The U.S. Army Campaigns of the Vietnam War

TRANSITION

NOVEMBER 1968–

DECEMBER 1969
CMH Pub 76–6

Cover: Adviser watches over South Vietnamese soldier firing M16 rifle, November 1969. (CMH Files)
by

Adrian G. Traas

Center of Military History

United States Army

Washington, D.C., 2018

TRANSITION

NOVEMBER 1968–

DECEMBER 1969

5

Introduction

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

a divisive issue. But fifty years after the beginning of major U.S. 

combat operations in Vietnam, well over half the U.S. population 

is too young to have any direct memory of the conflict. The massive 

American commitment—political, economic, diplomatic, and 

military—to the mission of maintaining an independent and nonCommunist South Vietnam deserves widespread attention, both 

to recognize the sacrifice of those who served and to remember 

how those events have impacted our nation.

U.S. involvement in Southeast Asia began after World War 

II when elements of the Vietnamese population fought back 

against the reimposition of French colonial rule. Although 

the United States generally favored the idea of an independent 

Vietnam, it supported France because the Viet Minh rebels were 

led by Communists and U.S. policy at that point in the Cold War 

sought to contain any expansion of communism. France’s defeat 

in 1954 led to the division of Vietnam into a Communist North 

(Democratic Republic of Vietnam) and a non-Communist South 

(Republic of Vietnam). The United States actively supported the 

latter as it dealt with a growing Communist-led insurgent force 

(the Viet Cong) aided by the North Vietnamese. The initial 

mission of training South Vietnam’s armed forces led to deepening American involvement as the situation grew increasingly 

dire for the Republic of Vietnam.

By the time President Lyndon B. Johnson committed major 

combat units in 1965, the United States already had invested thousands of men and millions of dollars in the effort to build a secure 

and stable Republic of Vietnam. That commitment expanded 
6 

rapidly through 1969, when the United States had over 365,000 

Army soldiers (out of a total of a half million troops of all services) 

in every military region of South Vietnam with thousands of other 

Army personnel throughout the Pacific area providing direct 

support to operations. The war saw many innovations, including 

the massive use of helicopters to conduct airmobile tactics, new 

concepts of counterinsurgency, the introduction of airborne 

radio direction finding, wide-scale use of computers, and major 

advances in battlefield medicine. Yet, as in most wars, much of 

the burden was still borne by soldiers on the ground who slogged 

on foot over the hills and through the rice paddies in search of 

an often elusive foe. The enormous military effort by the United 

States was, however, matched by the resolve of North Vietnamese 

leaders to unify their country under communism at whatever 

cost. That determination, in the end, proved decisive as American 

commitment wavered in the face of high casualties and economic 

and social challenges at home. Negotiations accompanied by the 

gradual withdrawal of U.S. forces led to the Paris Peace Accords in 

January 1973, effectively ending the American military role in the 

conflict. Actual peace was elusive, and two years later the North 

Vietnamese Army overran South Vietnam, bringing the war to an 

end in April 1975.

The vast majority of American men and women who went 

to 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.

JON T. HOFFMAN

Chief Historian
7

Transition, November 1968–

December 1969

By 1968, the government of South Vietnam, backed by U.S. 

advisers, had been fighting Communist Viet Cong insurgents and 

their patrons in neighboring North Vietnam for fourteen years. It 

was a desperate struggle that pitted neighbor against neighbor and 

exacted a mounting toll in the form of casualties, refugees, and 

socioeconomic dislocation. In 1965, the United States had added 

its own ground combat troops to the struggle, thwarting the very 

real prospect of a Communist victory. Since that low point the 

allies had been gradually gaining ground in an escalating conflict. 

In late January 1968, the Communist leadership in North Vietnam 

had launched a major offensive in a bid to change the situation 

in its favor. The widespread attacks, which began during the Tet 

new year holidays and continued on and off through September, 

failed miserably. The population of South Vietnam refused to rise 

up in support, and the Communists suffered enormous casualties. 

As the enemy aggression abated, the commander of U.S. Military 

Assistance Command, Vietnam (MACV), General Creighton W. 

Abrams, believed the allies were poised to make significant gains. 

But time was not on his side. Although the allies had defeated the 

enemy militarily, the shock that the Communists had been able to 

launch such a massive strike after years of American involvement 

had undermined support for the war back in the United States. 

With peace talks under way in Paris, Abrams raced against the 

clock to give South Vietnam the best chance for survival before 

the inevitable withdrawal of U.S. troops.
8

Strategic Setting

In the aftermath of the 1968 offensives, both sides consolidated their positions and increased their forces. The enemy 

withdrew his regular main forces—a combination of Viet Cong 

People’s Liberation Armed Forces (PLAF) and North Vietnamese 

People’s Army of Vietnam (PAVN) units—to remote bases in South 

Vietnam and to sanctuaries in Laos and Cambodia. He reinforced 

these units by moving additional men, weapons, and supplies 

along the Ho Chi Minh Trail from North Vietnam through Laos 

and Cambodia and into the South. By September, the allies estimated that the enemy fielded more than 250,000 frontline combatants, backed by many more part-time guerrillas, political operatives, and active sympathizers. Meanwhile, U.S. forces increased to 

538,000, with the Army approaching 355,000 soldiers in country. 

Other nations, particularly South Korea and Australia, provided 

66,000 men, while the South Vietnamese military stood at 996,000 

soldiers, sailors, airmen, territorials (Regional and Popular Forces), 

and other paramilitary personnel. Assisting them was a growing 

number of policemen and a partially armed, hamlet-based militia 

called the People’s Self-Defense Force (Map 1).

By the fall of 1968, the U.S. Army had troops in each of South 

Vietnam’s four corps tactical zones. Due to the threat of an invasion 

from North Vietnam, Abrams maintained a heavy U.S. presence in 

the northernmost zone, known as the I Corps Tactical Zone. The 

commander of the III Marine Amphibious Force, Marine Corps 

Lt. Gen. Robert E. Cushman Jr., supervised the U.S. contingent in 

I Corps. He assigned control of U.S. forces from the Demilitarized 

Zone that separated North and South Vietnam south to the Hai 

Van Pass in Quang Nam Province to the U.S. Army’s XXIV Corps. 

The commander of XXIV Corps, Lt. Gen. Richard G. Stilwell, had 

operational control of the 101st Airborne Division (to include 

the unit’s 3d Brigade, recently transferred from III Corps), the 3d 

Marine Division, and the recently arrived 1st Brigade, 5th Infantry 

Division (Mechanized). The 101st Airborne Division was in the 

midst of being transformed into an airmobile division to give it 

more mobility and striking power. South of the pass, III Marine 

Amphibious Force directed operations of the 1st Marine Division 

and the Army’s 23d Infantry Division, also called the Americal 

Division. The 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile) was also present, 

but it would soon be shifted elsewhere. Other forces in I Corps 
III CTZ

IV CTZ

I CTZ

II CTZ

Ho C h i M i n h Tra i l

Tonle Sap

GULF

O F

TONKIN

GULF

O F

SIAM

SOUTH

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

BURMA

NORTH

VIETNAM

CHINA

CHINA

THAILAND

LAOS

CAMBODIA

SOUTH

VIETNAM

INDOCHINA

1968–1969

0 150

Miles

Corps Tactical Zone Boundary

Map 1
10 

included two South Vietnamese infantry divisions, an infantry 

regiment, territorial forces, and a South Korean marine brigade. 

These troops, as was the case throughout the country, operated 

under their own national command authorities in collaboration 

with those of the United States (Map 2).

In the II Corps Tactical Zone, which spanned the center of 

the country from the sparsely populated Central Highlands in 

the west to the crowded lowlands that lined the South China Sea, 

Abrams assigned U.S. forces to I Field Force under Lt. Gen. William 

R. Peers. Peers commanded just two major tactical units—the 

Map 2

ARVN

1

X X

Marine

2 ROK

X

XXX

III MAF

USMC

XXX

XXIV USMC

1

X X

USMC

3

X X

Americal 196

X

Americal 198

X

Americal 11

X

ARVN

2

X X

Americal

X X

101

X X

1 5

X

DA NANG

HOI AN

PHU BAI CAMP EAGLE

HUE

CHU LAI

QUANG NGAI

KHE SANH

DONG HA

QUANG TRI

DUC PHO

II CTZ

1

9

1

1

14

14

DEMARCATION LINE

QUANG

TRI

THUA THIEN

QUANG NAM

QUANG TIN

QUANG NGAI

KONTUM

BINH DINH

NORTH VIETNAM

LAOS

CAMBODIA

December 1968

I CORPS TACTICAL ZONE

0 50 Miles

0 50 Kilometers

Corps Tactical Zone Boundary

Military Installation
11

4th Infantry Division, which patrolled South Vietnam’s western 

border, and the 173d Airborne Brigade, which operated along the 

coast. U.S. Army Special Forces patrolled the border using tribal 

irregulars known as Montagnards. Two South Vietnamese and two 

South Korean infantry divisions backed by territorials covered the 

rest of II Corps, but there was no doubt that the allies were hard 

pressed to cover the area, which represented nearly half of South 

Vietnam. (See Map 3.)

Farther south still lay the military region known as the III 

Corps Tactical Zone. Home to the country’s capital at Saigon and 

nearly 40 percent of the country’s population, III Corps was the 

political and administrative heartland of South Vietnam. Saigon’s 

significance as well as its vulnerability—the city was situated just 

sixty kilometers from Cambodia, whose government permitted 

the enemy to use its territory as a staging ground—led Abrams to 

garrison the zone strongly. He assigned U.S. troops in III Corps 

to II Field Force headquarters, led by Lt. Gen. Walter Kerwin. 

Kerwin had at his disposal the 1st and 25th Infantry Divisions; 

the 3d Brigade, 9th Infantry Division; the 199th Infantry Brigade; 

the 11th Armored Cavalry; and, after being transferred from the I 

Corps Tactical Zone in September, the 3d Brigade, 82d Airborne 

U.S. soldiers with the 4th Infantry Division search for mines south of Pleiku in the Central 

Highlands in May 1968. U.S. Army
Map 3

CAP ROK

X X

4

X X

173

X

9 ROK

X X

XXX

I FF

22

ARVN

X X

23

ARVN

X X

NHA TRANG

NINH HOA

BAN ME THUOT

QUI NHON

PLEIKU

BONG SON

III CTZ

I CTZ

SOUTH CHINA SEA

14

14

20

21

19

1

1

1

1

11

14

Dao Phu Qui

QUANG TIN

QUANG NGAI

KONTUM

BINH DINH

PLEIKU

PHU BON

PHU YEN

DARLAC

KHANH HOA

QUANG DUC

TUYEN DUC

BINH THUAN

PHUOC

LONG

LAM DONG

BINH TUY

LONG

KHANH

PHUOC TUY

NINH

THUAN

Da Lat Cam Ranh

CAMBODIA LAOS

December 1968

II CORPS TACTICAL ZONE

0 50 Miles

0 50 Kilometers

Corps Tactical Zone Boundary

Military Installation
13

Division. Allied forces included contingents from Thailand, 

Australia, and New Zealand. Three South Vietnamese infantry 

divisions, territorial forces, and the nation’s airborne and marine 

reserves also made III Corps their home, although the Vietnamese 

Joint General Staff often called on the paratroopers and marines to 

serve elsewhere in the country on a contingency basis. (See Map 4.)

Last but not least, South Vietnam’s IV Corps Tactical Zone 

encompassed the southernmost portion of the country. The 

Mekong River Delta dominated the region, a heavily populated, 

often inundated, agriculturally rich area. Three South Vietnamese 

infantry divisions backed by territorial forces provided the bulk of 

IV Corps’ defenses. The U.S. ground presence was limited to Special 

Forces camps along the Cambodian border and the remainder 

of the 9th Infantry Division, some elements of which were just 

in the process of relocating from III Corps to IV Corps. The 

division patrolled the southern approaches to Saigon, sometimes 

aboard the vessels of the Mobile Riverine Force. Army aviation 

support came from the 1st Aviation Brigade’s troop- and cargocarrying helicopters, fixed-wing utility and surveillance aircraft, 

Grenadiers of the 199th Infantry Brigade fire M79 grenade launchers near Saigon in an area 

thought to be booby-trapped. U.S. Army
14 

and assault helicopters, including the deadly AH–1G Cobra. U.S. 

forces in South Vietnam’s IV Corps Tactical Zone were too few in 

number to have a U.S. corps-equivalent command such as the III 

Marine Amphibious Force in I Corps or the two U.S. field forces 

in II and III Corps. Consequently, Abrams placed them under the 

Map 4

3 9

X

3 25

X

2 25

X

1 25

X

199

X

1 ATF

X

XXX

1 II FF

X X

11 ACR

III

3 82

X

1 1

X

1

X X

18

ARVN

X X

5

ARVN

X X

25

ARVN

X X

DAU TIENG

TAN AN NUI DAT

TAY NINH CITY

LAI KHE

PHUOC

VINH

LONG BINH

XUAN LOC

CAMP

FRENZELL-JONES

DUC HOA

CU CHI

PHU LOI

IV CTZ

II CTZ

SOUTH CHINA SEA

14

20

15

13

1

1

4

4

4

4

22

PHUOC TUY

BINH TUY

BINH

THUAN

LONG KHANH

PHUOC LONG

BINH

DUONG

HAU

NGHIA

LONG AN

GO CONG

KIEN HOA

KIEN TUONG

DINH TUONG

GIA DINH

TAY NINH

BIEN

HOA

QUANG DUC

LAM DONG

BINH LONG

BA XUYEN

VINH BINH

VINH LONG

SAIGON

CAMBODIA

December 1968

III CORPS TACTICAL ZONE

0 50 Miles

0 50 Kilometers

Corps Tactical Zone Boundary

Military Installation
15

operational control of Maj. Gen. George S. Eckhardt, the senior 

U.S. adviser to the South Vietnamese commander of IV Corps. 

(See Map 5.)

Because President Lyndon B. Johnson was reluctant to declare 

a national mobilization, relatively few national guardsmen or 

reservists served in Vietnam. However, in May 1968 the president 

had authorized a modest call-up that included seventy-six Army 

units. Forty-three of these (eight National Guard and thirty-five 

Reserve) deployed to Vietnam between August and December. 

The contingent consisted of artillery, infantry, engineer, transportation, medical, ordnance, supply, and maintenance specialists 

organized into units that ranged in size from battalions to small 

detachments. One infantry unit, a long-range patrol company, 

U.S. Army AH–1G Cobra assault helicopters, like the one shown here supporting the 101st 

Airborne Division, were used with deadly effectiveness. U.S. Army
16 

was the only National Guard ground maneuver unit to serve 

in Vietnam. While deployed on tours that typically lasted ten 

months, these units played an important role in supporting the 

American war effort.

