During the last four months of 1967 a series of fierce border battles erupted in South Vietnam that cast a shadow on what had been a positive year for U.S. forces in Southeast Asia.

Beginning in mid-September, PAVN began the continuous shelling of a Marine outpost located at Con Thien, near the Demilitarized Zone in northern Quang Tri Province.

He believed that American air power would prevent a repeat of the French defeat at the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, which rapidly became the point of comparison, both among military officers and the media.

PAVN forces would be massing in a single geographic area in divisional strength in a remote unpopulated region where there would be no restrictions on bombing missions.

On January 19, Westmoreland passed his request for Air Force control up to the chain of command to CINCPAC, Admiral U.S. Grant Sharp, Jr., in Honolulu.

[1] The perennial interservice rivalry over missions and assets (which had plagued the services since the creation of the National Security Act of 1947) raged anew.

[2]: 178  Westmoreland ordered Operation Igloo White to assist in the defense of Khe Sanh even though the system was only then undergoing its test and evaluation phase in Laos.

Momyer demonstrated the effectiveness of the Stratofortress as a tactical platform by bringing the B-52 strikes safely to within three-quarters of a mile of the base and the restriction was lifted.

In 1976, he revealed that "Although I established a small secret group to study the subject, Washington so feared that some word of it might manage to reach the press that I was told to desist.

On 7 February, however, North Vietnamese infantry, backed by Soviet-built PT-76 tanks, overran the Special Forces border camp at Lang Vei, only seven miles west of Khe Sanh Combat Base.

Naval aviation (even though concurrently conducting the bulk of Operation Rolling Thunder missions over the DRV) contributed 5,337 sorties and 7,941 tons of bombs.

[7] This article incorporates public domain material from the Air Force Historical Research Agency A film clip "Airpower at Khe Sanh" is available for viewing at the Internet Archive