Firebase Birmingham (also known as FSB Birmingham, LZ Birmingham and Huế Southwest Airfield) is a former U.S. Army and

Army of the Republic of Vietnam The Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN; ; ) composed the ground forces of the Republic of Vietnam Military Forces, South Vietnamese military from its inception in 1955 to the Fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. Its predecessor was the ground forc ...

(ARVN)

firebase Firebase was a company that developed backend software. It was founded in San Francisco in 2011 and was incorporated in Delaware. In 2014, Firebase was bought by Google. Its name continues as a set of backend cloud computing services and ...

southwest of

Huế Huế (formerly Thừa Thiên Huế province) is the southernmost coastal Municipalities of Vietnam, city in the North Central Coast region, the Central Vietnam, Central of Vietnam, approximately in the center of the country. It borders Quảng ...

in Thừa Thiên–Huế Province,

Vietnam Vietnam, officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV), is a country at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of about and a population of over 100 million, making it the world's List of countries and depende ...

History

1968

The base was originally established in March/April 1968 by the 1st Brigade,

101st Airborne Division The 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) ("Screaming Eagles") is a light infantry division (military), division of the United States Army that specializes in air assault military operation, operations. The 101st is designed to plan, coordinat ...

on Highway 547 as part of

Operation Jeb Stuart Operation Jeb Stuart was a U.S. Army operation during the Vietnam War that took place in Quảng Trị Province, Quảng Trị and Thừa Thiên-Huế Province, Thừa Thiên Provinces from 21 January to 31 March 1968. The original operation plan ...

. The base is located approximately 12 km southwest of Huế.

1969-70

Birmingham was used to support the 101st Airborne's major operations against the

People's Army of Vietnam The People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN), officially the Vietnam People's Army (VPA; , , ), also recognized as the Vietnamese Army (), the People's Army () or colloquially the Troops ( ), is the national Military, military force of the Vietnam, S ...

(PAVN) base areas in the

A Sầu Valley The A Shau Valley (Vietnamese: ''thung lũng A Sầu'') is a valley in Vietnam's Huế, along the border of Laos. The valley runs north and south for 40 kilometers and is a 1.5-kilometer-wide flat bottomland covered with tall elephant grass, fla ...

- Operation Apache Snow in 1969 and Operation Texas Star in 1970.

1972

On 1 February 1972 in a turnover ceremony attended by Brigadier General John G. Hill Jr., assistant Division commander, 101st Airborne Division and Major General

Phạm Văn Phú Major General Phạm Văn Phú (16 October 1928 – 30 April 1975) was an officer in the Army of the Republic of Vietnam. Military service Vietnamese National Army Phú began his military career as an interpreter for the French Far East Exp ...

, commanding general of the

(ARVN) 1st Division, Birmingham was handed over to the ARVN. Like most other support bases in Thừa Thiên Province, the base came under intense fire during the

Easter Offensive The Easter Offensive, also known as the 1972 spring–summer offensive (') by North Vietnam, or the Red Fiery Summer (') as romanticized in South Vietnamese literature, was a military campaign conducted by the People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN, t ...

of 1972. Following a PAVN attack on

Firebase Bastogne Firebase Bastogne (also known as Firebase Phu Xuan) was a U.S. Army and Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) firebase, located along Highway 547 halfway between the city of Huế and the A Sầu Valley, a feeder route from the Ho Chi Minh Tra ...

, 6km to the west, on 9 April the ARVN 54th Regiment's headquarters were moved to the base from Bastogne. On 5 May after Bastogne had been abandoned to the PAVN, Birmingham was shelled by the PAVN and in two clashes west and southwest of the base, 39 PAVN and two ARVN were killed. On 14 May approximately 4,000 ARVN 1st Division troops supported by artillery and B-52 strikes advanced west along Route 547 coming to within of Firebase Bastogne and killed 110 PAVN. The base was overrun by the PAVN, but later recaptured by the ARVN.

1975

The base was captured by the PAVN again during the

1975 Spring Offensive The 1975 spring offensive (), officially known as the general offensive and uprising of spring 1975 (), was the final North Vietnamese campaign in the Vietnam War that led to the capitulation of the Republic of Vietnam. After the initial succ ...

Current use

The base is abandoned and turned over to farmland and housing.

References

Installations of the United States Army in South Vietnam Installations of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam Buildings and structures in Huế {{VietnamWar-stub