Vietnam War remained in the field for four days. Tellingly, South Vietnamese forces were again defeated in June 1965 at the Battle of Đồng Xoài. On 8 March 1965, 3,500 U.S. Marines were unilaterally dispatched to South Vietnam. This marked the beginning of the American ground war. U.S. public opinion overwhelmingly supported the deployment. The Marines' initial assignment was defensive. The first deployment of 3,500 in March 1965 was increased to nearly 200,000 by December. The U.S. military had long been schooled in offensive warfare. Regardless of political policies, U.S. commanders were institutionally and psychologically unsuited to a defensive mission. General William
1971 in the Vietnam War Chenla II was a major military operation conducted by the Cambodian military (then known as FANK) during the Cambodian Civil War. The Cambodian military failed to dislodge the communist North Vietnamese Army and Viet Cong from territory and suffered heavy casualties. Operation Jefferson Glenn was the last major ground operation in which U.S. troops participated in the Vietnam War. Three battalions of the 101st Airborne patrolled the area west of the city of Huế, called the "rocket belt," to try to prevent communist rocket attacks. The Americans were gradually replaced by soldiers of the South Vietnamese army. The Americans and