Crazy Asian War

By Smilie

Dave Martin served seventeen months in Vietnam as a Marine infantryman (grunt). He was involved in sixteen major operations along with the dozens of smaller firefights and skirmishes. He participated in Operation Buffalo and the Siege of Con Thien. He served in Bravo Co. 1/9, India Co. 3/3, and India, Kilo, Lima, Mike Co. 3/9 as a forward observer from July 1966 to November 1967. He’s never forgotten the courage, sacrifice and brotherhood he witnessed by the Marine Grunts he served with.

Most of his tour in Vietnam was with the 3rd Battalion, 9th Marine Regiment. He feels fortunate and proud to have served with them.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: May 1, 2008
• ISBN: 9781453506738

Smilie

About the author … Dave Martin served seventeen months in Vietnam as a Marine infantryman (grunt). He was involved in sixteen major operations against the dozens of smaller firefights and skirmishes. He participated in Operation Buffalo and the Siege of Con Thien. He served in Bravo Co. 1/9, India Co. 3/3, and India, Kilo, Lima, Mike Co. 3/9 as a forward observer from July 1966 to November 1967. he’s never forgotten the courage, sacrifice and care he witnessed by the Marine Grunts he served with. Most of his tour in Vietnam was with the 3rd Battalion, 9th Marine Regiment. He feels fortunate and proud to have served with them.

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Copyright © 2008 by Smilie.

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without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Rev. date: 12/10/2021

Xlibris

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CONTENTS

Acknowledgments

Chapter One:Going To War

Chapter Two:An Hoa

Chapter Three:Hai Van Pass

Chapter Four:The DMZ

Chapter Five:The Bridge

Chapter Six:Along The DMZ

Chapter Seven:Massacre of One Nine

Chapter Eight:The Long Hot Summer

Chapter Nine:Butch

Chapter Ten:The Siege of Con Thien

Chapter Eleven:The Rockpile

Chapter Twelve:D-5 Area

DEDICATION

I began writing Crazy Asian War forty years ago, when I first came home from Vietnam. After twenty years of therapy involving twenty shrinks, I finished it. I wrote this book to tell the unknown story of the bloody battles we marines engaged in at the DMZ against the North Vietnamese Army Regulars. I also wrote it as therapy for myself. My unit, the Third Battalion, Ninth Marine Regiment, was involved in some of the most vicious combat of the war. We participated in the 861/881 Hill battles, July Forth massacre of One-Nine, called operation Buffalo, and in the siege of Con Thien, where, in twenty-eight days of sustained bombardment, we suffered seven hundred casualties out of an eight-hundred-man battalion. Each battle we won, defeating regiment after regiment of top-of-the-line North Vietnamese Army Regulars, in combat that was hand to hand at times. But we suffered terrible casualties accomplishing this. All the while, Americans ranted and raved at antiwar demonstrations, reviling us as we fought for our lives, thirteen thousand long and lonely miles away from home. I was an infantryman, a grunt, as we called ourselves, right in the middle of it all. I went through that hell and saw firsthand the horror, terror, and sacrifice of the DMZ battles. I also witnessed the absolute courage, fidelity, and honor of my fellow grunts. Young men, still teenagers, not old enough to drink or vote back home, gave their last full measure, their lives, for God, Country, and Corp, but mostly for their fellow marines. I swore a blood oath on the Fourth of July, 1967, after we recovered the mutilated bodies of Alpha and Bravo companies, One-Nine, that I would never forget that day. I have not forgotten that day, nor any of the other days, nor the sacrifices we winter soldiers made for our country. It is with this spirit of attempting to give voice to those who cannot that I wrote, and here dedicate, this book. God bless ya, bros.

Dave Martin

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thanks to my wife Christine for her patience, my brother Doug and friend Nab for their encouragement, my therapist Dr. Howard Cohen for his guidance, but mostly to God who spared me from death in that crazy Asian war.

