The Hammer Falls

With the end of the 1966 dry season and the wrapping up of Operation Attleboro, General Westmoreland had both the resource and favourable weather to launch his planned series of offensives designed to push away Viet Cong and PAVN (People’s Army of Vietnam) forces away from the key cities of South Vietnam. As in the previous year his focus would be the area around Saigon. Having amassed two infantry divisions, two separate brigades, and a powerful armoured cavalry regiment, he felt ready to secure the area. In this he was ably supported by General Bruce Palmer, the Commander of II Field Force, Vietnam.

What followed was a constant series of offensives, including the only battalion-level combat jump made by the US military in Vietnam. These operations were large, involving multiple divisions and generating several hard-fought battles. The US and South Vietnamese forces used all the panoply of a combined arms forces with airmobile, mechanized, and infantry operations trying not only to destroy their opponents but removing their logistical infrastructure.

Until recently these operations had been largely portrayed by historians as failures that did not further US aims in Vietnam, yet after Westmoreland’s large scale offensive enemy activity in the region declined sharply. This new analysis looks at them using more recent scholarship, debunks several myths and ties them to the overall, and often misunderstood, strategy applied by General Westmoreland.

The book provides the reader with a nuanced analysis of battles and strategy bringing a fresh perspective not only on the US Army in the Vietnam War and General Westmoreland’s strategy, but also at the broader subject of ‘limited wars’ and ‘counterinsurgencies’.