The U.S. Army Campaigns of the Vietnam War

BUYING

 TIME

1965 –1966
CMH Pub 76–2

Cover: Men of Company C, 1st Battalion, 16th Infantry, 1st Infantry Division, draw sniper fire while on a 

mission in Bien Hoa Province east of Saigon. (National Archives)
by

Frank L. Jones

Center of Military History

United States Army

Washington, D.C., 2015

BUYING

TIME

1965 –1966

5

Introduction

To many Americans, the war in Vietnam was, and remains, 

a divisive conflict. Now almost fifty years after the beginning 

of major U.S. combat operations in Vietnam, the war has faded 

from much of America’s consciousness. Over half of the U.S. 

population was born after the war and has no direct memory of 

the conflict, yet this does not lessen its importance. The massive 

American commitment—political, military, and diplomatic—to 

the independence of South Vietnam beginning in the 1950s and 

continuing with U.S. direct combat operations in the 1960s and 

early 1970s makes it important to remember those who served. 

U.S. involvement in this corner of Southeast Asia began after 

World War II when Vietnam was fighting for independence from 

France. Although generally favoring Vietnamese independence, 

the United States supported France because the rebels—or Viet 

Minh—were led by Communists and in the days of the Cold 

War U.S. officials considered any and all Communists to be little 

more than the puppets of Moscow and Beijing. France’s defeat in 

1954, the bifurcation of Vietnam into a Communist North and 

non-Communist South, and America’s assumption of the job of 

training the armed forces of the newly created non-Communist 

Republic of Vietnam pulled the United States deeper into the 

conflict. Framed primarily as a fight to defend democracy against 

the forces of international communism, the United States gradually committed more troops and materiel to fight Communist-led 

Southern guerrillas (or Viet Cong) and the regular military forces 

sent to South Vietnam by the politburo in Hanoi.

By the time President Lyndon B. Johnson committed major 

combat units in 1965, the United States had already invested 

thousands of men and millions of dollars in the fight to build a 

secure and stable South Vietnam. That commitment expanded 

rapidly until by 1969 the United States had over 365,000 soldiers 

in every military region of South Vietnam with thousands of other 
6 

servicemen and women throughout the Pacific area in direct 

support of operations. The war saw many technological innovations including the massive use of helicopters, wide-scale use of 

computers, sophisticated psychological operations, new concepts 

of counterinsurgency, and major advances in military medicine. 

Yet, as in most wars, much of the burden of battle was still borne 

by the foot soldiers on the ground who slogged over the hills and 

through the rice paddies in search of an often elusive foe. The 

enormous military and political effort by the United States was, 

however, continuously matched by the determination of North 

Vietnamese leaders to unify their country under communism at 

whatever cost. That determination, in the end, proved decisive. 

Negotiations accompanied by the gradual withdrawal of American 

forces led to the Paris Peace Accords in January 1973, effectively 

ending the U.S. military role. The continued existence of an independent South Vietnam, however, was of short duration. Two 

years after the American exit the North Vietnamese Army overran 

South Vietnam and sealed its victory in April 1975.

The vast majority of American men and women who served 

in Vietnam did so in the uniform of the United States Army. They 

served their country when called, many at great personal cost, 

against a backdrop of growing uncertainty and unrest at home. 

These commemorative pamphlets are dedicated to them.

 RICHARD W. STEWART

 Chief Historian
7

Buying Time, 1965–1966

In January 1965, the principal U.S. ally against communism 

in Southeast Asia, the Republic of (South) Vietnam, appeared to 

be headed for collapse. Armed revolutionaries fighting a proxy 

war on behalf of Communist North Vietnam held the political 

and military initiative. The insurgents controlled nearly half of 

South Vietnam’s countryside and almost a third of its population. 

The U.S.-trained South Vietnamese Army was losing soldiers and 

equipment at an alarming rate. Regiment-size enemy units threatened the nation’s capital, Saigon, and the fractious coalition of 

civilian and military officials who governed the country seemed 

unable to deal with the crisis. President Lyndon B. Johnson and his 

National Security Council concluded that the Republic of Vietnam 

could only survive if the United States took a more active part in 

the war.

America’s military involvement in Vietnam began twenty 

years earlier when a team of agents from the Office of Strategic 

Services, predecessor to the Central Intelligence Agency, parachuted into northern Vietnam during the closing months of World 

War II. The team formed an alliance with Ho Chi Minh and his 

Viet Minh (Viet Nam Doc Lap Dong Minh Hoi, or League for the 

Independence of Vietnam) guerrilla army, which had been fighting 

the Japanese troops occupying the former French colony since 

1941. Needing the Viet Minh’s help in rescuing downed Allied 

airmen, the United States overlooked the fact that Ho Chi Minh 

was also a Marxist-Leninist revolutionary who had been trying to 

end French colonial rule since the 1920s. That became impossible 

to ignore in late August 1945, however, when Japan surrendered to 

the Allies and Ho’s victorious army seized control of Hanoi. France, 
8 

still stinging from its wartime humiliation, demanded the restoration of its Indochinese colonies. Ho Chi Minh and his Viet Minh 

army retreated to the countryside, but neither the Communists 

nor many Vietnamese nationalists were willing to abandon the 

dream of Vietnamese independence. Within two years, Ho and his 

followers were at war with the French colonial government.

This local conflict became a major U.S. concern after Mao 

Zedong’s Red Army completed its conquest of mainland China 

in late 1949. Mao’s government began shipping large quantities 

of military equipment to the Viet Minh. With those arms and a 

host of Chinese military advisers, Ho Chi Minh’s fighters began 

to defeat the French and the Vietnamese forces representing the 

French-sponsored government led by Emperor Bao Dai. Then, in 

the summer of 1950, U.S. fears about the spread of communism 

in Asia quickened when North Korea, a close ally of Communist 

China and the Soviet Union, invaded South Korea in a bid to reunify 

the Korean Peninsula by force. The fighting in Vietnam and Korea 

seemed to prove that both Joseph Stalin and Mao Zedong were 

eager to support proxy wars that promoted the spread of communism. France’s imperial conflict in Southeast Asia had become 

a Cold War battleground for the United States. Had times been 

different and there not been a perception that it was engaged in a 

global struggle against communism, the United States might have 

supported Vietnamese independence. But Cold War concerns and 

the need to keep France as a strong ally in both Asia and Europe 

led the United States to take a different course. On the one hand, 

it pressed France to grant the non-Communist states of Indochina 

greater autonomy. On the other, it backed France in its struggle 

against the Viet Minh. 

In September 1950, President Harry S. Truman directed the 

formation of the Military Assistance Advisory Group (MAAG) 

to help the French colonial forces absorb the growing volume of 

U.S. military equipment that was flowing into Vietnam. Over the 

next four years, this small support group supervised the transfer 

of nearly one billion dollars’ worth of American aid. Despite that 

assistance, the French colonial army gradually lost control over 

most of northern and central Vietnam. Following a crushing defeat 

at Dien Bien Phu in May 1954, the government in Paris agreed to 

negotiate an end to the war and to renounce its colonial claims in 

Southeast Asia. 
9

The resulting Geneva Peace Accords of 1954 divided Vietnam 

into two halves, leaving Ho Chi Minh’s Communist Lao Dong 

(People’s Worker) Party in control of the territory north of the 17th 

Parallel and a non-Communist government led by Prime Minister 

Ngo Dinh Diem in charge of the south. The accords stipulated that 

a national referendum be held in 1956 to reunify Vietnam under 

a single government, but neither Diem nor the United States was 

willing to risk a Communist electoral victory. After defeating 

his political rivals in 1955 and consolidating a base of power in 

Saigon, Diem declared the formation of the Republic of Vietnam 

with himself as its president.

The new state of South Vietnam resembled an upright 

crescent nearly 1,100 kilometers in length, with a width of about 

70 kilometers at its slender top growing to approximately 200 kilometers at its broader base. The majority of the nation’s 15 million 

inhabitants resided in the lowlands that bordered South Vietnam’s 

long coast or in the Mekong Delta that formed a broad triangular 

plain south of Saigon. Rugged mountains and thick forests blanketed the interior of northern and central South Vietnam, the 

traditional homeland of the Mon-Khmer tribal people the French 

called Montagnards (or “mountain dwellers”). South Vietnam 

was mainly a rural society, with some 80 percent of its population engaged in farming, fishing, and hunting, or working in 

agricultural industries such as salt production, brick making, and 

rubber tree harvesting. The main exception to that rule was Saigon 

and its 1.5 million people—a mixture of government employees, 

business people, shop owners, and manual laborers—crowded 

into about ten square kilometers at the northeastern edge of the 

Mekong Delta. There in the political and commercial hub of South 

Vietnam, a few blocks from Ngo Dinh Diem’s presidential palace, 

the United States established its new MAAG headquarters.

Between 1956 and 1959, the U.S. advisory mission to South 

Vietnam remained limited, but that began to change when Ho 

Chi Minh’s followers in the South—President Diem derisively 

called them “Viet Cong” (Communist traitors to Vietnam)—

launched an armed uprising in early 1960. When the insurgency 

gained momentum in early 1961, the new U.S. president, John F. 

Kennedy, began sending additional advisers and support units to 

Vietnam. To keep pace with the growing U.S. assistance program, 

President Kennedy authorized the formation of a new joint headquarters, the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (MACV), in 
10

February 1962. Despite MACV’s support, the South Vietnamese 

armed forces failed to contain the growing Viet Cong insurgency, 

which spread to nearly every corner of the country. After the 

assassination of Kennedy in November 1963 and the military coup 

that had ended Diem’s life a few weeks earlier, Lyndon B. Johnson, 

Kennedy’s successor, vowed to continue the U.S. advisory mission. 

He issued National Security Action Memorandum 288 in March 

1964 to make clear his determination to preserve “an independent 

non-Communist South Vietnam.” The coming year would test just 

how far the United States was prepared to go in order to secure 

that aim (Map 1).

Strategic Setting

General William C. Westmoreland, the U.S. Army officer who 

led MACV, controlled approximately 23,000 uniformed personnel 

at the beginning of 1965. MACV headquarters consisted of slightly 

more than 1,000 personnel who mainly worked in downtown 

Saigon. Around 15,000 Army troops served as field advisers; onethird of those soldiers worked directly with South Vietnamese 

units or regional headquarters, while the remaining two-thirds 

provided logistical, administrative, and technical support to 

MACV and South Vietnamese personnel. Another 6,000 or so 

personnel from the Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps worked 

A U.S. adviser accompanies South Vietnamese troops during a mission in Long An Province 

southwest of Saigon. National Archives
 Map 1

Ho C h i M i n h Tra i l

Tonle Sap

GULF

O F

T ONKIN

GULF

O F

SIAM

S OUTH

CHINA

SEA

Red R

Black R

Mekong R

Mekong R

DEMARCATION LINE

HAINAN

Con Son

Phu Quoc

Haiphong

Dien Bien Phu

Vinh

Dong Hoi

Hue

Da Nang

Pleiku

Qui Nhon

Quang Ngai

Quang Tri

Kontum

Da Lat

Nha Trang

Cam Ranh

Tay Ninh

Bien Hoa

Vung Tau

Sihanoukville

Can Tho

Loc Ninh

HANOI

VIENTIANE

BANGKOK

PHNOM PENH

SAIGON

BURM A

NORTH

VIE TNA M

CHINA

CHINA

THAILAND

L A O S

CAMBODIA SOUTH

VIE TNA M

INDOCHINA

1965–1966

0 150

Miles
12 

with their branch counterparts 

at a dozen major airbases and 

naval stations across South 

Vietnam. The largest single 

Army component within 

MACV was the 1,200-man 

U.S. Army 5th Special Forces 

Group, also known as the 

Green Berets. In addition to 

training the South Vietnamese 

Special Forces, the Green 

Berets also operated from 

more than forty remote camps 

that monitored enemy infiltration from Laos and Cambodia. 