Regardless of where they were located, U.S. troops faced an 

inhospitable environment of rugged mountains, swamps, and 

forests. Land clearing by armored bulldozers called Rome Plows 

was effective in cutting back the enemy’s cover, but it was impossible to clear more than the verges of roads and a few areas of 

Map 5

9(-)

X X

7

ARVN

X X

21

ARVN

X X

9

ARVN

X X

7 1

I I

DONG TAM MY THO

TAN TRU

VINH LONG

VINH LOI

SA DEC

III CTZ

SOUTH CHINA SEA

GULF

O F

THAILAND

4

4

4

4

4

1

SAIGON

BAC LIEU

CHUONG THIEN

KIEN GIANG

AN GIANG SA DEC 

KIEN

PHONG 

KIEN TUONG

DINH TUONG

HAU NGHIA

LONG AN

KIEN

HOA

GO CONG

GIA DINH

BIEN

HOA

CHAU

DOC

BA XUYEN

VINH BINH

VINH

PHONG LONG

DINH

AN XUYEN

CAMBODIA

December 1968

IV CORPS TACTICAL ZONE

0 50 Miles

0 50 Kilometers

Corps Tactical Zone Boundary

Military Installation
17

critical importance. Air Force C–123 Provider aircraft sprayed 

herbicides under a controversial program called Operation 

Ranch Hand, but by 1968 the United States was curtailing this 

activity. Vietnam was such a verdant land that even in defoliated areas some tree canopy survived to conceal the enemy. He 

persistently used this cover to avoid detection, to launch surprise 

attacks, to demolish bridges, and to interdict roads and waterways 

with ambushes, mines, and booby traps. To make matters worse, 

A crane assigned to the 131st Engineer Company (Vermont Army National Guard) is shown 

parked in South Vietnam. The unit performed road construction and other engineer support 

missions in the highlands. U.S. Army
18 

the tropical climate and frequent rains caused physical discomfort, 

created health risks, and restricted major combat operations to 

the drier seasons. Damage caused by floods and typhoons added 

to the misery and complicated efforts to build bases and to keep 

supply roads open.

The challenges posed by geography and weather were constants, 

but the rising tide of antiwar sentiment in the United States was 

adding concerns of a different kind. In November 1968, Americans 

elected a new president, Richard M. Nixon, who, like an increasing 

number of Americans, no longer believed military victory in the 

traditional sense was possible. He was not willing to abandon 

Vietnam, but neither was he prepared to maintain an indefinite 

commitment. He hoped U.S. military pressure would compel the 

Communists to accept peace on terms favorable to the allies, but 

he also wanted to end America’s participation in the war as quickly 

as possible. Throughout his first year in office, the president would 

vacillate between these two, often incompatible, desires.

In truth, the writing had been on the wall for some time. 

Abrams’ predecessor, General William C. Westmoreland, had 

begun withdrawal planning in late 1967, and after the Tet offenA modified D7E bulldozer equipped with a Rome Plow blade and an armored cab clears 

trees and brush. The vehicles became an effective tool for clearing roadside areas, hindering 

enemy ambushes, and limiting cover and concealment.

U.S. Army
19

sive of January–February 1968 the United States had accelerated 

its efforts to prepare South Vietnamese forces for the day when 

U.S. ground combat troops would no longer be present. The 

initiation of peace talks in Paris between the United States and 

North Vietnam later in the year added urgency to these activities 

because, while it was unlikely that the antagonists would reach 

a quick accord, that possibility could not be discounted, making 

it imperative that the South Vietnamese become as strong as 

possible, as quickly as possible. Similar considerations shaped 

General Abrams’ strategy for the coming year. Concerned lest 

a sudden agreement in Paris freeze the warring parties in place, 

Abrams and his deputy for Civil Operations and Revolutionary 

Development Support (CORDS), Robert W. Komer, persuaded 

South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu to embark on 

an offensive to reclaim as much territory and as many people as 

possible. The allies called the effort the Accelerated Pacification 

Campaign, pacification being the term used to describe politicomilitary programs to secure the nation’s population, replace the 

clandestine Communist governing apparatus with an effective 

government administration, and build a prosperous and united 

nation through socioeconomic development and reform. The 

campaign, which coincided with the advent of drier, and thus 

more militarily favorable, weather throughout much of the 

country, began on 1 November 1968.

Operations

Winter 1968–Spring 1969

The Accelerated Pacification Campaign set an ambitious 

goal—to convert about 1,100 hamlets that were either ruled by 

the Viet Cong or in a contested status to at least minimum government control by 31 January 1969. For the South Vietnamese, 

it meant an all-out politico-military effort, supported by U.S. 

CORDS advisers, to push into the countryside, to secure the 

targeted population, and to establish the rudiments of government 

administration. Specially formed Revolutionary Development 

teams acted as the vanguard of pacification, working in hamlets 

for several months to establish a government presence before 

moving on to repeat the process in another community. Although 

the teams had their own security element, most of the burden for 

providing population security lay with the Regional and Popular 
20 

Forces, the National Police, and the militia, all backed by the 

South Vietnamese Army, which often detached battalions for that 

purpose. The contribution of U.S. Army units, while vital, was 

more indirect. U.S. units conducted large-unit sweeps and smallunit patrols near areas undergoing pacification to prevent enemy 

military units from interfering with the process. They also worked 

with South Vietnamese officials to eliminate Communist agents 

living among the people and helped train South Vietnamese 

forces, either by conducting combined operations with them 

or by providing training. Farther afield, U.S. units conducted 

vigorous “spoiling attacks” against the enemy’s bases and supply 

lines to degrade his ability to conduct war near populated areas. 

Statistically the campaign was a great success. The allies occupied 

all 1,100 targeted hamlets. The results encouraged them to push 

ahead with equally ambitious pacification plans for the rest of the 

year. Nevertheless, it was difficult to judge the true state of affairs. 

Circumstances varied from hamlet to hamlet, and the Communist 

clandestine apparatus often remained intact to some degree even 

after occupation. Frequently, the strongest emotions exhibited by 

those living in newly pacified communities was apathy and a deep 

desire to be left alone by both sides in the conflict.

A Regional Forces patrol enters a Montagnard village in 1969. Note the soldier at left is still 

equipped with the M1 rifle while the soldier at center carries an M1 carbine.

U.S. Army
21

The number of violent contacts between U.S. and Communist 

forces was relatively low during the Accelerated Pacification 

Campaign. The United States took advantage of the lull to redeploy 

Maj. Gen. George L. Forsythe’s 1st Cavalry Division from I Corps 

to III Corps. The move, code-named Liberty Canyon, reflected 

Abrams’ sensitivity to the threat 50,000 enemy combatants posed 

to Saigon and its environs. In sixteen days in late October and early 

November 1968, a fleet of planes, helicopters, trucks, and ships 

moved the division 917 kilometers. Forsythe established his new 

headquarters at Phuoc Vinh, Binh Duong Province, about fifty 

kilometers northeast of Saigon. No sooner had he arrived than 

he began operating over an immense area (12,432 square kilometers) of forest and plantations that encompassed the provinces of 

Phuoc Long, Binh Long, Tay Ninh, and northern Binh Duong. 

His mission was to interdict Communist infiltration routes from 

Cambodia to make it impossible for the four major enemy formations based in the area (the 5th PLAF, 9th PLAF, 1st PAVN, and 

7th PAVN Divisions) to mass enough men and supplies to threaten 

Saigon. To support the division’s frequent airmobile raids and 

patrols, U.S. Army engineers built a line of artillery firebases and 

helicopter landing zones near the Cambodian border. Some of 

these proved too vulnerable to the enemy’s concentrated power 

in Cambodia, and by year’s end Forsythe had fallen back to a new 

line deeper inside South Vietnam. Nevertheless, the active screen 

provided by the 1st Cavalry Division enabled allied units operating in the more populated areas closer to Saigon, most notably 

the U.S. 1st and 25th Infantry Divisions and the South Vietnamese 

5th and 18th Divisions, to vigorously prosecute the Accelerated 

Pacification Campaign. (See Map 6.)

Allied actions suppressed, but did not eliminate, enemy 

activity in III Corps during early 1969. Most incidents amounted 

to small-scale attacks on hamlets, outposts, and supply routes. One 

of these actions took place on 11 January 1969 along Highway 13 

in northern III Corps. A platoon from Troop A, 1st Squadron, 

11th Armored Cavalry, had just escorted a supply column to Quan 

Loi, ninety-six kilometers north of Saigon. The operation had been 

incident-free, but on the return trip a reinforced enemy company 

ambushed the column of seven M113 armored personnel carriers. 

A recoilless rifle round hit one of the carriers and set it ablaze, 

seriously wounding the leader of the column, 1st Lt. Harold A. 

Fritz. Realizing the enemy had his platoon surrounded, Fritz 
22 

climbed to the top of his burning vehicle from where he directed 

his troops into defensive positions. He then dismounted and 

ran from vehicle to vehicle, encouraging his men, assisting the 

wounded, and directing fire. One vehicle in particular was crucial 

to the platoon’s survival—an M113 equipped with a six-barreled 

Map 6

FIREBASE CAROLYN

6 May

QUAN LOI

12–14 May

CAU KHOI

12–14 May

FIREBASE CROOK

5–8 May

RENEGADE WOODS

5 June

FIREBASE WASHINGTON

19 June TAY NINH CITY

PHUOC VINH

DAU TIENG

LONG BINH

BLACKHORSE

IV CTZ

II CTZ

SOUTH CHINA SEA

14

20

15

13

1

1

4

4

4

4

22

PHUOC TUY

BINH TUY

BINH

THUAN

LONG KHANH

PHUOC LONG

BINH

DUONG

HAU

NGHIA

LONG AN

GO CONG

KIEN HOA

KIEN TUONG

DINH TUONG

GIA DINH

TAY NINH

BIEN

HOA

QUANG DUC

LAM DONG

BINH LONG

BA XUYEN

VINH BINH

VINH LONG

SAIGON

CAMBODIA

1969

III CORPS TACTICAL ZONE

0 50 Miles

0 50 Kilometers

Corps Tactical Zone Boundary

Military Installation

Engagement
23

Vulcan 20-mm. antiaircraft gun that flashed continuously. When 

the enemy launched an assault, Fritz manned a machine gun to 

help repulse the attack. No sooner had the first wave receded 

than a second wave of enemy soldiers nearly overran the platoon. 

Armed with a pistol and a bayonet, Fritz led a small group of men 

in a daring charge that routed the attackers. His actions bought the 

platoon enough time to survive until a relief force arrived from the 

1st Cavalry Division. The U.S. government recognized Lieutenant 

Fritz’s valor by awarding him the Medal of Honor.

South of Fritz’s position, in northern IV Corps, the 9th Infantry 

Division supported the Accelerated Pacification Campaign by 

conducting engagements in Kien Hoa Province before initiating a 

wider action, dubbed Operation Speedy Express, on 1 December. 

Under the leadership of Maj. Gen. Julian J. Ewell, the division 

conducted a myriad of small waterborne and airmobile efforts 

backed by copious air and artillery strikes to make Viet Cong 

haunts in the northern Mekong Delta as inhospitable as possible. 

On 13 December, the Viet Cong struck back, attacking the 2d 

Battalion, 60th Infantry’s base camp at Tan Tru in central Long 

An Province. For three hours, they lashed the base with mortar 

rounds and machine-gun fire, then tried to break through the 

U.S. soldiers operate an armored personnel carrier equipped with a Vulcan antiaircraft gun. 

American troops used a Vulcan during an enemy ambush on Highway 13 in northern III 

Corps on 11 January 1969.

U.S. Army
24 

barbed wire that ringed the fortification. When it was over, thirtythree Viet Cong and two Americans were dead. The defeat seemed 

to dampen the enemy’s spirit because he launched only a handful 

of serious attacks over the next few months.

American morale, on the other hand, received a boost 

when Maj. James N. “Nick” Rowe escaped from the Viet Cong 

on 31 December 1968 after five years of captivity. The Viet Cong 

had captured Rowe, a Special Forces intelligence officer, during 

an ambush in 1963. After multiple harsh interrogations, he had 

deceived his captors into thinking he was merely an engineer 

charged with civic action duties who lacked any valuable knowledge. The Viet Cong had nevertheless confined him to a small, 

bamboo cage in the southern Mekong Delta where he experienced 

torture and deprivation, in part to punish him for three unsuccessful escape attempts. When the guerrillas inadvertently learned 

that Rowe was an intelligence officer from American peace activists 

who expressed a desire to meet him, his captors became enraged 

at having been deceived and decided to execute him. He was being 

led to his execution when two U.S. helicopter gunships flying in 

support of a South Vietnamese ground operation appeared in the 

area. Rowe overpowered his guards, who had become distracted 

by the aircraft, and waved down the helicopters, which flew him 

to safety. The Army recognized his bravery during his captivity 

and escape by awarding him the Silver Star. He would later apply 

his experiences when designing the Army’s Survival, Evasion, 

Resistance, and Escape course. A lifelong counterinsurgent, Rowe 

would die in the line of duty as a colonel when Communist guerrillas assassinated him in the Philippines in 1989.

During the early months of 1969, Ewell kept up a frenetic pace 

of round-the-clock raids, ambushes, and patrols that, by the time 

Operation Speedy Express ended on 3 June 1969, had achieved 

impressive results. During the operation’s six-month duration, 

the 9th Division reported killing 10,899 Viet Cong and capturing 

another 2,579. In the same period, 242 Americans had died, 

yielding an enemy to friendly kill ratio of 45:1. However, the claim 

strained credulity, given the fact that the normal ratio throughout 

South Vietnam was 3.5:1. Some speculated that many of the dead 

were civilians. Probably some civilians were killed, but the most 

likely explanation for the dubiously high casualty number was that 

units turned in inflated claims due to Ewell’s well-known practice 

of measuring performance through “body counts.” Whatever the 
25

truth, pacification statistics also soared behind the division’s operational screen. The number of Viet Cong–controlled villages in four 

key provinces in which the division was most active fell from 117 

in December 1968 to 66 by the end of March 1969. But here, too, 

the results were questionable, as CORDS officials reported that 

division operations antagonized the population through property 

destruction and intrusive behavior. It was an unfortunate fact of 

life both here and elsewhere in Vietnam that pacification could not 

succeed without security but that security could not be achieved 

without inflicting some adverse consequences on pacification. 

Map 7

TF REMAGEN

X

OPERATION FAYETTE CANYON 15 Dec 68–28 Feb 69

(HAMBURGER HILL)

BATTLE OF HILL 937

11–20 May 69

11 Aug 69

11 Sep 69

13 Sep 69

DA NANG

HOI AN

TAM KY

PHU BAI

A LOUI

A SHAU

HUE

CHU LAI

KHE SANH

QUANG TRI

CA LU

QUANG NGAI

II CTZ

1

9

1

1

14

14

547

529

DEMARCATION LINE

Batangan Peninsula

My Lai

QUANG

TRI

THUA THIEN

QUANG NAM

QUANG TIN

QUANG NGAI

KONTUM

BINH DINH

NORTH VIETNAM

LAOS

CAMBODIA

1968–1969

I CORPS TACTICAL ZONE

0 50 Miles

0 50 Kilometers

Corps Tactical Zone Boundary

Military Installation

Engagement
26 

Notwithstanding the controversy, in April Abrams promoted 

Ewell to become II Field Force’s commanding general.

As the 9th Division combed the northern Mekong Delta, 

U.S. forces in I Corps divided their efforts among guarding the 

Demilitarized Zone that separated North from South Vietnam, 

securing populated areas through active patrolling, and harassing 

the enemy by interdicting his lines of supply and raiding his bases. 

