Military History Institute of Vietnam, p. 222. 239240. The Laotians were overrun, and many fled to the Special Forces camp at Lang Vei. [77] When weather conditions precluded FAC-directed strikes, the bombers were directed to their targets by either a Marine AN/TPQ-10 radar installation at KSCB or by Air Force Combat Skyspot MSQ-77 stations. [138], On the following day, the 2nd Brigade captured the old French fort near Khe Sanh village after a three-day battle. Two days later, the PAVN 273rd Regiment attacked a Special Forces camp near the border town of Loc Ninh, in Bnh Long Province. While climbing, the C-123 was struck by several bursts of heavy machine gun and recoilless rifle fire. 528 of them include images. That afternoon, as a rescue force was dispatched to the village, Army Lt. Col. Joseph Seymoe and other soldiers died when their helicopter was attacked. It was the only time Americans abandoned a major combat base because of enemy pressure. Westmoreland was replaced two months after the end of the battle, and his successor explained the retreat in different ways. [111] The base could also depend on fire support from US Army 175-mm guns located at Camp Carroll, east of Khe Sanh. During the 1968 Tet Offensive, as many as 30,000 Communist Vietnamese forces surrounded roughly 6,000 U.S. marines defending a combat base on .. Week of February 21 A Look at the Damage from the Secret War in Laos, How Operation Homecoming Was Sprung into Action to Repatriate American POWs, The Viet Cong Were Shooting Down Americans From a Cave Until This GI Stopped Them, https://www.historynet.com/recounting-the-casualties-at-the-deadly-battle-of-khe-sanh/, Jerrie Mock: Record-Breaking American Female Pilot, When 21 Sikh Soldiers Fought the Odds Against 10,000 Pashtun Warriors, Few Red Tails Remain: Tuskegee Airman Dies at 96. 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! [80] Westmoreland had already ordered the nascent Igloo White operation to assist in the Marine defense. For additional reading, see: Valley of Decision: The Siege of Khe Sanh, by John Prados and Ray W. Stubbe; and the official Marine Corps history, The Battle for Khe Sanh, by Moyers S. Shore II. The PAVN 130mm and 152mm artillery pieces, and 122mm rockets, had a longer range than the Marine artillery support which consisted of 105mm and 155mm howitzers. Army Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Ladd (commander, 5th Special Forces Group), who had just flown in from Khe Sanh, was reportedly, "astounded that the Marines, who prided themselves on leaving no man behind, were willing to write off all of the Green Berets and simply ignore the fall of Lang Vei. Battlefield boundaries extended from eastern Laos eastward along both sides of Route 9 in Quang Tri province, Vietnam, to the coast. Lownds feared that PAVN infiltrators were mixed up in the crowd of more than 6,000, and lacked sufficient resources to sustain them. 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. "[168][Note 7], Marine General Rathvon M. Tompkins, the commander of the 3rd Marine Division, pointed out that had the PAVN actually intended to take Khe Sanh, PAVN troops could have cut the base's sole source of water, a stream 500 m outside the perimeter of the base. The pallet slid to a halt on the airstrip while the aircraft never had to actually land. The Battle of Khe Sanh's initial action cost the Marines 12 killed, 17 wounded and two missing. [119] By 11:00, the battle was over, Company A had lost 24 dead and 27 wounded, while 150 PAVN bodies were found around the position, which was then abandoned. Background [ edit] [147] The official closure of the base came on 5 July after fighting, which had killed five more Marines. [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. [33] Troops of the US 1st Infantry Division were able to respond quickly. On July 10, Pfc Robert Hernandez of Company A, 1st Battalion, 1st Marines, was manning an M-60 machine gun position when it took a direct hit from NVA mortars. The origin of the combat base lay in the construction by US Army Special Forces of an airfield in August 1962 outside the village at an old French fort. [47][Note 3] Westmoreland regarded the choice as quite simple. Few areas of the world have been as hotly contested as the India-Pakistan border. While I was in training, my motivation was to get these wings and I