BGen. Stiles had divided the operation into two phases. The first phase was to send in his recon assets in an area in the vicinity of the Hiệp Đức District. The division's intelligence (D-2) section had sources of a headquarters of the People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) 2nd Division lying somewhere near the western border of I Corps in the Quế Sơn Valley. The second phase consisted of a massive exploitation of the recon team's findings, by sending in a joint show-of-force; four infantry battalions from the 1st Marine Division and the ARVN 2nd Division.