CHAPTER ONE

Going To War

I left college in the fall of my sophomore year to defend the Vietnamese, my family, and friends from those slant-eyed little commie bastards over there. Life was young and new to me back then, and full of the fire of youth. I had a rage deep inside of me to break the bonds that kept me home and see the world.

Nothing was happening with my life. I was flunking out of school, had just broken up with my steady girl, and didn’t have a clue of what I was doing with my future. I had no money to go to college, was too stupid to get a student loan, and sure as hell wasn’t smart enough for any scholarships, so I had to work my way through school. I had two or three part-time jobs and worked about thirty hours a week just to get the money. I went to junior college full-time, ran cross country and track, and was on the wrestling team. I was burning the proverbial candle at both ends and had a flame in the middle, too. Sometimes, I would fall asleep at the library while studying in my spare time, with stubbly face snoring on Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath. The Stone’s, I Can’t Get No Satisfaction, and, Got To Paint It Black, seemed to sum up my mood.

After a year and a half of this shit, I began to burn out. The girlfriend and I argued most of the time, school was a real drag, the three part-time jobs were a hassle, and I hardly had time to train, so my cross country running sputtered. At wrestling, I learned what an ants-eye view of the mat looked like while someone’s nasty ass squashed me into it. I needed a change. My aimless drifting had to stop. I needed goals. When the Vietnam War started to escalate, I was ripe to go. I was ready for adventure, and ready to break away. I needed a crusade!

Throughout high school, I had dabbled with the idea of joining the marine corps. I liked their uniform and thought I’d look cool in it. I read books about the corps and talked often to my friends about it. I daydreamed of doing `Sands Of Iwo Jima` assaults on the enemy at hot beachheads. I’d win medals, maybe even the Congressional Medal of Honor! Boot camp was supposed to be real tough, and I daydreamed about going there and getting in top shape. One of my high school buddies had planned to go into the corps with me right after school, but my parents wouldn’t sign for me. He left six days out of high school, and I was left with a fading dream.

My daydreams of the corps were unfulfilled, the rest of my life sucked, but I still excelled at raising hell. I was getting drunk a couple of times a week by now with my buddies and cruising around Trenton in my two-tone turquoise-and-white, 283, `56 Chevy, listening to the Stones, Beatles, and Dylan on the AM radio.

Finally, the nudge I needed came from the Trentonian newspaper headlines one morning. Marines Massacred On Hill 400, it read. The story told of a small group of marines who were ambushed on a hill somewhere in South Vietnam. They fought valiantly as they did in `Sands Of Iwo Jima`. I was thrilled, excited, and angered, all at the same time. I had to go, now! I ran up Willow Street to Trenton Junior College, found the class my friend Bob was in, tapped on the classroom window, and waved him into the hall.

Look at the headlines, Bob, I said, crumbling the paper in my hand. We gotta sign up now!

Marty, I’m in class. It’s near the end of the semester. I ain’t ready to go right now, he countered, somewhat annoyed.

This whole thing was your idea, and you’ve been bugging me for a whole year to go. We gotta go, man, they need us over there! My voice was charged with excitement.

Bob stared at me for a minute, searching my eyes to see if I was bullshitting him or not.

Ok, let’s go, he said, leaving me upstaged and surprised at how easily he went for the idea.

Now, Bob?

Let’s go!

The marine recruiters were in a graystone, Federal style Post Office building about a half mile away. We ran fast down State Street, with books tucked in like a football, before we could change our minds.

The recruiter’s office was neat, clean, and generally squared away and had both the American and marine corps flags on poles in each corner. The recruiter was squared away too, with his crew cut hair and dress blues uniform, and was quite aggressive for someone who was trying to sign recruits up during a war. The selling point for me was when he tapped his chest and said, I don’t have a heart in here, but the marine corps emblem beating inside. I needed to get some of that spirit and direction.