Throughout the first few months of 1969, the 101st Airborne 

Division ran numerous operations, from brigade search-anddestroy missions to platoon patrols, all aimed at keeping enemy 

main force units away from the coast of Thua Thien Province and 

Hue, the country’s second-largest city after Saigon. (See Map 7.)

The Americal Division performed similar missions in the 

southern I Corps, penetrating enemy base areas in the western 

mountains and hunting guerrilla bands along the populated eastern 

coast. Its largest endeavor of the period was Operation Fayette 

Canyon, which aimed to disrupt enemy bases in southern Quang 

Tin Province while the 1st Marine Division undertook a parallel 

effort in the northern part of the province. The primary area of 

General Abrams (left) addresses senior commanders in April 1969 during a change of 

command ceremony at II Field Force, Vietnam. At right foreground is Lt. Gen. Julian J. Ewell, 

the II Field Force incoming commander, while South Vietnamese Lt. Gen. Do Cao Tri, the 

commander of III Corps, is at center.

U.S. Army
27

operations was a defile created by the Thu Bon River that wound its 

way eastward from the mountains to the South China Sea. Regular 

main force units thought to be living in what soldiers called the 

Antenna Valley included the 21st PAVN Regiment, the Viet Cong 

1st Main Force Regiment, and an artillery battalion. Preliminary 

actions began in November 1968 as the Americal’s 196th Infantry 

Brigade established several artillery firebases from which patrols 

and expeditions could emanate. Fayette Canyon got under way 

in earnest on 15 December, as elements of three battalions and a 

helicopter troop moved out behind five strikes made by Air Force 

B–52 Stratofortress strategic bombers. Contact was sparse. Either 

the enemy used the valley’s rugged slopes and lush vegetation to 

evade contact, or he had departed before the operation had begun. 

Over the next two and a half months, the 196th Brigade scoured 

the region with little success. Because the brigade lacked airmobility to range far and wide over the rugged hills, its commander, 

Col. Frederick J. Kroesen, ordered “maximum use of artillery,” but 

there was no way to know what effect the 8,067 rounds fired by 

the three batteries supporting the operation had on the enemy. By 

the time Fayette Canyon ended on 28 February 1969, the 196th 

Brigade reported having killed 238 North Vietnamese soldiers 

and 89 Viet Cong at a cost of 2 Americans dead and 17 wounded. 

Having failed to harm the enemy seriously, the brigade withdrew 

from the interior “to secure population centers and counter enemy 

attacks on the coastal plain,” exactly what the operation was 

supposed to have prevented had it succeeded in pinning down the 

enemy in his base areas.

Farther south, in the center of the country, U.S. Special 

Forces and the 4th Infantry Division tried to screen II Corps’ long, 

remote border with Laos and Cambodia. It was a daunting task 

given the vast distances, rugged terrain, and the lack of roads, 

with some posts accessible only by air. Fortunately, most of the 

region’s population was clustered near the major cities—Kontum 

in Kontum Province, Pleiku in Pleiku Province, and Ban Me 

Thuot in Darlac Province—and the few roads that serviced them, 

making population security easier. Although sparsely populated, 

the Central Highlands was of great strategic significance since it 

offered a covered route by which enemy units based in Laos and 

Cambodia could advance toward the heavily populated central 

coast. Despite the onset of drier weather that the enemy traditionally used to launch attacks, he was unusually quiet during 
Map 8

FIREBASE DORRIE

7 Nov–3 Dec

CAM RANH BAY

11 Aug

FIREBASE KATE

30 Oct–1 Nov

DUC LAP

20 Oct

30 Oct–3 Dec

BU PRANG

20 Oct

30 Oct–1 Nov

7 Nov–3 Dec

FIREBASE ST GEORGE

6 Nov

BEN HET 

25 Feb–3 Mar

NHA TRANG

BAN ME THUOT

QUI NHON

PLEIKU

KONTUM

III CTZ

I CTZ

SOUTH CHINA SEA

14

14

20

21

19

1

1

1

1

11

14

Dao Phu Qui

Tam Quan

QUANG TIN

QUANG NGAI

KONTUM

BINH DINH

PLEIKU

PHU BON

PHU YEN

DARLAC

KHANH HOA

QUANG DUC

TUYEN DUC

BINH THUAN

PHUOC

LONG

LAM DONG

BINH TUY

LONG

KHANH

PHUOC TUY

NINH

THUAN

Da Lat

Cam Ranh

CAMBODIA LAOS

1969

II CORPS TACTICAL ZONE

0 50 Miles

0 50 Kilometers

Corps Tactical Zone Boundary

Military Installation

Engagement
29

late 1968 and early 1969. The 4th Division nevertheless remained 

vigilant, working together with the South Vietnamese to make the 

enemy’s task as difficult as possible. His failure during the winter 

to breach the screen of American posts in the west made life easier 

for the only other major U.S. formation in II Corps—the 173d 

Airborne Brigade. It spent the winter and spring dispersed along 

South Vietnam’s central coast, helping South Vietnamese military 

and political forces secure the population during the Accelerated 

Pacification Campaign (Map 8).

Driving the intensity of U.S. activity across South Vietnam 

in early 1969 was Abrams’ belief that the enemy would launch 

a major offensive around the time of the Tet holidays, just as he 

had done in 1968. Outgoing President Johnson had made the 

enemy’s job easier in November 1968 when he had unilaterally 

suspended the bombing of North Vietnam in the hope of coaxing 

the Communists into serious negotiations. The Communists had 

taken advantage of the suspension by improving infiltration routes 

and by building a petroleum pipeline in the Demilitarized Zone. 

Troops and materiel had poured into South Vietnam during the 

following months, reinforcing Abrams’ suspicions about a new Tet 

offensive and prompting him to launch spoiling actions throughout 

the winter. During the first forty days of 1969, aggressive allied 

actions captured large quantities of Communist weaponry.

Allied preemptive measures could not stop the enemy, but 

they greatly limited the impact of his offensive when it finally 

began in the early morning hours of 23 February. During the 

action that followed, the enemy struck over 125 major targets 

and 400 lesser ones. In many cases he eschewed ground assaults 

for bombardments delivered by mortars, artillery, and rockets. 

Two enemy divisions did attack logistical installations outside of 

Saigon, but the allies rebuffed these. Operations against Hue and 

other coastal cities in the northern part of the country proved 

stillborn, while in the Central Highlands, the Communists 

made only one significant thrust. In late February, the North 

Vietnamese began bombarding the Ben Het Special Forces camp, 

thirty-five kilometers northwest of Kontum City. They followed 

up in early March with several assaults involving the 66th PAVN 

Regiment and a contingent of Russian-made PT–76 light tanks. 

Backed by elements of the 4th Infantry Division and U.S. aircraft, 

the camp weathered the challenge, although a desultory siege 

would continue for several more months.
30 

Taken as a whole, the 1969 Tet offensive was a bust. 

Communist losses soared—from 27,400 dead in the last quarter of 

1968 to nearly 45,000 in the first quarter of 1969—with very little 

to show for the sacrifice. General Abrams believed his strategy of 

launching spoiling attacks against enemy bases and supply routes 

had taken the wind out of the Communists’ sails, thereby limiting 

the impact of the offensive. In the case of III Corps, the enemy’s 

major target, Abrams particularly credited the 1st Cavalry 

Division and the 11th Armored Cavalry for blunting the blow. 

Thanks to them, he said, the enemy “had to wrestle with us from 

the Cambodian border all the way down [toward Saigon]. They’ve 

[the 1st Cavalry Division] ridden him, taken his stuff away from 

him, and he’s just had a hell of a time.”

In fact, spoiling actions had been so successful that Abrams 

made them a centerpiece of post-Tet operations. Many of the 

largest of these missions during the first months of 1969 took 

place in I Corps, which was particularly vulnerable to infiltration due to its proximity to North Vietnam and Laos. The greatest 

threat came from Laos, which meant that U.S. forces had to move 

westward into the heavily forested Anamite Mountains if they 

were to effectively interfere with the enemy’s ability to amass the 

supplies he needed to mount large-scale attacks. In late January, 

elements of the 3d Marine Division had begun operating along 

the Laotian border in Quang Tri and Thua Thien Provinces. In 

mid-March, the 1st Brigade, 5th Division, reinforced the effort by 

forming a heavily armored group called Task Force Remagen that 

advanced along Highway 9 from Ca Lu to the Khe Sanh plateau in 

western Quang Tri Province. It then turned south to interdict the 

border and screen the northern flank of the marines searching for 

enemy units and bases in the valleys to the southeast. Task Force 

Remagen roamed the area until the end of April, encountering 

light resistance.

Meanwhile, reports of an enemy buildup in the A Shau Valley, 

one of the main avenues into South Vietnam in western Thua 

Thien Province, caused Maj. Gen. Melvin Zais’ 101st Airborne 

Division to join the hunt. The allies had swept the rugged defile 

several times in previous years, but it was too remote to permanently control, and the enemy always returned from across the 

Laotian border after the Americans had left. Nor was it easy for the 

Americans to return. Each foray required an extensive engineering 

effort to build or restore the artillery firebases, landing zones, and 
31

roads needed to keep the combat troops supplied and supported in 

the heavily forested interior.

Zais’ paratroopers uncovered a number of logistical facilities 

in a series of operations conducted in February, March, and April, 

but rarely did the enemy choose to stand and fight. This changed 

on 11 May when the 3d Battalion, 187th Infantry, advanced on 

Ap Bia Mountain (Hill 937), a prominence near the Laotian 

border west of the A Shau Valley, where intelligence indicated a 

significant enemy presence (Map 9). The going was tough, as the 

soldiers pressed through bamboo thickets, triple-canopy jungle, 

and the occasional clearing choked with tall elephant grass. When 

Company B neared the abandoned village of A Luoi, gunfire 

erupted from camouflaged bunkers. The unit suffered three 

soldiers killed and nineteen wounded. The survivors withdrew, 

leaving the wounded where they fell. After a quick regrouping, 

the paratroopers dashed back to retrieve their comrades, but 

again Communist fire drove them off. The commander of the 

3d Battalion, Lt. Col. Weldon F. Honeycutt, ordered Company B 

to make another assault. Under a curtain of supporting small-arms 

fire, the soldiers charged the bunkers, passing the bodies of their 

comrades as they went. By 1645, they had cleared the enemy from 

the hillside. Later that evening helicopters evacuated the wounded, 

South Vietnamese soldiers carry one of their wounded during fighting near Bien Hoa in 

February 1969.

U.S. Army
32 

but tragedy struck when a helicopter gunship accidently fired on 

the battalion command post, killing one and wounding thirty-five.

The next morning, 12 May, the battalion pushed through 

more tall vegetation as it ascended the ridges that led toward Hill 

937. Once again, fire from hidden bunkers limited the advance, 

and, as the battalion dug in for the night, artillery pounded the 

Map 9

PAVN

29(-)

III

PAVN

29(-)

III

3 187

I I

1 506

I I

Hill 937

Hill 916

Ap Bia Mountain L A O S

S O U T H

V I E T N A M

BAT TLE OF HILL 937

AREA OF OPERATIONS 

11–17 May 1969

U. S. Movement

Enemy Entrenchments

All Positions are Approximate

0

0 1 Kilometer

Mile 1

0 600 700 800 900 and Above

ELEVATION IN METERS
33

enemy’s positions farther up the mountainside. Perhaps to lessen 

pressure on the mountain, just before dawn on the thirteenth 

two North Vietnamese battalions stormed Firebase Airborne, 

seven kilometers northeast of Ap Bia. Sappers penetrated the 

perimeter and ran through the compound, tossing explosives 

into bunkers. They destroyed one 105-mm. howitzer and badly 

damaged a 155-mm. piece, then moved toward an ammunition 

storage bunker. Grenades flew, and the bunker went up in a flash 

of fire. Ultimately, the defenders drove the North Vietnamese from 

the base, killing forty. But U.S. losses were also heavy—twentyone dead and fifty-two wounded. Meanwhile, back on Ap Bia 

Mountain, Honeycutt’s troopers spent the thirteenth working their 

way farther up the slopes while artillery and air strikes enveloped 

the higher elevations in smoke and flame. But the onslaught was 

not enough to silence the North Vietnamese, who kept up their 

fire, picking off the Americans as they moved.

At 0800, 14 May, Honeycutt ordered Companies B and C to 

attack the mountain from the west and Company D to attack from 

the north, supported by aircraft and artillery. Fifteen minutes later, 

Company C reported that it had moved into a bunker complex 

and that the North Vietnamese were fighting hard. The company’s 

3d Platoon almost reached the ridgetop but was forced to retreat. 

M113 armored personnel carriers assigned to the 1st Brigade, 5th Infantry Division 

(Mechanized), cross the sixty-foot span of an armored vehicle launched bridge in the Khe 

Sanh area in June 1969. 

U.S. Army
34 

Company B was now exposed on both flanks, so Honeycutt 

ordered it to withdraw as well. When Company B returned to the 

rear, its commander reported that the ridgetop “was covered with 

blood, pieces of body, and enemy dead.” The fight for Hill 937 was 

becoming a meat grinder for both sides, leading the paratroopers 

to name it: Hamburger Hill.

It was more of the same the next day, 15 May. Following a 

massive barrage, Honeycutt’s Company C moved into a blocking 

position while Company A joined Companies B and D on the offensive. By early afternoon, the three companies were heavily engaged, 

the fighting made worse by mines the North Vietnamese had laid 

during the night. Company B suffered the most, with a half-dozen 

men wounded and killed during the day. Even the battalion headquarters came under attack. Several rocket-propelled grenades hit 

the command post, wounding several, including Honeycutt, but 

he refused evacuation and continued directing the fight.

Slowly but surely, the Americans pushed forward, using a 

90-mm. recoilless rifle to neutralize bunkers near the hilltop. 

At 1400 on 15 May, the men of the 3d Battalion, 187th Infantry, 

Bridge under construction along Route 547

U.S. Army
35

were 150 meters from the summit when another friendly fire 

incident occurred. Cobra helicopter gunships accidentally loosed 

their rockets into Company B’s command group, killing two and 

wounding fourteen, including the company commander.

Honeycutt was furious. He replaced the wounded commander 

and got the units moving again, and within an hour his paratroopers had moved another seventy-five meters up the mountain. 

“[T]he enemy was quite willing to let us get to the top of the hill,” 

recalled 2d Lt. Franco J. Boccia, “because once we got up there we 

were in the open and they could fire at us from well-entrenched 

and concealed positions all around us.” It certainly appeared as if 

Company A would make it to the top by nightfall, but Honeycutt 

was reluctant to risk leaving a single understrength company on 

the hilltop overnight. There was no choice but to order it back 

down the hill to the previous night’s defensive positions.

Colonel Honeycutt had other reasons to be cautious. It 

seemed that he might be facing more than one battalion on Ap 

Bia Mountain. Many of the dead North Vietnamese had fresh 

haircuts, clean uniforms, and new weapons, which, according to 

one report, confirmed that “reinforcements were being slipped 

into the area, undoubtedly from across the Laotian border.” 

Consequently, he decided not to launch another ground assault 

until Lt. Col. Robert J. Bower’s 1st Battalion, 506th Infantry, was 

in position to the south.

