By Kevin Seabrooke
For about half an hour artillery and rockets fired from UH-1B helicopters from the Aerial Rocket Artillery battalion had pounded an area in Vietnam’s Central Highlands between Chu Pong, the 1,000-foot massif straddling the border with Cambodia, and the Ia Drang River.
The short bombardment was intended to soften up potential resistance without giving the enemy time to prepare. Out of seven potential landing zones (LZs), Lt. Col. Harold “Hal” Moore, commanding officer of the 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, had chosen the one closest to the enemy position designated by the innocuous NATO alphabet letter “X-ray.”
Moore knew that he and the 90 men from the first drop would be alone in the small clearing for at least 30 minutes while the 16 Hueys made the 34-mile round trip to Plei Me Camp to pick up more troops.
Since the French had left Vietnam in 1954, the limited U.S. military involvement in the country had been primarily as advisors focused on training and support roles. President John F. Kennedy authorized Special Forces troops to train and assist the South Vietnamese military. By 1963, the number of U.S. troops in Vietnam had grown from 700 to 16,000 and they were now involved in counterinsurgency operations as well as training. In 1965, the first U.S. combat troops were deployed to Vietnam, marking a significant shift from an advisory role to active participation in the war.
In October, the People’s Army of Vietnam (PAVN) 32nd Regt had attacked the U.S. Special Forces camp at Plei Me, 17 miles to the east. The Communists stopped short of completely destroying the camp, hoping to draw Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) forces into an ambush, a tactic they had used before. The ARVN asked for U.S. help and together they attacked and severely crippled the waiting 33rd PAVN Regt., sending both units retreating for the Cambodian border. Attacking, then retreating over the border into Cambodia or Laos where U.S. soldiers were forbidden to pursue, became a regular tactic for the Communists.
Chu Pong had become a major communist stronghold and a point of entry for PAVN troops coming down the Ho Chi Minh Trail to enter the Central Highlands of Vietnam.
To investigate the Ia Drang Valley, the U.S. Military decided to fully deploy its Air mobility tactics, newly developed for Vietnam—helicopters would deliver, supply and extract a battalion-sized force into hot zones. Since the mountainous terrain and heavy vegetation wouldn’t allow the heavy weapons of a normal combined-arms force, that role would be filled by artillery, aerial rocket fire and close air support.
Finding signs of recent enemy activity, Moore began to doubt the viability of their mission. In that first hour, as troops were being ferried in, Moore’s men captured a PAVN deserter, a young boy, who said there were two regiments on the mountain. It would turn out that, in addition to the 32nd, 33rd, the 66th Regt. was also there. The landing zone was a clearing about the size of a football field, surrounded by dense jungle, making it harder to assess potential threats and any intelligence they had was limited and likely outdated.
Some 90 minutes after the first troops landed, the shooting began. Over the three days and two nights, Moore’s 1st Battalion, and later 2nd Battalion replacement, would find themselves not on a search and destroy mission, but in a fight for their lives against a numerically superior force.
One of the chopper pilots, Captain Ed W. Freeman, recalled that the operation was running smoothly over the first four drops. “I thought we had another cakewalk here,” Freeman said in a Library of Congress interview. “On the fifth, they cut us in two. They had three regiments on the side of that hill and they were dug in.”
They were outnumbered by the PAVN by about 10 to 1, Freeman said. “They were just eating helicopters live … I took 50-something rounds in my helicopter.” The attack was so intense that once Freeman’s crew got back to the staging area, all helicopter operations into the landing zone were shut down.
That first bloody and chaotic day at LZ X-ray—November 14, 1965—would grow into the month-long Battle of Ia Drang, considered the beginning of full-scale U.S. military involvement in Vietnam. It was the first U.S. clash with trained North Vietnamese regulars and a turning point in the Vietnam War. It was also a showcase of the resilience and fighting spirit of American soldiers.
The situation at X-ray was soon desperate for Moore and the 1st Battalion who were pinned down and running out of ammunition, water and medical supplies. There were also a rapidly growing number of wounded to be evacuated. But enemy fire from the mountainside made resupply and evacuation missions extremely dangerous.
At the staging area, the commanding officer, then-Maj. Bruce Crandall, called for a volunteer to fly back in with him to help. The only one who joined him was his friend Freeman.
“I put’em in there,” Freeman recalled, so not volunteering wasn’t an option.
Military policy didn’t allow medevac pilots to land at an LZ unless it was “green”—not under enemy fire—for at least five minutes, so Freeman and Crandall also began evacuating the wounded.
On that first day of the battle, Freeman flew 14 missions and Crandall 22 in unarmed helicopters—many of which had to be switched out due to damages—encountering intense enemy fire to bring the much-needed aid and fly more than 70 casualties to safety.
“I put in 14-and-a-half hours that day, in and out of that LZ, doing that. And at 10:30 [p.m.], I made the last landing with some guy holding a flashlight and hauling those people out,” Freeman remembered. “And [Moore] came out and said, ‘I can last till daylight. Shut it down.’”