We have the 120-day delay program for you college types, he offered.

That’s so you can finish school and still get in. When do you want to go—you name it?

How about tomorrow, I said, as surprised as Bob that I suggested it.

Laughing, the recruiter said, I never heard that one before. No can do since it takes at least two weeks to process the paperwork. Is that OK?

Bob and I agreed two weeks would be fine. We were satisfied with our upstaging the hard corps Marine. The recruiter signed us up, we passed the written tests and were sent to Philadelphia to get our physicals.

For the next two weeks, we met down at the YMCA every day to work out and get in top shape. I was always into exercise, and so Bob keyed in on me as I pushed both of us to be ready. I convinced him that the marines loved physical fitness, and boot camp would be easier if we went there fit and ready. We lifted, ran, and did more calisthenics then ever before. The pressure of leaving soon for Paris Island Boot Camp kept us going.

At supper one night, I told my folks that shortly I was going in the corps, and nothing was going to stop me. My mother cried, and my father was in shock. Silence filled the room. I left the table to work out a little more that night. There’s no use arguing with a hard head with his mind made up. I’d found my crusade!

The night before I left, my parents threw a party with family and friends. I got drunk and after the party took a joy ride and buried my Chevy up to the body, one hundred yards into a muddy corn-stubble field, several miles out of town. The next morning, before Dad drove Bob and me to the train station, I flipped my brother Doug the keys and told him he could have it if he could find it. I had no idea where the car was, myself.

From the Trenton train station to Philadelphia was only about a half an hour. From there, we walked to the Philadelphia district recruiting station, boarded a bus, and were driven to an airport. About eighty of us embarked on a bumpy prop-engined vintage Piedmont plane, and in less than two hours were in South Carolina. We again boarded buses which drove us to Paris Island Marine Recruit Depot. Along the way we sang marine corps songs, whooped it up, and generally had a good time. It was soon to end.

Once past the armed Marine MPs, and across a long causeway, which was the only link to the mainland, the bus stopped. A corporal came on board and told us all to shut up and listen.

Ya all gonna shut up and do exactly as you’re told, when you’re told, or I’ll kill ya.

All of us were ordered off the bus, kicked or pushed by the corporal, and herded into a waiting area. Once there, we emptied our pockets and were searched for weapons, money, or anything that wasn’t USMC issue, which was everything we had. It was all sent home along with our civilian clothes. We were issued marine clothes, which were entirely green. Next came the basic USMC haircut, which really was like mowing a lawn more than it was a haircut. Once back in the waiting area, I couldn’t recognize Bob.

Marty, yo, Marty, what do think of this place so far? A voice was talking to me from the green-clad crowd.

I looked at six recruits squatting on the floor. They all looked alike to me—sort of like jar-shaped heads. Which one was Bob? Finally, I eliminated the rest and started talking to the guy I figured was him, wisecracking about how nuts I thought all the marines we met so far were. A bald head said, Yea, I think they’re nuts, too, but I ain’t Bob.

Marty, I’m over here, Bob said about two recruits away. I could hardly recognize a buddy I went to high school with. We’d already started becoming a part of the Green Machine.

The next several days were spent getting more issue of green clothes called utilities and in marching to the mess hall, and marching to get our 782 gear, which is what the Marines call web gear, such as cartridge belts and canteens. We began each march by placing our feet in the little yellow footprints painted on the sidewalks. We were told we’d have to learn how to do everything all over again because we’d been doing it wrong our whole lives. There was only one way, and that was the marine corps way! In all the time during the first few days, we still hadn’t met the drill instructors (DIs). We were to get three DIs, and they were the meanest, nastiest, and most fearful humans on Earth, we were told about every other minute or so.

About the third or fourth day, the DIs came in, cussing and threatening to kill us all if we didn’t do exactly what we were told. They ran us over to our squad bay, which is what our barracks was called. They did a lot of screaming and cursing, kicking the metal garbage cans and punching some recruits out. It seemed everyone got punched out a few times at Paris Island. I think that’s how DIs showed affection towards us.

