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Oh, man! It looks like I struck a nerve. I hope y’all aren’t too upset with me.
Mark: Yes, I used to worry about what I’d become too and even more concerned whether or not I would be able to shed the “new” me when I got home. The truth is that I haven’t. He’s mostly out of sight now, but still there, still lurking in the shadows and I’m scared of him. In your instance, I find it intriguing that you became concerned about what you’d become over nearly shooting one of your own, when the larger question might have been how and why you got to the place of being able to force a child to walk point. Though I doubt many of us have come to that particular example of cold-heartedness, we’ve done other things equally as bad and they reveal a lot about us, don’t they?
Carl: I think what you mentioned is the root of my problems too. I’m a Christian and know right from wrong. At the time, I believed but had never made that profession of faith necessary for salvation, but I still knew when I was doing things which just weren’t right and it bothered me…a lot. It still does. I used to wonder whether or not the situation we found ourselves in trumped morality, or whether morality in that place was different because of the situation. If those morals I’d been taught were absolutes, then I was immoral. If they weren’t absolute, then I had no moral grounding.
I’ve finally come to the conclusion that the men we became there are not the aberration. The good and decent men we THOUGHT we were was the facade, the mirage. In reality, I think the monster is the true self and the Bible backs that up. But, just knowing that and becoming that are two very different things. One value from that experience is that I now know for SURE what my salvation cost Christ because I’ve met my true self and know how awful I am, how deep the pit of evil is in my own heart. Fortunately, most people never have to confront their true nature, but those of us who have know something they don’t and never will. But, it’s not an easy thing to see, is it?
LT: I can’t fault Nixon for ending the war however he could. The People had grown weary of spending the lives of their sons and their treasure on an endless war with no prospect of victory. Nobody will do that forever, nor should they be forced to.
Gary, it was the beginning of my 10th month. I was leading a platoon sized element from one village to another, along a well traveled trail. Being somewhat uncomfortable, I took a girl from the first ville and had her walk point. She was about 11 or 12 years old. At some point , we stopped and she drifted away from me. I heard her scream; and came running into my arms for sobbing and shaking. One of the FNG’S had exposed himself to her. Gary, I swear; I was this close from wasting that guy. It was at that point that I said to myself , ” WHAT ARE WE DOING HERE?” and ” WHAT HAD I BECOME?”
What really corks my butt is on the 28th of January 1973 the powers to be signed the Vietnam Peace Accord which was one of the worst decisions that was ever made. How could we have thought we could trust them and forsake the lives of all those lost. I just hope to God that we learned some lessons and never sign some damn peace agreement with and enemy and turn our back on our soldiers as the enemy doesn’t think twice about violating any agreement and rolls into our soldiers as their back is turned to leave the area.
Gary,
I think we all became desensitized. It still bothers me, especially as a Christian, that I felt no remorse or emotion over all the dead Vietnamese, NVA, VC, civilians, men or women. I do remember when we were about to spring an ambush on some NVA. As I watched and waited to blow the claymore; I thought,” I hope you wrote your parents or wife and children today and told them that you love them, because your life has come down to seconds.” I tear up just thinking of that moment in the darkness of an ambush site. Some of us on both sides were thrust into situations where we no other choice; kill or be killed. I believe I could have made friends with some of them if we could have shared a meal and shared stories of our childhood together. But that was never an option. Kill or be killed the only option!!!!!!
Gary,
Tai and I talked about the clothes she apparently had hidden. It obviously was not any type of uniform as almost every person I saw out in the bush had black pants for sure and the VC would not want to call attention to themselves. Tai and I think that maybe that was her one nice outfit that she kept nice to wear at New Years. I’m sure she had little and those clothes might have been her pride and joy. Who knows for sure! They might be living under a communist regime but at least now they can subsist and no live in fear of dying at any moment.
That’s an interesting take on it which I’ve never considered. Of course, being the typical crude American with little or no cultural sensitivity, that’s not surprising, is it? Let’s face it; they didn’t teach us very much about the Vietnamese people, did they? That one good, that one bad was about it. We should have had someone like Tai with us, but I guess nobody had thought of that yet. We had Tiger Scouts with each platoon, but their job was to identify bad guys and give us advice on how find them. At least they’re doing better than that in Afghanistan today because cultural contact people accompany many patrols, and a lot of them are women in deference to that culture.
Anyhow, whatever those clothes represented, I should have brought her out and turned her over to “the system.” I know that. I knew it then, but I just wasn’t able that day. That happened fairly early in my tour and after a few more months had passed, I doubt I’d have been anywhere near as generous. I think I eventually gave up on remaining human.
Gary,
I have for years said that I felt a great deal of empathy and or sympathy for the poor farmers who tried to eek out an existence on a small plot of land when the Americans kicked their butts during the day and the VC haunted them at night. I never forget that one day we came upon a small ville area and we rounded up 71 women and children(no men) you or old. I always thought it somewhat funny when we would ask a young women holding a baby maybe a month or two old where papasan was and generally got back several responses. He’s dead from VC or he go to Danang to join army. Both these were highly unlikely due to the child’s age. They were more than likely in hiding and probably watching us. One of the sad parts about hootch burning was that the Vietnamese felt that their deceased relatives lived in the building.
The whole of what we did to those people was sad. All we accomplished was to make them hate us.
But, I’m glad to hear I’m not the only one. Too often, Vets express a sort of casual disregard for those people caught in the middle and I always suspected it was a sort of false bravado driven by fear of being seen as unmanly or something. I don’t know what the motivation might be.
Or, it could be that I’m the oddball, the one who was too sensitive for my own good. Again, I don’t know. All I know is that when I first came home, I was pretty well desensitized myself (no surprise there, is there?), but 30 years of long, all-night driving by myself with too much time to think, allowed me to analyze, sift and examine what I did and why. These stories represent the culmination of all that and the conclusions I came to. I could not have written them without decades of reflection.