The 1st Battalion, 506th Infantry’s march to Hill 937 on 16 

May was not easy. Companies A and C, moving along separate 

routes, ran into machine guns firing from bunkers on Hill 916, 

about 1,000 meters southwest of Ap Bia Mountain. Despite artillery and air strikes, the enemy kept shooting. It was soon clear 

that Bower would not be able to join forces with Honeycutt by the 

morning of the seventeenth as planned. For the rest of the day, 

the two companies slugged it out with the enemy, traveling slowly 

along the ridge, taking casualties as they went.

In the meantime, Honeycutt made plans for the attack, now 

rescheduled for 18 May. The 1st Battalion, 506th Infantry, would 

support his assault from the southwest behind a curtain of air 

strikes and tear gas. He issued flak jackets and extra ammunition 

to his men, although the extreme heat made wearing the body 

armor almost unbearable. For the rest of the day, the paratroopers 

sat and waited, and for the first time in a week they had no contact 

with the enemy.
36 

Not so for Colonel Bower’s battalion, which faced even 

stiffer opposition as it advanced. Concentric rows of mutually 

supporting bunkers forced the battalion to move through killing 

fields with little cover. “The bunkers,” said one officer, “had cover 

which would enable them to withstand some pretty strong air 

attacks and artillery fire. In addition the slopes were covered by 

a variety of claymore [mines], some of them quite large.” With 

the help of gunships, artillery, and tear gas, Bower’s paratroopers 

moved from bunker to bunker, clearing the enemy away. By nightfall of the seventeenth, they were in position to begin the attack on 

Hamburger Hill.

On the morning of 18 May, fighter planes streaked overhead, 

hammering the enemy. And once again they failed to crack the 

hardened bunkers. The thick jungle was now gone, leaving the 

mountaintop “completely bald,” yet still the North Vietnamese 

poured heavy fire on anyone advancing up the hill.

The Americans started back up the mountain a little after 

0800—the 3d Battalion, 187th Infantry, from the north and the 

1st Battalion, 506th Infantry, from the south. Honeycutt’s men 

met “intensive and withering” fire but were able to push on. The 

Company D commander yelled over the radio that the North 

Wounded soldiers receive treatment before medical evacuation during the Battle of 

Hamburger Hill in May 1969.

U.S. Army
37

Vietnamese were “all around him,” but that his men were “shooting 

them up.” By noon, he and the other company officers were 

wounded. All three companies were forced to halt while gunships 

and artillery took over once more. To make matters worse, a 

torrential rain storm burst over the A Shau, turning Ap Bia’s now 

bare slopes into a mudslide. Casualties mounted—fourteen killed 

and sixty-four wounded—prompting the brigade commander to 

order the companies to pull back.

Colonel Bower’s men had it no easier. As mortar rounds rained 

on them, they fought their way, bunker by bunker. Company B 

reported taking fire from all sides and was able to move only 100 

meters in five hours. By the time the unit set up a night defensive 

perimeter, it was still 600 meters from the crest of the hill.

Following the action closely from a helicopter above was 

General Zais, who now appeared to have two choices: call off the 

operation or press on. After some reflection he felt certain that 

his men could take the hill, if they were reinforced. That evening, 

he met with General Stilwell and the commander of the South 

Vietnamese 1st Division, Maj. Gen. Ngo Quang Truong. All agreed 

that two additional battalions would turn the tide. General Truong 

volunteered his 2d Battalion, 3d Regiment, and Zais decided to use 

his 2d Battalion, 501st Infantry.

On 19 May, helicopters flew the South Vietnamese battalion 

to a landing zone 1,200 meters southeast of the mountain, from 

where it advanced to attack positions for the following day. The 

2d Battalion, 501st Infantry, commanded by Lt. Col. Robert L. 

German, helicoptered in about 1,200 meters northeast of the 

hill. Meanwhile, on the mountain itself, the 1st Battalion, 506th 

Infantry, pushed upward, one company leapfrogging over another. 

By nightfall, it was within 200 meters of the summit. The 3d 

Battalion, 187th Infantry, now reinforced with Company A, 2d 

Battalion, 506th Infantry, encountered much less resistance.

The next morning, 20 May, aircraft and artillery pounded the 

mountaintop as the Americans prepared to climb the slopes. At 

1100, the 3d Battalion, 187th Infantry, moved out. At first there 

was no reaction from the enemy, but after several minutes mortar 

rounds, bullets, and rocket-propelled grenades filled the air. But 

fifty-five minutes later the paratroopers reached the top. Company 

A stepped onto the summit first, but there was no time to rest. 

The enemy fought fiercely, and it was not until every bunker was 

blown that the Americans finally forced him off the shattered hill. 
38 

Honeycutt watched from his helicopter as the surviving North 

Vietnamese fled from the mountain, scurrying down draws and 

gullies while harried by jets overhead (Map 10).

After ten days of fighting, Ap Bia Mountain was in American 

hands. More importantly from the division’s perspective, it had 

decimated the enemy. The official body count was 633 North 

Map 10

3 187

I I

1 506

I I

ARVN

2 3

I I

2 501

I I

Hill 937

Hill 916

Ap Bia Mountain

L A O S

S O U T H

V I E T N A M

BAT TLE OF HILL 937

AREA OF OPERATIONS 

20 May 1969

U. S. Movement

Enemy Entrenchments

All Positions are Approximate

0

0 1 Kilometer

Mile 1

0 600 700 800 900 and Above

ELEVATION IN METERS
39

Vietnamese dead, while the Americans lost 70 dead and 372 

wounded. General Zais was pleased with the results, although he 

regretted the cost in American lives. In the end, it was the enemy 

he was after, not the terrain. “The 29th North Vietnamese Army 

Regiment had been eliminated as a force to contend with at a later 

date,” read one report.

But if MACV and the 101st Airborne Division were satisfied, 

others were dismayed. While the battle was not much different 

than countless other fights, circumstances made the engagement 

a volatile one. The Nixon administration had come into office 

promising peace, and to many people that meant avoiding bloody 

fights with the enemy. The spark that touched off the tinder was 

an Associated Press story by journalist Jay Sharbutt, who wrote of 

reluctant soldiers pushed onward by unrelenting officers. Senator 

Edward M. Kennedy used the story to denounce President Nixon’s 

Vietnam policy as being “counter to our stated goals and intentions in Paris.” He also condemned the Army’s tactics, saying it 

was “senseless and irresponsible to continue to send our young 

men to their deaths to capture hills and positions that have no 

relation to ending the conflict.”

General Zais was stunned. “These people are acting like this 

was a catastrophe for the U.S. troops,” he told his officers. “This 

was a tremendous, gallant victory.” But he was fighting a losing 

battle. Operations aimed at destroying the effectiveness of enemy 

units by killing as many soldiers as possible—a war of attrition—

were no longer credible in the eyes of many Americans. The public 

was tired of seeing body bags. Abrams, who had rejected calls the 

previous year to reduce U.S. casualties, could no longer defy the 

mounting pressure. From now on, he and his subordinates would 

have to exercise greater restraint in undertaking actions that 

put Americans in harm’s way. He nevertheless recognized Zais’ 

achievements by promoting him to become the commander of 

XXIV Corps.

Vietnamization and Withdrawal

The new approach was not long in coming. On 14 May, 

three days into the battle for Hill 937, President Nixon told the 

American people, “We have ruled out attempting to impose a 

purely military solution on the battlefield. We have also ruled out 

either a one-sided withdrawal from Vietnam, or the acceptance in 

Paris of terms that would amount to a disguised defeat.” Part of his 
40 

plan was for a phased withdrawal of all U.S. and North Vietnamese 

combatants. To get the ball rolling, Nixon would take the first step, 

withdrawing some U.S. forces before North Vietnam agreed to 

remove any of its troops.

Deputy MACV commander General Andrew J. Goodpaster 

called the effort “de-Americanization,” but Secretary of 

Defense Melvin Laird preferred the more positive sounding 

“Vietnamization.” Shortly after the Battle of Hamburger Hill ended, 

President Nixon and South Vietnamese President Nguyen Van 

Thieu formally promulgated Vietnamization on 8 June in a meeting 

on the Pacific island of Midway. Vietnamization was designed 

to create South Vietnamese forces strong enough to defend the 

country with only a modicum of U.S. support. In theory, U.S. units 

would only be withdrawn to the degree that the South Vietnamese 

armed forces proved themselves capable of picking up the slack. 

Closely tied to the military initiative were political, social, and 

economic reforms that leaders hoped would turn South Vietnam 

into a more viable and democratic state. Such reforms, however, 

could not progress until security measures had significantly 

degraded the enemy’s clandestine presence among the population. 

(Seated from left) Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Earle G. Wheeler; Lt. Gen. 

Walter T. Kerwin, the commanding general of II Field Force, Vietnam; Secretary of Defense 

Melvin R. Laird; and General Creighton W. Abrams, the commanding general of MACV, 

receive a briefing from Roger McGuire, of CORDS Advisory Team 91, in Bien Hoa Village in 

March 1969. U.S. Army
41

These realities, combined with the demand for fewer casualties, 

resulted in a greater emphasis on security, pacification support, 

and training missions. Major offensive operations would continue 

but would become more difficult as U.S. soldiers withdrew from 

the conflict. Those withdrawals were to start immediately.

At Midway, President Nixon announced that he would 

withdraw 25,000 U.S. troops from South Vietnam starting within 

thirty days. Further withdrawals would be made as the situation 

warranted. Believing that the United States needed to demonstrate 

that it was serious about seeking peace and requiring the South 

Vietnamese to assume more of the war’s burdens, Laird insisted 

that this initial increment, labeled Phase I, be drawn mostly from 

frontline combat units. He left the selection of exactly which 

units to MACV.

General Abrams approached Vietnamization warily. When 

the Nixon administration had sent him in January to alert Thieu 

to the possibility that the United States might start withdrawing 

troops in 1969, he had told the South Vietnamese president that, 

in his opinion, “the time is [not] yet right for [a] withdrawal of 

major [American] combat units.” Little had transpired in the first 

half of the year to make him change his mind, and he had argued 

throughout the spring against an early or substantial withdrawal. 

The administration rejected his counsel, opting for a 50,000-man 

reduction by year’s end. Although he had lost the battle over the 

initiation of the withdrawal, his arguments had succeeded in 

limiting the size of Phase I and in postponing the decision on the 

timing of future increments.

It is important to note that the Vietnamization program 

announced at Midway was not designed to make South Vietnam 

entirely self-sufficient. In fact, General Abrams and the chairman 

of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Earle G. Wheeler, believed that 

Vietnamization would fail if used for that purpose. President Thieu 

agreed. Essential to Vietnamization’s success, therefore, were the 

presumptions that either U.S. negotiators at Paris would succeed 

in getting North Vietnam to remove the bulk of its military forces 

from South Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, or that the United 

States would remain in the fight, albeit to a lesser degree. Should 

these assumptions prove false, senior U.S. military leaders believed 

South Vietnam would be in grave jeopardy.

Hoping to secure as much aid as he could from the arrangement, Thieu requested that the United States allow a more rapid 
42 

buildup of Vietnamese forces and of U.S.-provided equipment than 

currently envisioned. Abrams successfully resisted the call for the 

rapid infusion of more U.S. heavy equipment on the grounds that 

the Vietnamese would have trouble absorbing it. Besides, since he 

believed some U.S. forces would still be necessary to secure the 

South even after Vietnamization was completed, it made sense for 

the United States to continue to provide and maintain the most 

sophisticated weapons. A more measured pace would serve the 

Vietnamese better.

In July, Abrams submitted a proposal that called for the United 

States to retain 275,000 troops in South Vietnam after the completion of the withdrawal in about two years’ time. This “residual 

force,” not unlike the contingent the United States continued to 

retain in Korea years after the 1953 armistice, would include eight 

combat brigades and twenty-eight artillery battalions backed by 

ample contingents of aircraft, helicopters, engineers, and logisticians. Whether Nixon, Laird, and, for that matter, the American 

people would permit such a hefty commitment was questionable. 

The request was another indication of the U.S. military’s belief that 

South Vietnam would require substantial American support for 

the indefinite future.

President Nixon makes a surprise visit to troops in Di An near Saigon in July 1969 after a trip 

to Guam and a meeting with South Vietnamese President Thieu. U.S. Army
43

Because Secretary Laird had rejected Abrams’ warning that 

“any significant reduction in current [U.S.] force levels will result 

in a significant decrease in combat capability,” as well as a loss of 

bargaining position at Paris, the MACV commander had no choice 

but to orchestrate the drawdown as best he could. He tried to tailor 

the cuts so as to maintain “a balanced combat capability and as 

much capability for as long as possible.” For Phase I, he decided to 

withdraw elements of the 3d Marine Division, the headquarters of 

the 9th Infantry Division, and two of the division’s three brigades. 

The II Field Force commander, General Ewell, warned that the 

Vietnamese in IV Corps were not yet able to stand on their own 

without the 9th Division’s support, but Abrams thought that the 

northern Delta was where he could best take the risk.

The president’s special assistant for national security, Henry 

A. Kissinger, thought Abrams faced a thankless task, remarking 

that “he could not possibly achieve the victory that had eluded 

us at full strength while our forces were constantly dwindling.” 

Abrams’ only recourse was to press ahead with efforts to improve 

the South Vietnamese armed forces, both materially and in terms 

of skill, in the hope that the improvements would be sufficient 

to counterbalance the reduction of American combat power. 

Initially, MACV planners envisioned simply transferring equipment from departing U.S. units to equivalent South Vietnamese 

organizations, but the focus quickly changed to delivering new 

equipment from depot stocks. Still, unit-to-unit handovers 

occurred, particularly for artillery and engineer units, with the 

18th and 20th Engineer Brigades handing over equipment on a 

massive scale beginning in June.

Along with the transfer of equipment and the delivery of new 

materiel, U.S. advisers and combat units actively assisted in the 

training of the South Vietnamese military. In January 1969, the 1st 

Logistical Command had initiated a new program titled Project 

Buddy, an effort designed to prepare the South Vietnamese to 

assume greater logistical responsibilities through a formal program 

of on-the-job training. Later, MACV headquarters extended this 

program to all its subordinate commands. For example, South 

Vietnamese Army engineers gained valuable experience under 

Project Buddy by working with associated U.S. Army engineer 

units. Between August and December 1969, two U.S. Army 

construction battalions worked closely with the South Vietnamese 

and encouraged them to assume more responsibilities, such as 
44 

expanded minesweeping and road repair work. In time, South 

Vietnamese engineers became very proficient at repairing and 

building bridges. Similar improvements in capability were soon 

noticeable in other types of units, both combat and noncombat 

alike, but everyone acknowledged that the South Vietnamese were 

a long way from being self-sufficient.

Military Operations, Summer–Fall 1969

Directives from the Nixon administration to reduce U.S. casualties mirrored those from officials in Hanoi, who also changed 

tactics in 1969 to lessen their losses. Their motivations, however, 

were different. The Communist armed forces were still recovering 

from the terrible defeats they had suffered in 1968, losses they 

could not sustain indefinitely if they hoped to prevail. Moreover, 

with the United States beginning to withdraw from the conflict, 

the Communists could afford to wait for the day when they could 

go head-to-head against the South Vietnamese alone. Although 

U.S. negotiators in Paris were insisting that the North Vietnamese 

withdraw as part of any peace deal, the Communists refused to 

countenance it. Kissinger openly worried that by making unilateral 

withdrawals the United States had undercut its own negotiating 

As part of Project Buddy, a U.S. soldier supervises a South Vietnamese engineer as he 

operates a grader typical of the equipment transferred to the South Vietnamese military.

