Memories Unleashed: Vietnam Legacy

By Carl Rudolph Small

After forty years of silence, a Vietnam veteran shares powerful personal memories of his year of combat.
 
This memoir of the Vietnam War is structured as a series of short vignettes that convey the emotional and physical landscape of the Vietnam War. It is a window into the war from the perspective of “the marine”—the author, who served in a rapid response assault force.
 
Carl Rudolph Small joined the Corps in 1969 at nineteen years old, coming from a small Vermont farming community. After boot camp and specialty training he landed in Da Nang as a private first class. With three battlefield promotions in eight months, he soon became a platoon sergeant.
 
Small did not talk of his experiences in Vietnam over the next forty years—but now, he has written this book so that veterans’ families, including his own, can better understand what their loved ones experienced. It brings you inside the mind of the marine; you see what he sees, feel what he feels. You know him and where he comes from, what he is thinking, why he makes the decisions he needs to make.

Memories Unleashed is an assemblage of memories, consisting of stories that stand alone to create a whole greater than the sum of its parts. It addresses the warrior, the lives of innocent people caught up in the war, and the American and Vietnamese families impacted by those who fought.
 
“A fierce focused account of one man’s year in the kind of close combat that was hard to talk about and hard to forget.” —Tom Powers
 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Casemate Publishers
• Release date: Jun 11, 2019
• ISBN: 9781504059138

Carl Rudolph Small

Carl Rudolph Small joined the Marine Corps in 1969 and served thirteen months in a Special Landing Force operating in I Corps, Vietnam. This is the first time he has spoken of the war. Two of the stories from the Memories Unleashed collection have placed first in the New Hampshire Writers’ Project Regional Flash competition—“Coming Home” and “The Good Letters Home.” “The Good Letters Home” was also published in Writer Advice Literary Magazine (September 2014). He has authored a children’s book, The Indoor Cat’s Outdoor Adventure (Rose Dog Books, 2015).

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

Goodbye; For a Year or Forever

The marine slid his sea bag closer to the door that led to the tarmac. Not just a sea bag any longer; now his war bag. His tailored khaki uniform formed to his lean, muscular frame. The crease of his shirt sleeve pressed perfectly through the center of his P.F.C. rank chevron. Sunlight shone through the window onto his young face. It was the only window in the airport terminal. The room, about the length of two picnic tables, had one entry door from the parking lot; one desk for information, ticket sales and baggage labeling. A sign nailed to the wall above the only other door read exit to terminal, bring your luggage. The room: full of his loved ones. A plane’s propellers vibrated the glass window. He looked up to the top of the control tower, next to the runway. The tower, three stories high; had only room for two people; one on duty. This was a small airport, running an air-shuttle service to the closest major transportation hub, 150 miles away.

His mother and father and siblings, his girlfriend and her parents all had their private thoughts they told to him. The mother was saying goodbye. She spoke with a heavy German accent, having come from Austria. She had met the father in that war. She hugged her son, hard, not wanting to let him go, tears running down her cheeks. She had lost her father and brother in the other war.

Don’t get hurt. God keep you safe, she said, her final words. This was her first son to go to this war.

They’d had a quiet talk earlier. It was one of those rare moments when a mother of six kids gets to talk alone with one. He had completed boot camp and then graduated from four weeks specialized individual combat training. Only a few days left of a two-week leave. They knew now where his orders would send him. Eleven-thirty in the morning; he came into the kitchen for a drink. She slid the blackened kettle to the front of the stove, hands shaking. He grabbed one of her hot homemade biscuits, twisting off the top. It opened into his hand. He brought it up to his mouth. The warm scent of home forever locked in.

He put his arm around her shoulders, grabbed the teapot, and turned her, as in the Viennese waltz she had taught him, to the old white cast sink with the wooden two-by-four replacement legs. They put the kettle under the spout of the kitchen faucet. She started laughing as they filled the kettle together.

Everything will be alright. I won’t get hurt. He said to her. I’ll need a cup of tea and a hot biscuit when I get back home.

The father had been in the Army around ten years, taking a break in the middle, rejoining for World War II, the last four years in combat liberating Europe. He knew the price it retracts from a person, the price the family would pay waiting and praying for his safe return. They had talked alone earlier; about life and war and death; matter of factly; laying emotion aside.

Don’t ever get wounded… his father had said, looking straight into his eyes. Don’t ever get hurt… he said again. The son knew what he meant. Any letters to them would be good letters. Then his father, who had not hugged him since grade school, put his arms around him, holding for a short while before letting him go. All in private; in the crowd, he shook his hand and wished him luck.

His girlfriend’s family had two sons of their own in the service, knowing what it meant to wait for their safe return; they were saying goodbye again to a loved one.

Stay low and come back home,her father said and held his handshake a little longer.