Most of these outposts 

contained a dozen Green 

Berets, a comparable number 

of South Vietnamese Special 

Forces soldiers, and between 

200 to 900 Vietnamese irregulars, most of them ethnic 

Montagnards recruited from 

the highland tribes. Another 

service component within 

MACV, the U.S. Air Force 2d 

Air Division, provided the 

ground troops with logistical 

and combat support. 

The South Vietnamese regular forces that MACV helped 

train and support numbered around 250,000 personnel. Of those, 

220,000 belonged to the South Vietnamese Army. Organized 

along American lines, the regular army consisted of ten light 

infantry divisions serving under four regional headquarters—the 

I Corps Tactical Zone at Da Nang on the northern coast; the II 

Corps Tactical Zone at Pleiku City in the Central Highlands; the 

III Corps Tactical Zone at Bien Hoa to the east of Saigon; and the 

IV Corps Tactical Zone at Can Tho in the heart of the Mekong 

Delta. Organized around three infantry regiments backed by a 

field artillery battalion and some engineers, the divisions were 

principally equipped with U.S. gear from World War II and the 

General Westmoreland addresses men of the 

1st Cavalry Division. National Archives
13

Korean War. Most of the ninety-three infantry battalions were tied 

to a particular province or district; rarely could an entire regiment 

be assembled for an operation (Map 2). 

The South Vietnamese lieutenant generals who commanded 

each corps supported those divisions with a total of eight separate 

battalions of artillery, four battalion-size armored cavalry groups, 

and twenty ranger battalions. The corps commanders reported to 

the South Vietnamese Joint General Staff (JGS) in Saigon, which 

controlled a strategic reserve of six Airborne and five Marine battalions—some 10,000 well-trained and politically reliable troops—

that could be deployed to any part of the country on short notice. 

Also under JGS control, the South Vietnamese Air Force consisted 

of 11,000 personnel and fifteen squadrons of non-jet aircraft, while 

the South Vietnamese Navy and its 8,000 sailors manned a small 

fleet of armed coastal junks and river assault boats.

In addition to those regular armed forces, the South 

Vietnamese government fielded another 264,000 paramilitary 

soldiers who performed local security missions in the countryside. 

Known as the Popular and the Regional Forces, these lightly armed 

paramilitary troops operated under the control of the 44 province 

and 242 district chiefs. Relatively poorly trained and equipped, 

the Popular and Regional Forces were—together with another 

97,000 irregulars, militia, and police—the first line of defense in 

most villages and hamlets. MACV was stretched thin supporting 

the regular South Vietnamese Army, but General Westmoreland 

hoped to expand the amount of U.S. assistance given to the rural 

security forces once resources became available.

The insurgent forces trying to topple South Vietnam’s government numbered roughly 170,000 armed fighters at the beginning 

of 1965. Divided into five categories—main force, local force, rear 

service, guerrilla, and political cadre—these troops were mostly 

southern-born Vietnamese, many of whom had fought for the Viet 

Minh against the French, and some of whom had regrouped in the 

North after 1954 to receive military and political training before 

infiltrating back into the South to lead the revolution. About a 

third of the fighters belonged to main force units of the People’s 

Liberation Armed Forces (PLAF). These well-equipped battalions 

and regiments operated across provincial boundaries, either 

under regional military headquarters known as Fronts or under 

the control of the Central Office for South Vietnam (COSVN), a 

political-military body that supervised the war in the lower half of 
 Map 2

Da Nang

Bien Hoa

Can Tho

Pleiku

Tonle Sap

G ULF OF

THAIL AND

SOUT H

CHINA SEA

SOUTH CHINA SE A

Mekong R

Mekong R

III C T Z

IV C T Z

I C T Z

II C T Z

DEMARCATION LINE

L A O S

THAILAND

CAMBODIA

NORTH

 VIE TNA M

SAIGON

Corps Tactical Zone Boundary

Corps Tactical Zone Headquarters

1965–1966

SOUTH VIE TNA M

CORPS TACTICAL ZONES

0

0 150

150 Kilometers

Miles
15

South Vietnam. The second type of enemy formation, local force 

units, usually operated in a specific district under the command of 

a local Viet Cong party committee. Rear service troops maintained 

the logistical channels that connected the Communist supply 

dumps in Cambodia and Laos to forward base areas, usually 

located in mountainous or heavily forested areas, across South 

Vietnam. The Viet Cong guerrilla force—part-time soldiers who 

lived and worked in a specific village or hamlet—helped protect 

the political cadre, or infrastructure personnel, who acted as a 

shadow government, collected taxes, recruited new fighters, and 

supervised the distribution of war material. Supplementing the 

Southerners were about 10,000 soldiers from the People’s Army 

of Vietnam (PAVN), which reported to the North Vietnamese 

Ministry of Defense. Whether from the North or the South, all 

Vietnamese Communist soldiers came under the authority of 

the Lao Dong Party and its leading officials—President Ho Chi 

Minh, First Secretary Le Duan, Minister of Defense General Vo 

Nguyen Giap, Prime Minister Pham Van Dong, and about a dozen 

others—who held the reins of power in North Vietnam. 

As the year 1965 began, U.S. policymakers were both deeply 

worried about the situation in Vietnam and divided about what 

should be done about it. Many feared that South Vietnam could 

not be saved, but in the context of the global war on communism, 

few believed that it was politically and strategically acceptable for 

the United States to allow South Vietnam to fall without putting 

up more of a fight. If, as official policy stated, the United States 

was truly dedicated to the preservation of a free, independent, 

non-Communist South Vietnam, a few senior officials, primarily 

in the Army and Marine Corps, believed that the United States 

would have no choice but to deploy large ground forces in a bid to 

defeat the Communists militarily, or at least to bring them to the 

negotiation table on favorable terms, as had occurred in Korea. 

Others thought that a full-fledged war was undesirable, unlikely 

to achieve victory, and domestically unsustainable. They preferred 

using limited military means to coerce the Communists into 

accepting South Vietnam’s independence. Should North Vietnam 

not back down, the United States could apply additional pressure 

in carefully calibrated doses until the enemy backed off. It was this 

approach, favored by Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara, 

U.S. Ambassador to South Vietnam and retired Army General 

Maxwell D. Taylor, and many other senior policy personnel, that 
16

President Johnson initially selected. No one in the U.S. government, however, seemed to have a clear vision of how the crisis 

might end if the Communist leadership in Hanoi refused to be 

cowered.

Unfortunately, North Vietnam’s leaders had no intention of 

backing down. Although they feared U.S. military intervention, 

they regarded the reunification of Vietnam under communism as 

nonnegotiable, and they were prepared to pay a steep price to obtain 

it. Indeed, they had already committed themselves to launching 

a major offensive in early 1965, one bolstered by the infusion of 

North Vietnamese Army divisions, to try to make South Vietnam’s 

position untenable before a possible U.S. intervention. The two 

nations were thus on a collision course. One, North Vietnam, 

was advancing aggressively forward toward conquering South 

Vietnam. The other, the United States, was moving hesitantly and 

with ambivalence toward a deeper involvement of undetermined 

proportions to save South Vietnam. Neither antagonist had a firm 

grasp on a situation that would soon spiral out of control. 

Operations

The First Combat Troops Arrive

The tipping point for U.S. intervention came on 7 February 

when Viet Cong sappers and mortar teams attacked a U.S. barracks 

and airfield near Pleiku City in the Central Highlands. The raid, 

which killed 8 Americans and wounded 126 others, also destroyed 

or damaged 25 aircraft. A similar event occurred three days later 

when Viet Cong guerrillas attacked a U.S. enlisted men’s billet in 

the port city of Qui Nhon. The Johnson administration, already 

looking for a reason to employ stronger coercive measures against 

North Vietnam, seized the moment. “We have no choice now but 

to clear the decks,” President Johnson told the American public, 

“and make absolutely clear our determination to back South 

Vietnam in its fight to maintain its independence” (Map 3).

In response to the attacks on Pleiku City and Qui Nhon, 

the United States launched a flurry of reprisal air raids in the 

southern portion of North Vietnam. When those attacks failed 

to elicit any diplomatic response from Hanoi, President Johnson 

authorized the commencement of a strategic bombing campaign 

known as Rolling Thunder. Ambassador Taylor championed 

the bombing campaign, believing it would persuade North 

Vietnam to end its support for the insurgency in the South. 
 Map 3

An Khe

Plei Me

Duc Co

Cam Ranh Bay

PLEIKU

7 Feb

QUI NHON

10 Feb

OPERATION GILBRALTAR 27 Aug–1 Oct

OPERATION SILVER BAYONET 14–18 Nov

DAK SUT 18 Aug

III C T Z

I C T Z

Chu Pong

Massif 

SOUTH 

CHINA SE A

SOUTH 

CHINA SE A

20

1

1

11

14

14

21

14

19

1

1

Dao Phu Qui

Q UANG TIN

Q UANG NGAI

KONTUM

BINH DINH

PLEIKU

PHU BON PHU YEN

DARL A C

KHANH HOA

Q UANG DUC

TUYEN DUC

BINH THUA N

PHUOC

LONG

L AM DONG

BINH TUY

LONG

KHANH

PHUOC TUY

NINH

THUA N

Kontum

Tuy Hoa

Dak To

Ban Me Thuot

Da Lat

CAMBODI A L A O S

Corps Tactical Zone Boundary

Engagement

1965

II C ORPS T A C TICAL Z ONE

0 50 Miles

0 50 Kilometers
18 

General Westmorland also welcomed the measure, describing it as 

a “program of measured and limited air action.” He did not think, 

however, that aerial bombing alone would be sufficient to turn 

the tide. In the “Commander’s Estimate of the Military Situation 

in South Vietnam” that he prepared for his superiors in March 

1965, the MACV chief concluded that a limited number of U.S. 

combat forces—several Army and Marine brigades with the necessary supporting units—should be deployed at once to stabilize 

the faltering republic. The recent Viet Cong attacks had already 

demonstrated that the air campaign would be in jeopardy unless 

U.S. air bases and installations in South Vietnam could be properly 

protected.

Pulled by conflicting impulses to win—or at least not immediately lose—the Cold War in Southeast Asia, to avoid a major 

confrontation, and to press forward with an aggressive agenda 

of socioeconomic reform at home, President Johnson continued 

to try to adhere to a “middle” course. On 26 February, he authorized the deployment of elements of the 9th Marine Expeditionary 

Brigade to Da Nang in northern South Vietnam to protect important air and naval facilities located there. These elements landed 

at Da Nang on 8 March. The U.S. Army’s 716th Military Police 

Battalion arrived two weeks later to assume security responsibilities for important U.S. military installations in and around Saigon. 

The need for heightened security at U.S. facilities proved prescient, 

for at the end of the month, a truck loaded with hundreds of 

pounds of plastic explosives detonated outside the U.S. Embassy in 

Saigon, damaging the building, killing two Americans and eleven 

South Vietnamese, and wounding several others, including the 

U.S. deputy ambassador, U. Alexis Johnson. In response, President 

Johnson approved the deployment of two more Marine battalions 

and as many as 20,000 logistical personnel to Vietnam on 1 April. 

He also authorized U.S. forces to carry out limited patrols near 

military installations to protect them from enemy mortar attacks 

and sapper raids. Some, notably Ambassador Taylor, wanted to 

confine the marines and any additional forces that might be sent 

to the mission of defending politically and logistically important 

coastal enclaves to minimize the chance of the United States 

becoming sucked into a major ground war. Others, including 

General Westmoreland and Army Chief of Staff General Harold K. 

