Death in the Highlands: The Siege of Special Forces Camp Plei Me

Death in the Highlands: The Siege of Special Forces Camp Plei Me
J. Keith Saliba
Stackpole Books
249 pp; photos, maps
 
Summary
The siege of Plie My Special Forces camp in October of 1965 was the real beginning of America’s war in Vietnam. It was also the beginning of the Ia Drang campaign. Twelve American Special Forces soldiers and the Montagnard Civilian Irregular Defense Group troops that they trained and led were besieged by a regiment of North Vietnamese regulars. This books covers not only the siege, but also the ARVN breakthrough to the camp. This column also had to deal with an NVA regiment.
 
The book covers the background of the military situation at the time and of the Special Forces and their role. But the bulk of the book is a detailed account of the military operations themselves based to a significant degree on participant accounts. Mr. Saliba has also used NVA accounts which are surprisingly frank about the defeat they suffered.
 
Thoughts
This book was truly hard to put down after the introductory material was behind me.  There is just the right amount of detail about a number of the participants to get appropriate background without going too far afield. One of these was then Major Charles “Chargin’ Charlie” Beckwith who led his DELTA team of handpicked Special Forces soldiers into the camp. Another was the legendary Joe Galloway who came in as a reporter, but ended up on the fighting line.
 
One of my favorite parts of the book was related by a unique individual, Captain Russell Hunter, M.D. As a medical doctor he went through the selection process and complete training to become a fully trained and qualified member of Special Forces. He inserted into the camp to tend the casualties as it was too dangerous to try to get them out.  Here is a quote from the book concerning Beckwith’s and his DELTA team’s effect on the garrison.
 
“Still, Hunter readily admits that he was relieved when Beckwith and DELTA arrived. These were the professionals, the hard-chargers who were a breed apart even from Special Forces troopers like himself. In their wizened faces, shadowed by age and experience, he saw sharp-edged fighters, tempered in the fires of World War II and Korea. ‘I didn’t know if there was a guy in DELTA younger than twenty-five,’ he recalls. ‘Charlie Beckwith had gray whiskers, and everybody just looked tough. Bill DeSoto looked as if he could eat snakes. I felt better.’”
 
Of course, Beckwith would go on to be the first C.O. of the U.S. Army’s super elite DELTA Team.
 
This is an almost minute by minute account of fast moving, exciting military history that is well written and researched. It is a nice companion piece to We Were Soldiers Once and Young as this fight was the prelude to that attempt to bring these same NVA regulars to battle. On a scale of 1 to 5, I would definitely give Death in the Highlands five stars, maybe even 6.
 
Tom

That's high praise indeed Tom. Another book I need to get.

You won’t be disappointed.
Tom

That book sounds great.  Definitely one to add to my list of reading. Nice review Tom.

Thanks.
Tom

Added to the to-read list!

Thanks Tom

cool one to get , good maps then mate ?

Well, the maps are good enough to illustrate what is going on. I wouldn’t get it just for the maps. The The fight took place at basically two locations. One was the camp itself, the other the ambush of the relief column. There is one map for each of those. In the beginning there is a very general map of Vietnam. This does not add very much to anyone familiar with the war. A final, fourth map, shows an enlarged area including both the camp and the ambush site, as well as the areas of the subsequent searches for the NVA after the fight. None of these maps are anything to get too excited about, but they are adequate for their intended purpose. You could not set up a war game table based on the maps.

Hope that helps.

Tom