If you look at the PAVN sapper against the concrete tower and the sandbags… I know our south east Asian friends are a bit smaller than the rest of us, but this painting is definitely not to scale.
And as there are no other pics to be found ,well not by me anyway …other than a Arial shot during the clean up .
This will be a challenging job,
Stacking putty sandbags is easy but now i have to do a collapsing wall …
So i will make my own interpretation of this scene (in 1/35 of course )
As i type all the material is being delivered to make a start 
Have a good weekend guys/girls !
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Look forward to seeing what you do with this.
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Well well well,this looks interesting!
J
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you are most correct as usual. It was a Main Force VC battalion that over ran Lang Vei They would probably be wearing black PJ’s. Still in that area, and later to the south; you might find Chinese, East Germans, and even a few Bulgarians. Still a rare thing for them to be caught on the east side of the fence. We did catch five Chinese guys in the Valley back in mid 68. They were all taller than I was.
gary
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Go for it Piet , you’ve got my attention …
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Glenn, this one will have plaster (concrete tower )
Would be an interesting read… about the east Germans and Bulgarians and other non Vietnamese that were fighting along side the NVA.
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The Germans stayed on the otherside of the fence, although there were rumors flowing thru the 196th about seeing them in the flesh inside the Que Son Valley. SF had reel to reel tapes of their radio traffic, but couldn’t understand a word of their German. Freddie had a listen, and told them where they were from (a little south of Leipzeg). The had a three point radio direction find, and they were done away with (three). I had the rifle and pistol off of one for awhile. It was a for real Hungarian Assault Rifle. Probably the rarest AK variant. CIA took it from me about six weeks later. Gave the pistol away because it was a 9mm. The Chinese guys were picked up by elements of the 196th out near the fence. Never knew what happened to them. The others were real, but only on tape recordings. As funny as it may sound, and as close as we got to Laos; I never saw a Laotian Communist, but traded rounds with them (so they say). I’ve been four or five feet inside Cambodia. Right at the marker
that divides Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. Old First Sargent has a photo of me peeing on it. Give most anything for a copy. Otherwise we never crossed the fence, but with a purpose in hand.
Out on the border is where I saw wild tigers, and a leopard or two. There were elephants, but never saw one. You just can’t imagine how pretty that place is
gary
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Diorama Police have been alerted - penalties apply for failing to complete! This looks veeeeery interesting 
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Officer ,i am working on it as we speak . 
I am curious, what kit are you going to use for the PT-76? I have, someday, of doing a Pt-76 with markings of one that would of been there at Lang Vei. Got some AM decals that should work. I picked up the Trumpeter PT-76B No. 00381 thinking(hoping) it was the most correct kit to do for a PT-76 at Lang Vei. Thank for any input.
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Hi Robbie,
I have the same PT-76 kit, Only thing to ad is a gun mount for the DShK MG
I didn’t find any decals for the Lang vei version , also cant see any marking on them from the period pictures (maybe there burned of ? ) Any info/link would be appreciated .
For now i use the PT-76 for scaling the bunker
PS
TRUM00382 has the gun mount not sure if its the correct one ?
Its a cheap kit ,i will get that one also if i can find one …all sold out in my neck of the woods .
I Just ordered this book:
This is about where I left off. A few years ago I saw a documentary on TV about it which caught my attention. But pretty much I have not seen any PT-76 alive or dead during that mess did I notice any markings. I sort of just left it with doing the monument. I also plan on - again some day doing a T-55 around the time of the fall of Saigon. I guess matching NVA bookends 
This is where i am at on the PT-76 marking-wise
Cheers
last night I did a Goggle search on Lang Vei (A101). The First CAV did take some photos. The ground layout is as I remembered flat but on a slight grade. The shape of the place was something I’d completely forgotten about!
