Gloria Grahame in state of undress in a scene from the film “Naked Alibi”, 1954. (Photo by Universal/Getty Images)

A woman made-up with the technique of Body Paint seen during the 2nd Spanish tattoo artists Convention of the Only Tattoo Barcelona in Barcelona, Spain on March 17, 2018. (Photo by Ramon Costa/SOPA Images/Rex Features/Shutterstock)

A model presents a creation for a make-up styling show by Mao Geping at China Fashion Week in Beijing, China March 26, 2018. (Photo by Jason Lee/Reuters)

In the spring of 1965, within weeks of 3,500 American Marines arriving in Vietnam, a 39-year-old Briton named Larry Burrows began work on a feature for LIFE magazine, chronicling the day-to-day experience of U.S. troops on the ground – and in the air – in the midst of the rapidly widening war. The photographs in this gallery focus on a calamitous March 31, 1965, helicopter mission; Burrows’ “report from Da Nang”, featuring his pictures and his personal account of the harrowing operation, was published two weeks later as a now-famous cover story in the April 16, 1965, issue of LIFE.

Photo: Man your battle stations: The crew chief of helicopter Yankee Papa 13, lance corporal James C. Farley, mans an M-60 machine gun during a mission near Da Nang, Vietnam on March 31, 1965. (Photo by Larry Burrows/Time & Life Pictures)

Three Chinese soldiers at the time of a civil war in China. (Photo by General Photographic Agency/Getty Images). 1922

FC Barcelona's Catalina Coll and Lucy Bronze in action with Olympique Lyonnais' Lindsey Horan during their women's Champions League final in Bilbao, Spain on May 25, 2024. (Photo by Violeta Santos Moura/Reuters)

An Afghan Hound in the grooming tent at the 147th Annual Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show in Queens, NY on May 8, 2023. (Photo by Peter Fisher for The Washington Post)

A workman smooths out the gravel near the base of British artist Alex Chinneck' latest sculpture “A bullet from a shooting star” on the Greenwich Peninsula in London on September 17, 2015. The 35-metre tall, upside-down electricity pylon overlooks the Canary Wharf financial district. (Photo by Leon Neal/AFP Photo)