Chap 15 The Voice of God  010425

      When the tail end of “A” Company of the Black Lions (2/28th) trickled into LZ X-Ray, artillery officer Hearne and other key officers had already joined Lazzell, at the spot where the command bunker was going to be dug. There they stood, listening to Lazzell flap his jaws when he should not have been calling for a meeting in the first place. Instead, he should have just finished working Hearne's behind off, having him call down multiple barrages of artillery on previously registered points around the clearing. Napalm and cluster bombs should have also been used to clear away any ambushers and their equipment. Yet when I landed hours later, the area was as pristine as ever. After the prepping , he should have had his soldiers double time around each side of the large clearing toward the north end, with the speed and urgency of an air assault. Soon after that, Lazzell should have been walking the perimeter, himself, making sure defensive positions were being dug in the correct locations. They also should have begun digging in immediately. The two trailing companies of the Black Lions should have been ready to double time into position behind the Rangers (1/16th), instead of being allowed to linger far behind. There had been an abundance of warnings recently, to indicate that nonchalantly strolling into LZ X-Ray could be suicide. Triet's sappers were keeping him abreast of when Lazzell would arrive at LZ X-Ray. I talked about that in the last chapter. Yet, it's obvious from reports and maps, that Lazzell was taking a very cavalier attitude toward the entire march, from LZ Rufe to LZ X-Ray. Sergeant Murry, himself, later verified that no one was told to dig in when his men first arrived. Instead, the men were allowed to rest and eat lunch. This means that they were allowed to fall into a much more relaxed state of mind than should have ever been allowed. Boxes of machine gun ammo were scattered around where they were not in easy reach of the gunners. Some men started writing letters home. Some took naps. This type of relaxed state would never have been allowed by Dick. Yet, it would be wrong to blame what happened next entirely on Lazzell. The buck did not stop with him. He just did not know what he didn’t know. He had convinced himself that he had arrived as a commander and there was absolutely no one to show him differently.

     When the attack started, Hearne was standing in a circle of leadership personnel. It was at this moment, that the first sporadic gunfire could be heard in the background. Some of those first shots were fired by Triet's tree snipers. They should have been burned up in the prepping, which never occurred. Instead, Triet was able to telephone orders to those snipers to start shooting Lazzell's men in the clearing. He was able to telephone them, on that same como wire, which also should have been destroyed in the prepping. The sound of that shooting confirmed the command to start the formations of brown uniformed conscripts double timing down those ox cart trails toward what would become a living hell. Many would soon trade that earthly hell for an eternal one. Chinook resupply helicopters were circling above the clearing. That was an indication to Triet that there was not going to be any further air strikes since these lumbering giants were entering the flyway. It didn't take long for Triet's snipers to realize that these Chinooks made much better targets than individual soldiers in the clearing. The Chinooks were big, and they were slow. They were slowed even more, because they had webbing dangling from under their weather-beaten bellies. That webbing was crammed with all sorts of resupplies. The diversion, these Chinooks offered snipers, probably saved some American lives. Only one man in the “A” Company of the Black Lions was killed in the clearing by a sniper. His name was Lloyd Wohlford. His friend, Spec-4 Canute was lying beside him when he was fatally shot. Canute immediately drew sergeant Bivens’ attention to what was happening. The sergeant took it upon himself to have his squad break formation with the rest of his company and move closer to the protection of the wood line. Others along the entire length of “A” Company followed their lead. Sergeant Bivens’ unilateral decision to break formation and move proved one thing. It proved that he understood that the most important part of his job was looking after his men. Personally, I do not believe this was understood by most field commanders in Vietnam.

