Khe Sanh has been a US garrison base in South Vietnam since 1962. Its importance was a result of its position. US forces based at Khe Sanh were very well placed to patrol the nearby Ho Chi Minh Trail. The base also acted as the western end base for the demilitarised zone that separated the North and South Vietnam. By 1968, there were 6,000 Marines at Khe Sanh. The base was an obvious target for the North Vietnamese. If they could defeat the base, they would have an almost unobstructed control of the northwest section of South Vietnam, which would allow them to exploit the Ho Chi Minh Trail to the full. For this reason, General Giap placed a great deal of importance on capturing Khe Sanh -- to the extent of surrounding the base with 20,000 men.
The battle around Khe Sanh was fought as part of the Tet Offensive, though for the purposes of History it has taken on a dimension of its own. The siege of the base started on January 21st 1968 as part of the Tet Offensive. General Giap hoped that the Americans would place so much importance on the base, that they would defend it at all costs. This, Giap hoped, would include bringing in other US reserves from elsewhere in South Vietnam so that these places would be less well defended.
It is almost certain that the leader of the North Vietnamese Army, General Giap, believed that he could orchestrate another version of his historic victory against the French at Dien Bien Phu with a conventional assault on US forces at Khe Sanh. In this instance, despite his many successes, Giap was wrong.
The battle fought in and around Khe Sanh has gone into US military history. Khe Sanh base was to the southwest of the 17th Parallel and a number of miles northeast of Danang and Hué. The battle at Khe Sanh was the bloodiest of the Vietnam War and initially there were fears that it might degenerate into an American Dien Bien Phu. However, the importance of the battle ad the success of the US Marines was shown when in May 1968, President Johnson awarded the 26th Marine Regiment the Presidential Unit Citation for its bravery at Khe Sanh. source: historylearningcenter.co.uk
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