“If what you’re telling me is true, why would Burke make such an accusation?”
“To me, Burke seems obsessed with killing Gooks and he’s jealous about us shooting that VC girl last week. Maybe he figured by trailing us, a VC might get flushed his way, but he got caught in his own scheme.”
“Both your stories sound like bullshit,” replied Hartwell. “But I don’t have the time or energy to referee squabbling NCOs. You two are going to have to learn to get along, so work it out between yourselves.”
“It won’t happen again, Sir.”
Only four weeks in Vietnam and already I was on everyone’s shit list. What the hell, I still felt my actions were justified under the circumstances. From that day on, I was a marked man. Both Bruckner and Krol kept a watchful eye, waiting for me to screw up. It wasn’t long before they caught me.
The next night I was assigned to a two-hour radio watch, but the man I was supposed to relieve failed to wake me up. In turn, I failed to wake up the next guy, which left us for several hours with no radio contact. In the morning, Lieutenant Bruckner charged everyone involved with an Article 15 for sleeping on guard and levied a $50.00 fine on top of it. Krol also added to the punishment in his own brutal way with plenty of extra humping. I believe Bruckner gave us the Article 15 because I was involved, and he wanted to begin building a case against me.
At least the squad backed me up. PFC Scoggins confided that the entire squad was on my side, and added that it was a welcome relief to finally see someone stand up and try to change the arbitrary tactics we were forced to follow. The encouragement of the men fueled my determination to continue fighting the Lifers and the war with as little recklessness as possible.
“That’s all the guys want you to do, keep them alive.”
I had just completed my first month in-country when our company was sent to Eagle Beach, the 101st division rest site, to enjoy a three-day stand down. A stand down was a Grunt’s best friend because it was one of the few times that officers and senior NCOs did not have total control over us. They relaxed with their peers, and we relaxed with ours.
Since Eagle Beach was nearly fifty miles from Camp Evans, we thought the Army would fly us there. Instead, we rode in the back of ten large transport trucks. Our convoy rolled out Camp Evans’ front gate onto Quoc-Lo 1, the only blacktop route in northern I Corps. Running parallel to the South China Sea, Quoc-Lo 1 connected the region’s coastal cities and villages with a steady flow of US and ARVN (Army of the Republic of Vietnam) military vehicles and civilian buses and motor scooters.
As we traveled through the flatlands of Phong Dien, I got to view the inhabitants of the Vietnam I would rarely see: attentive farmers, mostly old men and women, working tiny plots of land to support their meager existence. They lived in poverty yet maintained the traditional work ethic passed down from their ancestors. In the midst of war they labored as if the outcome didn’t matter. Whoever the victor was, they simply wanted to keep their land.
Several miles later we began entering the heavily populated streets of Hue, Vietnam’s ancient capital. Hue was a city of constant activity. The streets were filled with kamikaze-driven motor scooters and taxicabs. Vietnamese outdoor markets bustled with shoppers while sidewalk vendors sold everything from stolen black market goods to live chickens. The air reeked of exhaust fumes, dried fish, and burning incense. At each major street intersection there was a sandbagged military checkpoint reminding everyone that even the large city of Hue was not immune from the war.
One of the most pleasant sights in Hue was the teenage schoolgirls dressed in the traditional Vietnamese ao dais apparel. The girls looked like travel brochure models as they strolled beneath shade trees. We waved to them but they would not acknowledge us.
An hour later we arrived at Eagle Beach, a military installation so far removed from the war that it looked and felt more like summer camp. We bunked in cabin-style hooches perched a mere two hundred feet from the sandy beaches of the South China Sea. Gone were the drab surroundings of concertina wire, bunkers, and piss-tubes. In their place were asphalt courts for basketball, tennis, and volleyball. We could swim in the ocean or water ski in the nearby bay. Some soldiers caught up on sleep, wrote letters home, or hung around the jukebox listening to the latest tunes from the outside world. Each night there was live entertainment from different Filipino bands followed by a movie. While all this was going on, we had nonstop hot dogs, hamburgers, and traditional barbecue fare, plus all the beer and soda we could handle.
Our only responsibility was that two members from each platoon took turns guarding the weapons and equipment. Since I considered myself a Cherry, and somewhat unworthy of celebrating with old-timers who had seen combat, I frequently volunteered for the guard duty. Although guarding equipment was not an NCOs job, I wasn’t going to make my men do anything that I wouldn’t do myself. I figured simple acts like this would help the men realize I was on their side.
PFC Howard Siner pulled guard with me a few times. We talked about sports, music, and our common interests from living only one hundred miles apart back in the World. But Siner surprised me when he spoke about what he thought his role should be in the squad.
