The War: Victory in the Valley

Of all the varied and difficult terrain in South Viet Nam, the jungled peaks and malarial valleys of the Central Highlands would seem least worth winning. Scant crops grow there, and scarcely any Vietnamese live there. The triple canopy of jungle foliage shadows the ground in a perpetual, skyless twilight. But, on the Highlands border where Laos and Cambodia meet, there is a valuable piece of real estate: a natural valley that funnels through the worst border mountains out into the gentler highland countryside rolling down to the sea. Astride the valley sits Dak To, until three weeks ago...