NATIONAL CAP MEMORIAL
CAP MARINES: COMBINED ACTION PROGRAM
The Marine CAPs, in the Vietnam War were one of the Marine Corps counter-guerrilla strategies to pacify the rural countryside and stop the Viet Cong from interfering with the normal lives of the villagers. These Combined Action Platoons, (CAPs) were ideally 14 US Marines and a US Navy combat corpsman who integrated into a Vietnamese Popular Force platoon to protect and serve that Popular Force platoon’s home village. The Viet Cong had these villages intimidated and the PF soldier afraid for themselves and for their families.
The Marines stayed in their villages full time and conducted constant day and night missions to accomplish their goal of securing the villages. Throughout their existence, the Marines built relationships of trust with the villagers and this trust resulted in an intelligence net that resulted in a surfeit of information about Viet Cong activity and the Viet Cong infrastructure.
This was dangerous work and many CAP Marines were wounded and others sacrificed their lives for the cause. But our war was truly different, and most CAP Marines will tell you they loved their villages and felt a deep satisfaction that they were making a difference. At the peak of their existence there were approximately 114 CAPs spread around the different Marine enclaves of what was known as the I Corps, the northern sector of the country of South Vietnam.
From the start, in August of 1965, until after the Tet Offensive of 1968, the CAPs (known early as CACs) operated out of fixed locations. These “compound” CAPs were established in village headquarters or anywhere there was a Popular Force location. As the war increased the Viet Cong attacked these vulnerable fixed compounds and caused many tragedies. It was difficult for any reaction force to get there quickly, and a lot of the times their ability to call in life saving artillery was impossible due to their close in location to the homes of villagers.
After the Tet offensive, the CAPs started transitioning to mobile units. The make up and the mission was similar, but these mobile CAP Marines were out in the village itself 100% of the time. Everything they had they carried with them. They changed day and night locations near daily. In the daytime they would set up in a villager’s house or an abandoned village building. Never the same one twice in a row. At night they would all move out together. They would head towards and night command post and from there send out their ambush patrols. This was a rough life on the Marines that were in these mobile CAP teams. But it was a lot safer and the Viet Cong had a harder time pinning down their locations.
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