Book Description

The U.S. Marine Corps' war in Vietnam was a mixture of large-scale conventional battles against main Viet Cong and North Vietnamese Army (NVA) units and smaller pacification operations designed to secure the South Vietnamese population from Communist insurgents. During the latter half of 1965, Marine forces fought repeated engagements against large Viet Cong units, most notably the 1st Viet Cong Regiment. The first battle, a fight in August to secure the area around Chu Lai called Operation Starlite, inflicted significant casualties upon this force. However, within just a few months, the Communist unit reconstituted itself, forcing the Marines to launch another operation to destroy the formation in December. The Marines codenamed this action Operation Harvest Moon.Operation Harvest Moon has largely been overlooked in histories of the Vietnam War. While Operation Starlite was considered a major success and a clear demonstration of the superiority of America's conventional military forces compared to the Viet Cong, Harvest Moon was less decisive. The following year, the Marine Corps' attention also began to shift north toward the demilitarized zone (DMZ) as more regular North Vietnamese combat forces put pressure on the Marines' area of operations. Consequently, the battle was overshadowed by larger engagements.Nevertheless, the operation was important for a number of reasons. Harvest Moon was the Marines' last large-scale, conventional operation of 1965 in Vietnam. Fought in the valleys and hills between the city of Tam Ky and the inland outpost of Hiep Duc, it was the largest combined operation between Marine units and the South Vietnamese military to that date. Perhaps most importantly, the battle demonstrated many of the frustrations and problems faced by all the American forces in South Vietnam as they tried to defeat the Viet Cong-led insurgency. The disparity in the fighting abilities between the Marines and South Vietnamese Army units hindered combat effectiveness. The lack of coordination between the two forces, and between the Marine Corps and U.S. Air Force, also led to heavy losses on the allied side. Enjoying logistical support from North Vietnam, the 1st Viet Cong Regiment was able to defeat South Vietnamese forces while largely evading American units.The battle revealed a number of problems in how Marines coordinated counterguerrilla operations and used helicopters to lift formations into combat zones. In the course of the operation, the commanding general was relieved due to his inability to provide clear direction to his units. Although the Marine forces involved in Operation Harvest Moon were able to exact a heavy price from their Viet Cong adversaries, 2 | Marines in the Vietnam War Commemorative Series nevertheless, the main enemy units were able to retreat and regroup, leaving the valley far from secure. Marines would return to the valley complex two months later to fight the same Viet Cong unit. Thus, although the engagement did not produce the seemingly decisive result of Starlite or later battles like Hue City, Harvest Moon was arguably more representative of the American experience in Vietnam as a whole.