Battle of Nam Dong
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| Battle of Nam Dong | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of Vietnam War | |||||||
|
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| Combatants | |||||||
 South Vietnam United States Australia |
 Viet Cong |
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| Commanders | |||||||
| Captain Roger H. C. Donlon | Unknown commander | ||||||
| Strength | |||||||
| 200+ | 1,000+ | ||||||
| Casualties | |||||||
| South Vietnam: 115 dead and wounded US:9 dead and wounded Australia: 1 dead |
62 bodies left | ||||||
The Battle of Nam Dong was fought on July 6, 1964, when the Viet Cong attacked the Nam Dong CIDG camp in an attempt to overrun it.
Nam Dong is situated 32 miles west of Da Nang in a valley near the Laotian border. It was manned by South Vietnamese personnel with American and Australian advisors.
The Viet Cong struck at the camp at 2:30AM to achieve the element of surprise, and reached the outer perimeter where South Vietnamese special forces managed to hold out. The battle lasted for five hours when the VC decided to abort the mission.
At 9:45AM six USMC helicopers arrived to extract the special forces.
[edit] Popular Culture
A key battle scene in The Green Berets (film) of the 1960s was based on this battle.
