The Immaculate Deception

By Charles R. Polonsky

The fictional memoir of a soldier in Viet Nam who never really existed.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Dec 12, 2012
• ISBN: 9781300514404

Book preview

The Immaculate Deception

The Immaculate Deception

Colonel Charles Richards

United States Army, Special Forces

K.I.A. December 21, 1971

Charles R. Polonsky

©2007 Charles R. Polonsky

All rights reserved. This book or any part of this book may not be reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the author. All names and locations are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to any person or

persons, either living or deceased, any event, group or

organization is purely coincidental.

COVER DESIGN ©2007 Charles R. Polonsky

This book is dedicated to all the men and women who unselfishly dedicate their lives in the service of their fellow human beings, their country and its citizens, and to all the brave souls who have made the ultimate sacrifice in that noble pursuit.

To my mother, father, brother and sister,

I’m sorry. I love you all, rest in peace.

Chapter One

THE BEGINNING — OF THE END

Colonel Charles Richards is dead. He was killed in Vietnam on December 21st, 1971 when the helicopter he was on exploded in mid-air vaporizing everyone and everything onboard. Colonel Richards led an elite team on hundreds of missions and rescued over two-thousand American POW’s, but you will not find his name on any memorials. You will not find his name in any history books, magazines or newspapers. You will not find his name in any records of the Department of the Army or the Department of Defense. You will not find any evidence of his actions, accomplishments or even his very existence—anywhere. But I know the truth. I know the truth about Colonel Charles Richards. I know the truth about the Vietnam War, the men responsible for the war and some of our Country’s dirtiest, darkest secrets. I knew too much. That’s why they killed me. You see, from March 28, 1970 through December 21, 1971, I was Colonel Charles Richards and fought in Vietnam for a year and a half. I am the lone voice of the truth and this is my story.

April 15th, 1972 I am alone, so very alone and I’m writing this from my apartment just off campus at a small mid-western university. I’ll be twenty- two next week and have enrolled in the summer session preparing for my senior year. I thought if I put my experiences of the last two and a half years down on paper I would be able to stop the nightmares that have been haunting me and be able to make some sense of the extraordinary events that have drastically changed my life. I’m not sure if when I’m finished writing this document it will be my life insurance policy or my last will and testament. I only know that I have to write this exactly as it happened and this story must be told. I’m not certain when or how, but I know someday the truth must be told. If I start to ramble, please excuse me, I haven’t slept much in the past three weeks and don’t expect this to read like a Hemingway novel or anything like that, as I’m not a professional writer. This story is going to be more of substance than style. Writing this story isn’t going to be easy as nothing has ever been easy for me. I know — what could possibly be so hard for a twenty-one year old college student? It’s complicated and I’m not sure where to start but in order to truly understand what happened I should go back to the beginning.

It all started right here, on this campus, in the fall of 1969 when I was nineteen and starting my junior year. I was an average kid; not a jock, face-man, geek or nerd, just like any other kid from an upper-middle class neighborhood in the city. I’m a first generation American as both my parents were born in Europe and emigrated here when they were children. I suppose my up-bringing was old-school. You know, you work hard your whole life and then you die. Maybe that’s a little too simplistic but it about summed up how I felt. Anyway, I was truly ordinary; polite and well-mannered with a good sense of humor and generally liked by people who knew me. I was going through the motions of being a college student so I could get my degree and then join the rest of the mindless masses in the workplace. I never really thought about anything else. That’s what I was supposed to do. That’s what was expected of me.

School was good. If it weren’t for the academics it would have been great! I was majoring in visual communications. I wanted to be an architect but when I saw how much math was involved I blew it off. I wasn’t the greatest student but not the worst either. I had a hard time getting excited about things that didn’t make any sense to me like the ‘new’ math, political science or stuff like that. Design was my thing. I had a natural ability to visualize things three dimensionally. I was creative and could always find a creative solution to any problem. I always had an interest in history, more like a hobby. I was fascinated in the why rather than the where and when. I liked to analyze the people involved and figure out what they were thinking, what were they like, what they had to gain, what they had to lose and things like that. I felt it was the way to fully understand the true cause and effect.

