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"A" Co, 4th INF, 12th BTLN,.. 199th Light Inf Bgde
The first morning at the Replacement Depot, seeing the black trails in the sky, then remembering what an NCO said before I left CONUS, "Gentlemen, you know what smog is, I give you smit".
Hockey pucks -- the dang canned fruit cake in C rats. Pretty awful stuff. Little packs of Lucky Strikes in the C rats. Early on some of the old WW-II C rats had green package Lucky Strikes. I still have some of that John Wayne toilet paper here. Been carrying it deer and elk hunting but haven't been forced to use it yet. A collection of P-38 can openers. Bergtreffer.
I want to thank everyone for shairing their stories and the pictures. This was something Im sure that was and is hard for a lot of you to share with us. Thank you all and not just for your service but for giving us a glimps into a part of your life. Thank you
Riding shotgun on convoy 1969. Loved my Ma Deuce..
[img][/img]
Iam still looking for a friend, Bill Spicer. He was wounded while standing with me and a couple other guys at LZ Mary Lou. A mortar round hit about 30 ft away and got him in the back. I was hit with 3 pieces, but my flack jacket stopped them, Bill was not wearing his.
He was medivac'd out, that was the last I saw of him. His name is not on the wall so I know he survived.
Edit::: Fast forward to today 10-30-15. I found Bill. A TV production company I contacted about 5 years ago located him. They put me in touch with him on the phone. I plan to see him soon. He lives about 7-8 hours away from me in Ca.
Lefty,
You were in the Highlands the same time I was, HHC 2/1 cav. We had a firebase on the highway going toward An Khe (Spelling), not far from the bottom of the Mang Yang pass, called it Black Hawk, also worked up in Kohn Tohm and Doc also. Cpt John Abrams was our C.O. .
W.D.
Goofy grape koolaid, Tiger piss beer,johnny Walker Red, eating fried frogs and rice with the locals, mother with newborn with nipples cut off by the VC, burning hootches and waiting for secondary explosions or hidden rounds cooking off, smell of burning rice cashes, seeing bullets hiting the rice paddy water in front of me and not seeing the shooter. boot lace 6-8 inch long leaches. little black leaches swolen with your blood. shootout with VC in a MG bunker made with portland cement bags "made in the USA". finding ammo and supply cashes with better (new) 782 gear better then what I had. first kill and a squad leader that froze up i had to push (rifle butt to the head)out of the way or die. (got two on the trail who were cooking rice)only three days in country on Deck House I. India Company comming back with 30 some odd marines out of 200, the rest whent home in bags. hill 69 overrun just outside of Chu-Lie. just 17 of us walked down the next morning. burning C-4 to heat the C-rats, burning heat tabs under my poncho to stay warm, in the rain. ARVN's that stand up to take a piss while on ambush. ARVN officers shooting our captured VC's. VC'c who got flying lessons. NVA Regulars that stand and fight for days. The underground bunker I found, with AID room, sleeping mats, ammo & weapons. enough for a hundred or more men not more then 2 clicks from Chu-Lie. TAM-KY, Den fu, marble, R&R in Hong Kong, ROK's that were assume fighters, ChickenSH** PF's and ARVN's. Papa san stealing grenades from our bunkers.
Its hard to tell all from only 1 year and a few months, so much happened.
One last one, anti war protestors at the gate outside El-Toro Ca. Airfield, but it was home.
Short round (I know, there were a lot of short rounds)
PFC/LCpl
1965-1966 CHU-LIE RVN
USMC, GRUNT
no matter if you live 1 more day or 50 more years you will never forget that time in your life. i still don,t understand how that can be your worst and best time of your life at the same time. but as i get older it seems that way. eastbank.
Burning bodies, piled up as high as the buildings in down town Pleiku, Tet, 1968. I can still smell the burning flesh from that pile. Seeing the bodies of all the children in the orphanage, hacked to pieces by the VC, when we cornered them in Pleiku. The faces of the guys at Dak To, when we flew in 155 howitzer shells, and as much ammo as we could carry, they thought they were dead. Met one of those guys this summer on a trip to DC, and he hugged me for twenty minutes, thanking me for being there. An out of body experience!