“You’re the Sarge,” he said, as if making a profound statement, “and it’s my job to protect you.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” I asked, thinking he had lost his mind.
“I’ve been watching you, and I’ve been watching how the men react to you not being afraid to question stupid tactics. Some of them nicknamed you ‘Mugwump’ because of your independent thinking. They want you to keep it up. Bruckner and Krol probably hate you, but we think you’re doing a good job.”
“Listen Siner, I’m flattered by their faith in me, but I haven’t been here long enough to take on that kind of pressure. I haven’t even been under fire yet. I’m just trying to keep everyone alive.”
“That’s all the guys want you to do, keep them alive.”
I didn’t realize things were so bad that the men would start placing their trust in a new guy like me, but it sure felt good to be wanted.
Eagle Beach strengthened our camaraderie but stand downs, like all good things, must come to an end. Before we knew what happened, our three days were up and we were sent back to Camp Evans. Some men returned with cans of beer hidden in their rucksacks so they could stay drunk, but the majority came back with hangovers that were magnified by the bumpy truck ride and the diesel exhaust fumes.
Upon arrival, Captain Hartwell called everyone together to inform us of our new assignment. “Men,” he began, sounding quite official, “we have a new AO. We are going into the A Shau Valley. Some of your buddies have run into a problem out there and we’re going in to help. Each man will carry a minimum of 300 rounds of M-16 ammo, 100 rounds of M-60 ammo, six frags and six M-79 grenades. I suggest you start getting your shit together because we will be on the chopper pad before dawn.”
“Gawd!” Stan Alcon exclaimed. “The Gooks drive trucks in the A Shau. We’re going there? No more booby traps and shit like that. Now you’re talking ambushes and bayonets.”
The situation sounded depressing. Up to this point we had only contended with small infiltrations of VC, but soon we would be facing a fierce opponent who did not hesitate to attack openly and in large numbers. I wondered just what kind of trouble our buddies were facing out there.
The A Shau is a 35-mile fertile valley paralleling the western South Vietnam frontier less than two miles from the Laotian border. As early as 1962, the American and Vietnamese military established bases in the valley to protect the Montagnard inhabitants. In 1966, the NVA had overrun the last of the bases and drove out all the tribesmen. For the next two years, the Communists had unchallenged control of the region.
The close proximity to the Ho Chi Minh trail and Laotian sanctuaries allowed the NVA to develop the valley into a formidable supply and staging area. In 1968, the 1st Calvary Division and the 101st made several successful raids, disrupting enemy supply routes in the valley. Now, the renewed presence of the 101st denied the NVA the use of Highway 548, a major artery of the Ho Chi Minh Trail. The loss of this dirt truck route, which zigzagged along the valley floor, forced the NVA into the new strategy of taking a defensive position and fighting.
We learned that four companies from the 3/187th Infantry had been engaged with the enemy for eight straight days. The action was initiated on May 10 as our troops conducted sweeps of the area. During that first day, they discovered a network of enemy trails, communication wires and cables, spider holes, huts, bunkers, and discarded miscellaneous clothing and equipment. Whenever the GIs neared Dong Ap Bia Mountain (Hill 937 on military maps) they were shot at by snipers with RPGs (Rocket Propelled Grenades) or ambushed by machine gun fire and command detonated claymore mines dangling from bushes and trees.
The first concentrated attempt to take Hill 937 occurred on May 14. Up to that day, most of the action had been on the ridges and in the draws around the base of the hill, making it difficult to pinpoint the location of the main enemy forces. For the next four days, artillery and tactical air strikes pounded away at the hill, pulverizing the terrain, but not enough to soften the enemy so the hill could be taken. Each successive ground assault met fiercer resistance. There was no question the NVA were on the hill in formidable numbers and they had no intention of leaving without a fight. By the time our company arrived several assaults, countless snipers, and dozens of ambushed patrols left an estimated fifty GIs dead, fifteen missing and presumed dead, and almost 300 wounded. Worse yet, four of the dead and 53 of the wounded resulted from three separate incidents of misguided helicopter gunship fire. The fact the NVA had lost men at ten times our rate was of little comfort to men who watched as Americans accidentally killed Americans.
On Sunday morning, May 18, it was still dark when we assembled on the helipad. The rumble of three giant CH-47 Chinook transport helicopters broke the ominous pre-dawn silence. The choppers drifted in slowly, landing one at a time, staying on the ground just long enough for thirty-five men to climb aboard each ship.
We sat against the fuselage wall, facing each other across the aisle. The Chinook was too noisy for us to talk, so no one bothered. We just looked past each other and out the windows at the shadowy mountains below. During the half-hour flight the morning sun began to shine on the mountaintops. From where we sat, the jungle below looked peaceful; everyone knew differently.
