Montagnard Rebellion information
for CIDG
SF
Montagnard Revolt
From date 640919 to 640928
CIDG was a Civilian Irregular Defense Group unit
SF was a US Army unit
Primary service involved, Civilian Irregular Defense Group
Darlac Province, II Corps, South Vietnam
Location, Ban Me Thuot
Description: The Montagnards revolted against their Vietnamese LLDB leaders over mistreatment and distrust. Sadly all those who revolted were from five SF camps in the Ban Me Thout area. On the night of 19-20 Sep, 3 CIDG companies at Bon Sar Pa killed 11 LLDB soldiers and held the SF of A-311A Det hostage, then moved by trucks northeast to seize parts of Ban Me Thuot. At Buon Mi Ga, 4 CIDG companies killed 10 LLDB and disarmed the SF in A-121A Det before leaving for Ban Me Thuot. The SF promptly had some helicopters remove them from that camp. At Ban Don, 5 CIDG companies bound their LLDB advisors, locked up A-75 SF Det and also left for Ban Me Thuot. At Bu Prang, 3 CIDG companies killed 34 Vietnamese and restricted A-311B SF Det to the camp; but could not move to their objective in Gia Nghia due to lack of transportation. A-312 SF Det at Buon Brieng persuaded 715 Rhade Montagnards not to follow through with their plans. Later this proved critical to saving Ban Me Thuot because it left Highway 14 open to the north. Elements from the ARVN 23d Div and the Montagnard troops faced each other uneasily outside Ban Me Thuot. There was only one clash at a Buon Mi Ga Montagnard force roadblock and this caused ten striker casualties. The SF also prevented a major ARVN attack on the Buon Mi Ga force located at the original CIDG camp of Buon Enao. By the 22d most of the revolt had subsided and on the 28th the Bon Sar Pa force released their hostages after the 47th ARVN Regt had moved into positions around them. Little was done to address the Montagnard demands. As a result of this, most of the CIDG camps were closed within the next year. There would be one other minor revolt in late July, 1965.
The source for this information was Green Berets at War P:97+
Additional information is available on CD-ROM.
Please send additions or corrections to: Gary Roush Email address: webmaster@vhpa.org
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Date posted on this site:
05/13/2023