Into Cambodia - Keith Nolan [105]
Major General Walker and his ADC for operations, Brig. Gen. John G. Wheelock HI, were not as interested in killing NVA in Cambodia as they were in disrupting the enemy's infrastructure by capturing or destroying supplies, and plans and operations were tailored to that end. Intelligence had generally fixed the locations of enemy base camps across the border, and Walker and Wheelock selected what they hoped would be undefended clearings sufficiently close to the suspected sites to enable their battalions that were being airmobiled in to capture them before the enemy could evacuate the facilities, or destroy their documents.
Speed was the key.
That created another problem. The order to Cambodia reversed their withdrawal from the Central Highlands and taxed the 4th Division, which had limited aviation assets, with moving two brigades from the An Khe AO to Cambodia without benefit of forward operating bases. This made for a long and vulnerable supply line, originating with the U.S. Army Support Command, Qui Nhon, near Highway 1 on the coast, north to Highway 19, then west to An Khe and farther to Pleiku, which is where the ARVN area of operations began and where things got tricky. The ARVN had not had the resources to sweep and secure Highway 19, so the 4th Division had to commit its 2-8 Mechanized Infantry and 1-10 Cavalry to reopen the road farther west through the mountains to Plei D'Jereng, which sat in one of the mountain valleys along the border just south of the highway. There an airstrip already existed, and there, beginning on 4 May, under the control of the HQ, 4th Division Support Command, convoy after supply convoy did arrive. So did plenty, but not enough, supply helicopters, as the 4th Division rushed to build up a forward support area in an effort to adhere to the invasion timetable.
Plei D'Jereng was flat, desolate, hot, and dusty. On 5 May, while the 3-8 Infantry disembarked at Plei D'Jereng via CI30 transport planes, the 2-8 Mechanized Infantry and 1-10 Cavalry cleared Highway 19 to link up with them, followed by supply convoys from the Qui Nhon Support Command and the 4th Division Support Command. Midstride during this activity, before long-range artillery had been brought forward, the 4th Division began its attack into Cambodia. The division chose to lead with the 1st Brigade, and brigade chose to lead with the 3-506 Infantry, opcon from the 101st Airborne Division, which departed at 0915, 5 May 1970, from Pleiku. All available helicopters had been gathered there, since it was the last secure airfield to the west at the time. It had been quite a gaggle getting everyone refueled and ready to launch. Since it was about seventy-five kilometers from Pleiku to the preselected LZs in Cambodia, the helicopter pilots had enough fuel to get there and back, but didn't have much loiter time. When they descended with the 3-506 Infantry into their LZ, there was considerable consternation when they were met by heavy 12.7mm antiaircraft fire. The fire was received as the lead lift began its run into the LZ in single file, and the pilots instantly broke off their approach in accordance with the SOP that one does not land a slow-moving chopper, full of men, in a hot LZ. The air armada ascended out of range of the gun batteries below in the jungle. Since the choppers were without either artillery support or the fuel time to wait for air strikes, the battalion commander used his authority as the man on the spot to abort the insertion and to return to Vietnam to refuel before making a try at their alternate landing zones. The lift ships carrying the 3-506 Infantry thus turned around for Pleiku, even as the ones carrying the second wave, the 1-14 Infantry from Plei D'Jereng, continued on for their LZ near another suspected enemy base camp. Riding the lead ship was a lieutenant