Gary, When I try to tell others about my experiences in Vietnam, there are no words to describe the thoughts and emotions that ran through my mind. They ran the gamut and seemed to do that daily and at times, as you described, moment to moment. When I read something like this, there is a video playing in my mind. I can visualize walking across that paddy, wet from the rain, and the smell of burning wood when we neared a ville. I can see the villagers huddling in a circle, crying, and fearful of what might happen to them. I can feel the compassion that you felt but rarely, if ever, any intense hatred but always the fear. That story takes me back to many times in my one year journey in Nam. Bedtime is at hand but sleep will be delayed tonight. Too much on my mind. Thanks for your story. Looking forward to more.
I didn’t mean to ruin your sleep, but you should know re-reading those stories ruins mine too. It’s a subject which is close to the surface at all times. Too close, probably, and it doesn’t take much to re-generate those old emotions. I suspect they’ll never leave until we get senile or die…or both.
And that leads to something anyone who reads my writings needs to know. I never intended for them to be just a straight forward telling of what happened to me, and by extension the rest of us too. History books are full of “battle stories,” and I wanted more than that. I want the reader to understand what it’s like BEING Infantry, not just ACTING Infantry. See the difference? I’m convinced the emotional and spiritual impact of warfare on the soldiers who actually do the fighting is grossly misunderstood and too often hidden behind patriotic jingoism, often by the soldiers themselves who do not dare touch the deeper subjects.
Well…I want to touch that third rail and I want the readers to touch it too. It’s not surpassing that it resonated with you because you know EXACTLY what I’m talking about, but those outside our small community do not. Those are the people I want to reach; the ones who don’t know, but think they do.
Damn spell check. That should be surprising, not surpassing.
Ok, just one. This one is a true story which I don’t often share because what I did pisses off other soldiers. What I did with the woman in this tale was wrong, but I make no apologies. That day, it was the best I could do. Other days had different outcomes.
A VILLAGE
We crossed a large, open rice paddy to reach the village that morning, a long line of shabby, dispirited, filthy and tired young men, all dressed alike in faded green, soaked to the skin by rain and sweat. From behind, we are indistinguishable from each other. Hunched over, bearing weapons and ammunition, grenades and machete’s thrown about our bodies and on our backs in random order, as each man preferred.
The Army is known for its unity, discipline and conformity to a standard of appearance which would make any soldier look just like any other. Manuals have been written, classes conducted and sergeants have screamed and yelled for centuries to attain this uniformity, but out here, in the bush, it all means nothing. Each man is free to carry his stuff however he wants. Oddly, we look more like soldiers than do those parade ground frauds who strut around pretending to be soldiers and we like it. It’s a good feeling to know that here, in this place and in this time, we can be real soldiers, be men, be part of something larger than ourselves, be found by our friends to be satisfactory and accepted. Odd that we should place so much value on that feeling of acceptance within the platoon, but we do and those who don’t secure it are soon gone and good riddance. We can’t accept anyone who won’t conform to our unconformity.
We trudge along under a gray, overcast sky, the drizzle falling without let up, penetrating our already soaked clothes, turning our skin white and delicate, susceptible to the most painful, red chaffing, I notice that I can see a little of my shadow preceding me across the paddy dike. It’s indistinct because the sun isn’t shining right now, hasn’t in weeks, but I can clearly see my outline moving determinedly through the grass which lines the trail, never quite catching up to the heels of the man walking before me. I watch it and am amazed that it represents me. It seems unreal.
How did I come to be doing this? Why am I here? Can that image of a man burdened with a rifle, which I can clearly see swinging at the end of his right arm, bullets and that incongruously large steel pot which gives his head a unique roundness really be me? Am I really a soldier, really in a war, really doing this? How can I do this? It’s insane for me to be here, yet there is the proof that I am.
I’m appalled that I’ve become this, yet proud of it too. I always wanted to be a soldier, to experience the things I’d read of since youth, but never imagined that I would actually be found doing it and certainly not in the Infantry. As a young man growing up with the war, the idea of going to Vietnam was exciting and I couldn’t wait to experience it all, but the thought of having to do it in the Infantry, a foot-slogging bullet stopper, was beyond my comprehension. It just didn’t seem possible that I could stand it, yet, here I am doing that very thing which I feared most and doing it fairly well. What a surprise.
I lift my head and look around at the vastness of the valley, the waterlogged and flooded rice fields extending away to the right and left until they abruptly stop at a tree line. To the sides, the trees are far away, maybe 3 or 400 yards. Before and behind, they are much closer for this paddy is long and narrow and we are crossing it near the waist. Each of those tree lines, however, represent a very real and deadly threat. Who knows what is hidden in there? Viet Cong, maybe or North Vietnamese Regulars. The enemy. He’s here in this valley and active, very active. We’ve found him several times already on this operation or, rather, he has found us. We never see him first but we know he is there even if we don’t hear the bone chilling crack of his bullets. Always watching us, always probing for weaknesses, always ready to kill us individually or in groups, any time, night or day.
I quickly scan the tree lines, even glancing over my shoulder. I am near the front of the file and there are men ahead of me and behind, but I look anyhow. It’s not that I don’t trust them to protect me, I do, but I still must look. So are the others. It’s just something I have to do. Not that I can prevent anything, not that my diligence and awareness can protect me: nothing can do that. Right now, at this instant, a bullet could be whizzing my way to catapult me into eternity and I would not know it, would not see it, would not even hear it or the sound of the rifle from which it comes because it travels too fast to be seen and would hit me before its sound arrived. I could truly be in the arms of God and not even know how I got there. Even given that, though, I still look around. My pulse quickens and the pit of my stomach draws up. Hurry, hurry. Let’s get out of the open.
Ahead, I see that the point man is disappearing into the tree line. I catch my breath and quickly scan about for a safe place to drop in case shooting breaks out. He’s vulnerable because right now, he’s the only man in the trees and they could kill him without hindrance and he doesn’t have a clue what’s in front of him. He could be about to trip over the muzzle of a machinegun and he’d never see it or could be one step away from a booby-trap. Walking point is terrifying. Watching someone walk point is terrifying too.
