Search and destroy

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For articles with the similar name "Seek and destroy", see Seek and Destroy (disambiguation).

Search and Destroy, or Seek and Destroy, or simply S&D, refers to a military strategy that became a notorious element of the Vietnam War.

The idea is to insert ground forces into hostile territory on a special mission to destroy enemy forces and withdraw them immediately afterwards, a strategy that seemed to be ideally suited for guerrilla / jungle warfare. The complementary, and more conventional, strategy, which entailed attacking an enemy position, conquering, fortifying and holding it indefinitely, was called Clear and Hold.

S&D missions entailed sending out a group of soldiers from a fortified position, generally into the jungle, to find and destroy the enemy. Most of the time, the S&D mission involved hiking out into the boonies and laying an ambush in the brush, near a suspected trail.

The S&D mission ambush typically involved use of fixed Claymore antipersonnel mines, crossing lines of small arms fire, mortar support, and possibly additional artillery support called in via radio from nearby firebases.

"Search and Destroy" is also the name of a popular song by The Stooges.