Boot camp moved along at an accelerated pace due to the Vietnam war.

President Johnson needed marines to kill Viet Cong, and that point was brought to our attention a lot at PI. Our physical training (PT) was seriously punctuated with little anecdotes about needing strong arms to fight, so we did push-ups for the war, and we’d need strong legs, so we ran for the war. We had a definite goal since this was no peacetime team we were on, but real training for a real war we were getting closer to each day. We ran, marched, and did thousands and thousands of push-ups, sit-ups, and pull-ups. We learned discipline the hard way, and we learned to take and follow orders exactly as given. We looked alike, dressed alike, acted alike, ate the same food, and wiped our asses the same way. We were not individuals anymore, but marine larvae, maggots as we were called.

While at Paris Island, I had a hard time adjusting to the discipline since I was somewhat of a wise ass. I did excel at PT, however, and beat everyone on the obstacle course and at push-ups. Now, in high school I was known as 710, since at one point in gym class I had done 710 push-ups in the one-hour gym period. Later, I did over a thousand, but 710 stuck; it sounded better. So when I found out that the marines valued physical fitness almost over everything else except shooting or kicking ass, I went for it.

Each Sunday, we had Field Days, which were physical fitness competitions. I won the push-up competition each and every week. It got so easy, and I became so confident, that my DI insisted that I go last so all I had to do was one more pushup than the other guy. I always did. I wasn’t a brain, didn’t possess great athletic skills, and wasn’t especially sharp at military training, but I could do push-ups, or any other PT test known to man, and I knew it would help me get out of Paris Island alive.

The last couple of days, we had the big regimental meet at the end of our training. I was called to win one more meet for the battalion. The commandant of the marine corps, General Wallace Green, was going to watch this, and had flown in from Washington, DC, to see some of his recruits firsthand, who were getting ready for Vietnam. The battalion commander, a colonel, called me in the night before the meet and informed me that I had to win, or I’d repeat the whole damn nine weeks of boot camp. He then asked me how many push-ups I could do all together.

I don’t know, sir, I said, I never tried to keep going, but only did them for a certain time, like an hour or so.

An hour or so? What are you, some kind of wise ass or something. The colonel looked at me in disbelief.

No, sir, I said, worried, and wondering what the hell I was getting into. I just never tried to do all I could.

The DI and I went back to the squad bay. He was curious about how many I actually could do and apprehensive about the meet, sort of like if he had money on it, or something.

Y’all will now do all the push-ups in the world. Said the DI. I want y’all ready for tomorrow.

So I dropped down and began to do all the push-ups in the world. I actually took it as a challenge and hoped I had enough left for tomorrow’s competition. I got off showing this loudmouthed marine sergeant what I could do. Like I said before, I wasn’t a shooter, fighter, or great athlete, but get out of my way when it comes to PT!

Fortunately, one of the other DIs came in after about four hundred push-ups and talked sense to his buddy. He told him I’d be better off resting and be fresh for the meet. Besides, he needed me to donate blood at the naval hospital. So after doing four hundred push-ups, I continued my rest by donating a pint of blood at Bufford Naval Hospital.

The next day, in spite of all this, I won the competition and set a new marine corps record of one hundred and seventeen back straight, chest to deck, all the way up, perfectly correct God bless the Marine Corps push-ups in two minutes flat! I shook the commandant’s hand and received a round of applause from eight thousand recruits, sergeants, officers, and dependent family members and got the honor of carrying the trophy back to the squad bay for my accomplishment. I was proud as hell about that.

