The company first sergeant moved up
and down the line of men, clad in green and heavily burdened. He
frowned at the men carrying three and four grenades.
“Get rid of the extra grenades,”
he said. “Put them back in the crates on the truck and grab some
more ammo. You're more likely to use that than those eggs,” and he
moved further down the files, checking his men, making sure they had
their weapons safed but loaded, and they were clean. “Remember,”
he said. “A clean -16 is a happy -16,” and he held his up as an
example. His rifle carried an extra cleaning rod taped to the
forward hand grip for quickly clearing jams and he only had to
occasionally used it. He nodded as he passed the Lima platoon M-60
gunner, Arkansas.
Arkansas shucked the M-60, clipped on
an 81mm mortar sling and flipped an ammo belt over his left shoulder,
adjusting the way the belt rode on the C-ration can wired to the left
side of the gun's receiver. “Good to go, Sarge,” he said through
a smile and he popped a stick of C-Rat chewing gum into his mouth.
Arkansas didn't smoke and it made him popular at meal time when the
ration boxes were opened and the trading began. He liked the beans
and weenies and loved to suck the juice from the weiners then setting
them aside, eating the beans, and saving the weiners for the last
while everyone in the squad queued up to offer him delicacies for his
cigarette pack. He never lacked for chewing gum that way.
The first sergeant smiled back as he
continued the inspection and stopped as he approached the company
commander.
“All correct. Ready to go, sir.”
He resisted the urge to salute. A salute was never given to an
officer in the field. Too many snipers. Unless you didn't like him.
Then you saluted him at every opportunity. And he knew you didn't
like him then. But there wasn't anything he could do about it because
you were following regs. But it was funny that way.
“OK, first sergeant. Let's get 'em
moving.”
“Copy that,” said the sergeant. He
looked right and left to the Lima and Mike platoon commanders and
making a knife edge with his hand, he waved it forward toward the
tree line in front of him, just as the RTO Cooper started to hand him
the handset for the radio, trying to anticipate the need to transmit. The first sergeant looked down at the
black plastic handset, wrapped in a plastic bag to keep the moisture
out and chuckling, and sarcastically said “Please. Let's go,” and turned toward the
tree line. The little command group tagged along behind, the FO
hunched over staring at his map and figuring out where they
were and where the registration points for map fire were, the medic and his aide walking and sorting through their sacks,
getting morphine and battle dressings on the top of plasma bags and
making sure they had their scissors for cutting open uniforms at hand. The first sergeant
reflexively reached onto the left shoulder of his web gear and tapped
the compass pouch that instead held his own battle dressing. It would
be used first for him if he needed one and he had made sure that
everyone else carried one, too. Not everyone still did. But they were
slowly converting over to carrying their own.
The lead recon squad of each Platoon
moved as quietly as they could into the thick growth, Lima's squad
having tough going and Mike's squad a little easier, the brush being
lighter and advancing forward through the trees and brush. The squad
moved suspiciously passed an old broken down hootch, empty with holes
gaping in the rooks and the squad leader said “Stay the h*** out of
the hootch. Could be booby trapped.”
One of the squad members, a few meters
back, said the old saw, “And you know what booby traps catch?”
Low voices up and down the squad simultaneously murmured, “Yeah,
Bobbies,” and a few chuckles could be heard.
They continued
forward, across a dry paddy and were almost into another line of
trees when from their right-rear, the rattle of AK fire burst through
a gap in the trees and scattered the squad as they dove for cover,
some forward into the trees, some taking cover behind the dike of the
paddy wall.
"Contact Right! Contact Right!”
yelled the squad leader and the M-16 volume of fire swelled as the
squad members figured out where the fire was coming from and began
returning fire into the tree line through the gap. The deeper thud of
the M-60 machine gun carried by the squad chimed in as the gunner got
it into action and the squad lead barked, “Semi-Auto! Go to
Semi-Auto. Save your ammo, damn it!” He raised his -16 and fired a
few rounds toward the tree line to set a good example and walked back
down the line. A round whizzed by and he indifferently shrugged it
off. The VC couldn't anything at this range And he was more
worried about his two cherries at the back of the squad. Had to make
sure they got into the fight.
