An Khe Vietnam, 1st Air Cavalry 1966 US Army; from Your Army Reports No. 3 (Patreon)

more at http://quickfound.net/

'This film report includes... stories on the First Cavalry Airmobile Division in Vietnam...'

Originally a public domain film from the National Archive, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and one-pass brightness-contrast-color correction & mild video noise reduction applied.

The soundtrack was also processed with volume normalization, noise reduction, clipping reduction, and/or equalization (the resulting sound, though not perfect, is far less noisy than the original).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1st_Cavalry_Division_(United_States)

Wikipedia license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Vietnam – 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile)

On 29 June 1965, the colors of the 1st Cavalry Division, at that time assigned to Korea, were transferred to Fort Benning taking over the re-flagged units of the 11th Airborne Division (United States) and 2nd Infantry Division, while the flag of the 2nd Infantry Division was moved to Korea taking over the re-flagged 1st Cav units.

The 1st Cavalry Division next fought in the Vietnam War. No longer a conventional infantry unit, the division had become an air assault division as the 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile), commonly referred to as the 1st Air Cavalry Division. The use of helicopters on such large scale as troop carriers, cargo lift ships, medevacs, and as aerial rocket artillery, was never before implemented, but by doing so it freed the infantry from the tyranny of terrain to attack the enemy at the time and place of their choosing. In 1965, colors and subordinate unit designations of the 1st Cavalry Division were transferred from Korea to Fort Benning, Georgia, where they were used to reflag the existing 11th Air Assault Division (Test) into 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile). Concurrently, the colors and subordinate unit designations were transferred to Korea to reflag what had been the 1st Cavalry Division into the 2nd Infantry Division.

Shortly thereafter, the 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile) began deploying to Camp Radcliff, An Khe, Vietnam, in the Central Highlands and was equipped with the new M16 rifle, the UH-1 troop carrier helicopter, the AH-1 attack helicopter, the CH-47 Chinook cargo helicopter, and the massive CH-54 Skycrane cargo helicopter. All aircraft carried insignia to indicate their battalion and company...

The division's first major operation was the Pleiku Campaign. The opening battle, the Battle of Ia Drang Valley, described in the book We Were Soldiers Once...And Young, was also the basis of the film We Were Soldiers. Because of that battle the division earned the Presidential Unit Citation (US), the first unit to receive such in the war. 1967 was then spent conducting Operation Pershing, a large scale search and destroy operation of enemy base areas in II Corps in which 5,400 enemy soldiers were killed and 2,000 captured. In Operation Jeb Stuart, January 1968, the division moved north to Camp Evans, north of Hue and on to Landing Zone Sharon and Landing Zone Betty, south of Quang Tri City, all in the I Corps Tactical Zone...

The First Cavalry Division would end the Vietnam War suffering more casualties than any other division: 5,444 men killed in action and 26,592 wounded in action...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Khê

An Khê is a town (thị xã) of Gia Lai Province in the Central Highlands region of Vietnam.

As of 2003 the district had a population of 63,118.[1] The district covers an area of 199 km². The district capital lies at An Khê.

Located on the main highway, QL-19, between Qui Nhơn on the coast and Pleiku in the Central Highlands, An Khê was of strategic significance during the Vietnam War...