After boot camp, we went directly to ITR, which means Infantry Training Regiment, located at Camp Geiger, North Carolina. There, we learned how to use many different weapons, explosives, and walk forever and ever with fifty pounds on our backs, and those boys walked fast down there, too! We learned to eat fast, even if the food had dirt or sand blown in it from the wind. We low crawled through the mud, with live ammunition being fired just over our heads, sat for hours outside in the rain, listening to boring military lectures, and basically learned the skills of a grunt, the term marines called infantry men.

The training lasted about five weeks. After a total of three-and-a-half months of insulting, pushing, hitting, and threatening, the USMC had broken down our scuzzy civilian bodies and minds, replacing them with a lean and mean fighting machine framework, on which we were to go to Southeast Asia, kill the Viet Cong, and wipe them off the map, just like we did the Jap! We, too, had been transformed into men who had the marine corps emblem beating inside our chests instead of hearts, and I had a purpose in life, a crusade!

Upon leaving Camp Geiger, we all went on a month’s leave before going overseas. Back in Trenton, I looked up some old friends, and in particular I hung around with my brother Doug and Bill Nabinger, whom we all called Nab.

They were into the same agenda, I found out, since they, too, were seriously considering joining the corps. My brother had gotten his 1-A draft notice, making him particularly vulnerable to going in the army very soon. Nab was 1-A also. Since I had survived boot camp, and before me another close friend of ours, Buz, had also survived, it seemed fitting that the next two in line should go into the corps, too. To our gang, it’d be a disgrace to be drafted into the army or miss Vietnam.

It was June, and June meant the Jersey shore. Several times, Nab and I would run private races down the beach at many different distances. Nab could burn up a beach. In school, he did the hundred in ten two, which ain’t bad for a white guy, and that was on a grass track! He could beat me, and every other dude in school, in any sprint race there was. But anything past a mile belonged to me, although Nab, facing boot camp, made the runs real tough. In particular, we often raced three miles barefooted along the beach, with the waves lapping at our legs as we ran. This helped cool us down so we could run our guts out. Nab stayed neck and neck with me until the last fifty yards, when my greater endurance just barely kicked in. Nab was running for boot camp, but I was running for the fast-approaching Vietnam War.

During those last several weeks, I got bolder with the ladies and tried to hit on every one I could. I connected one time with a waitress, Linda, at a soda fountain. She and I hung around a lot and played ad lib-type games, such as hide and seek in a graveyard; winner got the body. She was a lot of fun. Our song became Frank Sinatra’s, Stranger In the Night because we were pretty much strangers. She was attracted to my boldness, and my boldness came from the looming trip overseas.

My last obligation before I left was stopping by to see the girl who had broken up with me before I joined the corps. I went to see her at the department store she worked at. Among the ladies’ clothes, I said some awkward things about being sorry things didn’t work out between us and apologized if I had hurt her in any way. My last sentence was asking, Can you imagine me killing anyone?

No, I can’t, she said.

Neither can I, I said with a heavy heart, too scared to lie.

An hour later, I had bid good-bye to my parents and a few friends at my folks’ house. Then my buddy, Bear, took me to the airport and looked about as sad as I felt. Next stop was California and then Vietnam. The seriousness of the situation had finally caught up to me.

Once in California, those of us bound for Vietnam received several more weeks of accelerated guerilla warfare training and additional forced marches of many miles under the California July sun. The marines were the walkingest outfit I ever saw! We assaulted mock VC villes, and shot many rounds at pop-up targets with slant-eyed oriental faces on them. We learned the many names for our enemy, such as VC, Victor Charley, gooks, slopes, dinks, zips, zipper heads, and Viet Cong. Marines who had been there already conducted the training. They seemed very much older than they were and offered some personal advice not found in any Marine Guide Book. They also seemed to have a far-off look in their eyes, a strange stare, that I hadn’t noticed in the Stateside marines.

