Battle of the Ia Drang

A month-long action fought in Vietnam in 1965, the Battle of the Ia Drang was the first combat action involving First U.S. Airmobile Combat Deployments|an airmobile unit of divisional strength. Airmobile units are light infantry with regularly assigned helicopters, which make most tactical movements by helicopter. Earlier in 1965, there had been promising combat demonstrations by the 173rd Airborne Brigade, but the helicopters were ad hoc attachments and the team was not well practiced.

In the fall of 1965, tje 1st Cavalry Division (airmobile) arrived in Vietnam and set up its base at An Khe in the II Corps Tactical Zone (i.e., the Central Highlands of South Vietnam).

Ia Drang demonstrated the fundamentally new capabilities, as well as the liabilities, of large, well-integrated airmobile forces.

Preliminaries

On 19 October, North Vietnamese troops attacked the Civilian Irregular Defense Group (CIDG) camp at Plei Me. CIDG camps had Vietnamese light infantry troops, usually under United States Army Special Forces leadership.

By 22 October, two North Vietnamese regiments were confirmed to be in the Plei Me area, suggesting the North Vietnamese were making a serious push to control the Central Highlands. Plei Me proper was being attacked by the 33rd Regiment, but the 32nd Regiment had set ambushes along the road to Pleiku, from which a South Vietnamese relief column would come.

The commander of II Vietnamese Corps could lose Plei Me if he did not relieve it, but if the troops in Pleiku went to Plei Me, Pleiku might come under attack by additional North Vietnamese troops. It was known that the 66th Regiment was somewhere in the Central Highlands.

Stretched to the limit, the Vietnamese asked the U.S. forces for assistance. GEN William Westmoreland, the overall U.S. commander, decided this was an opportunity for the airmobile force. The "1st Cav" was dispatched to take on the three PAVN regiments.

Early movements by 1st Cavalry Division (airmobile)

Task Force (TF) INGRAM, a reinforced battalion of 2/12 Cavalry, moved by helicopter from An Khe to Plei Me, bypassing the 23nd regiment. U.S. aircraft supplied Plei Me with parachute-dropped supplies.

Division commander Harry Kinnard sensed he might be able to outmaneuver and confront a large force, and moved his 1st Brigade to Pleiku, where it took operational control of TF INGRAM, provided fire support to the ARVN force now freed to move to Plei Me, and providing a reserve. ARVN armored forces moved by road toward Plei Me, and indeed was attacked by the 32nd Regiment. U.S. artillery helped the column beat off the ambush. The relief column arrived at Plei Me on 25 October.

By this time, 1st Cav units had flown from Pleiku to areas within striking range of the Plei Me area. Their field bases were not in Plei Me, but in a position to give fire support and move heliborne troops anywhere in the area, potentially cutting of PAVN retreat.

Late that night, the 33rd PAVN Regiment began to withdraw to the west, leaving a strong rear guard. The next phases were to be a matter of maneuver, with the PAVN moving under cover and the Cav engaging them when they were found. In airmobile doctrine, the Cav did not need to hold ground, but could sting the enemy and fly off.

LZ X-Ray

In November, then-LTC Hal Moore took 450 men of the 1/7 Cavalry battalion -- the same unit that George Armstrong Custer took to a place called the Greasy Grass, or the Little Big Horn -- to a place with no name other than the map designation, Landing Zone X-Ray (LZ X-Ray). , and was soon in a desperate fight. There are strong suggestions that the North Vietnamese specifically wanted to test tactics against the new airmobile units, one of which was "hugging the belt" -- staying in such close contact that the U.S. support weapons could not be used for fear of fratricide. Approximately 4,000 NVA hit LZ X-Ray, and the situation, for a time, was desperate for the Cavalry. Eventually, they were reinforced, but the original unit had close to 50 percent casualties. It is estimated that the NVA took at least 4 times the casualties, but the U.S. force made an orderly retreat; Moore considers the battle a draw. It demonstrated that air assault tactics were not a panacea.