wear them today proudly, the airman recalled in 2015. By early January, the defenders could count on fire support from 46 artillery pieces of various calibers, five tanks armed with 90-mm guns, and 92 single or Ontos-mounted 106-mm recoilless rifles. Time magazine, in an April 12, 1968, article titled Victory at Khe Sanh, reported General William Westmoreland, commander of U.S. forces in Vietnam, after flying into Khe Sanh by helicopter, declaring: We took 220 killed at Khe Sanh and about 800 wounded and evacuated. [90], The Tet Offensive was launched prematurely in some areas on 30 January. [126], On 30 March, Bravo Company, 26th Marines, launched an attack toward the location of the ambush that had claimed so many of their comrades on 25 February. The 324th Division was located in the DMZ area 1015 miles (1624km) north of Khe Sanh while the 320th Division was within easy reinforcing distance to the northeast. [93] At 18:10 hours, the PAVN followed up their morning mortar attack with an artillery strike from 152mm howitzers, firing 60 rounds into the camp. [51] Other concerns raised included the assertion that the real danger to I Corps was from a direct threat to Qung Tr City and other urban areas, a defense would be pointless as a threat to infiltration since PAVN troops could easily bypass Khe Sanh, the base was too isolated, and the Marines "had neither the helicopter resources, the troops, nor the logistical bases for such operations." Marine Khe Sanh veteran Peter Brush is Vietnam Magazines book review editor. "[28], As far as Westmoreland was concerned, however, all that he needed to know was that the PAVN had massed large numbers of troops for a set-piece battle. For seven weeks, American aircraft dropped from 35,000 to 40,000 tons of bombs in nearly 4,000 airstrikes. All of the attacks were conducted by regimental-size PAVN/VC units, but unlike most of the previous usual hit-and-run tactics, they were sustained and bloody affairs. HistoryNet.com is brought to you by HistoryNet LLC, the worlds largest publisher of history magazines. According to the official PAVN history, by December 1967 the North Vietnamese had in place, or within supporting distance: the 304th, 320th, 324th and 325th Infantry Divisions, the independent 270th infantry Regiment; five artillery regiments (the 16th, 45th, 84th, 204th, and 675th); three AAA regiments (the 208th, 214th, and 228th); four tank companies; one engineer regiment plus one independent engineer battalion; one signal battalion; and a number of local force units. The Marines fought long, hard and well at Khe Sanh, but they sacrificed in much greater numbers than has been acknowledged by official sources. The attacks hindered the advancement of the McNamara Line, and as the fighting around Khe Sanh intensified, vital equipment including sensors and other hardware had to be diverted from elsewhere to meet the needs of the US garrison at Khe Sanh. Enemy artillery rounds slammed into the runway. [67], At the same time as the artillery bombardment at KSCB, an attack was launched against Khe Sanh village, seat of Hng Ha District. For them, the battle started when the North Vietnamese attacks began in January. [128] Also, Marine Lieutenant General Victor Krulak seconded the notion that there was never a serious intention to take the base by arguing that neither the water supply nor the telephone land lines were ever cut by the PAVN. [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. There are still debates about the true number of casualties, but estimates range that 1,000 to 3,500 US soldiers died, and a secret report from the US Military Assistance Command, Vietnam,. A myth has grown up around this incident. [25], Marino stated that "by 1966, Westmoreland had begun to consider Khe Sanh as part of a larger strategy." The Marines at KSCB credited 40% of intelligence available to their fire-support coordination center to the sensors. At dawn on 21 January, it was attacked by a roughly 300-strong PAVN battalion. The aircrew then had to contend with antiaircraft fire on the way out. 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. Battle of Hamburger Hill The 29 th North Vietnam Army had entrenched themselves on Hamburger Hill in South Vietnam; a joint US-South Vietnamese force was ordered to remove them. 