      The enemy attack was more concentrated on the northwest corner of the perimeter, where several ox cart trails converged into the clearing, but in this chapter I am not going to give great detail about the main battle, itself. David Hearne has already given a good account, which he took from eyewitness accounts of the people who were there. Sergeant Murry was in the heaviest  fighting on the north end. He also gave a good account. Hearne wrote about it in a book entitled "June 17, 1967 - Battle of Xom Bo II". Murry gave more details in his book which is entitled "Content With My Wages A Sergeant's Story". Sergeant Murry's two machine gunners, in 2nd platoon were among the very first exposed to the main thrust of the brown suited conscripts as they came flooding down ox cart trails toward their positions. 1st platoon was to Murry's front, hampering his men's ability to return fire, without hitting men in 1st platoon. However, Murry, was able to position his two machine gunners, Jose Garcia, and Bob Pointer on the left flank where a gap existed between “B” Company of the Black Loins and “A” Company of the Rangers. Jose Garcia heard the NVA conscripts stampeding down the ox cart trail, in front of his position, before he saw them. When Jose opened up, the return fire was enormous. Since the prepping of the clearing had been inadequate, the trails around the clearing were clear of the downed trees and branches that a good prepping would have caused. This lack of prepping allowed for much easier access to predetermined points around the perimeter. Once conscripts were within about fifty meters of the perimeter, they were guided by black pajama sappers, who were skilled at probing for holes, in the woefully unprepared defenses. If they encountered heavy return fire, they used the previously dug pits as temporary shelter until the firing subsided and then moved on to probe another part of the perimeter. As usual, most of the Americans shot over their enemy's head, but not so with Captain Ulm’s “B” Company of the Ranger Battalion. Captain Ulm's Company of veterans held down the east side of the perimeter and they were definitely not shooting high. Charging conscripts were riddled with bullets from the accurate suppressing fire laid down by Ulm’s grunts. The conscripts who made it were smart enough to hunker down and wait for the firing to subside. They then joined those who had already been positioned on the South side of the perimeter. American return fire was much lighter there, because there were only thirty Americans covering an expanse of the perimeter which should have been covered by entire company. As I have already mentioned, Lazzell should have redirected Hearne's A Company of the Black Lions to cover that side of the perimeter as soon as they entered the clearing. Instead, he allowed them to continue marching single file toward the north end of the open clearing. Now, The Americans on the south side were out in the open and facing an enemy who outnumbered them at least ten to one. The NVA advanced almost nonchalantly into that south end of the clearing, murdering the wounded, and taking souvenirs, as they went along their way, unaware that on other sides of the perimeter, their comrades were nor faring nearly as well. This is proof that fire fights in Vietnam had some very strange aspects to them.

      Meanwhile back at Lai Khe, during the attack on LZ X-Ray, my squad was just finishing up a nice hot lunch and returning to our perimeter bunkers for a refreshing afternoon nap. I had already positioned my nap time spot behind some sandbags, so a sniper could not zero in on me. Milliron was still state-side and Bowman was also gone on R & R. The ever-faithful Walker was there, as always. Unfortunately, my nap time plans were soon interrupted when Bartee returned from a briefing at command center. Moments after returning, he gave us orders to saddle up, and before long another unit showed up to relieve us of perimeter guard duty. We followed Bartee down the dirt road which led to the mess hall tent, where we had just been served lunch. Other groups of men in my battalion were already congregating around a line of "deuce and a half" trucks. Some had already started climbing into the back of empty trucks. It wasn't long before the trucks were loaded and started pulling away, heading through a grove of rubber trees, and toward the air strip. While riding to the air strip, Bartee explained that the Rangers (1/16th) were under heavy attack and needed our help. When we arrived at the air strip, a line of helicopters were already waiting for us to load up. We were down to seven men, in my squad, and low on new recruits in the unit, as a whole, but never mind that. Two companies of my battalion (my B Company and Mac McLaughlin's C Company) jumped off trucks and filed down the right side of that line of Huey helicopters. The general feeling was, that we had the best "ole man" in the entire division and we could handle anything the enemy would be able to throw at us, as long as some ignorant lieutenant didn't get in our way. That was the general feeling. However, I would soon discover that my own feelings were starting to dance to a very different tune on this particular day. The chopper's engines were running. Their rotor blades were turning slowly. It was “hurry up” and “wait”, and “wait some more”. We knew the drill and would only board a chopper when told to do so. While waiting, some guys took this opportunity to nervously check their gear. Some left our lines to walk over to several stacked crates of ammo, hand grenades and C-rations. Most of us stocked up on such stuff long before we thought we might need it, so we just sat in the red airstrip dirt, leaned back on our ruck sacks, and waited. Standing a very short distance away was the tall lanky Mac McLaughlin. I didn’t recognize him as being the same new guy whom I had been envious of, while he was digging in next to me, many months before. That day was a thousand years removed from the thoughts on my mind today.

