Bob and I have know each other since sixth grade. We were browbeat by the same nuns and, in our own ways, never seemed to fit in, except with others who didn't seem to fit in. We began to drift apart in high school maybe because we attended different schools. He went the parochial route and wished he hadn't. I spent my years at a public high school and have since thought how much different my life would have been had I gone with Bob to De LaSalle. Can't say my life would have been better, just different.
After our time in the Army we saw each other rarely; years between meetings. Then, a couple of years ago it changed. We now keep in touch and spend, with our wives, two months together each winter down on the Gulf Coast. Bob is a good man and the world needs more like him.
Lois and I visited Judy and Bob this last summer. During our time together he loaned me a hand-typed copy of a Vietnam remembrance written by his immediate commander, Lt. Christopher Noble. It has some weight to it but, in fits and starts, I've finally made it through to the end. While reading this morning, the area along the Cambodian border called Moc Hoa came to mind and I realized I'd never written of Bravo Company's week there patrolling and helping build a fire support base. It wasn't till years later that I learned it's exact location. Yup, that's where it was alright, up in a corner under a little finger of Cambodia that pointed like an arrow at Saigon.
I think I have a photo somewhere of Tom Smith (that's Thomas C. Smith as opposed to Thomas A. Smith or Thomas E. Smith, we had all three in Bravo Company) and 'Iron' Mike Whitworth (we called him 'Iron' Mike cause he was about five-seven and a hundred-twenty pounds. Maybe it was short for ironic) standing on a tarmac, waiting for an Eagle Flight, and sharing a bottle of Tiger beer. If the photo actually exists, I must have been the one who shot it. I did have a Kodak Instamatic camera and did shoot a few pictures. My intention was to take many more but it never seemed all that important when the time came to buy more film. And then my time was up. Never made it to the end of the first roll. The last couple of snaps were of Schofield Barracks.
I must have shot it between naps on the tarmac. In truth I never actually napped. But I did lay back, head in helmet, eyes closed. No one messed with me when I did that. Sleeping dogs and all that. It was the only way I could be alone with my thoughts while in a crowd of antsy men. Yeah, it was my method of dealing with fear by drawing inward behind my eyelids so I could head off to my happy place. Some people call it self-hypnosis. Some, mediation. I didn't call it anything, it was just what I did when we were on the edge of total shit. Figured that the shit was gonna happen regardless of what I feared of ruminated on, so there was no point in dwelling on it. When we were in the middle of whatever was up ahead, escape was impossible. Then it was time for complete concentration on what was coming down. When death entered the game it was time for a grunt to stay on his toes. And no one had to remind him to pay attention. He couldn't help it. Totally real? You bet.
'Iron' Mike walked point for the first squad. Tom was his back up. It was a normal thing, almost a requirement, that the first two men in a squad become friends and those two were no different. Mike, a taciturn kid from Texas who liked alcohol in all its forms, and Tom, a grinning, easy going surfer from California, made an odd pair, but a pair nonetheless. Once they were even dusted off together after riling up a beehive of colossal, black bumble bees. If that ain't friendship I don't know what is.
This time we were on a tarmac waiting for a ride. At putzed, a few batteries of six and eight inch guns were hammering an area of Snoopy's nose with the intention of giving the beagle a nosebleed before us grunts were flown in to teach those evil VC bastards a lesson they'd, or more accurately, I'd never forget. This was to be a battalion sized operation with Bravo as one of the sweeping groups.
Sittin' there waiting for our Eagle Flight, I doubt if any of us gave a lot of thought as to the effect an artillery barrage would actually have. I know that it never crossed my mind. Being young, ignorant, and stupid goes a long way in building unfounded military confidence.
WWII seemed to tell us that if the enemy was hunkered down it mattered little how many tons of ordinance was shot at or dropped on them. From my meager experience in the Delta I'd say the same was true for us. You'd have thought someone up in the ranks was keeping notes about those kind of things, even back in the ancient times of the 1940's. Something like:
"Hammered Okinawa for three days. Bombs, artillery, and leaflets that insulted the Emperor's bad taste in footwear. Not a tree or hill left standing. Thousand's of us died when we hit the beaches. Get's you to thinking there must be a better way."
Random shelling seems to kill people only if it lands on top of them. A crap shoot with little chance of success.
In our case it did do a fine job of sending a calling card to the VC telling them that we were coming in force and pinpoint the location where we'd be knocking on their door. All they had to do was figure on us arriving a few minutes after the shelling stopped and set up an appropriate ambush. Fortunately for them, they were good at ambushes and we were even better at walking into them.