The little children that surrounded you when you stopped for what ever reason, while hauling 155 shells on convoy, they just seemed to come out of the wood work, always hungry, and we would give them whatever we had to give, usually our precious cans of ham-n-limas! Couldn't eat that bababooey anyway! Running down the runway at Cahm (sp) Rahn Bay, trying to catch our huey lift off to go home, while it was taking mortor rounds from Charlie. I guess he didn't want us to go home! Thank God we made it!
Being spit on by people that I had gone to high school with, for being a baby killer. At that time, it almost became true![:(!]
What I remember? Couple months ago, I met a recent basic training graduate, he asked me when I was in Nam? I told him him a couple nights ago. He looked puzzled. I told him if he is unfortunate enough to go war, some day he would understand.
Prangle, I flew for you guys in the 199th while you were there. In fact, in the 5th picture, note the Greyhound on the door panel. Greyhounds, 240th Assault, our gunships were the maddogs. I was a slick driver for the Greyhounds from July 67 - June 68.
If you ever saw a Warrant Officer pilot trying to eat beans and weenies and play air guitar while flying, that was prolly me!
Sorry about those rough landings, and almost clipping you with the tail-rotor.
Sorry about making that 10-ship CA with only six guys, since lead ship was the only one with grunts aboard. (Man y'all's LT was PO'ed!) Some of those pics look like Dong Tam/My Tho. Was that in your AO? Bad neighborhood!
Welcome home.
Some of these stories are absolutely bone-chilling.
quote:Originally posted by prangle
Found some picture! early 1968 199th Light Infantry
quote:Originally posted by tequacha
What I remember? Couple months ago, I met a recent basic training graduate, he asked me when I was in Nam? I told him him a couple nights ago. He looked puzzled. I told him if he is unfortunate enough to go war, some day he would understand.
I was an advisor to the RF, PF and PSDF in SVN. Smells--I loved the smell of gunpowder smoke, I hated the smell of a garbage dump south of Cholon that I had to go through to get home. I ate with the Vietnamese, fought along side them, slept with them, trained them and went on patrol with them. They were human beings and were happy to have an American by their side -- day and night! I was part of CORDS and this program wiped the VC from the countryside. The same concept is now being used in the middle east by Gen Patraus. Counter insurgency at its best! I am proud to say that I helped "win their hearts and minds"!
Congress lost the Viet Nam War for us and indirectly killed a lot of my VN friends over there.... What a world we live in. Bitter? Naw!
Hi there , i'm new.
What do i remember most? well lots of things i haven't talked about in 36 years but what stands out the most / coming home and sitting in a classroom taking a placement test for 6 hrs at international paper only to be told at the end all nam vets could go home we don't hire nam vets. that was the longest 40 feet i ever walked.leaveing.
I learned real quick to not talk about it.
This is my son's idea to join a group and maby loose some anger.
other than that the damn scream of the transmission at my back.
copters was my game , D and H models.
70-72
...The bugs, the smell, the rain,the mud, nothing dry everything always wet.The C-rats and K-rats. The oldest one I remember was 1939, most were from the 40's and 50's. The heat, Mamasan's cooking, Papasan's always smiling while working on the base and then lobing mortars in at night. The smell of death. The fear always there in the back of your throat. Doing what has to be done to get home in one piece. The huey's with the mini-guns strafing the side of the mountain every night to keep the VC from setting up mortars and rockets. The 81mm mortars(ours), the gunfire. Then coming home to the protesters. Not being the same person you were when you left. And there are the nights when your demons come to visit you in your sleep. Yeah I remember this and alot more. Wish I could forget.
Went to China in 2001. I was so scared I did not pee or poop for 2
days. But why? We were coming to HELP people. To SAVE them. We were
on a mission. Sound familiar? Make a long story short. We REALLY DID
HELP. Lot different from 30+years before. Best PART was that trip
Home. Thank you GOD for jet streams
Forgive me for jacking your post for a minute or two.
I have wanted to post and say thank you to each and every one of you for a while now but thank you just does not cover what I want to say. Truth is, I don't know/have the words to express how i feel about each and every one of you for what you have done for my family and our country.