I always wanted to play college football but I blew out my knee in a high school pick-up basketball game and that ended my football career. I probably wasn’t good enough anyway. I was only 5’ 10", 195 pounds and not big enough or fast enough so I joined a frat and played intramural football and baseball but football was my favorite sport. Most of the guys played for fun, they liked the game and enjoyed the activity. I played because I loved it. I was addicted to the challenges, the planning, the competition, the physical contact and the thrill of victory.

The story of my life began on a Saturday afternoon as we were getting ready to play a football game. I had no idea what was about to happen. I couldn’t have imagined it in my wildest dreams. The team we were going to play was called the Flunkies. That summed up who they were; a bunch of jocks that didn’t make the grades to stay on the school team. They were big, strong, and mean. Most of them had been on this team for four or five years, maybe longer. These guys were good, well compared to most of their competition they were good, not real bright, but good. They had a reputation for being dirty. I mean real dirty and brutal. They intimidated most of the teams they played. Hell, they even intimidated the refs. They won about half their games, the other half were called a forfeit because of the fights that broke out. They were a legend on campus and had a pretty big following. It was a bit sick but the kids liked to watch them destroy whoever they played. I didn’t get it but I knew we were next. Most of the guys felt like Christians waiting for the lions but I felt exhilarated and ready for battle. I couldn’t wait for the game to start.

I was the quarterback. Not because I was the best athlete, although I had a pretty strong and accurate arm and I could run, but because I had a natural ability to visualize the field. I could instantly look at the other team, sense what they were going to do and make up the plays in the huddle. The guys liked that because it meant they didn’t have to practice as much. We merely went into the game and improvised. We were fairly successful and everyone was happy. I wasn’t. I didn’t like to lose. I knew that the game itself was meaningless but something deep inside compelled me to win.

The weather on that day was beautiful, the sun was shinning brightly and it was about 70 degrees. The field was in pretty good condition and a lot of people came to watch. From the first kickoff it was obvious what was going to happen, we were going to get our butts kicked. As the game progressed someone was hurt on almost every play. They were throwing forearms, leg whips, crack backs, right crosses, blind side blocks and about everything else they could think of. They had one guy who was rushing the passer who was about 6’ 5 and 265 pounds who was destroying everyone who tried to block him. He was the master of dirty. He knocked people down and then stepped on them, punched them in the face with his forearm or fists and beat up anyone who got in his way. Someone ended up lying on the ground writhing in pain after almost every play. I was getting mad and knew it had to stop. I figured it was time to send a message since we were already getting beat big time and had nothing to lose. I used to tell the guys, don’t get mad― get even". So I called the old ‘turn around and watch’ play. This is a play which is designed to stop someone like that. It could have stopped the game but I thought the guys had about enough punishment for one day as it didn’t look like they were having much fun. The play was simple. Snap the ball to me, let the big boy through, turn around and watch. I would take about a three step drop, wind up and throw the ball as hard as I could, right between his eyes. It was simple and effective, not very decent but it only counted as an incomplete pass. I realized it could start world war three and end the game but enough was enough.

The guys gave me a vote of confidence in the huddle and they agreed, Let’s do it! So I called the play. Everyone went to the line and took their positions. The linemen had to block their guys for only a two count except for the guy blocking the mark― he simply lets him go by.  We were in position and the ball was snapped. I dropped back three steps and wound up as hard as I could and then let it fly. Thud! The big guy’s head snapped backward and his body followed. He went down like a sack of bricks. We walked off the field waiting for the refs to stop the game and hoping that we weren’t being followed by the rest of their team but something really weird happened. They carried the big guy off the field and basically continued to play. We finished the game with no other casualties, we lost but at least it was respectable. I didn’t mind losing this game as much as I did the others. I think we earned some respect from the Flunkies as we sent them a message we weren’t going to take any more crap from them and after the game we shook hands, said ‘good game’ and all that B.S. We were being polite. It wasn’t a good game; it was a travesty, realizing that something so innocent and simple shouldn’t turn into a conflict where people were getting hurt. What was it that made people act that way? It didn’t make any sense to me at the time. I didn’t understand.