Johnson, argued that such a posture was untenable and that offensive operations offered the only way to reach a favorable outcome. 
19

The president, vacillating between the hope of avoiding war on the 

one hand and saving South Vietnam on the other, authorized U.S. 

ground forces to adopt a more aggressive posture on 6 April, but 

then made known that nothing should change for the immediate 

present. A week later, he vacillated again. After telling the Joint 

Chiefs of Staff that he was willing to do whatever was needed “to 

win the game in South Vietnam” and to “start killing more Viet 

Cong,” he recoiled when the Joint Chiefs recommended that 

he send in three U.S. Army divisions, opting instead to deploy 

just one brigade—the Army’s 173d Airborne Brigade—which 

Westmoreland had requested for security duties similar to those 

performed by the 9th Marine Expeditionary Brigade at Da Nang. 

The airborne brigade arrived in South Vietnam on 5 May 

with two battalions of infantry and one of artillery. Offloading at 

the port of Vung Tau, southwest of Saigon, the brigade detached 

one battalion to protect the port and its airfield. The remainder of 

the 173d traveled north to the air base at Bien Hoa, twenty kilometers northeast of Saigon, the scene of a devastating Viet Cong raid 

against U.S. aircraft in November 1964. By the end of May, more 

than 50,000 U.S. personnel were present in Vietnam, almost half 

of them Army (Map 4). 

Confined as they were to protecting a few key installations, 

the first U.S. ground combat units in Vietnam were unable to 

influence the course of the war. During the spring of 1965, the 

Communists pressed forward with their planned offensive, 

capturing one district capital and destroying the equivalent of 

one South Vietnamese battalion every week. In May, a large Viet 

Cong force nearly overran the provincial capital of Song Be, ninety 

kilometers north of Saigon. Later that month, the government 

sustained a major blow at the battle of Ba Gia in the northern 

province of Quang Ngai. Two Viet Cong regiments decimated 

the South Vietnamese 39th Ranger Battalion and a battalion 

from the South Vietnamese 51st Infantry Regiment. Then on 9 

June, a Viet Cong regiment attacked the U.S. Army Special Forces 

camp at Dong Xoai, about 120 kilometers north of Saigon near 

the Cambodian border. During the fourteen-hour battle, 2d Lt. 

Charles Q. Williams, the executive officer of a detachment of the 5th 

Special Forces Group, led a successful defense of the camp despite 

repeated attacks from a larger force. At substantial personal risk, 

he ensured the evacuation of all personnel from the camp while 

sustaining four wounds himself. For his actions, Williams received 
20 

the Medal of Honor. Still, the allies suffered significant losses: two 

battalions of relieving South Vietnamese troops, including one 

airborne battalion, were essentially destroyed in the battle. More 

than 400 South Vietnamese soldiers died before the Viet Cong 

forces broke contact and withdrew. The pattern of enemy success 

was becoming distressingly familiar.

 Map 4

SAIGON 30 Mar

SONG BE

10–15 May

DONG XOAI 9 Jun

OPERATION HUMP 5–8 Nov

OPERATION BUSHMASTER II 28 Nov-1 Dec

IV C T Z

II C T Z

Bien Hoa

Vung Tau

W AR Z ONE C

W A R Z ONE D

IRON TRIANGLE

SOUTH 

CHINA SE A

4

4

4

1

4

22

15

1

20

1

14

13

PHUOC TUY

B INH TUY

BINH

THUAN

LONG KHANH

PHUOC LONG

BINH DUONG

H AU NGHIA

LONG AN

GO CONG

KIEN HOA

KIEN TUONG

DINH TUONG

GIA DINH

T AY NINH

BIEN HOA

Q UANG DUC

BINH LONG L AM DONG

BA XUY E N

VINH BINH

VINH LONG

CAMBODI A

Corps Tactical Zone Boundary

Engagement

1965

III C ORPS T A C TICAL Z ONE

0 50 Miles

0 50 Kilometers
21

Determined to press their advantage, North Vietnamese 

leaders continued to push troops and supplies into the South 

via the Ho Chi Minh Trail—actually a network of trails running 

from North Vietnam along the borders of Laos and Cambodia 

and into South Vietnam. As the enemy’s strength increased, 

the South Vietnamese sustained more and more casualties, which triggered an even higher rate of desertion. These 

events, coupled with complex maneuvering on behalf of South 

Vietnam’s various political factions, forced Prime Minister 

Phan Huy Quat to hand the reins of government over to the 

Armed Forces Council. General Nguyen Van Thieu became 

chief of state with Air Vice Marshal Nguyen Cao Ky installed 

as prime minister. The regime change would eventually bring 

a measure of stability to South Vietnam after a long period 

of debilitating political turmoil. The Johnson administration 

pledged its total support to the new regime, yet the military 

situation remained precarious. When the air campaign failed to 

deter North Vietnam, President Johnson informed Secretary of 

Defense McNamara that the United States needed to “find more 

dramatic and effective action in South Vietnam.”

The Start of Offensive Operations

Westmoreland responded aggressively to the president’s 

concerns. In a message to Washington in early June that, in the 

words of Secretary McNamara, “stirred up a veritable hornet’s 

nest,” the MACV commander argued that U.S. combat units should 

take the war to enemy main force units to buy breathing space 

for the South Vietnamese Army. Ambassador Taylor, recognizing 

that North Vietnam would not crumble under the air campaign 

and that his enclave strategy was no longer viable, seconded 

Westmoreland’s view. So too did Secretary McNamara, who told 

the president that the United States “could no longer postpone a 

choice about which path to take.”

On 26 June, the president gave General Westmoreland the 

authority to use U.S. combat forces “in any situation in which the use 

of such troops is requested by an appropriate GVN [Government 

of Vietnam] commander and when, in COMUSMACV’s 

[Commander of the U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam] 

judgment, their use is necessary to strengthen the relative position 

of GVN forces.” As one historian has noted, the administration 

had essentially granted Westmoreland unfettered discretion to 
22 

conduct offensive operations in South Vietnam whenever and 

wherever he deemed necessary.

Using his new authority, General Westmoreland on 28 June 

ordered the 173d Airborne Brigade to conduct an offensive sweep 

into War Zone D north of Saigon, a major enemy base that one 

reporter described as an “unbelievable tangle of double-canopy 

forest and thick undergrowth.” Several intense engagements 

followed in which the American troops killed a substantial 

number of enemy and uncovered large Viet Cong installations in 

the jungle. 

Meanwhile, an accelerated buildup of U.S. forces was occurring. In mid-July, the 2d Brigade of the 1st Infantry Division 

arrived in Vietnam and moved into the Bien Hoa air base area. At 

the end of the month, the 1st Brigade, 101st Airborne Division, 

deployed to Cam Ranh Bay, a large natural harbor some 300 kilometers northeast of Saigon. Work on major logistical bases began 

as well, particularly upgrading the port facilities at Saigon and 

developing Cam Ranh Bay into an extensive deepwater port to 

relieve the congestion at Saigon. Other projects included building 

additional airfields for light aircraft and jets, and supply facilities 

in several locations. 

That same month, Secretary McNamara asked the chairman 

of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Army General Earle G. Wheeler, what 

chance “the U.S. can have of winning in South Vietnam if we do 

everything we can.” A joint study group provided an appraisal 

on 14 July. The group stated that “within the bounds of reasonable assumptions . . . there appears to be no reason we cannot 

win if such is our will—and if that will is manifested in strategy 

and tactical operations.” In practical terms, this meant abandoning the administration’s incremental approach of gradual 

escalation and the calculated, but limited, application of force 

to persuade, rather than defeat, the enemy. Johnson would have 

to remove the restrictions he had imposed on the air campaign 

over North Vietnam, end the piecemeal and reactive deployment 

of forces, and lift the ban on offensive ground operations against 

the enemy’s supply and staging areas in Laos and Cambodia. 

Even then, success would not be guaranteed. The enemy might 

escalate his own efforts, and the budding stability in the Saigon 

government might evaporate—developments the United States 

could not control. McNamara did not forward the study to the 

White House.
23

After meeting with General Westmoreland in Saigon along 

with Henry Cabot Lodge, whom President Johnson had nominated to replace Ambassador Taylor, McNamara informed 

President Johnson that U.S. forces in South Vietnam should be 

increased to approximately 175,000 and that possibly another 

100,000 would be required in early 1966. Even more men might 

be needed depending on developments. These additional troops 

would allow Westmoreland, who was currently in a primarily 

defensive and reactive mode, to take the offensive in the first half 

of 1966, concentrating on high-priority areas, destroying enemy 

forces, and allowing for the reinstitution of government control in 

the countryside through pacification measures. The secretary also 

recommended that the president mobilize 230,000 reservists and 

national guardsmen, a measure the Joint Chiefs of Staff believed 

vital if the health and readiness of the Army as a whole was to be 

maintained during the crisis.

President Johnson once again tried to balance his conflicting 

Cold War and domestic policy agendas. By the end of July, he had 

agreed to send everything Westmoreland had requested for 1965. 

Thirty-four more U.S. combat battalions—including the newly 

formed 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile), the first heliborne 

division in history—would be heading for Vietnam along with 

ten battalions belonging to America’s Asian allies. He promised 

to consider, but did not commit to, sending additional forces in 

1966. Monthly draft calls would be doubled to 35,000, but there 

would be no call-up of the reserves. Mobilizing the reserves would 

put the United States on a war footing, a politically controversial 

move that would incite a disruptive debate and possibly derail his 

attempt to push through Congress his “Great Society” agenda—a 

slate of legislation designed to attack poverty and racial prejudice. 

Lifting the ban on ground operations in North Vietnam, Laos, and 

Cambodia was also out of the question, as it would only lead to a 

wider conflict.

As the parameters under which he would have to operate 

became increasingly clear, Westmoreland moved to formulate a 

strategy to meet the situation. By September, he had articulated 

a concept consisting of three broad phases. The first task was to 

arrest the current Viet Cong offensive—“to stem the tide,” as he 

put it. In this phase, the allies would defend existing enclaves, keep 

the enemy off balance with occasional forays, and improve pacification efforts in and around Saigon. Once the situation had been 
24 

stabilized and more reinforcements had arrived, a process that 

the general foresaw taking all of 1965 and 1966, Westmoreland 

planned to launch large-scale operations to destroy major enemy 

units and bases in 1967. Protected by the American shield, the 

South Vietnamese would meanwhile be able to clear and pacify 

designated high-priority areas, thereby further strengthening the 

Saigon government and weakening the enemy. Full restoration of 

government control throughout the countryside, the progressive 

withdrawal of U.S. forces, and the solidification of nation-building 

gains would occur in the third and final phase. For the most part, 

U.S. forces would bear the primary burden for major offensive 

operations, while the South Vietnamese concentrated on pacification and local security missions. Westmoreland forecast that the 

entire process would take years to complete. 

First Blood

As the MACV commander prepared to implement his strategic vision, the first large battle involving major U.S. ground 

combat units occurred in August when the III Marine Amphibious 

Force discovered a Viet Cong regiment on Quang Ngai Province’s 

Batangan Peninsula just south of the Marine base at Chu Lai, and 

launched a preemptive attack called Operation Starlite. The 

engagement began with an artillery and air bombardment before 

marines surrounded the Viet Cong unit and pinned it against the 

sea. Intense and bitter fighting, including hand-to-hand combat, 

lasted for several days before the marines would declare victory, 

killing almost 700 of the enemy while suffering 45 dead and 120 

wounded (Map 5). 