As I read your experiences it truly breaks my heart.
I have never served, however my wife is Active Army and has been deployed to Iraq twice, Korea once and looks like Afghanistan is coming around the corner.
Anyway, I just wanted you all to know, for what it's worth you have all our respect, our thanks and we hope you can forgive the American people for there ignorance. God bless you all.
Reading this forum brings back many thoughts,heat,humidity,never-ending rain,replacement depot,truck ride to assined unit,another replacement unit in the unit for in-country trainning,tower guard,first incomming,joining recon(very stupid),PBR's,ambush,being ambushed,crying,fear,heat-stroke,following blood-trails,nite-ambush,OP,LP,f4's,napalm,500 pounders,wounded,dead,crying,patrols,red ants,setting up nite ambush in ant nest, moving ambush in the dark,resuply,mail from home,c-rats unfit to eat but you eat them anyway,carrying so much waight the straps on the ruck left scares I still have to this day,seeing my best friend die,seeing my new best fiend die,DROS,home,leave and nobody cares,new assinement,FT. CARSON,being spit on by a bunch of hippies,deciding I would rather be shot by NVA than spit on here,second tour,more of the same.I survived and I don't know why.
I'm the son of a son of a sailor and grew up in the P.I, NAS Sangley Point, Subic, etc. I was ready for the heat, humidity and the nasty smell but the memory of dead Marines in body bags is still there. I finished my enlistment at NAS pensacola/NCTC Corry Field and our wards were full of RVN causualties.Corpsman were in short supply in '68.quote:Originally posted by givette
The smell. Upon our arrival the stewardess opens the door on the plane,...dunno how to put it..."sweet, poopty odor" permeating the entire country. Body bags. I could always sense the body bags' presence. Again, the smell. The flies hovering. Why were body bags always laid out in the sun? Breaking whiskey bottles so we could scatter the broken glass underneath the concertina wire. (I don't think the gooks liked that too much)[:D] Feeding the dogs leftovers. Someone learned that if you rolled the meat in hot sauce, then sprinkled it with .50 cal. gunpowder, it would keep the dogs mean, and the chemicals in the gunpowder would make their brains unstable. We alwaystook heed when they started growling. I firmly believe the dogs saved my life. Body count. The body count is important to someone, I guess. And don't forget to count the blood trails too. Fukk-U lizards. Now they were a class act. (At least they told you outright how they felt about the "round-eye"). VN's (friendlies)..seems the closer to the boonies we got, the less they were trusted. For the life of me, I can't figure out why. Yeah, right. Washington. When asked what her husband found most troublesome about the war (Vietnam) Lady Bird said it was the constant rat-a-tat-tat. What a joke. Ever notice the youth of our country go through the same assinine routine again and again, approximately every 25yrs. or so??
Ahhhh the memories. If you ride a motorcycle and are interested in joining a good group of Combat Vets check out combatvet.org. It's not an "MC" but an association. We don't sit around talking about things that happened or the way it was, we live for today and enjoy the brotherhood that binds us all together. Check 'em out there's probably a chapter in your area.
Dear fellow gunnut you have made my day! You have just reminded me why vets don't wanna talk about their life in hell. That was damn funny I thought I;d poop my pants! Now I can go to sleep knowing that we all will rest well tonight because our guys on the front are keeping the bad guys at bay. Thanks again for the memories!
quote:Originally posted by gunnut505
Picking your head out of that nasty red dust to view the treeline with no leaves, wondering who made Ham'n'limas the most often canned substitute for food, blowing smoke at someone through yer gun barrel, stories of the legendary white/black team of deserters, "It ain't no thing", spider holes right next to your OP, Ba Muy Ba (Formaldehyde in a can), rain without lightning, mud without rain, sleeping for 10 minutes and thinking it was an hour, aftermath of flechettes, impact noises just over your head while leaves and branches rain down, betting how high Charlie would fly on the next blooper, body counts, finding gooks with playing cards on/in them, heat worse than St Louis in August, wondering how things were going in The World, medevac and Lisa at Da Nang.
quote:Originally posted by prangle
Found some pictures! early 1968 199th Light Infantry
Was that second picture taken at a CA out of Black Horse?
