The Đắk Sơn Massacre was a

massacre A massacre is the killing of a large number of people or animals, especially those who are not involved in any fighting or have no way of defending themselves. A massacre is generally considered to be morally unacceptable, especially when per ...

committed by the

Viet Cong , , war = the Vietnam War , image = FNL Flag.svg , caption = The flag of the Viet Cong, adopted in 1960, is a variation on the flag of North Vietnam. Sometimes the lower stripe was green. , active ...

during the

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...

, in the village of Đắk Sơn, Đắk Lắk Province,

South Vietnam South Vietnam, officially the Republic of Vietnam ( vi, Việt Nam Cộng hòa), was a state in Southeast Asia that existed from 1955 to 1975, the period when the southern portion of Vietnam was a member of the Western Bloc during part of th ...

. Prior to the attack, earlier battles had occurred between the Viet Cong and the village defence militias.http://www.virtual.vietnam.ttu.edu/cgi-bin/starfetch.exe?sChOubo.LCctE5dCKhl3JvYOz0qh7yZCw7BGzvffNIEfnqFJvbXmjx2tW1l81BhQ3g@Z5nzDMBmadMoArEMac4sdSxNaZA91Qk0g9flbB8IImL2htxwIOQ/2311311042.pdf On 5 December 1967, two battalions of Viet Cong attacked Dak Son village, and after a battle with the defence militia, killed between 114 and 252 civilians in a "vengeance" attack on the hamlet of Đắk Sơn, home to over 2,000 Montagnards. The Viet Cong believed that the hamlet had at one point given aid to refugees fleeing Viet Cong forces. Troops marched into a village near Dak Son, some of whom used

flamethrower A flamethrower is a ranged incendiary device designed to project a controllable jet of fire. First deployed by the Byzantine Empire in the 7th century AD, flamethrowers saw use in modern times during World War I, and more widely in World ...

s effectively. As the Viet Cong fired their weapons, people were incinerated inside their own homes, and some who had managed to escape into foxholes in their homes died of smoke inhalation. The homes that were not destroyed by flamethrowers were destroyed with grenades, and on the way out patches of the main town were set afire. Just before they left the village, the Viet Cong shot 60 of the 160 survivors. Most of the remaining villagers were taken hostage.

Gallery

File:DakSonMassacre1.jpg File:DakSonMassacre2.jpg File:DakSonMassacre3.jpg File:Infant victim of Dak Son massacre.jpg

Gallery

See also

References

Further reading

External links