Lieutenant Bruckner gave me command of the second squad. My fire team leaders were Specialists Stanley Alcon and Freddie Shaw. Alcon was a California beach lover who constantly talked about girls, cars, and drag-racing. However, with jet-black hair and brown eyes, he didn’t fit the blond, blue-eyed surfer boy image. Shaw was black and came from the Virginia Bible belt, so he never swore or used foul language. If he had to shit, he called it a rump dump; to piss was a tinkle. His two front teeth were gold capped, each had a pattern cut out of it so the white of the tooth showed through. One pattern was of a cross and the other was a star. Shaw rarely associated with other blacks. He never said why.
Our machine gunner was PFC (Private First Class) Jimmy Smith from Kentucky. Smith was tall, quiet, and spoke with a light Southern accent. PFC William Scoggins, a Texan, was the assistant machine gunner. He was also quiet and liked to stay out of everyone’s way. Our pointman was Norman Keoka from Hawaii, who was affectionately nicknamed “Pineapple.” The rest of the squad was a mix of average guys, mostly white and and one other black. Each man had combat experience and they all knew I was a Shake-n-Bake with no combat experience. Naturally, I was worried they might hold that against me, maybe even kill me for it. All I could do was speak honestly to the men and explain how I intended to run the squad until I gained experience.
“I’m what a lot of people call an Instant NCO,” I began slowly and deliberately. “I didn’t want to come to Vietnam. I wanted to stay in the World. That’s why I went to NCO school, but you can see how well that worked. I’m not a Lifer, I got drafted. The only thing I want out of this war is to go home in one piece and to help you guys do the same. I don’t know shit about Vietnam yet, but I hope you’ll correct me anytime you think I’m doing something wrong. I don’t want anyone getting fucked-up because of a stupid mistake. We’re all in this together with a huge responsibility to one another, so I expect everyone to cover each other’s ass.”
I thought my little speech was a good icebreaker, but the men gave no reaction at all. They listened and bobbed their heads as if to pacify me. I realized it would take a lot more than talk to gain their respect. I also didn’t want to make the mistake of giving the wrong impression with an ego remark like, “Here I am, and I’m in charge!”
During my first week, I wasn’t allowed to do much of anything related to the war until I got accustomed to the heat and the platoon’s daily routines. However, I didn’t like sitting back while others went out on patrol or ambush because I stood out too much as it was. I wanted to blend in so badly that I purposely tripped and fell, hoping to soil my uniform to look like everyone else’s. But the weight of my rucksack propelled me to belly flop into the mud. Everyone chuckled as I emerged looking like the victim of a water buffalo attack.
My dirty look paid off, but not with the old-timers. The next day, when a new guy joined my squad, he thought I was a seasoned veteran.
“Hi Sarge,” he said, nervously introducing himself, “I’m PFC Howard Siner, but everyone usually calls me Howard. Do you mind being called Sarge?” I thought “Sarge” sounded stupid, but I didn’t say anything about it.
“Put your gear over there,” I said, pointing to a clump of bamboo. “Where are you from Siner?”
“The Bronx, New York City,” he proudly announced, “home of the New York Yankees.”
“And Cousin Bruce Morrow on WABC radio,” I added.
“That’s right!” Siner beamed. “Are you from the city?”
“No, central Connecticut. We don’t have any decent radio personalities, so at night we listen to New York stations.”
Siner nodded knowingly as he began to feel at ease.
“Boy, it must be rough out here. Look at you Sarge, you’re filthy. Were you in a firefight today?”
Everybody laughed.
“No, Siner,” I embarrassingly admitted, “I look like this because I fell in the mud. I haven’t been here long enough to get sniped at, let alone be in a firefight. I’m just as cherry as you are.”
PFC Siner was the tallest man in the platoon, but his size hid his calm demeanor. He had already spent two years in college, where he learned to take a slow methodical approach to situations, a trait many of us would come to admire. I had no way of knowing it at the time, but in the months ahead, Howard Siner would become one of my best and most trusted friends in Vietnam.
If there was anything tolerable about being in the field, it was that there was no military etiquette. We never stood at attention, saluted officers, or had inspections. The only formality we displayed was when we called the Lieutenant “Sir” and Krol “Sergeant.” The most intolerable thing about the field was just being there, especially the physical demands.