After the game I was walking to my car which was parked on the street and noticed two men standing by the car. They were older, maybe in their 30’s, official looking and clean cut, wearing nice black slacks, golf shirts and dark sunglasses. As I approached the car I thought, now I’m in trouble, they’re probably going to arrest me for breaking that kid’s nose and I was expecting the worst.

When I approached my car one of the men looked at me and said, Nice throw kid.

I answered back, I missed my receiver and he just got in the way. They both made a face like they knew I was lying, then cracked a very faint smile and said, yeah, right.

They introduced themselves only as Mr. Black and Mr. White and then pulled out ID’s. My heart started to beat like a drum. They weren’t police although they both had ID’s — they were CIA!

Mr. Black said, We’ve been watching you. How would you like to help us out? Maybe help your country and make a few bucks at the same time?

I was caught totally off guard and quipped back the first thing that popped into my brain, OK, who do I have to kill?

And with a totally deadpan expression Mr. Black replied, No one — yet.

I guess these guys didn’t really have a sense of humor. I was kidding, I didn’t know if he was kidding or not. We talked for a while but all the time I was wondering about how they were watching me. I couldn’t believe they were even talking to me let alone asking me to work for them. The gist of the conversation was they asked me if I would be interested in helping keep an eye on the anti-war movement on campus.

Mr. Black said "they were in the intelligence business and everything was important to them, and since I was an art major it would be easy for me to infiltrate their organization, blend in with these people and see what they’re up to. No big deal, no one gets hurt or anything like that. It was simply doing some observation and writing reports. For my participation I would receive $250 in cash each week.

When I told them that I thought the CIA wasn’t supposed to be involved in domestic operations,

Mr. White simply said, We’re not — you are. They made it seem like the right thing to do, like a one-of-a-kind opportunity for me to serve my country and all that jazz. They were pushing all the right buttons ― and I knew it.

I was already working a couple of part time jobs to help pay for school and $250 a week was more than I would ever be able to earn with those little piddly jobs, plus, I got to work for the CIA! How cool was that? I didn’t trust them or totally believe everything they said but what the hell, I agreed, obviously. I had no qualms about it. I had no real feelings about the war except I knew that people were getting killed every day but they were soldiers and that’s what happens to soldiers in war. I didn’t have any strong feelings about the political reasons for the war. My thoughts were that there were a great number of people making these decisions who were a lot smarter than I was about this kind of thing. The point is that when your country calls you just can’t say, No thanks, I don’t like this one. It doesn’t work that way. I have an older brother. When we were growing up he was always in some kind of mess. I remember he picked a fight with three other guys, bigger guys, and he was going to get his ass kicked. I knew he was wrong but when the time for talking was over and things started to happen, I jumped in to help. I had to, he was my brother. Right or wrong, I had to help. That’s how I felt about my Country. Right or wrong, it’s my country, love it or leave it and if I would ever be fortunate enough to get an opportunity to help and be able to make a difference I was definitely going to go for it!

How I felt about the war protestors was totally different. Hippies! Pot heads! I felt they were cowards. They were merely looking for something to protest and the war happened to be it. They didn’t care about anyone or anything else but themselves. It didn’t make a difference to them if their efforts were actually hurting the very soldiers they were supposedly trying to help. Sure, there were a lot of people against the war. There are always a lot of people against any war, but the protesting hurt the guys who were in the field. It worsened their morale and made the issues even more confusing. It gave the enemy more strength and determination to succeed with the knowledge that the American people may be their ally, so it didn’t bother me one iota to spy on them and report on their activities.   Somehow I sensed these guys from the CIA already knew how I felt and that