Naval construction force support unit 3 patch

Timmons, Garrett, PO1 , Present. Trammell, Ryan, PO1 , Present. Treat, William, PO1 , Ulrey, Jack, CPO , Voelpel, Jeffrey, PO1 , Present. Wagner, Marco, PO1 , Walker, James, CMC , Walter, Jeffery, PO1 , Present. Wiles, William, PO3 , Williams, Allan, PO1 , Williams, James, PO1 , Wills, Christopher, PO1 , Excellence Awards.

NCF Jan 08, The Seabees were slated to play an important and historic role in the growing Southeast Asian conflict. By autumn of , when Vietnamese requirements reached their peak, world-wide Seabee strength had grown to more than 26, men, serving in 21 full-strength Naval Mobile Construction Battalions, 2 Construction Battalion Maintenance Units, and 2 Amphibious Construction Battalions.

In fact, the first U. Navy involvement in Vietnam took place as early as May In response to the bishop's plea for help, Captain Percival led a rescue party of 80 sailors and marines ashore. After seizing three Mandarins as hostages, he quickly dispatched a letter to the Emperor demanding the release of Lefevre.

The message either went unheeded or undelivered, because a reply was never received. Deciding on an alternative course of action, Percival released the three Mandarins when they steadfastly promised that they would personally seek Lefevre's release.

Still later, after hearing no more from the Mandarins and fearing that he had been tricked, Captain Percival set sail for Macao, where, nine days later, he apprised the French authorities of Lefevre's plight. A warship was promptly dispatched and, as a result, Bishop Lefevre was finally rescued.

Thus, the story of the first United States intervention in Vietnam ended happily. The second instance of significant of U. Naval activity in Vietnam took place years later and, this time, the Seabees were prominent participants.

The Geneva agreements, which recognized the North Vietnamese communist government of Ho Chi Minh, also contained a provision which gave the Vietnamese populace an opportunity to choose whether they would live in the north or the south of a country newly divided roughly at the 17th parallel. Prior to 18 May , the expiration date of this provision, nearly , Vietnamese emigrated from north to south.

Their exodus, in which four nations participated, has since come to be known as the "Passage to Freedom. Through the concerted effort of these four governments, , refugees were evacuated from North Vietnam. In addition, 68, tons of military equipment and 8, military vehicles which, furnished to France under the Mutual Defense Assistance Program, were kept from North Vietnamese hands. Another detachment from the same battalion constructed a refugee tent camp and accompanying water and power supply facilities at the mouth of the Saigon River.

This Seabee-built camp served as a reserve living area for the overflow of refugees from Saigon. Since the Geneva accord specifically prohibited the landing of foreign military units or the establishment of foreign military installations in French Indo-China, the Seabees of this detachment were required to wear civilian clothes and to remove all U. Detachments from Amphibious Construction Battalion Two were originally scheduled to build a causeway across the beaches adjacent to the North Vietnamese city of Haiphong.

Over this causeway military equipment and refugees were to be transferred to the many ships lying offshore. The plan, however, was soon abandoned because of French opposition and the later discovery that the previously selected beaches were unsuitable for such a causeway.

Instead, all loading operations were carried out from the Haiphong waterfront, and the Seabees were diverted to the south to help their comrades with the construction of the massive refugee camp.

The Seabees labored for about one month in Vietnam and, before being relieved, made an important contribution to the success of this historic "Passage to Freedom.

During the summer of , a team from a Seabee construction battalion was sent to the newly- established Republic of Vietnam to conduct a survey of some 1, miles of existing and proposed roads. Two solid months of seven-day-a-week labor in extremely rough territory yielded valuable results. When the Seabees returned almost ten years later, these results helped them build many of the roads that were then crucial to the conduct of the war. As tension continued to mount in Southeast Asia during the s, the Seabees first returned in the form of thirteen-man Seabee Teams, capable of performing a great variety of tasks.

Although small in size, these units possessed unique capabilities never before assembled in such compact but highly effective and versatile packages. In the northern provinces these diversified units taught and advised local Thais in an effort to help them form the cadre of essential rural public works organizations. Three years of diligent work in this region was finally concluded in May In early November , the Seabee Team program in Thailand shifted from rural development to the Thai Border Patrol Police Program for the development of remote area security.

The program's underlying aim was to win village support for the government in regions continually plagued by communist insurgency. Before the termination of all Seabee Team efforts in Thailand in , these skilled units had made significant progress toward the attainment of this national aim.

Also in , two years before the first full Seabee battalion arrived, Seabee Teams were laboring in South Vietnam. They constructed small support points throughout the interior of South Vietnam to counter Viet Cong political influence in the villages. The teams built U. Army Special Forces camps, performed civic action tasks, and conducted military engineering projects under the Civil Irregular Defense Group Program.

Seabee Team activity in South Vietnam continued to grow. Generally working in remote rural areas, away from large population centers, the Seabees served throughout twenty-two provinces scattered from the Mekong Delta, along the Cambodian border and the Central highlands, to the North Vietnamese border. In the early years, only two teams at a time were employed in these regions, but by the number of teams in-country had grown to Seabee Team accomplishments were many and varied.

The U. Army Special Forces, who were engaged in training and advising Vietnamese Strike Forces and the Civilian Irregular Defense Group in anti-guerilla fighting and defense tactics, required fortified camps in advance areas able to withstand recurring ground and mortar attacks. Besides constructing these special camps, Seabee Teams were called upon to build access roads and nearby tactical airstrips. Further, in South Vietnamese hamlets and villages, teams carried out numerous civic action projects.

From training local inhabitants in basic construction skills to providing desperately needed medical assistance, the Seabees made a significant impact on the Vietnamese populace. While they were primarily builders and instructors, Seabee Team members were sometimes directly involved in battle. Perhaps the most famous such battle occurred in June at Dong Xoai, 55 miles northeast of Saigon. Army Special Forces team and nine men of Seabee Team , seven of the Seabees were wounded and two killed.

Shields, USN, who was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for conspicuous gallantry in carrying a critically wounded man to safety and in destroying a Viet Cong machine gun emplacement at the cost of his life.

Not only was Marvin Shields the first Seabee to win the nation's highest award, but he was also the first Navy man to be so decorated for action in Vietnam.

Recipient Name. Naval Construction Battalion Cruisebooks. The Seabees began as regular construction battalions made up of 32 officers and enlisted men.

The construction projects undertaken by the Seabees were not confined solely to building naval installations but they were called upon to construct vital bases for the Army, Marines and for the Allies around the globe. In order to meet these diversified demands, Seabee battalions were composed of four construction companies comprising men representing some 60 different trades. In addition, the battalion complement calls for a headquarters company of men who serve as office workers and specialists.

The headquarters company made it possible for the battalion to operate as a self-contained unit. When three or four battalions were stationed in the same general sector, a regiment was formed with a regimental staff directing the activities of the battalions. The battalion retained its individual identity, handled its own issues, and local work assignments, but through the regimental staff, groups of skilled men were shifted temporarily from one battalion to another to speed high priority construction projects.

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