U.S. Army
45

position, but he could not dissuade President Nixon and Secretary 

Laird from moving ahead. With the United States creating the very 

situation for which the Communists hoped, the North Vietnamese 

decided they could afford to hold back most of their conventional 

forces, using the withdrawal period to rebuild, while keeping up 

pressure through guerrilla warfare, terrorism, bombardments 

made from a distance, and raids by specially trained teams of 

sappers. Such tactics reduced North Vietnamese losses while 

inflicting a continuous flow of casualties on the Americans that 

was both difficult for the allies to stop and politically damaging 

given the U.S. public’s growing disenchantment with the conflict.

The combined impact of the withdrawal of U.S. combat 

forces, the enemy’s penchant for attacking soft targets rather than 

tangling with U.S. combat formations, and the frontless, guerrilla 

nature of the conflict put soldiers who normally did not play a 

direct role in combat, such as clerks, logisticians, and construction 

troops, in the line of fire. Not only were these men and women 

critical for the smooth operation of the American war machine, 

but their deaths and injuries had just as much political impact on 

Americans at home as casualties suffered among the combat arms.

Engineers assigned to repairing roads and clearing them of 

mines and booby traps were always in jeopardy. The 19th Engineer 

Combat Battalion, for example, endured incessant harassment 

while working on Highway 1 in northern II Corps and southern I 

Corps. During the quarter ending 31 January 1969, for example, 

the battalion recorded 202 incidents, including small-arms and 

grenade attacks and mine explosions that killed 5, wounded 31, 

and damaged vehicles and equipment. Explosives also destroyed 

bridges and culverts, and enemy sappers and civilian laborers 

frequently cut trenches and built barricades along the roads. In 

reaction, the 19th and other engineer units formed their own 

infantry detachments to carry out security, reconnaissance, and 

even offensive missions around worksites and camps.

Noncombat commands, such as the 1st Logistical Command, 

likewise initiated crash training programs to prepare for combat 

contingencies. Too often, however, guards at supply depots were 

unqualified to operate the weapons they were issued. Meanwhile, 

transportation truck units frequently endured ambushes, as they 

offered lucrative targets at minimal risk. In II Corps, the most 

frequently ambushed route was Highway 19 between the coastal 

port city of Qui Nhon, Binh Dinh Province, and the Central 
46 

Highlands city of Pleiku. In III Corps, the enemy especially 

targeted the road network between the massive logistical facilities at Long Binh, Bien Hoa Province, to the east of Saigon; 25th 

Infantry Division camps at Dau Tieng, Binh Duong Province, to 

the north; and Tay Ninh City, Tay Ninh Province, to the west. 

Combat troops or military policemen offered some protection 

to convoys, but the policemen had too few V–100 armored cars 

to be everywhere. Helicopter gunships helped, but again it was 

impossible to overfly every convoy. Consequently, transportation units resorted to fitting armor plating to the sides of their 

vehicles and sandbagging the floors. They also created “gun 

trucks” equipped with heavier armor and weapons that included 

quadruple .50-caliber machine guns. The added security, while 

necessary, reduced hauling capacity, as every Army transportation group converted the equivalent of an entire truck company 

to gun trucks.

All of these adaptations enabled the Army to continue to 

perform many critical functions in an increasingly resourceconstrained environment, but no place in Vietnam was ever 

entirely safe. This was demonstrated in August 1969, when enemy 

sappers attacked the rest and recuperation area at Cam Ranh 

Bay, Khanh Hoa Province, killing 2 Americans and wounding 

198 others. The next day saboteurs detonated explosives at an 

English-language school operated by the U.S. Army near Saigon, 

killing twelve and wounding sixty-seven, including twenty-eight 

Americans.

But the Communists could not afford to simply ignore U.S. 

combat units, for this ceded too much initiative to the Americans. 

When they felt the situation favored them, when confronted 

by the threat of a significant setback, or when pressed against 

a wall, they would fight, as evidenced by the recent Battle for 

Hamburger Hill. Indeed, while that battle was unfolding in May 

1969, the Communists were taking the offensive far to the south 

in III Corps.

The reason for the offensive lay in the effectiveness of allied 

operations. As one Communist history explained, by the late 

spring of 1969,

the enemy continued to successfully implement his plans 

of gaining control of the population and “pacifying” the 

area. He mounted counterattacks that recaptured most 
47

of the liberated zones and areas we had seized during 

the previous offensives. His forces attacked and blocked 

our source of supplies from the great rear area [North 

Vietnam]. Our armed units suffered tremendous 

shortages of all types, and the lives of the troops became 

very difficult.

To rectify the situation, the Communists felt it was imperative to break the screen that U.S. units were maintaining north and 

west of Saigon. The target they chose was the city of Tay Ninh, 

the capital of Tay Ninh Province, located about ninety kilometers northwest of Saigon and within easy striking distance of 

Communist bases in Cambodia.

The enemy’s initial target was Firebase Carolyn, which 

sat astride one of his supply routes leading into South Vietnam. 

During the first few minutes of 6 May, a sentry from one of the two 

companies from the 1st Cavalry Division that manned the base 

detected movement near the perimeter wire and opened fire. For 

the next two hours rockets streaked toward the base. Then, at 0200, 

the bombardment increased dramatically. Two enemy battalions 

moved forward under the barrage, striking from three directions, 

penetrating the wire, and establishing a foothold inside the base.

The defenders called for support, which was provided by artillery at neighboring firebases and from helicopter gunships. The 

combined air and artillery fire halted a North Vietnamese attempt 

to reinforce their salient inside Carolyn, and a counterattack by 

the defenders drove out the enemy, though not before he managed 

to blow up the ammunition storage bunker. By dawn the attack 

had waned, and at 0600 the 95C PAVN Regiment broke contact and 

withdrew northward. The failed assault cost the Communists 198 

killed and 31 captured, and they left behind dozens of assault rifles 

and 23 crew-served weapons.

The North Vietnamese defeat at Firebase Carolyn did not 

end the offensive. Instead, the enemy intensified bombardments of 

other bases. The high point came between 12 and 14 May, just as 

the battle for Hamburger Hill was getting under way to the north, 

with coordinated ground assaults by elements of the 9th PLAF 

Division on three firebases and a sapper attack against the 1st 

Cavalry Division’s camp at Quan Loi, Binh Long Province, ninetysix kilometers north of Saigon. All were unsuccessful. At the same 

time, part of the 18B PAVN Regiment ambushed truck convoys on 
48 

Route 26 near Cau Khoi, southeast of Tay Ninh City. By the last 

week in May, enemy action dwindled to almost nothing, and the 

gambit had cost the Communists over 500 men. The screen of U.S. 

bases had effectively cut the flow of men and supplies needed for 

the offensive and doomed it to failure.

During the rest of the summer, the 1st Cavalry Division 

continued to harry Communist units and bases. The enemy, 

however, had not abandoned his designs on Tay Ninh. This time, 

he chose to reach the city by tackling Firebase Crook, a 25th 

Infantry Division post fourteen kilometers northwest of Tay Ninh 

City that, like Carolyn, blocked a Communist supply route. 

Enclosed by three rings of barbed wire, Firebase Crook was also 

equipped with remote sensors and radar and lay well within range 

of large caliber guns situated at several nearby installations. Inside 

the perimeter, Battery A, 7th Battalion, 11th Artillery, manned six 

105-mm. howitzers, protected by Company B, 3d Battalion, 22d 

Infantry, and the battalion’s Headquarters Company.

On the evening of 5 June, Crook’s seismic sensors alerted 

the garrison to movement in the woods east and northwest of the 

camp, while radar detected the presence of small bodies of troops 

on all sides. Battery A opened fire, and the base’s commander, Maj. 

Joseph E. Hacia, executive officer of the 3d Battalion, 22d Infantry, 

requested artillery support. Enemy movement subsided until 0255 

on 6 June, when a barrage of rockets, rocket-propelled grenades, 

and mortar shells—estimated at eighty rounds per minute for 

the first five minutes and fifty per minute for the next hour and 

a half—accompanied a battalion-strength infantry assault on the 

installation by the 272d PLAF Regiment. Most of the rockets sailed 

over the base, but one mortar round killed a U.S. soldier. Small 

arms and artillery from inside the compound, aided by fire from 

neighboring firebases, stopped the infantry attack.

After sunrise, Company B sent a platoon through a gap in 

the wire to reconnoiter. It found about a dozen enemy soldiers 

in hiding who wounded four Americans with grenades. The 

platoon withdrew and called in artillery from a nearby firebase, 

as well as air strikes. Reconnaissance eventually revealed the 

bodies of seventy-six enemy. Meanwhile, Companies A and C 

of the 3d Battalion, 22d Infantry, arrived by helicopter about five 

kilometers north of Firebase Crook and began a sweep toward 

the base. In the afternoon, they engaged a hostile force for about 

three hours.
49

Enemy activity at Firebase Crook slackened during the day 

but resumed in the evening on the previous night’s schedule. The 

base’s radar detected small groups of men moving in the forest 

beginning at 2000 on 6 June and continuing into the early hours 

of the next morning. U.S. artillery, directed by heliborne observers 

as well as those at the camp, fired beehive rounds, each containing 

8,000 flechettes. At 0255, 7 June, the Communists initiated a fierce 

bombardment on Firebase Crook as two battalions advanced on 

the post. The force approaching from the northwest got inside 

the first line of barbed wire before the defenders shot it up, but 

the northeastern attackers never reached the perimeter. Sunrise 

revealed the bodies of 323 dead enemy soldiers.

That evening, at 2000, the time when the base’s radar had 

begun to detect enemy movement on the previous two days, 

Major Hacia ordered a precautionary test firing of all weapons. 

The enemy responded with several 75-mm. recoilless rifle rounds 

and small-arms fire from all sides of the perimeter. Mortar rounds 

and rockets followed, and the Americans replied with artillery and 

automatic weapons for an hour and a half. The exchange marked 

the end of the battle.

The defense of Firebase Crook had succeeded beyond expectations. In three days, the small garrison, aided by sensors and 

heliborne observers and overwhelming support from tactical air 

strikes, helicopter gunships, and artillery, had killed over 400 of 

perhaps 1,100 attackers. The defenders had lost one dead and seven 

wounded. Careful construction of the base, excellent training, 

and the advanced technology that characterized the American 

approach to the war had achieved their purpose.

While part of the 9th PLAF Division attacked Firebase Crook, 

the rest of the division had moved against Tay Ninh City, where, 

allied intelligence sources said, the National Liberation Front 

hoped to establish a capital for its newly organized Provisional 

Revolutionary Government of the Republic of Vietnam. Attempts 

to counter the offensive began soon after dawn on 5 June, when 

Companies C and D of the 4th Battalion, 9th Infantry, found the 

271st PLAF Regiment in Renegade Woods, fifteen kilometers south 

of the city, and called in air strikes. The Americans killed forty-five 

of the enemy while suffering four killed and fourteen wounded.

The next day, 6 June, the enemy struck at six sites in and 

around Tay Ninh City. South Vietnamese and U.S. troops rebuffed 

the enemy in a series of battles that lasted through 9 June. A 
50 

ten-day lull ensued until the wee hours of 19 June, when the 

enemy made yet another attempt on Tay Ninh. A heavy mortar 

barrage and machine-gun fire covered the advance of North 

Vietnamese sappers on Firebase Washington, northwest of the 

city. The sappers broke through two rows of barbed wire before 

fire from the defenders, helicopter gunships, and nearby artillery 

batteries stopped them. Shortly before dawn, South Vietnamese 

paratroopers engaged a battalion of the 88th PAVN Regiment east 

of Tay Ninh. U.S. soldiers from Company C, 4th Battalion, 23d 

Infantry, lent a hand, and together the allies drove the foe from 

the city. Meanwhile, South Vietnamese marines and elements of 

the U.S. 25th Division engaged in several battles south and west of 

town. By dusk several hundred enemy soldiers were dead, bringing 

the offensive in Tay Ninh Province to closure.

As the summer rains descended, three U.S. Army units—the 

25th Infantry Division, 1st Cavalry Division, and 1st Infantry 

Division—continued to guard the western and northern 

approaches to Saigon with fair success. Along with allied units 

posted to the east of the city, including the 199th Infantry Brigade, 

and the 3d Brigade, 9th Infantry Division, to the south, they spent 

their time skirmishing with guerrillas, probing enemy base areas, 

Firebase Washington, one of the firebases of the 25th Infantry Division near Cu Chi, northwest 

of Saigon, is shown in an aerial photo in August 1969.

U.S. Army
51

interdicting known supply routes, and patrolling the countryside. 

To help improve the South Vietnamese military, all U.S. units 

conducted combined operations and assisted in the training of 

South Vietnamese regular and territorial forces. U.S. troops also 

continued to run operations to secure the region’s agricultural 

bounty and to destroy Communist caches. In this they had great 

success, for as a captured document conceded: “The situation in 

this area is extremely tense, since practically every unit down 

here has been stricken by hunger. [T]o purchase rice is a matter 

of life or death.”

The absence of major battles did not mean that service in III 

Corps was any less dangerous. During the summer of 1969, one 

man received two Silver Star awards for bravery, but they were 

not his first. In January 1968, Clyde L. Bonnelycke had received 

a Silver Star while serving as a marine during the Tet offensive. 

After reenlisting in the Army, S. Sgt. Bonnelycke found himself 

back in Vietnam in July 1969 with Company D, 2d Battalion, 

8th Cavalry. On the thirteenth, the enemy ambushed his platoon 

during an operation in Tay Ninh Province, wounding several 

soldiers. Bonnelycke picked up a wounded man’s machine gun 

and laid a base of fire that allowed his men to counterattack. He 

kept firing until running out of ammunition, then silenced an 

enemy bunker using hand grenades. These actions resulted in 

Bonnelycke receiving his second Silver Star. One month later, 

on 12 August, the post at which he was staying came under an 

intense bombardment. He left the safety of his bunker to rescue 

wounded soldiers, then ran to the perimeter to lay down suppressive fire on the enemy with a machine gun. When that weapon 

ran out of ammunition, he obtained a second one and continued 

to fight while wounded, exhibiting gallantry that resulted in yet a 

third Silver Star.

Actions by men like Sergeant Bonnelycke contributed to the 

allies’ success in keeping Saigon and its environs relatively secure 

during the summer and fall of 1969. Yet the cordon that ringed 

the capital lost some of its elasticity due to the withdrawal of the 

9th Infantry Division from northern IV Corps. The division’s 

departure began in July, and by the end of August, all but the division’s 3d Brigade, which remained as an independent unit, had 

left Vietnam.

The first withdrawal of a major U.S. combat formation created 

challenges that would soon become familiar over the next two 
52 

years. One of these was to keep some semblance of pressure on 

the enemy. The 9th Division continued to run patrols even as it 

stood down, but these became increasingly tied to camp security. 

The units then moved to the Mobile Riverine Force’s main base 

at Dong Tam, Dinh Tuong Province, where they billeted aboard 

barracks ships. Tactical coordination with the South Vietnamese 

7th Infantry Division, which operated in the same region and with 

whom the Americans had a long relationship, took place without 

difficulty. But it was impossible to expect the South Vietnamese to 

maintain the same amount of pressure with one division as the allies 

had been able to do with two. As the 9th Division’s operations drew 

to a close, engineering activities also phased out, although projects 

relating to pacification or civic action continued to completion.

