1967 in the Vietnam War

1967 in the Vietnam War
← 1966 1968 →
Air drop of supplies in Operation Junction City
Location Vietnam
Belligerents
Anti-Communist forces:  South Vietnam  United States  South Korea  Australia  Philippines  New Zealand  Thailand Kingdom of Laos Republic of China	Communist forces:  North Vietnam Viet Cong Pathet Lao  People's Republic of China  Soviet Union  North Korea
Strength
South Vietnam: 798,800 United States: 485,600 South Korea: 47,830 Thailand: 2,220 Australia: 6,820 Philippines: 2,020 New Zealand: 530	US estimate: 242,000–600,000 170,000
Casualties and losses
US: 11,363 killed[1] South Vietnam: 12,716 killed[2]: 275  Allies: Unknown	US estimate: 140,000 casualties[3]

At the beginning of 1967 the United States was engaged in a steadily expanding air and ground war in Southeast Asia. Since its inception in February 1965, Operation Rolling Thunder, the bombing campaign against North Vietnam, had escalated in the number and significance of its targets, inflicting major damage on transportation networks industry, and petroleum refining and storage facilities. Yet the campaign showed no signs of achieving either of its stated objectives. The air attacks had not broken the Hanoi government's will to continue the war, and they had not halted or appreciably hindered the flow of People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) troops and supplies into South Vietnam. North Vietnam had been able to repair damage and develop substitutes for destroyed facilities rapidly enough to counter the incremental escalation of the U.S. air campaign. With Soviet and Chinese assistance, the North Vietnamese had built a large and sophisticated air defense system. Its guns and missiles extracted a toll in pilots and aircraft for every American raid. On the ground in South Vietnam, the U.S. force buildup, begun in late 1965, was approaching completion. More than 380,000 American troops were in the country, alongside over 730,000 Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) soldiers and some 52,000 soldiers from other allied nations. After a year of base building and intensifying combat, the U.S. commander, General William Westmoreland, believed that his forces were ready for major offensives that would seize the battlefield initiative from the PAVN and Viet Cong (VC). The PAVN/VC, however, had been conducting their own buildup, including the infiltration into South Vietnam of regular PAVN divisions. These units, along with VC guerrillas and light infantry formations, were countering the American challenge. Within South Vietnam, the PAVN/VC sought opportunities to inflict American casualties in large and small engagements. They also concentrated troops at various points on South Vietnam's borders to create a strategic threat to the allies and compel the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, (MACV) to disperse its reserves.^[4]