Each man carried his world on his back. Up to seventy pounds of food, ammunition, and creature comforts were packed into a bulging rucksack. We were so familiar with its contents that we could easily retrieve a toothpick from it on a moonless night. Any personal items, like a wallet, a photograph, matches, or toilet paper were usually carried in our pockets inside tiny plastic bags to protect them from sweat or other moisture.
Mornings started with brushing our teeth from a canteen of rice patty water rendered potable by adding two purification tablets. Some men shaved, many did not, and no one ever used deodorant. Chow consisted of our choice of any one of a dozen equally unappetizing C-ration selections, which we either ate or went hungry. One meal, ham and lima beans, was so bad we called it “Ham and Mother-fuckers.” But no meal was more hated than the infamous jellied version of ham and eggs. Even the villagers, who were always looking for a free meal, wouldn’t eat it. A heat tablet that sat inside a tiny stove fashioned from a discarded cracker tin warmed the food. Nearly everyone drank coffee or hot chocolate, while a fortunate few made lemonade from powdered mixes sent from home.
Manners meant nothing in the field, even during mealtime. A person might urinate only five feet away, while another is burping, farting, or scratching his nuts. When someone needed to perform their daily constitutional, there was no privacy either. A buddy went along to guard against a VC sniper shooting him in mid-shit.
We rarely bathed. During the hottest part of the day, if we were located near a stream, some men took sponge baths, or jumped in clothes and all. We wore the same sweat-soaked fatigues for weeks at a time. The only way to get a clean or new uniform was if something got torn open. The only reserve clothing we carried was an extra pair of socks and a medium-size bath towel. The towel was issued for shaving and bathing, but it was most often used to wipe the sweat from our brows or draped over the shoulders to keep the rucksack straps from digging in.
April was the dry season, but about every fourth day a brief rain shower soaked us just before dusk, too late for anything to dry out. As hot as it was in the daytime, we were often cold during the night because everything was still wet. The soggy conditions were ideal for developing ugly pus-seeping body sores that never seemed to heal. This skin ailment, known to GIs as jungle rot, thrived in the damp areas of poorly ventilated wet clothing. Not everyone got the sores, but we took no chances either. No one wore under-shorts because crotch rot was a very real and painful blight.
We slept on the ground, usually on a waterproof poncho, sometimes covered by a lightweight poncho liner. As soon as the sun went down, it was as if the dinner bell had rung for the bugs. Mosquitoes that seemed to be as big as birds would carry someone off unless they were doused with the Army issue insect repellent we nicknamed “bug juice.” It was a foul, eye-burning chemical strong enough to melt holes through rubber. Some guys developed a rash from the bug juice, so they wore a face net to keep insects from crawling into their eyes and ears.
Our AO (Area of Operations) outside the village of Phong Dien was relatively quiet with rare enemy confrontations. During the daylight hours, when not humping, we stayed concealed in one of the many bamboo thickets, playing cards, writing letters, sleeping, or just hanging around. Other than the mail, our only diversion from the war’s activities was an illegal transistor radio each squad took turns passing around. AFVN (American Forces Vietnam Network) was the only American station with broadcasts limited to top forty rock, country western, the news, and some interviews. Otherwise strictly forbidden, the radio was a luxury allowed only during daylight in a considerably safe location.
Each night we moved to an ambush site to wait for an unsuspecting VC to walk by. The routine became boring, and boredom itself became an enemy. We did the same thing every day and every night. Relaxation followed by the extreme tension of waiting for something to happen that never did. After a while, the frustration affected us such that we wanted to fight. One day we blasted a large snake out of existence as it tried to slither past our position. It was a welcome relief just to fire our weapons.
Some of our duty was hard to take seriously, especially our daytime positions around the outskirts of the village. We were supposed to be concealed, but because there was such a maze of footpaths throughout the AO, the villagers would pass by our location and wave hello to us. Sometimes they would even come in looking for food. If we got real lucky, the local boom-boom girl would stop by to offer her services.
There was a dull humor to us hiding in the bushes. Our weapons could wipe out most anything in our way while the peasants walked by with only farm tools as they traveled to work their fields and rice paddies. Night, of course, was a different story. No one dared to venture from the security of the village. Once darkness fell, the area became a free-fire zone, and anyone out there was fair game. It was strictly shoot first, and ask questions later.
