spartans_in_darkness

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(U) Third Interlude: "\Vho'll Stop the Rain"
America Enters the Ground War, 1965-1967
(V) Soldiers ofa Fotwilrd direction finding site ilt an unidentified fire base, 1968
CD) The beginning of Rolling Thunder in
March 1965 forced a new demand on the
American command in Vietnam: air base security.
The mortar and sapper attack against Pleiku in
early February 1965 illustrated only too well the
communist capability to harass operations at the
vulnerable airfields, especially the big ones at
Danang and Cam Ranh Bay. To provide the necessary
security required a larger ground force element.
ARVN forces were considered inadequate
to meet both this task and to counter the communist
military onslaught. The solution was for
American troops to guard the air bases and other
installations. This would free up the ARVNto battle
the Viet Cong units in the field.
CD) Sending in American ground troops was
an option not sought eagerly by Washington.
However, the political and military situations in
South Vietnam appeared to be on the verge of a
collapse. The successive Saigon regimes under
General Khanh and Marshall Nguyen Cao Ky
seemed incapable of handling the military struggle
with the Viet Cong, and, only barely, had
defeated the large-scale, countrywide opposition
from the Buddhists. Rolling Thunder was not
having the desired result of stiffening Saigon's
spine. Neither did the bombing seem to lessen
Hanoi's will to continue the struggle in the South.
In March 1965, General Westmoreland had anticipated
the problem and had cabled President
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