The slack man, second in line, enters the bushes, then the Lieutenant, his radio man, long whip-like antenna waving its message to the VC, “Kill me. Kill me. I’m important.” No shots fired no screaming, no yelling. It must be safe in there, at least so far and I unconsciously push the guy in front of me to hurry while those behind imperceptibly pick up their pace. We want, we need the security of cover, even if it’s a false security. The last few yards to the welcome embrace of the trees seems to take an eternity, but finally, the shadows fall across my face and my body is out of sight of whoever might be out there in the open. I feel an awful sense of relief and am able to breathe again without gasping. “Ching” Lau, the guy in front of me, turns around and gives me a dirty look for hurrying him. I smile, he smiles. We both felt it.
We all feel that fear, we all live with the sure knowledge that each breath can be our last, each laugh or curse word our final remarks on earth. It’s just part of our daily existence, un-noticeable most of the time, but always there, tingling our senses, pushing us along the road of what little life we have left, daring us to hope for survival when the odds are stacked so heavily against us in this place. No, the war isn’t going full blast here, it’s really sort of peaceful compared to other places, but it’s still alive and we’re still dead if we stay here long enough. It’s funny how a man can adjust to constant fear, can internalize and make peace with the prospect of his own, sudden, violent death, but we have, most of us. Otherwise, we’d go insane. Who can face the Reaper twenty four hours a day and not blink?
Ahead, the men have begun to fan out in a small clearing in the trees, each going off to the right or left. I hear voices, American and Vietnamese and my pulse quickens again. Something’s wrong, the voices are strident, demanding, scared. All of them. I see one man, our platoon sergeant, Ronald Staley, pointing to the right with his weapon and someone moving in that direction. My muscles tighten up; the old “fight or flight” syndrome kicks in yet again. It’s a familiar feeling, a daily, no, hourly, no, minute by minute occurrence. We live on adrenaline. It’s our body’s most common food and we sometimes get the shakes from too much of it or too little of it. Adrenaline is a drug and it comes complete with a hangover and an aftermath of fatigue and an insane desire for more.
I step into the clearing and can relax a little because those who preceded me have spread out and secured the area. Not that we can’t all be killed right now, we can, but it looks secure anyhow and men are watching and that’s enough. There are two small grass shacks which are so common in this valley standing about 50 yards apart. No, wait. There’s a third one over there behind some trees. I’m aggravated at myself for not seeing it first. Since it is hidden, it represents the biggest threat and I’m embarrassed and alarmed that I didn’t spot it on my initial eye sweep. Gotta do better than that, I say to myself. If you want to survive this, see everything, see it all at once, miss nothing or die.
I’ve seen these kinds of homes before. They are all over this valley, which we call Antenna Valley. It’s in the Hiep Duc area north and west of Tam Ky. That really means nothing to someone who hasn’t been here, but it means much to us and to those who preceded us, mostly Marines. This used to be their stomping grounds and many of them have died here over the years and many more of us will die here too. I can only hope we are accomplishing something, but I doubt it. The war has been going on for so long and so much death and destruction has swept through this place, but we are still here, still doing awful things to these people in the name of goodness and right that it seems a horrendous exercise in futility. I suppose one could be philosophical about it and mark it all down to the progress of man or to resisting the evil communists, but to these people, it’s a moot issue. All they really want is to farm their fields in peace and we won’t let them. Neither will the enemy. They kill them by night and we kill them by day. God, how awful for them.
These shacks, for that’s what we call them in our “ugly American” arrogance, are really works of art. Built by the inhabitants, they mostly consist of large mats of woven leaves hung upon a bamboo frame. No nails are used; just hand carved dowels and strips of wet bamboo which are laced around the joints and left to dry, creating an iron-like band which holds the whole thing together. The roofs are made of palm fronds tied together at the stalk, attached to bamboo cross runners and fanned out, layer upon layer, which creates a watertight shield. Amazing craftsmanship and the amount of effort and diligence needed to create this is mind-boggling. They very much remind me of our own country’s pioneers who moved into a new area and built homes of whatever material they could find.
Mustn’t dwell upon that, though, because they aren’t like us at all, are they? The Vietnamese here are universally small, compared to us; short, lithe, delicate, almost fragile looking people but I know they aren’t really. They are tough, very tough, made of a steel which we may not be capable of producing in our society and they are a force to be reckoned with, not only by us but by the VC as well. Hardy, resourceful, reserved, untrusting. These poor people have seen it all and while they may or may not be the enemy, they are still a powerful threat. Most of them hate us. Some of them hate the enemy. Some of them are the enemy, but there is no way to determine who, so we treat them all as if they are. Probably not the best way to win friends and influence people, but we do what we have to do to survive.
Someone has rounded up a couple of women and some children. They huddle in a small, tight group, hugging each other, most crying. They look about fearfully; jump when someone comes near. The little children are confused and must be terribly frightened by us as we are so tall, heavily armed and so threatening in our gestures and movements. The women, one probably in her thirties or so and a couple of teenagers, know the possibilities, know what could happen in an instant and they are cowed by fear for themselves and for their children. It is both disgusting and pleasing to see the effect our presence has on these people.
It is important to our safety that we scare these poor people to death. We can brook no opposition and we are still as vulnerable as they are. Fear permeates this little clearing in the forest, floods it until we all drown in it. Right now, we have control of the situation and we must maintain it for our own security and the best, quickest, most sure way to do that is to threaten them. We don’t do it deliberately and we’ve never been ordered to do so, we just sort of know it. We don’t have the time, the inclination nor an interpreter to get to know these people. They may be VC or VC supporters and we must complete this and move on. There are no men present in this village and we saw none working in the fields, so they have either run off at our approach or be away serving with the VC. It’s hard to tell, but their absence makes these women and children suspects so we wrap them in a cocoon of fear and hold them tight.