“We’ve got a dead Gook out there! I can smell him!”
With the coming of dusk, the mixed character of the local Vietnamese, who were friendly by day, often enemy by night, made relocation of our platoon a first priority for survival. After spending the entire day in a bamboo thicket, we moved at twilight to a nearby position to decoy any VC that may have observed us earlier.
I had been in the field only two weeks, but easily fell into the quiet dusk-assembling routine. There was no talking, and the only noises were the dull thuds of equipment being gathered. With everything collected, we stood motionless in the eerie quiet, darting glances at one another until the point man was given the hand signal to move out. With owl-like eyes I glanced at the men in front of me and observed the surrounding terrain in the fading light. To our left was a series of dark hulks–the village huts. To the right, the distant lights of Camp Evans. Directly ahead, the grass knolls had faded, casting heavy shadows on the low-lying shrubs and bamboo thickets.
Suddenly, the column stopped. The point man signaled us to kneel down as he pointed to the right. On the horizon, we could barely distinguish what appeared to be a squad of VC walking toward us. They moved to within 100 yards until their leader stopped, staring cautiously in our direction, somehow sensing our presence. He motioned his squad to retreat, but the instant they turned, we opened fire. The VC scattered as two M-60s, two M-79s and twenty-six M-16s unleashed an awesome five-minute burst of firepower. I expected the only remains would be tiny chunks of flesh.
As quickly as it had been shattered, the silence returned. Sergeant Krol ordered us to form a line and assault in a wave. Assault? In the dark? My mind raced. I felt I was looking into the face of death. We moved rapidly toward the impact area, listening intently for sounds but hearing only our own heavy breathing and the brush rustling underfoot. I tried to stay beside the man on each side of me, not wanting to neither fall behind nor get ahead. It was the safety in numbers thing; the age-old herd mentality that has not yet been bred out of humans.
The irregular vegetation looked like the perfect hiding place for a wounded VC to wait in the darkness to cut my throat as I passed by. I squeezed every bit of energy to visually penetrate each shrub. Suddenly, a bush in front of me moved! I swung around firing wildly into the shadows. Then I wondered why I was the only person shooting.
“Who fired those rounds?” shouted Lieutenant Bruckner.
“Wiknik, sir,” I answered sheepishly.
“Whadya get?”
I closed in on the undergrowth. There was nothing there. I only thought it had moved.
“I shot a bush, sir.”
“Nice going, Cherry. Let’s hope you killed it,” he chided me as a few snickers were heard within the ranks. “I don’t want it sneaking up on us in the middle of the night.”
We continued combing the area for another ten minutes but found nothing. It was now too dark to see anything, so we decided to abandon the search until first light.
The platoon separated into four-man positions to set up a perimeter guard about one hundred feet across. The Lieutenant, his RTO and the Platoon Sergeant formed a CP (Command Post) in the center.
My position had PFCs Smith and Scoggins, each with nearly six months of experience in the field. They were regular guys who had trained together stateside, arrived together in Vietnam, and had become close friends. They didn’t bother anyone, and in return just wanted to be left alone. They never volunteered for anything, but they also never refused to do their part. I felt safe with them.
The other GI in our position was Specialist Harrison, the platoon’s longevity man with more than ten months in the field. Eager to return home, he was always pulling some goofy stunt, trying without success, to get sent to the rear. His nasal Kentucky twang and permanent grin sometimes made us think his antics were a sure sign he was a burned-out GI. Standing a scant five and one-half feet tall, three inches shorter than me, he was someone we all looked up to.
Early in his tour, Harrison had taken part in a night ambush of what was believed to be an North Vietnamese squad. Instead, his platoon had engaged the lead element of a company-sized enemy force. The ambush turned into a bloody firefight complete with aerial flares, artillery, and air support. During the battle, Harrison ran out of ammunition and was forced to scavenge M-16 magazines from a dead GI. While trying to reload his weapon, Harrison looked up to see an enemy soldier standing five feet away pointing an AK-47 at his head. When the NVA pulled his trigger, the rifle misfired, giving Harrison the split-second edge he needed to bayonet the soldier to death. The nightmarish event changed Harrison forever.
