On the morning of 8 March 1965, Battalion Landing Team 3/9—the 3d Battalion of the 9th Marine Regiment—began landing across Red Beach Two, just north of Da Nang, South Vietnam. Some 4,000 yards offshore were the amphibious ships. Surf conditions were rough. Waves were running four to five feet high and breaking. At the same time, air-lifted elements of BLT 1/3 began arriving at Da Nang Air Base from Okinawa.
By evening, these two battalion landing teams of the 9th Marine Expeditionary Force were firmly ashore. The landings had not been opposed but they might well have been. South Vietnamese forces had skirmished with the Viet Cong in the vicinity of Red Beach the day before. As it was, hostile reaction was limited to small arms and automatic weapons fire against the transports bringing in the airlifted elements; not much, but enough for the aircraft to take a number of small-caliber hits.
One Marine helicopter squadron, HMM-163, was already operational at Da Nang. A second squadron, HMM-365 (which had earlier completed a six months’ deployment at Da Nang), flew in its helos from the USS Princeton (LPH-5) and turned them over to HMM-162 whose personnel were airlifted from Okinawa.
In the next few days and weeks, the 9th Marine Expeditionary Brigade continued to grow in size and its responsibility was soon extended to include the security of the air strip at Phu Bai, located some 40 miles to the north.
Despite growing ground strength, Marines at Da Nang were uneasy because one essential ingredient of their air-ground team was missing. There were no fixed-wing Marine aircraft, other than liaison types, ashore. The Marines wanted their own fighter aircraft. More particularly, they wanted their own attack aircraft, ready to provide close air support when and if needed. This point was hammered home late in March when HMM- 163 was hurt badly during the airlift of a Vietnamese battalion. All 17 helicopters taking part were hit by ground fire. Four were destroyed or had to be left behind. Sixteen Marines were wounded, two of them fatally.
The Marines at Da Nang breathed a little easier after the arrival on 11 April 1965 of VMFA-531, equipped with the F-4B McDonnell Phantom II. There is no better fighter plane in the U. S. inventory; it is also a very adequate attack aircraft.
The Marines, however, consider the A-4 Douglas Skyhawk to be even better suited for a ground support role in an environment such as South Vietnam. Therefore, there was considerable jubilation when the construction of an assault airfield was authorized at Chu Lai, 52 miles southeast of Da Nang, to support operations by Marine Aircraft Group 12 which included three squadrons of A-4s.
Accordingly, the 3d Marine Expeditionary Brigade went ashore at Chu Lai on 8 May. With the Brigade went SeaBee Battalion NMCB-10 in a partnership reminiscent of World War II. In three weeks, the airfield was sufficiently complete to become operational.
The first A-4 landed at Chu Lai at eight o’clock in the morning of 1 June. Before the day was out, the A-4s had flown their first air strike against the Viet Cong.
After the Chu Lai landing, Marine combat forces in Vietnam—the 3d and 9th Marine Expeditionary Brigades—were consolidated into the III Marine Amphibious Force.
The introduction of U. S. ground combat troops into South Vietnam signalled a change in U. S. policy toward U. S. military participation in South Vietnam’s war. The mission of the Marines was defensive in nature, but this did not mean that they were to be confined to a fixed or static defense of Da Nang’s military installations. As the Commandant of the Marine Corps General Wallace M. Greene, Jr., said in a visit to the 9th MEB in April, Marines were not in Vietnam to sit on their ditty boxes, but to “kill Viet Cong.”
South Vietnam’s struggle has been called a “war of liberation” by the Communist side and a “counterinsurgency war” by our side.
Since the word was coined a few years ago, “counterinsurgency,” has become a very much over-worked, and misused term. The Joint Dictionary defines it as being “those military, paramilitary, political, economic, psychological, and civic actions taken by a government to defeat subversive insurgency.” “Insurgency” is further defined as “a condition resulting from a revolt or insurrection against a constituted government which falls short of civil war. In the current context, subversive insurgency is primarily Communist inspired, supported or exploited.”
U. S. counterinsurgency doctrine recognizes that insurgency can be practiced with widely varying levels of intensity.
At the lowest level, the threat of subversive activity may be latent or potential, something to be protected against rather than something requiring active military measures. If this incipient insurgency is not contained or eliminated, a higher level of insurgency, one marked by active guerrilla warfare and terrorism may be reached. And finally, if the insurgents become strong enough, they may elect to enter boldly into a war of movement in which they openly challenge the forces of the legitimate government.
