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Camp Carroll was a United States Marine Corps artillery base
during the Vietnam War. It was located 8 km southwest of the
town of Cam Lo. Camp Carroll was also at the centroid of a large
arc of the strategic Highway 9 corridor south of the
demilitarized zone, which made it a key facility. The camp was
named after Navy Cross recipient Captain J.J. Carroll who was
the commanding officer of Kilo Company, 3rd Battalion, 4th
Marines. He was killed by friendly tank fire on October 5, 1966
during Operation Prairie. The camp was commissioned on November
10, 1966 and became home for the 3rd Marine Regiment. It was one
of nine artillery bases constructed along the DMZ and had 80
artillery pieces including M107 175mm guns from the United
States Army. From a tactical perspective, therefore, the 175mm
self-propelled gun was the most important weapon at Camp
Carroll. The 175mm guns put Camp Carroll on the map,
particularly the tactical maps of the North Vietnamese forward
observers. The most powerful American field artillery tube, the
175mm could fire a 150-pound projectile 32,690 meters and
effectively return fire on any enemy gun that could hit it.
Camp Carroll diminished in significance after the 1968 Tet
Offensive. The 3rd Marine Division began relying on highly
mobile postures rather than remaining in their fixed positions
as sitting targets.
On April 2, 1972, Colonel Pham Van Dinh
surrendered the facility to the North Vietnamese Army. At
present the land belongs to Xi Nghiep Ho Tieu Lam, the
Vietnamese state-operated pepper enterprise. |