Lima platoon was progressing more
slowly, having just come to the edge of the tree line. They were
gazing across at the small copse of trees to their front, southeast
of their position, and the platoon leader was beginning to think that
maybe they should move over to the next position. The first squad had
just stood and their first fire team was just starting to bound
forward when they heard off to the east the cackle of automatic
weapons fire and then shortly there after, the swelling of return
fire, the thudding of a machine gun and the crump of grenade
launchers.
The Lima platoon commander signaled to
his second squad on his right to move forward and pumped his fist up
and down to signal speed to the squad leader. He heard the squad
leader yelling at his men to “Go, Go, Go” and saw the squad rise
up from the brush and charge forward toward the group of trees, their
guns at the ready, silently rushing through the tall grass and
bushes. He was just about to yell to first and third squad to follow
when he saw movement in the trees to his forward right and the
twinkling of gunfire and then heard the crackle of automatic fire. He
saw the green tracers flash through the second squad and two men fell,
clasping wounds, as the remainder of the squad fired off to their
right toward the source of fire.
A new fire erupted from the trees
directly in front of them and he slid behind a tree as bullets
slammed into the tree, bark flying off the surface. He bellowed
“Contact Front! Light 'Em Up!” and he was gratified when there
was an immediate crash of weapons fire from M-16's, M-60's and
M-79's hammering the trees in front of them.
The leader turned and was about to say
something, pointing off to the right, when the FO said, “I'm on
it.” Speaking into the handset, he said, “Red Leg 18. Red Leg 18.
I am FDC of Lima Platoon, Bravo Company. I authenticate Tango Alpha Four Five” The squad leader heard
tinny, electronic speech back from the speaker.
“Fire Mission”
“Roger,” came the tinny reply back
from the distant voice.
“From Reg Pt 1. Direction 1800,
Right 600, Drop 400. 15-man patrol. Will adjust fire.”
Listening as he could over the rising
gunfire, he heard the coordinates read back and then heard a pause.
Then the squad leader heard an electronic bark from the radio's tiny speaker and the FO turned to
the platoon leader and said, “Out!” The platoon leader
instinctively crouched down and turned to watch for the spotting
round as it whistled down from the sky, rumbling overhead. He
hollered to his other platoon members. “Incoming!”
The 105 mm round crashed down in the
open field, a plume of white and gray smoke erupting and a second
later, the clothing, the dirt and leaves jumped from the shock wave
of the round. The FO noted the splash of the round and said, mostly
to himself, “Got 'em.” He spoke into the handset again.
“Add thirty. Left fifty. Fire eight
HE for effect.” He smiled as the squad leader raised his eyes at
him in question. “That will cook their goose.”
Clapping his helmet onto his head with
his left hand, he yelled, “It's gonna rain!” and he hunkered down
behind the big tree he was using for cover. The volume of fire
dropped off as his platoon hunted positions of cover and ceased their
firing for the artillery coming in. The VC fire also tapered off, the
enemy realizing something was up and probably seeking cover also.
Then the rounds began to slam into the
trees.
The rounds were impact-fused, design to detonated on impact so
they buried themselves into the soil and a millisecond later
exploded, fountaining dirt, logs, brush, trees, and other items
skyward along with the smoke and shrapnel. The Lima platoon leader
held his mouth slightly open to equalize the pressure but the
concussion still hammered him. He looked at the FO who sat looking at
the eruptions, a smile on his face as the concussion waves washed
over him, the front of his blouse and his equipment jumping back and
forth with each slamming impact.
“Gotta love it,” he said and he
rolled the black coiled cord around the handset and hung the handset
from the spring metal clip through his web gear. He settled back using his pack with the radio for a prop and relaxed against it. Pointing toward the wasteland the trees had become and saying, “My work here is
complete,” he popped a large red licorice whip he had pulled
from his pants cargo pocket into his mouth.