The U. S. Army joined the semantic sweep- stakes early by identifying its Special Forces as being a counterinsurgency as well as an unconventional warfare force.1 The original mission of the U. S. Army Special Forces was to provide “highly trained troops who conduct military operations in enemy terrain to foster and organize resistance potential in order to develop and exploit guerrilla forces.” Obviously, these same skills made the Special Forces ideally suited to the training of friendly paramilitary forces in a counterinsurgency situation.
The Air Force organized a somewhat comparable force, the Air Commando (or more correctly, the Special Air Warfare Forces). Reversing the precedence observed by the U. S. Army Special Forces, the Air Commando was intended to be primarily a counterinsurgency force with an included, but secondary, unconventional warfare capability. The Air Commandos have been equipped primarily nostalgically but also realistically— with World War II aircraft, the premise being that these would be the aircraft that would be found in the indigenous air force of lesser developed nations.
Meanwhile, the Marine Corps doggedly continued to insist that it required no specialized counterinsurgency units as such. It held that the Corps was ready to conduct its share of the military aspects of counterinsurgency at any level of insurgent activity.
In fact, Marines were inclined to be a bit impatient when “counterinsurgency” was mentioned. Their attitude was apt to be that this was the sort of business Marines have been about during most of the years of their history when they were not fighting the larger wars of the Republic.
This is not quite true. The “small wars” of the past are not quite the same as the U. S. counterinsurgency efforts of today. It can be argued that the “interventions” before and after World War I are just what present-day counterinsurgency efforts seek to avoid.
But, be that as it may, many of the devices and techniques which were evolved and used in those simpler, more direct times, are now being rediscovered and relearned. Examine, for example, the exasperatingly long chase (1927-1932) of the elusive Augusto Sandino. In broadest outlines, Nicaragua was not unlike Vietnam today (but in microcosm and not so critical, either to the United States or to the world). The United States was supporting an indigenous military effort faced with an internal security problem. The bandits (not dignified then by the term “insurgents”) were Communist-supported, had all the advantages of cross-border sanctuaries, poor in-country communications, a weak and divided national government, and an indifferent and largely apathetic populace.
Nicaragua saw the first real combat use of Marine air-ground team. In December 1927, the World War I DeHavilands were discarded and Vought Corsairs (the original Corsairs) and Curtiss Falcons were brought in. Also present was the Fokker trimotor transport, spiritual ancestor of today’s KC-130 Hercules.
In addition to aerial resupply, reconnaissance, and air evacuation, air operations included close air support—dive bombing and the first known case of an air attack being directed by ground troops. There was also the first use of rotary-wing aircraft—the Pitcairn autogyro—in a counter-guerrilla environment.
There were lessons learned, too, on the ground: for instance, that the Thompson submachine gun, until then untried by the military, was a good solution to close-range combat and ambush problems. The chief ground lesson, however, was the reaffirmation of the tenet that there was no substitute for hard and aggressive patrolling when it came to fighting guerrillas.
These lessons from Nicaragua and the other half-forgotten campaigns of the Twenties and Thirties were recorded by the Marines in their Small Wars Manual, first published in 1934. This was probably the first manual prepared by a U. S. armed service on what is now called “counterinsurgency.” The manual stood the test of time well enough to be used as a point of departure for the present Fleet Marine Force Manual, Operations Against Guerrilla Forces.
Where there are nations with both extensive coast lines and considerable dependence upon river lines of communication, amphibious techniques are very useful, not only for counterinsurgency but also for larger operations.
Vietnam, for example, is well-suited by the facts of geography to amphibious operations. So is much of the rest of Southeast Asia and the Western Pacific. There is good reason, then, for significant Marine-type forces in these countries. Korea has a Marine Corps of division size. Nationalist China has a division and a brigade. Next to that of the United States, these are the largest Marine Corps in the world. Thailand can field a Marine regiment. Indonesia has a 14,000-man Komando Korps. All of these are of post-World War II formation; all show the mark of U. S. Marine Corps schools and advisory effort. All, with the somewhat ambiguous exception of Indonesia, are firmly in the Free World camp.