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. [45] In December and early January, numerous sightings of PAVN troops and activities were made in the Khe Sanh area, but the sector remained relatively quiet.[46]. "[97], Ladd and the commander of the SOG compound (whose men and camp had been incorporated into the defenses of KSCB) proposed that, if the Marines would provide the helicopters, the SOG reconnaissance men would go in themselves to pick up any survivors. By the end of January 1968, he had moved half of all US combat troops, nearly 50 maneuver battalions, to I Corps. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam Studies and Observations Group, microwave/tropospheric scatter technology, "The Battle of Khe Sanh 40th Anniversary: Casualties in May 1968", "The Battle of Khe Sanh 40th Anniversary: Casualties in June 1968", https://web.archive.org/web/20080215233328/http://www.historynet.com/wars_conflicts/vietnam_war/3029941.html?featured=y&c=y, https://www.historynet.com/recounting-the-casualties-at-the-deadly-battle-of-khe-sanh/, https://www.historynet.com/the-withdrawal-from-khe-sanh/?f, "Khe Sanh: 6,000 Marines Dug In for Battle", "The US's secret plan to nuke Vietnam, Laos", "Memorandum for the President, 19 February 1968", "Battlefields of Khe Sanh: Still One Casualty a Day", "The US Army Quartermaster Air Delivery Units and the Defense of Khe Sanh", "5 things you didn't know about Khe Sanh", "Operational Report Lessons Learned, Headquarters, 8th Battalion 4th Artillery, Period Ending 30 April 1971", "Narrative of Events of Company B, 2nd Battalion, 506th Infantry, 101st Airborne Division (Airmobile) During LAM SON 719", United States Army Center of Military History, Bibliography: The Tet Offensive and the Battle of Khe Sanh, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Battle_of_Khe_Sanh&oldid=1142289112. [65] The fighting and shelling on 21 January resulted in 14 Marines killed and 43 wounded. This is also the position taken in the official PAVN history but offers no further explanation of the strategy. Five Marines were killed on January 19 and 20, while on reconnaissance patrols. Ray Stubbe has published a translation of the North Vietnamese history of the siege at Khe Sanh. The NVA 304th Divisions history notes that on 9 July 1968, the liberation flag was waving from the flag pole at Ta Con [Khe Sanh] airfield. On July 13, 1968, Ho Chi Minh sent a message to the soldiers of the Route 9Khe Sanh Front affirming our victory at Khe Sanh.. At 21:30, the attack came on, but it was stifled by the small arms of the Rangers, who were supported by thousands of artillery rounds and air strikes. With a view to gain the eventual approval for an advance through Laos to interdict the Ho Chi Minh Trail, he determined that "it was absolutely essential to hold the base." On April 6, a front-page story in The New York Times declared that the siege of Khe Sanh had been lifted. In the coming days, a campaign headquarters was established around Sap Lit. The relief of Khe Sanh, called Operation Pegasus, began . [70] The Marines and ARVN dug in and hoped that the approaching Tt truce (scheduled for 2931 January) would provide some respite. The enemy by my count suffered at least 15,000 dead in the area.. 1st Marine Aircraft Wing records claim that the unit delivered 4,661 tons of cargo into KSCB. The adoption of this concept at the end of February was the turning point in the resupply effort. Hundreds of mortar rounds and 122-mm rockets slammed into the base, levelling most of the above-ground structures. Subscribe to our HistoryNet Now! However, North Vietnamese sources claim that the Americans did not win a victory at Khe Sanh but were forced to retreat to avoid destruction. On June 28, a Communist spokesman claimed the Americans had been forced to retreat and that Khe Sanh was the gravest tactical and strategic defeat for the U.S. in the war. 