The squads separated, with two walking levees around paddies and the others further out along the base of the hills rising from the valley floor. The troops did, however, check papers, search and question a number of them as we moved along. We were in a flat valley covered with rice paddies and the civilians farming there were considered pacified. When we reached point where the patrol would begin its sweep, the platoon leader confirmed coordinates of our position and drew a circle on his map from that point with the FSB at its center. It would take three days, assuming there was no significant contact. The patrol was to be 8 kilometers out and 360 degrees around the FSB. I decided that I would go and take only our senior motion picture (mopic) cameraman, Specialist 6th Class, Bill Foulke. Our boss at MACV wanted us to accompany the platoon and take footage and stills for a feature story. With the loss of life the night before and increasing enemy activity, the 196th Brigade HQ ordered a platoon perimeter sweep to clear the area of enemy. With the loss of life in the attack the night before and an increasing amount of enemy activity in the area, 196th Brigade headquarters ordered a platoon perimeter sweep to search and clear the area of enemy. A damaged, yet-to-be-recovered helicopter in the foreground has been pushed into a breech in the fortified perimeter. Also in the background, a 105mm howitzer is firing in support of 196th troops in an operation to the south of the firebase. In the background of the photo above, troops are erecting a new tent and rebuilding the destroyed command center. The range of these rockets is up to 11km and they were probably fired from the hills overlooking the FSB. Three others had been wounded and evacuated. The unit commander and two NCOs were killed. The fire direction and command center took a direct hit from a Soviet-made 140mm or 122mm BM-21Rocket.
The night before there had been a rocket attack on the fire support base (FSB) Charlie of the Third Battalion, 82nd Artillery (105MM). We were on our way to Nui Thanh to film an assigned story about Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) training of new recruits.įire Support Base (FSB) Charlie, 3RD Battalion, 82ND Artillery (105) Welcome to FSB Charlie Nash, mopic cameraman and Jim Dennison, audio recording.
There were four of us: myself, Bruce Wesson, team leader Bill Foulke, senior mopic cameraman C.J. The Military Assistance Command Vietnam (MACV) Army A Team arrived at the Chu Lai, South Vietnam press camp around noon. The location was in the Hiep Duc Valley region, northwest of Chu Lai with the 196th Light Infantry Brigade. We had been redirected to another assignment. When we arrive, the press camp non-commissioned officer (NCO) in charge was waiting for us with a set of new classified orders he had received from our contact at MACV headquarters at Tan Son Nhut.
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