As satisfying as Westmoreland found Operation Starlite,

the Viet Cong made a statement of their own when they simultaneously overran the U.S. Special Forces camp at Dak Sut in 

Kontum Province. Only a few South Vietnamese troops and 

U.S. Army advisers stationed at the remote outpost were able 

to escape. The reversal highlighted not just the vulnerability 

of these small and isolated outposts, but also the role that the 

Central Highlands played in enemy strategy. Communist strategists had long considered the decisive theater of the war to be 

the highlands, where the terrain would offset the allies’ technological supremacy and where Communist troops could thus 

isolate and defeat large allied formations. After achieving such 

victories, the enemy would then be posed to advance down the 
25

mountain spurs and valleys to the coast where they could cut 

South Vietnam into one or more disjointed parts, ripe for the 

picking. 

Determined to forestall this danger, in September 

Westmoreland chose to introduce a new and versatile weapon 

to the battle for control of the Central Highlands—the 1st 

Cavalry Division (Airmobile). Wanting to reduce reaction time 

and fuel consumption, the MACV commander chose to deploy 

the division not on the coast, but at a forward base at An Khe 

in western Binh Dinh Province. Located about sixty-five kilometers from the major U.S. logistics port of Qui Nhon, An Khe 

 Map 5

1

9

1

1

14

SOUTH 

CHINA SE A

A SHAU VALLEY 9–10 Mar 66

BA GIA

28 May 65

OPERATION STARLITE 17–24 Aug 65

Da Nang

Chu Lai

II C T Z

DEMARCATION LINE

Cu Lao Cham

NORTH VIE TNA M

L A O S

CAMBODIA

Hai Van Pas s

Hue

Quang Ngai

Quang Tri

Khe Sanh

A Shau

Tam Ky

Dong Ha

Q UANG TR I

THUA THIEN

Q UANG NAM

Q UANG TIN

Q UANG NGAI

K ONTUM

B INH DINH

Corps Tactical Zone Boundary

Engagement

1965–1966

I C ORPS T A C TICAL Z ONE

0 50 Miles

0 50 Kilometers
26 

was situated on Highway 19 approximately halfway between 

Qui Nhon and the vital road and political center of Pleiku City, 

the capital of Pleiku Province. To facilitate the move, the 1st 

Brigade of the 101st Airborne Division and South Vietnamese 

forces cleared the An Khe area and secured Highway 19 between 

Qui Nhon and An Khe, flushing the enemy from the area and 

inflicting substantial casualties. This five-day operation, known 

as Gibraltar, was one of the first extensive U.S. Army searchand-destroy campaigns of the war. The brigade claimed that it 

killed 225 Viet Cong, while its own losses numbered 13 killed 

and 28 wounded. As the 1st Cavalry Division’s more than 400 

helicopters moved up to An Khe under Gibraltar’s protection, 

Westmoreland made ready to test whether the massive use of 

helicopters would give the United States the advantage it needed 

to root out the elusive enemy from his mountain fortress. 

The 1st Cavalry Division Goes into Action

It did not take long for Westmoreland’s concern about the 

Central Highlands, and his proposed remedy, to be put to the test. 

In October, the enemy assembled three North Vietnamese PAVN

regiments—the 32d, the 33d, and the 66th—in western Pleiku 

Province and in adjacent Cambodia. North Vietnamese General 

Chu Huy Man’s Western Highlands Field Front had designed a 

A U.S. Army artillery fire support base in the Central Highlands National Archives
27

plan to strike western plateau areas of Kontum, Pleiku, Binh Dinh, 

and Phu Bon Provinces. The first phase of the plan was to destroy 

the Special Forces camps at Plei Me, Dak Sut, and Duc Co and to 

obliterate the Le Thanh District headquarters, which defended the 

approaches to Pleiku City. 

On 19 October, General Man began his campaign when the 

33d PAVN Regiment attacked the Special Forces camp at Plei Me, 

forty kilometers southwest of Pleiku City. The South Vietnamese 

corps commander, Lt. Gen. Vinh Loc, dispatched a relief force 

from his headquarters at Pleiku City. Assisted by U.S. tactical 

air strikes and the 1st Brigade, 1st Cavalry Division, the South 

Vietnamese ground troops soon reached Plei Me. Disoriented by 

the speed and unpredictability of the U.S. airmobile assaults, and 

 Map 6

19

14

14

19

19

567

509

509

14B

14B

6C

6C

DUC CO

PLEI ME

NEW PLEI DJERENG

LZ Albany

LZ X-Ray

23 Oct

19 Oct

Prek Drang

Ia Drang

Ia Drang

CHU GOUNGOT

CHU PONG MASSIF

Plei Ya Te

Plei Beng

Thanh An

Plei Toun Breng PLEIKU

C A M B O D I A

S O U T H 

V I E T N A M

BAT TLE OF THE IA DRANG

1st CAVALRY DIVISION

19 October–18 November 1965

ELEVATION IN METERS

0 200 500 800 and Above

Ground Movement

Air Assault

Enemy Retreat

Engagement

0

0 10 Kilometers

Miles 10
28 

hounded by the 1st Cavalry Division’s helicopter gunships, the 

North Vietnamese beat a hasty retreat west toward Cambodia. All 

told, the Communist regiment lost around 800 killed, 100 missing, 

and 500 wounded from its original complement of 2,200 men 

(Map 6).

Seeking to build on this success, a week later General 

Westmoreland directed the 1st Cavalry Division to seek out and 

destroy the enemy in western Pleiku Province in Operation Silver 

Bayonet. Taking over from the 1st Brigade on 9 November, the 

1st Cavalry Division’s 3d Brigade went looking for the enemy 

near the Cambodian border, hoping to box in the 33d PAVN 

Regiment before it could slip away. The brigade, commanded by 

Col. Timothy W. Brown, consisted of the 1st and 2d Battalions, 

7th Cavalry, and for this operation, the 2d Battalion, 5th Cavalry. 

On 13 November, division commander Maj. Gen. Harry W. O. 

Kinnard directed Brown to search the densely wooded area south 

of the Ia Drang River at the base of the Chu Pong Massif, a rugged 

mountain area spanning the South Vietnam–Cambodia border, 

one that U.S. intelligence believed to be a major base for the North 

Vietnamese. The intelligence proved correct. 

After the reversals in October, General Man had reconstituted the remnants of the 33d PAVN Regiment into a battalion and 

placed it in the valley between the Ia Drang River and Hill 542, a 

A UH–1 Huey gunship idles on an airfield next to an A–1 Skyraider attack aircraft. National Archives
29

prominent point of the Chu Pong Massif. The North Vietnamese 

commander situated the 32d PAVN Regiment, which had suffered 

moderate losses over the last few weeks, about thirteen kilometers 

to the west. His freshest unit, the 66th PAVN Regiment, waited 

along the Ia Drang River roughly two kilometers west of the 33d 

PAVN Regiment. The entire 1st PAVN Division was now concentrated in a relatively compact area on ground of its choosing. 

On the evening of 13 November, Colonel Brown ordered the 1st 

Battalion, 7th Cavalry, commanded by Lt. Col. Harold G. Moore, to 

execute an assault by helicopter into the Ia Drang Valley, just north 

of the Chu Pong Massif, early the next morning. Two batteries of 

105-mm. howitzers would support Moore’s battalion from Landing 

Zone Falcon, a clearing about nine kilometers east of the search area.

Moore decided he would insert his battalion as a unit instead 

of setting down his four companies into separate landing zones. 

Thus, his complete force would be available to him in case the 

enemy attacked upon landing. However, Moore’s battalion was 

only at two-thirds strength because of losses from malaria, individuals completing their service obligation, and other duties.

The morning of 14 November dawned bright and clear. A 

reconnaissance of the area identified a large natural clearing in the 

jungle that was suitable as a landing zone, which Moore designated 

Landing Zone X-Ray. The two artillery batteries to provide fire 

support were in position. It was approximately 0915. All preparations were complete; there were no signs of enemy activity around 

the landing zone. Moore ordered the initial assault for 1030. 

He was also aware, based on recent intelligence, that an enemy 

battalion was located five kilometers northwest of X-Ray, with 

another enemy force of undetermined size likely southwest of the 

clearing, and a base camp about three kilometers to the northwest. 

These were the forces Moore’s battalion would attack (Map 7).

Concerned that the earlier aerial reconnaissance had alerted 

the enemy to his plan, Moore arranged for the 21st Artillery to fire an 

eight-minute diversionary bombardment on two alternate landing 

zones, Tango and Yankee, located two kilometers to the north 

and south of X-Ray, respectively. This was followed by a twentyminute stream of fire on X-Ray. Gunships of the 2d Battalion, 

20th Artillery (Aerial Rocket) (Airmobile) then launched thirty 

seconds of rocket and machine gun fire, followed by more machine 

gun fire from the escort gunships of the 229th Combat Aviation 

Battalion. Moore, in the lead helicopter of the assault, watched 
 Map 7

LZ ALBANY

LZ TANGO

LZ X-RAY

LZ VICTOR

LZ YANKEE

LZ FALCON

la

Dran

g

al Meur

PLEI GONG KRECK

CHU PONG MASSIF

Ground MovementEnemy Attack

14–18 November 1965

B AT TLE OF THE IA DRANG

2 0 Miles

0 2 Kilometers
31

his plan unfold without problem. The fires concentrated around 

X-Ray were delivered precisely where needed, and perfectly timed 

for the assault. At 1048, Colonel Moore and the first elements of 

Company B leapt from the eight helicopters to secure the landing 

zone. The troopers charged into the sparse scrub brush and trees 

surrounding X-Ray, firing volleys at potential enemy positions. 

The helicopters on the ground lifted off, and soon after the second 

wave of eight helicopters descended. The shuttling of the battalion 

into the area of operations would continue into the afternoon.

As the lead element secured the landing zone, Company B 

reported it had captured a lone North Vietnamese soldier. Under 

interrogation the prisoner revealed that three Communist battalions with a combined strength of around 1,600 soldiers were 

located near the base of the mountain. At that moment, Moore 

barely had a company on the ground. Less than an hour later, 

Company B made contact with a large North Vietnamese force 

northwest of the landing zone. The contact grew in intensity 

until about 1330 when the Company B commander reported that 

two enemy companies were attempting to outflank his position. 

Second Lt. Henry Herrick of Company B maneuvered his second 

platoon to block the enemy advance, but soon discovered that his 

men had lost contact with the remainder of the company and they 

were now surrounded by North Vietnamese troops.

Members of the 1st Cavalry Division guard captured Viet Cong prisoners.

National Archives
32 

Around that time, a third helicopter lift arrived at X-Ray, 

giving Colonel Moore an additional cavalry company to reinforce 

the two already in contact. The new troops arrived just in time; 

North Vietnamese scouts had begun to infiltrate the landing zone, 

moving stealthily through the tall elephant grass, and firing on 

the Huey helicopters as they landed and departed. Moore used 

his third company to restore the perimeter, while he directed his 

air operations and artillery liaison officers to ring X-Ray with a 

curtain of steel. 

For the next five hours, the pair of batteries from the 21st 

Artillery provided nearly continuous support from Landing Zone 

Falcon. Unfortunately, the forward observers on the ground and 

the artillery liaison and forward air controller in the command 

helicopter overhead had difficulty controlling the bombardment. 

Smoke, dust, and vegetation obscured the impact areas, so the 

forward observers began walking artillery barrages into places that 

would help the besieged companies. Although the artillery fire did 

not halt the North Vietnamese assault, it did hinder the flow of 

enemy reinforcements into the battle. Two air strikes also relieved 

pressure on the U.S. units.

As the battle raged and casualties mounted in the afternoon, Herrick’s surrounded platoon struggled to survive. Sgt. 

Ernie Savage was in command since Herrick and the platoon 

sergeant had been killed in the intense fighting. Savage called 

in artillery fire as close as he could to the perimeter. All through 

the day and into the night the artillery kept enemy forces at bay 

as they attacked the position persistently. In the early afternoon, 

Companies A and B tried to reach the platoon, but they were 

stopped by a sizable enemy force. They tried again around 1620. 

