Photos US Forces

[BravoZulu]

Firebase Tomahawk was on Tomahawk Hill or Hill 132. Located in the Phu Loc District southeast of Hue in central Vietnam.

 

[BravoZulu]

Navy Corpsman Vernon Wike by the side of a mortally injured Marine, Hill 881. April-May 1967

Image by Catherine Leroy, In 2005 Paris-Match sent her to Arizona for a reunion with Vernon Wike in what would be her last photo assignment. She died in 2006.

During the battle for Hill 881 on 30 April 1967 she took a series of photos of U.S. Navy Corpsman Vernon Wike tending to a dying Marine which were published in Life to critical acclaim and was one of three taken in quick succession. In the pictures Wilke is crouched in tall grass cradling a Marine who has been shot while smoke from the battle rises into the air behind them. In the first frame Wike has two hands on the Marine's chest, trying to staunch the wound. In the second, he is trying to find a heartbeat. In the third frame, "Corpsman In Anguish", he has just realised the man is dead

 

[BravoZulu]

US Navy SEAL Team 2 9th Platoon B squad with LDNN, Vietnam War.

The South Vietnamese Navy Lien Doi Nguoi Nhai (LDNN), or Frogman Unit, were commando teams given the mission of salvage, obstacle removal, pier protection and special amphibious operations.

By the mid 1960s US Navy SEAL teams were being rotated regularly through South Vietnam on combat tours. Specialists in raids, amphibious reconnaissance and neutralization operations against the VC infrastructure, the SEALs worked closely with the LDNN and began qualifying Vietnamese personnel in SEAL tactics.

 

[BravoZulu]

Feb. 20, 1967. A trooper with an M-60 machine gun on his shoulder stands in front of a burning village. The soldiers from C Co., 1st Battalion, 8th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Cavalry Division, set fire to the village of Lieu An on the Bong Son plain during Operation Pershing. The night before they had been in a firefight at the village. As the soldiers approached in the morning they tripped mines. Three soldiers were wounded and one was killed.

 

[BravoZulu]

A wounded United States Marine is held in the arms of a buddy while awaiting medical attention during fighting on Hill 881, Khe Sanh, May 11, 1967

 

[BravoZulu]

An unidentified U.S. Marine, his face covered with grease, rest after a sweep through the western edge of the dmz near Khe Sanh, 15 October 1968. He is a member of a long range recon patrol from Force Recon

 

[BravoZulu]

September 1965. Four "Ranch Hand" C-123 aircraft spraying liquid defoliant on a suspected Viet Cong position in South Vietnam. During the Vietnam War, Air Force C-123 planes sprayed millions of gallons of herbicides over the jungles of Southeast Asia to destroy enemy crops and tree cover. The military stopped the spraying by early 1971, but some Air Force Reserve units continued to fly the former spray planes until the early 1980s

 

[BravoZulu]

Captain Donald R. Brown of Annapolis, Maryland, the advisor to the 2nd Battalion of the 46th Vietnamese regiment, dashes from his helicopter to the cover of a rice paddy dike during an attack on Viet Cong in an area 15 miles west of Saigon on April 4, 1965, during the Vietnam War. Brown's counterpart, Captain Di, the commander of the unit, rushes away in background with his radioman

 

[BravoZulu]

US Army engineer operates a Rome plow.

 

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This M88 has armour shields mounted around the commander’s .50 Caliber MG which has a flash suppressor on the barrel. Note the Jerry can mounted on the inside of the open door on the side hull and a red fire extinguisher is mounted inside the hull. Painted on the gun shield is a red Pegasus which is a mythical winged divine horse from Greek mythology.

 

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Douglas A-1E Skyraider nicknamed "Carolyns Folly" escorting an HH-3C rescue helicopter as it goes to pick up a downed pilot in Vietnam in 1966.

 

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F-4B from VF-96 flying from the USS Enterprise. Transferred to VMFA-542 and was shot down by ground fire near Ban Kapay/Ban Naba, Laos Jan 5, 1970. Both crew killed.

 

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Armorers load 20 mm rounds on Lt. Cmdr. William Bowes’ A-7E Corsair II of Attack Squadron VA-94 aboard the aircraft carrier USS Coral Sea in 1972
**empty brass rounds are used to "lead in" the live rounds

 

[BravoZulu]

06 Feb 1968, Hue, Vietnam, a US marine walking around after being under attack by the Viet Cong

 

[BravoZulu]

USMC M-48 Patton, Da Nang, Vietnam Sept 1972

 

[Bennie]

RF-4 Phantom II and RF-101 Voodoo reconnaissance aircraft destroyed at Tan Son Nhut airfield, South Vietnam, February 1968

 

[BravoZulu]

A Marine wearing a personalised helmet near Da Nang Air Base, circa April 1965.

 

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Captain Fred Mayer from Company B, 1st Air Cavalry Brigade, October 1966

 

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MACV-SOG Recon Team "Virginia" wielding M60s connected by a 5' aircraft-type articulated feed belt to a 500 round ammo box dubbed "The Death Machine" c. 1972

 

[BravoZulu]

April 1968. Mortarmen of 1st Battalion, 27th Marines, firing the M2 60mm mortar during Operation No Name II.