“Who wants first guard?” asked Smith.
“How about giving it to the bush killer?” offered Harrison.
“Yeah,” said Scoggins, “he sure as hell won’t crash tonight.”
“Okay you guys, so I was nervous. That was my first contact.”
“Man, that wasn’t shit,” chided Harrison. “The only thing we did was scare the crap out of those Gooks. You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.”
“Tell me something,” I said curiously, “I’ve been in the field for two weeks now and still don’t know what the hell we’re doing patrolling around this village.”
“Well, it’s like this,” said Harrison, “the VC are out here every night trying to get stuff from the villagers like food, clothes, money, recruits, even information. But most of the villagers are friendly toward us and don’t want anything to do with the Gooks. So, our job is to ambush the VC and let ‘em die for their cause.”
“Well, now that we made enemy contact, how come we’re not digging in?”
“You kidding? If we dug in every night this place would be so full of holes we’d never be able to move in the dark without breakin’ our fuckin’ necks.”
“What if the VC counter attack in the middle of the night?”
“They don’t do that shit anymore. Now they just run around setting up booby traps, hitting us only when it’s to their advantage. Besides, we’re so close to Camp Evans that we can bring the world down on top of them and they know it.”
“Hey,” laughed Smith. “Did you guys see that dip shit Halveston firing his M-60 over Evans?”
“Yeah,” said Scoggins, “he’s so stupid. Those tracers sailed right past the bunker line. I’m surprised they didn’t shoot back at us.”
“They were probably sleeping,” added Harrison. “That bunker line guard duty is really boring.”
“Here, Wiknik,” said Scoggins. “Take this handful of stones.”
“Stones? Stones for what?”
“To throw at Halveston. He’s always falling asleep during his guard and he snores so loud that he might give away our position. So we toss stones at him to keep him awake.”
“Geez, I can’t believe that guy is in the field.”
“Neither can we, but so far he’s been harmless.”
The banter continued until my companions settled down for their turn at sleep. The stillness of the evening surrounded me as I sat alone, contemplating my chances of surviving the year-long tour of duty. It didn’t look promising if more nights started out like this one had.
At dawn, we performed our morning routines while waiting for enough light to resume our search. That’s when Harrison started up.
“We’ve got a dead Gook out there! I can smell him!”
“Knock it off, Harrison!” shouted the Lieutenant.
“Hey, man. I can smell him,” he growled back, pointing toward an opening in the brush. “Look over there.”
Nobody believed him, of course, thinking it was just another one of his acts to convince us he’s crazy. Krol took five guys to check it out just in case. After a few minutes one of the men yelled, “Over here! A dead Gook!”
“I told you we got one,” Harrison smugly said. We looked at him in amazement, wondering whether he had some magical power or if he was just plain nuts.
I couldn’t resist the temptation to check out our kill. Death must have been instantaneous. The body lay face down with arms and legs frozen in a running position. Near the right shoulder blade, the shirt had a tiny bloodstained bullet hole. One of the men prodded the corpse several times before rolling it over. Each person stepped back with the same astonished look on his face. I felt nausea. There was a gaping hole in the shoulder big enough to put a softball in. The mutilated tangle of splintered bones and flesh seemed unreal. The face was contorted with teeth gritted and eyes closed. I squirmed inside as the lifeless form became recognizable. The physique was that of a young woman, maybe in her late teens, about my age. We had killed a girl. During my sheltered civilian life I had never been to a wake or funeral, and now the first dead human I set my eyes upon was a female with her shoulder blown away. It was sickening.
A few of the platoon members came over for a glimpse of the body. The others, not caring, continued eating and talking. I was subconsciously glued to the spot, watching as the Lieutenant searched over the grisly corpse.
“She didn’t even have a weapon,” I said faintly.
“The Gooks know the rules. Don’t get caught after dark.”
“Holy fuck!” shouted Stan Alcon as he wandered over. “That’s the boom-boom girl I screwed the other day!”
“Are you sure?” asked Lieutenant Bruckner.
“I’m positive. She came around with her pimp about three days ago. Cost me five bucks.”
“She was probably a VC, but we won’t know until someone from G-2 checks these documents she was carrying.”
