The Battle of Hamburger Holl

NOVEMBER 2013

AWOAC HISTORICAL CASE STUDY

ADMINISTRATIVE DATA

TITLE: The Battle of Hamburger Hill

WRITTEN BY: ____________________________________________________

REVIEWED BY:

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APPROVED BY:

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November 2013

TABLE OF CONTENTS

The Battle of Hamburger Hill

PAGE

INTRODUCTION 1 1

HISTORY 1 1

EXECUTION & ACTION 2

AFTER ACTION 6

LESSONS LEARNED 7

REFERENCES 9

SUPPORTING REFERENCES 10

THE BATTLE OF HAMBURGER HILL

Introduction

The Battle of Hamburger Hill proved to be one of the more significant battles of the Vietnam War due to the large amount of casualties in such a short period of time. Under command of Major General Melvin Zais, with the aid of elements of the 101st airborne division, and a small contingent of the Army of Vietnam soldiers the allied forces led an offensive against the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) to gain control of hill 937. The successful capture of hill 937 would ultimately aid in the end goal of controlling the Ashau Valley, which had become a major supply route for the NVA. Although the battle only lasted for 10 days, the grueling battle concluded with 72 U.S. troops dead and an additional 420 wounded.

History

The entire Ashau Valley had been used extensively by the NVA and Viet-Cong as an ingress and egress route for their soldiers to move supplies in and out of Laos. “Enemy forces habitually infiltrated through Laos and staged in safe sanctuaries just across...

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...00 soldiers wounded. The sheer number and effectiveness of the Allied air strikes and artillery is demonstrated by the 10:1 kill ratio of enemy troops. By the nd of May 1969 almost all the Allied forces have abandoned Hill 937, which led many troops and American media question the purpose of the battle if we were only going to abandon it. “Well for one thing, it overlooks a great deal of the Ashau Valley. For another, you pull back and Charlie (the North Vietnamese Army) sure as hell will follow you right down and hit you…We don’t really go out for a piece of terrain. We go out to clobber him, and that’s what we have done.” Bottom line is the strategic goal was not to capture and hold Hill 937, but rather destroy the 29th NVA Regiment that was occupying the hill and using it as a supply/staging base.

Lessons Learned

Notes