My happy place was back home, even if that meant weeding the garden. A nothing special happy place where doing ordinary things seemed wonderful. We constantly forget how good it is to have food on the table, a roof over our heads, and no one ordering, "Let's all of us saddle up and go get our shit blown away!".
But I wasn't thinking about the killing part. Death could take care of itself just fine. Didn't need my help at all. I was lost in thoughts of being alive with people I loved, most of all Lois. She wrote me every day and I carried her most recent letters with me to wear out until new ones arrived.
Everything was there, back home where I wanted to be. But, for the moment, I was laying on my back on a tarmac in Southeast Asia waiting for the choppers to come take us to a place that would no doubt send a few of us home in bags. Kinda sucks doesn't it? Wasn't like this was anything new for us or those who came before, so no one whined about it. For better or worse we were in it together. Each of us, alone with our thoughts and looking down the scattergun barrel of the democracy that is death in combat.
The operation must have used nearly every chopper in the Ninth Division, even the one that had NAM SUCKS emblazoned in large white letters on its underbelly. Gotta like that. We came down in the quiet of large, dried out rice paddies. Looked as abandoned as the last time we were at Snoopy's Nose. Should have brought some beer on ice, lawn chairs and the horseshoes. A regular picnic in paddyland.
This time we didn't set out on patrol in single file, fifteen meters apart. Instead we stretched out in a single horizontal line, every man-jack in a row. Left to right it was First, Second, and Third Platoon. All of us faced forward, then started walking. The order of the day was to squeeze off a round now and then to encourage anything and anyone in front of us to hightail it toward the blocking force. Which I expect was some other Company. A plan for sure. Maybe even given a lot of thought.
I take that back. Yes, it was a plan but it wasn't all that well thought out. Like our artillery barrage we were saying to the VC, "We're off the choppers now and making a lot of noise just so you can know exactly where we are and where we're heading." Made us look like a bunch of Red Coats in the American Revolution.
I guess our Colonel forgot all about what he'd learned about fighting guerrilla forces back in his grade school history class. As in, "Us Brits will put on bright red uniforms and march along out in the open. You yankees go hide in the trees and ambush us just like a bunch of wild Indians."
Down the row from me in the middle of the Second Platoon was a man from Texas who fired his M-60 from the hip. Yeah, he was a big guy. Later Bravo Six recalled watching him as we moved forward. Said that the only thing moving as the man spit out bursts from his machine gun was his shirt that rippled with each trigger squeeze, "Yeah, he was a real hoss."
A few weeks later, The Farmer tried the same trick. Now, The Farmer was a strong man, no doubt about it. Had hands the size of a farmer, mostly 'cause that's what he was and that's why we called him The Farmer. But Frank wasn't but a welterweight in size. After a couple of his hip high, machine gun bursts we received a call from Bravo Six, a half mile away. Seemed he was wondering who was firing at him and his command group. Not that Frank wasn't an excellent soldier but it took a man of serious size to counter-balance and hold down a hip fired M-60.
We were moving at a full walking pace. Why not? It was open, dry field from one side of the company to the other. Eventually we came upon a small, pocket swamp with a stand of trees in it. Not something you'd want to walk through. Mud, leeches, snakes and big-assed bugs that'd take you down and eat you when properly tenderized and cured. Mainly, we'd been dry to this point and intended to stay that way. No sir, we were all for gettin' through this day and this year as quickly and cleanly as possible.
I was butt up against the left flank of Second Platoon and walking straight at the swamp and had a decision to make. Passing on getting wet, two of us First Platooners hung a right with Second and the rest of the First passed the swamp on its left. Truthfully, I never gave a thought to having pulled a bonehead move. Neither did anyone else. But boneheaded is what it was.
A moment's consideration would have told a good soldier that some form of cover was necessary to set up an ambush. Seeing as how every patch of ground behind us was wide open there was no possibility of an ambush there. But a swamp with brush and trees? If I was gonna hide, that would be the place (an even better place to hide would have been Winnipeg).
Forty yards later, the swamp behind us, me and the other First Platooner angled back left and rejoined our group. Second Platoon continued straight ahead, leaving a gap between the two platoons of about fifty yards as I recall. Don't quote me on the yardage, but it's in the ballpark.
Believe me, I didn't think about it at the time. It took a couple of decades to realize what we'd done when we bypassed the swamp and never gave it a look-see. From my personal survival point of view, not looking might have been the best thing I could have done. Instead, I walked into and out of an ambush in complete, oblivious ignorance.
As it was, our open field was ending. A woods stood a short chip shot past the swamp. Midway between the two Second Platoon found themselves in a crossfire. If I described it as withering I wouldn't be far off. By then my platoon was far enough away to see nothing of what was going on. But we could hear. By both radio and rifle fire. They were in a world of hurt and calling for some kind of relief.