Leaving Dong Tam marked the first major disposal of real 

property in the war and foreshadowed problems with future 

base transfers. An inventory of the base reported 1,001 buildings and facilities valued at $9.2 million. Service troops shipped 

home some items, such as air conditioners, lighting fixtures, and 

ceiling fans. Some damage occurred as departing Americans and 

arriving Vietnamese looted the facilities. Bureaucratic snafus 

The Dong Tam base in the Mekong Delta is shown in an aerial photo. Completed in late 

1968, the base was the first major real property to be transferred to the South Vietnamese 

military and foreshadowed problems with future base transfers.

U.S. Army
53

and Vietnamese lethargy delayed the final transfer of the base 

to South Vietnam by nearly two months, to late October. In an 

effort to ensure that the Vietnamese could maintain the facilities, the 9th Division and U.S. contractors set up a number of 

training programs.

A similar process occurred elsewhere. In October, the Army 

transferred Blackhorse, the former base camp of the 11th 

Armored Cavalry located sixty-four kilometers east of Saigon, to 

the South Vietnamese 18th Division. No significant damage took 

place at the 700-acre installation valued at $1.9 million. Then, in 

December, the departing 3d Brigade, 82d Airborne Division, either 

dismantled or turned over to the Vietnamese its camps in III Corps. 

But the reshuffling caused by the withdrawals also resulted in some 

gains for the Army. Thus, the 1st Brigade, 5th Infantry Division 

(Mechanized), inherited the departing 3d Marine Division’s base 

at Quang Tri City, Quang Tri Province, while elements of the 1st 

Cavalry Division moved into quarters formerly belonging to the 

Philippine Civic Action Group at Tay Ninh.

The 11th Armored Cavalry continued operations around Saigon such as this minesweeping 

team clearing the way for M551 Sheridan tanks. The Sheridan was a light amphibious tracked 

vehicle designed as an antitank vehicle for airborne forces and had more firepower than the 

armored cavalry assault vehicle. The Sheridan began arriving in Vietnam in early 1969.

U.S. Army
54 

Because U.S. forces were already stretched thin, General 

Abrams did not require any major drawdown from units in II 

Corps during 1969. In the Central Highlands, Lt. Gen. Charles A. 

Corcoran, who had taken over command of I Field Force from 

General Peers in March, continued his predecessor’s program of 

screening the border, harassing Communist lines of supply, and 

working to improve South Vietnamese forces through combined 

operations, training teams, and buddy programs. Generally the 

enemy was quiet, but in the fall U.S. intelligence detected troop 

movements from Cambodia into the southern Highlands—two 

North Vietnamese infantry regiments, the 28th and 66th, each 

with a strength of about 1,800 men, along with the 40th PAVN 

Artillery Regiment and the K–37 Sapper Battalion. The move was a 

major one considering how little action had occurred in the region 

through most of the year. Their targets appeared to be Bu Prang 

and Duc Lap, two Special Forces camps guarding valleys that the 

Communists used to infiltrate the area with men and materiel 

from Cambodia.

On 20 October, the 66th Regiment and the 33d Battalion, 

40th Artillery Regiment, moved toward Bu Prang in the southA U.S. soldier with the 101st Airborne Division views a bunker while on patrol east of Tam Ky 

in northern I Corps in June 1969. U.S. Army
55

western corner of Quang Duc Province, while the 28th Regiment

and other elements of the 40th Artillery Regiment, spearheaded by 

the K–37 Sapper Battalion, moved on Duc Lap forty-five kilometers to the northeast.

At Bu Prang, Capt. William L. Palmer’s twelve-man Special 

Forces Detachment A–236 and 336 Montagnard irregulars 

defended the camp, which included several satellite fire support 

bases whose guns were manned by U.S. artillerymen. On 30 

October, an enemy battalion attacked Firebase Kate, nine kilometers east of Bu Prang, but the timely arrival of U.S. helicopter 

gunships drove it off. The attackers then initiated a siege, digging 

trenches ever closer to the base.

South Vietnamese troops from the 23d Division tried to 

pry the enemy away from Firebase Kate, but to no avail. On 1 

November, a heavy North Vietnamese barrage knocked out all 

of the base’s artillery. Ground assaults from the south, east, and 

west followed. All were beaten back, but that afternoon the allies 

decided to evacuate Kate as well as two other firebases.

Under the watchful eye of U.S. aircraft, Kate’s defenders left 

at 1630, quickly linking up with two companies from the South 

Vietnamese 5th Mobile Strike Force Battalion, which had moved 

in to act as an escort. The force then marched north and met the 

1st Battalion, 2d Mobile Strike Force, which had air assaulted in to 

add further protection. By noon the following day, Kate’s weary 

contingent of more than a hundred men reached Bu Prang, where 

it joined the garrison. Troops from the other two firebases began 

their evacuations on 2 November, with helicopters airlifting their 

artillery to Bu Prang and Ban Me Thuot. After the evacuation of 

the firebases, the South Vietnamese fell into a defensive shell. U.S. 

advisers concluded that this “defensive attitude” made it impossible for the base to do more than await its fate at the hands of the 

North Vietnamese.

The situation was much the same at Duc Lap, located on 

two hilltops overlooking a broad plateau that extended to the 

Cambodian border. U.S. Army Special Forces Detachment A–239 

and more than 200 Montagnard irregulars manned the post. 

Four artillery firebases—Dorrie, Helen, Mike Smith, and 

Volcano—provided support, but as was the case at Bu Prang, the 

arrangement was not enough to prevent the enemy from making 

a concerted attack. In three separate engagements between 30 

October and 2 November, Montagnard irregulars and soldiers 
56 

from the South Vietnamese 53d Regiment, the 22d Ranger 

Battalion, and the 3d Squadron, 8th Armored Cavalry, drove the 

enemy away from Duc Lap with heavy casualties. For the next 

few days, at least, the enemy limited his activity to a desultory 

bombardment.

On 3 November, two South Vietnamese ranger companies 

flew to Firebase Helen, where they joined in a search for two 

American helicopter pilots who had been shot down the previous 

day. Enemy troops pinned down the rangers, forcing the South 

Vietnamese 23d Division to send reinforcements to bail them out. 

The North Vietnamese struck the relief force as well, and through 

the night and all of the following day the South Vietnamese were 

heavily engaged. On 5 November, the South Vietnamese 1st 

Battalion, 45th Regiment, added its weight to the battle, and the 

enemy attack ground to a standstill.

To support the South Vietnamese, I Field Force ordered more 

artillery to the area. On the morning of the fifth, two 155-mm. 

howitzers from Battery C, 1st Battalion, 92d Artillery, were helicoptered in from Ban Me Thuot to Firebase Dorrie, located 

on Highway 14 east of the Special Forces camp. Two days later, 

on 7 November, the enemy converged on the base as well as on 

Volcano. Both bases held their own. For the next ten days, 

combat was equally distributed between the vicinities of Bu Prang 

and Duc Lap. The North Vietnamese bombardment of Bu Prang 

rose in tempo, and between 16 and 18 November the defenders 

endured the heaviest shelling of the siege. On the seventeenth, the 

South Vietnamese 1st Battalion, 47th Infantry, sweeping the jungle 

two miles east of the camp, bumped into an enemy battalion in 

a fight that lasted for several hours. Artillery from Bu Prang and 

air strikes killed 243 North Vietnamese soldiers, while the South 

Vietnamese suffered 11 wounded.

As far as I Field Force was concerned, the only way to break 

the siege at Bu Prang was to apply additional airpower, but restrictive rules of engagement imposed by officials in Washington 

made this difficult. These rules banned the use of heavy firepower, not only inside Cambodia, but within Vietnam in areas 

near the border. As General Corcoran complained, “Tactical air 

and artillery cannot be placed on possible or even known enemy 

positions unless the actual gun positions have been identified 

and a tactical emergency declared.” The I Field Force commander 

told Abrams that the procedure “causes unnecessary delays in 
57

engaging targets and has resulted in additional casualties and a 

lowered morale at Bu Prang.”

Abrams agreed with his subordinate’s concerns. In a message 

on 1 December to the commander in chief of U.S. Pacific 

Command, Admiral Thomas H. Moorer, he urged “that I be given 

operational authority to conduct Arc Light [B–52 Stratofortress 

strategic bomber] strikes within the disputed area.” Enemy attacks 

in the vicinity of Bu Prang had “mounted steadily” in the past few 

weeks, and the Communists were clearly taking advantage of the 

limitations placed on U.S. airpower. For example, noted Abrams, 

one 120-mm. mortar position was “located almost precisely in 

the center of one of the Arc Light target boxes disapproved” by 

Washington. In order to gain the upper hand, argued the MACV 

commander, “I consider it necessary to deny the enemy the use of 

his privileged sanctuary from which he is mounting his attacks on 

the Bu Prang Special Forces camp.”

Changes in the rules were slow in coming, and the North 

Vietnamese barrage gradually ground down the defenders. On 2 

December, Corcoran reported that “the situation within the Bu 

Prang camp is gradually deteriorating due to continuous indirect 

fire attacks.” Over the past five days, almost 700 artillery and 

mortar rounds had fallen within the perimeter, and I Field Force 

worried that “the morale of the [irregulars] is going down.” Twelve 

Montagnards and two American Special Forces soldiers had been 

killed during this time, and fifty-seven, ten of them Americans, 

had suffered wounds. Corcoran feared the worst, telling Abrams, 

“If the enemy has the capability and is permitted to maintain his 

resupply unimpeded in the disputed area and to continue to shell 

the camp, in the long term [he] may be able to destroy Bu Prang 

without resorting to a ground attack.”

After much beseeching, the Joint Chiefs of Staff approved two 

successive nights of B–52 strikes against the enemy. Beginning on 

the early morning of 3 December, the strategic bombers pounded 

five separate targets in the previously off-limits area west of Bu 

Prang. A second raid followed the next night. Although it was 

impossible to tell how effective the strikes had been, the North 

Vietnamese soon broke off the sieges of both Bu Prang and 

Duc Lap. Ultimately, airpower had played a critical role in their 

defense. Over a period of sixty days, U.S. tactical aircraft had 

made 1,309 sorties in support of the two Special Forces camps, 

while B–52 bombers had undertaken 87 missions. Altogether, U.S. 
58 

aircraft had dropped 30 million pounds of bombs. Artillery had 

also played a large role, lobbing 20,000 rounds of 105-mm. and 

155-mm. ammunition and 1,100 175-mm. and 8-inch shells at the 

enemy between 28 October and 10 December. Here, as well as at 

many other battlefields during the course of the war, the heavy 

application of firepower provided by planes, helicopter gunships, 

artillery, and offshore warships often made the difference between 

victory and defeat.

Yet it was only a matter of time before the North Vietnamese 

tried again, so in late December, the allies razed Bu Prang and began 

rebuilding it in a more defensible location eighteen kilometers to 

the southeast. Constructed by the 19th Engineer Battalion, the 

new facility, dubbed “the ultimate Special Forces fighting camp,” 

was sited on a prominent hilltop and built almost completely 

underground. Monsoon rains delayed construction, however, and 

the new base was not completed until November 1970, at which 

time the United States turned it over to South Vietnam. Duc Lap 

remained in place until December 1970 when it, too, came under 

control of the South Vietnamese.

Apart from the battles at Duc Lap and Bu Prang, and a 6 

November sapper attack on Firebase St. George, thirty-five kilometers south of Pleiku City, that left nine Americans dead and 

twenty-four wounded, the Highlands were relatively quiet in late 

1969. The situation allowed the 4th Infantry Division to transfer 

some of its units away from the border to the piedmont and coastal 

lowland sections of II Corps. The division’s 2d Brigade moved to 

Binh Dinh Province in September, followed by the 1st Brigade in 

December. This left just the 3d Brigade, 4th Division, together with 

U.S. Army Special Forces, artillery, and aviation troops to assist 

the South Vietnamese in holding the vast Highlands. Meanwhile, 

the rest of the 4th Division helped other U.S., South Korean, and 

South Vietnamese forces in shielding II Corps’ most populated 

areas from local guerrillas and the occasional main force threat. 

Central to this effort was the U.S. Army’s 173d Airborne Brigade, 

which, since April 1969, had been devoted to an intense pacification support mission called Operation Washington Green.

Binh Dinh was one of the most populous and poorest provinces in South Vietnam, and since the days of the anticolonial war 

against the French, it had been one of the Communists’ strongest 

bastions. After repeated attempts to wrest it from the enemy had 

yielded modest results, Abrams ordered the 173d Brigade to try its 
59

hand at pacifying the province’s northern districts. The plan called 

for the brigade to break down into platoon-sized packets that 

would guard roads and installations, saturate inhabited areas with 

day and night patrols, attack the enemy’s clandestine infrastructure, and work closely with the territorials and militia through 

combined operations and training programs. The troops would 

live and work in close proximity to hamlets to lend maximum 

support to the South Vietnamese government’s pacification activities. “If this thing works,” declared General Abrams, “we are going 

to do it throughout the Army.”

Operation Washington Green scored many successes 

during the remainder of 1969. Security from hostile military action 

improved, the combined result of U.S. activity and the fact that 

Viet Cong military forces rarely operated in groups larger than a 

squad and almost always tried to avoid contact. Scores registered 

by the Hamlet Evaluation System, the primary means by which 

MACV measured pacification progress, rose noticeably. In fact, 

the number of people living in Communist-controlled communities plummeted to just 1,300, while the system reported that 

90 percent of the province’s rural population was now “relatively 

secure” and living under some degree of government control. The 

size, armament, and ability of the Regional, Popular, and People’s 

Self-Defense Forces increased, while Communist morale declined. 

The allies were also moderately successful in sweeping up cadre 

of the enemy’s clandestine governing apparatus. U.S. officials 

touted the operation’s success and vowed to continue it in the new 

year. Even the enemy acknowledged the change in fortunes. In 

November, a Communist official reported that “the enemy pacification elements scored many successes.” In another document, the 

Communists acknowledged that the

presence of U.S. and Regional Forces troops in the 

hamlet areas are making it difficult to procure rice and 

supporters will not rally. Sympathizers are dwindling 

and popular support is at an all-time low. The mountains 

are no longer a sanctuary. The U.S. and Regional Forces 

62 troops are penetrating and locating base camps 

in the Tiger Mountains by use of squad and platoon 

reconnaissance in force. U.S. troops choose to fight 

under all circumstances, and will insanely pursue us 

into the mountains.
60 

Operation Washington Green was working. But there were 

plenty of obstacles ahead. To date, South Vietnamese authorities had enjoyed only modest success at establishing sound local 

administration, let alone popular government. Competent, 

dynamic leadership was rare. If local security forces had improved, 

performance still varied widely, and generally speaking, they 

remained dependent on the United States. This was not a good 

sign for Vietnamization, a program whose achievements depended 

on fostering autonomy. Last but not least, Washington Green’s 

accomplishments had gotten the attention of Communist leaders, 

and they were determined to do something about that.

