Ban Keo Hill

Ban Keo Hill

Ban Keo hill is located in the northwest of the stronghold group. The French colonialists gave Keo village a new name as the Anno Mari resistance center. This base is located next to Keo village - a village of Thai ethnic people, so it is called Keo hill. In Thai, Keo means a small "Thung" at the foot of the mountain. Here there is a large beach near the foot of the mountain (currently soldiers often use it as a training ground). Ban Keo hill is not very high but quite long, shaped like a crescent moon, concave and facing the northern mountains. Along with Doc Lap Hill, Keo village is responsible for protecting Muong Thanh airport, preventing attacks by our troops from the direction of Lai Chau to Dien Bien Phu. Here, the French army arranged a quite solid defensive fortification system. In addition to the fortified battlefield, they also use barbed wire fences surrounding the base. Opening the first attack, on March 13, 1954, we destroyed the Him Lam base. On March 15, 1954, we destroyed Independence base. At this time, Ban Keo base had become isolated, under strong threat from our troops, those reluctant puppet soldiers were in a very tense mood and during the 2 days of the battle, the Thai soldiers witnessed The rapid collapse of the two strongest resistance centers, protected by French European and African units considered to be fierce, saw with their own eyes how soldiers, even when going to the rescue, were beaten to pieces in their vehicles. Bloodied monks from Doc Lap fled to Muong Thanh, and now they had to consider a way out, they saw the strength of the Viet Minh. The Viet Minh had big artillery and a mighty army. The Viet Minh had artillery trucks. Just appearing on the field was a strange event never seen before in the war at Dien Bien Phu. The 36th Regiment of the 308th Infantry was assigned to destroy Keo village. The 36th Regiment realized that it had the ability to solve this stronghold without a battle, so it used a single-army order to call on the Thai soldiers to surrender. On March 16, 1954, at the foot of Ban Keo hill, a large picture-like scene appeared of a group of Thai soldiers leaving their positions with the words: "Return to the Fatherland, with your compatriots, you will received a kind welcome." Although the French commander tried to control him, the Thai soldiers took advantage of the time the French commander went underground to hide, brought out their weapons, and pulled out the line. The French sent tanks to chase the Thai Wei army and artillery. of the Viet Minh fired to cover the above-mentioned soldiers running to safe shelter positions in the forest. Without firing a shot, the 36th Regiment captured Keo village, ending the first attack, opening the northern door to the center of the Dien Bien Phu stronghold. Source: General electronic information portal of the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism of Dien Bien province

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Rating : National monument

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