Video: 'Vietnam The Ten Thousand Day War The Village War 10 13' (Operation Lam Son 719 at 32:22)

(Monday, February 8, 1971, 7:00 a.m. Saigon Standard Time; during the Vietnam War, part of the Indochina Wars and the Cold War) — Operation Lam Son 719, an attack by the First Infantry Division of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) from South Vietnam into the Kingdom of Laos, was launched today in the Vietnam War against North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces operating across the border.

The 3,000 ARVN troops crossed the border in armored columns and by American-piloted helicopter troopships and reached a trail complex 20 miles south of Xépôn, the key enemy supply center for the Communists.

The United States provided logistical, aerial and artillery support to the operation, but its ground forces were prohibited by law from entering Laotian territory.

Video: 'Vietnam: A Television History - Cambodia and Laos [8/11]' (Operation Lam Son 719 at 32:38)

The objective of the campaign was the disruption of a possible future offensive by the People’s Army of Vietnam (PAVN), whose logistical system within Laos was known as the Ho Chi Minh Trail (the Truong Son Road to North Vietnam).