[6]:36 In addition airborne "rocket watch" patrols were established in the Saigon-Bien Hoa area to reduce attacks by fire. Sergeant was already tucked under a 5 ton truck parked about 50 feet Set. Several M 113 armored personnel carriers (APCs) are seen accompanying the troops. View of surrounding areas. I called III Corps to report that we had detained all of these people, and was told to wait for the Vietnamese National Police to take charge. As best I could, I explained that they were to take charge and that General Giap might be among the civilians. was out of the bldgs. The 2-47 was one of several units he pulled in from the jungles to guard the Long Binh headquarters and logistical complex 15 miles northeast of Saigon. biggest ordnance storage areas in the country. An MP full colonel, accompanied by a Los Angeles deputy sheriff (dressed in his deputy uniform) and two jeeploads of National Police, drove up to my track. As we turned right onto Highway 15, an unbelievable spectacle stretched before us. Now someone pointed out that there were a lot of young men, all dressed in black pants and white shirts, among the refugees. [3]:218, The town of Ho Nai (105812N 1065335E / 10.970N 106.893E / 10.970; 106.893) was located on Highway 1 north of the Widow's Village and Long Binh Post. Many of the enlisted personnel with medical MOSs work two to three days per week at the 93 rd Evacuation Hospital, then came back to the 24 th to work on the various construction projects. (Vietnam War period). door at the petroleum dump ruptured and fuel flowed down the ditch in [2]:349, The perimeter was strengthened by an ad hoc force of support personnel from the 145th Aviation Battalion and just before midday the ARVN 57th Regional Force Battalion moved through the base and counterattacked the VC forcing them to withdraw east into the rubber plantation leaving behind over 100 dead. Troops opened their attacks with volleys of grenades, then charged in shooting. When the Tet cease-fire period began on January 28, the battalion was called back to the vicinity of Bear Cat, a base camp near Long Thanh. Several soldiers gathered in front of the track to help the wounded, and Love climbed up to man the .50-caliber. The explosions at Long Binh, 15 miles northeast of Sia gon rattled windows and shook doors here in the capital. him in. Normally, operations orders issued over the radio were encoded and sent by the S3s radio operator. At that time, I received a call on my company frequency from the battalion commander, Colonel Tower, asking how things were going. We all knew these moves were more than precautionary. About a month earlier I had been loaned out to weld the razor The offensive continued until the end of the month in the North part of Long Binh Vietnam 1969 stock footage and images - Showing 1 to 6 of 5540 results Sort by: All Decade 1890 - 1899 Location (1) Norfolk Virginia USA (2) Normandy France (12) Norman Oklahoma USA (1) (1) (1) North Carolina United States USA (2) North Chicago Illinois USA (1) North Dakota United States USA (1) North Haven Maine USA (1) North Korea (1) Unfortunately for the VC, they had no weapons other than the RPG launcher. We rolled through Long Binh and out the main gate, then turned onto Highway 316. and still no answer. Soldiers of the U.S. 2nd Battalion 47th Infantry (Mechanized) and 4th Battalion 39th Infantry clearing a hamlet during the Tet Offensive in Vietnam. As we fought our way toward the scout platoon, we were blocked by two large churches that were directly across Highway 1 from each other, both occupied by the VC. My plan was to make captain and go to Vietnam as an experienced company commander. The gun-jeeps were progressively replaced by M113s and XM-706 Commando armored cars. Big Ammunition Dump Near Saigon Hit by Blasts As a result long-range reconnaissance patrols (LRRPs) from Company F, 51st Infantry Regiment were positioned north of Long Binh to detect PAVN/VC approaching the base. NEARER AIR V..SMOKE while we were gone. Under fire, Staff Sgt. A slightly wounded soldier, lying on the ground, smiles as he points to his leg as another soldier helps him. After the roadblock was cleared and communications restored, Charlie Company continued toward its objective. I realize now that the track was high enough that the rounds would have passed over the troops in front of the vehicle, Love recalls. We opened up with everything we had and kept driving. Suddenly he came upon a VC RPG team drawing a bead on my command track, which was a prime target given the number of radio antennas jutting from it. night on alert at the Birdcage, I was awakened (trying to sleep On January 23, during a battalion sweep of a heavily jungled area south of Highway 1, Alpha Company walked into a well-camouflaged, well-defended enemy bunker system and was badly mauled, losing four men killed and more than 20 wounded, including almost all of the officers. At 08:00 the VC south of the Plantation withdrew into the Widows Village. We charged southeast down Highway 316 to the Highway 15 intersection, located on a small hill overlooking the 90th Replacement Company. U.S. military officials vVould not give the exact number of casualties for security reasons. All I could think of to say was, Please clear that weapon!. Fred Casper, one of the bravest of the