 This is the village of Ro Chai. Located high in the mountains of Vietnam's central plateau, it is part of the Dalat area. To this relocation village come the Vietnamese mountain dwellers known as Montagnards. A civic action program is underway here to improve the health and well-being of these primitive people. These films taken on 11 December 1965 show a friendly visit to the village by a signal group chaplain and two civilian missionaries. For the chaplain this is a regular part of his routine. He visits the tribes in the Dalat area quite frequently delivering simple sermons and distributing small gifts. The grown-ups of the village look forward to these visits as much as the children. The Montagnards undernourished and in poor health when first brought to this relocation village are steadily improving under the civic action program. Members of the 502nd Battalion 101st Airborne Division are briefed at a command post outside of Bencott. It is 9 December 1965 and word has been received that Viet Cong forces are entrenched on a big rubber plantation some five miles to the west. The mission of the 502nd is to conduct an assault landing by helicopter and sweep the plantation for any hostile units positioned there. Arriving at the plantation the men of the 502nd are joined by local friendly natives who act as their guides. The informants point out the carefully screened hiding places of the Viet Cong guerrillas. Dugouts and tunnels are scoured for enemy personnel but only a few items such as this propaganda poster are found. Throughout the plantation area troops are deployed in patrols searching fields roadside ditches and thick patches of woods. The Viet Cong are nowhere to be found however and the search goes on hour after hour. At a shallow river forward some of the men load up with jerry cans of fresh water. It will have to be boiled to purify it and then cooled before use. Armed guards cover the jeep crews. Down the road to the east land mines were discovered when one blew up killing some of the airborne infantrymen. Clearing work started immediately. Meanwhile some of the sweep teams take a few minutes out for a water break. The plantation though a scant 25 miles from Saigon is located in the famous D zone seen of some of the toughest Viet Cong resistance of the war. Radio contact with search teams in the area reveals the same story as before. Still no enemy forces sighted. Additional troops arrive to broaden the scope of the mission and with them the battalion chaplain who drove up in his jeep and prepared to conduct services for the men. Even with their small field altar out in the open these clergymen are a great comfort to the fighting men. Through the courageous service of these chaplains the combat soldier remains strong in spirit and resolute in his duty. With operations now in full swing the flying infantrymen move up in force and fan out to search more deeply the surrounding terrain. Some light enemy sniper fire is encountered and mortar fire is directed at the suspected Viet Cong positions. Contact with the VC is not established however and finally the mission is called off. The first cavalry division air mobile is implementing the air mobility concept in Vietnam and these films of the division were made from 9 through 11 December 1965. At An Ke the first air cave has established a highly complex and sophisticated base of operations embracing not only air operations but major maintenance of all organic helicopters. This includes tactical aircraft as well as support copters. Leading elements of this division first arrived in Vietnam on 15 September 1965 and proceeded to An Ke. This base and all of its facilities have been developed in this wilderness area since that time. Last summer on the 1st of July 1965 the first cavalry division was designated the first air mobile division in the United States Army. Here in Vietnam the division is a mighty busy outfit. The maintenance work on aircraft is carried out on the flight line intent covered Konex containers converted into shops and on rollaway engine stands out of doors. Aircraft upkeep and testing is constant day after day to make sure the fleets of choppers are operational at all times. The work being done encompasses not only normal maintenance but repairs to the assault helicopters which have been damaged by Viet Cong ground fire. The most delicate work for the aircraft mechanics is that which must be done on the rotors of the helicopters. Minute adjustments of bearing assemblies and pitch adjustment along with other critical maintenance is carried out in the tent covered shops. This is to keep stray particles of dirt and other foreign matter from blowing on to exposed vital parts. Out in front of the engine and powertrain shop two men of the 229th maintenance battalion install a hot end on a UH-1D engine. In addition to the B level maintenance carried out here in the shop area line mechanics handle regular servicing out on the flight line. To support this maintenance work there is a parts supply depot near the shops but the sprawling first air cav base encompasses much more than the maintenance facility for helicopters and the overall installation continues to grow. These men are pouring cement for a new mess hall floor. In other localities around the base more new buildings are being erected. The complex already includes administrative buildings, communications, air ops and several other structures. A large pol dump supplies fuel and oil for the aircraft. This is the air field at Ankay. It is the home of the division helicopters and has become known to airmen all over Vietnam as the golf course. A multi-purpose field it is capable of handling aircraft as large as the Air Force C-130s and it is not uncommon to see a dozen or more helicopters taking off at one time. The UH-1D helicopter is one of the most versatile choppers the first air cav has. The workhorse of the cargo copters is the big CH-47 Chinook which is used to deliver everything from troops to field artillery and there are the smaller helicopters used in recon work and air evacuation of the wounded. Everywhere you look helicopters fill the landing pads or the air over them. The business of the first air cavalry division is air mobility and that means total air delivery of everything required by the fighting men of this division. Whatever the airlift requirement of the mission may be there are combat ready troops and machines here to fulfill that requirement. Getting away from the air field for the moment there are still other areas of the base to be seen. In the division headquarters area a military museum has been set up. On display here are various types of weapons captured from the Viet Cong during helleborn assaults upon enemy forces by the flying cavalrymen. The communist made recoilless rifles and other pieces attest to the success of those past airborne missions. Conventional fixed wing aircraft such as the CV-2 caribou are also used by the division for a number of other chores requiring more speed than is available with the helicopters. All in all the control tower personnel here see nearly as much daily air traffic as the control towers of many big U.S. city airports back in the states. To the Ankay airfield come all kinds of airborne cargoes. When this film was made the Christmas mail for the men of the division was pouring in by the plane