We were ordered to hold our ground until a plan of action was decided on. So that's what we did. Cracked open c-rations and took a break. All the while Second Platoon was being picked off one at a time. They went to the field with no more than twenty-seven men. As I recall, when all was said and done they took twenty-two casualties, three of which were KIAs. It was a slaughter. Fish in a barrel.
First Platoon sat there while it was happening. I had my boots off briefly to air my feet. Even soaked them in a little rectangular pool that had probably once been part of a farmstead. Soothing, cool water that refreshed my feet but did nothing to improve the circumstances.
And listened to the happenings on my radio. Like tuning into a Gopher's football game back home while raking leaves in the fall. Believe me, we felt for those poor souls over there but you see, they were over there getting shot and we were here, not getting shot. What could we do but sit there and wait for the word, while Bravo Six no doubt talked with the Battalion Commander whose plans were falling apart man by man? Must have been tough on the Colonel knowing his possible promotion was now going to be based on his ability to write and put a positive spin on this fiasco. Hell, from what I saw, most of the war reporting was fiction anyhow, what was one more puny battle in the scheme of things?
How long did we sit there? Seemed like hours but was probably more along the lines of fifteen minutes. Or an eternity if you were laying out in the open in a pool of a friend's blood.
I guess none of us were in a hurry to do anything 'cause we knew, sooner or later, a plan would be hatched and we'd be among the feature players. No doubt in my mind when that time came, our little world would turn into total shit.
All the while, in the background, then buzzing around from person to person like a fly that had been following too many dogs, was the leader of First Squad, a sergeant who claimed to be one of only two real soldiers in Bravo Company. Over and over he told everyone, and no one, that he was having a heat stroke and needed to be dusted off. Did it with so much energy there was no doubt what his real problem was. Everyone within earshot either turned a cold shoulder or told him to kiss their ass. On and on and on he ranted with no luck or sympathy. We knew what his problem was and it was the same one that we'd all be facing in a few minutes.
Also coming into play was our new point man, George Steele, who we all called Weasel 'cause that's what he told us to call him. Weasel was nervous, as was his backup, Bruce Rolland, who we eventually called Papa-san 'cause he was the oldest man in Bravo Company outside of the First Sergeant. Both were National Guardsmen who'd been activated for the war. They were both fresh in country and for some reason or other, thought I was an old-timer. Guess I'd aged a lot in seven weeks. The three of us hit it off from the get-go. Even teamed up on bunker guard back at Moore.
Weasel was nervous, probably border line terrified, since this was his first operation at point. To this moment it hadn't mattered. Now it did. Big time. If we moved out to rescue Second Platoon, guess who would probably lead the way? He asked, 'cause of my aura of sagacity, if he thought he would be made to lead us into a sure fire hell hole. Of course I said he wouldn't. It made no sense. Why send a rookie who knew nothing, up front where he'd jeopardize all of our lives? Let First Squad walk point. Better yet, put their Sergeant up front.
Of course I was wrong. The plan was for First Platoon to slip around behind the gunmen in the wood line and trap them as they'd trapped us. We set out with Weasel in the lead and moving at a pace similar to growing hair or continental drift. We followed a small dike, overgrown with trees and brush, all the while keeping the gunmen to our right.
Didn't take long for me to get a call from our Platoon Leader asking Weasel to step it up. I passed it on. Seemed Weasel was scoping out every blade of grass for the fishing line that meant booby trap or possibly a Mickey Mantle rookie card to add to his collection. The idea of speeding up held no appeal for the man. He called back in a voice easily heard at the rear of our line, "If you want to go any faster, get your ass up here and lead the way!" We resumed the pace of Weasel.
Our goal was to pass the VC on their right, form a line to their rear, and trap them between us and the remnants of Second Platoon reinforced by the Third. Might have worked. Never did find out. Along the way, our squad leader came upon a canteen perched on a dike. Not one to pass up a freebie or to keep Vietnam from being over-littered, he reached for it and was shot in the hand. Almost like it was a set up.
Here's where irony lent its twisted hand again. The night before, that sergeant and I had gotten into a a war of egos on the way into our night position. I have no recollection what it was about. Probably something along the line of angels dancing on the head of a pin. Whatever it was, there was no way in hell I was backing down even though his stripes and the entire US Army said I should. One thing was for sure, I was no soldier, just a civilian in green with an occasionally missing sense of reality, and a mouth. Lord how a mouth can get a man in trouble.
Finally, he laid one on me that was one retort away from ending the discussion. Along the lines of something like, "When we get in on stand down I'm gonna kill you. That's no bullshit. As sure as I'm standing here I'm gonna empty a clip in your useless carcass and laugh all the while I'm blastin' away."
