![]() ![]() Hinkle knew the redness was caused by the high concentration of iron ore in the soil. The pigment stained fatigues and even penetrated skin, giving the Marines a distinctive red hue. A fine film of red dust covered everything Hinkle could not even tell the time on his watch without first wiping the crystal. All around, soldiers were busy unloading crates of supplies as well as digging bunkers, endlessly filling sandbags with the pervasive red dirt of the area. As the days passed, the sights, sounds and smells of Khe Sanh soon became familiar to Sgt Hinkle and the other new members of the garrison. The next few months were spent preparing and fortifying the base for whatever lay ahead. He was assigned to Lima Battery, 4th Battalion, 12th Marines, with responsibility for one of the 155 mm Howitzers that pointed out of the base. Sgt Hinkle was amongst the first of those reinforcements to arrive. This brought the total at Khe Sanh to around 6,000 β the maximum that could realistically be supplied with the 60 tons of food, water, ammunition and medical equipment needed per day for the base to function. Despite the overwhelming numerical disadvantage, the Marines would stay to defend it, and an additional 1,000 troops were ordered in to bolster those already there. Westmorland, whose Marines had already repelled several attempts by the NVA to take the surrounding hills, considered the base too great an asset to concede. President Lyndon B Johnson was concerned that the 5,000 Marines, at the base and dug into the surrounding hills, were horribly outnumbered and faced impossible odds. Just how highly prized it was by the enemy became clear to Washington when intel reports revealed that two divisions of 20,000 highly trained and well-equipped NVA troops were heading for the area, with the intention of capturing the base. It provided US Army General William Westmorland and the military planners in Saigon a base from which to monitor and disrupt the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) and Viet Cong (VC) troop movements across the border. Its proximity to Route 9 and the Ho Chi Minh trail β the two main supply routes into the south β made the base valuable real estate to both sides. ![]() From above, the landing strip looked like a little bald patch shaved into the undulating green landscape. Isolated by miles of triple-canopy jungle, it was virtually inaccessible except by air. The Khe Sanh combat base was situated in the remote far northwest corner of South Vietnam. Checking the Ollech & Wajs wristwatch heβd just picked up at the Dong Ha base exchange, he saw that it was not even midday.50 years on, as a tribute to his late father, Jeffrey Taylor Hinkle set out on his own mission: to find the exact same Ollech & Wajs watch that had served his father so well all those years ago. On 9th September 1967 Sergeant Jerry Wayne Hinkle stepped off a C-130 supply aircraft into the stifling heat of the Khe Sanh valley, close to the Laotian border.
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