At that time, one of the Company A platoons ran directly into 

a larger enemy force, and it was soon pinned down. The use 

of white phosphorus artillery shells allowed other elements of 

Company A to reach the platoon, which pulled back with its 

dead and wounded.

Moore estimated that his battalion was fighting approximately 500–600 enemy soldiers. He asked his brigade commander 

to send another rifle company, which Brown approved. At 1500, 

Moore landed the remainder of the tactical elements of the 

battalion consisting of the reconnaissance platoon, three helicopter loads of Company C soldiers, and some Company D 

personnel. The battalion surgeon and his staff arrived and began 
33

to treat the wounded, identifying which among them required 

immediate airlift to a rear hospital. Throughout the afternoon, 

helicopters delivered water, ammunition, rations, and medical 

supplies, and the battalion’s operations officer, the artillery 

liaison officer, and the forward air controller joined Colonel 

Moore on the ground. The promised reinforcements also arrived 

by helicopter in the form of Company B, 2d Battalion, 7th 

Cavalry. Moore made the unit his reserve. Finally, at 1740, he 

decided to pull all his units into a tight defensive perimeter for 

the night, and while the “lost” platoon remained separated, he 

had communications with it. The troops prepared the clearing 

for night landings and the supporting gunners registered their 

mortars and howitzers. In a pensive moment, Moore wrote in his 

postwar memoir We Were Soldiers Once . . . and Young that dust 

and smoke “hung like a horizontal curtain” over the landing zone 

as darkness descended.

Few slept well that night. The enemy had conducted a couple 

of small probing actions of the main perimeter. Meanwhile, the 

isolated platoon, about 300 meters to the north, had withstood 

enemy assaults with a combination of grit, small-arms and artillery fire, and U.S. Air Force tactical bombing strikes, which relied 

on air-dropped flares to see the enemy. At dawn, Moore and his 

staff prepared to rescue the endangered platoon, but the enemy 

A medical evacuation helicopter transports the wounded from the battlefield. National Archives
34 

forestalled the attempt when a battalion from the 66th PAVN 

Regiment attacked the southern sector of the main perimeter. 

The Americans called in artillery and mortar fire as well as air 

strikes to blunt the Communist assault. The fire came in so close 

that the defenders could hear the shrapnel scything through the 

vegetation around them, but the enemy attack continued. Moore 

called for more reinforcements, and again Brown assured him of 

the same.

By 1000 on the fifteenth, Colonel Moore had repulsed the 

attack and had begun receiving reinforcements from the 2d 

Battalion, 7th Cavalry, on the eastern edge of the landing zone. 

Colonel Brown also established a second artillery landing zone 

five kilometers northwest of X-Ray where he placed two more 

batteries of 105-mm. howitzers. A few hours later, Lt. Col. Robert 

B. Tully and his 2d Battalion, 5th Cavalry, arrived at X-Ray after 

completing a 3.5-kilometer march from Landing Zone Victor. 

The battalion commanders formed a relief column, and by midafternoon, the survivors of Herrick’s “lost” platoon were safely 

inside the U.S. perimeter. Everyone dug in for the night.

The North Vietnamese attacked the U.S. position with a sizable 

force several times in the early hours of 16 November, but again, 

artillery and mortar fires as well as tactical air support repelled the 

enemy. By 1000 on the sixteenth, the siege of X-Ray had ended. A 

Soldiers of the 1st Brigade, 101st Airborne Division, prepare an 81-mm. mortar for action in 

Phu Yen Province during Operation Harrison.

National Archives
35

short time later, the lead element of the 2d Battalion, 7th Cavalry, 

under the command of Lt. Col. Robert A. McDade, marched into 

Colonel Moore’s perimeter. With its arrival, helicopters lifted the 

men of the 1st Battalion and the other units that had fought beside 

them for three days out of X-Ray to rest and reorganize at a camp 

just outside Pleiku City. But the Ia Drang campaign was not over.

On the morning of 17 November, Tully’s 2d Battalion, 5th 

Cavalry, and McDade’s 2d Battalion, 7th Cavalry, marched out of 

X-Ray with Tully’s battalion in the lead. McDade’s destination was 

to the north, an open area known as Landing Zone Albany, while 

Tully moved to another landing zone to the northeast. McDade’s 

unit included a company from the 1st Battalion, 5th Cavalry, as 

a replacement for the two companies that had been airlifted out 

with Moore’s battalion. A walking artillery barrage covered Tully’s 

battalion.

At 1100, the two battalions went their separate directions with 

Tully offering McDade his supporting fires, but McDade declined 

the gesture, fearful that the fires would betray his unit’s position 

to the enemy. McDade, a new battalion commander, also did not 

require his subordinate units to assume tactical formations as they 

marched to Albany, although some of his company commanders 

did so as they moved through the tall grass in the rising heat of 

the day. So slack was the security in some units that one company 

The CH–47 Chinook helicopters deliver troops and 105-mm. howitzers at a landing zone on 

the Bong Son Plain during Operation Masher. National Archives
36 

commander called the march a “walk in the sun.” At noon, a 

company took two North Vietnamese prisoners who had deserted, 

but learned nothing of importance under interrogation. The unit 

pressed on after a short rest and the head of McDade’s strung-out 

column reached Albany a little after 1300. The landing zone was 

sizable, with two open fields suitable for landing helicopters, and 

the men of the lead platoon dispersed to secure the area, “sitting 

on their packs,” as they awaited orders.

Unknown to McDade, a battalion from the 66th PAVN 

Regiment and a company from the 33d PAVN Regiment were 

waiting for him. The North Vietnamese commander in charge, Le 

Xuan Phoi, had deployed his troops to create an L-shaped ambush 

at the edge of the clearing. His soldiers to the northeast of the 

landing zone formed the long stem of the L, running parallel to 

McDade’s line of advance, while the lone company formed the base 

of the L. The Communist troops held their fire until McDade’s lead 

elements entered the clearing and reached its far edge. At 1315, 

they opened fire on the unsuspecting Americans, mowing down 

dozens in the opening moments of the ambush.

As the firing intensified, Communist soldiers closed the 

distance with McDade’s men from all sides. The Americans soon 

became disoriented in the chaos. North Vietnamese soldiers were 

all around them, and the tall grass made it hard to see what was 

occurring and to consolidate into a defensive position. Platoons 

and companies shattered into ineffectiveness under the intense 

fire, with some U.S. soldiers firing on their comrades in the confusion. The fighting, in some locations, turned into a hand-to-hand 

struggle.

The afternoon stretched into evening, but even in the fading 

light, the U.S. artillery continued to support what had now become 

three islands of American survivors. Finally, at dawn of the eighteenth, the shelling ceased, but small-arms fire between the North 

Vietnamese and the Americans continued through the morning. 

In the early afternoon, McDade’s staff officers called for close air 

support before the North Vietnamese made an all-out assault. A–1E 

Skyraiders from Pleiku City answered the call and at 1415 began 

their attack. Below them, the A–1E pilots could see an enemy force 

concentrating to the east of Albany. The propeller-driven fighterbombers strafed and dropped napalm. For two hours, the planes 

kept up their strikes, which allowed the Americans on the perimeter to organize and consolidate. Sniping, probing actions, and 
37

small firefights would continue into the early evening. Eventually 

they ceased, and a company from Pleiku arrived by helicopter to 

reinforce what remained of McDade’s battalion. The airlift also 

meant that wounded could be evacuated. 

Meanwhile, a company from the 5th Cavalry, which had 

begun its movement that afternoon, was making its way from the 

east toward McDade’s location. It joined up with the company 

of McDade’s battalion that was the farthest down in the column, 

and which had been able to mount a strong defense as an integrated unit. These two companies then moved forward to link up 

with McDade, but the approaching darkness and heavy enemy 

fire required them to wait until morning. In the darkness, the 

enemy withdrew. While the enemy would order another foray at 

another location in the valley later that day, it would be the last 

North Vietnamese assault of any consequence during the Pleiku 

campaign, and the American units countered it effectively.

That next day, 19 November, the Americans recovered 

casualties and equipment and tallied up the enemy dead. As the 

official history indicates, it had been “a terrible bloodletting.” 

Approximately 70 percent of the men in the U.S. units that had 

been ambushed were either killed or wounded; one company 

had lost three-fourths of its men. The final tally: 151 killed, 121 

wounded, and 5 missing. The 1st Cavalry Division’s after action 

report estimated that enemy losses were in the hundreds, but this 

was a matter of conjecture. Nonetheless, enemy casualties were 

probably substantial and included the death of Le Xuan Phoi. 

The heroic stand of Colonel Moore’s battalion and the earlier 

successful engagement at Plei Me suggested that even inexperienced U.S. soldiers could defeat North Vietnamese regulars under 

difficult circumstances. In the view of General Westmoreland, the 

outcome was an “unprecedented victory” that produced a discernible improvement in the morale of the South Vietnamese government. General Kinnard also considered the Pleiku campaign a 

success. It had validated the airmobile concept and blunted the 

North Vietnamese campaign to dominate the highlands. The 

near destruction of three North Vietnamese regiments was also 

a credit. On the other hand, at Landing Zone Albany, there had 

also been “failures of leadership, particularly at the battalion level.” 

Moreover, in many instances U.S. ground troops would not have 

survived without massive air and artillery support. This led to a 

debate about the airmobile division’s “staying power” since it did 
38 

not have the heavy equipment that a standard infantry division 

had. More significantly, the engagement hammered home to 

commanders the importance of having access to heavy fire support 

at all times. 

A Flurry of Engagements

As the Ia Drang campaign was unfolding, other offensive 

actions were occurring to the south. The 1st Infantry Division, 

the 173d Airborne Brigade, and South Vietnamese units pressed 

outward from Saigon into the enemy’s sanctuaries near the capital. 

For three months, from October to December 1965, the 173d 

Airborne Brigade carried out fourteen company-size or larger 

operations east and northeast of Saigon. The 1st Infantry Division, 

operating mainly north of Saigon, executed fifty battalion-size or 

larger operations with names like Hopscotch, Viper, Maverick, 

and Smash. Both of the units also informed MACV that they 

conducted more than 3,000 smaller operations, of which approximately 800 resulted in engagements with the enemy. These figures 

attest to the enemy’s willingness to enter combat with U.S. forces. 

The maxim for their campaign was straightforward, “Seek out the 

Americans to fight them, pursue the [South Vietnamese] puppets 

to kill them.”

November 1965 proved to be a month of success and failure 

for the South Vietnamese. One South Vietnamese regiment 

inflicted a heavy defeat on a Viet Cong main force regiment operating near the Michelin rubber plantation seventy kilometers 

northwest of Saigon. However, the thrill of this success abated 

five days later when a Viet Cong regiment overran a battalion of 

government troops, rendering the unit ineffective. Intelligence 

reports indicated a substantial increase in the number of PAVN

units infiltrating from North Vietnam. Specifically, U.S. intelligence estimated that the number of North Vietnamese regiments 

had increased from five to twelve, with an estimated strength 

of 65,000 combat personnel. By year’s end, nearly a third of all 

Communist battalions in South Vietnam were composed of North 

Vietnamese regulars. 

U.S. forces saw action too, and the results were generally positive. After Operation Hump in early November, the 

commander of the 173d Airborne Brigade said that his unit had 

“beat the living hell” out of the enemy units that had crossed 

its path. During Operation Bushmaster II, which ran from 28 
39

November through 1 December 1965, the 1st Infantry Division 

mauled several Viet Cong units and destroyed a large quantity 

of enemy supplies. This second operation proved once again the 

value of supporting firepower, whether it was Air Force fighters, 

helicopter gunships, or artillery. In fact, one of the U.S. battalion 

commanders involved with Bushmaster II remarked that he had 

such an abundance of firepower he had to take care not to make 

casualties of his own men through friendly fire. 