Those probably weren't the exact words but the gist is there. As far as he was concerned at the time, I was a deadman. No doubt my response was something along the line of "Oooh, tough guy. That the best you've got? Why not eat my body when you're done killing me?"
Not only was he shot in the hand by reaching for the canteen, he was shot in the thumb. Nearly tore the sucker off. A million dollar wound and a one way ticket back to the world. He left on the dustoff with a smile on his face. I have to admit I felt no disappointment in not being killed on our next stand down. As for the First Squad's leader, the one feigning heat stroke, he was allow to climb aboard simply to get his demoralizing self away from us.
The odd thing, and a normal combat thing, was that, had we any sense, we'd have all climbed aboard. War be damned. But not a one of us would have even if Bravo Six had come up and asked for volunteers. I'd sure as hell like to tell you exactly why we wouldn't but it's a total mystery to me. Nothin' new. Most things in life are a mystery from why anything exists in the first place to all the idiots walkin' around with their eyes glued to a smart phone. Thank God at least the phone is smart.
We left the dustoff behind and continued on at Weasel's barely movin' pace.
Time to cut to the chase. And in this case. that's exactly what she was. We never did make it to the rear of the VC. No more than a minute into our move, a call came over the radio sayin' three VC had materialized out of a spider hole and high-tailed it for God know's where with Third Platoon in pursuit, no doubt hot.
Here my memory gets a little fuzzy but I do remember the basics. Somehow or other the VC made it to the protection of a mud bunker of sorts. I think they learned to make those things when they were kids 'cause they didn't have Legos to play with. Third Platoon had squeezed off a few rounds during their pursuit but it ain't all that easy to hit a moving target, 'specially when you're also moving, with a pack bouncin' away on your back. From personal experience, it also ain't easy to hit one that just sits there and lets you take aim.
And that bunker was between us and Third Platoon with us covering the back side. Kinda funny when you think of it. Nearly all my days in the Army were spent covering my own backside. As it turned out, my backside was a lot less dangerous.
Right off the bat there was a plan. Since bullets weren't strong enough to penetrate the dried mud of the bunker and there were no volunteers to low crawl up to it and drop a 'please surrender your sorry asses' note through the opening in the form of a GI grenade, it was decided to fire up the LAW. Most every platoon carried one, no doubt in the hopes we'd come across a Panzer Division that had made a wrong turn back in WWII, and in this case, the LAW turned out to be the weapon of choice.
The choice of a LAW was pretty cool. Only problem I could see with using one was our lack of training with it. Back in AIT we'd each fired it once. That's it. Hard to get real good with a weapon when about all you know is how to squeeze the trigger and hope you don't go deaf.
As I saw it, three things could happen, 1) the round would be fired low to no effect, 2) on the money and we win the war, go home to mom and apple pie or, 3) the round overshoots and, remember which platoon is on the backside, lands in someone's hip pocket and blows their balls off.
When we get the call, all of us in First Platoon hunker seriously down. Remind ourselves the paddy is our friend. Me, I recite the Infantryman's Mantra of "oh shit, oh shit, oh shit," till boom time. Turned out choice number two was the winner. A perfect shot right through the window. Unfortunately, the VC were unscathed. Not good. On the other hand, they were scared and once again took off running only to be gunned down by the Third Platoon.
As it was on that day, Second Platoon took twenty-two casualties, three of them KIA. From my reading on body count calculations, here's my best guess of what was reported by Division Command. Battalion Command figured that with our total casualty count of twenty three, plus one heat stroke, we must have killed more than three of the buggers and bumped it up to six. Brigade couldn't believe the embarrassingly low ratio and pushed the number of VC dead to eleven. Finally, Division reported to the Stars and Stripes a successful mission by the 3/39th involving sixteen dead VC and a cache of recovered weapons, ammunition and Ho Chi Minh's mustache. Our Battalion Commander is given a Silver Star for his brilliance and the Division Commander puts himself in for a Congressional Medal of Honor from the pain of returning the salute of a PFC he passed while on the way to the Officer's Club. Or something like that.
Of course that's not the end of this tale. Once in a while we had an E-7 tag along with us, as he did on this day. Three things I recall about the man, he always carried a pint of Bacardi rum with him, which he was willing to share and his weapon of choice was a sawed off AR-15. He also proved beyond any doubt that it's not easy to kill or be killed even with a fully automatic weapon.
While we were filing back to the meadow for our ride home he tagged along at the end of the line. It was his sudden volley of rifle fire and its companion return from inside the wood line that drew our attention. I originally wrote that we'd snapped around but I don't recall that as being true. After the day we'd had, what was another three dozen rounds?