U. S. Marines participate frequently in large-scale combined exercises with the Korean and Chinese Nationalist Marines. Both follow closely the structure and concepts of the U. S. Fleet Marine Forces. Both also have a significant amount of amphibious lift. These, then, are our major amphibious partners in the Western Pacific, welded together by concept, doctrine, training, exercises—and in the case of Korea, mutual combat experience. In the Korean war, the then brand-new Korean Marine Corps provided a regiment that fought as part of the U. S. 1st Marine Division.
In Vietnam, after the departure of the French in 1954, we assisted in the formation of the Vietnamese Corps of Marines. It started as a river-type landing force, charged with the security of rivers and canals. It now consists of a brigade of five infantry battalions, an artillery support battalion, and an amphibious support battalion. The infantry battalions follow the U. S. Marine model closely, fairly big battalions with four rifle companies. The artillery is armed with 75- nun. and 105-mm. howitzers. The amphibious support battalion includes transport, medical, signal, engineer, landing support, and reconnaissance companies.
The advisory force with the Vietnamese Marine Brigade now numbers about 30 U. S. Marine officers and men. In addition to the Viet Cong, the advisors have had to contend with dengue, dysentery, hepatitis, bubonic plague, and malaria. There is a close professional and personal link between the Marine advisors and the Vietnamese Marine commanders. Most Vietnamese Marine officers in the rank of captain and above have trained in U. S. Marine Corps schools. This includes Brigadier General Le Nguyen Khang, who has commanded the Brigade (with some interruptions) since May 1960.
How good are the Vietnamese Marines? “They are durable little characters,” says a U. S. Marine colonel who served as their senior advisor for a year. “In a fight I would be glad to have them on my flank.”
The Vietnamese Marine Brigade has given an excellent account of itself as a fighting service. It is regarded as an elite formation and has been much used in the role of mobile general reserve. It has been so much used, in fact, in conventional operations, that its amphibious potential has been only partially exploited.
Elsewhere in the world, Marine Corps advisors and sometimes mobile training teams are provided to many other foreign Marine Corps. Usually the Marine Corps advisors are part of the MAAG or the Navy Mission to the country involved, and usually the mobile training teams are drawn from the Landing Force Training Units which are maintained in the amphibious forces of both the Atlantic and Pacific fleets.
This training, along with quotas in Marine Corps Schools for foreign students, and a very modest amount of hardware—mostly in the electronics field—make up the Marine Corps contribution to the U. S. Military Assistance Program.
In this hemisphere, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, and Venezuela have Marine Corps of substantial size. In Europe, the present-day British, Dutch, and Spanish Marines have all been strongly influenced by U. S. Marine Corps concepts and practice.
Always linked at least loosely by generally similar customs and traditions, the Marines of the Free World now form a fraternity of comrades-in-arms bound together by personal ties, similar organization and equipment, and a common body of amphibious doctrine.
Compared to the massive U. S. Army advisory effort in South Vietnam, the U. S. Marine advisory effort has been small. As applied to the special and specific case of the Vietnamese Marine Brigade, the results, in return for a modest investment, have been very satisfying.
More recently, the Marine Corps took over from the Army about half the infantry and artillery advisory billets in I Corps—the northernmost Corps area.
One of the more obvious lessons learned in Vietnam is that advisors work best at the lower end of the counterinsurgency spectrum, while the subversive threat is either latent or potential and has not yet turned into fullblown hostilities. Once the counterinsurgency situation has degenerated into a virtual condition of war, the advisor finds himself in the uneasy situation of having the responsibility for recommending the conduct of operations without having the requisite authority to do much about it. His effectiveness is thus limited to his own powers of persuasion.
By the end of 1964, it had become apparent that the South Vietnamese pacification effort, even with U. S. military assistance on the order of 22,000 men, was not prevailing against the Viet Cong, supported as they were from the sanctuary of North Vietnam.
Realization that “advisory” warfare alone was a poor match against “sanctuary” warfare led to the U. S. decision to bomb the enemy’s lines of communication in North Vietnam and to increase the U. S. commitment to South Vietnam. Derived from this larger decision came the order to land the 9th MEB at Da Nang.
Why the 9th MEB was ready to land— literally at a moment’s notice—deserves some examination. The Marine Corps is the only U. S. armed service to have its minimum organization prescribed by law: not less than three combat divisions, three air wings, and “such other land combat, aviation, and other services as may be organic therein.” These divisions, wings, and supporting troops make up the Fleet Marine Forces—type commands within the Atlantic and Pacific fleets. Nearly two-thirds of the 190,000 Marines on active duty are in the FMF.
