Chapter 21: The Bigger Picture 032125

      The next day after my Dogface boys ran the 165th NVA regiment off Hill 203, they got a break. Nothing but routine patrolling happened for them on that day. By now, they also had a lot of company in the general area. Back on the morning of the 29th, two companies of Jim Kasik's 2/28th Infantry Battalion had been sent to the airstrip itself. Kasik's men dug-in outside the existing perimeter around the air strip, while the CDIG forces were still clearing out enemy conscripts hiding in those abandoned bunkers inside the perimeter of the airstrip. The Montagnard fighters and the Vietnamese Rangers made a quick work of those wretched souls. Kasik's men had donated the rocket launchers which they used to complete that gruesome task. Kasik’s men shoveled a little faster each time they heard another explosion from one of those rockets. Those hapless conscripts had been too scared of being shot by their own communist cadre to withdraw earlier, without orders. Their cadre, however, knew a little more about how the game was played. When things got hot, they withdrew like scared rabbits. There was no one to shoot them and they could later tell the story anyway they saw fit. So, those conscripts in the bunkers became trapped, while the rest of the 273rd retreated. Greg Murry's 1/16th later landed in an LZ (landing zone) several miles northeast of Loc Ninh. The Blue Spaders (1/26th Infantry Battalion) were also inserted a few miles north northwest of Loc Ninh. To beef things up even more, the commander of II Field Force, Lt. General Fred Weyand, transferred operational control of the 2/12th battalion to my "Big Red One”. On the 2nd of November they were inserted northeast of the airstrip. That battalion was a part of the very brave Oliver Stone's 25th Division.

     Looking back over fifty years at the bigger picture, it’s easier for me to understand now how easy it was for the man at the top, Le Duan, to move forward with his plans. History records that those in his inner circle who opposed his big battle plans were done away with. As with the mafia and all communist governments, Duan was subject to few time-consuming moral restraints. The people had no power. Duan sent as many of his teenaged conscripts to their deaths as needed for him to stay in power and possibly win the war. Actually, he was using his conscripts as a distraction, a red flag, if you will; something for us Americans to chase through the woods. Meanwhile his “made guys” clamped down harder and harder on villages and towns, extorting their help in preparing for a fake uprising. It was all an illusion, but one which our incredibly smart Secretary of Defense, Robert MacNamara, was fooled by until the day he died. In late 1967, Le Duan could not be more pleased with the way Westmoreland was taking the bait. The bullish Westmoreland was mindlessly hooking his horns into Duan’s red flag, ripping it to shreds, but leaving Duan's shadow government intact. So far, the man who looked like a general, talked like a general and walked like a general was not disappointing Duan.

     Nevertheless, the II Field Force, under Weyand, performed magnificently. It was a daunting task to accomplish what Weyand's people accomplished to counter Hoang Cam’s attacks in late October on remote outposts like Loc Ninh and Song Be. There were few roads to bring in resupplies and those were vulnerable to constant attacks. Sure, we had the mobility of helicopters to move troops and supplies in and out of remote areas, but it took a tremendous effort by our logistics people to keep those birds flying. It also took a lot of thoughtful tactical savvy to make sure they got in and out of landing zones safely. The logistics required to service, repair, and provide fuel for them, was mind-boggling.

     Recorded statistics say that 19 enemy died for every one American killed. My research and my experience in the field says that number was at least double, if not triple. Whatever the number, however, this statistic was meaningless. Westmoreland never understood this one simple truth. That truth says that it is always possible to do something very, very well and yet that "something" can absolutely be the wrong thing to do. If a solution does not produce the desired results than it is no solution. By the end of 1967 we had become very proficient at doing exactly the wrong thing. We became very skilled  at chasing down and ripping apart the enemy's red flag every time. So, he kept pulling out another one and waving it in front of our faces. To make matters worse, my research suggests that the very astute Lt. General Fred Weyand knew we were pursuing a wrong course, but like Westmoreland's old boss, James Gavin, he was powerless to stop the madness. If those men had been given the power, would they have known any better than Westmoreland, what course to take? At this point Vietnam was a runaway train, and the devil had hijacked the controls.