By late November 1965, North Vietnam had more 

infantry battalions in South Vietnam than the United States, 

and Westmoreland realized that the Communists could build 

up their forces faster than the United States. It appeared that 

the enemy was putting the bulk of his forces in the Central 

Highlands. Westmoreland also believed that projecting U.S. 

forces into the Mekong Delta was necessary to strengthen allied 

control of this vital rice-producing area and to interdict the 

main infiltration routes from Cambodia into the Communist 

base area known as War Zone C, a triple-canopy rainforest that 

covered northern Tay Ninh Province. His assessment was not 

optimistic. To be able to take to the offensive in a sustained 

way, U.S. combat deployments needed to be larger, as he could 

only cover so much territory with the forces at hand. Further, 

because of the currently limited logistical infrastructure, especially port facilities, additional support units were necessary. An 

Soldiers on reconnaissance make their way through a rubber tree plantation in III Corps. National Archives
40 

intelligence estimate that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) 

completed four months earlier suggested that Westmoreland’s 

concerns were valid. 

Even more disturbing from a combat effectiveness perspective, Westmoreland and the MACV staff came to realize in late 

summer that in preparing the troop estimates for the Phase I reinforcement plan, they had drastically miscalculated the number 

of support personnel needed to sustain the forty-four maneuver 

battalions effectively. Thus, throughout the autumn, based on a 

flurry of MACV requests that President Johnson readily approved, 

air transport, air defense, artillery, engineer, medical, tactical air 

units, and other support elements were added, enlarging the target 

Phase I force level to 220,000 U.S. troops. Stretching out deployments under this phase until April 1966—an action necessitated by 

the president’s refusal to mobilize the reserves—caused an overlap 

with the Phase II troop movements, which complicated Phase II 

deployment planning.

After visiting Vietnam in November, Secretary of Defense 

McNamara warned President Johnson that U.S. casualty rates 

of possibly 1,000 dead per month could be expected. He voiced 

his belief that the North Vietnamese thought the war would be a 

long one with time being on their side and they would have the 

better staying power. The most distressing note was the secretary’s insistence that even the original estimates for Phase II troop 

requirements were inadequate, providing only sufficient force to 

hold present positions. In addition to several units of Free World 

Military Assistance Forces (mainly from Australia and South 

Korea), McNamara recommended forty additional combat battalions to “provide what it takes in men and materiel . . . to stick 

with our stated objectives and win the war.” The toll to be paid 

was pricey—approximately 400,000 U.S. personnel in Vietnam by 

the end of 1966, with an additional 200,000 in 1967. Even then, 

McNamara could not guarantee success. Perhaps he recognized 

the situation was exactly how the Prussian theorist, Carl von 

Clausewitz, described it in his major work, On War, “Everything 

in war is very simple, but the simplest thing is difficult.”

Although Westmoreland of necessity focused much of his 

attention on the arrival of combat units, the earlier U.S. advisory 

effort continued as well. It took a slightly new direction in 1965 

as the MACV commander focused much of its new growth at the 

district level, with 151 of South Vietnam’s 241 districts receiving 
41

U.S. advisory teams. Those advisory teams brought much-needed 

training and resources to the Regional and Popular Forces who did 

much of the fighting against Viet Cong local force and guerrilla 

units. The province and district advisers also brought increased 

assistance to South Vietnam’s efforts to pacify the countryside. 

All told, approximately 5,000 U.S. Army officers and enlisted men 

acted as advisers to South Vietnamese units and to provincial and 

district headquarters around the country. In addition, some 1,500 

members of the U.S. Army’s 5th Special Forces Group advised the 

30,000-man-strong Civilian Irregular Defense Group. 

In December 1965, both sides agreed to a thirty-hour 

Christmas truce, and President Johnson approved a pause in 

the bombing of North Vietnam for thirty-seven days while the 

United States attempted to pressure the North Vietnamese into a 

negotiated peace settlement. When the cease-fire ended, U.S. and 

allied units retained their defensive posture as MACV ordered 

them not to fire unless fired upon or attacked. Nonetheless, 

North Vietnamese and Viet Cong attacks grew in number and 

strength, and on 26 December U.S. forces and their allies resumed 

ground offensive operations. By year’s end, U.S. troop levels in 

Vietnam reached more than 184,000, and Time magazine selected 

General Westmoreland as its Man of the Year for 1965. Overall, 

as a CIA historian noted, the increased U.S. military presence had 

precluded North Vietnam from toppling the feeble Saigon government. However, it was too early to tell whether President Johnson’s 

gamble would shift the military initiative in the allies’ favor.

Year of the Horse: 1966

With North Vietnam showing no interest in peace negotiations, Westmoreland took an equally uncompromising stance as 

the new year began. He ordered his subordinates to crush the 

Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese units throughout South 

Vietnam. The mission was straightforward: “find, fix, and destroy.” 

Unfortunately, U.S. forces were still too small in number to 

seize the initiative effectively. Consequently, allied forces would 

continue to focus on keeping roads open, securing rice harvests, 

and making spoiling attacks to keep the enemy off balance until 

the allied buildup would allow the United States to undertake 

large-scale operations on a sustained basis. 

At the beginning of January 1966, the 173d Airborne Brigade 

moved into Hau Nghia Province to the west of Saigon, a region 
42 

that contained several major Viet Cong infiltration routes and a 

string of forested enemy base camps. From 1 to 8 January, the paratroopers swept the rubber and pineapple plantations along the 

Oriental River during Operation Marauder, finding numerous 

camps, caches, and arms factories. The paratroopers then shifted 

northeast to the Ho Bo Woods, a disused rubber plantation on 

the Saigon River near the town of Cu Chi, and close to where the 

25th Infantry Division would soon establish its main base camp. 

Pairing up with the 1st Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, for 

Operation Crimp, the 173d Airborne Brigade soon discovered 

an extensive tunnel and bunker system, some of it more than a 

dozen meters below ground, that contained command bunkers, 

a hospital, classrooms, living quarters, kitchens, and defensive 

positions. The allied soldiers met stiff Viet Cong resistance as 

they searched and destroyed the tunnels, but were able to capture 

mortars, antiaircraft machine guns, and a large number of documents valuable for their intelligence (Map 8).

The 1st Brigade, 1st Cavalry Division, began the new year 

with Operation Matador, to find and destroy the enemy in 

Pleiku and Kontum Provinces. As with Operations Marauder

and Crimp, the action underscored the depth of enemy infiltration in South Vietnam as well as the benefits the enemy derived 

Troops of the advance element of the 1st Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, arrive at Ton 

Son Nhut Airport. U.S. Army
43

from sanctuaries in neighboring Cambodia. The troops uncovered 

abundant evidence of enemy activity, but the enemy was usually 

able to escape across the border. Unable to attack the cross-border 

sanctuaries due to restrictions imposed by President Johnson, 

Westmoreland continued to focus his efforts in wearing down 

enemy strength inside South Vietnam. 

 Map 8

OPERATION ABILENE 30 Mar-15 Apr

OPERATION MARAUDER 1–8 Jan

OPERATION CRIMP 8–14 Jan

OPERATION BIRMINGHAM 24 Apr–17 May

OPERATION EL PASO II 2 Jun–13 Jul

Bien Hoa Cu Chi

Vung Tau IV C T Z

II C T Z

W A R Z ONE C

W A R Z ONE D

IRON TRIANGLE

SOUTH 

CHINA SE A

14

20

15

13

1

1

1

4

4

4

4

22

PHUOC TUY

B INH TUY

BINH

THUAN

LONG KHANH

PHUOC LONG

BINH DUONG

H AU NGHIA

LONG AN

GO CONG

KIEN HOA

KIEN TUONG

DINH TUONG

GIA DINH

T AY NINH

BIEN HOA

Q UANG DUC

L AM DONG

BINH LONG

BA XUY E N

VINH BINH

VINH LONG

An Loc

Loc Ninh

SAIGON

CAMBODI A

Corps Tactical Zone Boundary

Engagement

1966

III C ORPS T A C TICAL Z ONE

0 50 Miles

0 50 Kilometers
44 

On 19 January 1966 in the coastal lowlands of II Corps, 

the 1st Brigade of the 101st Airborne Division, along with the 

South Korean 2d Marine Brigade and the South Vietnamese 

47th Regiment, initiated Operation Van Buren to locate and 

destroy a North Vietnamese regiment believed to be in the Tuy 

Hoa Valley, one of the principal rice-growing regions in Phu 

Yen Province. In addition to capturing and killing a number of 

the enemy, the allies secured the harvest of more than 30,000 

tons of rice, which they placed in government warehouses. 

Westmoreland augmented allied forces in II Corps by directing 

the 3d Brigade, 25th Infantry Division, which had begun 

arriving in Vietnam in late 1965, to assemble near the strategic 

crossroads of Pleiku City. 

In January 1966, President Johnson and Prime Minister Ky 

met in Hawaii to discuss the war. President Johnson renewed 

his pledge to defend South Vietnam, with the allies agreeing 

to pay increased attention to gaining the support of the South 

Vietnamese people for their government. Continuing in the vein 

set by Westmoreland’s three-phased strategy, the president then 

set specific goals for 1966. Among these were to bring 60 percent 

Marines from South Korea set up new fortifications near Tuy Hoa. U.S. Army
45

of South Vietnam’s populace under government control, to destroy 

about half of the enemy’s major base areas, and to wear down 

Communist forces “at a rate as high as their capability to put men 

into the field.” The president and the secretary of defense also reassured General Westmoreland that he would receive all the Phase 

II reinforcements he asked for, albeit at a slower pace than the 

MACV commander had originally envisioned.

The enemy, of course, did not remain idle, with the situation 

in the northern provinces assuming a particularly ominous aspect. 

Two North Vietnamese divisions threatened invasion across the 

Demilitarized Zone into the northernmost province of Quang Tri. 

By February, enemy infiltration across the northern border as well 

as from Laos into the next province to the south, Thua Thien, was 

well under way. These two provinces, separated from the rest of 

the country by a precipitous mountain barrier that extended to the 

sea and could be traversed only by the narrow Hai Van Pass, had 

a single South Vietnamese division and a U.S. Marine battalion 

deployed to protect them. Responding to the looming threat, 

MACV sent the greater part of the U.S. 3d Marine Division north 

of the Hai Van Pass, leaving the U.S. 1st Marine Division and a 

South Vietnamese division to defend the three southern provinces 

of I Corps.

If U.S. forces were arriving more slowly than Westmoreland 

would have preferred, enough men were on the ground to warrant 

greater development in command and control arrangements. In 

March, the MACV commander formed two Corps-level subordinate headquarters. I Field Force controlled U.S. units in South 

Vietnam’s II Corps region, while II Field Force controlled U.S. 

units operating in South Vietnam’s III and IV Corps. A U.S. 

Marine Corps entity—III Marine Amphibious Force (III MAF)—

controlled U.S. units in South Vietnam’s I Corps.

March got off to a rocky start for III MAF headquarters when 

North Vietnamese regiments attacked a Special Forces camp 

in the remote A Shau Valley of western Thua Thien Province. 

After three days of severe fighting in terrible weather, the CIDG 

soldiers and their associated U.S. and South Vietnamese Special 

Forces personnel abandoned the camp in the face of a superior 

force. The camp was key to the surveillance of the valley, and with 

its abandonment, North Vietnamese units moved in and built a 

major logistical base to store supplies brought down the Ho Chi 

Minh Trail. Because the allies were short of troops and helicopters, 
46

and threatened by the possibility of a North Vietnamese incursion 

across the Demilitarized Zone, Westmoreland reluctantly decided 

not to reoccupy the camp. It would be two years before U.S. troops 

would be in a position to return.

