Khe Sanh half a century on

"I left my heart to the sappers round Khe Sanh

And my soul was sold with my cigarettes to the black-market man"

- Khe Sanh, Cold Chisel

--

"I had a brother at Khe Sanh

Fighting off them Viet Cong

They're still there, he's all gone'

- Born in the USA, Bruce Springsteen

It looks just like many other small country towns in the highland of Vietnam; slow paced, surrounded by untamed terrain but modern and full of noisy motor bikes. 

We are around 10km from the border with Laos.

At the local market there are unfortunate chickens tightly packed into metal cages, awaiting their fate. Ready to be purchased, slaughtered and plucked on the spot.

There are songbirds in tiny wooden cages. You would like to release them, but they would not survive out of captivity.

But sudden death is not uncommon in these parts. The small town’s name is known around the world: Khe Sanh.

Just take a drive of around 2km from the main street of the capital of Qung Tri Province – there are no signposts that I could see – and you will find yourself at what the locals call San Bay Ta Con.

Khe Sanh Combat Base was a United States Marine Corps outpost just south of the Vietnamese Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) and a key battleground during the Vietnam War (which the Vietnamese call the American War).

Khe Sanh occupies a key spot on the Ho Chi Minh Trail, a network of roads and trails that ran from North Vietnam to South Vietnam including border regions of Laos and Cambodia.

It was a route used to move supplies and reinforcements from the north into the south via 
Laos, which the Americans and their allies wanted to halt.

The Battle of Khe Sanh ran from January 21-July 9, 1968, with US forces defending their combat base against the North Vietnamese People’s Army of Vietnam (PAVN).

The base was subjected to artillery, mortar, and rocket attacks, and several infantry assaults, placing it under siege.

The Royal Australian Air Force No 2 Squadron took part in daylight bombing operations around the base, occasionally also flying night missions.

After many bloody battles, the base was eventually evacuated and largely destroyed. The Battle of Khe Sanh was widely believed to have played a major role in distracting US forces from the crucial Tet Offensive that foreshadowed the end of the war.

The defenders’ losses were reported to be about 1,000 killed and 4,500 wounded, with North Vietnamese casualties believed to be far higher, but unsubstantiated.

Small parts of the Khe Sanh runways survive and there are munitions, several tanks and helicopters and transport aircraft captured from fleeing US forces a half a century ago that lie scattered around the former base.

A Lockheed C-130 Hercules, Boeing CH-47 Chinook and a Bell UH-1 Iroquois are all on display.

You can walk through some remaining tunnels of the base, peer through the firing slits in the camouflaged bunkers, even jump onto one of the tanks for a happy snap.

Many of the few Australian and US visitors visiting on this October day do. 

But this is a melancholy place, eerily quiet, with barely a bird to be heard. The same is true
of Dachau and other places where bad things happened.

Much of the fertile red soil surrounding the base is now used for agriculture: coffee plants thrive here, as do avocadoes. Green peppers, sugar cane, passionfruit, and taro leaves (similar to spinach) are also grown here. 

But much of what used to be Khe Sanh military base is now simply overgrown. Reclaimed by nature.

There is a lady serving Ta Lu Khe Sanh coffee at the only concession kiosk. It is rather good.

She tries to convince me to take some home. 

The coffee beans are grown by members of two ethnic minority tribes in Huong Phung and Hương Tan.

The lack of mass tourism means the only seller of trinkets we see is selling pieces of shrapnel, and some bullets that may, or may not, be real.

While the outdoor exhibits are at the mercy of the elements and look a little down-at-heel, the small on-site museum is well maintained with commentary from one viewpoint. To the victor the spoils.

Not far from Khe Sanh you can also visit the Vinh Moc Tunnel, the tunnel shelters that Vinh 
Linh people used to hide from the intense bombing in the Vietnamese Demilitarized Zone, and other battlefields.

Strangely, while the name Khe Sanh may be known to just about every Australian, many young Vietnamese have never heard of the town or the battle. Several people I spoke to in Hanoi and Da Nang gave me blank looks when I mentioned it. 

There are a few small hotels in Khe Sanh town where visitors can stay - including the Hotel Thai Ninh and The Khe Sanh Luxury Hotel (both have rooms for $20-30 a night and get decidedly mixed reviews) - along with several decent eateries.

Most tourists, however, take a day trip or tour from either the former capital of Hue (around 2 ½ hours by car), or from Da Nang, where the Pullman Da Nang Beach is excellent place to stay. See https://www.pullman-danang.com/

# The writer was a guest of Vietjet, which flies to Ho Chi Minh City from major Australian cities like Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, and Perth, and also connects Hanoi to Sydney and Melbourne. Economy fares start at around $250, while business class fares begin at $1,100. https://www.vietjetair.com/en

He paid his own way to Khe Sanh with Connect Travel, which conducts bespoke group and individual tours to both Khe Sanh and the DMZ. https://connecttravel.vn/en/product-category/tours/ 

# All images by Winsor Dobbin. This is an edited version of a story that appeared in Explore magazine. https://www.exploretravel.com.au/explore-magazine/