Allied gains notwithstanding, the enemy’s clandestine 

network still existed and continued to wield influence over much 

of the province’s population. The enemy used its clandestine 

presence, along with guerrillas and sappers, to launch a major 

terror campaign that the allies found impossible to stop. During 

1969, the Communists initiated more terrorist incidents in Binh 

Dinh than in all but one of the country’s forty-four provinces. 

They assassinated 570 people, injured 535, and kidnapped another 

373. The murders, kidnappings, and acts of random violence had 

a disproportional impact. They eroded civilian confidence in the 

government and intimidated local officials, making it exceedingly 

hard either to establish effective government or to persuade the 

population to actively support the allies. To make matters worse, 

during the fall of 1969, the 3d PAVN Division moved into Binh Dinh 

Province for the specific purpose of undermining the pacification 

program. The shift had an immediate and adverse effect. The I Field 

Force responded to the threat by relocating two of the 4th Division’s 

brigades from the Highlands to Binh Dinh. The deployment meant 

that the 173d Airborne Brigade could continue its highly dispersed 

and hence vulnerable pacification-oriented mission under the 

protection of the newly arrived troops, but it correspondingly 

weakened the allies’ position in the Central Highlands. Moreover, 

the reinforcement was not enough. Although the Americans easily 

rebuffed a few small-scale attacks in October and November, by 

December, the commander of the 173d Airborne Brigade, Brig. 

Gen. Hubert S. Cunningham, felt compelled to withdraw one of 

his battalions from pacification work to boost the conventional 

defense of the province. Even without winning battles, the mere 

presence of the 3d PAVN Division encouraged local Communists 

and cowed South Vietnamese officials. The implications for the 
61

future were stark, especially because the 4th Infantry Division was 

slated to return to the United States in the following year.

For the present, however, allied officials were encouraged by 

what had transpired in Binh Dinh, and they felt fairly good about 

what was happening to the north, in I Corps, as well. Under the 

supervision of the new commander of III Marine Amphibious 

Force, Lt. Gen. Herman Nickerson Jr., U.S. combat units kept up the 

pressure on the enemy throughout the summer and fall by raiding 

his bases and by helping to secure the rice harvest. In June, the 

101st Airborne Division completed its conversion to an airmobile 

configuration, making it even more lethal than before. Like most 

other U.S. formations, the division ran a myriad of small patrols, 

ambushes, and heliborne raids of company and battalion-size, but 

just because the majority of these operations were small in size did 

not mean that they were any less dangerous.

On 13 July, one element of the 101st Airborne Division—

Company B, 1st Battalion, 506th Infantry—was moving along a 

ridgeline in Thua Thien Province to attack a fortified position that 

had pinned down an adjoining company. Suddenly, from a nearby 

hill, the North Vietnamese unleashed heavy fire that stopped the 

General Abrams (right) greets South Vietnamese Lt. Gen. Hoang Xuan Lam, the commander 

of I Corps, as U.S. Marine Corps General Nickerson, the commander of the III Marine 

Amphibious Force, looks on in June 1969. U.S. Army
62 

unit in its tracks. Sp4c. Gordon R. Roberts, a rifleman who had 

received a Silver Star at Hamburger Hill, crawled through the grass 

toward the nearest emplacement. He then jumped to his feet and, 

with rifle blazing, headed straight into the enemy’s fire. He killed 

two gunners and, after pausing to load a fresh magazine in his M16 

rifle, advanced on a second bunker. When enemy fire knocked 

the weapon from his hands, he picked up an M16 dropped by a 

comrade and continued his assault, killing the crew at the bunker 

with rifle fire before eliminating a third position with an accurate 

grenade toss. By then, he was cut off from his platoon, but he 

continued forward, knocking out a fourth enemy position. He 

then helped move wounded men while under fire to an evacuation area. The following year, President Nixon draped the Medal of 

Honor around Roberts’ neck for his actions that day.

A week after Roberts’ display of bravery, another 101st 

Airborne Division trooper, S. Sgt. John A. Gertsch, assigned to 

Company B, 1st Battalion, 327th Infantry, distinguished himself 

when the division once again raided the A Shau Valley. When 

hostile fire seriously wounded his platoon leader, Gertsch dragged 

the fallen lieutenant to safety. He then took command of the 

platoon and forced the enemy to withdraw. In another action, 

when the North Vietnamese attacked part of the platoon, Gertsch 

charged, scattering the enemy and rescuing two wounded men. 

Eventually during the operation Gertsch was wounded, but he 

continued to lead his men and, when he saw a wounded man and 

a medic in jeopardy, he moved forward once again, gaining time 

for the two to escape before enemy fire cut him down. The U.S. 

government recognized Sergeant Gertsch’s valor by posthumously 

awarding him the Medal of Honor.

As the 101st Airborne Division scoured Thua Thien Province, 

farther south the Americal Division worked to improve security 

along I Corps’ southern coast. Throughout the summer and fall, 

Maj. Gen. Lloyd B. Ramsey, who had taken command of the 

division in June, continued long-standing search-and-destroy 

operations in the coastal hills to prevent Communist conventional 

units from descending into the lowlands to disrupt pacification. 

Because the enemy usually avoided contact, few major engagements resulted from these operations. Then, in late July, the division’s 198th Infantry Brigade (Light) joined with U.S. marines 

and South Vietnamese forces to comb Quang Ngai Province’s 

Batangan Peninsula, a longtime Communist stronghold. The 
63

operation weakened, but did not eliminate, the enemy’s deeply 

rooted presence in the area.

The following month, the enemy launched a rare offensive in 

the Americal sector. The target was Firebase West, a post located 

on Liet Kiem Mountain, thirty-two kilometers west of Tam Ky, 

the capital of Quang Tin Province. The base dominated the high 

ground at a key point where the Hiep Duc, Que Son, and Nui 

Loc Son Valleys converged, and little could pass by unnoticed 

by the hilltop garrison. Companies A and E, 4th Battalion, 31st 

Infantry, 196th Infantry Brigade, and three 155-mm. howitzers 

from Battery C, 16th Artillery, made West their home. Two other 

nearby bases—Center and Siberia—provided additional artillery support.

Late at night on 11 August, ground radar picked up movement 

to the north of Firebase West, and soon sentries saw movement on 

the slopes below. An inaccurate mortar barrage broke the silence. 

Only one round landed inside the base, killing one American 

and wounding three others. As soon as the barrage lifted, about 

200 soldiers from the 31st PAVN Regiment rushed toward the 

wire but without firing their weapons. The Americans shattered 

the eerie silence by firing everything they had at the attackers, 

including howitzers at Firebases Center and Siberia. These two 

posts fired more than 1,700 rounds throughout the night and into 

the early daylight hours. The result was devastating. Not a single 

enemy soldier made it into the perimeter, and in the morning, 

troops found fifty-eight dead—fully one-quarter of the attacking 

force—and dozens of weapons, including bangalore torpedoes and 

twenty-pound shaped charges.

The enemy was not finished, however. The Hiep Duc Valley 

was a crucial infiltration route, and the Communists could 

not allow the Americans to remain unmolested. A month later, 

during the early hours of 11 September, they zeroed in on Siberia, 

the westernmost base in the 196th Brigade’s area of operations. 

Located about eight kilometers west of Landing Zone West near 

the banks of the Tranh River, Siberia found itself the target of 

a battalion from the 60th Battalion, 1st PLAF Regiment—part of 

the 2d PAVN Division. As one company attacked from the west, 

another stormed up the north slope using flamethrowers and 

rocket-propelled grenades. Within minutes of the assault, artillery from Landing Zone West rained down on the attackers, and 

within the hour, an AC–119G Shadow gunship arrived above the 
64 

base and sprayed minigun fire on the attackers. Enemy machine 

guns forced the plane to depart, but air strikes soon destroyed the 

machine-gun emplacements and the gunship returned.

Despite the suppressing fire, the enemy made it to the perimeter. Sappers cut through the wire, throwing satchel charges and 

firing rocket-propelled grenades. At least one Communist soldier 

managed to use his flamethrower against one of the bunkers, 

killing one American and wounding another two. But determined 

fire from the defenders, plus artillery support, drove back the 

attackers, and by 0315, only recoilless rifle fire and a few mortar 

rounds were hitting the base.

At about the same time, the enemy struck Hiep Duc town, 

only recently repopulated by the South Vietnamese government 

as part of the pacification effort. The Communists targeted a 

couple of Regional Forces outposts west of the community, as well 

as Landing Zone Karen, which protected the town to the south. 

The following day, the South Vietnamese, with some U.S. support, 

drove the foe away.

The only other significant enemy attack in September occurred 

along Route 529 near the village of An Phong, twenty kilometers 

southwest of Chu Lai, Quang Tin Province. On 13 September, 

two companies of North Vietnamese soldiers launched a predawn 

assault on the village, a key outpost at the mouth of the Suoi Tra 

River Valley, a fertile and well-populated narrow strip of flat land 

that extended well into the mountains west of the coastal plain. 

The local militia held its own against the enemy troops, and, in 

about an hour, two Regional Force companies were brought in by 

helicopter, arriving just in time to help repel a second assault. That 

afternoon, reinforcements from the 1st Battalion, 52d Infantry, 

and Troop H, 17th Cavalry, swept in and chased the enemy out. By 

the end of the day, the Americans and South Vietnamese had killed 

116 North Vietnamese, ending what had been a serious threat to 

this crucial salient of government control into the mountains.

Throughout the rest of the year, the Communists remained 

quiet in southern I Corps. Intelligence reported that all major 

North Vietnamese units had moved west into the mountains and 

“were primarily occupied with the gathering and storing of rice 

and with establishing themselves in secure base areas far removed 

from the normal [areas of operation] of Americal units.” Viet 

Cong combat units had broken down into squad size or smaller 

to escape detection. What few attacks there were during the last 
65

three months of 1969 were usually executed by local guerrillas and 

were aimed at South Vietnamese pacification activities, especially 

in Quang Tin Province. Americal patrols did, however, occasionally encounter the enemy as he tried to infiltrate into the populated lowlands. On 13 December, for example, the 198th Brigade’s 

Troop D, 1st Squadron, 1st Cavalry, bumped into a large group of 

enemy soldiers on the Batangan Peninsula. A fierce battle erupted, 

and Troop C rushed to reinforce. Later in the day, the enemy broke 

contact, leaving behind more than fifty dead.

Morale and Leadership Problems

Despite the decline in the number of major battles, the 

Americal Division, like many others, operated under stressful 

circumstances in the latter half of 1969, suffering a steady stream 

of casualties from snipers, mines, and booby traps. It was frustrating work not being able to come to grips with one’s tormentors 

and unable to tell friend from foe among the population, but by 

and large, the unit performed well. In November, however, the 

division’s honor was tarnished when news broke about a massacre 

committed in March 1968 by members of the division in the 

hamlet of My Lai in Son My village, eight kilometers northeast of 

the provincial capital of Quang Ngai. In that incident, U.S. soldiers 

operating in the Batangan Peninsula had vented their frustration 

by murdering several hundred civilians in a senseless rampage. 

Americal Division officers had then covered up the massacre, 

and it had gone undetected until a former Americal soldier—who 

had learned of the incident by talking with fellow soldiers but 

who had not himself witnessed it—tipped off senior officials in 

Washington. The Army eventually brought charges against over 

two dozen personnel, but only one platoon leader, Lt. William L. 

Calley Jr., was successfully prosecuted for murder. The lurid affair 

undermined support for the war at home, weakening the spiritual 

bonds between a people and its army so vital in a democracy.

Those bonds had, in fact, been fraying ever since the war 

had begun, as a growing segment of the American public became 

openly critical of the commitment. The war’s unpopularity, 

coupled with turmoil at home over the draft and a variety of other 

social, racial, and economic issues, cultivated an atmosphere that 

promoted the questioning of authority. Increasingly, many soldiers 

in Vietnam saw themselves not as the defenders of freedom, but 

as the unfortunate victims of a misguided government. These 
66 

pressures escalated as the new withdrawal policy undermined the 

rationale for men to risk their lives for an uncertain and thankless 

outcome. No soldier wanted to be the last to die in an unpopular 

war. Consequently, the Army increasingly found itself grappling 

with problems of disobedience, drug abuse, and racial tensions.

Compounding the fallout from domestic turmoil and the 

decision to withdraw was the long-standing policy of limiting a 

soldier’s tour of duty in Vietnam to one year. Although multiple 

tours were possible with a break in between, the Army was 

desperately short of frontline leaders by 1969. To make up for 

the shortage of noncommissioned officers (NCOs), the Army’s 

Noncommissioned Officers Candidate Course, derisively called 

the “Shake ‘n’ Bake” course, rushed promising privates directly 

through twenty-one weeks of advance training to become 

sergeants. These young and inexperienced NCOs faced considerable difficulty leading combat troops. Even then, many specialist 

fourth class soldiers ended up as squad leaders. Lowered standards, shortened training, and faster promotions to meet the high 

demand for noncommissioned and junior officers often resulted 

in the assignment of squad, platoon, and company leaders with 

less combat experience than the troops they led. Added to this 

was the frequent shifting of officers to new assignments, a practice 

that undercut unit cohesion and smacked of ticket punching to 

enhance one’s career. Several scandals, including one involving 

the former sergeant major of the Army, as well as incidents of 

false reporting and inflated body counts, further tarnished the 

reputation of the officer and NCO corps. All of these problems 

raised disquieting questions about the professional competence 

and ethics of Army leaders.

In some cases, disenchanted soldiers threatened or harmed 

noncommissioned and junior officers they disliked. This phenomenon was referred to as “fragging,” due to the use of fragmentation grenades by soldiers to intimidate or injure their leaders. The 

full extent of the problem will never be known, but it increased 

sharply in 1969.

One incident that came to exemplify the deterioration was the 

“Alpha Company Affair.” On 12 August 1969, Communist soldiers 

attacked a remote firebase overlooking the Song Chang Valley, 

forty-eight kilometers south of Da Nang in Quang Nam Province. 

In the battle that followed, a helicopter went down with the loss 

of all on board. A major effort then ensued to reach the crash site 
67

and recover the bodies. Over the next five days, one of the units 

involved, Company A, 3d Battalion, 21st Infantry, 196th Infantry 

Brigade, lost ten killed and twenty wounded. When it received 

orders on the sixth day to move back into the valley, the company 

commander, 1st Lt. Eugene Shurtz, who had been in Vietnam for 

only two weeks and was occupying a job normally reserved for 

a captain, reported that his men refused to advance. When the 

battalion commander, Lt. Col. Robert C. Bacon, asked why, Shurtz 

stated that they “simply had enough—they are broken. There are 

boys here who have only ninety days left in Vietnam. They want to 

go home in one piece.” The lieutenant further reported that he had 

little support in the unit because many of his noncommissioned 

officers were either dead or wounded. Colonel Bacon directed his 

executive officer and an experienced NCO, Sgt. Okie Blankenship, 

to visit the unit to “give them a pep talk and a kick in the butt.”

When Colonel Bacon’s emissaries arrived, the soldiers told 

them that they were sick of the heat and the sudden firefights by 

day and the mortaring by night and that they would go no further. 

