Mike & H&S Companies 

Third Battalion, Fifth Marines

Veterans of the Vietnam War

Vietnam Now

These are a number of pictures from Mark Daniels, who works in Thailand and does business and makes numerous trips to Vietnam.  Over the years he's made more than 40 visits in-country, many with returning vets.  With research and help he's located many of the areas in Vietnam where U.S. conducted Operations and had significant contact with the enemy, plus firebases and AOs.  An amateur photographer he's graciously sharing these with us. All these pictures are thumbnailed, please click to enlarge.

1. Rockpile on Route 9

2. Pearl River in Hue

3. Ordnance at Khe Sanh

4. Lang Vei Special Forces camp....near Laos on Rte 9, past Khe Sanh.

5. Khe Sanh runway

6. Khe Sanh memorial

7. Hill 1015 North Khe Sanh

8. Dakrong Bridge on Rte 9.

9. Co Roc Mountain in Laos (an NVA stronghold).

10. Camp Carroll 175mm Howitzer location.

11. A Shau Hill Tribe girls.

12. A Shau Valley Jungle (Mike Kelley's AO...author of Where We Were In Vietnam, a most excellent research book)

13. A Shau Valley at peace

14. Ho Chi Minh trail in the A Shau.

15. Returning Vet at Cu Chi on an M-60

16. Hill 1338 Dak To battle 1967

17. Phu Cat air base at Qui Nhon

18. Future trouble

19. Dak To airfield.

20. Hamburger Hill, Ap Bia mountain

21. Kham Duc Special Forces Airfield

22. Mark Daniels at LZ Raven in 2005 (Operation Essex 1967)

23. In former CAP village near Da Nang.

24. Ap Bon 2 Village locale in 2005.  Site of the death of Lt. Robert Warren Miller of Hotel 2/5 on Op. Essex on 6 November 1967.

25. Antenna valley in 2005.

The following set of pictures are from a recent trip Mark made to Laos.  Here is what he has to say about the trip:

These photos are from a recent trip to northern Laos. I have some close friends who were involved in the operations there - Air America, Ravens and USAF. Although a considered a "sideshow", in fact the unofficial US operations probably saved thousands of American lives by drawing off several divisions of NVA trying to maintain the HCM trail and fight the Hmong.

We drove 1500 KM for 8 days on mountainous (40 km/hr) roads to find some of these sites. Long Cheng was the top secret base for CIA/Ravens/Air America during the war and apparently among the 4 busiest airports in the world in 1968 (along with Danang, Bien Hoa and Tan Son Nhut). My friend and I managed to sneak into the Long Cheng base - it is still off limits to foreigners. We were briefly detained by the Laotian military base commander. There is still fighting between Lao govt and Hmong. We were lucky.

We also tried to make it to Phou Pha Thi Mountain (LS85) and made it within 30km but were told in no uncertain terms that to continue would result in death or incarceration. We made it to within 10km of the Viet border (Vieng Xai Pathet Lao HQ during the war - they hid in caves and were bombed incessantly). Phou Pha Thi is a 6000 ft mountain that had a radar installation for all-weather bombing of North Vietnam. It lasted about 4 months before being overrun by the NVA - the story is still highly controversial.

The Moung Souay LS (Lima Site was the designation for the airstrips used for operations - there were more than 300 sites) is where my friend Mike Cavanaugh, who was a Forward Air Controller (FAC) with the Ravens, landed under extreme circumstances. He was out of gas and had to land on that strip while it was held by NVA.

A lot of the fighting and bombing took place on the Plain of Jars. It is one of most bombed places in the history of warfare. Nobody knows where the ancient jars came from.

26. Spook City;  27. Rice field with Hard Rice; 28. Plain of Jars; 29. Northern Laos; 30. Moung Souay landing strip; 31. Long Cheng landing trip LS20A runway; 32. Laotian mining team; 33. Hmong Hill tribe; 34. Common site in Laotian mountains.

Pictures 35 through 40:  Pictures of the Arizona and the Vu Gia river.