New In Country
No sooner had the plane landed in Saigon in 1967, than we had to start unlearning some of the things we were taught in the States about surviving in Vietnam. I had to stay in a new-in-country unit for about a week. I had to go to classes and pull guard duty at the airport. At the time, we thought the airport was very secure, but we would learn soon (Tet Offensive Jan. 1968) that no place in Vietnam was secure.
One night, I was taken to a guard shack and put in charge of guarding a deserter.The guard shack was just that, a small shack with a desk, and a couple of chairs. I was told that the man I was guarding was a deserter, a coward under fire, and if I let him escape, I would have to serve his time back in the States. I was given a 45-caliber pistol and told to watch the man and shoot him if he tried anything. Now I don’t know if this was some kind of a test or what, but I took it serious. Here I was, just a private in the Army, new in country, and put in this kind of situation. The deserter was much larger than this little nineteen-year-old white boy.
I will call the deserter Simpson (I really can’t remember his name). After a while of looking at each other Simpson stood up and said, “Man what cha gonna do if I walk out that door right now?” I didn’t say a word I just pulled the 45 and cocked the hammer. He sat back down, and didn’t say another word. I kept the gun on him as I looked into the desk drawer, and found a pair of handcuffs. I put one handcuff on him and the other around a pipe that was near one of the walls. He got to stand up the rest of the night. In addition, he didn’t say anything else all night.
I was relieved the next morning and allowed to get some sleep. I had been trained as an infantryman, but when I got my assignment to a unit in Vietnam, it was a Mechanized unit: The 2nd Battalion 47th Mechanized Infantry of the 9th Infantry Division. Mechanized meant we were on Armored Personnel Carriers (APCs), sometimes called Tracks. They really were not armored, a small mine could turn one over, and thus the squad of men rode on top, not down in the APC. Now if you rode on top, then the snipers could pick you off, so we always had to wear flak jackets and steel pot helmets.
The good thing about a Track is that you can carry your gear, drinks, and food in the form of C-rations (that’s can food), plenty of ammo and weapons. We had a 50-caliber machine gun, two 60-caliber-machine guns, an M79 grenade launcher, several rocket propelled grenade launchers, and every man had an M16 rifle. You have to understand that this was the first time I had been on an APC. I had seen one in training one time. It was an awesome vehicle. They are still being used today, thirty-four years later, in Iraq and other parts of the world.
Being mechanized meant that we could cover more ground. With tracks not wheels, the APC could go about anywhere. It didn’t mean that we never had to walk. We would go from one point to another, set up base camp, dig in, and go on foot patrols from there.When I first got in the country of Vietnam, the APCs were gas powered, and they were very vulnerable to mines. The 50-gallon gas tank made them very explosive. They were switching over to diesel powered APCs when I left. The changeover came much too late for many good men.
Live and learn; learn and live. War is hell.
One night, I was taken to a guard shack and put in charge of guarding a deserter.The guard shack was just that, a small shack with a desk, and a couple of chairs. I was told that the man I was guarding was a deserter, a coward under fire, and if I let him escape, I would have to serve his time back in the States. I was given a 45-caliber pistol and told to watch the man and shoot him if he tried anything. Now I don’t know if this was some kind of a test or what, but I took it serious. Here I was, just a private in the Army, new in country, and put in this kind of situation. The deserter was much larger than this little nineteen-year-old white boy.
I will call the deserter Simpson (I really can’t remember his name). After a while of looking at each other Simpson stood up and said, “Man what cha gonna do if I walk out that door right now?” I didn’t say a word I just pulled the 45 and cocked the hammer. He sat back down, and didn’t say another word. I kept the gun on him as I looked into the desk drawer, and found a pair of handcuffs. I put one handcuff on him and the other around a pipe that was near one of the walls. He got to stand up the rest of the night. In addition, he didn’t say anything else all night.
I was relieved the next morning and allowed to get some sleep. I had been trained as an infantryman, but when I got my assignment to a unit in Vietnam, it was a Mechanized unit: The 2nd Battalion 47th Mechanized Infantry of the 9th Infantry Division. Mechanized meant we were on Armored Personnel Carriers (APCs), sometimes called Tracks. They really were not armored, a small mine could turn one over, and thus the squad of men rode on top, not down in the APC. Now if you rode on top, then the snipers could pick you off, so we always had to wear flak jackets and steel pot helmets.
The good thing about a Track is that you can carry your gear, drinks, and food in the form of C-rations (that’s can food), plenty of ammo and weapons. We had a 50-caliber machine gun, two 60-caliber-machine guns, an M79 grenade launcher, several rocket propelled grenade launchers, and every man had an M16 rifle. You have to understand that this was the first time I had been on an APC. I had seen one in training one time. It was an awesome vehicle. They are still being used today, thirty-four years later, in Iraq and other parts of the world.
Being mechanized meant that we could cover more ground. With tracks not wheels, the APC could go about anywhere. It didn’t mean that we never had to walk. We would go from one point to another, set up base camp, dig in, and go on foot patrols from there.When I first got in the country of Vietnam, the APCs were gas powered, and they were very vulnerable to mines. The 50-gallon gas tank made them very explosive. They were switching over to diesel powered APCs when I left. The changeover came much too late for many good men.
Live and learn; learn and live. War is hell.
posted by 7horses | Tuesday, June 21, 2005
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