You will always be in our prayers. Don’t get hurt and come back safe, her mother said and hugged him. Sometimes she had made them toasted tuna sandwiches when he was there late at night.

Don’t forget. I’ll want another toasted tuna when I get back, he said with a smile.

The hardest to say goodbye to: his girlfriend; his Love. They knew they would be married when he returned. He physically ached saying goodbye, the rapid beat of his heart, his chest nearing explosion. The first night he saw her, they were going on a blind date as a favor to their friends, the first blind date either had gone on; a double date with another couple. He watched her in the rear view mirror as she walked to his car, with her friend, under the streetlight.

Slacks hugged her petite shape. Shoulder-length brunette hair bounced as she walked. Her hands were thrust into her back pockets, hips swaying sensually. A chocolate-colored suede jacket, zipped up, molded to the form of her breasts. Reaching over the four-on-the-floor shift, he opened the door, the dome light coming on. She slid onto the front seat, looking at him with her dark brown eyes and a smile that lit up her face.

The Marine with his Love before he went to war.

Thank You God he murmured, stunned by her beauty, then blushed, hoping no one heard, as he had meant it to be a silent thought.

He told her first where he was headed, but not until the last part of his two-week leave. She had surmised it. Where else did they send marines but to war? She had cried hard: body-shaking hard: gasping for air hard: tears never stopping hard. They held each other, an eternal embrace.

His spoken promise to her: I won’t get hurt. I’ll be back and we’ll spend the rest of our lives together.

He held her last before boarding the plane. Her soft lips pressed hard against his. Their fierce embrace pressing each body into the other. A memory meant to last a year or forever, the final memory before stepping on; to war.

25,000 Mornings

The number of days in an average lifetime is 25,000. This day was his day number 7,340. The alarm went off at 0100. Anticipation had made sleep impossible, stirring his blood. The bare bottoms of his feet felt the smooth tile of the shower room, the steaming hot water pelting his lean body.

How long will it be before I feel tile under my feet and hot water again. The bar of soap broke in his hand, crushed against his stomach. Bringing the pieces to his face, he inhaled the clean scent. The mirror above the sink reflected the image of the man deep in thought, eyes closed as if in prayer, before the shower’s mist encompassed them as in a morning fog.

Pressed khakis bloused near the top of his black, spit-shined boots; the ironed green shirt with the rank insignia creased down the exact center; the Eagle, Globe and Anchor pinned on the front left side of his soft-cover completed his preparation. He picked up his sea bag and walked out of the marine barracks, headed to his ride to the tarmac. The darkness of the California morning shielded the mass movement going on at the base.

Their plane lifted off into the darkness, the thrust of the rapid take-off pushing him back into his seat. He looked out the window, his heart hurting like an open wound as he watched the lights of his homeland become smaller and smaller, turning into a distant tiny star just before disappearing into the blackness. Destination: Vietnam.

They made a quick stop and plane change in Hawaii, shuffled from one plane to the other, walking the corridor between concertina wires strung out on both sides of them, like criminals. That was hours ago. The plane started to descend. All eyes focused out the windows. Boyish faces on grown men pressed against the glass looked down at the land that unfolded beneath, a picture just coming into focus.

The mountains reminded him of the green mountains of Vermont. They were a darker green; the deep green of the vine-end of a watermelon in July. The jungle canopy was thick and unrevealing of its secrets underneath. Foothills sloped into valleys. Straw-thatched huts of the villages dotted the centers. Rice paddies surrounded them, water glistening; their earthen borders lay out in blocks.

Their plane lined up with the distant runway, the vehicles on the airstrip resembling ants moving on a parking lot. The plane touched down, stirring up the red dust of Da Nang. Silence came over the men on board. Some faces blank, curiosity in others. All knew from this moment their lives would be changed forever.

Outside the hatched door, the heat struck him. Not the temperature, though it was over one hundred degrees; the heat of activity. People were moving everywhere; running or a fast walk. Planes with their cargo doors open being loaded with stacks of equipment on fork lifts driving into the belly of these the beasts; swallowed whole. F-4 Phantom jets were taking off, the thunderous roar deafening. Their bombs and rockets would be death for some; life for others.

He stopped at the last step of the plane’s ramp, pointing to groups of men carrying long black bags into the belly of another plane.

What are they loading? he asked the corporal meeting him.

Body bags…

A chopper flew him and two other marines to their new platoon. He had met them on the plane; they had exchanged names and home-towns; made a pact to keep in touch with each other when they found out who they would be assigned to. They arrived at a sandbagged bunkered fire base. Between somewhere and nowhere he thought. Orientation, clothing, armament, squad placement; they assigned him to 2nd Squad; the others went to 1st Squad. Introductions to his squad were quick. They were preparing for their night patrol in the Zone.