Just our appearance is enough to frighten them. Imagine, if you can, sitting in your own home watching TV or something, your family gathered around going through their daily business when suddenly a large group of heavily armed men, each head and shoulder’s taller than you, appears at the door with no warning. They do not knock or ask your permission, they just walk into the security of your home and violate it. Waving rifles in the faces of you and your children, shouting angry sounding words in a language you don’t understand, they usher you all outside, post someone to point a gun at you and begin ransacking your personal belongings. How would you feel? How can these people feel any differently?
I pity them, feel their hopelessness, and sympathize with their situation. I want to go over and hug them all, tell them it will be alright, let them know that we won’t harm them, but I can’t. I can’t alleviate their fears without increasing mine and it would be a lie anyhow because we will harm them before this is through. We will not touch their persons, unless they do something foolish, but we will destroy their lives. That’s what we are here to do. This is not a mission of interrogation or intelligence gathering. It is a mission of destruction and we will carry it out simply because that is what we do here. It is our mundane, daily job and we don’t approach it as anything else.
The older woman in the group looks at me and I look at her. She sees something in my eyes, some glimmer of humanity or shame or sympathy or something which gives her hope and she runs the short distance between us, pleading with her eyes and with her mouth in a language I don’t understand. Even though I cannot speak a word of Vietnamese, outside a few fundamental commands, I know what she wants, can hear it in the tone of her voice, can see it in the desperation of her eyes. She wants me to protect her, to make it all stop, but I can’t do that. I don’t have either the authority or the willingness, but she doesn’t know that. I want to reach out and stroke her shiny black hair, put my arm over her shoulder and soothe her, but I can’t do that either. Today, I must be a destroyer. Steeling my heart and my eyes, I wave her away and gesture her back to the group. It hurts me to do this.
Someone has begun searching one of the shacks and a couple of men move away toward the more distant one.
Our primary job for today is at hand and we get on with it. I am standing just beside the other hootch, but no one is inside searching it yet so I ask sergeant Staley if he wants me to search this one too. He says yes.
I enter and am surprised and frightened to find people in it. Why weren’t they rounded up at first and brought outside? Two small girls, about 5 or so, hug each other fearfully over in the corner. Squatting just in front of me is an old lady who is perhaps 40, although it is hard to tell these people’s ages. They may be 60 and look 20 or 20 and look 60. In any case, right now it doesn’t matter. She is a threat to me by her very presence. Even the children could harm me, it’s been done before, so I am instantly on guard and wary. Fight or flight again. A shot of adrenaline goes coursing through me and I begin to shake just a little.
I glance at the children and they just cringe there and cry. The old woman looks up at me and we make eye contact and I step back from what I see. She hates me, violently and completely, I can see it. If she had the means, she’d kill me right now with no compunction. I have never seen such a thing in anyone’s eyes before in my life and it scares me, but I cannot show that, cannot get into a situation where she and I contest for control of this house. It is her home, but today it is mine and she must know that right now.
I flip the selector switch on my rifle to automatic with a distinctive click and point the muzzle into her face. We are only a few feet apart. All the hatred and anger washes out of her face and she suddenly begins to tremble in abject fear. She is looking eternity in the face and knows it. That is exactly the reaction I had hoped for. I am now dominant and she is at my mercy. I don’t like being cruel to her, but right now I have no choice, it must be this way for my safety. The lives of this woman and her children are of secondary importance to mine and if she forces me to choose between my life or her’s, I’ll kill her and she can see that in my eyes just as I saw it in her’s and I am not joking.
Where does this hardness of heart come from? How can I be this way? I’ve never been a cruel person, never wanted to strike fear into other people’s hearts, always been a kind and sensitive kind of guy, I think. Not a monster, yet the monster exists. As a teenager, the friends I hung around with often wanted to fight each other as a form of recreation. I could never do that, could not imagine hurting someone I didn’t hate, could not separate actions from feelings, yet here I am today, right now, willing to kill this woman I do not even know and hold nothing against. I have become another person, someone I don’t know nor really like and I wonder how and when this transition happened. I guess it’s just situational. I don’t know, but I do know that I frighten myself.
The muzzle of my rifle holds her in place and I yell for someone to come get these kids. Someone does, herding them outside to join the others, but I motion for the woman to remain. She watches the children disappear with that armed stranger and I can see the confusion and pain in her eyes. She does not know what will happen to them nor if they will be harmed and it hurts to see her reaction, but I know they are safe, although I cannot express that to her. None of my friends will hurt those children unless they are forced too.
Now we, she and I, must begin the search of her home. I will touch nothing in here, will not pick up anything nor move any objects. She will do all the work at my direction because that is safest for me. I do not know what is in here, whether there are weapons or booby traps or explosives or even a man hidden away. My finger is on the trigger the whole time and one false move will bring death this morning. She knows that and has probably been through this before and her demeanor changes to one of conciliation and humility. I do not trust her, though, because I saw her true feelings toward me at the outset and do not doubt for an instant that she is still a threat to me.
This hootch, like all the others in this valley, is just a single room, rectangular in shape, with two openings for entrance and exit. I’m standing in one while the other is just off to my left around a corner. To my right is the other end of the house and it is dark and shadowed in there as there are no windows of any kind. Even if there were, there would be no glass, just a hole in the wall like the entrances. This is the tropics and there is no need to keep out the cold as it never gets cold. Actually, this home is a little different from most because the two entrances are not directly opposite each other. Usually, they are so that evil spirits will pass through the house without stopping. The whole structure is probably not over 20ft x 10ft.
The old lady still squats there on the floor awaiting my commands. She is wary too and still frightened, but the atmosphere has moderated somewhat, now that dominance has been established. Just behind her is the cooking area, a pot sitting on a stove made of piled rocks and beyond that is a pile of bamboo containers and some things sitting on shelves along the wall.
I motion with my rifle for her to rise, which she does and we begin looking through things. I point and she picks something up and shows it too me, grinning the whole time displaying her red, beetle nut stained teeth. She grins, but she is not friendly. I prowl around in her life looking for…. I don’t know what. We go through the house thoroughly, looking in and under things, but I notice that she is trying to lead me away from the far corner and that there are things there which I have not seen yet. I motion her in that direction and indicate for her to pick up a wooden box resting there. She does, reluctantly.