      Then it happened. I watched the door gunner in the helicopter directly in front of me jump out and walk toward the rear of his chopper like he had probably done hundreds of times before. This time he walked directly into the whirling blade on the tail of the chopper. He was killed instantly. Within a few seconds medics responded and retrieved his limp body. When it happened, those of us waiting to board choppers did not flinch. Truth is, most of us were too familiar with sudden death to do that. However, I and several other veteran's whom I interviewed years later still remember. Mac McLaughlin was one of those guys. It’s probably a good thing that I did not recognize Mac standing so close beside me sporting sergeant stripes while my sleeves were now bare.

      In the past I had waited a lot, but this time it was different. The longer we waited to board our chopper, the more time I had to think. The more time I had to think the stranger this certain feeling became. There was no logical reason for what I was feeling. We were probably going to be flying straight into a living nightmare. Maybe part of the reason for this strange feeling was having seen that door gunner get killed in such a senseless way. No matter what triggered it, I would have never in a hundred years expected to be feeling what I was feeling. I was euphoric. That euphoric feeling was further buoyed up by the sound of a recent rock song by "The Byrds". That song was playing over and over in my head. The name of that song was "Hey Mr. Tambourine Man”.

     Had I finally lost my ever lovin mind? I was actually feeling a tidal wave of upbeat emotional energy. How could I be experiencing that at a time like this? Instead, I should have been feeling at least some anxiety over the very real prospect of dying. We knew for sure that we were flying into a hot LZ. I knew for sure that I was carrying a worn-out M-16, which couldn't hit the side of a barn at fifty paces. However, my mind was having none of that. Instead, it was embracing a feeling which was totally new to me. I can only explain that off the wall sensation in the following way. You see, there was a much greater fear than combat, which had been taking over, little by little, since joining my unit and even before A.I.T.. I had no outlet to numb this growing fear. I never drank. I never smoked and I never complained about anything to Sergeant Bartee, or anyone else, for that matter. I just tucked things down, inside, and went along to get along. I was convinced, that I was powerless to change anything anyway, so why try? From those first days, shortly after basic, and starting during the training in A.I.T., I had learned that excelling didn't buy much respect. In fact, it seemed to do just the opposite in my case. After finishing A.I.T., I was not promoted to P.F.C. as 99% of the others were. Why was that? Was it because my sergeants had to stay up all night looking for me, during escape and evasion training? Maybe. Or was it because I had refused to buckle under, when given the third degree, about not signing up for Officer Candidate School. Maybe. I never really figured out the reason. However, I assumed that it was one or the other. It could not have been for poor performance, because I graduated A.I.T. at least in the top ten. One sergeant told me that I would have graduated first in my class if I had only run the mile instead of walking it. There was a reason for not running that mile. As the smallest kid in my junior high class, I used to have to run from neighborhood bullies all the time. By the time I turned eighteen, I had worked out enough to face off with every single one of those bullies. I told myself afterward that I would never run again unless I was running of my own free will.



Wayne Wade - Fort Jackson June, 1966

     The most recent occurrence, fueling what I now realize were passive aggressiveness feelings, was the article 15. It didn't bother me much at first. Yet, afterward, in the days since, I could feel a kind of slow smoldering deep inside, with the misdirected object of that growing anger being Captain Brown. Though he was an actor in a minor incident, he was also somewhat of a last straw. My perfectionist mind was now causing me to close off more than ever. The distain which I felt for most of the current leadership of my unit and the military in general was overwhelming. The damage that anger was causing to my sanity seemed, however, almost sweet to the taste. I knew my day would come. I would get even. In the meantime, one thing I knew for sure. I knew, if I wanted to survive my superiors, I needed to be careful. Interestingly, that fear which I was feeling was much more potent than the fear I had for that Cong hiding in the jungle. My fear was an overwhelming fear of “good ole Uncle Sam. That child molester had been allowed to expose me in my last year as a teenager to an X rated environment. At the same time, he was telling me that I was too young to vote. Now, however, what could I do against such a powerful enemy. Besides, I loved my country, but I very much hated the people running it.