The Marine division is a big division, some 18,000 Marines and over 1,000 Navymen. It is essentially an infantry division configured for amphibious assault. With the exception of the infantry battalions, which are quadrangular (that is, they have four rifle companies), the division is triangular in organization in that its units are, for the most part, pyramids of threes: three infantry battalions to a regiment, three infantry regiments to a division, three six-gun batteries to an artillery battalion, three light artillery battalions to the artillery regiment, and so on. This triangular structure does more than give a pleasing symmetry to the Marine Division: it facilitates the formation of task organizations for combat.
The most familiar Marine task organization is the Battalion Landing Team. For a Marine infantry battalion to become a BLT, it must be reinforced. Typically, a BLT will include artillery, heavy mortar, tank, anti-tank, amphibian tractor, and reconnaissance elements. An infantry battalion at authorized strength will number 1,144 Marines and 56 Navymen, A BLT is larger, numbering about 1,600 officers and men.
One of the criteria of the Marine division is that all of its elements be air-transportable. Just as the BLT is the convenient tactical organization for amphibious deployments, so is the more lightly equipped air-lifted battalion a frequently used means for reinforcing a forward-deployed Marine force. These deployments, it must be pointed out, are air-transported not airborne operations. In all cases, the airlifted elements go into a beachhead firmly held by Marine forces which are already there on the ground.
A typical Marine Corps wing will have about 11,000 officers and men and will operate about 350 aircraft. The basic unit within the wing is the squadron, and the squadrons are task organized into Marine Aircraft Groups or MAGs. The Marine Corps has 14 medium helicopter squadrons (HMMs) and most of these fly the single-rotor Sikorsky UH-34D. The tandem-rotor Vertol CH-46A is just beginning to come into squadron use. A heavier lift capability is provided by two squadrons (HMHs) with the bigger Sikorsky CH-37C.
Since April 1962, there has been a Marine medium helicopter squadron plus its supporting elements continuously deployed to Vietnam. Marine helicopters first operated in the south, from Soc Trang airstrip. In September 1962, they shifted north to Da Nang. From here, Marine helicopter squadrons, rotating at about four month intervals, supported the operations of the Vietnamese I Corps. And this was the Marine squadron that was already ashore when the 9th MEB arrived.
The Marine Corps’ 15 fighter squadrons have the single-place, single-engine F-8 Crusader and the F-4B Phantom II. Because the two-place, twin-jet Phantom II has the bonus quality of a good close air support capability, Marine fighter squadrons, (VMFs) equipped with this plane have been redesignated as VMFAs.
Most of the 12 attack squadrons (VMAs) have the lightweight single-place A-4 Skyhawk. The bigger twin-jet, two-place A-6A Intruder is just beginning to come into the inventory.
To satisfy their amphibious assault missions, Marine fighter and attack aircraft have to be capable of both carrier-based and SATS (Short Airfield for Tactical Support) operations.2
Coupled with the three KC-130F Hercules refueler/transport squadrons (VMGRs), the SATS helps to cut down the Marine Corps requirement for carrier deck space in an amphibious operation. The KC-130S can provide aerial refueling to the fighters and attack aircraft both in their movement to the combat zone and for their operations within the battle area.
There are also three light antiaircraft missile battalions. These LAAM battalions have the Hawk, an excellent surface-to-air weapon against low and medium altitude attacks. On 7 February 1965, one of these battalions was ordered from Okinawa to Da Nang. The first battery was moved by MATS airlift. Within 32 hours after the order to move, the battery had been unloaded at Da Nang, was set up and 100 per cent operationally ready to fire.
Marine division, wing, and force troop elements are task organized into air- ground teams, adjusted in size and composition to meet the job at hand.
Although exact composition—and even names—will vary with differing locales and situations, Marine Corps doctrine prescribes four basic sizes or levels of air-ground organization:
A Marine Expeditionary Unit is a battalion landing team plus a provisional aircraft group built around an attack squadron and a medium helicopter squadron. An MEU will have its own separate air-ground headquarters; its strength is about 2,800.
A Marine Expeditionary Brigade is a regimental landing team (RLT) plus a composite Marine attack aircraft group with attack aircraft, fighters, helicopters, and whatever other type aircraft in the Marine Corps inventory that is called for by the occasion. With its Brigade headquarters and its combat service support reinforcements, a MEB will total upwards of 10,000 men.