Ah ha. I thought so. Something is hidden underneath that box in a small hole dug into the ground. A small, wicker basket with a lid rests there and I make her pull it out of the hole and set it in front of me. I can see fear in her eyes again and I know that there is something in that basket which she did not want me to find and I tighten my finger on the trigger. There might be a weapon of some sort in there and she might grab for it. The tension increases for both of us and she slowly and deliberately removes the lid while maintaining eye contact with me. I can see both of her hands on the lid and if one disappears into that basket, even for an instant, she dies.
No one is in here but us and all the sounds from outside recede and time stops. If killing this woman becomes necessary, I must do it myself, face to face and right now. I will. She knows it.
She slowly and deliberately places the lid on the ground and begins to reach for the basket. I stop her and wave her away. She duckwadddles backward a few feet and I motion for her to go further. I want her far enough away that she cannot spring forward and grab my rifle without taking a step. She complies and I glance briefly down into the basket which sits at my feet. Oh, shit! Black pajamas. The almost standard uniform for the VC. I glance up at her again and the look in her eyes leaves no doubt that this is the home of an enemy soldier. She looks defeated now, like a kid with her hand in the cookie jar; she’s caught and caught well. This type of clothing is the usual peasant garb and most every farmer wears it, so it is nothing really unusual. But if this is the home of a simple farmer, why hide his clothing? Do you or I take our regular, everyday wear and bury it in the ground? No. It was hidden for a reason and that reason is because this woman is my enemy, plain and simple. Maybe the clothes belong to her husband, maybe to her. It does not matter to me right now. All I know is that I have an enemy soldier or supporter in my custody. The question is… what do I do now? Should I just arbitrarily shoot her on the spot? I could and no questions would ever be asked.
But I don’t want to. Suddenly, I’m overcome with an enormous feeling of sympathy for this poor woman. I do not hate her for being the enemy, she has the right just as I do to choose sides, and even though she has chosen to be my enemy, I still can’t hate her enough to kill her nor to do to her what revealing what I have found will cause. If I call out to one of my leaders that I’ve found these pajamas, she’ll be interrogated and shipped off into the hands of the South Vietnamese authorities. Her children and other family members will be sent somewhere and she may never see them again. She herself will be tortured, imprisoned and probably killed. All of this flashes through my mind as I look at her and she looks at me. She does not know what to expect and her face is a perfect blank of resignation.
I cannot do it, cannot consign this woman to such a fate on my own. If someone else were here, I probably could without any regret, but there is no one else in here right now. It’s just me and her and we stare at each other, both comprehending the magnitude of what I just uncovered. My heart beats rapidly as I know that I must make a decision right now, before anyone else enters. Her fate is totally in my hands and we are both infinitely aware of it. She trembles and so do I. If I reveal this, can I live with the results for the rest of my life? Can I go away from this place and never think about what she must endure because I was so diligent in doing my duty? I don’t know, but I don’t think so. I waver, thoughts running a mile a minute, contemplating options and effects. This is heavy shit for a twenty-one year old kid and I suddenly feel very, very old. But, I decide.
Glancing over my shoulder to be sure I can’t be seen, I motion for her to replace the lid and put the basket back into its hole. Hide it again, woman, and be very, very quick about it before you are discovered. Today, I offer you life, as a gift; don’t toss it back by being too slow to accept it. She sits stunned for just a moment and then leaps to grab the basket. Quickly, she returns it to the hole and places the wooden box back on top. Turning to face me, she does not smile or grin a thank you; she just stares at me with open mouth, relief washing over here like a hard rain. She has been spared and it doesn’t seem that she considers this an act of weakness on my part but seems to accept it for what it is; a reprieve, a chance to live another day, an act of charity from a stranger and I can see that she is grateful and it makes me feel warm inside, although I am not sure I have made the right decision.
She is the enemy and my sparing her will be good for me, but who may die because of it? She will remain here this day after we leave and it is doubtful that any of this will cause her to change her allegiance. Tonight or tomorrow, she may be out there, she or her husband, waiting in ambush as we or someone else comes along. In fact, she probably will. It is very likely that failing to turn her in is a mistake, one which may even cost me my life or the life of someone I care about or even the life of a total stranger, but I’m unable to do otherwise. I’m a coward, one who fears to live with himself and since destroying her life would have to happen right now and the long term effects of what I have just done are in the future somewhere, I prefer to deal with the consequences later. My emotions run the gamut from shame to fear to pride for what I have done and it must remain a secret, known only to me and her and it has until now.
After this, we seem to come to some kind of accommodation. Without knowing why, I feel that I have nothing more to fear from this woman nor her from me. We continue the search, even going outside and peering into a bomb shelter carved into the side of a nearby hill and there is no tension between us, we are like old friends. She laughs, I laugh with her. She points out the entrance to the bomb shelter and when I am reluctant to stick my head inside and look around, she moves into it herself, raises a straw mat on the floor to reveal for me that there is no bomb, no punji pit concealed underneath, walks through the cave waving me forward with friendly gestures until I have moved through it and out the other side. We are a team, two people trying to overcome the hatred, trying to get through this together. She approaches and touches my arm and the warmth of her touch floods me with relief. She smiles and I smile back, convinced now that I have done the right thing. Not in a military sense, I know that was wrong, but in a human sense. I have re-affirmed my own humanity to my self and to her and I do not regret it. I am content with my decision and I suppose she is too, although this day is far from over. Hard and bitter things are yet to come for her, and for me, but at this moment in time, we share a brief respite from the madness. I have brought myself away from the brink and I am happy for it.
I motion for her to join the little group of her family and she goes willingly, not looking back. She and I are finished; we share a secret which no one else can know, so she never looks at me again.