Turned out he'd spotted an armed man in the woods. Seeing has how the man didn't have a water buffalo with him there was little doubt as to his political affiliation. One clip fired one way on full bursts of rock and roll. Another returned. No one hurt. Sergeant York where are you? A comic and fitting ending to the day.
We road out on Chinook, lacking any true poets in the Army we called them Shithooks, helicopters. For some of us, we had another Chinook ride in our near futures. That one would be to Saigon and our flight to Hawaii. The second one was better but the first wasn't bad at all.
I think I have a photo somewhere of Tom Smith (that's Thomas C. Smith as opposed to Thomas A. Smith or Thomas E. Smith, we had all three in Bravo Company) and 'Iron' Mike Whitworth (we called him 'Iron' Mike cause he was about five-seven and a hundred-twenty pounds. Maybe it was short for ironic) standing on a tarmac, waiting for an Eagle Flight, and sharing a bottle of Tiger beer. If the photo actually exists, I must have been the one who shot it. I did have a Kodak Instamatic camera and did shoot a few pictures. My intention was to take many more but it never seemed all that important when the time came to buy more film. And then my time was up. Never made it to the end of the first roll. The last couple of snaps were of Schofield Barracks.
I must have shot it between naps on the tarmac. In truth I never actually napped. But I did lay back, head in helmet, eyes closed. No one messed with me when I did that. Sleeping dogs and all that. It was the only way I could be alone with my thoughts while in a crowd of antsy men. Yeah, it was my method of dealing with fear by drawing inward behind my eyelids so I could head off to my happy place. Some people call it self-hypnosis. Some, mediation. I didn't call it anything, it was just what I did when we were on the edge of total shit. Figured that the shit was gonna happen regardless of what I feared of ruminated on, so there was no point in dwelling on it. When we were in the middle of whatever was up ahead, escape was impossible. Then it was time for complete concentration on what was coming down. When death entered the game it was time for a grunt to stay on his toes. And no one had to remind him to pay attention. He couldn't help it. Totally real? You bet.
'Iron' Mike walked point for the first squad. Tom was his back up. It was a normal thing, almost a requirement, that the first two men in a squad become friends and those two were no different. Mike, a taciturn kid from Texas who liked alcohol in all its forms, and Tom, a grinning, easy going surfer from California, made an odd pair, but a pair nonetheless. Once they were even dusted off together after riling up a beehive of colossal, black bumble bees. If that ain't friendship I don't know what is.
This time we were on a tarmac waiting for a ride. At putzed, a few batteries of six and eight inch guns were hammering an area of Snoopy's nose with the intention of giving the beagle a nosebleed before us grunts were flown in to teach those evil VC bastards a lesson they'd, or more accurately, I'd never forget. This was to be a battalion sized operation with Bravo as one of the sweeping groups.
Sittin' there waiting for our Eagle Flight, I doubt if any of us gave a lot of thought as to the effect an artillery barrage would actually have. I know that it never crossed my mind. Being young, ignorant, and stupid goes a long way in building unfounded military confidence.
WWII seemed to tell us that if the enemy was hunkered down it mattered little how many tons of ordinance was shot at or dropped on them. From my meager experience in the Delta I'd say the same was true for us. You'd have thought someone up in the ranks was keeping notes about those kind of things, even back in the ancient times of the 1940's. Something like:
"Hammered Okinawa for three days. Bombs, artillery, and leaflets that insulted the Emperor's bad taste in footwear. Not a tree or hill left standing. Thousand's of us died when we hit the beaches. Get's you to thinking there must be a better way."
Random shelling seems to kill people only if it lands on top of them. A crap shoot with little chance of success.
In our case it did do a fine job of sending a calling card to the VC telling them that we were coming in force and pinpoint the location where we'd be knocking on their door. All they had to do was figure on us arriving a few minutes after the shelling stopped and set up an appropriate ambush. Fortunately for them, they were good at ambushes and we were even better at walking into them.
My happy place was back home, even if that meant weeding the garden. A nothing special happy place where doing ordinary things seemed wonderful. We constantly forget how good it is to have food on the table, a roof over our heads, and no one ordering, "Let's all of us saddle up and go get our shit blown away!".
But I wasn't thinking about the killing part. Death could take care of itself just fine. Didn't need my help at all. I was lost in thoughts of being alive with people I loved, most of all Lois. She wrote me every day and I carried her most recent letters with me to wear out until new ones arrived.