“See if she’s got my five bucks.”
“There’s no money, you asshole! Only these papers.”
I walked back to fill Harrison in. He seemed happy.
“Good,” Harrison remarked. “We don’t get laid that much, so now them Charlies won’t get laid either.”
The villagers started coming around then. After all the shooting the night before, they knew something was up, but we wouldn’t let any of them near the corpse. An hour later, an Intelligence officer and two GIs drove out in a pickup truck to recover the body. They loaded her into the back like a piece of firewood. As they drove away the villagers chased after them, perhaps to see if they could recognize the remains. When the truck was out of sight, we hiked off in the opposite direction as if shooting women was routine.
Between the ambushes and hiding in thickets, each squad took turns going out on a RIF (Reconnaissance in Force) patrol. A RIF involved sweeping over large areas to make our presence known so the village would be less likely to be threatened by the VC. Except for booby traps, however, there was very little evidence of enemy activity. There weren’t a lot of them, but enough to keep us on our toes.
The most common booby trap was a trip-wired hand grenade, usually placed inside a discarded C-ration can or tied to a tree. A thin wire attached to the grenade pin is stretched across a footpath just high enough so anyone walking by would kick the wire, activating the grenade. Our fear of hidden traps forced us to be constantly vigilant for wires or suspicious objects. Whenever a booby trap was located, we hooked onto the trip-wire with a rope then tugged on it from a safe distance to set it off.
The RIFs and booby trap hunts were radical on-the-job training exercises, with very serious consequences. One afternoon, two men were considered lucky to receive only minor wounds when one of them tripped a poorly aimed trip-wired grenade. Also, on two separate occasions, men were evacuated due to heat exhaustion. Losing men to injuries or sickness was an expensive way for our platoon to gain experience. It was obvious we had developed some bad tactical habits. The men bitched about it, but only to each other. No one dared make a formal complaint for fear that Krol would make us hump all the more. That’s when I decided it was time for me to speak up. Even though I was the new guy with minimal experience, I figured there was nothing to lose by offering alternatives. Besides, if anything I said was of value, it might contribute to the success of each mission. With that in mind, I confidently went to the CP to discuss my concerns with Bruckner and Krol.
“I’ve been watching how we operate,” I started, “so I thought you might be interested in my observations.”
“Go ahead, Wiknik,” Lieutenant Bruckner said curiously. “Whatcha got?”
“Well Sir, our AO seems to have its fair share of hand grenade booby traps, so I think we should be crushing our C-ration cans to keep the Gooks from using them against us. We should also be walking in single file, stepping where the last man did, not sweeping over the terrain like we’re trying to find booby traps. I also think we could eliminate the heat exhaustion problem if we humped during the cool of the morning rather than the blazing heat of midday.”
Before responding, Lieutenant Bruckner paused to look at Krol who stared back at him with his eyebrows raised. Their silence worried me.
“Sergeant Wiknik,” Bruckner began, sounding slightly irritated. “Do you think we don’t know what we are doing out here?”
“No sir, that’s not it at all. I just think some of the things we do are dangerous and should be done differently.”
“I’m going to let you in on a little secret,” he said rigidly. “We’re in the middle of a fuckin’ war here, and war is dangerous. We cannot be expected to win this thing if we sit back playing it safe. However, I’m not an unreasonable man, Sergeant Krol and I will consider your suggestions. But you may want more field experience before you get too many bright ideas. Most old-timers don’t like it when Cherries try to change things overnight. You better think about that.”
I didn’t know if I had done the right thing or not. They looked at me as if I was a malcontent who had just insulted them. Like typical Lifers, they either doubted my ability and training, or felt threatened by it.
Several hours later, Bruckner told me I was correct about the crushing of C-ration cans and also about the way we walked on our patrols, but he sure didn’t like admitting it. There was also a price to pay for my speaking out, we still went out on mid-afternoon patrols, and my squad was selected for the honor more than any other.
The everyday RIFs got old real fast, especially when it got so hot that Krol stayed back, sending us out by ourselves. His attitude made me more determined that no one from my squad would get hurt or sick while I was in charge. On my next patrol, we traveled far enough to get out of sight of the platoon then hid in the bushes. I kept calling in different locations on the radio to make it appear as if we were moving.