I report to sergeant Staley that I have found nothing out of the ordinary. He accepts that without question and as we stand there, I smell smoke and see flames begin to shoot up from the shack beyond the trees. The Vietnamese see them too at about the same time and begin to scream and wail. One young woman grabs her head in her hands and runs off toward the fire but is restrained and placed back in the group by an angry young man. The second hootch spurts flames too as someone torches it.
I turn to sergeant Staley and ask if he wants “my” hootch burned too. Yes, he says, so I walk over, fishing my Zippo out of my pocket, select a place where the vegetation from which the walls are made is frayed, down near the bottom and light it. I move down the length of the structure, lighting the grass in several places and along the eaves in the dry, tinder-like palm fronds. I have to move quickly for the flames spread very, very rapidly and it is hot.
Actually, I’m thrilled to be able to do this. I like it, the destructiveness feeds my soul for some reason. It’s not just fun, it’s necessary, and more, fulfilling. How can burning the home of the woman I just spared be fulfilling? What’s wrong with me? How can I be such a man as this and like it? Just moments ago, I liked myself for being compassionate and now I like myself equally for not being so. This place almost makes me schizoid. I’m like two completely independent people inhabiting the same body.
As I watch the home burn, and it doesn’t take long, I am struck by the dichotomy of this day and of myself. My emotions once again run the gamut from shame and desperation to pride to guilt to….everything. On the one hand, I want the fire to hurry up and burn everything and on the other, I feel as if I should run to snuff them out, to prevent what I’ve already done, to hide my handiwork. I glance over to the little crowd of people whose lives are going up in smoke and search for the woman. She’s there, with her back turned deliberately to me, the others wailing and crying, holding tight to each other, while she stands stoically and unmoved, not looking at me. I wish she would. I wish she would turn around and give me absolution, but she doesn’t. Maybe she can’t. Maybe she wouldn’t if she could, but she at least owes me that. I have saved her life, but the tradeoff is that I have taken her possessions and now I would like something in return from her. I would like her forgiveness, but she doesn’t offer it and I don’t demand it. I have no right to it anyhow.
We leave them there, destitute, bare to the elements, still standing in a little wad, still holding hands and crying, still clutching whatever little bit of their lives they happened to have had in their hands when we arrived. I am both ashamed and proud of myself as we leave that little clearing and move back across the paddies to our night position. It has been an eventful day and I know, even now, that I will never be the same man again. Something deep in my soul has changed, something has died and something has been re-born. I can’t put a name on it, even now, but that day altered me forever. True, there is a monster in me but there is a thinking, caring man too and it is up to me to decide which I will be and I know now that I can change from one to the other at will, whenever I choose and that is a scary, scary thought.
I do not look back until I am entering the tree line on the other side of the paddy. I can see a column of white smoke rising through the trees, already beginning to diminish as our fires, my fire, finish consuming those people’s lives. No one is visible, not the woman nor any of the kids, just the trees and smoke. That’s good. It would probably kill me to find her there watching me and I’m glad that she isn’t. Had she suddenly appeared and pointed an accusatory finger at me, I might have gone insane on the spot. Thankfully, that did not happen and in the intervening years, she hasn’t yet come in my dreams to do it either, though she is often on my mind.
I stood looking back for just a second, whispered a silent prayer that someone would come along and take them in, protect them, give them a place out of the rain, turned and moved away.
Gary, share some more. I’d love to see more.
Gary, I’m glad that you went as far as you could. Thanks for sharing.
Gary,
You did an excellent job of expressing the experiences we had. Thank you.
I’m pleased that y’all like it, but I’d like to apologize to anyone who may feel I’ve misrepresented their experience. I can only write about what I saw and felt and that may not be like others experienced it.
Terry: I completed a rough draft on that very subject nearly 20 years ago, but never really re-worked it and finished it. I’ve also got a pretty good collection of short stories similar to that one, but I’ve never pursued publication very hard because I don’t know how and getting a foot in the door is really hard for an unpublished author. And besides, it’s harder work than you think. Writing these things is physically and emotionally exhausting.
But, all is not lost. My rough draft memoirs is in the collection of the US Army Institute for Military History at Carlisle Barracks, PA under the title: “Vietnam, 1970-71: A Private’s War” and a history professor at the University of Houston has used some of my short stories in his classes.
Gary, are you sure you have’nt written a book about your experiences? If not, you should as there is a ring dedication in what you write.
Gary,
Well said. The only thing I will disagree with is there are “no common grunts”. We all were very “uncommon” in our willingness to serve even if it “didn’t mean nuthin” then because just knowing what we all went through “means everything” to me. We remember and honor our dead and those living now.
Gary:
That is a powerful statement of how those things happened.
They were confusing, terrifying and out of focus.
As you say, they remain so today.
Thanks
Gary, Very well written. Thanks for the reply. Even though this was 2 years after I left, I can still feel a connection with Pop and Allen. That was a place where many lives were changed in a second and forever. We all saw similar happenings and even though we survived, our lives were never the same.
Three years ago, one of our guys named Russell Wright managed to make contact with Allen’s surviving family and several of us joined his brothers for a memorial service at his grave in Belleville, IL. That was quite an experience. And, Charles Surface discovered that Pop’s is buried in Arlington National Cemetery. When we held our 70-71 reunion in Alexandria, VA a few years ago, we visited his grave too.
I can offer this short story I wrote about Pops and Gray. I posted it on Facebook this week as a memorial to them.
January 11, 1971 (local time) January 10th, US time.
It’s early morning. The tropical sun leaps above the hills to the east, illuminating the fog which clings to our little hilltop in Antenna Valley, south and west of Danang. Everything not close by is obscured by the fog which now diffuses the suns’ light, the luminescence engulfing us without actually revealing anything. We know what’s out there beyond our foxholes because we saw it yesterday, but we can’t see it now.
SSG Leo “Pops†Rose and SP/4 Allen Gray are sitting in their damp, dank, wet foxholes for stand-to, like the rest of us. We were awakened by the last guard shift an hour or so before sunrise to tumble into our holes (which are remarkably like graves) in anticipation of a VC attack just as the sun rises. It’s their favorite time to attack. We do this every morning, like clockwork, but nothing ever happens.
