page_title: 1966 in the Vietnam War
section_title: April
hierarchical_section_title: 1966 in the Vietnam War / April
caption_attribution_description: English: SEARCH AND DESTROY MISSION NEAR CUI CHI, RVN. Operation Albilene, a search and destroy mission against the Viet Cong by elements of the 2nd Brigade, 1st Infantry Division. The operation began 50 km SE of Saigon and extended approx 71 km NE of Saigon, near the village of Binh Ga, RVN. Personnel guard a VC prisoner captured during the operation.
context_page_description: At the beginning of 1966, the number of U.S. military personnel in South Vietnam totaled 184,314. South Vietnamese military forces totaled 514,000 including the army and the Regional Force and Popular Force militias. The North Vietnamese People's Army of Vietnam numbered 400,000, most still in North Vietnam. 50,000 PAVN cadre and soldiers infiltrated South Vietnam during 1965. Group 559, charged with transporting supplies down the Ho Chi Minh Trail to supply PAVN troops in both South Vietnam and Laos, numbered 24,400 personnel. The U.S. estimated the number of Viet Cong and PAVN soldiers in South Vietnam at nearly 280,000 by June 1966, including part-time guerrillas. A pause in the bombing of North Vietnam by U.S. warplanes had been announced by President Johnson on 24 December and remained in effect.
context_section_description: 1 April
  General Pham Xuan Chieu, a member of South Vietnam's 10-man military junta who was appearing as an emissary of Prime Minister Kỳ to seek popular support in Da Nang, was surrounded by a mob of 1,000 students and Buddhist activists as he arrived at city government offices. The group then held him captive, transported him around the city in a cycle rickshaw, forced him to make a speech at the local radio station and then released him unharmed.
  The VC bomb the Victoria Bachelor Officer's Quarters in Chợ Lớn killing three U.S. serviceman.
  2 April
  Ten thousand protesters (including 2,000 South Vietnamese soldiers and sailors in uniform) marched through the streets of Da Nang and denounced both the United States and the South Vietnamese government of Prime Minister Kỳ. Da Nang Mayor Nguyen Van Man, who had allowed protesters free use of city offices, motor vehicles and printing facilities, was accused of treason by Kỳ, who said that he planned to have Man executed by a firing squad.
  4 April
  Premier Kỳ sent five battalions of ARVN Rangers and South Vietnamese marines to Da Nang to quell the Buddhist uprising. The U.S. transported the soldiers and marines. General Westmoreland ordered that all American soldiers in Da Nang be confined to their billets.
  9 April
  A platoon of U.S. Marines blocked the passage of a convoy of pro-Buddhist ARVN soldiers en route to take over Da Nang Air Base. The armed confrontation was resolved after negotiations between the two sides. Over the next few days the tense situation in Da Nang and Huế quieted down, although control of the two cities was still contested between the government and the Buddhists.
  11 April
  The conservative newsweekly U. S. News and World Report became the first American news magazine to analogize the Vietnam War as a "stalemate" with neither side likely to defeat the other.
  11 - 12 April
  The Battle of Xa Cam My was fought over two days. Originally planned as a U.S. search and destroy mission intended to lure out the "crack" VC D800 Battalion in the rubber plantations of Xa Cam My, approximately 42 miles (68 km) east of Saigon. During this battle, 134 men of Charlie Company, 2nd Battalion, 16th Infantry, 1st Infantry Division were ambushed by the VC. The battle resulted in 41 VC and 36 U.S. killed.
  12 April
  For the first time, North Vietnam was bombed by American B-52 Stratofortress bombers when 29 B-52s dropped 585 tons of bombs on the Mụ Giạ Pass through the Annamese Mountain Range, in an attempt to break the supply line that was nicknamed the "Ho Chi Minh trail". Although the objective was to create landslides that would close off the pass completely, a reconnaissance mission the next day found that the North Vietnamese had cleared the area, filled the craters in the road, and were driving their trucks through the pass once more. After a second wave of intensive bombings and an equally intensive clearing of the pass, a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) appraisal would later note that the "Communists will spare no effort to keep it open".
  14 April
  General Thiệu signed a decree promising that free national elections for a civilian government would take place by 15 September.
  A VC mortar attack on Tan Son Nhut Air Base destroyed 2 RVNAF aircraft and killed seven USAF and two RVNAF personnel.
  15 April
  Lieutenant General Tôn Thất Đính arrived in Huế and took over as commander of I Corps after General Chuan asked for the marines to be withdrawn from Da Nang, prompting the ten-man junta to unanimously removed him; Chuan also voted for his own ouster. Kỳ felt that Đính's aggressive attitude following the Xá Lợi Pagoda raids staged under the Diệm regime in 1963 indicated a willingness to suppress Buddhist dissidents.
  A U.S. military spokesman reported that there had already been 1,361 U.S. servicemen killed in the war as of 9 April, more than the 1,342 that had died during the entire year of 1965. By April, according to the press release, the combat death rate for U.S. Army, Marine, Navy and Air Force personnel was now averaging 100 people per week.
  19 April
  Clashes erupted in 
caption: ARVN with a captured VC, Operation Abilene
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