I was a 'Redcatcher' 68-69. 87th Engineer Co. (CBT).
Were you there when they hit the POL dump right behind our Co area??
I to remember the 3rd Ord Ammo Dump going up. It lasted for several days!!!
I found an efficient way to 'burn fooey'. While out at Black Horse we had a Arty Battery next to us. As you cannon cocker can verify, when the powder canister is open it is considered contaminated and any unused power bags are latter burned. Well I would get the 'contaminated' bags from the arty next door and we would use them to burn the crap. About two or three bags and you could eat out of the barrel. But some AH butter bar thought it was 'unsafe' and made us stop doing it.[V]
By the way, my second tour I was the one in the left door (crew chief) of those Hueys!! 282nd AHC (Black Cats) and 71st AHC (Rattlers)![;)]
What unit were you with in the 199th?
Those pictures sure bring back some memories! Thanks for posting them!
quote:Originally posted by MMOMEQ-55
One thing that sticks in my mind was the time my spotter and myself were being extracted from a hot LZ. For some reason an Army huey was there to pick us up. (we were Marines) The bush was full of gooks and this a##hole pilot leaves us there. We were less than 10 yards from that chopper. He was sh#tting in his pants from taking on fire and left us standing there. Worst feeling in the world when you are about to be over run by a 50/60 gooks.
I took one in my knee then one in my head. My spotter drops everything and throws me over his shoulder and runs many clicks with me. We finally get to lay low for a few hours,long enough for charlie to give up on us. To this day I still don't know the pilots name but if I ever did found out I would track him down and gut the coward like he deserves.
I don't judge the whole Army on one bad apple. And I don't want to offend anyone. We all served no matter what branch you were in. So pease don't take offense. I post this in hopes that someone might know something about this pilot and can steer me to him. And if you are the pilot who ran out on us, please feel free to contack me. We need to talk.
You don't offend me. We never did that, but I have heard stories like yours before. We even waited in a hot lz to get ARNs out.
I can tell you one about a Marine who's life we saved. He got hit with a kettle claymore and 'some one' came up on guard and ask if anyone in the area could do an emergency Dust Off and we volunteered. When we landed and were about to load this guy a Lt. came up and told us to wait, he didn't want one of his Marines dying on a Army bird, he would wait for a Marine bird. (They were about 15 out). I told my AC about this and told him I was going to kick this guys * rather than leave this guy to die. He said 'do what you have to do'. So I took the 60 operating rod I kept in my smoke pole and coal cocked the AH Lt and we took the Marine and he lived. Never heard a thing about it again. I am betting when this AH Lt came to and want to raise hell his CO told him to pound sand!!![;)]
I flew a Flachett loaded UH-1C Gunship (I Corp) on many sniffer missions. Killed a load of VC and NVA but also a ton of monkeys. Flew into the Tennis Court/Ah Shau/Rock Pile/Vadergriff/Ripcord on many missions but the worst of all was Lam Sahn 719 into Laos. Flew for the Alleycats out of DaNang and the Jokers out of Dong Ha and Khe Sahn.
quote:Originally posted by overo88
Goofy grape koolaid, Tiger piss beer,johnny Walker Red, eating fried frogs and rice with the locals, mother with newborn with nipples cut off by the VC, burning hootches and waiting for secondary explosions or hidden rounds cooking off, smell of burning rice cashes, seeing bullets hiting the rice paddy water in front of me and not seeing the shooter. boot lace 6-8 inch long leaches. little black leaches swolen with your blood. shootout with VC in a MG bunker made with portland cement bags "made in the USA". finding ammo and supply cashes with better (new) 782 gear better then what I had. first kill and a squad leader that froze up i had to push (rifle butt to the head)out of the way or die. (got two on the trail who were cooking rice)only three days in country on Deck House I. India Company comming back with 30 some odd marines out of 200, the rest whent home in bags. hill 69 overrun just outside of Chu-Lie. just 17 of us walked down the next morning. burning C-4 to heat the C-rats, burning heat tabs under my poncho to stay warm, in the rain. ARVN's that stand up to take a piss while on ambush. ARVN officers shooting our captured VC's. VC'c who got flying lessons. NVA Regulars that stand and fight for days. The underground bunker I found, with AID room, sleeping mats, ammo & weapons. enough for a hundred or more men not more then 2 clicks from Chu-Lie. TAM-KY, Den fu, marble, R&R in Hong Kong, ROK's that were assume fighters, ChickenSH** PF's and ARVN's. Papa san stealing grenades from our bunkers.
