Forty one years ago, today, 14 November 1965, the 7th Air Cav engaged the North Vietnamese in the Ia Drang Valley at LZ X-Ray.
The names of the 234 men who died in this battle, as well as the 71 more who died, including one Air Force pilot, in desperate skirmishes which followed that 4 day battle, are on Panel 3-East, of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C..
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"If you are able, save for them a place inside of you and save one backward glance when you are leaving for the places they can no longer go.
Be not ashamed to say you loved them, though you may or may not have always. Take what they have taught you with their dying and keep it with your own.
And in that time when men decide and feel safe to call the war insane, take one moment to embrace those gentle heroes you left behind."
Major Michael Davis O'Donnell (Listed as KIA February 7, 1978)
1 January 1970
Dak To, Vietnam
On 12 May 2005, the following was sent to the President of Viet Nam by Patriarch Alexei:
Patriarch Alexei II Greets the President of Viet Nam with the 30th Anniversary of
the Victory of Communism during the Civil War
On May 12th, Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia, Alexei II, greeted the president of the Socialist Republic of Viet Nam, Chan Dik Loong with the 30th anniversary of communist victory in the Civil War which posed the democratic South against the communist North.
"I heartily congratulate you, and through you, all the brotherhood of Vietnamese citizens with this glorious jubilee" wrote the patriarch in his letter. The patriarch noted that the Russian Orthodox Church, during difficult years devotedly spoke out for the establishment of peace in Viet Nam. The Moscow Patriarchate, fulfilling the directives of the soviet leadership, carried out their contribution "toward the hastening of that day through a framework of peacemaking efforts by the international religious organizations."
"We rejoice that 30 years ago a great victory in this war, the heroic Viet Nam brought to an end the tragic divisions between the North and the South, revealing to a united Vietnamese peoples new horizons of national progress under conditions of independence."
Underlined the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church.
Patriarch Alexei wished President Dik Loong "the generous help of God in blessed labors for the good of the Vietnamese government", and for the peoples of Viet Nam "good fortune and growth".
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Lt. Colonel Nguyen Huu An, commander of the N.V.A. and Viet Cong forces said the following at the end of the battle:
“The end will be the same except for the numbers who will die before we get there. They will think that this was their victory.”
The names of 58,000+ United States Servicemen's names are on The Wall on either side of, and including, Panel 3 East.