Figure 1.-- This press photo during the Tet Offensive shows civilans seeking shelter at Pleiku, The oress caption read, "Mother and Child: Left homeless after recent fighting, a mother and child sit in a tnt in the backyard of a Roman Catholic church in Oleiku in South Vietnam's Cntral Highlands. In the grotto behind them is [a] stattue of the Virgin Mary." The photograoh is dated February 13, 1968.

Pleiku was one of the lonest running battlefields of the Vietnam War. Battlles were fought in and around Pleiku throughout the Vietnam War. It is the capital of the Gia Lai Province and area populated by Bahnar and Jarai ethnic groups (the Montagnards or Degar) hill people. Pleiku was a village located in the Central Highlands. It sits at the junction of several national roads. National Route 14 runs north to Kon Tum and south to Buôn Ma Thuột. Route 19 runs west to Stœng Trêng in Cambodia and east into Bình Định Province in the east. It was thus of great strategic importance in the Vietnam War. This was the case because it was located near the North Vietnamese primary terminus of Ho Chi Minh Trail. This was the military logistical corridor running south from North Vietnam through Laos and Cambodia. Pleiku stood along Highway 19 as a barrier between the NVA supply center in Cambodia and the populated areas of cntral Vietnam eastward to tthe port facilities of Qui Nhơn. In addition, the central location of Pleiku on the central plateau (between Kon Tum and Buôn Ma Thuột) was the principal defensive position for ARVN and the U.S. Army blocking the delivery of supplis to the Việt Cộng and NVA operating in the Central Highlands. It was the main center of defense for the highland region of the South Vietnam. Military planners understood this intuitivly. It was why the U.S. Army built a base there even before its major involvement--Camp Holloway. VC attack on Camp Halloyway (early-1965), was one of the key VC escalating events that resulted in the major U.S. troops escalation.

Created: 8:39 PM 6/4/2018
Last updated: 8:40 PM 6/4/2018