Its hard to tell all from only 1 year and a few months, so much happened.
One last one, anti war protestors at the gate outside El-Toro Ca. Airfield, but it was home.
Short round (I know, there were a lot of short rounds)
PFC/LCpl
1965-1966 CHU-LIE RVN
USMC, GRUNT
I was a crew chief those many years ago , we are being forgotten as ww1 and ww2 vets are , sad but true. Every nite I pray to GOD our boys come home safe from the current SNAFU.
me red beach
marble mountain
and this one is important
I don't know why I posted these old photos , maby the web will preserve them.
roboat
Did you every fly into Tango Tango? Tan Tru home of the 2nd of the 60th Infantry. I think I remember the Grayhounds, I rode Eagle Flights out of there from 16 Oct 67 to 15 Oct 68 as a grunt.
I would like to thank all past and present Special Operations Men and Women who have kept, and keep the SF Traditions and Faith Alive.
"Thanks to all who have Served and continue to serve" "Godbless"
I know who you are,even if you don"t yet know.You"ve seen Death-you have been Death,yet only your Brothers and Sisters in arms know your great pain and suffering.You"ve seen the Very worst of Mankind,and you"ve been lucky enough to Be the Greatest Mankind has to offer.For our job we are only known as Vets.If Jhon Q.Public knew,realy knew what we know Wars might end.{Welcome Home}to all my brotherhood.
My first post.Michael Day Co.C 1st of 35 3rd beg. 4th Inf.Div. (68)
Getting that sad/glad feeling..The odor was death and decay and human excrement....Those darned water buffalo,seems to me that they hated Americans,,punji stakes,,living around the 'yards,I kinda liked them..Drinking rice wine from a crock jar through a straw...
humping a prc25 through the jungle,A1E's dropping he's or napalm,,
calling in artillery,naval gunfire,tac air,,seeing good men die
for a people who didn't care,,yeah,getting negative.......
What I remember......103 degrees at 8:00 AM, drinking water that smelled like Clorox bleach, burning poopters, C rations from the late 40's, salt tablets, spent brass, arc lights, no showers, scorpions, flying on CH 46's with the windows broken out and the ramps down, sweat,the smell of blood.
I found this forum a walk down the 1970s,and was very heartfelt and alot of strong words of I Cant wait till morning gets here.I tip my hat to all that served for us.
Some of my memories of Viet Nam.
Smells: fish sauce, sweat, rotting everything, JP5, Charlie, hospitals, and mamason's cooking. Sights: napalm, Puff staffing the hillside, leafless trees, red dust from blade wash, my M60 rounds tearing through rice patties\hooch's\boats\humans, blood pouring out of dust off birds we were supporting as we flew back to DaNang, green tracers, battle weary men, tiger at 5 meters.
Sounds: the jungle at night when on ambush, screams of the enemy when they breached the wire, screams of my wounded and dieing friends, AK and other rounds as they fly by\hit flesh\canopy, DaNang ammo dump going up, incoming and outgoing mortar\arty rounds, the Jackson 5.
Feelings: scared but strangly excited, pulling leeches off my body, so tired even my hair (stubble) hurt, warmth of blood, the love\trust of my fellow Marines, emptiness of loosing those Marines, puzzlement when falling out of my bird, my legs when the nerves finally came alive (joy even though it burned like hell), the anger\betrayal when returning home.
Comments
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Riding shotgun on convoy 1969. Loved my Ma Deuce..
[img][/img]
Iam still looking for a friend, Bill Spicer. He was wounded while standing with me and a couple other guys at LZ Mary Lou. A mortar round hit about 30 ft away and got him in the back. I was hit with 3 pieces, but my flack jacket stopped them, Bill was not wearing his.
