(Read Part 2 here)
PART 1: The Road
They called the highway Thunder Road. On the maps, it was called "Highway 13". In truth, it was a rude gash through the
outback of Viet Nam, meandering north from Saigon to the Song Be river. The men of Lima Platoon, Charley Company, 1/16 1st
Infantry Division (“THE BIG RED ONE”) didn’t know where it went from there,
because they never crossed the river.
That part of the country was outside of their Area of Operations, and they
didn’t care about it.
In fact, they didn’t much care about the road, one way or
the other. The only thing they cared
about was getting fed, staying dry, and not getting shot or blown up.
Vietnam in January of 1970 was existential for American Infantrymen; as long as they still consciously existed, they
were okay. They didn’t do anything that they
didn’t absolutely HAVE to do (as far as their orders were concerned). They walked, hid, ate what the army called
“food” (which is to food as military music is to music), slept when they could
and they were dressed in ‘uniforms’ which were rags that the REMFs (“Rear Echelon
Mother Fuckers”) wouldn’t deign to steal from their duffel bags … which in turn
were locked in not-very secure containers somewhere in the Division Base camp
in Dian.
On the map, Thunder Road was a red line. In fact, it was a shallow depression in the
plains north of Saigon, which was epitomized by the two seasons (Monsoon, when
it was mud, and “Not-monsoon”, when it was dust). Sometimes the tanks and Armored Personnel
Carriers of the 11th ACR or the Second of the Fourth Armored Battalion (“two-quarter horse”) would charge back and forth on their way to a
mission. Their mission was rarely to
support the infantrymen of Lima . “The
Big Red One” was, as far as the
infantrymen were concerned, both the Division and The Road.
Sometimes ... rarely ... the platoon was transported on
those magnificent war machines. They
would huddle on the hull, sometimes holding onto the barrel of the Main Gun
while they moved. They liked it when
they drove on The Road on the way back to our base, because it saved them hours
of walking. Of course, during the
not-monsoon season the tracks kicked up a lot of dust. When they got back to base, they would have
to do an especially thorough cleaning, which usually involved a dip into a tub
of solvent, such as gasoline. But that
took less time than walking ‘home’
They especially liked riding on armor in the bush, which was
at waking pace and with very little dust. Except when they would go through The
Woods, when the trip almost invariably led to brushing a tree and dumping a nest of
stinging, biting ChiCom Ants in their shirts.
It is customary to refer to forested areas in Viet Nam as
“Jungle”, but in truth “Three Zone” didn’t have much jungle. What it had was something that looked like
Alder thickets, and bamboo clumps, and Rubber Tree plantations. So they just called it “The Bush”.
The Infantry man’s view of Viet Nam also included deadly
snakes, deadly centipedes, deadly booby traps, deadly Viet Cong, deadly North
Vietnamese Army (rarely, there), and sometimes deadly ARVNs.
ARVNS? Army of the
Republic of Viet Nam. ARVNs were nominal
allies, but in the actual event American troops learned to never turn our back
on them. When they were assigned to work
with ARVNs, they set up in a circle; the ARVNs took one half of the circle,
Americans took the other … and always had as many armed and alert troops
watching the ARVNs (on the inside) as were watching for VC on the outside of
the circular position.
Along Thunder road … at least in the immediate AO were three
communities and a special “area of interest”.
THE VILLAGE: The village was called ”Phuc Binh” and was
home to perhaps 150 souls. It was east of a straight portion of the road which had been graveled … recently, which
was uncommon. The villagers had an
amiable relationship with American troupes.
They would sell us cokes and short time sex during the day, and
entertain and feed the roving VC at night.
None never truly believed that they had killed any Americans themselves,
but had no doubt that they were giving aid and information to the enemy who had
killed Americans.
THE ARVN COMPOUND: The Army of the Republic of Vietnam had a
walled compound across The Road from the village, and a couple of miles further
south. There were approximately 50
ARVN soldiers there, but they usually had their wives and families living with
them. It was a “permanent duty station”
in that respect, and the presence of their families presumably encouraged the
soldiers to defend its walls enthusiastically.
It’s hard to work with the VC to overwhelm the compound when your family
will die with the soldiers.
NOVEMBER2 Night
Defensive Position: The American
position was ill-named as a “Night Defensive Position”. It was actually a Fire Support Base, housing
behind its bunker line and barbed wire and mine fields a battery of 105mm
mobile guns. Also, there were positions
dug to provide berms for visiting armor units, both tanks and Armored Personnel carriers. There were latrines with actual sit-downs
and walls! There were shower points; in
this case privacy was not important. It
was just a water bladder hanging out in the open, with a shower nozzle on the bottom and a rope you
pull to dump the water on you. Sometimes
the men would be taking a shower, totally nude, when a group of nurses or
“donut dollies” (female volunteers who would set up temporary stalls where they
would hand out pastries and hot coffee and cocoa and sodas to the troops) came
into the NDP. Modesty and shyness were
the first civilized aspects to be ignored by infantrymen; on patrol, there was even a buddy system …
one of the other men would come watch over us when we defecated, like bears, in
the woods.
The NDP was on the same side of The Road as the Village (the east side) but further south than either the Village or the ARVN compound. Lima Platoon was currently using the NDP as its base of operations. and had been for just long enough to understand they didn't yet know the terrain as well as they should.
(click below for more)
n-gr
v
)
s