Meanwhile, a political crisis arose in I Corps when Buddhists 

and student factions in Hue and Da Nang challenged the South 

Vietnamese government’s authority. Anti-government demonstrations soon spread to Saigon. The government attempted to quell 

the disorder by adopting a political program to meet Buddhist 

demands. Unrest continued in Saigon until June when South 

Vietnamese troops seized the principal Buddhist center in the 

capital, thereby crushing the Buddhists’ power. Fortunately, the 

struggle between the Buddhists and the South Vietnamese government had little impact on U.S. military units.

In late March, still concerned with the safety of the Central 

Highlands, Westmoreland sent two battalions of the 3d Brigade, 

25th Infantry Division, and some engineer units to repair and 

secure Highway 14 between Pleiku City and Ban Me Thuot. Once 

the road—which the Viet Cong had kept closed for nearly a 

year—had been opened, the cavalry troop and tank platoon 

attached to the 3d Brigade began running patrols between the 

two cities to discourage the enemy from building roadblocks or 

setting ambushes. When more U.S. units moved into the Central 

Highlands, General Westmoreland planned to restore the 

northern branch of Highway 14 between Pleiku City and Kontum 

City, thereby giving the allies a dependable north-south line of 

communications that stretched nearly 300 kilometers from the 

upper to the lower end of the Central Highlands (Map 9). 

Farther south, the allied campaign to remove the enemy from 

the provinces surrounding Saigon met strong opposition in Hau 

Nghia Province, northwest of the capital. The enemy there posed 

a major threat to Saigon. Additionally, the province contained the 

major enemy supply routes between Cambodia, the Mekong Delta, 

and War Zones C and D. War Zone C, abutting the Cambodian 

border, was where the National Liberation Front supposedly had 

its headquarters. Between it and War Zone D lay the infamous 

Iron Triangle, a hilly, heavily forested area containing an extensive 

underground tunnel system, mines, and booby traps. Together, 

these Communist bastions posed a major threat to the capital.

General Westmoreland responded to the danger by deploying 

the bulk of the newly arrived U.S. 25th Infantry Division to 
 Map 9

An Khe

Pleiku

Plei Me

Qui Nhon

Cam Ranh Bay

OPERATIONS PAUL REVERE I and II 10 May–25 Aug

OPERATION GARFIELD 25 Feb–24 Mar

OPERATION AUSTIN IV 1–18 May

OPERATION VAN BUREN 19 Jan–21 Feb

OPERATION MATADOR 1–20 Jan

OPERATION HAWTHORNE 2–21 Jun

III C T Z

I C T Z

Chu Pong

Massif 

SOUTH 

CHINA SE A

SOUTH 

CHINA SE A

14

14

20

21

19

1

1

1

1

11

14

Dao Phu Qui

Q UANG TIN

Q UANG NGAI

KONTUM

BINH DINH

PLEIKU

PHU BON

PHU YEN

DARL A C

KHANH HOA

Q UANG DUC

TUYEN DUC

BINH THUA N

PHUOC

LONG

L AM DONG

BINH TUY

LONG

KHANH

PHUOC TUY

NINH

THUA N

Kontum

Tuy Hoa

Dak To

Tou Morong

Ban Me Thuot

Da Lat

CAMBODI A L A O S

Corps Tactical Zone Boundary

Engagement

1966

II C ORPS T A C TICAL Z ONE

0 50 Miles

0 50 Kilometers
48 

Hau Nghia Province. The division established its base camp 

along Highway 1 at Cu Chi and began operations throughout 

the province. In addition, in March and early April, the U.S. 1st 

Infantry Division and the 1st Australian Task Force launched 

Operation Abilene, a spoiling operation to destroy base camps 

and caches that the 5th PLAF Division had established east of 

Saigon in preparation for an attack on the capital. Although no 

major engagements occurred, the allies seized supplies and forced 

the Viet Cong to abandon the area for the moment.

In late April, the 1st Infantry Division entered War Zone 

C in northern Tay Ninh Province. The sweep operation known 

as Birmingham uncovered vast quantities of rice, clothing, 

medicine, and other supplies that enemy rear service troops 

had smuggled across the border and then stashed in concealed 

dumps. The attack did not inflict large numbers of enemy casualties, as the Viet Cong opted for their usual tactic of withdrawing 

into Cambodia. 

Almost simultaneously with Birmingham, the 101st 

Airborne Division launched Operation Austin IV in the II Corps 

border provinces of Quang Duc and Phuoc Long, a foray that 

lasted until mid-May. The action began with the division’s 1st 

Brigade routing a battalion from the 141st PAVN Regiment, forcing 

it to retreat into Cambodia for sanctuary. Two weeks later, on 1 

June, the same U.S. brigade, accompanied by South Vietnamese 

A U.S. soldier examines the contents of a bunker abandoned by the Viet Cong. National Archives
49

units began Operation Hawthorne, a spoiling attack designed to 

thwart an anticipated enemy offensive around Tou Morong, Tan 

Canh, and Dak To in Kontum Province. After nineteen days of 

tough fighting, the enemy lost more than 500 soldiers, rendering 

his 24th PAVN Regiment combat ineffective. Operations along 

the border to thwart the enemy’s monsoon season offensive soon 

spread to Darlac and Pleiku Provinces. There, in Operation Paul 

Revere, the 3d Brigade, 25th Infantry Division, and supporting 

units made contact with the 1st PAVN Division in the border 

area west of Pleiku and killed more than 400 of the enemy while 

suffering light casualties itself. 

While U.S. units preempted the enemy’s planned offensive in 

II Corps, the 1st Infantry Division and the South Vietnamese 5th 

Infantry Division continued to hunt for enemy main force units 

in III Corps. The scene of the action was the corridor between 

War Zone C and Highway 13, an all-weather road that ran some 

130 kilometers north from Saigon through Binh Duong and Binh 

Long Provinces. The road was the main line of communications 

between the capital and allied installations in northern III Corps. 

When II Field Force commander, Lt. Gen. Jonathan O. Seaman, 

learned in early June that the 9th PLAF Division was planning to 

cut the road and perhaps attack the district capital of Loc Ninh in 

northern Binh Long Province, he ordered Maj. Gen. William E. 

DePuy and his 1st Infantry Division to begin a highway security 

mission known as Operation El Paso II. 

The first major contact of the operation took place on 8 June 

when the 272d Regiment from the 9th PLAF Division ambushed 

an armored cavalry troop from the 1st Infantry Division south of 

Loc Ninh. General DePuy reinforced his hard-pressed cavalrymen 

with an infantry battalion inserted by helicopter into the enemy’s 

rear. South Vietnamese forces also joined the battle. The combined 

allied force broke the ambush and killed an estimated 300 Viet 

Cong soldiers at a loss of fourteen Americans and nineteen South 

Vietnamese. Over the next five weeks, General DePuy’s 1st Infantry 

Division fought several more major battles with the 9th PLAF 

Division in the vicinity of Loc Ninh and An Loc, eliminating more 

than 2,000 enemy soldiers by the time that the operation ended on 

13 July. U.S. losses were 125 killed and 424 wounded, but DePuy 

had proven that his division could defend the Highway 13 corridor 

with only modest assistance from the South Vietnamese and II Field 

Force’s artillery and aviation assets. However, DePuy and Seaman 
50 

would need additional troops if they intended to pursue the enemy 

into the jungles of Binh Long and Binh Duong Provinces, where the 

Viet Cong had established their main base camps. 

Renewed Emphasis on Pacification

Notwithstanding the lopsided casualties that often resulted 

when U.S. and Communist troops clashed, Secretary McNamara 

gave the president an ambivalent report when he returned from 

visiting Saigon in July 1966. “We have done somewhat better 

militarily than I anticipated,” he told Johnson, saying that the 

buildup of U.S. forces had halted the Communist military 

initiative and lessened the probability that the Viet Cong could 

attain victory in South Vietnam. However, McNamara also 

highlighted two concerns. He forthrightly admitted that he 

could not see any “reasonable way to bring the war to an end 

soon” because enemy morale remained high despite the heavy 

losses inflicted by the allies. Further, the enemy continued to 

replace losses through recruitment in South Vietnam and infiltration from the North. The second issue was that pacification 

was a severe disappointment. Indications were that the Viet 

Cong political infrastructure was thriving, giving it a distinct 

advantage in intelligence gathering, and guerrilla operations in 

the countryside had become bolder and more successful. The 

South Vietnamese remained a weak ally, decidedly lacking in 

effectiveness and initiative. 

To rectify this situation, McNamara recommended that the 

United States take a more active role in supporting South Vietnam’s 

pacification efforts and “getting ourselves into a military posture 

that we credibly would maintain indefinitely—a position that 

makes trying to ‘wait us out’ less attractive.” The secretary told the 

president that pacification—a term that encompassed the various 

military, economic, and political efforts undertaken by the Saigon 

government to promote security and prosperity in the countryside—would prove to be the key measurement of allied progress in 

the war. Given more U.S. resources, McNamara said that the South 

Vietnamese could build an effective rural development program in 

about two years. Though the Joint Chiefs of Staff were more upbeat 

about the military situation than the secretary, they agreed that 

the allies needed several more years to generate widespread and 

lasting gains. Seeing no prospect of the situation improving on its 
51

own, President Johnson agreed to send more troops to Vietnam 

and hand to MACV a larger pacification support role.

A slew of new American units joined MACV during the late 

summer and autumn of 1966. The 196th Light Infantry Brigade 

deployed to III Corps in August, followed a month later by the 11th 

Armored Cavalry Regiment and its fleet of M48 tanks and M113 

armored cavalry assault vehicles (ACAVs). In October, the 1st and 

the 3d Brigades of the 4th Infantry Division debarked in III Corps, 

with the 1st Brigade soon moving on to its new permanent home in 

the Central Highlands. Secretary McNamara watched the buildup 

with growing dismay. He worried that deploying more U.S. combat 

units would not produce a breakthrough in the war, and that it was 

in fact destabilizing the South Vietnamese economy. Therefore, he 

wanted the military leaders in the Pentagon and at U.S. Pacific 

Command to review the accuracy of their force requirements and 

to send to Vietnam “only what is needed.” The secretary’s concerns 

were well founded. The U.S. Embassy in Saigon reported during 

the summer that inflation was now rampant in South Vietnam, 

driving up the cost of living. South Vietnam attempted to counter 

the impact by devaluing its currency, but that step undermined 

wage stability, contributed to an inflationary gap between projected 

Soldiers of the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment stand next to their M113 ACAV as they 

perform maintenance on a pair of M60 machine guns.

National Archives
52 

revenues and budget, nurtured the burgeoning black market, and 

ignited political unrest in populated areas. 

As for pacification, Johnson established a special assistant 

in the White House to ensure that pacification received sufficient 

attention from both U.S. military and civilian officials and the 

South Vietnamese government. He chose Robert W. Komer, a 

former CIA analyst who had joined the National Security Council 

staff during the Kennedy administration, for the job. 

Komer began his duties in March 1966 and made pacification a matter of personal commitment. He understood Johnson’s 

resolve regarding what the commander in chief called “the other 

war.” Johnson hoped that economic, social, and political reforms 

akin to his domestic initiative, the Great Society, would persuade 

the Vietnamese population to turn against the Communists and to 

support the allied cause actively. 

Within a few weeks of beginning his new position, Komer 

completed and coordinated with the relevant U.S. agencies a 

presidential directive designed to centralize management of pacification in Washington under his control. This directive, signed 

by Johnson, granted Komer direct access to the president and 

substantial authority over not only the civilian agencies responsible for pacification activities—the Department of State, the U.S. 

Agency for International Development (USAID), and the Central 

Intelligence Agency—but also influence in the employment of 

military resources to fulfill the president’s pledge to the South 

Vietnamese leaders to help build a new South Vietnam.