load but the big C-130s of the air force and the cargo carriers of the first air cavalry division bring in every conceivable item of materiel from vehicles and aircraft parts to containers of aircraft fuel and office supplies everything and anything that is needed for daily routine as well as tactical materiel for air assault missions. To handle these heavy loads the runways and parking strips were surfaced with weatherproof heavy aluminum mats. One of the most interesting helicopters in service with the division is the Sikorsky CH-54A flying crane. It was designed to airlift the heaviest materiel and offers a variety of cargo handling accessories. On this particular mission a damaged caribou aircraft is being transported from Ankay airfield to the fixed wing aircraft repair shops at Quignon. The caribou's wings and parts of the empanage are being carried in the cargo pod of the cameraman's flying crane. While the caribou fuselage is being delivered by one flying crane the other is touching down with the rest of the caribou parts. Waiting ground crews move in and the unloading begins at once. This mission is typical of the daily routine for the big helicrains and as a matter of fact the flight crew had barely completed this delivery before they were given a new assignment. An AD-6 sky raider had crashed while making an approach at some airfield and it now had to be airlifted out to a navy LST in the harbor which would carry it to Danang for repairs. And so the lift hook is made secure and locked and the cargo is ready for transport. From inside the sky crane you get a better idea of what it's like to transport a heavy free swinging load. The rudder of the payload serves as a wind vane and helps to stabilize the damaged sky raider in transit. Finally we are over the LST and the cargo at the end of the cable is decked. Back at Queen Yawn other deliveries by flying crane are being made. In this case the fuselage of a UH-1D helicopter is brought into position and lowered on to a bed of old tires where it will be checked over later. Returning to An Kei and the first air cavalry division base we find the day-to-day activities of the outfit much the same as before their arrival in Vietnam. The post office is still a kind of link with the folks back home and the barbershop is busy as usual. There's even thought given to the question of re-enlistment. Despite the fighting here Vietnam is an exotic and interesting land. In typical American fashion the streets and roads of the base have been given stateside names and as you can see vehicular traffic is rather steady as people scurry about carrying on the work of the division. In the days recently before these films were made the area had been inundated with heavy rainfall and the roads were in bad condition. But the prime mission of the division is to take the war to the enemy. On this combat assault helicopters of the 229th aviation battalion airlifted a battalion of first-cav troopers into Ka Nuck. All aircraft in the lift received enemy ground fire and an armed chopper was brought in to strafe the area. The heavily wooded terrain below makes spotting the enemy difficult. Down there the Viet Cong have begun firing at us and our gunners return the fire. It seems the snipers are located around the edges of those openings so the pilot drops down for a closer look. At treetop level you can see pretty well but the enemy stayed hidden. After the first attack for the choppers had ended they returned to the base for more ordinance and refueling. The full load of rockets and ammo for the M-60 has been expended in the effort to eliminate the enemy snipers at the LZ. Evaluating these strikes is difficult because unlike fixed targets the Viet Cong guerillas use the endless jungles of this land as a living screen behind which they evade contact and disappear with amazing swiftness. Fragmentation weapons like these rockets are one answer to the problem of eliminating the Viet Cong snipers once they are pinpointed. And so the refueling, the re-arming, and the flying of these missions goes on. On a surveillance flight over the division sector the character of this central plateau country unfolds below. The establishment of the division base was accomplished only after hewing the wilderness to meet the requirement. Up ahead lies the valley land of Pleiku Province. Besides its heavily wooded hills it is largely an agricultural region producing crops of sweet potatoes. Remote from any of the major population centers of South Vietnam the area has few roads. In every sense this is back country and the farmers who live here employ only the crudest methods of cultivating the land and harvesting their crops. The top of Hong Kong mountain overlooking On K Pass offers radar cover for the entire area. Where the war is concerned this type of terrain is to be found over much of South Vietnam between the 15th parallel and the 17th parallel the Northland of South Vietnam. In this kind of country embracing jungles and overgrown valleys without roads the air mobile striking force of the first cave is at its best. Here the ground combat troops of the division are deployed against the Viet Cong swiftly and without regard for the unfriendly terrain. Below us the peaceful village of On K belies the continual feverish activity of war which is taking place at the airfield just beyond. In an operation where so many types of helicopters are constantly in use the requirement for servicing and support maintenance is unusually high but the organization of the air mobile division is such that the maintenance support element is prepared for this problem. A level maintenance can be carried out in the field if the job is relatively uncomplicated and can be completed within four hours. Bigger more complex repair jobs are B level maintenance and are usually done at the division base within a 72 hour time limit. If the difficulty cannot be corrected in that length of time the job is sent to rear echelon for C level maintenance. Like everything else used by this division the work is sent to the rear by air lifting it out. The sky cranes seen earlier are capable of transporting any aircraft used by the division. Watching the crowded airspace overhead you understand more readily the amount of aircraft maintenance being done. As formations of assault helicopters whirl away on their particular missions other squadrons are returning. Other armed helicopters take to the air to provide fire support for the troop carriers. Then there are the recon helicopters always shuttling back and forth on one mission or another. The support command of the first cavalry air mobile division has a variety of assignments to carry out. One of the most important is to deliver the division's artillery. With an air assault underway the gun crew loads a 105 howitzer into a waiting shinok. It will be flown to a strategic ground position where it can be used to support the assault. Ammunition for the field piece is palletized and with the aid of a cargo sling is also airlifted along. Unloading at the objective is efficiently and quickly accomplished by the highly trained gun crew. Moments later the shinok with mission accomplished lifts off before the enemy spots it and can start firing. On this mission a small truck was taken along to assist in moving the gun into its position. Another phase of air mobility in Vietnam.