Footnote on my signature

[Bravo 51...Over]

Like so many here, I was reflecting on the past.  Forty-two years ago, (1968) the Tet Offensive in Viet Nam was raging all across that country.  Marines at a little known Combat Base called Khe Sanh were surrounded, outnumbered and resupply was cut off except by air.  For 77 days they hung on, pounded day and night by North Vietnamese artillery.  Enemy entrenchments reached to with a few hundred yards of the perimeter. Massive air strikes when the weather permitted, kept several NVA divisions at bay. The base was never overrun and relief broke through in April.  "Leatherneck" magazine carried an article later that covered the ordeal the Marines and members of other services stationed at Khe Sanh endured.  One picture in that article was of a cardboard sign someone a put up in the mist of that battle.  "Leatherneck" had put out a call asking for the author of that sign to let them know so they could acknowledge them.  They never heard from anyone so they thought that the author was probably killed during the fighting.  The words some one wrote whether original or not still ring true in my mind as I see what is going on with my country. Like so many others here, I took an oath to defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies both foreign and domestic. "FOR THOSE WHO FIGHT FOR IT, FREEDOM HAS A FLAVOR THE PROTECTED NEVER KNOW."  Semper Fi!!

[Rustyinfla]

   Khe Sanh little known?

[Bravo 51...Over]

The "little known" reference is related to the time of the battle.  As usual, the places where American fighting forces do battle seldom are household names until later. During the siege, the few correspondents that were actually there were able to get their stories out with the mail on choppers when they could get in and out. It became almost a nightly feature on the network news.  Several books have been written, the History Channel carried a story some years back and the Military Channel has shown some great footage of the battle.
There is a web site, "Khe Sanh Veterans Home Page". It has probably the best resources to see what really went on.  There are a number of links to other interesting sites as well.
But at the time, the Combat Base at Khe Sanh wasn't even identified on some military maps as such.  I was later stationed with a tanker that was with one of the first tank platoons to go there (mid 1966).  He told me the maps of the area they had didn't have anything but the airstrip that the Vietnamese had built several years earlier and did not show "Khe Sanh Combat Base" as that was still being developed.  I'm sure that most civilians didn't have a clue as to where it was except that is was somewhere in Viet Nam.