Delta Force (8 page)

About the last of July in 1965—I'd been in country a month—we were asked to go up and do a small operation southwest of Pleiku, around the Special Forces camp at Duc Co. This was Indian country. Bad. We were supposed to put teams on the ground and report enemy sightings back to II Corps. Col. Ted Mataxis was the senior American advisor there, but Maj. Gen. Vinh Loc was the ARVN (Army of the Republic of Vietnam) commander in the area. Although the war at this time was still a Vietnamese show, the Americans were beginning to elbow themselves onto center stage.

The first mission I went out on was run by the Vietnamese. Although ostensibly I was only going to tag along, I had been warned that once on the ground, if we Americans didn't take control we would all be in trouble. The recon team I went in with included three Vietnamese and Sergeant Weber. Major Thompson was a little uneasy about this. I said, “You don't need me sitting back here. Hell, you run this show. I need to know what's going on in the field. I gotta see how the Vietnamese operate.”

We boarded Sikorsky H-34 helicopters, and I thought I'd shit. There was a leak somewhere and oil was all over the floor. I thought we'd crash for sure. But somehow they always managed to fly. This was when I was first introduced to the Vietnamese helicopter pilots. They were some of the bravest men I'd ever met. They were handpicked, the cream of the Vietnamese Air Force, and they were the finest pilots in the country. In my view, there wasn't an American pilot who could wipe their asses and take the risks these little guys took.

Our senior Vietnamese pilot was named Khoi. We trusted
him. If he said he'd put you down somewhere, you could be sure it was exactly where you should be. On operations like those we were running, to be put down in the wrong place would have meant disaster. When Khoi went back to camp after inserting us, I'm sure he walked into Major Thompson's office, picked up a colored pin, put it in the map, and said, “Here is where I inserted Major Beckwith.” That was reassuring.

We were put in late in the afternoon. On the ground we ran as quickly as we could away from the LZ (landing zone). Intelligence indicated the area was pretty saturated with the VC, the Viet Cong.

The job was to look at two large trail complexes coming out of the Tri-Border area and hitting Route 19. When we were about four kilometers away from one of the junctions, we decided to stop. There were mountains to the west, but where we stood it was hilly. We spent the night in a thicket. I thought the Vietnamese made a good choice. We sat there all night. I didn't sleep a damn wink. You couldn't have drilled a flaxseed up my ass with a sledgehammer. I was scared.

Before first light, sixty or seventy yards out in front of the thicket, I spotted the biggest pussycat I have ever seen. I'd seen a tiger before in Malaya, but just for a flash. This one, which was as pretty as a picture, I watched for what seemed an hour. He didn't pay any attention to me, but I tracked him over the sight of my rifle. I wasn't going to shoot it, because the shot would have told the enemy where we were, and, besides, what was I going to do with a tiger? I felt good about seeing it. If that big old cat could come through there, obviously ain't nobody else around.

We moved out a short time later. I heard Thompson buzzing near us in a single-engine Otter (U-1). He called, “One Zero Foxtail, this is Big Bear. Do you read?” Quickly we snapped the talk button on our HT-1 three times, click, click, click. “I have authenticated your position,” he said. “You're on course.” We moved carefully, slowly. Around noon we hit the first trail. There was nothing moving, but looking at the ground we could tell there had been a lot of activity in the area.

The Vietnamese lieutenant in charge said we should break up in a circle and observe the trail from hidden positions. This was a good little drill I'd learned in Malaya. I climbed into a large bamboo brake adjacent to the trail. I figured, shit, ain't nobody going to see me in here. I felt I could even smoke. I had just settled down for a long quiet wait, pulled out some rations, added a little curry powder to my plastic bag of rice, when all of a sudden, directly over my head, I heard an ear-shattering scream. I nearly pissed all over myself. An enormous black gibbon ape swung down and looked me straight in the face. He scared the living daylights out of me. My heart just pounded. I was told I didn't scream. Weber, who was in another part of the thicket, said he heard the gibbon but didn't hear me. It happened so quickly. My heart returned to my chest, and I caught my breath. I don't remember whether I enjoyed my lunch or not.

We watched the track until the middle of the afternoon, then decided to move along to spend the night in a location that was very close to the second trail. We found another good spot to spend the night. Suddenly, I felt all worn out. I was at the point where I really didn't care whether the VC walked up on me or not. I'd been under a lot of stress because I wanted to do well. Weber watched me. He said, “Did you get any sleep last night?” I told him I hadn't and asked him if he'd take the first watch. That was O.K. with him.

About 0400 Weber woke me up. “Boss, I can't keep my eyes open any longer.” “Go ahead and sack out,” I said. “I won't get you up till 0730. We'll leave late. Screw it.” The rest of the night I fought big black ants. They nearly ate us alive. Big old black ones able to bite your ass off. Eventually the sun came up and scattered the clouds to the horizon. Shortly afterward we left the hiding place.