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. [142], Lownds and the 26th Marines departed Khe Sanh, leaving the defense of the base to the 1st Marine Regiment. Taking a larger but more realistic view, the Khe Sanh campaign resulted in a death toll of American military personnel that approached 1,000. In fact, neither side won a resounding victory. On 18 January, Westmoreland passed his request for Air Force control up the chain of command to CINCPAC in Honolulu. This is the battles end date from the North Vietnamese perspective. [33], On 27 October, a PAVN regiment attacked an Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) battalion at Song Be, capital of Phc Long Province. [88] Westmoreland was so obsessed with the tactical situation that he threatened to resign if his wishes were not obeyed. [129][130] Nevertheless, according to Tom Johnson, President Johnson was "determined that Khe Sanh [would not] be an 'American Dien Bien Phu'". However, the PAVN committed three regiments to the fighting from the Khe Sanh sector. The US command in Saigon initially believed that combat operations around KSCB during 1967 were part of a series of minor PAVN offensives in the border regions. North Vietnamese Army gained control of the Khe Sanh region after the American withdrawal. [64], The main base was then subjected to an intense mortar and rocket barrage. At 04:15 on 8 February under cover of fog and a mortar barrage, the PAVN penetrated the perimeter, overrunning most of the position and pushing the remaining 30 defenders into the southwestern portion of the defenses. [33] The PAVN fought for several days, took casualties, and fell back. "[105] There had been a history of distrust between the Special Forces personnel and the Marines, and General Rathvon M. Tompkins, commander of the 3rd Marine Division, described the Special Forces soldiers as "hopped up wretches [who] were a law unto themselves. 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. After failing to respond to a challenge, they were fired upon and five were killed outright while the sixth, although wounded, escaped. Westmoreland echoed this judgment in his memoirs, and, using exactly the same figures, concluded that the North Vietnamese had suffered a most damaging and one-sided defeat. Although the camp's main defenses were overrun in only 13 minutes, the fighting lasted for several hours, during which the Special Forces men and Bru CIDGs managed to knock out at least five of the tanks. The border battles, however, had two significant consequences, which were unappreciated at the time. The Marines pursued three enemy scouts, who led them into an ambush. On the following night, a massive wave of PAVN/VC attacks swept throughout South Vietnam, everywhere except Khe Sanh. [71][72], Nine days before the Tet Offensive broke out, the PAVN opened the battle of Khe Sanh and attacked the US forces just south of the DMZ. The opportunity to engage and destroy a formerly elusive enemy that was moving toward a fixed position promised a victory of unprecedented proportions. Home > Features > Battle of Khe Sanh > View All. The Marine defense of Khe Sanh, Operation Scotland, officially ended on March 31. Following a rolling barrage fired by nine artillery batteries, the Marine attack advanced through two PAVN trenchlines, but the Marines failed to locate the remains of the men of the ambushed patrol. [137] Opposition from the North Vietnamese was light and the primary problem that hampered the advance was continual heavy morning cloud cover that slowed the pace of helicopter operations. With Khe Sanh facing a full-scale. Minor attacks continued before the base was officially closed on 5 July. Johnson backed the Marine position due to his concern over protecting the Army's air assets from Air Force co-option. [62], On 20 January, La Thanh Ton, a PAVN lieutenant from the 325th Division, defected and laid out the plans for an entire series of PAVN attacks. [63] Hills 881 South, 861, and the main base itself would be simultaneously attacked that same evening. Consequently, and unknown at the time, Operation Scotland became the starting point of the Battle of Khe Sanh in terms of Marine casualty reporting. Early in the war US forces had established a garrison at Khe Sanh in Quang Tri province, in the . [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. [78], Thus began what was described by John Morocco as "the most concentrated application of aerial firepower in the history of warfare". Battle of Khe Sanh : American Casualties We have 535 casualty profiles listed in our archive. Murphy 2003, pp. Officer casualties of all branches were overwhelmingly white. [118], On the night of the fall of Lang Vei, three companies of the PAVN 101D Regiment moved into jump-off positions to attack Alpha-1, an outpost west of the Combat Base held by 66 men of Company A, 1st Platoon, 1/9 Marines.