On weekends, most of the guys split for Tijuana, or other Mexican spots, to snag whores and booze. I went for the first few weeks but got tired of the sleaziness of it all and found it trite and boring. I also wanted to continue my physical conditioning for the upcoming war. The weekend drinking was ruining me! So I started to practice on the cargo nets and went up and down the nets until I was exhausted. The nets simulated leaving a ship at sea and were quite high. Even climbing them once was tiring. I did them ten to twenty times a day on weekends. I lifted weights and did many push-ups. I also ran the hills of southern California.

On one of the last weekends, as I ran up a hot, dry hill, I almost stepped on a rattlesnake, all coiled and ready to strike. I leaped backwards, probably setting some kind of world record for leaping backwards, and ran as fast as my well-trained legs would go, which when threatened by Mr. Snake was pretty damn fast!

I met a marine on that weekend named Wes who was also into running and found out he ran track and cross country in high school, too. We ran the last few weeks together, each night and weekends. The last weekend, he invited me to his grandmother’s place in Pasadena. The Pan Am Games, an international track meet, was at the Coliseum, and some world-class runners would be competing. A home-cooked meal and the Pan Am games were too good to pass up. So I went, and the last weekend was as homey and welcome as I could ask for.

Just before we got ready for the flight to Vietnam, Wes said, Marty, I’d like you to have this as a good luck symbol to carry in Vietnam. It was a tiny pocket Bible.

Wes, I ain’t really religious you know.

Look, it doesn’t matter. You’re a grunt, and I’m in motor transport. My grandmother wanted me to carry it, but I don’t need it like you’re going to. Do it as a favor for me. OK?

Thanks, Wes, I said, keying into the gesture of friendship and concern for my safety more than the religious point. I was as relaxed and ready for war as any man ever was, thanks to Wes and his grandma. Although his point about me needing the Bible more than he kind of made me think a bit.

On a hot Monday in the middle of July, our time for war came. Wes, I, and about one-hundred and-eighty Marines loaded aboard a civilian airliner with stewardesses, meals, and the whole deal! We flew over Washington State as the pilot told us we were twenty-some thousand feet above Seattle and then flew north to Alaska for two hours to refuel. Most of us jumped off just to stretch our legs.

The airport seemed to be in the middle of a huge wilderness, with evergreen forests all around. We bought some candy or cigarettes and tried to scope out the girls. But we didn’t see too many up there. Alaska seemed pioneerlike, and the air was crisp and clean compared to California, not to mention Jersey. I’ll be damned, the sky really is blue! I wanted to explore this virgin world a little, but the marine corps had a pressing matter for us down south a ways.

We flew out of Anchorage, and in several more hours, we landed in Okinawa. Then we were taken to Camp Hansen, which is a very large marine base. At Hansen, we were given another round of shots. It seemed we were always getting shots for one thing or another, and our arms were sore a lot from this. The navy corpsmen said they were for tropical diseases, but I kind of figured they were to keep us pissed off, so we’d be ready to fight in Nam. We were to stay in Hansen until our flight came for Vietnam. Any last-minute details had to be checked out now. Some guys found phones and called home. Some wrote letters or sent postcards. Some wandered around to see what Camp Hansen was like. Others went carousing. There was an inspected whorehouse area right off base, but who inspected them I do not know. A lot of guys caught the crabs, syph, or gonorrhea at the inspected houses.

This part of Okinawa was full of sleazy bars where little Japanese people tried to sing and look like the Beatles, or the Monkeys. It didn’t work out too well. The Beatles haircut looked ridiculous on them, they sang off-key, and I could hardly understand the words because of the accent. We laughed our asses off at the shows.

Tattoo parlors abounded in those districts, also. One night, after carousing, I went to get the marines mascot, the bulldog, engraved on my left arm, and USMC, with a lightning bolt through it, on the other. I paid for it, sat in the chair, and was told to close my eyes because it might hurt a bit. The next thing I remember was waking up in the early morning, out in some slum alley, with no money, a hangover, a lump on my head, and no tattoo! Back at base, I had the obligatory hangover breakfast of strong coffee, eggs, and toast. Also, a little crow was thrown in by the guys because of my missing tattoos.