He was medivac'd out, that was the last I saw of him. His name is not on the wall so I know he survived.
Edit::: Fast forward to today 10-30-15. I found Bill. A TV production company I contacted about 5 years ago located him. They put me in touch with him on the phone. I plan to see him soon. He lives about 7-8 hours away from me in Ca.
You were in the Highlands the same time I was, HHC 2/1 cav. We had a firebase on the highway going toward An Khe (Spelling), not far from the bottom of the Mang Yang pass, called it Black Hawk, also worked up in Kohn Tohm and Doc also. Cpt John Abrams was our C.O. .
W.D.
Its hard to tell all from only 1 year and a few months, so much happened.
One last one, anti war protestors at the gate outside El-Toro Ca. Airfield, but it was home.
Short round (I know, there were a lot of short rounds)
PFC/LCpl
1965-1966 CHU-LIE RVN
USMC, GRUNT
The little children that surrounded you when you stopped for what ever reason, while hauling 155 shells on convoy, they just seemed to come out of the wood work, always hungry, and we would give them whatever we had to give, usually our precious cans of ham-n-limas! Couldn't eat that bababooey anyway! Running down the runway at Cahm (sp) Rahn Bay, trying to catch our huey lift off to go home, while it was taking mortor rounds from Charlie. I guess he didn't want us to go home! Thank God we made it!
Being spit on by people that I had gone to high school with, for being a baby killer. At that time, it almost became true![:(!]
If you ever saw a Warrant Officer pilot trying to eat beans and weenies and play air guitar while flying, that was prolly me!
Sorry about those rough landings, and almost clipping you with the tail-rotor.
Sorry about making that 10-ship CA with only six guys, since lead ship was the only one with grunts aboard. (Man y'all's LT was PO'ed!) Some of those pics look like Dong Tam/My Tho. Was that in your AO? Bad neighborhood!
Welcome home.
Some of these stories are absolutely bone-chilling.
quote:Originally posted by prangle
Found some picture! early 1968 199th Light Infantry
What I remember? Couple months ago, I met a recent basic training graduate, he asked me when I was in Nam? I told him him a couple nights ago. He looked puzzled. I told him if he is unfortunate enough to go war, some day he would understand.
Welcome home, my brother. Rest easy.
PTSD sucks.
Congress lost the Viet Nam War for us and indirectly killed a lot of my VN friends over there.... What a world we live in. Bitter? Naw!
dg13
What do i remember most? well lots of things i haven't talked about in 36 years but what stands out the most / coming home and sitting in a classroom taking a placement test for 6 hrs at international paper only to be told at the end all nam vets could go home we don't hire nam vets. that was the longest 40 feet i ever walked.leaveing.
I learned real quick to not talk about it.
This is my son's idea to join a group and maby loose some anger.
other than that the damn scream of the transmission at my back.
copters was my game , D and H models.
70-72
days. But why? We were coming to HELP people. To SAVE them. We were
on a mission. Sound familiar? Make a long story short. We REALLY DID
HELP. Lot different from 30+years before. Best PART was that trip
Home. Thank you GOD for jet streams
Forgive me for jacking your post for a minute or two.
I have wanted to post and say thank you to each and every one of you for a while now but thank you just does not cover what I want to say. Truth is, I don't know/have the words to express how i feel about each and every one of you for what you have done for my family and our country.
As I read your experiences it truly breaks my heart.
I have never served, however my wife is Active Army and has been deployed to Iraq twice, Korea once and looks like Afghanistan is coming around the corner.
Anyway, I just wanted you all to know, for what it's worth you have all our respect, our thanks and we hope you can forgive the American people for there ignorance. God bless you all.
Levi & Capt C. Nation 53rd Med Bat.
