Green Berets practice helicopter insertions at the Special Warfare Center
FORCE FACTS Special Forces honored president John F Kennedy by naming its training facility The JFK Special Warfare Center after he was assassinated in November 1963
S T E R E B N E E R G 8
G R E E N B E R E T S 9 INTRODUCTION Captain Roger Donlon and his detachment of Army Special Forces more popularly known as Green Berets arrived in South Vietnam in late May 1964 Along with about 300 South Vietnamese soldiers Donlon’s 12-man team quickly established a small fortified camp called Nam Dong near the border with Laos Eventually more than 200 simi lar camps would dot the countryside strategically located to attack enemy supply routes These attacks were thorns in the side of the Viet Cong and later North Vietnamese who worked to eliminate the source of such assaults At about 2 25 a m on July 6 Nam Dong was attacked by a force of nearly 1,000 Viet Cong who had surrounded the camp and fired mortars grenades and automatic weapons During the savage firefight Conlon was wounded in his stomach his shoulder his leg and his face Flying shrapnel opened cuts all over his body Despite his wounds Donlon continued to direct the camp’s defenses as the Green Berets and South Vietnamese fought off wave after wave of attackers He even administered first aid to some of the other wounded American reinforcements finally arrived at about 7 00 a m The attackers melted back into the jungle According to estimates they had lost more than 200 men Fifty-five South Vietnamese had also perished along with two members of Donlon’s detachment and an Australian special forces soldier Later that year Donlon was awarded the Medal of Honor the nation’s highest military decoration for his actions It was the first Medal of Honor awarded during the Vietnam War ZzZ U S soldiers had to adapt quickly to Vietnam’s wild ter rain and jungle conditions