That day, the big silver bird loaded us on board, and we commenced the last leg of our journey to the war. So far, this wasn’t too bad! I had seen half the world already, been carousing several times, almost got a tattoo, and met some new friends. About two hours later, we were told we had entered Vietnam airspace and to prepare to land. Suddenly, the jetliner began some rather serious tight turns while descending at the same time. It was like a roller coaster, except with tighter turns and no tracks. The speaker crackled:

Gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. We are landing in combat turns to avoid any ground fire. Do not be alarmed. We will land shortly.

Nice time to tell us, I thought.

We landed. My heart was racing a mile a minute. I was excited about being in Vietnam and happy as hell to get off that plane. A few Southern boys, and my Yankee self, shouted for joy at being in Veetnam or Vietnam or whatever this place was called. I was wild with the anticipation of playing war!

The door swung open. It was July, and July was hot in New Jersey, California, and Okinawa, but it wasn’t hot like Da Nang was hot. It was an oven! That dry heated air seemed to slap me wide awake. The heat made mirages down the runway. It was almost dusk, and it was still hot as hell. We were covered with sweat within minutes. Soon, a bus-looking vehicle called a cattle car pulled up, and we loaded our seabags and selves on board as fast as we found them. Now, this took some finding since the wise-assed aircrew just dumped one hundred and eighty seabags on the runway in a large mess. After having fifteen seabags thrown at me and fourteen taken away, I loaded me and bag on board the cattle car.

From the airstrip, we were taken to a hangar area, at which point we were sorted out by the divisions we were headed to. Our orders were handed to us. Those of us assigned to the Third Marine Division went by large open-bed trucks, called six-bys, to a high hill overlooking the Da Nang airfield. It was night on this hill already, and the exhaust flames could be seen from the Phantom fighter jets taking off to combat somewhere in the hills beyond the base. The roar of the jets was incredible, too. I could hardly hear the roll call of names and units called off by the sarge.

Now, the word big had several meanings to me before I saw the sarge. After seeing him, he became the definition of big to me. He was a nasty-tempered thing, too. Big and nasty—the perfect Marine sergeant. I listened to him closely.

Thomas, One-Three; Thompson, One-Three; Vegas, Two-Nine; Webber, One-Nine; Young, One-Nine. You Marines leave tonight. Now! Line up over by the chopper pad. Tomorrow’s flight starts at A. Adams, Two-Three; Anderson One-Four, . . . "The sarge went on and on, and the nearer he got to the Ms, the more anxious I got, . . . Long, Three-Nine; Marshall, Three-Nine; Martin, Three-Nine; Martinetti, Three-Nine . . . We grouped ourselves by unit assigned to.

Why do some units get more guys than others? I naively asked.

Casualties! bellowed the big sergeant. The more casualties, the more men needed. Right now, Three-Nine needs a lot of replacements. You figure it out, dumbshit! Welcome to Veetnam.

With those kind words of welcome, our little group of future Three-Niners departed to the hot, dark tent to try and get a little shut-eye before dawn. Entering the tent, I had a strange feeling that shut-eye and dawn would both be very far off. There were no pillows, sheets, or blankets upon which to lie. In fact, there were no cots, either, but rather empty wooden ammo crates lined up in uneven rows. This is truly going to be one long night, I thought as the Phantoms roared loudly far down in the Da Nang valley, outgoing artillery bellowed from some distant battery, and thousands of hungry insects drank my tasty, Stateside blood. Yet in spite of this, I was digging every minute of my foreign adventure. Tomorrow I’ll finally get to An Hoa with the Ninth Marines, and be in the war, I thought, and fell asleep trying to imagine what the war would be like.

CHAPTER TWO

An Hoa

Before dawn, the black night began to lighten into brighter shades of gray. I awoke in that strange dark gray predawn world of my first morning in Vietnam. Slowly, the fog of sleep lifted from my head, and I lay on the hard ammo boxes, unkinking bone and muscle alike, trying to figure out what was going on around me before I moved.

