Rip-roarious Success.
The 173rd Airborne were a picture of efficiency in organising for the deployment, and prepared parachutes and loaded into aircraft faster than commanders expected. The result was 2nd Battalion landed, regrouped and moving off toward their objective well before the sun had begun to kiss the skyline.
Taken by surprise, North Vietnam Army defenders of the Psar Krom bridge were overrun by a coordinated assault by the paratroopers. Swift work was made to neuter enemy sabotage attempts to the bridge, before the paratroopers were once again underway, making use of commandeered enemy transport vehicles to reach the next objective.
The force narrowly averted disaster when a communications failure resulted in the convoy veering off course, but thankfully were able to regain bearings and escape the dense jungle they had entered.
Pushing further into the jungle and toward Hill 220, fighting became more and more intense as the NVA fought furiously to defend their headquarters, with a superior numerical and geographical advantage.
The NVA was simply outmatched, however, by the skill and coordination of the paratroopers, who used a combination of supporting arcs of fire from the multiple M60 machineguns the brigade had to cover advances, as well as M72 LAW rockets carried and employed prodigiously to fire into enemy fighting positions and armoured vehicles.
Before midday, the 173rd stood atop Hill 220, the NVA headquarters completely captured.
4 enemy vehicles were completely destroyed among numerous captured. An estimated 150 enemy combatants were killed in the operation, to 107 US losses. The only major loss by the US was that of Hawk One, one of the US Army Air Force Chinook helicopters flying in support of the troops, which was downed by enemy fire whilst ferrying supplies and only reached by ground forces after the pilot and crew had succumbed to their injuries.