MAJOR ENGAGEMENT VICINITY OF BINH SON (1), 5 KM SOUTH-SOUTHEAST OF QUE SON 21APR67
UTM grid reference is BT060300

Fox 2/1 was out posted to Nui Loc Son FOB in the Que Son Valley in April 1967. It was reinforced with a recoilless rifle and 81mm mortar sections from battalion and a 4.2mm mortar battery from 1/11. The purpose was to interdict NVA 2nd Division units from food and tax collections in the valley and rich coastal plain to Tam Ky on the coast. On April 21st, F 2/1 led an assault on was assumed to be an occupied village, Binh Son. The lead element of F 2/1 made it halfway across the rice paddy fronting Binh Son when the NVA, in well dug-in and calibrated positions opened up with mortars and heavy AW and SA fire, including 50 caliber machine guns, killing or wounding 31 Marines including the CO Captain Deegan and every other officer except the FO.

The Bald Eagle reaction force, Mike and India 3/1 were immediately mobilized when word came in that F 2/1 was "lost". Given the scope of the unfolding battle, 3/5 was also mobilized and given command control landing in the early morning hours. By dawn on the 22nd contact by all units was broken.

Thus began a series of heavy engagements starting with Operation Union I that would take 46 lives in the first 2 days and over 900 KIA in the next seven months. That battle would lead, according to a book by Otto Lehrack, The Road of 10,000 Pains, to the ultimate destruction of the NVA 2nd division with over 6,000 KIA. " Five Marines and one Navy Chaplin would be awarded the Medal of Honor, all posthumously. Twenty one Marines and Corpsman would receive the Navy Cross and 72 Silver Stars. Between now and the end of 1967, more Marines and Corpsman died in the Que Son Valley..then were lost a Hue, Khe Sanh or Con Thien".

Stevens, Talmadge Cecil, LCpl