Freeman said he was happy to hear that. “We had been hot-refueling, so we hadn’t even shut the helicopter down—we’d eat maybe a can of C[-rations] on the way—it was a 13-minute flight each direction from where we picked up the supplies to drop them off into his landing area.”
The Battle of Ia Drang (November 14-18) resulted in 237 U.S. soldiers killed and 258 wounded, with four missing. For the ARVN, the numbers were 132 killed, 248 wounded and 18 missing. The fighting at LZ Albany on November 18 would be the deadliest single-day battle in Vietnam with 151 American soldiers killed and 121 wounded. At LZ X-ray, 70 Americans were killed and 120 wounded.
The U.S. estimated Communist losses at 1,037–1,745 killed, though the PAVN claims the total was half of that.
The Battle of Ia Drang inspired the critically acclaimed book We Were Soldiers Once … And Young, which was the basis for the film, We Were Soldiers, released in 2002.
In the book, co-written with journalist Joe Galloway (who was embedded with the 7th Cavalry), Moore noted that there were many more instances of valor at the Battle of Ia Drang
“Too many men had died bravely and heroically, while the men who had witnessed their deeds had also been killed… Acts of valor that, on other fields, on other days, would have been rewarded with the Medal of Honor or Distinguished Service Cross or a Silver Star,” Moore recalled. Instead, the only recognition the families of those soldiers received was a telegram of condolence from the U.S. Army.
Those on the ground were officially recognized soon after the battle.
A second lieutenant during Ia Drang, Walter Marm of Company A, 1st Battalion, was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor in December 1966 for “conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of life above and beyond the call of duty.”
Leading his platoon to relieve 2nd Platoon, B Company, which was cut off and completely surrounded by PAVN, Marm and his men came upon an entrenched machine-gun position at a large termite hill. Marm “demonstrated indomitable courage during a combat operation” by deliberately exposing himself to fire to find the hidden weapon that had them pinned down. After trying unsuccessfully to take the gun out with a light anti-tank weapon, Marm charged the machine gun—killing some of the enemy with grenades and finishing off the rest with his rifle. Marm also received a Purple Heart.
“It was a very intense battle,” Marm said, speaking to an American Legion audience. “We had tremendous support. It was a total team effort. The Air Force provided cover with about 100 airstrikes.”
In June 1966, Moore, promoted to colonel, was awarded the U.S. Army’s Distinguished Service Cross, the military’s second-highest recognition for valor.
The award citation praised Moore’s “great skill and foresight” in moving “from position to position, directing accurate fire and giving moral support to the defending forces” and his “successful predictions of insurgent attack plans” enabling him to direct attacks, from small arms to air strikes, against the enemy.
Moore’s “ability to shift men and firepower at a moment’s notice against the savage, last-ditch efforts of the insurgents” allowed his battalion to repulse yet another large attack by well-trained and numerically superior PAVN on the third day.
Moore would also receive the Silver Star and Bronze Star medals as well as a Purple Heart.
Clyde E. Savage was a sergeant serving as squad leader for 2nd Platoon, Company B, 1st Battalion, the so-called “lost platoon” that was surrounded by the PAVN. Savage had taken over command after the platoon leader, platoon sergeant, and weapon’s squad leader had all been killed. Completely surrounded, they held off the enemy for 26 hours, with Savage calling for artillery strikes during the night within 50 meters of their position. In the morning, he shot more than 30 insurgents. For his “leadership during the battle [that] influenced his men to hold out until reinforcements relieved them,” Savage received the Distinguished Service Cross in February 1966.
Second Lieutenant John L. Geoghegan was posthumously awarded the Silver Star, Bronze Star, Purple Heart, and the Air Medal. Geoghegan left his foxhole command post when he heard Specialist 4 Willie F. Godboldt yell for help after being hit. His citation notes that he “selflessly exposed himself to the sheets of enemy fire as he ran out to assist his wounded trooper, receiving fatal wounds in the process.” Their names are next to each other on the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, D.C.
Specialist 4 Bill Beck and Specialist 4 Russell E. Adams, both of Platoon 3, Company A, 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry, held the flank of LZ X-ray for hours against a steady stream of NVA. After years of bureaucratic delay, they were awarded the Bronze Star with Valor in 1996.
In January, 1998 journalist Joseph Galloway became the only civilian from the Vietnam War to receive the Bronze Star Medal for heroism. Embedded with the troops, Galloway was at the Battle of Ia Drang and “disregarded his own safety to help rescue two wounded soldiers while under fire” on the second day at LZ X-ray.
Though they all took part in the same watershed moment in America’s involvement in Vietnam, recognition for the valorous efforts of the two pilots would take more than 40 years to be officially recognized.
Captain Ed Freeman received the Congressional Medal of Honor in July 2001, for making 14 volunteer flights in his unarmed helicopter into LZ X-ray. Major Bruce Crandall would receive the Medal of Honor for his 22 flights into enemy fire in February 2007. For delivering much needed water and ammunition and evacuating wounded soldiers, the two men are credited with saving countless lives.
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