Tank commander with a Blackhorse combat patch, 1971

29 March 1971. Route 9 between Khe Sanh and Tchepone, Laos. A tank commander tries to clear a stoppage of his .50 caliber machine gun. The name “Hanoi Negotiator” is neatly stenciled on the barrel of this tank’s 90mm barrel. This is one in a sequence of three photos. Photo by Neal Ulevich/AP/Shutterstock

Here is a great photo of a tank commander (TC) in the cupola of his M48 tank in Vietnam on 29 March 1971. I didn’t have much information in the caption besides the date and that the photo was shot on Route 9, but there were two other photos in the sequence. It took some digging to figure out, but this tanker was likely with 1st Battalion, 77th Armor, 1st Brigade, 5th Infantry Division. 

Starting 7 February 1971, the South Vietnamese Army (ARVN) 1 launched a major invasion into Laos called Lam Son 719. The operational objectives were threefold:

  • Sever the enemy supply network on the Ho Chi Minh trail,
  • Prevent a North Vietnamese offensive in the Spring of 1971,
  • Demonstrate the progress in combat effectiveness achieved by South Vietnamese ground and air forces. 2

The U. S. part of Lam Son 719 received the code name Dewey Canyon II, and began with the 5th Infantry Division’s reopening late in January 1971 of the old Fire Support Base Vandegrift, northeast of Khe Sanh. Next, U.S. and ARVN forces reestablished the old combat base at Khe Sanh, which served as a major staging and resupply point for both during Lam Son 719.

U.S. ground forces inside Vietnam were tasked with keeping the main supply routes open and free of enemy activity. From the start of Lam Son 719 until US and ARVN forces finished the operation on 7 April 1971, Route 9 leading past Khe Sanh to the Laotian border was the scene of many North Vietnamese Army ambushes and land mine incidents. U.S. Soldiers dubbed the road “Ambush Alley.”

February 1970. Soldiers of the 59th Landclearing Company pose at the border with Laos after finishing a secondary route into Laos for Lam Son 719. Life Magazine Photo by Larry Burrows

American ground forces were prohibited by law from entering Laos on the ground. For the first time, ARVN combat forces would fight without their American advisers, relying only on their own leaders once they crossed into Laos.

Late January 1971. Elements of the reinforced 1st Brigade, 5th Infantry Division occupy Fire Support Base Vandegrift. Life Magazine Photo by Larry Burrows

Lam Son 719 turned into a bloody debacle for the ARVN. Although U.S. air power, helicopter units and artillery provided extensive combat power to the invasion forces, it was not enough to achieve victory. U.S. Army helicopter crews over Laos faced a highly sophisticated North Vietnamese low altitude air defense system, and endured heavy aircraft losses during the invasion. These brave aviators paid a high price for the support they rendered to the ARVN. 3

Here is the next photo in the black and white sequence. The tank commander has given up trying to clear his .50, and is now holding an M16 rifle. Note the M79 grenade launcher lying on the hatch cover. Photo by Neal Ulevich/AP Shutter-stock

1st and 3rd Squadrons of the Blackhorse stood down from combat operations in January 1971. Along with these squadrons, Hotel Company, 2nd Squadron’s tanks, stood down as well. Some of the regiment’s subordinate elements were out of combat in December of 1970. By the 20th of the month, the entire regiment had the news that more than 2,000 troopers and their equipment were going home soon. In March 1971, these units completed their mission, closing out this part of the regiment’s service in Vietnam.

A period of organized chaos followed the stand down notification. Troopers with less than 60 days on their twelve-month tours received the word that they would be heading home early, if they wanted to go. The squadrons swapped out hundreds of Soldiers between them. 2nd Squadron (minus their M48 tanks), Air Cavalry Troop, and platoon-size support elements stayed in country until March 1972. 4

This is the last photo in the black and white sequence. Here, the tank’s loader is filling M16 magazines while another Soldier fires his rifle. The tank commander is most likely talking on his radio. If you look at the loader closely, you’ll see he’s wearing a 5th Infantry Division patch on his left shoulder. Photo by Neal Ulevich/AP Shutterstock

The photos of this tank commander are especially interesting to me because he is wearing an 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment combat patch. 5 He was obviously having a very bad day when Associated Press photographer Neal Ulevich shot the three pictures of him on 29 March 1971. I did some thinking, and came up with four possibilities why the TC would be with 1/77 Armor at this point in the war:

  • He could have been serving a second tour after completing a year in Vietnam with the Blackhorse,
  • He might have been wounded while serving with the Blackhorse and returned to a different unit after recovery,
  • He may have had too much time left in country to get a 60 day drop when the regiment shrunk its footprint to one squadron with no tanks, so he got transferred out of the regiment,
  • He might have had enough time to get a drop, but decided he wanted to stay in country, but 2nd Squadron didn’t have a slot for him. There were too many volunteers who wanted to stay with the regiment when it slimmed down, so he may have been excess.

1/77 Armor stood down from combat operations not long after Lam Son 719 ended. The battalion was inactivated in July 1971. 1st Brigade, 5th Infantry Division subsequently cased its colors in a quiet ceremony on 8 August 1971. I hope the tank commander in these photos and his battle buddies all made it out of Vietnam in one piece. Some gave everything and all gave a great deal of themselves in service to their country.

A Huey helicopter lands prior to taking on fallen U.S. Soldiers during Lam Son 719. About 10,000 American troops participated in Dewey Canyon II/Lam Son 719. Casualties were as follows: 215 were killed, 1,149 wounded, and 38 missing. 6 Life Magazine by by Larry Burrows

Never forget, Mark

Notes

  1. ARVN was the acronym used by the U. S. for the Army of the Republic of Vietnam.
  2. Objectives extracted from page v of the monograph “Lam Son 719” by Nguyen Duy Hinh, Center for Military History, 1979.
  3. As of 15 June 2020, eleven U.S. service members are still missing from Lam Son 719.
  4. For a full account of the 11th ACR’s redeployment home from Vietnam, check out chapter 7 of The Blackhorse in Vietnam by Don Snedeker, Casemate Publishers, 2020.
  5. Soldiers wear the patch of their current unit on their left shoulder. On the right shoulder, they are authorized to wear the patch of the unit they served with during wartime or combat deployments. This insignia is called the combat patch, although strictly speaking, it does not signify that the wearer saw actual combat, only that he served within the boundaries of a combat theater of operations. The Army name for this patch is “Shoulder sleeve insignia-former wartime service (SSI-FWTS). Since this acronym is impossible to pronounce, Soldiers have always simply called it a combat patch. If a Soldier has not been on a combat deployment, he is said to be “light on the right.”
  6. The cited casualty figures are found in chapter 11, page 362 of American Military History, Volume II – the United States Army in the Global Era, 1917-2008, Richard W. Stewart, ed., Center of Military History, 2010.