A Marine Expeditionary Force is the classic Marine air-ground team: a Marine Division plus a Marine Aircraft Wing plus supporting troops. The total strength of an MEF is about 43,500.
A Marine Expeditionary Corps (or MEC) would be the major elements of two divisions and two wings plus their supporting elements.
For the past several years, a Special Landing Force has been kept at sea with the Seventh Fleet. At its minimum the SLF has consisted of a battalion landing team and a helicopter squadron. (And thus falls short of being a true MEU because it does not have a MEU headquarters nor does it have its own attack aviation element.)
When tensions mount, as they so frequently do in the Western Pacific, the SLF is normally beefed-up to a Marine Expeditionary Brigade. This was the Marine Corps’ posture on 7 March when the order was given to land at Da Nang. Then, with the 9th MEB ashore, the 3d MEB was constituted and moved into the ready position for the Chu Lai landing.
In the same way that the Seventh Fleet’s SLF makes its home in the South China Sea, there is also always a BI.T or MEU deployed from FMFLANT to the Caribbean. This force was first deployed as part of a routine training requirement; in recent years it has become more of a contingency force. Thus it was that when the recent crisis in the Dominican Republic occurred, the 6th MEU embarked in the Carib Ready Phibron which included the USS Boxer (LPH-4), was already there. On 26 April, the Phibron moved into position off the evacuation port of Haina, some five miles west of Santo Domingo. On 27 April the evacuation of U. S. citizens began. A small detachment of Marines went ashore to assist.
The next day, with the situation in the city worsening, 400 Marines were landed to ensure the safety of persons being evacuated and to reinforce the guard at the U. S. Embassy. The Marines came in from the Boxer onto the polo field next to the Embajador Hotel, certainly the most elegant landing zone ever used by Marine helicopters.
The next day, 29 April, all ground elements of the 6th MEU were landed. By late that evening, 1,600 Marines were ashore.
The buildup of American forces, both by air and sea, was rapid. The first two battalion combat teams of the 82d Airborne Division began arriving early on the 30th. By 1 May two more battalions of Marines had been ordered to land, the 6th MEU dissolved, and its place taken by the 4th Marine Expeditionary Brigade.
By 7 May, with three BLTs ashore and one waiting off-shore in floating reserve, Marine strength in the area had reached 8,000.
Reversal of the build-up was equally dramatic. On 26 May the withdrawal of two BLTs began. The remainder of the Marines left in two echelons, clearing the area on 3 and 6 June.
During most of their time ashore, the Marines had been responsible for the security of the evacuation port of Haina, five miles west of the city, and of the International Safety Zone, an area which included the western half of the city of Santo Domingo.
Marine casualties for the Santo Domingo operation were eight killed and 29 wounded.
The oldest of the afloat contingency forces is in the Mediterranean. Since 1948, there has been a battalion landing team deployed continuously with the Sixth Fleet. This was the force that made the initial landing in Lebanon in 1958. Current deployments include a detachment of helicopters which give the force a limited vertical envelopment capability, plus a Marine attack squadron or fighter squadron on board a Sixth Fleet carrier.
Recent studies at Marine Corps Schools, Quantico, apply the term “crisis control forces” to the many different Marine Corps forces just described. This term fits into the Marine Corps lexicon more comfortably than does “counterinsurgency.” Crisis control forces are defined as being those required to intervene rapidly to restore or bolster local governments by means ranging from their presence alone to sustained combat action. The primary requisite for these forces is the ability to apply force selectively, on a worldwide basis, in terms of time, place, and degree.
An analysis of the crises that have confronted the United States since World War II, where the use of armed force has seemed imminent, will show that in almost every case the rising tensions that led to the crisis gave ample warning to permit the stationing of seaborne forces sufficiently close to the potential objective area.
These same studies, projecting the military environment 20 years into the future, conclude that an integrated amphibious weapons system—amphibious shipping, troops, and support—will continue to be one of the most continuously useful instruments of national strategy. Santo Domingo and Vietnam offer fresh proof of the validity of this conclusion.
1. Even by military professionals, who should know better, the terms counterinsurgency (Cl) and unconventional warfare (UW) are sometimes confused and, even worse, sometimes used interchangeably. Unconventional warfare consists of the three interrelated fields of guerrilla warfare, evasion and escape, and subversion. Thus UW is quite the opposite of Cl.
2. See New Navy, pp. 168-171, this issue.