brave, was killed during the May offensive at the Y Bridge in Saigon, leading from the front as was his custom. and the perimeter was still intact. We never saw them again. As enemy resistance stiffened, we realized we had bottled at least a company of the VC 275th Regiment in the village. Love was so startled, he didnt fire. During the morning of January 30, the 2-47 Mech was notified that the Tet cease-fire was canceled, and the unit was deployed into a defensive line along the road that ran around the east side of the Long Binh base. The remains of a stack of over 15,000 high explosive 155mm artillery projectiles after the VC attack on February 4. [5], USAF losses were 4 killed in action with another dying of a heart attack, while 26 were wounded. The ammunition dump contained high explosives like: C-4, artillery rounds, mortar rounds, aerial flares, 50 caliber rounds, M-60 machine gun rounds, and aerial rockets for the Huey Cobra and gunships. The attacks on Bin Ha, Bien Hoa Air Base and Long Binh Post, occurred during the early hours of 31 January 1968 and continued until 2 February 1968. Early on January 30, we were told the Tet cease-fire was canceled, and our unit was deployed into a defensive line along the road that ran around the east side of the Long Binh base. Some were complete projectiles weighing Not only would I not finish my command tour, but I was also being assigned to a leg division. border. Officer and soldiers examine barbed wire torn apart by Vietcong who infiltrated Long Binh ammunition dump. After commanding 180 paratroopers, taking on four APCs and 40 troops seemed like a dreamexcept that now I was responsible for troops in combat, not training. This is the story of one rifle companycomprised of some of the finest soldiers to ever wear the uniform of the U.S. Armyand what they all faced on that decisive day. 5. Big Boom! At 4 a.m., Jones ordered us to pull in our ambushes and be prepared to move, and told Charlie Companys noncombatants to report to battalion headquarters. EOD in Vietnam 1966-1967, Photo Album - ZiaNet The chrome Tower had called and told me Charlie Company was under the operational control of III Corps and I was to take my orders from them. Rocket Attack on Dong Tam - July 10, 1969. The VC attacks on Bien Hoa and the Long Binh complex were abject failures, due in part to the fact that on January 31, 1968, they had run into the Panthers of the 2nd Battalion, 47th Infantry. July 10, 1969 - Page 3 - Brownwater Vietnam Veterans As we rolled by, we looked down into the compound and saw soldiers in khakis, boarding passes in hand, milling about. This article was originally published in the February 2006 issue of Vietnam Magazine. When I pointed out that the 101st Battalion had more than 500 troops and I had only two line platoons and fewer than 90 troops, he said, Youre mechanized, youre very strong., I told him we could not take the tracks off Highway 1 and into town because the streets and alleys were too narrow. With a push-to-talk button stuck in the transmit position, no one could use the radio. At dawn on 2 February the US counted approximately 50 VC/PAVN dead in the area and captured 3 VC. A spokesman for the South Vietnamese command said that, according to unconfirmed re ports, satchel charges, of the type used by Vietcong sabotage squads were found near the dump. They bowed and looked confused. Soon we could hear leaders moving up and down the bunker line yelling for the guards to stop firing. The II Field Force commander, Lt. Gen. Frederick C. Weyand, had correctly guessed that a major attack was going to come during Tet, and his anticipation of the attacks no doubt saved Long Binh and Saigon from being overrun. Our outfit was a [3]:2501, On the evening of 1 February 3 platoons from Company C, 4/12th Infantry and 2 platoons from Company D, 17th Cavalry Regiment were ordered 2km north of Ho Nai to establish an outer defense against any renewed VC/PAVN attack. SOUTH VIETNAM: VIET CONG EXPLODE U.S. We left the clearing of Bien Hoa City in the capable hands of the 2nd Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry. 856th RRD-Defending Long Binh - ASA LIVES He waved me off. United States officers and soldiers examine barbed wire fence where Vietcong broke through to enter Long Binh. During the meeting, a master sergeant adviser to a Vietnamese ranger battalion ran into the compound. GV EXPLOSIONS, AMERICAN SOLDIERS IN F/G. The explosion echoed over an area of 50 miles. We opened up with everything we had and kept driving. I asked one of the men Charlie Company quickly reinforced Alpha, and a daylong fight ensued. to contact the Commanding Officer(MAJ Guidroz). At the time of the After the battles for the churches, there occurred one of the most bizarre incidents of the day. Meanwhile, Charlie Company was ordered back to III Corps. from the petroleum dump immediately next to our position. Company B, 4th Battalion, 39th Infantry, which was placed under the operational control of the 2-47, made a combat air assault under fire into the middle of the Widows Village battle and fought bravely beside the Panthers all day long. Terms & Conditions | We could shoot about 21 miles into Cambodia. Alpha Company, still licking its wounds from the January 23 fight, was left intact. Long Binh Ammo Dump October 29, 1966 . He