Back to the TOC bunker a minute. Every SF base camp had one thing in common. The Alamo! Some are small as a 12 foot square, and some are pretty big and fancy (Like the one at Thien Phouc). They are built with one thing in mind; the last stand. This is where most communications to the outside world come, and thus the radio antennas. I’ve been on three or four SF base camps, and none were slightly similar. They almost always have a well built basement with a lot of dirt piled up ontop. Usually six to eight feet deep. The one at A102 was completely underground, and made of concrete. Yet had at least six feet of earth over the top. Ontop of the earth these guys built their own bar (I swear they did). It was open on the sides, but had a roof over it (in this case a thatched roof). There were at least three enterence points and a couple tunnels leading out of it. Might have been even more, as these guys were paranoid about be trapped inside. Most of the concept was from a previous camp built in the Ashau. It too was over ran like Lang Vei. The Alamo was also built on the highest point in the compound, and overlooked everything. The one at Lang Vei looked to be on high ground as well. Kam Duc was also high, but nothing like A102. (by the way Kam Duc sucked on a good day) The radio equipment reminded me of some of the radios used in an FDC, and were powerful. They had the ability to monitor virtually all radio traffic in the area at the sametime, and often recorded it. Never went thru the entire Alamo, but maybe half of it. Concrete was poured by the Sea Bees out of Chu Lai and DaNang. Combat Engineers were too hard to get, and the Sea Bees had serious heavy equipment.
gary
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Garry ,
So what’s your expert opinion, was this just a earth mount with sandbags on top the underground bunker ?
Ps
Keep these stories coming
I casted some resin barrels… full and the empty ones and Primed, i believe these are for the blast wall in front the entry down into the bunker.(on the left in the painting )
Empty ones are the ones that are tipped over by the reckless driving by the NVA soldier, these will be partly filled with rubble when the modelling is done .
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Though not really my subject, I will certainly keep an eye on this, as I am impressed with the things you have done…
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Molds make for fast reproduction, excellent. Don’t sell the dio yet, we want to see it finished, lol.
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Here’s my take, and it doesn’t agree with everybody, but I’m one of the folks that got to listen to the event on the fire push in real time. Looking at the photo you notice one major thing right away. No radio antennas! Plus it’s common knowledge that they were making radio transmissions from “A” basement. They even told the Marine Major when begging for arty. They go on to where you can hear the tank’s engine over head as well as voices speaking in the sing along tone (not derogatory). You wouldn’t do that from that position in the photo. That looks like a perimeter command bunker to my eyes (note it has a concrete watch tower and is dung in kinda deep close to the road. Now look at the one with the tank ontop it. You see the concrete watch tower that denotes it’s importance to the defense of the camp. also note the other tank entering the area. It gives you a hint of where they are coming from. You already know they didn’t come from the Khe Sahn side, and more than likely from the east. The place was kinda narrow looking, and they pretty much had to use a trail that is memory is right goes to the southwest. The first bunker was probably the first they encountered when entering the camp perimeter. (oh for the need of a 90mm or 75mm recoilless rifle). Everything in the photo points towards the center of the camp.
One very small note about the fuel drums (kinda picky if you ask me). 90% of them were MoGas fuel drums, and you best never put a torch to them! Two wraps of DET cord tied in a knot with a blasting cap in the knot. Then use a two minute fuse. Lid goes about fifty feet in the air and the remaining gas looks like an after burner can. But the top looks like it was cut with a plasma cutter, and the top is still round. I learned that from SF, and they learned it from somebody before them.
You know this area of the country is most interesting. Ashau is directly south. On further south is the Que Son Valley. Then you go way down south, and you arrive at Kam Duc. Not a good place to be stuck at. The Ashau gave us Bennie Adkins and a few other guys that looked like they could walk on water. Then we get units like the 506th Infantry (serious bad boys), and Rip Cord. By the way; the movie Band Of Brothers depicts Easy Company of the 506th Infantry. They are literally a history book! Bennie won the CMH for his actions in the Ashau (by the way you can’t a Skyraider in the Ashau Valley). Kam Duc was where you went to meet your maker. Tough is putting it mildly. I got stranded in there for four or five days and could smell death hourly. The Que Son Valley had the same smell of death as well as the Ashau. Always thought there were ghost roaming in Death Valley, and even the rats had enough sense to say out of the valley. Death Valley introduces you to Hau Duc and the Hiep Duc Ridge line (note really a ridge, but a bread loaf shaped place about ten miles long and maybe a mile and a quarter wide. (seven CMH’s came out of that area alone). East of the Hiep Duc gets you to the infamous Pine Apple Forest. Tanks didn’t like going thru there. I’ve been thru it twice like a fool (probably thought we were escapees from the loony bin). Some of the best men I’ve ever seen were Marine Force Recon planted on an island east of Tam Key. some day I’ll tell you how I got to visit that garden spot, and how I came to love those guys. I still worry about them to this day.
Gotta go hiding as Top is looking for me again
gary
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