Around 1300 hours we came up on the second trail. No one ate lunch that day. Walking in the morning, Weber and I made up an E and E plan in case something happened. I wasn't impressed with the Vietnamese as we proceeded. They weren't too slow for me, just nonchalant. When we got to the trail, the Vietnamese weren't keen on following the footprints we
found. I felt we needed to find out where these prints entered the trail and where they left it. They didn't like that idea, so Weber and I ended up doing it ourselves.

The second night was spent uneventfully. We got up early the next morning. Thompson came up on the radio. We passed our intel to him very quickly. We had accomplished what we'd set out to do, and everything was quiet. Tommy told us to find an LZ, and that afternoon they'd come in with a chopper and extract us. That is when you really become vulnerable, because you get antsypants wanting to get out. When the Vietnamese learned we were leaving to go home—man, you could see them perk up. Things got even more lax. The Vietnamese began to want to walk too fast, to take shortcuts, to move through some open areas.

Weber chastised the little lieutenant: “We ain't going through here that way. We're going to bend way around here; we're going to take the long way.”

“Not necessary. Nothing here.”

Well, you never knew.

We found a helicopter landing zone around 1530. The Vietnamese swept the area, looking, listening. Then it began to rain like hell. That didn't stop us. Weber and I did most of the chopping. Nothing fancy, just a platform an H-34 could land on. The rain quit suddenly. Everything I had was wringing wet, but I didn't care, because I wanted to get out of there. By 1630 we were ready. I heard a chopper way off. We gave him our location. Didn't even have to pop any smoke, we just put up a mirror that he caught. Came straight down, picked us up and took us out.

In Vietnam I began to learn the art of compromise. One of my biggest concerns was trying to get a handle on what the Vietnamese were doing. Bill McKean—his radio call sign was Bulldog—was just like that name implies. He was always biting everybody in the ass. Particularly the Vietnamese. He was anxious to get them off their asses and moving. He wanted to kill some bad guys, and he wanted to look good. Sometimes people don't need to be bitten in the ass, just for the sake of biting somebody. I felt that way. And particularly the Vietnamese,
because in my opinion McKean didn't try to understand them. He'd just walk down and tell General Quang, who was the overall commander of the Vietnamese Special Forces, “This is what I want done!” You don't do that with Orientals. You've gotta gradually get their confidence, bring them around slowly. There has to be some compromise.

I had a real concern. I wanted to be able to use those Vietnamese Ranger companies without going through General Quang. Thompson explained to me. “We can usually get one company without any strings being attached. Two is like pulling teeth, and we ain't never going to get three.” I said, “It has to be arranged so we can get two.” I liked a good-sized force. Shit; get in trouble out there, you want some help. I started thinking about my counterpart, Major Tut. I tried to put myself in his shoes. Would I go fight my boss for something the other guy wants that doesn't mean anything to me? Probably not. Thompson had an idea. He said, “Captain Kong, Tut's operations officer and my counterpart, is the smart one. Why don't we try to manipulate him to manipulate Tut?” Kong, I knew, was sharp.

Thompson and I, one evening, took Kong to dinner at Francois, which was the fanciest restaurant in Nha Trang. You could get a huge lobster for a dollar and a half and a bottle of Algerian wine for fifty cents. We talked to Kong about a number of things, then, “—Oh, by the way, how about the use of these Ranger companies?” I said, “We got four companies here. I want to be able to commit two, and the compromise will be on three.” I knew I'd never get four anyway.

Captain Kong, who enjoyed the dinner, politicked with Major Tut, and Tut worked on General Quang.

TEN

NO MATTER HOW
badly October ended, it certainly began innocently enough. You might even say it began auspiciously.

In the middle of the month I was asked to go to a place called Phu Cat, which is up above Qui Nhon in Northern II Corps. DELTA was to run a recon operation in order to find out how many bad guys there were in the area. This was a very important mission, because we'd just gotten permission to take along two Vietnamese Ranger companies.

In October the weather was bad in Northern II Corps: fog that hovers in the hot air, then lots of rain and low-hanging clouds. All this makes it tougher to get a recon team out if it runs into trouble. Then Lt. Col. John Bennett, who was the group deputy, came up to see us. As the road was normally closed from Qui Nhon to Phu Cat I recommended that he parachute into our location. I did that really hoping he wouldn't, but the bloody man did. He looked over our operation and wasn't at all impressed. He felt we were wasting a lot of time for the little we had discovered. John Bennett wasn't really interested in recon operations. What John Bennett was interested in was body counts. He couldn't see any advantage in just going out and looking at the VC without shooting them. I wasn't interested in running out, getting into a firefight, then returning to a big “attaboy” for ten VC killed. I never was one for trying to kill more than anyone else. My mission was to find the enemy and report that to the big boys, but I understood Bennett's point of view.

