Battle epitaph of Ronald W. Sanders

By early summer of 1967, enemy pressure was putting a tremendous strain on the Marines involved in the SPOS (Strongpoint Obstacle System) along the DMZ. The brain child of this was Secretary of Defense, Robert S. McNamara's idea and fostered by our fearless leader, General Westmoreland. These two guys cost us many Marine lives by trying to put together this McNamara Line, which was a logistical nightmare. It was to setup six strong points and four battalion base areas, the strong points were A1 thru A6 and the base areas were C1 thru C4. Khe Shan, Gio Linh, Con Thien, and Dong Ha. No one liked it, and it was a bad idea. Marines called it McNamara's meat grinder, combining Marines and NVA, called the Westmoreland hamburger. This burger was served to you on the ground, and of course many of those who attended would order theirs to go, in a body bag, or what we called, "bagged and tagged” We were surprised that these guys didn't put up a Hotel for R&R (Rest and Relaxation) with a perfect view of the war, for the their guests. How am I doing Ron, telling it like it is aay?

These four Marine battalions, engineers, artillerymen, and supporting units as it turns out, were unable to both defend their front and construct the SPOS. It is a known fact that the casualties directly attributable to its construction were never even calculated, but they did calculate the cost of equipment losses as a result of enemy action and that was over a million dollars. This brings us to 8 May 1967 in which my friend Ronald W. Sanders was killed in the battle of Con Thien. The NVA had launched a major ground attack on Con Thien on the morning of the 8th of May 1967. Note: Diem Bien Phu French Command Post fell at 10pm May 7th, 1954.

At Con Thien, was a battalion command group, an ARVN Civilian Irregular Defense Group (CIDG) worthless as tits on a bull and two Marine Companies A and D, of 1st Battalion, 4th Marines that occupied Con Thien. Like the calm before a storm, at 0300 with eye lids feeling heavy, green flares light up the night sky to the south of the base. Suddenly, artillery started pounding the base, Marines yelling incoming, since our own artillery was pounding support missions many clicks away. Under the cover of this barrage of hundreds of artillery shells from the north, pounding the base with deafening blows. Two NVA battalions were charging the base. The NVA laid down a curtain of automatic fire. The NVA RPG's, hit the perimeter defenses and as they got closer, the lead Sapper squads hit the defenses Bangalore torpedoes and satchel charges. The Sappers breached the wire in 2 places with their explosives, and NVA were now pounding the Marine defenders with mortar fire. This onslaught entered the breaches of the wire in front of Company D and all hell broke loose. Marines with M-16's that were jamming, some died without firing a round, and with cleaning rods still in the barrel. Flares were popping, igniting, and burning out with tracers flying everywhere. The NVA were everywhere, pouring in on Company D as fighting quickly turned to hand to hand, with frag grenades being tossed back and forth. Marines firing point blank at the NVA in an attempt to gain control of the fight. Smoke was clouding the battle field and the Marines were yelling, "Die" firing their weapons. With the intense noise of battle in the background the commander Captain R.F. Corcoran of Alpha Co. quickly dispatched parts of 1st & 3rd platoons and mechanized it with two LVT (amtracs) with 50's blazing, Jeeps with RPG's, and three Army M-42 Dusters with their twin 40mm cannons to the scene. The 2 Dusters were hit with B-40's, while the 2 Amtrac's were hit with satchel charges and flame throwers, in a deadly ambush killing both Marine squad's still inside LVT's (the first time Flame Throwers were used by NVA in the war), this ambush destroyed them almost immediately upon arriving at the ARVN trench line, along with the 2 Jeeps. The three M-48 Tanks which were heavily damaged, fired Beehive rounds point blank into the breaches of the perimeter. The relief Marines that were running on foot, had laid down such a blistering field of fire on the besieged companies foes, that the fighting had brought the NVA to a stalemate, and this halted the NVA's advance. All the flares had run out and now the battle field flashes had turned into a strobe light effect everywhere. Puff arrived much later, and was sitting above its flares, spiting like a Ray Gun 6000 rounds per min. with tracers splashing red everywhere until daylight. Now new vigor the Marines of Delta Company started to gain some control of the fervently fire fight. A badly wounded Marine blasted a Claymore at a group of NVA on their flanks, thus killing himself and the NVA. This blast was mixed along with the deafening clatter of small arms fire of red and green tracers filling the battle field. Wounded NVA were being carried by their comrades and the Marines were quickly dispatching them on the spot, for them to join their dead already on the battle field. The NVA began to withdraw under the din of light breaking the night sky, and duels were still being fought with the remaining NVA until the firefight diminished to sporadic fire fights up to and until mid-morning. During all this Ron my friend, died along with his fellow Marines in the early part of the battle. He was one of 44 Marines that died that morning, along with 207 wounded Marines that were scattered all over the battlefield. The NVA left behind over 240 dead, and carried away an estimated 215 dead and 350 walking wounded. This firefight lasted about 6 hours, Alpha and Delta companies of 1st Battalion 4th Marines had laid to waste 2 NVA battalions with pure guts and fire-power. We would pursue and engage this NVA unit again just north of Con Thien and from May 13^th, for the next 4 days routing them back into the DMZ. Ron, our drill instructor from boot camp  Plt. 1048 in San Diego, Staff Sgt.(Chuck)C.C. Burnett will fall victim on this pursuit. God Bless you both Ron and Chuck.

The DMZ was the political stopping point of pursuit, but MAC V allowed the pursuit right up to the river in the DMZ, and like following fresh blood trail of a wounded deer, the Marines pounded them some more with artillery, and air even across the river. They called this area, "Leatherneck Square," I wonder what was their first clue.

Submitted by:

Bob LeBeau

A friend to L/Cpl Ronald W. Sanders a member of Alpha Co. who perished that day.