Everything was there, back home where I wanted to be. But, for the moment, I was laying on my back on a tarmac in Southeast Asia waiting for the choppers to come take us to a place that would no doubt send a few of us home in bags. Kinda sucks doesn't it? Wasn't like this was anything new for us or those who came before, so no one whined about it. For better or worse we were in it together. Each of us, alone with our thoughts and looking down the scattergun barrel of the democracy that is death in combat.
The operation must have used nearly every chopper in the Ninth Division, even the one that had NAM SUCKS emblazoned in large white letters on its underbelly. Gotta like that. We came down in the quiet of large, dried out rice paddies. Looked as abandoned as the last time we were at Snoopy's Nose. Should have brought some beer on ice, lawn chairs and the horseshoes. A regular picnic in paddyland.
This time we didn't set out on patrol in single file, fifteen meters apart. Instead we stretched out in a single horizontal line, every man-jack in a row. Left to right it was First, Second, and Third Platoon. All of us faced forward, then started walking. The order of the day was to squeeze off a round now and then to encourage anything and anyone in front of us to hightail it toward the blocking force. Which I expect was some other Company. A plan for sure. Maybe even given a lot of thought.
I take that back. Yes, it was a plan but it wasn't all that well thought out. Like our artillery barrage we were saying to the VC, "We're off the choppers now and making a lot of noise just so you can know exactly where we are and where we're heading." Made us look like a bunch of Red Coats in the American Revolution.
I guess our Colonel forgot all about what he'd learned about fighting guerrilla forces back in his grade school history class. As in, "Us Brits will put on bright red uniforms and march along out in the open. You yankees go hide in the trees and ambush us just like a bunch of wild Indians."
Down the row from me in the middle of the Second Platoon was a man from Texas who fired his M-60 from the hip. Yeah, he was a big guy. Later Bravo Six recalled watching him as we moved forward. Said that the only thing moving as the man spit out bursts from his machine gun was his shirt that rippled with each trigger squeeze, "Yeah, he was a real hoss."
A few weeks later, The Farmer tried the same trick. Now, The Farmer was a strong man, no doubt about it. Had hands the size of a farmer, mostly 'cause that's what he was and that's why we called him The Farmer. But Frank wasn't but a welterweight in size. After a couple of his hip high, machine gun bursts we received a call from Bravo Six, a half mile away. Seemed he was wondering who was firing at him and his command group. Not that Frank wasn't an excellent soldier but it took a man of serious size to counter-balance and hold down a hip fired M-60.
We were moving at a full walking pace. Why not? It was open, dry field from one side of the company to the other. Eventually we came upon a small, pocket swamp with a stand of trees in it. Not something you'd want to walk through. Mud, leeches, snakes and big-assed bugs that'd take you down and eat you when properly tenderized and cured. Mainly, we'd been dry to this point and intended to stay that way. No sir, we were all for gettin' through this day and this year as quickly and cleanly as possible.
I was butt up against the left flank of Second Platoon and walking straight at the swamp and had a decision to make. Passing on getting wet, two of us First Platooners hung a right with Second and the rest of the First passed the swamp on its left. Truthfully, I never gave a thought to having pulled a bonehead move. Neither did anyone else. But boneheaded is what it was.
A moment's consideration would have told a good soldier that some form of cover was necessary to set up an ambush. Seeing as how every patch of ground behind us was wide open there was no possibility of an ambush there. But a swamp with brush and trees? If I was gonna hide, that would be the place (an even better place to hide would have been Winnipeg).
Forty yards later, the swamp behind us, me and the other First Platooner angled back left and rejoined our group. Second Platoon continued straight ahead, leaving a gap between the two platoons of about fifty yards as I recall. Don't quote me on the yardage, but it's in the ballpark.
Believe me, I didn't think about it at the time. It took a couple of decades to realize what we'd done when we bypassed the swamp and never gave it a look-see. From my personal survival point of view, not looking might have been the best thing I could have done. Instead, I walked into and out of an ambush in complete, oblivious ignorance.
As it was, our open field was ending. A woods stood a short chip shot past the swamp. Midway between the two Second Platoon found themselves in a crossfire. If I described it as withering I wouldn't be far off. By then my platoon was far enough away to see nothing of what was going on. But we could hear. By both radio and rifle fire. They were in a world of hurt and calling for some kind of relief.
We were ordered to hold our ground until a plan of action was decided on. So that's what we did. Cracked open c-rations and took a break. All the while Second Platoon was being picked off one at a time. They went to the field with no more than twenty-seven men. As I recall, when all was said and done they took twenty-two casualties, three of which were KIAs. It was a slaughter. Fish in a barrel.
First Platoon sat there while it was happening. I had my boots off briefly to air my feet. Even soaked them in a little rectangular pool that had probably once been part of a farmstead. Soothing, cool water that refreshed my feet but did nothing to improve the circumstances.