We were taken to a staging area on the A Shau Valley floor where we had to provide our own security while waiting for the next phase of the operation. After the Chinooks roared out of sight the men became unusually quiet as we examined our new surroundings. The valley was less humid than the flatlands, almost comfortable. But that was the only thing that felt good about this eerie place. Just outside our position, ten-foot tall elephant grass had been matted down by the Chinook’s powerful rotor wash, leaving nothing to conceal us if we were attacked. Beyond that, steep mountains with sharp ridges walled up the valley where fog and clouds seemed to manifest themselves from the triple canopy jungle. The A Shau Valley was a strange place that seemed not to want us there any more than we wanted to be there.
“Do you think we’re being watched?” Freddie Shaw asked, looking up at the ridgeline.
“Are you kidding?” Harrison laughed. “Every fuckin’ NVA in the valley knows we’re here. If those three Chinooks didn’t give our position away, nothing will.”
“It looks like the Gooks could easily mortar us from those ridges,” added Scoggins. “Or maybe attack us from the other side of that tall grass.”
“Knock it off!” shouted Lieutenant Bruckner. “They’ll be plenty of time to worry about the NVA when we get to where we’re going.”
No one said anything else.
After an hour-long wait, sixteen Bell-UH1D slicks arrived to take us to our destination. We piled aboard, six men to a bird, our feet dangling out the open doors. The ships lifted off but didn’t go very far. We simply flew above the valley in a huge circle. When I asked the door-gunner why we weren’t heading in any direction, he pointed to a desolate mountain, saying that we couldn’t land because the LZ (landing zone) was taking small arms fire. Just what I needed to hear—my first helicopter assault would drop us into a hot LZ.
I gazed at the mountain with its oddly brown slopes against the otherwise green backdrop. We circled about a mile away and on each pass I stared at the mountain with its limbless trees standing like twisted telephone poles after a violent storm. As the flight continued, I looked down at hundreds of water-filled bomb craters on the valley floor. None of it looked good. Man how I wished I was back in the flatlands.
Suddenly our chopper dove toward a hillside LZ about a half-mile from the mountain. The co-pilot told us we were not going to touch down because the NVA were still shooting at each aircraft that came in. Instead, we would be given a scant five seconds to jump out. As we approached, the door-gunner fired his M-60 into the jungle while two machine gunners on the ground did the same. We were already standing on the skids when the chopper began hovering, but we didn’t get any closer than ten feet above the ground. The door-gunner yelled at us to jump, but I thought ten feet with a full rucksack and extra ammo was too high. I was about to tell him so when my five seconds expired and he shoved me. I landed flat on my face.
As the helicopter sped away, I scrambled to the tree line where Major General Melvin Zais, commander of the 101st Airborne, grinned as he watched our unloading acrobatics. He seemed to get a big kick out of it. I gave him a “What the fuck are you smiling at?” glance, but he looked right past me, still grinning. Then it hit me. A US Army general was way out here? I looked around to see at least 300 other GIs also assembled for action. That was when I realized we were in the middle of something big, and playing for keeps.
We moved a short distance from the LZ and spent the rest of the day digging in and rebuilding damaged bunkers and fighting positions to protect us against mortar or infantry attacks. I thought we would go into battle that day, but we remained in our defensive positions and set up for the night.
“Wow,” Freddie Shaw commented, “there are a lot of guys here. I wonder how bad it really is?”
“Pretty bad,” answered Alcon. “Look at the shrapnel scars in the trees. I bet the NVA have been mortaring the place.”
“Did you guys see that two-star General?” asked Jimmy Smith. “I don’t think a guy like that will still be here after dark.”
“Do you blame him?” added Scoggins. “I don’t even want to be here in the daylight. I can’t imagine what it’s going to be like at night.”
As darkness approached, strange noises were heard from the jungle below us. It sounded like enemy movement, but we later discovered it was only splintered bamboo reacting from previous artillery barrages. High on the hill, the NVA came out of their tunnels and bunkers to light dozens of small cooking fires. They kept them burning through the night as if to taunt us. In response to the fires, our artillery and mortars shelled the side of the hill at random intervals just to let the NVA know we were not going anywhere. Since both sides knew exactly where the other was, the normal discipline of keeping quiet after dark was sometimes ignored. Despite our rival forces positioned so close together, the night passed without incident.
Just after sunrise, a pair of F-4 Phantom jets provided tactical air strikes. They dropped several 250-pound bombs where bunkers had been spotted and in areas that needed to be cleared for the next ground assault. We cheered each explosion, feeling exhilarated when the ground shook as the planes took turns releasing their ordnance. The raid included napalm canisters that crashed to the earth with a giant fireball so intense that, for a moment, we felt the heat where we stood. The savagery of the attacks was awesome.