That’s not to say it couldn’t. It could, and especially here in this valley. We’ve been here now for about 4 or 5 weeks, off and on. We did an operation here back in early December and another one later in the month, which stretched into the new year. We got a couple of bad guys and few from the other platoons have gone home on Dustoff’s. The usual stuff. Get some; lose some. It never ends.
Now, we’re back again and, like the previous operations, the signs of the enemy’s presence is everywhere. We’ve already made contact this time, in the Landing Zone (LZ) when we landed, but no one was hurt. We’ve also nearly fired up another platoon in this dense brush and 1st and 3rd platoons have had a firefight with each other. This place is thick with bad guys and the sense of ominous doom is heavy. This morning, though, is quiet. No movement, no clatter of distant small arms or even the “crump†of artillery. It’s almost peaceful, as if the whole world has decided to sleep in because of the fog.
We wipe the dew off our faces with the nasty, filthy green towels which we wear around our necks to cushion the weight of our rucksacks and prepare for the day. Who knows what the day will bring? Will we live? Will we die? It no longer seems all that important. We are grunts, common Infantry, and our job is to die whenever, and wherever, our leaders think it appropriate or when God decides. We have no say in the matter.
But, today starts like any other. It’s monotonous, routine, predictable. We awake, sit in our holes, watch for the enemy who may come and hoping that he does not. Today, he does not. No screaming hordes of VC or NVA suddenly erupt from the brush just beyond our pile dirt. Well and good. We fiddle with our stuff, searching through our over-burdened rucksacks for breakfast and tearing down our poncho tents, keeping a close eye on everything all the while. Is that movement there in the bushes? No, it’s nothing. Is that noise suspicious? No, it’s just an animal.
I’m not particularly hungry this morning, so I fish out a couple of C-ration packets of hot chocolate and dump them into my canteen cup. I mix in some powdered milk packets and a couple of packets of sugar (also from the C-rats) and try to make it as thick as I can. It seems a little lame and thin, but it’s the best I can do. Breaking off a chunk of C-4 explosive from a 2lb block of the stuff, I drop it into a used C-ration can which I’ve perforated with a “church key†and use as a stove. Lighting the C-4, which burns almost invisibly, I sit my canteen cup on my “stove†and await the boiling, which won’t take long.
Just as it begins to steam, my Squad Leader, SSG Jerry Tucker, comes by and says it’s time to go out and pick up our MA’s. An MA is a “Mechanical Ambush,†a Claymore mine rigged with a trip-wire which we use both offensively and as a defensive measure for our little NDP (Night Defensive Position). (“Booby traps†are illegal under the Geneva Conventions, so we call them “MA’s.â€) The night before, we set out a few of them to cover likely avenues of approach and we have to go and retrieve them. Normally, this isn’t something I would be involved in because I’m a member of the Machinegun crew. Dennis “Ching†Lau and I are the gunner and assistant gunner and our “Pig†normally stays right where it is when the other guys go out to pick up MA’s. But, today, I feel compelled to go, so I offer to take the “Pig†for additional firepower just in case. Tucker accepts my offer, but “Ching†declines to go. No problem. Nothing is likely to happen anyhow and it’s no big deal.
I leave my steaming hot chocolate and join 3 or 4 others who have assembled for our purpose and Bob Jascek leads us to where he set out the MA yesterday at sundown. I throw my Machinegun up on a pile of dirt and aim down the trail toward where the MA is planted. Bob jerks on the battery wire, the Claymore tumbles backwards without incident; we retrieve it and return to the perimeter. This is actually surprising. We’ve already had a couple of incidences of the enemy having sneaked up during the night, turning the Claymores around, and then making noise to encourage us to blow the mines in our own faces and at least one incident of a fragmentation grenade being placed underneath the mine. Today, though, nothing is amiss and I feel sort of foolish for bringing the “Pig.†It wasn’t needed and I only inconvenienced myself for nothing. As we said then, “It don’t mean nuthin’.â€
When we get back to the NDP, my “hot†chocolate is cold, but I drink it anyhow. It’s just as refreshing. Our Platoon Leader, LT Terry Haines, calls the Squad Leaders to a conference at his rucksack and the rest of us begin packing up. We know the routine too well: Pack it all away, walk to somewhere, hoping against hope that we don’t get ambushed, unpack it all, set up a tent and spend another night on some other hilltop pretending we aren’t going to die before sun up. They decide that the platoons will split up this day, each squad performing a different mission, and re-joining later with the rest of the company. The CO has decided it’s much too “hot†around here for the under-strength platoons to be operating independently, so he wants the whole company together by days end.
The plan, as reported to us by SSG Tucker, is this: 1st squad (SGT Price) will go somewhere and do something. I don’t know because I wasn’t paying attention. I’m in 2nd squad. 2nd squad will stay right here and organize an ambush of our NDP. The “Dinks†have a bad habit of following us around and picking up what we’ve dropped or discarded, so we’ll be waiting for them here if they show up. 3rd squad (SSG Rose) will move out and go back to a “hootch†(civilian grass shack) we’d visited the day before in hopes of catching the inhabitants at home. No one had been there when we searched it yesterday, but it showed signs of having been recently inhabited.
Those of us in the 2nd squad move our rucksacks into the bushes, under SSG Tucker’s direction, and hide them, then get down into positions covering the trail which bi-sects our NDP. .He places Ching, our “Pig†and I in a position to see, and fire on, everything. I have visions of cutting some poor VC slob who comes to see what we’ve left behind in two and relish the thought. The 1st squad saddles up and moves out down the trail toward the valley below. SSG Rose and his 3rd squad put on their rucksacks, mill around a few moments, getting themselves into single file, and move off into the brush up the hill, with Gray walking point. Tucker tells me to remove some junk I’ve placed under the camouflage band, such as a pressure bandage, and while I’m doing that, “Pops’†squad disappears into the bush.