The next morning, Tuesday, October 19th, a helicopter came in and picked up Colonel Bennett. Later in that same day, toward dusk, I got a call on the radio informing me that the Special Forces camp at Plei Me was under heavy attack and that I should get my force to Pleiku as quickly as possible.

Plei Me, in October 1965, was defended by 400 Montagnard tribesmen with their families. Also, there was an “A” Detachment of twelve Green Berets, and an equal number of Vietnamese. The compound, perched precariously along National Route 6C, twenty-five miles southwest of Pleiku, was one of several civilian camps that kept tabs on enemy movement in the western highlands. There were about ninety similar camps spread throughout the country. The concept was a good one. The camps gave protection to the villagers in the area, prevented the VC from recruiting them, and helped to establish an American presence in the region.

Attacking just before last light on the 19th, the enemy surrounded Plei Me, and it appeared that rather than hitting and running they were there to slug it out toe to toe with whatever the South Vietnamese and Americans could throw at them.

On the morning of the 20th—after the fog had burned off, Project DELTA's four recon teams on the ground were extracted from the Phu Cat area. I selected fifteen Americans who had not been deployed earlier to go with me, and they, along with the two South Vietnamese Ranger companies, were shuttled back to Qui Nhon. On the airfield tarmac there were parked a C-130 and a C-123. The two planes were already heavily loaded with equipment, and I was worried about getting our 175 men on board. I pointed out that at Fort Bragg we felt we could only load so many men on an aircraft before it got dangerous. The Air Force types reassured me they could handle anything. We were not to worry. I did. We loaded up; people were packed in and standing on top of each other. The two aircraft somehow got airborne and in about thirty minutes arrived at Pleiku.

I was met by Colonel Bennett and Bill Patch, a lieutenant colonel who commanded the American Special Forces advisors in the II Corps area. The two men quickly explained the
situation—that Plei Me had been attacked by an unusually large Communist force and was now under siege, that heavy casualties had been sustained by both sides, and that it was important for me to get my force into the camp and give the defenders some help.

Colonel Bennett thought the best way for us to get on with it was to parachute into Plei Me right before last light—that evening! John was the sort of fellow who pushed you along. Hey, man, I said to myself, this ain't the way to go. I couldn't see hanging from a parachute and being shot at by the Communists as I floated into that little old camp. I thought other courses of action were open to us.

Bennett kept saying, “It's going to be all right. Charlie, we've thought about this.” I said, “Yeah, but I haven't.” I was very happy, therefore, when the senior American military advisor in the region, Col. Ted Mataxis, who was listening to our conversation, turned to Bennett and said, “There'll be no parachute operation this evening. In fact, there won't be one at all.”

That Wednesday evening things really got going. Colonel McKean flew in.

The obvious way to get into Plei Me was to conduct an airmobile operation. In other words, we should be put down by helicopter as close to the camp as possible, then fight our way in. The problem was that an operation was planned elsewhere in II Corps and the helicopters we needed had already been committed. McKean and Mataxis really went around the axle on that one and had one hell of an argument. Colonel McKean said, “What if the weather is bad, Ted, and these choppers can't get to the other operation's staging area?” Mataxis said. “Then, Bill, the helicopters would be made available to you.” “Then, goddamn it,” McKean said, “the weather's bad!”

The other operation was finally canceled when Plei Me became the region's number one priority, and the helicopters were made available to us.

I worked all night, studying maps, looking for LZs, determining routes. My bones told me this was not going to be any
piece of cake. I talked to the Air Force forward air controllers who had been flying over the camp. There was a lot of our enemy down there. This was going to be an operation where a lot of our people would get hurt.

Bill McKean and I, the next morning, flew near the camp trying to find an LZ. The trick was finding one not so close to the camp that it gave our position away to the enemy, and not so far away that we would wear ourselves out working our way to the camp. As we were flying around looking at the proposed LZ the Hog (helicopter gunship) that was escorting us threw one of its rotor blades, crashed, and exploded in the jungle. A bad omen.

The two Vietnamese Ranger companies and fifteen American Green Berets from Project DELTA climbed into the helicopters at Camp Holloway and took off, flying south toward Plei Me. After the LZ had been prepped with two air strikes flown by bombers and gunships, we landed about 0900 of the 21st. The day was another hot one. Major Tut, who commanded the Ranger companies, and I agreed we'd go along very slowly, carefully. I didn't think we should sacrifice speed for security. The elephant grass we were moving through was shoulder high. In some areas, where the foliage was particularly heavy, we had to crawl on our hands and knees.