Come on, marines, ya better get some chow before the choppers get here. Get up and move it, screamed the sarge.

Those of us destined for the Ninth Marines joined the long chow line of young strangers in green. We were all replacements; not one familiar face was in the crowd. Small talk abounded concerning where we were to go and the combat action in that area. All the strange foreign names of the villages and areas meant absolutely nothing to me. I didn’t know an An Hoa from a Phu Lok, and although I was prepared with four-and-a-half months of green machine training in the art of warfare, I was so new to the marines I was lucky to be able to present the right side of my mess tray for the mess men to place food on, let alone know how to act in an ambush. I keyed in on any person in the immediate area who looked as though they had even one more day in country then me.

We ate what was once a hot meal in double time. I wanted to catch that chopper and get on with this war. Soon, a faint beating sound became louder and louder until the air was full of the overpowering whump, whump, whump of helicopter downblast, which sent a ton of dust onto, and into, everything. The big sergeant’s mouth flapped wide open with words I never heard but completely understood. Probably in the order of, Get your fucking lazy-assed jerk-ball cruddy selves on this thing before I kick your fucking asses back to the whorehouses your mothers work in, or words to that effect, if I remembered my marine sergeant language correctly. We bolted on board.

Air temperature at ground level was about one hundred and three, and the relative humidity was around 90 percent or so. It was hot and humid on that hill. But as the chopper rose, airborne temperature quickly dropped twenty degrees, with less humidity, as a steady breeze came in the open side where the door gunner hung out. It was a great relief.

Where we headed? I shouted to the door gunner.

An Hoa, he replied. That’s about twenty air miles from here.

An Hoa, I mused as I concurrently gave up the idea of spoken communication on that noisy beast and watched a part of Vietnam unfold one thousand feet below me. It was green, more green then any place I ever saw before. It was covered with rice paddies and wooded sections. Certain sections were covered with various-sized craters caused by battles fought not so long ago. Sometimes, hundreds of such craters covered the paddies; I was surprised and impressed. We were definitely flying towards the war!

Within minutes, we landed in a cloud of red dust at An Hoa, with another of those combat tight circling landings. We came in faster and sharper in the chopper than the airplane. The chopper nudged down, shit us out, and flew off to get more replacements for Three-Nine.

A corporal met us, and we followed him to a small tent covered with red dust and with the flaps rolled up on the sides. Inside, at a beat-up-looking old desk made of ammo boxes, sat another first sergeant, who was also big and ill-tempered. He divided us up by our orders and told us off at the same time. The corps must have an abundant supply of nasty pills for their oldtimers, I thought.

A couple of us went to the eighty-one-millimeter mortar section which we were assigned to and were officially welcomed by the smallest sergeant I’d seen so far. He was from the South, as was half the corps. There must be some heavy-duty recruiting going on below the Mason-Dixon Line, I figured.

Na ya’ll boys are wit Mike Company 81’s, and Mike Company is called ‘Medevac Mike.’ But don’t be ’larmed ’cause we’s take good care of ya’ll. The Southern three stripper had a beer gut, and slight wise ass grin, set under the shrewd stare usually found on con artists.

Somehow I wasn’t convinced this reb sarge could do that. But I said not a word. An Hoa’s remoteness put the zaps to my brain. I figured I needed all the friends I could get out there.

The corporal took us to the squad tent, which was at least fifteen degrees hotter than the outside, and we grabbed a cot. At least they’ve got cots here, and even a green machine wool blanket, I mused.

Corporal, what’s this blanket for? I always had the balls to ask dumb questions.

You can always tell a dumbass FNG. The monsoons, numb nuts! When it starts raining, and don’t stop until Easter, it gets pretty cold around here, especially at night.

Everyone was so damn