Sergeant Blankenship tried to motivate the men by telling them—

falsely—that another company was down to only fifteen men and 

was still advancing. When a soldier called his bluff by asking him 

to identify the unit, Blankenship responded by challenging the 

men’s courage, saying, “Maybe they have got something a little 

more than what you have got.” Enraged, one soldier moved toward 

Blankenship with fists raised, yelling, “Don’t call us cowards, we 

are not cowards,” but Blankenship simply turned his back on him 

and walked away. Shamed into action, the rest of the company 

returned to the fight. No one was punished for the rebellion.

The incident was highly disturbing, as it marked the first 

time that a unit the size of a company had disobeyed an order 

in Vietnam. Nine days later, a smaller mutiny occurred when 

a platoon from the 2d Battalion, 27th Infantry, 25th Infantry 

Division, refused to go on a patrol. This time, the ringleaders were 

experienced noncommissioned officers. The captain commanding 

the company noted that the platoon’s twenty-one soldiers, all with 

extensive combat experience, had refused to move because they 

considered it unfair for them to have to go on another patrol. The 

Army prosecuted them, but meted out light punishments. Some 

officers complained that the Army had chosen to pamper enlisted 

men rather than inflict the sort of hard punishments they felt 

were needed to deter future insubordination. The Army, however, 
68 

believed there were extenuating circumstances. The battalion had 

lost three of its commanders to wounds in four months and a 

new company commander had just arrived to replace an officer 

relieved for cause. Moreover, some of the soldiers who were close 

to the end of their tours erroneously believed that official policy 

exempted them from combat missions within thirty days of their 

redeployment. The fact that everyone in the platoon had served 

honorably in combat before the incident, and that they continued 

to do so afterward, spoke toward leniency as well.

Large-scale acts of disobedience like these two episodes were 

rare, but they illustrated the strains that were increasingly tugging 

on the fabric of military discipline and unit cohesion in Vietnam. 

Fortunately, the vast majority of men did their duty, and there was 

plenty of bravery left in the ranks. Between late 1968 and late 1969, 

about fifty military personnel received the Medal of Honor for 

actions taken in Vietnam, with many more receiving lesser awards.

Analysis

The period from October 1968 to December 1969 was a 

successful one for the allies. Thanks to the boost given by the 

Accelerated Pacification Campaign and subsequent efforts, the 

As the year drew to an end, a U.S. soldier with the 199th Infantry Brigade boosts his morale 

with a Christmas card from home and his own tree. U.S. Army
69

percentage of the South Vietnamese population living in “relative 

security” under some form of government control (rated in 

categories A, B, and C in the Hamlet Evaluation System) leaped 

from 76 percent in December 1968 to 93 percent in December 

1969. Even if the numbers exaggerated the amount of progress, 

which they undoubtedly did, the trend was both encouraging 

and unmistakable. Taking advantage of the shield provided by 

U.S. forces and the enemy’s own decision to pull back some of 

his conventional units, the South Vietnamese government was 

getting out into rural communities as never before, organizing the 

population, creating militias and other territorial defense forces, 

and providing some rudimentary services. Roads were being 

repaired and reopened, commerce was flourishing, and agricultural and industrial production was growing. Plenty of socioeconomic and political problems remained, some of them severe, but 

there seemed to be reasons for hope.

The U.S. Army contributed to the progress in several ways. 

Thousands of soldier-advisers helped their South Vietnamese 

counterparts at every level from battalion to corps; while in 

the provinces, U.S. Army advisers assigned to CORDS assisted 

South Vietnamese officials in a wide variety of sociopolitico 

and security tasks. U.S. military units amplified the 14,000-man 

advisory effort by conducting training programs of their own and 

by coordinating their operations with South Vietnamese units so 

that the Vietnamese could learn by doing in combined activities. 

Pair-offs and buddy systems abounded, while logisticians busied 

themselves with delivering new equipment and instructing the 

Vietnamese on its use and maintenance. South Vietnam’s armed 

forces grew in strength and capability, with the United States 

paying particular attention to improving the territorial forces 

that were crucial to securing the gains made in pacification at the 

local level. CORDS personnel and U.S. units supplemented these 

activities with a robust campaign of civic action, delivering relief 

supplies, providing technical advice, dispensing free medical care, 

and supporting charitable undertakings.

The U.S. Army also contributed to progress in 1969 by killing 

thousands of enemy soldiers. Indeed, the war of attrition so often 

denigrated by critics of the conflict was very much alive in 1969. 

Both sides may have sought to minimize their own casualties, but 

neither had given up the belief that victory, or at least an acceptable result, could be achieved by using violence to destroy the 
70 

other side’s ability or will to continue the fight. Although there 

were fewer major battles than in prior years, the allies nevertheless 

reported that they had killed nearly 157,000 enemy personnel in 

1969, more than in any year except 1968. The human and material 

losses imposed by the United States demoralized the enemy, eroded 

his political as well as military influence over the countryside, and 

prevented his major conventional forces from invading the heavily 

populated areas and upending the pacification effort. Attrition 

by combat, therefore, remained an integral part of what General 

Abrams called a one-war strategy that attempted to blend military, 

security, pacification, and nation-building efforts into a single, 

seamless, unified effort. But military progress remained the first 

among equals, for as a special study group formed within the president’s National Security Council concluded, the principal driver 

for almost all allied success in pacification during the year was the 

“much more favorable allied posture in the main force war than 

had existed before 1969.” Because “the allies were able clearly to 

gain the upper hand in the main force war, destroying, dispersing, 

or pushing back the enemy main force units” in 1968 and 1969, 

pacification had prospered. If attrition through combat did not 

guarantee success, it provided the first step toward that goal.

But the Communists, too, had exacted a price—9,367 dead 

American servicemen (also the single greatest loss in any year 

other than 1968)—and nearly 22,000 dead South Vietnamese 

security personnel. The problem for the United States was that the 

huge casualties it had inflicted on the enemy had not caused the 

totalitarian leaders in North Vietnam to flinch. Instead, America’s 

comparatively small losses were having a disproportionate impact 

on its own democratic system, as a growing number of people 

came to the conclusion that a non-Communist South Vietnam was 

either unobtainable or not worth the price. The United States was 

thus losing the war of attrition, not materially, but spiritually, with 

ominous implications for the ultimate outcome. For if military 

success was the true driver of progress, and if that success was 

disproportionately due to American power, then the withdrawal 

of that power before the enemy abandoned his quest of conquest 

was dangerous indeed.

Thus the question at the end of the year, as at the start, was 

whether the United States could achieve enough positive change 

to ensure South Vietnam’s survival before the inevitable American 

withdrawal. Despite the many positive accomplishments over the 
71

past year, General Abrams was unsure he had attained this goal. In 

addition to lingering social, administrative, and political problems, 

South Vietnam’s security forces were overstretched, and as the 

U.S. withdrawal continued, they would undoubtedly struggle to 

make up for the quantitative and qualitative advantages they had 

enjoyed from America’s presence. True, some Vietnamese units 

were performing to a high standard, but many others remained 

mediocre. As is so often the case in human endeavors, leadership 

was what often made the difference, but that was a commodity far 

more difficult for America to export than bullets and guns. Abrams 

believed that a younger generation of officers showed promise, but 

many advisers in the field found their situation profoundly frustrating as they had to prod and cajole their counterparts, often with 

limited success, into effecting the changes they thought would put 

South Vietnam on a sounder footing.

To make matters worse, initial declarations that the composition and timing of the withdrawal would be based on the military 

situation on the ground quickly fell by the wayside. Under significant pressure to bring some closure to the unpopular conflict, 

President Nixon and Secretary Laird allowed domestic political 

considerations to dominate the process. This reality placed the 

whole process of Vietnamization, and of the ultimate outcome of 

the war itself, in grave jeopardy.

In August, Abrams tried to address administration concerns 

by reducing the size of the proposed postwithdrawal “residual 

force” to 50,000 men. Although still considerable, the new force 

would consist almost exclusively of advisers and support units 

without any of the direct ground combat capability MACV had 

originally envisioned. Laird rejected the proposal, wanting a clean 

break from the Southeast Asian quagmire. Instead, he asked for a 

plan that would create an indigenous military that could “maintain 

at least current levels of security” with minimal U.S. assistance. 

This meant giving South Vietnam technical capabilities that it 

had long relied on the United States to provide, particularly in the 

areas of air, artillery, transportation, and logistical support. He also 

wanted the plan to solve the “critical problems of corruption, leadership, motivation, and morale” that had plagued South Vietnam’s 

armed forces since their creation. If South Vietnam was to have 

armed forces capable of fighting both the Viet Cong and North 

Vietnam independently by the time the United States completed 

its withdrawal, it would have to expand its manpower, absorb 
72 

large quantities of equipment, and become proficient at operating 

a sophisticated command, control, and logistical infrastructure at 

breakneck speed.

The U.S. military’s response to the secretary’s demand was 

tepid. Abrams proposed ideas for redressing some of the systemic 

weaknesses in the Vietnamese military system, but these were 

neither novel nor promising given the fact that many of these 

problems had defied nearly two decades of U.S. military advice 

and assistance. Moreover, both he and Wheeler believed the 

administration was unrealistically changing the original goals of 

Vietnamization. They nevertheless went back to the drawing board 

to develop something more akin to the administration’s desires.

Meanwhile, President Nixon and Secretary Laird pressed 

ahead. Setting aside the military’s misgivings, in September they 

increased the Phase II withdrawal increment that was to be implemented by the end of 1969 from 25,000 to 40,000 men. Abrams 

grudgingly met the requirement by earmarking the rest of the 3d 

Marine Division and the 3d Brigade, 82d Airborne Division, for 

redeployment. He warned, however, that “the situation is such 

that it would not—repeat not—be militarily sound to recommend 

further U.S. troop redeployments at this time.” The administration 

disagreed, announcing in mid-December a Phase III withdrawal 

of another 50,000 men. The only concession Laird gave to Abrams 

was to extend the Phase III completion date to 15 April 1970. 

MACV selected the 1st Infantry Division, a brigade of the 4th 

Infantry Division, and a Marine Corps regimental combat team to 

meet the requirement.

In December, Abrams and the Joint Chiefs dutifully submitted 

a new plan to meet Laird’s requirements. It called for a larger and 

more rapid buildup of Vietnamese forces than hitherto contemplated. To the secretary’s annoyance, it also continued to call for 

a larger U.S. residual force than he desired, but he nonetheless 

accepted a revised version of the plan. Notable, however, were the 

assumptions on which the plan was based—that pacification and 

territorial security would keep making rapid progress, that U.S. 

materiel and financial support would continue uninterrupted, and 

that the U.S. Air Force would be able to conduct combat missions 

on behalf of South Vietnam from bases outside the country. 

Finally, the plan assumed that the North’s military presence would 

diminish inside South Vietnam. Any significant deviation from 

these assumptions would seriously compromise the plan. Abrams 
73

had already learned, however, that once the withdrawal train had 

left the station, it was awfully hard to stop. Whether the Nixon 

administration would be willing to slow or reverse the troop 

withdrawals should any of these assumptions prove inaccurate 

remained to be seen.

As he wrestled with his misgivings, the MACV commander 

felt that something more was needed to increase the odds of a 

favorable outcome. The answer, he believed, was for the allies to 

cross over into Cambodia, Laos, and perhaps even North Vietnam 

to destroy the sanctuaries that sustained the enemy’s war effort in 

the South. U.S. military leaders had been proposing such a move 

since 1961, but no American president had been willing to take the 

risk. Surprisingly, President Nixon proved receptive to the notion, 

for despite all the pressure to get out of Vietnam, he, too, realized 

that something more needed to be done to reduce the chances 

of defeat. A successful action against the external threat would 

undoubtedly cause a political backlash at home and abroad, but 

it might be worth the risk if it enabled U.S. troop withdrawals to 

continue unhindered and if it bought more time for the military 

modernization and nation-building effort in South Vietnam 

to proceed. A severe curtailment of North Vietnam’s ability to 

meddle in the South might even lead the Communists to agree 

to terms more favorable to the allies because, as yet, the talks in 

Paris had produced nothing tangible. Indeed, America’s unilateral removal of over 75,000 troops by year’s end had not enticed 

the Communists to make meaningful concessions, let alone to 

remove a single soldier in return. Nevertheless, by the end of 

1969, President Nixon had not approved any of the cross-border 

schemes proposed by the nation’s military leaders.

But that was about to change. In the spring of 1970, a coup in 

Cambodia would open the door to an intervention by the United 

States. President Nixon would seize the opportunity by authorizing a major ground operation to destroy the extensive logistical 

complex that the Communists had created in Cambodia to sustain 

their war effort in South Vietnam. Since Abrams assigned the 

South Vietnamese Army a significant role in the operation, the 

Cambodian incursion would also present the first major test of 

Vietnamization. Over the coming months, officials in Washington 

and Saigon would anxiously wait to see if the achievements of 1969 

had borne fruit.
74 

The Author

Adrian G. Traas is a retired U.S. Army Corps of Engineers 

officer who served as company commander of engineer units 

in Korea and Fort Belvoir, Virginia; post engineer in Verona, 

Italy; executive officer and commanding officer of a topographic 

battalion with mapping projects in Ethiopia, Liberia, and Iran; 

assistant professor of military science at Texas A&M and professor 

of military science at Marquette University; and on the faculty 

and staff at the U.S. Army Engineer School, Fort Belvoir. He also 

served two tours in Vietnam as S–3 and executive officer in a 

combat engineer battalion, staff officer in a construction group, 

adviser with the South Vietnamese combat group, and deputy 

region engineer; and in administrative positions and as a historian 

at the Center of Military History.

He is the author of Engineers at War (2010) and From the 

Golden Gate to Mexico City: The U.S. Army Topographical Engineers 

in the Mexican War, 1846–1848 (1993).
75

Further Readings

Clarke, Jeffrey J. Advice and Support: The Final Years, 1965–

1973. United States Army in Vietnam. Washington, D.C.: U.S. 

Army Center of Military History, 1992.

Cosmas, Graham A. MACV: The Joint Command in the 

Years of Withdrawal, 1968–1973. United States Army in Vietnam. 

Washington, D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Military History, 2007.

Hackworth, David H. Steel My Soldiers’ Hearts: The Hopeless 

to Hardcore Transformation of 4th Battalion, 39th Infantry, United 

States Army, Vietnam. New York: Rugged Land, 2002.

Hammond, William M. Public Affairs: The Military and the 

Media, 1968–1973. United States Army in Vietnam. Washington, 

D.C.: U.S. Army Center of Military History, 1996.

Heiser, Lt. Gen. Joseph M. Jr. Logistic Support. Vietnam 

Studies. Washington, D.C.: Department of the Army, 1974.

Spector, Ronald H. After Tet: The Bloodiest Year in Vietnam. New York: Free Press, 1993.

Stanton, Shelby L. The Rise and Fall of an American Army: 

U.S. Ground Forces in Vietnam, 1965–1973. Novato, Calif.: Presidio 

Press, 1985.

Tolson, Lt. Gen. John J. Airmobility, 1961–1971. Vietnam 

Studies. Washington, D.C.: Department of the Army, 1973.

Willbanks, James H. Abandoning Vietnam: How America Left 

and South Vietnam Lost Its War. Lawrence: University Press of 

Kansas, 2004.

Zaffiri, Samuel. Hamburger Hill, May 11–20, 1969. Novato, 

Calif.: Presidio Press, 1988.

For more information on the U.S. Army in the Vietnam War, 

please read our other titles 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

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