Komer assumed his role by frequently traveling to South Vietnam 

to observe the progress of pacification firsthand. When asked by the 

U.S. press in Saigon what it was like to deal with Komer, Ambassador 

Lodge likened it to having a “blowtorch aimed at the seat of your 

pants.” Komer’s nickname became “Blowtorch Bob” and he reveled in 

the appellation, as it was indicative not only of his forceful personality, 

but also of his dedication to the president’s priority.

Komer’s reports to President Johnson about pacification 

activities over the next few months were generally positive and 

optimistic. He was confident that the United States could build an 

effective nonmilitary effort to complement the military’s actions, 

but the pacification program was lagging significantly behind the 

combat power the U.S. military had introduced. He recognized that 

military requirements had priority, but he noted that economic 

instability in South Vietnam was linked to a number of factors, 
53

including the inefficient distribution of U.S. economic aid to the 

Vietnamese people. He pointed out, for example, that USAID was 

competing with the military for port space. It also did not have 

the transportation assets to deliver American aid—a steady stream 

of building material, agricultural tools, medicine, and food shipments—to where it was needed in a timely manner. He expressed 

concern about the weak and apathetic South Vietnamese approach 

to pacification, the military’s dominant role among the U.S. organizations, and the inability of the civilian agencies to operate at 

the high tempo the war required. He even swiped at Lodge, calling 

his leadership of the U.S. pacification effort ineffectual. Yet, he 

remained confident that the U.S. Embassy would eventually “bring 

order out of chaos” in the civil side. He pressed the military to 

assist USAID with its distribution needs by moving supplies into 

rural areas, a step toward achieving more balance between military 

and civil efforts.

Komer disparaged the lack of innovative thinking in Saigon 

and argued that the United States and South Vietnam should 

develop an integrated approach to pacification that harmonized 

the war with rural development. To that end, Komer believed that 

MACV’s emphasis on “search and destroy” missions needed to 

be refocused to clearing and holding the countryside if the South 

Men of the 1st Cavalry Division search a hamlet for signs of Viet Cong activity. National Archives
54 

Vietnamese were to regain control of the hamlets now dominated 

by the Viet Cong. 

In August 1966, after completing a comprehensive analysis 

of pacification activities, Komer concluded that the United States 

needed to bring all of its pacification-oriented efforts under a single 

manager structure. He favored MACV as the vehicle for this change, 

with General Westmoreland given broad supervisory authority over 

U.S. civilian agencies from the regional to district levels.

Lodge rejected Komer’s recommendation, but the proposal 

gained traction higher up the chain of command. U.S. Pacific 

Command began highlighting the importance of nation building 

in its planning. Westmoreland began discussing this element more 

directly in his strategy, now confident that with the buildup of U.S. 

forces, he could lend greater assistance to the South Vietnamese 

Army and to the South Vietnamese Ministry of Revolutionary 

Development, the agency that managed much of the pacification 

program. Lodge agreed with the MACV commander’s approach. 

However, given the negative response by civilian agencies to 

Komer’s proposal for placing their field personnel under military 

control, President Johnson tabled the idea for the time being. He 

would wait for the right psychological moment to implement it.

Building the Infrastructure

Fighting battles and wooing Vietnamese peasants may 

have grabbed the attention of Americans back home, but none 

of it was possible without a huge effort behind the scenes. Of 

particular interest to Westmoreland was the construction of 

airfields, cantonments, and logistics facilities. While substantial 

progress had been made in 1965, the colonel who ran the MACV 

Engineer’s office had neither the authority nor the staff necessary 

to coordinate the vast number of projects. Further, there was no 

construction plan or established priorities, a critical factor because 

of the extremely limited construction capability in country. The 

coordination problem stemmed partly from the pouring in of U.S. 

forces, equipment, and supplies, and partly on how projects were 

managed in South Vietnam. Not only was there a need for coordination between the military command and the civilian contractor 

(a combination of several corporations), but each of the military 

departments was responsible for different geographic regions 

or project categories and had its own funding source. Once one 

of the military departments approved a project, the engineer of 
55

the managing service could lay claim to a portion of the limited 

resources in country.

By the end of 1965, Westmoreland recognized the need for 

a more effective staff organization to manage the construction 

program and to ensure optimal use of resources. In January 1966, 

the secretary of defense approved the creation of an “engineer 

construction boss” under Westmoreland. A month later, U.S. Army 

Maj. Gen. Carroll H. Dunn became director of construction, with 

his directorate part of the MACV J–4 (Logistics) organization. 

The reorganization improved the allocation of resources. 

The construction of support facilities throughout South Vietnam 

continued at an acceptable pace through 1966. At year’s end, 

the United States had built cantonments for more than 400,000 

personnel. It had constructed 9.6 million square meters of warehouses, 34.2 million square meters of open storage, and 5.1 million 

square meters of ammunition storage. It had also erected 26 

hospitals and extensive communications facilities, valued at more 

than $27 million, and 280,000 kilowatts of electrical-generating 

capacity, a major feature given the demand for refrigerated storage 

to prevent food spoilage in a hot and humid climate.

The other vexing issue besides facilities was the supply 

system. As would make sense given the rapid buildup, each of the 

services implemented its own existing system within its area of 

operations. However, this approach presented problems in inventory and distribution because in many areas joint operations were 

occurring and some supply items were common to all services. 

In mid-1965, the Joint Chiefs studied the logistics support for 

U.S. forces and concluded that the establishment of a common 

supply system would yield benefits. Based on their recommendation, the secretary of defense tasked the U.S. Army to develop 

a single supply system for all U.S., South Vietnamese, and Free 

World forces. The Army prepared a phased implementation plan 

for identifying and filling requirements that was connected to the 

Defense Department’s budgeting and funding systems so that a 

“single integrated logistic system” would be in place. The Army 

recommended that it operate the system for the South Vietnamese 

and Free World forces in the Republic of Vietnam.

Secretary McNamara approved the initial phase of the plan 

in February 1966. Shortly thereafter, the Army began operating 

the common supply system, furnishing support in the categories of subsistence, packaged petroleum products, and select 
56 

general housekeeping supplies in all the corps tactical zones 

except I Corps, where the marines operated. 

Analysis

In February 1965, ten years of American advice, assistance, 

and limited combat support against Communist machinations in 

South Vietnam seemed to have been for naught, as the country 

stood on the brink of collapse. With 23,000 military advisers, 

aviators, communications specialists, and support personnel 

already in South Vietnam, President Johnson faced a hard choice; 

he could either fold or double down. If the latter, in what fashion 

should he up the ante? Loathing war but determined not to be 

known as the man who lost the Cold War in Southeast Asia, 

Johnson reluctantly decided to become more deeply involved in the 

conflict. At first, the administration hoped it could use airpower to 

persuade North Vietnam to abandon its quest to conquer South 

Vietnam. When that did not work, it opted to add ground troops 

to protect the installations that made the air campaign and the 

rest of the U.S. support effort possible. When this step too seemed 

unlikely to produce results, the president, without a clear plan, 

committed the U.S. military to a direct and escalating role in the 

ground war against Southern insurgents and the government of 

North Vietnam. Whether the goal was to defeat the enemy or to 

compel it to accept a compromise settlement depended on whom 

you asked and when you asked the question, but by October 1966, 

the “Americanization” of the war was well under way, with 351,372 

military personnel—over 60 percent of them members of the U.S. 

Army—deployed to Vietnam. If the aims of Washington policymakers remained unclear, the hardships were real for the men 

and women sent to Vietnam. Place names like Dong Xoai, Dak 

To, Plei Me, and Ia Drang—unknown to most Americans prior 

to 1965—were within a few months after the deployment of U.S. 

ground combat troops forever bloodily etched in the annals of U.S. 

history. The die of war had been cast. 

Prohibited from using ground forces to attack the resources 

in North Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia that made the enemy’s 

own escalation possible, General Westmoreland fashioned a 

military program to fit administration policy. Essentially, he took a 

twin approach—eroding the enemy’s forces on the one hand while 

restoring government control over the countryside on the other. 

He assumed these efforts would be mutually reinforcing, with the 
57

degree of emphasis shifting depending on circumstances. The U.S. 

Army and Marine Corps, backed by the U.S. Air Force, would 

bear the primary burden for the first task—that of destroying the 

enemy’s main combat forces—while the Vietnamese, with U.S. 

civilian and military advisory assistance, addressed the guerrilla 

and political threats and the socioeconomic conditions that fueled 

the insurgent aspect of the war. This formulation had governed 

America’s approach to the war since 1961, albeit now backed by 

U.S. ground combat troops, and it would remain largely intact for 

much of the rest of the conflict. 

There was much to be done in 1965, and real-life obstacles, 

exacerbated by the Johnson administration’s gradualist approach 

and refusal to mobilize, meant that it would take some time before 

the allies could effectively prosecute Westmoreland’s three-phased 

strategy. Nevertheless, by the end of 1965, U.S. troops moving 

about the country in “fire-brigade” fashion had staunched the 

most serious bleeding. Actions to parry the enemy’s thrusts, and 

to launch occasional thrusts of one’s own, continued throughout 

1966, as the United States gradually built up not just its forces, 

but also the logistical and administrative infrastructure needed to 

support the approximately 385,000 uniformed men and women 

who by late 1966 stood in harm’s way 8,500 miles from home. 

Pacification, given the tenuous nature of the situation in 1965 and 

early 1966, necessarily took a back seat to the military buildup, 

but it remained central to the allies’ approach to the war, with 

the White House taking measures to elevate its importance even 

further. 

Thanks to the sacrifices made by America’s soldiers, sailors, 

marines, and aviators as 1966 drew to a close, General Westmoreland 

was increasingly in position to launch the type of large, sustained 

military campaign that he hoped would both cripple the enemy 

and enable the South Vietnamese to make substantial progress 

toward pacification. The tide had been stemmed, yet no one was 

under the illusion that the task ahead would be either easy or 

quick. Indeed, the events of 1965 and 1966 had shown the enemy 

to be a dangerous and able foe, unshaken despite heavy losses in 

his own pursuit of victory. The true struggle had just begun. 
58 

The Author

Frank L. Jones holds a Ph.D. in political science from Griffith 

University in Queensland, Australia, and a master of public 

administration from the University at Albany, State University of 

New York. He served as a commissioned officer in the U.S. Army 

from 1973 to 1977. He is a professor of security studies in the 

Department of National Security and Strategy at the U.S. Army 

War College. In 2006, he retired from the Department of Defense, 

where he held a number of positions in the Office of the Secretary 

of Defense. These included his appointment as deputy assistant 

secretary of defense for special operations policy and support, and 

principal director for strategy, plans, and resources in the Office of 

the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Homeland Defense. He has 

authored several articles and book chapters on national security 

policymaking, homeland security, and terrorism. His most recent 

work is Blowtorch: Robert Komer, Vietnam, and American Cold 

War Strategy (2013).
59

Further Readings

Bergerud, Eric M. The Dynamics of Defeat: The Vietnam War 

in Hau Nghia Province. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1991.

Carland, John M. Combat Operations: Stemming the Tide, May 

1965 to October 1966. United States Army in Vietnam. Washington 

D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Military History, 2000.

Coleman, J. D. Pleiku: The Dawn of Helicopter Warfare in 

Vietnam. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1988.

Cosmas, Graham A. MACV: The Joint Command in the 

Years of Escalation, 1962–1967. United States Army in Vietnam.

Washington, D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Military History, 2006.

Moore, Harold G., and Joseph L. Galloway. We Were Soldiers 

Once . . . and Young. Ia Drang: The Battle That Changed the War in 

Vietnam. New York: Random House, 1992.

For more information on the U.S. Army in the Vietnam War, 

please read our other title in the U.S. Army Campaigns of the 

Vietnam War series published by the U.S. Army Center of Military 

History (www.history.army.mil).
nam War

The

Viet

50th Anniversary

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