Download the BASFA base area status dataset

Downloads and caches the Base Area Status File (BASFA) dataset covering assessments of enemy base areas in South Vietnam, North Vietnam, and Cambodia from 1967 to 1971.

Usage

get_basfa(cache = TRUE, force = FALSE)

Format

An sf data frame with 8,784 rows and 36 variables (geometry type POLYGON). Key variables include:

base_area_id

Base area identifier.

year

Year of assessment.

month

Month of assessment.

province

Province.

vc_military_region

Viet Cong military region.

current_status

Current status of the base area.

geometry

Polygon boundary of the base area (sfc_POLYGON).

Source

U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), College Park, MD. Electronic records collected by the U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (MACV). Source file: Base Area Status File (BASFA). See Smith (2025) and its Online Appendix for full archival accession details.

Arguments

cache

Logical. If TRUE (default), the downloaded file is saved locally and reused on subsequent calls without re-downloading.

force

Logical. If TRUE, re-downloads the file even if a cached copy already exists. Default is FALSE.

Value

An sf data frame with 8,784 rows and 36 variables (geometry type POLYGON).

Details

Each row is a monthly base area record. The dataset carries spatial geometry for the boundaries of 139 enemy base areas, and is returned as an sf object (geometry type POLYGON) ready for geom_sf() and other sf operations.

References

Smith, Gregory L. (2025). "Beyond body counts: Vietnam war ground combat data." Conflict Management and Peace Science. doi:10.1177/07388942251391081

Examples

if (FALSE) { # \dontrun{
  basfa <- get_basfa()
  head(basfa)
} # }