Week of November 29

Week of November 29—December 5, 2020:
Operation MEADE RIVER and Recon Team
Wage Earner

SUMMARY:  Operation MEADE RIVER was a combined search and destroy operation supporting a South Vietnamese country-wide “Accelerated Pacification Campaign” known as Le Loi. The 1^st Marine Division tasked its units to neutralize Communist antagonists influencing villages within a 36-square-kilometer area known as “Dodge City” that lay about 10 miles southwest of Da Nang and 8 miles inland from An Hoi within I Corps’ Quang Nam province. On November 29, 1968, 52 years ago this week, Marine Reconnaissance Team Wage Earner suffered three casualties and one of its Lance Corporals, Thomas R. Steinbach, earned the Silver Star Medal for his heroic actions and sincere concern for the welfare of his comrades.

FULL STORY:  Ten months after the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) and the Viet Cong (VC) launched their Tet Offensive in 1968, the legitimate government of South Vietnam continued to struggle for political control of more than 1,000 hamlets across its country – 141 of those hamlets lay within the I Corps tactical zone. The government’s plan to regain firm control of those hamlets was known as the “Accelerated Pacification Campaign,” or Le Loi.

Da Nang and Hoi An were coastal cities within Quang Nam province, the central of five provinces within the I Corps Tactical Zone. Due south of Da Nang lay an area known to Marines of the 1^st Marine Division as “Dodge City.” The area was tactically significant to both the North and the South because its central location gave inhabitants easy access to the coastal cities of Da Nang, Hoi An, and the inland city of Dai Loc. Its nearly flat terrain, generally only 12-15 feet above sea level, was crossed by waterways of various sizes, a breadbasket of fertile rice paddies, and Vietnam’s north-south railroad line. Enemy presence in the Dodge City area had been significant since 1966, and Marines drew its name from wild-west fame because they expected any allied patrol in the area to be engaged in a gunfight.

Intended to support the government’s Le Loi operation, Operation MEADE RIVER tasked 5,000 Marines of the 1^st Marine Division’s 5^th Marine Regiment to coordinate their efforts with elements from the Army of South Vietnam (ARVN), South Korean Marines, and South Vietnamese National Police.  They were to surround Dodge City and cordon off a 36-square-kilometer area, about 10 miles southwest of Da Nang and 8 miles west of Hoi An. The units tightened their combined grip on the area by maneuvering inward during the 19-day operation to search for and neutralize any enemy threats.

Lance Corporal Thomas Raymond Steinbach was an experienced Recon Marine. In country for nearly 7 months, and a Marine for more than a year, Steinbach was assigned to Reconnaissance Team Wage Earner, Company B, First Reconnaissance Battalion, 1^st Marine Division. He and his team were directed to support MEADE RIVER by establishing an observation post in the southwestern portion of Dodge City. As Steinbach and his team neared their proposed location on November 29, 1968, they noticed a North Vietnamese soldier moving toward what appeared to be a bunker complex. To assess the situation Wage Earner’s team leader directed Steinbach to lead a scout team closer to the suspected enemy position. As the four-man element maneuvered though four-feet-high elephant grass, automatic weapons broke the silence, and half of Steinbach’s element was immediately felled by well-placed enemy fire. LCpl Gary Lee Carlson and LCpl Evangelos “Van” Konstantine Caranasios – the team’s radio operator, were both gravely wounded.

Almost completely without cover, Steinbach reacted instantly by returning fire against the enemy and throwing a smoke grenade in an attempt to screen the team. Observing a helicopter overhead, he marked the hostile position with another smoke grenade and then crawled thirty feet through the limited protection of the elephant grass to aid his two injured teammates. With complete disregard for his own safety, he fearlessly raised himself up from his prone position to apply a battle dressing to one of the Marines, and while engaged in this selfless task, automatic fire mortally wounded the Lance Corporal as it struck his head and body before the enemy position could be knocked out. All three men perished. Operation MEADE RIVER continued for another ten days, and for his heroic actions and sincere concern for the welfare of his comrades the Marine Corps posthumously awarded Steinbach the Silver Star Medal.

At the time, MEADE RIVER was the largest heliborne operation in Marine Corps history. The Military Assistance Command – Vietnam (MACV) headquarters considered the combined force’s cordon to be “highly effective” because it had trapped the NVA’s 36^th Regiment and made it “combat ineffective” due to high casualties. The 36^th NVA Regiment had infiltrated Dodge City from North Vietnam in early 1968 and had been operating in the area for eight months with a joint force of about 900 NVA and Viet Cong. MACV credited its combined force with killing 841 enemy soldiers and detaining 2,710 suspects – of whom 71 were identified as Viet Cong cadre. The 5^th Marines turned over to the ARVN an additional 100 North Vietnamese soldiers as confirmed POWs. Also captured were 164 individual weapons, and 15 crew-served weapons.

American casualties during MEADE RIVER consisted of 107 Americans killed – including Steinbach, Carlson, and Caranasios, and 523 men wounded. Steinbach is buried in the Galveston Memorial Park in Hitchcock, Texas; Carlson in the Forest Lawn Cemetery in Seattle, Washington; and Caranasios in the Rice Cemetery in Elkhart, Indiana. All three Marines are memorialized together on the Vietnam War Memorial, panel 37W, line 4.¹