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All told, since the siege at Plei Me first began, the enemy suffered 1,769 dead. Some 140 were captured, as were 903 individual and 110 larger weapons —almost enough armament to equip a regiment. That was evidence enough of the fresh influx of North Vietnamese troops that U.S. intelligence had long anticipated once the rainy season ended. Where the infiltration rate down the Ho Chi Minh trail was once 1,000 a month, it is now probably running 2,500, bringing, to date, seven, possibly eight North Vietnamese regiments into South Viet Nam.
It may well have been the 1st Air Cav's threatened interdiction of the enemy's manpower pipeline that produced the unprecedented ferocity of Communist attacks last week. For Chu Pong is clearly a central enemy enclave and funnel point into South Viet Nam. On the Cambodian side, the hills slope gently, allowing easy access for the supplies and men arriving from the North. To the east, the la Drang River provides easy transport and a natural gateway to Viet Nam's central highlands—whose takeover some U.S. intelligence experts believe to be the goal of Hanoi's massive buildup. In its probes, the Air Cav apparently hit a vital nerve, and the Communists fought back in what may have been a critical defensive action.
At week's end, while Vietnamese paratroopers moved in to continue the battle and give the torn ranks of the 1st Air Cav a well-earned rest, General William Westmoreland summed up the official American view of the long month that began with the siege at Plei Me: "I consider this an unprecedented victory. At no time during the engagement have American troops been forced to withdraw or move back from their positions except for purposes of tactical maneuver. American casualties were heavier than in any previous engagement, but small by comparison with the enemy's."