that he was not about to be distracted. This time period does not particularly coincide with the fighting; rather, it dates from before the siege began and terminates before the siege (and the fighting) ended. The Marines knew that their withdrawal from Khe Sanh would present a propaganda victory for Hanoi. The enemy by my count suffered at least 15,000 dead in the area.. [138] At 08:00 on 15 April, Operation Pegasus was officially terminated. HistoryNet.com contains daily features, photo galleries and over 25,000 articles originally published in our nine magazines. [80] Westmoreland had already ordered the nascent Igloo White operation to assist in the Marine defense. On June 19, 1968, another operation began at Khe Sanh, Operation Charlie, the final evacuation and destruction of the Khe Sanh Combat Base. On the following night, a massive wave of PAVN/VC attacks swept throughout South Vietnam, everywhere except Khe Sanh. Once the aircraft touched down, it became the target of any number of PAVN artillery or mortar crews. [40] The 2nd and 3rd battalions of the 3rd Marine Regiment, under the command of Colonel John P. Lanigan, reinforced KSCB and were given the task of pushing the PAVN off of Hills 861, 881 North, and 881 South. [15], Unknown (1,602 bodies were counted, US official public estimated 10,00015,000 KIA,[19][20] but MACV's secret report estimated 5,550 killed as of 31 March 1968)[1]. [153][154] The gradual withdrawal of US forces began during 1969 and the adoption of Vietnamization meant that, by 1969, "although limited tactical offensives abounded, US military participation in the war would soon be relegated to a defensive stance. In the course of the fighting, Allied forces fired 151,000 artillery rounds, flew 2,096 tactical air sorties, and conducted 257 B-52 Stratofortress strikes. Several rounds also landed on Hill 881. [140] Operation Scotland II would continue until 28 February 1969 resulting in 435 Marines and 3304 PAVN killed. Unlike the Marines killed in the same place in January, since Operation Scotland had ended, the four Lima Company Marines who died in this attack on Hill 881 North were excluded from the official statistics. Route 9, the only practical overland route from the east, was impassable due to its poor state of repair and the presence of PAVN troops. [74], During January, the recently installed electronic sensors of Operation Muscle Shoals (later renamed "Igloo White"), which were undergoing test and evaluation in southeastern Laos, were alerted by a flurry of PAVN activity along the Ho Chi Minh Trail opposite the northwestern corner of South Vietnam.

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