[Dixiecapt]

Phu Bai (1968 Version): home of the Marine 3rd Division.




Phu Bai Airfield, and Home of the 3rd Marine Division's Base.




Phu Bai Helicopter Dispersal Area, meant to move men and equipment in mass by helicopter.

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South Viet Nam: The Rockpile
Friday, Oct. 07, 1966
Time Magazine

South Viet Nam: The Rockpile


The terrain was as tough as any the U.S. Marines had ever contested. It combined the horror of a Guadalcanal jungle with the exhausting steepness of the slopes at Chapultepec. Added to that were fusillades of bullets as ferocious as at Tarawa and showers of shrapnel that turned the forest into a tropical Belleau Wood. But "the Rock-pile," as Viet Nam's latest big battleground has come to be called, is weirdly unique.



There, just south of the inaccurately named Demilitarized Zone, a task force of six Marine battalions has been battling two entire divisions of North Vietnamese regulars whose apparent aim is to invade Quang Tri province. So far the Reds have failed. Over the past few months, Hanoi's hordes have shifted away from their old infiltration route, the Ho Chi Minh trail, which empties into the isolated Central Highlands. Instead, more and more have been striking directly southward into the populous coastal plain (see map).



The aim of the Marines' "Operation Prairie" is to cut those arteries from the DMZ and push the Reds so far west that they will once again be forced to use the trail.



Key to the fighting is "the Rock," a jagged, 750-ft. fang of granite that thrusts upward at the intersection of three river valleys and two enemy trails. During July's Operation Hastings, the Marines established a reconnaissance post atop the Rock, and a lone sniper fed by airdrops of C rations controlled the area. Now it is a Marine battalion command post, under almost steady siege and resupplied by heavy helicopters.





Read more: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/artic ... z1YQ6SviWe

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Ho Chi Minh Trail System



I have added a important segments of the Ho Chi Minh Trail System. I added the main trail which slips into Laos near the Rockpile where Route 9 empty into Laos. The main trail stays in Laos and crosses into Cambodia, with branches that dump into the middle highlands of South Vietnam. I have also added Route 9, which is was a major passage by Khe Sanh, and another important branch of the Ho Chi Minh trail going through the A Shau Valley.


Route 9 passing Khe Sanh with a sub-branch that dumps into the A Shau Valley branch.


Trails passing right under the Rockpile, showing the junction of Route 9 and the main segment of the Ho Chi Minh Trail.