And listened to the happenings on my radio. Like tuning into a Gopher's football game back home while raking leaves in the fall. Believe me, we felt for those poor souls over there but you see, they were over there getting shot and we were here, not getting shot. What could we do but sit there and wait for the word, while Bravo Six no doubt talked with the Battalion Commander whose plans were falling apart man by man? Must have been tough on the Colonel knowing his possible promotion was now going to be based on his ability to write and put a positive spin on this fiasco. Hell, from what I saw, most of the war reporting was fiction anyhow, what was one more puny battle in the scheme of things?
How long did we sit there? Seemed like hours but was probably more along the lines of fifteen minutes. Or an eternity if you were laying out in the open in a pool of a friend's blood.
I guess none of us were in a hurry to do anything 'cause we knew, sooner or later, a plan would be hatched and we'd be among the feature players. No doubt in my mind when that time came, our little world would turn into total shit.
All the while, in the background, then buzzing around from person to person like a fly that had been following too many dogs, was the leader of First Squad, a sergeant who claimed to be one of only two real soldiers in Bravo Company. Over and over he told everyone, and no one, that he was having a heat stroke and needed to be dusted off. Did it with so much energy there was no doubt what his real problem was. Everyone within earshot either turned a cold shoulder or told him to kiss their ass. On and on and on he ranted with no luck or sympathy. We knew what his problem was and it was the same one that we'd all be facing in a few minutes.
Also coming into play was our new point man, George Steele, who we all called Weasel 'cause that's what he told us to call him. Weasel was nervous, as was his backup, Bruce Rolland, who we eventually called Papa-san 'cause he was the oldest man in Bravo Company outside of the First Sergeant. Both were National Guardsmen who'd been activated for the war. They were both fresh in country and for some reason or other, thought I was an old-timer. Guess I'd aged a lot in seven weeks. The three of us hit it off from the get-go. Even teamed up on bunker guard back at Moore.
Weasel was nervous, probably border line terrified, since this was his first operation at point. To this moment it hadn't mattered. Now it did. Big time. If we moved out to rescue Second Platoon, guess who would probably lead the way? He asked, 'cause of my aura of sagacity, if he thought he would be made to lead us into a sure fire hell hole. Of course I said he wouldn't. It made no sense. Why send a rookie who knew nothing, up front where he'd jeopardize all of our lives? Let First Squad walk point. Better yet, put their Sergeant up front.
Of course I was wrong. The plan was for First Platoon to slip around behind the gunmen in the wood line and trap them as they'd trapped us. We set out with Weasel in the lead and moving at a pace similar to growing hair or continental drift. We followed a small dike, overgrown with trees and brush, all the while keeping the gunmen to our right.
Didn't take long for me to get a call from our Platoon Leader asking Weasel to step it up. I passed it on. Seemed Weasel was scoping out every blade of grass for the fishing line that meant booby trap or possibly a Mickey Mantle rookie card to add to his collection. The idea of speeding up held no appeal for the man. He called back in a voice easily heard at the rear of our line, "If you want to go any faster, get your ass up here and lead the way!" We resumed the pace of Weasel.
Our goal was to pass the VC on their right, form a line to their rear, and trap them between us and the remnants of Second Platoon reinforced by the Third. Might have worked. Never did find out. Along the way, our squad leader came upon a canteen perched on a dike. Not one to pass up a freebie or to keep Vietnam from being over-littered, he reached for it and was shot in the hand. Almost like it was a set up.
Here's where irony lent its twisted hand again. The night before, that sergeant and I had gotten into a a war of egos on the way into our night position. I have no recollection what it was about. Probably something along the line of angels dancing on the head of a pin. Whatever it was, there was no way in hell I was backing down even though his stripes and the entire US Army said I should. One thing was for sure, I was no soldier, just a civilian in green with an occasionally missing sense of reality, and a mouth. Lord how a mouth can get a man in trouble.
Finally, he laid one on me that was one retort away from ending the discussion. Along the lines of something like, "When we get in on stand down I'm gonna kill you. That's no bullshit. As sure as I'm standing here I'm gonna empty a clip in your useless carcass and laugh all the while I'm blastin' away."
Those probably weren't the exact words but the gist is there. As far as he was concerned at the time, I was a deadman. No doubt my response was something along the line of "Oooh, tough guy. That the best you've got? Why not eat my body when you're done killing me?"
Not only was he shot in the hand by reaching for the canteen, he was shot in the thumb. Nearly tore the sucker off. A million dollar wound and a one way ticket back to the world. He left on the dustoff with a smile on his face. I have to admit I felt no disappointment in not being killed on our next stand down. As for the First Squad's leader, the one feigning heat stroke, he was allow to climb aboard simply to get his demoralizing self away from us.
