I Find This Photo So Fascinating

Found this series of photos on a personal web site for Vietnam Veterans of the 3rd Marines. I was reading up on the Battle of Khe Sanh on the Wikipedia and linked to it. The first photo is actually the last photo, it shows an LZ after a helicopter has unloaded its troops, but I placed it first so you can get an overall view of the hillside. This group of Marines were part of an operation trying to clear the hillsides around Khe Sanh of NVA. The pictures were snapped by the helicopter's door gunner. Little did any of the Marines (nor helicopter crew) know, but they got dropped not more than 50 yards from a squad of NVA!

The second and third photos show the Marines right after they had left the chopper. Most of the men shown in these two photos were only minutes from dying, and I think that's what intrigues me the most. Because the two close-up photographs show the faces of real human beings like me, I can just imagine one of those guys, watching the helicopter fly away and how it would feel when the NVA opened up on me and watching almost all my buddies die.

The Yellow X's are NVA, The White X's are Marines (click on the picture to enlarge it)

The final photo here is the first photo but with markings showing were at least two of the NVA positions were, pointed out by one of the surviving Marines (and marked up electronically by the web site). Apparently, the NVA let the choppers fly right in, allowed them to unload their troops, and let them fly out again before they ambushed the Marines. According to the website, so intense was the NVA fire that it took three attempts to go back and evacuate the surviving Marines.

From the web site:
"The Marine (in photo #2) who's looking back at me (the camera man) snapping this picture is Ronnie Williams, and according to Gunny Hagar, was one of the wounded. He died the following day from shrapnel in left shoulder and chest. The surviving members of this team were pulled out later in the afternoon, along with their causalities. As soon as we dropped them they were immediately caught in interlocking fields of fire from the NVA."