2nd/28th Inf. Recon. BLACK LIONS
The smell. Upon our arrival the stewardess opens the door on the plane,...dunno how to put it..."sweet, poopty odor" permeating the entire country. Body bags. I could always sense the body bags' presence. Again, the smell. The flies hovering. Why were body bags always laid out in the sun? Breaking whiskey bottles so we could scatter the broken glass underneath the concertina wire. (I don't think the gooks liked that too much)[:D] Feeding the dogs leftovers. Someone learned that if you rolled the meat in hot sauce, then sprinkled it with .50 cal. gunpowder, it would keep the dogs mean, and the chemicals in the gunpowder would make their brains unstable. We alwaystook heed when they started growling. I firmly believe the dogs saved my life. Body count. The body count is important to someone, I guess. And don't forget to count the blood trails too. Fukk-U lizards. Now they were a class act. (At least they told you outright how they felt about the "round-eye"). VN's (friendlies)..seems the closer to the boonies we got, the less they were trusted. For the life of me, I can't figure out why. Yeah, right. Washington. When asked what her husband found most troublesome about the war (Vietnam) Lady Bird said it was the constant rat-a-tat-tat. What a joke. Ever notice the youth of our country go through the same assinine routine again and again, approximately every 25yrs. or so??
quote:Originally posted by gunnut505
Picking your head out of that nasty red dust to view the treeline with no leaves, wondering who made Ham'n'limas the most often canned substitute for food, blowing smoke at someone through yer gun barrel, stories of the legendary white/black team of deserters, "It ain't no thing", spider holes right next to your OP, Ba Muy Ba (Formaldehyde in a can), rain without lightning, mud without rain, sleeping for 10 minutes and thinking it was an hour, aftermath of flechettes, impact noises just over your head while leaves and branches rain down, betting how high Charlie would fly on the next blooper, body counts, finding gooks with playing cards on/in them, heat worse than St Louis in August, wondering how things were going in The World, medevac and Lisa at Da Nang.
Found some pictures! early 1968 199th Light Infantry
Was that second picture taken at a CA out of Black Horse?
I was a 'Redcatcher' 68-69. 87th Engineer Co. (CBT).
Were you there when they hit the POL dump right behind our Co area??
I to remember the 3rd Ord Ammo Dump going up. It lasted for several days!!!
I found an efficient way to 'burn fooey'. While out at Black Horse we had a Arty Battery next to us. As you cannon cocker can verify, when the powder canister is open it is considered contaminated and any unused power bags are latter burned. Well I would get the 'contaminated' bags from the arty next door and we would use them to burn the crap. About two or three bags and you could eat out of the barrel. But some AH butter bar thought it was 'unsafe' and made us stop doing it.[V]
By the way, my second tour I was the one in the left door (crew chief) of those Hueys!! 282nd AHC (Black Cats) and 71st AHC (Rattlers)![;)]
What unit were you with in the 199th?
Those pictures sure bring back some memories! Thanks for posting them!
One thing that sticks in my mind was the time my spotter and myself were being extracted from a hot LZ. For some reason an Army huey was there to pick us up. (we were Marines) The bush was full of gooks and this a##hole pilot leaves us there. We were less than 10 yards from that chopper. He was sh#tting in his pants from taking on fire and left us standing there. Worst feeling in the world when you are about to be over run by a 50/60 gooks.
I took one in my knee then one in my head. My spotter drops everything and throws me over his shoulder and runs many clicks with me. We finally get to lay low for a few hours,long enough for charlie to give up on us. To this day I still don't know the pilots name but if I ever did found out I would track him down and gut the coward like he deserves.
I don't judge the whole Army on one bad apple. And I don't want to offend anyone. We all served no matter what branch you were in. So pease don't take offense. I post this in hopes that someone might know something about this pilot and can steer me to him. And if you are the pilot who ran out on us, please feel free to contack me. We need to talk.
You don't offend me. We never did that, but I have heard stories like yours before. We even waited in a hot lz to get ARNs out.
