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The lead element of the 173rd Airborne Brigade
("Sky Soldiers"), stationed in Okinawa, departs for
South Vietnam. It was the first U.S. Army ground
combat unit committed to the war. Combat elements
of the 173rd Airborne Brigade included the 1st, 2nd,
3rd, and 4th Battalions, 503rd Infantry; the 3rd
Battalion, 319th Airborne Artillery; Company D, 16th
Armor; Troop E, 17th Cavalry; and the 335th
Aviation company. Headquartered at Bien Hoa Air Base
near Saigon, the Brigade conducted operations to keep
communist forces away from the Saigon-Bien Hoa complex.
In February 1967, the Brigade conducted
a combat parachute jump into a major communist
base area to the north of Saigon near the
Cambodian border. In November 1967, the Brigade
was ordered to the Central Highlands, where they
fought a major battle at Dak To against an
entrenched North Vietnamese Army regiment on Hill
875. In some of the most brutal fighting of the war,
the paratroopers captured the hill on Thanksgiving
Day, winning the Presidential Unit Citation for
bravery in action.
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