Siege of FSB Ripcord in Vietnam In 1970 - Improved Video

This is an updated version of what was posted in 2015. The images have been stabilized. It shows one of the last great battles of the war. There is no audio because the camera the Army provided was sturdy, but did not have the ability to record sound. In the early summer of 1970 FSB Ripcord, a base for the 101st near the NVA stronghold of the A Shau Valley came under siege. The mountain-top artillery position was routinely hit with incoming while grunts in the surrounding mountains were in heavy contact with the NVA. Given the volatile situation and possibility for bad PR at a time that the war was supposed to be winding down, the military forbade civilian or military photographers from going to Ripcord. But two motion picture and one still photographer from the 221st Signal Company/Southeast Asia Pictorial Center disobeyed orders and hitched a ride on a dust-off going to Ripcord. Lt. Col Andre Lucas, the commander at Ripcord, told them they could not g