Around noon we crept up to a small Vietnamese village. We learned it was deserted, but that villagers had been there no more than eight to ten hours before. The cooking fires were still smouldering. Somebody had come through there and taken these people with them. This bothered the Vietnamese. I didn't give it much thought since it was only a matter of time before we hit something. About then Colonel Bennett, who was flying in a Bird Dog (0-1), one of those small forward control aircraft, came up on the radio. He first asked me to mark my position with smoke. I refused. Then he tied into me. “Major, you're moving too slow. You won't get there in a week the way you're going.” I answered him respectfully, but thought, That's nice, but why don't you go to your room, boy, and let me get on with this operation. You're not on the ground, and you have no idea what we're trying to negotiate.

We continued to move through the jungle in single file. The column stretched out. Toward the middle of the afternoon I heard two shots up ahead of me. I ran forward and found one of my guys had shot an enemy soldier wearing a pith helmet and a khaki uniform. He'd been carrying a box of 75mm recoilless rifle ammunition. Another enemy soldier with him had managed to escape in the dense undergrowth. Major Tut came up and went through the dead guy's uniform looking for papers. Tut was getting nervous. He told me that this man was not a VC, but rather from a regular North Vietnamese unit. Our people had suspected the NVA had regular units in the south at this time, but this was the first time anyone had actual proof of it. The next time one of the communications planes flew over I got on the air and passed the news along.

Major Tut then came over and informed me he and the Ranger companies were going to turn back. This was as far as they were going to go. I told him my mission was to get into Plei Me, and I intended to do so with or without him. I preferred to do it with him, but I didn't really give a shit one way or another. I intended to reinforce the camp. Tut said that when we shot the NVA soldier it had become a new ball game. I didn't have enough sense to be frightened. Probably, I should have. It was getting late now so I didn't argue with him very long.

I called together the fifteen Americans and told them what had happened, and that I intended to push on. I told Major Thompson and my two sergeant majors we would lead the relief force.

I had with me the Group's sergant major, Bill McKean's right arm, John Pioletti. Sergeant Major Pioletti had convinced McKean to let him go. I had mixed feelings about this. I knew if anything happened to John, McKean would string me up alive; but I also knew that if I needed support McKean would not leave me and his sergeant major dangling out there. On top of it, Sergeant Pioletti was a first-class guy. I trusted my life with my own sergeant major, Bill DeSoto. I was glad he was along for the ride.

I also had with me a new operations officer. Tommy
Thompson was to go home in two weeks, and Major A. J. Baker had just arrived in country. He was a great big boy we called Bo who had played football at the University of Arkansas. He had arrived in Nha Trang on the 19th and on the 21st he was with us in the jungle outside of Plei Me. What a way to get his whistle wet! I asked him to bring up the rear of our small column. We moved out.

At approximately 2000 hours we were close enough to the camp to hear the shooting. I got the camp on the radio and they came in clearly. Someone said to me, “Come on in and join the party.” That made me angry. I knew people were dead and more were dying, and I didn't perceive this to be a goddamn party. I had also decided not to go into the camp that night. My sixth sense told me if I attempted to enter the camp, those inside might take us for the enemy; and if anyone on the perimeter was trigger-happy, it would end badly. I radioed back to Pleiku and informed Bill McKean that I would enter the camp at dawn. Bill DeSoto and I did a quick recon of the unimproved single-lane dirt road we'd been moving parallel to, which ran into the camp. When we returned to the column, Bo Baker ran up and said, “Major, Tut's back.” I followed him—there were the two Ranger companies. Tut said words to the effect that he would have lost face if he'd left me.

We went on half-alert that night, that's half the force awake and half asleep. I slept for three hours and was awakened on the 22nd before the sun came up. After Bill DeSoto got the column up we eased on about 300 yards to our left flank and began to slowly go down the side of the road. We hit a ridge above the camp, maybe 800 yards out, and from there I could look down into the NVA positions. I noticed a position the Communists had set up to ambush any relief columns that tried to enter the camp. For some reason it was unoccupied. I was damn glad. I told my guys and Major Tut it would take us too long to reach the camp continuing through the jungle. “My plan is to veer off to the east, hit the road just as it goes over the hill, then run like hell to the camp gates.”

We evidently caught the enemy by surprise. Once on the road we dashed for the camp and took some light fire. A Vietnamese
lieutenant was killed. So, too, was a newspaper photographer who, without permission, had gotten on one of the choppers back in Pleiku and had come with us. He had long blond hair. The bullet took him through the side of the face. Four or five others received minor wounds. Within a half hour everyone was in the camp. The first thing I noticed on going through the gate was the Montagnard tribesmen who had been killed while defending the camp; they were still lying in the wire. I mean everywhere. Dead people. Oh, shit, I thought, there's going to be a lack of discipline in here. If they can't pick up that kind of thing then, man, there's some problems in here. I was right. There were about sixty other dead Montagnard soldiers stuffed into body bags and stacked up like cordwood. The smell was terrible.