“Go, Go, Go,” yelled the platoon
leader as he grabbed up his M-16 and charged forward. “Let's go get
them before they exfil their holes and Di Di out the backside! Come on,” and let forth a burst
of -16 fire. He saw other platoon members rising up through the smoke
and moving forward with him and saw at least one VC infantryman,
blood streaming from his mouth, nose and ears, raising his hands in
confusion as a Lima platoon member dragged him out of a spider hole
and threw him down, snatching his assault rifle out of the same hole
and hurling it away. The soldier slapped the VC soldier down and
placed his rifle into the small of his back and shouted, “Don't
move, mother- f*****r!” The platoon commander was amazed at how
small the VC was and big in comparison the American looked.
He saw movement in the building off to
his left as more artillery slammed into the buildings there. He
thought he saw movement there but since there was no fire coming from
that location, the fleeing figures were probably mama- and papa-sans
who had been unfortunate enough to be caught between the two forces.
“Well, Sin Loi,” he thought. Tough sh*t.
The company commander walked through
the grasses, looking over the equipment that had been captured. RPD
machine guns, AK-47 machine guns, some SKS carbines, an old German
KAR-98 and a couple of Tokarev pistols and about ten thousand rounds
of ammuniton. About 250 pounds of rice in US AID bags, which he'd have scattered, and a few
Chi-Com hand grenades. He'd have the first sergeant take those away
and have the engineers back at base blow them separately. The VC
shortened the fuses on grenades so that as soon as you pulled the
arming string on the handle like the old German potato masher, they
immediately detonated similar to a land mine, rather than a grenade. Maybe
the Chi-Coms made them that way. But either way, they were a danger
and he didn't want to lose any more men.
12 US wounded, 4 seriously and he wanted
to talk to the Lima platoon leader about leading from the front
again. A good leadership tactic but it was going to get him wounded or killed and
his Bravo Bulls company had already taken enough platoon leader
casualties. They didn't need any more.
In the distance, he could hear the
thumping of helicopters as they descended toward the hastily chopped
LZ to the south. Third squad of Mike Platoon had sat out most of the
fight supposedly pinned down by fire and so they had been chopping
down the small standing growth for the last hour with machetes. Those
that didn't happened taken to the first sergeant's suggestion and carried them
got to use their e-tools instead. Oh well, he thought. But he suspected that
the new buck sergeant in charged needed a little steel put into his
spine. There had been a lot of mud on the front of his uniform, like he spent an untoward amount of time on his belly instead of up lead his teams. He would see about maybe having one of the staff sergeants
join him and “help” out his command technique or maybe go on a
few patrols with him to stiffen him up.
The pair of CH-47's and single Huey
fluttered down into the LZ and he turned his back against the storm
of leaves and twigs that gusted up from the rotor blast. The gusts of
wind let up as the pilots eased the collectives to neutral and the PP, or Peter Pilot as they called the copilots, jumped out of birds,
checking for any holes or fluid leaks. He could see the door gunners
in the heavy choppers in the sides with their fifty-caliber machine
guns peering at the tree lines. He caught the eyes of one of the
pilots, gave him the sign for “All Clear” and saw the pilot
speak into his helmet's boom mic. The barrels of the guns dropped
toward the ground as the gunners relaxed when they received word on
their intercoms of their safety. They could tense up on the flight
back.
“First sergeant!” he called as the
thin sergeant walked toward him. “Get the chalks divided by
platoons and loaded up. I'll take the three prisoners and the officer
we captured in the Huey with me back to base. Don't want anyone
thinking they can fly. We'll give them over to the S-2 and see what
intel they can find out. We should have had more resistance but I
guess the old man knows best.” He looked up as two fast movers,
clean and headed home, thundered overhead. He could have joined the
Air Force. “But No. Dad was in the Army with George Patton and I
was going to follow in his footsteps.” He walked toward the Huey
pilot, waving in recognition and looking back, motion with his hand
at the group of prisoners and their guards, two men from Lima
platoon, a reward for hard fighting. They could ride back with us.
“Lai Dai. Come on, lets go,” as he
headed for the ride home The prisoners, their hands wired behind then
with commo wire and the guards with their rifles slung over their
shoulders, rose up to follow him.
The prisoners war was over. But the
Americans' wasn't and wouldn't be for a while.
*{Tôi đã nói với bạn tôi nghe nói máy bay trực thăng!
I told you I heard helicopters!}
*{Tôi đã nói với bạn tôi nghe nói máy bay trực thăng!
I told you I heard helicopters!}
