Private Wayne Teeling was approaching the first line of houses when a bullet struck him through the neck. He died in the village of Binh Ba on 6 June 1969, one Australian killed in an engagement that would leave the village itself nearly destroyed. Operation Hammer, as the battle came to be known, was unlike anything the Australians had experienced in their years of jungle patrolling in Phuoc Tuy Province. This was not a firefight in dense undergrowth or an ambush along a jungle trail. This was house-to-house combat, room by room, with Centurion tanks punching holes through brick walls so that infantry could storm in behind them. By the time it ended three days later, at least 107 enemy fighters were dead, and the village that 3,000 people had called home was in ruins.
Binh Ba sat just five kilometers north of the Australian base at Nui Dat, on the western side of Route 2. It was a tidy, rectangular settlement of solid brick and tile houses, home to about 3,000 farmers and rubber plantation workers. The Australians knew it well. During the 5th Battalion's first tour, a rifle company and mortar section had been stationed inside the village itself, a presence that deterred the VC tax collectors and assassination squads who otherwise controlled the population through intimidation. But the small Australian force could not sustain such commitments indefinitely, and Binh Ba was eventually left to the protection of South Vietnamese Regional Forces. On the night of 5-6 June 1969, a combined force moved in to seize what the Australians had vacated: a company from the People's Army of Vietnam 33rd Regiment, elements of the VC D440 Provincial Mobile Battalion, and local guerrilla squads from Binh Ba and Ngai Giao.
Initial intelligence suggested only a platoon-sized force had infiltrated the village. That assessment was catastrophically wrong. At 08:00 on 6 June, an Australian Centurion tank and an armored recovery vehicle moving through Binh Ba to assist another battalion operating to the north were fired upon. A rocket-propelled grenade struck the Centurion, penetrating its turret and severely injuring a crewman. The district commander asked the Australians for help clearing the village, and the 1st Australian Task Force activated its Ready Reaction Force: an understrength D Company of just 65 men from 5 RAR, a troop of Centurion tanks, and a troop of M113 armored personnel carriers. Major Murray Blake led them south toward Binh Ba, where a force closer to battalion strength than the reported platoon was waiting behind brick walls and inside the houses of a village built to last.
After helicopter gunships from No. 9 Squadron RAAF prepared the ground and civilians were evacuated, D Company approached from the south at 10:30, four Centurion tanks leading with infantry in APCs behind. They reached the village edge at 11:20 under light fire, but by the time they pushed into the central marketplace, concealed RPG-7 teams had damaged two Centurions and penetrated a third. Within an hour, three of four tanks were disabled. Blake swung the attack left to clear the southern edge, and as the armor moved through the rubber trees they collided with an enemy company forming up to counterattack, inflicting heavy casualties. By afternoon, reinforcements from B Company arrived and Lieutenant Colonel Colin Khan assumed command. The second assault came with infantry leading, a deliberate house-by-house clearance where every building became a potential fortress. Tank rounds punched through walls; infantry rushed the breach. Six enemy dead lay in the rubble of the first house alone.
What made Binh Ba agonizing was the presence of the people who lived there. Despite evacuation efforts, pockets of civilians remained trapped throughout the fighting. Some hid in the small air-raid bunkers attached to every house. Others tried to flee through streets swept by crossfire. Enemy fighters, recognizing the complication this created, discarded their uniforms and weapons and attempted to mingle with the civilians who could not escape. The Australians were forced into an impossible calculus: they had to expose themselves to extreme danger while trying to move these groups to the rear of the battle zone, all while receiving fire from buildings a few meters away. The fighting continued until dark, and D Company and their armored support spent the night in a defensive position inside the village they had not yet fully cleared. At dawn on 7 June, B Company intercepted an entire PAVN/VC company trying to enter the town. The clearing resumed, bunker by bunker, house by house.
Operation Hammer ended on the morning of 8 June after one final sweep. One Australian had been killed and ten wounded. At least 107 enemy fighters were dead, six wounded, and eight captured. But Binh Ba was devastated, so many homes destroyed that the 1st Australian Civil Affairs Unit helped resettle displaced families. An unknown number of civilians had also died, a fact that, combined with the lopsided casualty count, later prompted allegations of an Australian atrocity in the press. The battle was nonetheless recognized as one of Australia's major victories in Vietnam. The Royal Australian Regiment, 3rd Cavalry Regiment, and 1st Armoured Regiment received the battle honour 'Binh Ba,' one of only five awarded to Australian units during the entire war. The PAVN withdrew from Phuoc Tuy into neighboring Long Khanh Province, and large-scale engagements in the Australian area of operations effectively ceased. The village was rebuilt. The war continued.
Coordinates: 10.59°N, 107.23°E. Binh Ba village sits 5 km north of the former Australian base at Nui Dat in what was Phuoc Tuy Province, now Ba Ria-Vung Tau Province in southern Vietnam, along Route 2. The area is relatively flat with rubber plantations and agricultural land. Nearby airports include Vung Tau Airport (VVVT) approximately 25 km to the south and Tan Son Nhat International Airport (VVTS) roughly 85 km to the northwest in Ho Chi Minh City. Best viewed from 3,000-5,000 feet AGL where the village layout and surrounding plantation grids are visible.