The odd thing, and a normal combat thing, was that, had we any sense, we'd have all climbed aboard. War be damned. But not a one of us would have even if Bravo Six had come up and asked for volunteers. I'd sure as hell like to tell you exactly why we wouldn't but it's a total mystery to me. Nothin' new. Most things in life are a mystery from why anything exists in the first place to all the idiots walkin' around with their eyes glued to a smart phone. Thank God at least the phone is smart.
We left the dustoff behind and continued on at Weasel's barely movin' pace.
Time to cut to the chase. And in this case. that's exactly what she was. We never did make it to the rear of the VC. No more than a minute into our move, a call came over the radio sayin' three VC had materialized out of a spider hole and high-tailed it for God know's where with Third Platoon in pursuit, no doubt hot.
Here my memory gets a little fuzzy but I do remember the basics. Somehow or other the VC made it to the protection of a mud bunker of sorts. I think they learned to make those things when they were kids 'cause they didn't have Legos to play with. Third Platoon had squeezed off a few rounds during their pursuit but it ain't all that easy to hit a moving target, 'specially when you're also moving, with a pack bouncin' away on your back. From personal experience, it also ain't easy to hit one that just sits there and lets you take aim.
And that bunker was between us and Third Platoon with us covering the back side. Kinda funny when you think of it. Nearly all my days in the Army were spent covering my own backside. As it turned out, my backside was a lot less dangerous.
Right off the bat there was a plan. Since bullets weren't strong enough to penetrate the dried mud of the bunker and there were no volunteers to low crawl up to it and drop a 'please surrender your sorry asses' note through the opening in the form of a GI grenade, it was decided to fire up the LAW. Most every platoon carried one, no doubt in the hopes we'd come across a Panzer Division that had made a wrong turn back in WWII, and in this case, the LAW turned out to be the weapon of choice.
The choice of a LAW was pretty cool. Only problem I could see with using one was our lack of training with it. Back in AIT we'd each fired it once. That's it. Hard to get real good with a weapon when about all you know is how to squeeze the trigger and hope you don't go deaf.
As I saw it, three things could happen, 1) the round would be fired low to no effect, 2) on the money and we win the war, go home to mom and apple pie or, 3) the round overshoots and, remember which platoon is on the backside, lands in someone's hip pocket and blows their balls off.
When we get the call, all of us in First Platoon hunker seriously down. Remind ourselves the paddy is our friend. Me, I recite the Infantryman's Mantra of "oh shit, oh shit, oh shit," till boom time. Turned out choice number two was the winner. A perfect shot right through the window. Unfortunately, the VC were unscathed. Not good. On the other hand, they were scared and once again took off running only to be gunned down by the Third Platoon.
As it was on that day, Second Platoon took twenty-two casualties, three of them KIA. From my reading on body count calculations, here's my best guess of what was reported by Division Command. Battalion Command figured that with our total casualty count of twenty three, plus one heat stroke, we must have killed more than three of the buggers and bumped it up to six. Brigade couldn't believe the embarrassingly low ratio and pushed the number of VC dead to eleven. Finally, Division reported to the Stars and Stripes a successful mission by the 3/39th involving sixteen dead VC and a cache of recovered weapons, ammunition and Ho Chi Minh's mustache. Our Battalion Commander is given a Silver Star for his brilliance and the Division Commander puts himself in for a Congressional Medal of Honor from the pain of returning the salute of a PFC he passed while on the way to the Officer's Club. Or something like that.
Of course that's not the end of this tale. Once in a while we had an E-7 tag along with us, as he did on this day. Three things I recall about the man, he always carried a pint of Bacardi rum with him, which he was willing to share and his weapon of choice was a sawed off AR-15. He also proved beyond any doubt that it's not easy to kill or be killed even with a fully automatic weapon.
While we were filing back to the meadow for our ride home he tagged along at the end of the line. It was his sudden volley of rifle fire and its companion return from inside the wood line that drew our attention. I originally wrote that we'd snapped around but I don't recall that as being true. After the day we'd had, what was another three dozen rounds?
Turned out he'd spotted an armed man in the woods. Seeing has how the man didn't have a water buffalo with him there was little doubt as to his political affiliation. One clip fired one way on full bursts of rock and roll. Another returned. No one hurt. Sergeant York where are you? A comic and fitting ending to the day.
We road out on Chinook, lacking any true poets in the Army we called them Shithooks, helicopters. For some of us, we had another Chinook ride in our near futures. That one would be to Saigon and our flight to Hawaii. The second one was better but the first wasn't bad at all.
No comments:
Post a Comment