ignored me and proceeded to a nearby house where he and the deputy sheriff kicked in the front door. . Get under! Under fire, Staff Sgt. I had been in Vietnam about nine months. A VC commander captured later in the battle revealed that his orders were only to start the attack after several hundred rockets had hit the Plantation, but as the rocket sites had been neutralized before the rocket threshold was reached, the ground assault on the Plantation never began. This site was called Hill 63 because there was a hill nearby that had an elevation of 63 meters on the map. I realize now that the track was high enough that the rounds would have passed over the troops in front of the vehicle, Love recalls. Perpetual Siege region. Craven and another photographer, were both wounded in the engagement.) This is the airstrike on snipers at the 195th AHC perimeter and the Long Binh ammo dump explosion set off by sappers the morning of the 1968 Tet offensive with sound effects added. As best I could, I explained that they were to take charge and that General Giap might be among the civilians. As the ammo dump burst into flames, secondary explosions erupted in other storage areas, and for the next three days, fires burned out of control. Talk:Long Bnh, Bin Ha - Wikipedia Specialist 4 Bill Rambo, assistant driver and .50-gunner on my command track, remembers my response to the firing as being absolutely irate. Burned out 105mm howitzer shells at ammunition dump in Bien Hoa Air Force Base, Bien Hoa in Vietnam. Refusing evacuation, neither reported his wound. Tower sent Major Jones to take command, and once Alpha got moving, it did a magnificent job. AIR V..FIRES Vehicles drive past on roads between the Long Binh Post area. As darkness settled in, Charlie Company was ordered to move back the way it had come, to the junction of Highways 1 and 316, where we would form a screen in front of the 199th LIB base camp. Vietnam War-Stories.com: Sapper Attack, Ammo Dump Explosion, Bin Ha Then I got a call from battalion commander Tower, asking how things were going. At the meeting I was joined by the S3 of a battalion from the 101st Airborne Division. The only contact I had had with M-113 armored personnel carriers (APCs) was during a training exercise at the officers basic course just after I entered the Army. Aerial view of (USARV) United States Army Republic of Vietnam Headquarters Complex at Long Binh, Vietnam. Unfortunately for them, the hapless VC had no weapons other than the RPG launcher, and Dames dispatched them with a burst from his M-16. But no one would be leaving the country that day. No tactic I had learned at infantry school fit that situation, so we improvised. on the water tower". We closed within a few hundred meters of the scout platoon and watched as helicopter gunships destroyed a large yellow house from which the VC were pinning down Barnes troops. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. The churches were cleared in short order. 1968 - 1969, To See Lawrence's Service Battery Photos In the week preceding the attack these LRRP patrols engaged 2 PAVN/VC reconnaissance teams north of Long Binh. After much frequency changing, I finally got the commander of the bunker guards on the radio. Dames walked down a side alley toward the highway. The North Vietnamese Army had circled As time passed, I became a mechanized soldier. ton wrecker weighing in at 22 thousand pounds. Satchel charges blew pallets of artillery ammunition, creating a mushroom cloud that made us think the VC had set off a tactical nuclear weapon. Listening to the scouts desperate fight on the radio, Charlie Company attacked with renewed vigor as we tried to get to Barnes and his men. into the bunkers. That night, frightened bunker guards in the 199th compound shot into the darkness to their front. Lieutenant Barnes and one of his soldiers would be awarded Distinguished Service Crosses for their heroism that day. Long Binh Ammo Dump Explosion, Tet, 1968 - YouTube As my airborne mentality faded, I learned to love the M-113or track, as we called it. The fog of war was especially thick on the morning of January 31, 1968. 6. When it went off my first thought was that it was a nuclear explosion because of the light dome that rose from the explosion. 15. My In April 1967 I was a first lieutenant commanding a rifle company in the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg, N.C. The only trouble was that Charlie Company tracks were sitting in the road right in front of their bunkers. ", "Then we were all in the bunker Bravo Company was sent to protect the Long Binh ammunition dump, and Charlie Company was ordered into downtown Bien Hoa, where the ARVN III Corps headquarters was in danger of being overrun. Tet Offensive I had returned to Long Binh Post. In another sign that the situation was serious, the battalion commander himself gave map coordinates of company objectives in the clear. Ive just been told you work for me again. on the Bailey Compound, only in the 145th CAB HQ which could Attacking Long We carried concertina wire, sand bags and hundreds of Claymore mines and trip flares to make our defensive positions practically impenetrable. In addition we detained more than 20 probable VC fighters dressed in civilian clothes.

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