A few moments later, a VERY few moments, we hear a loud explosion and a burst of automatic weapons fire. A cloud of dense, white smoke slowly envelopes us from the bushes. I’m lying there wondering what the hell that was, but knowing all the while what it was. Someone was dead. Almost instantly, the radio near LT Haines comes alive. I can hear it, but I can’t understand what the voice is saying, though I recognize the voice as belonging to Charles Surface, my friend. LT Haines, our Medic, “Doc†Yubeta, and Tucker grab their weapons and disappear up the trail, leaving the rest of us in suspension.
After this, I don’t remember it all in sequence. My memories are disjointed and unconnected, yet vivid. I recall seeing LT Haines sitting on a log and weeping, bitterly, while Doc Yubeta engulfed him in his arms. I can remember ashen faces and shock registered on someone’s face, but I can’t say whose or when, or where. I know someone came to where I was and said, “Pops is dead†but I don’t even know where I was at the time, but I’m sure it was SGT Larry West.
Tucker says now that he raced back to our perimeter, gathered up our squad, and took us to the ambush site to secure it, but I don’t remember that specifically, though I do remember peering into the spot in the bushes, behind a pile of dirt, from which the dink had blown the Claymore mine on Pops and Gray and I vaguely recall seeing a length of bamboo, with battery cells from a discarded American PRC-25 radio stuffed into it, end on end, which he had used to detonate the mine. I can remember hearing the Dustoff arrive, but I can’t remember watching it land. Maybe I wasn’t there. Maybe I was. I don’t know.
In the years since, I’ve tried to make sense of it, but I can’t. Yes, I know all the theoretical’s about sacrificing to prevent the spread of communism; of duty and honor and patriotism and service and all that other stuff, but I still can’t find any real, personal reason for their deaths. What did it accomplish? Did it affect the outcome of the war? Did it cause the enemy to do anything? Did it cause a change of any kind? No. “Pops†and Gray got up that morning, went through their personal routine, walked down that trail and died, forever. That’s all there is to it and nothing else seems adequate.
Pops left behind a wife and a couple of teenaged daughters. Gray didn’t have time to start a family. What have they endured for all this time and what had it all meant? I don’t know. I likely never will. The only thing of value which anyone can take from the deaths of these two men is that they were there that morning, putting themselves, and their futures and lives, at risk. That day, they got unlucky, but that was a chance we all took and in that risk is the only thing of any importance. Both of them could have avoided Vietnam and the war, but they didn’t.
Why? I don’t know. I only know they were there, they died, and it “Don’t mean nuthin.â€
Not I Carl!
The Americal facebook page reports that 2 guys from C2/1 were killed on this date in 1970 and 2 in 1971. Grover Bowers and Roy Lewis were KIA’s in an engagement in 70 and Allen Gray and Leo Rose were KIA’s in 71 from a command detonated claymore. Anyone recognize these and can give us an idea as to what occurred with these guys?
Hey Terry!
Seahawks one step closer to the big game! Good for them! I will be watching SF and Carolina tomorrow.
LT
The body count has to be low so far this month. It’s too cold for the bangers to go out shooting.
Boy, is mother nature unpredictable or what. We are going from -40 plus degree windchill to predicted highs of 40 degrees for Friday and Saturday with rain. On top of that, our community lost water pressure for a short time today and now we are under a boil order for 36 to 48 hours. A forecaster for the National Weather Service came up with a name for the cold in Chicago and called it Chiberia! Keep looking for all the reunion info as Larry posts it!!
You don’t need to boil it. Just add some halizone tablets and let your teeth turn purple. 🙂
Hey There Charlie Grunts. Welcome back brothers.
Nice discussion group you have here, been lurking for a while after referrals from the 196 dot org pointed it out.
I was with A 2/1 from from 11/67 to 3/68 (then with 2/1 HHC to 11/68).
I’m looking to connect to everyone who was there for 2/1’s actions just south of DaNang on 2/9/1968. Maybe email me at rmulock at webmd dot net.
I am in the process of getting the notices of two company reunions in 2014. There are a couple of different core groups that have reunions and some guys go to both, some guys only go to one and a some of guys don’t go to either. Everyone is welcomed at either reunion and encouraged to attend. There are core group of earlier tour guys and a core group of later tour guys. The old farts or earlier tour guy’s reunion is going to be in Escanaba, MI July 31 thru August 3, 2014. The young bucks or later tour guys’ reunion is going to be in Jefferson City, MO June 5 thru June 9, 2014. We all are brothers in arms. Everyone should experience the wonderful time of attending a company reunion. The full details of the reunions will be posted on this site later today.
I want to thank the guy that didn’t want to be mentioned for the nice donation. It took care of all the postage and some of the paper and envelopes to send the reunion notices.
We won’t even mention our Cowgirls.
Lt, My team the Bengals or Bungals as they are sometimes known; have lost in the first round in 3 straight years. They haven’t won a playoff game in 23 years no matter the weather.
LT,
We can start a losers club. I didn’t have a winner either but we are winners. We made it back and our wives took pity on us and married us. Me before the war and you after if I remember correctly.
Hey Carl,
It turned out to be rather balmy in Green Bay! Every team I wanted to win this weekend lost so I guess I am a real loser>
In January of 1982, the Bengals played the Chargers in the Freezer Bowl here in Cincinnati and the wind chill temperature was a -59 degrees. They honored that team before yesterdays game with the Chargers. I believe it was the first time that players wore short sleeves in a game with extreme cold. Too bad the results from that game and yesterday weren’t the same! Ugh!!!
Anybody want tickets to the Green Bay and San Francisco game today? I have a feeling there might be some available cheap as it is supposed to be even colder than the Ice Bowl Game with wind chills ion the minus forty degree day. I think it is cruel and inhuman punishment to make the players play in this game even though they are well compensated.
Terry,
Seahawks get another chance to whip NO.. GO Seahawks!
Extreme cold won’t stop a Packer’s fan! They REVEL in it!