I can tell you one about a Marine who's life we saved. He got hit with a kettle claymore and 'some one' came up on guard and ask if anyone in the area could do an emergency Dust Off and we volunteered. When we landed and were about to load this guy a Lt. came up and told us to wait, he didn't want one of his Marines dying on a Army bird, he would wait for a Marine bird. (They were about 15 out). I told my AC about this and told him I was going to kick this guys * rather than leave this guy to die. He said 'do what you have to do'. So I took the 60 operating rod I kept in my smoke pole and coal cocked the AH Lt and we took the Marine and he lived. Never heard a thing about it again. I am betting when this AH Lt came to and want to raise hell his CO told him to pound sand!!![;)]
Goofy grape koolaid, Tiger piss beer,johnny Walker Red, eating fried frogs and rice with the locals, mother with newborn with nipples cut off by the VC, burning hootches and waiting for secondary explosions or hidden rounds cooking off, smell of burning rice cashes, seeing bullets hiting the rice paddy water in front of me and not seeing the shooter. boot lace 6-8 inch long leaches. little black leaches swolen with your blood. shootout with VC in a MG bunker made with portland cement bags "made in the USA". finding ammo and supply cashes with better (new) 782 gear better then what I had. first kill and a squad leader that froze up i had to push (rifle butt to the head)out of the way or die. (got two on the trail who were cooking rice)only three days in country on Deck House I. India Company comming back with 30 some odd marines out of 200, the rest whent home in bags. hill 69 overrun just outside of Chu-Lie. just 17 of us walked down the next morning. burning C-4 to heat the C-rats, burning heat tabs under my poncho to stay warm, in the rain. ARVN's that stand up to take a piss while on ambush. ARVN officers shooting our captured VC's. VC'c who got flying lessons. NVA Regulars that stand and fight for days. The underground bunker I found, with AID room, sleeping mats, ammo & weapons. enough for a hundred or more men not more then 2 clicks from Chu-Lie. TAM-KY, Den fu, marble, R&R in Hong Kong, ROK's that were assume fighters, ChickenSH** PF's and ARVN's. Papa san stealing grenades from our bunkers.
Its hard to tell all from only 1 year and a few months, so much happened.
One last one, anti war protestors at the gate outside El-Toro Ca. Airfield, but it was home.
Short round (I know, there were a lot of short rounds)
PFC/LCpl
1965-1966 CHU-LIE RVN
USMC, GRUNT
me red beach
marble mountain
and this one is important
I don't know why I posted these old photos , maby the web will preserve them.
1. The sound of cockroaches scrambling up the paper map on the wall of my hooch at night.
2. The sound of the mess truck cranking up at 0400 outside my hooch to go get the VN civilian cooks at Long Thanh.
Here's Peter A. Bird's photo of Long Binh Jail, built by the US Army Engineer Command Vietnam, including my unit, 92nd Engineer Battalion.
Did you every fly into Tango Tango? Tan Tru home of the 2nd of the 60th Infantry. I think I remember the Grayhounds, I rode Eagle Flights out of there from 16 Oct 67 to 15 Oct 68 as a grunt.
"Thanks to all who have Served and continue to serve" "Godbless"
My first post.Michael Day Co.C 1st of 35 3rd beg. 4th Inf.Div. (68)
my
The beautiful beachs, and the friends I left behind.
humping a prc25 through the jungle,A1E's dropping he's or napalm,,
calling in artillery,naval gunfire,tac air,,seeing good men die
for a people who didn't care,,yeah,getting negative.......
Vietnam '66-'67
Vietnam 03/67 - 03/68
Smells: fish sauce, sweat, rotting everything, JP5, Charlie, hospitals, and mamason's cooking. Sights: napalm, Puff staffing the hillside, leafless trees, red dust from blade wash, my M60 rounds tearing through rice patties\hooch's\boats\humans, blood pouring out of dust off birds we were supporting as we flew back to DaNang, green tracers, battle weary men, tiger at 5 meters.
Sounds: the jungle at night when on ambush, screams of the enemy when they breached the wire, screams of my wounded and dieing friends, AK and other rounds as they fly by\hit flesh\canopy, DaNang ammo dump going up, incoming and outgoing mortar\arty rounds, the Jackson 5.
Feelings: scared but strangly excited, pulling leeches off my body, so tired even my hair (stubble) hurt, warmth of blood, the love\trust of my fellow Marines, emptiness of loosing those Marines, puzzlement when falling out of my bird, my legs when the nerves finally came alive (joy even though it burned like hell), the anger\betrayal when returning home.
USMC 10/68 - 7/69, 12/70 - 8/71, 12/71 - 8/72 (Laos mainly)