Khe Sanh, Bloody Great Battle

So why should I be going to Khe Sanh? Well, it was 19th March 2003 when working in Savanakhet Province, Laos, walking 120 kilometers to remote villages in Nong District to determine water well site when I heard on my short wave radio that America had dropped the first bombs on Iraq, Cluster Bombs. Standing in the midst of the terrible destruction of 40 years earlier among these simple hill farmers, I was shell shocked. How could any sane, civilised society be doing this again? Modern business studies and technical reporting expound about 'Lessons Learned'. Huh!

Khe Sanh was a bloody great battle to which the Americans dedicated the majority of its forces and planning, not being aware it was but a red herring, Red Haranguing even, by the North Vietnamese prior to the Tet offensive. So Nong District being but a long range shell away across the border received a pounding. It is on the Ho Chi Minh Trail and nearby the strategic pass from Khe Sanh, Vietnam, through to Laos. It was carpet bombed with millions and millions of Cluster Bombs, or the more sedate term, bombies. Whatever you wish to call them, they are still there waiting to kill for the next 3 or 4 hundred years unless we can convince our governments to stop using them.

For all you historians there is much information on all this, Khe Sanh Combat Base, Camp Carroll, the Rockpile, Dakrong Bridge, read all about it elsewhere.

Basing myself in comforable Dong Ha for a couple of days, I set off for Khe Sanh minus the saddle bags, tank bag and backpack. The good road to a main border crossing wound its way up through the hills. Light weighted at last, the Minsk with it's new clutch and chain whizzed up the road only occassionally changing down to third gear as apposed to second and occassionally first when fully laden. Passing through the town where a huge memorial statue stands dominantly, I rode on to the border town of Lao Bao. Sat by the lake, I drank a freshly squeezed cane sugar iced drink contemplating how the current tranquility must have been quite different in those historic days past.

But the Blood Bath was then. Now it's a Business Bath. Unbelievable. Huge super stores in there myriad constructed for cross border trading, seemingly for the future as they didn't seem too busy just then. The money shows, however, with construction of large swanky houses all over the place.

I had to come to the place that caused Nong District, just across the border, and other nearby parts to be the most heavily bombed areas of Laos, ney the world, devasted also by agent orange. Not much to see superficially, wonderful nature and industrious Vietnamese have transformed the ravages of war into a beautiful cultivated landscape amongst an inspiring mountainous setting. But ask the locals and that superficial serenity soon fades to the dark, vivid memories firmly implanted in their minds.

Hitting the saddle, it was a joy to be motorbiking again, sweeping down the mountains leaning hard into open S-bends. Ever vigilant on the 'blinds' for 10 wheeled trucks that are quite likely to be coming up on your side of the road. An acquaintance was taken out by such a bus in Sumatra several years ago. Or water buffalo sauntering down the middle with their fresh steaming dumps a further hazard which will send you through the bamboo crash bars should you catch one.

Que sera Khe Sanh.