Saddle up, his squad leader ordered. His squad moved out. Lock and Load. He slid in a clip, drew back the bolt, and released it; SHIICCKK… The sound of the bullet being chambered. Darkness had fallen on Day 7,340.

Inauguration to War: Day One

The quietness was loud. Cold beads of sweat rolled down his forehead. No one talked; they used hand motions, to break the unity with the night could bring swift retribution. The young marine’s placement in his squad: in the middle; just behind the squad leader; his protection from the night. The footsteps sloshing in the rice paddy stirred up a damp, musty smell of garden plants.

The hand of his squad leader motioned down, with urgent movements. Blood rushed through his body; a body acting on its own, not waiting for options for the mind to choose. He felt, rather than saw, his team drop to the ground. His breathing was rapid yet it seemed stopped.

Figures in the night walked in tight single file down the berm of the adjacent paddy dike, thirty-five to forty yards away. They were taller than he had imagined them. They seemed almost carefree. The rifles they carried betrayed the lie. They were in the kill-zone.

The illumination round flashed up into the sky a split second before he heard the bark of a rifle open fire. All around him he saw the muzzle flashes, heard the sounds of firepower from the M-60 machine gun, the gunner screaming directions to the ammo man, the urgent voice of the squad leader directing their fire. He yanked his clip out and spun it over, slamming home the one he had taped to the bottom. He didn’t have to hear the click of an empty chamber. He subconsciously had counted the eighteen rounds gone from his first clip. The bullets hit their mark. They fell, some still moving, some not. Fifteen rounds gone, three left. He reached for another clip from his bandolier; seventeen rounds gone, one left.

Screams filled the air, louder it seemed, than the crushing sound of the fresh clip slammed home. Four rounds gone, fourteen left. The illumination round just popped after streaking into the sky in a timeless arch, its brilliance lighting up the zone as it floated down in its tiny parachute. He heard the distinctive crack of the AK. Warm, sticky liquid ran down the inside of his right forearm. Eleven rounds gone, seven left. No return fire. No sight of them, even with the strong light of the illumination round still floating from the sky. The strong, arid smell of gun-powder lingered. The moaning sounds of the hurt drifted across the rice paddy.

Casualty count: his squad all okay. No need to mention the flesh wound. He had wrapped his bandana around it and rolled down his sleeve. There was more to do. It was his first night in-country and he still had a year or forever to go.

The Names

The terror of the firefight: the euphoria of survival. The emotions of the young marine surged as he stared into the trees at the rice paddy’s edge. His eyes strained in the darkness watching for more of the enemy. He knelt on one knee, his rifle raised, ready for another assault. The adrenaline pulsed through his body. Are there more here? he whispered.

Pray we don’t find out, the squad’s point man answered: his voice calm; the words chilling.

The firefight over, the enemy down, his squad leader had deployed the three-man fire team that included the young marine, to the tree line to secure that direction from another assault. The three-man machine-gun team guarded their flank. The remaining six marines checked the enemy causalities. He saw the enemy figures lying motionless in the rice paddy as he ran beyond them toward the tree line: death within arm’s reach; death he’d abetted to; yet darkness hid its faces.

He heard the choppers coming and looked up. Two Cobra gunship choppers skimmed the tree line, protecting the three transport choppers that they escorted. His squad leader ordered a defensive perimeter around the site and popped a flare. The transport choppers landed; the Cobras flew just above, ready to fire down on any enemy. The choppers with the casualties now aboard lifted back up into the night.

He heard rifle fire break out to the east; another firefight. He counted the seconds between seeing the muzzle flashes before the sound reached them; four, maybe five seconds: over a mile away: 1st Squad’s operation area. They had left the base twenty minutes before them. Lumination flares burst in the distance. The realization of war surrounded him: a shudder went through his body.

His squad leader assembled the squad. Everybody, get focused. We’re moving to our alternate site. Point man, move out. The night was not half over; seven hours till daylight.

They returned to base as dawn broke. The silence echoed. The young marine sat on his cot, motionless: His breathing slow and deep. He gripped his rifle and stared at his hands. His squad’s voices outside the canvas wall seemed distant, inaudible. Words floated by: firefight; gooks; new guy. His inauguration to war: His first night in-country: his first firefight. He survived.

He took a deep breath, pursed his lips and exhaled slow; his nerves taut. They were told that 1st Squad were ambushed by VC; the squad wiped out; all twelve marines KIA. He didn’t know 1st Squad: except for two; the two that he talked with on the plane coming here. He saw their faces. He laughed with them. He stared out the plane’s window with them. They saw the land of war together as they came into Da Nang. They deplaned right behind him. He flew with them on the chopper that brought them to the platoon. He was assigned to 2nd Squad; they were assigned