     October 31, 1967 brought more fighting. The Loc Ninh air strip was again assaulted by battalions of the 272nd Brigade shortly after midnight. Mortar fire led the attack. Then came the ground attack. Cam had some new toys to play with. One of those toys was the Chinese 122 mm rocket, which was being used for the first time in the 3rd Corps. He also had recoilless rifles and flamethrowers. Before the attack, he had been anxious to show off these weapons to his new NVA conscripts, for a reason, we Americans never quite comprehended. You see, while Westmoreland's mind was still stuck in his past war experience in Korea, the little-known leader of North Vietnam, Le Duan, was embracing a bigger picture. In this bigger picture, these weapons had a much broader purpose than we could ever have imagined. Besides being used to kill us, they were show and tell props, for the pep talks Cam's cadre routinely gave his teenaged conscripts. Cam had no illusions about these weapons being able to win the day for them, but that didn't matter. His cadre of pied pipers bragged them up anyway. Here's why. You see, fear of dying could make untested fifteen-year-old conscripts break down in disastrous ways, even if their photo ops did make them look invincible in those brown or green uniforms with the little rounded pith helmets. Yes, for the camera, these uniforms made their formations appear monolithic, but they were not monolithic. They were kids and under similar circumstances, they could have been our kids. We Americans saw what communist illusions wanted us to see. Those illusions were helped along by a national press corps growing ever more devoid of godly understanding. These new rocket weapons bolstered the nerve of these immature and very naïve child conscripts, plain and simple. They were not going to save a conscript from a grisly death. However, new conscripts didn't know that. These weapons gave them hope. It was false hope but so what? This false hope made them easier to control, as they were herded into position to make one more suicidal human wave attack into the killing caldron of Loc Ninh airfield. The truth is the entire communist ideology then and now is built upon false hope and self-delusion.  

     Interestingly, the survivors in the 273rd NVA Regiment, who lived through the maniacal attack on the 29th of October no longer needed those endless carrot and stick pep talks by their cadre. The miracle of surviving these first soul-shattering events on that Loc Ninh Air strip worked, to quickly harden their immature minds into becoming like the very same evil, but brave souls, who had victimized them in the first place. In between now and the next battle, the dope provided by their handlers would help speed up that transformation. Actually, preparations for this transformation did not begin with these poor youngster’s sojourn from North to South Vietnam. The communist military could not so soon turn rice farming teenagers into what they wanted the world to believe was an army of immortals. It had to be a cradle to grave process for that to happen. North Vietnamese leader and Order of Lenin award winner, Le Duan, understood this process well. It’s a process which never changes for those who crave to have the power of life and death over their neighbor. First comes the community activists with their constant appeals to those usually on the lowest rungs of a society to fight back against a perceived evil. Organized demonstrations are the next step. Support for this is garnered from wherever it can be found, whether that be rich do-gooders or the ruling body. Both the "haves" and "have-nots" are skillfully played against each other by the community organizer for the sole purpose of gaining power for himself. As the numbers increase under the control of this amoral power broker, then comes the ability to gain control of a church, a school, a town, or an entire nation. The only entity which has proven to be an effective antidote against this cancer in free societies is the Church of Jesus Christ. 

     Cam's people just added the final before the grave touches to this age-old malignancy. In North Vietnam it was a process, which, by now, was being carried along by a bureaucratic conveyance of rules governing every aspect of young conscript’s short lives. I was fortunate enough to have a high school civics teacher named Mr. Johnson, who took a semester to explain the truth about this evil process. Sadly, I would be willing to bet that there are no Mr. Johnsons teaching this subject in our high schools today, but guess who is there in ever increasing numbers, teaching our children and giving them pep talks. Without God's timeless rules for life, this process cannot be stopped, and it always starts with just a few community organizers feeding like parasites on the very freedom which they seek to destroy. In the end it will surely unearth the lowest forms of human depravity just as it did in Loc Ninh in the late fall of November, 1967.     

     Just after midnight on the 31st of October, the NVA 9th Division's 272nd regiment made another assault on Loc Ninh air Strip. Jim Kasik's Black Lions had by now moved their positions inside the wire and were ready and waiting. The NVA 9th Division's 208th Antiaircraft Battalion took positions around the Loc Ninh air strip to have a go at The Big Red One's deadly helicopter gunships and the Air Forces' more deadly C-47 "Spookys". (We also called them "Puff, The Magic Dragon") They gave their positions in the night sky away as they slung glowing red waves of tracer rounds toward the dark earth. Later a veteran forward air controller said that the NVA's 208th put out the heaviest antiaircraft fire that he had ever seen. However, it was to no avail. The battle on the 31st was repelled with huge losses incurred by the NVA. Of course, those numbers were underreported by the ever so careful Westmoreland. Only nine people were killed on our side and not a single American aircraft was shot down. The 165th was supposed to join the attack. That was the same unit, which Mac's C Company of my Dogface Battalion had sent packing on the 29th of October. The 165th was ordered to join the attack on the 31st but didn't make it to the fight, because it got lost in the rubber trees on the way to the assembly area. That speaks volumes about the incompetence of the core elements of this NVA unit. Did no one in the entire unit know how to use a compass? Perhaps the reason for getting lost was because Mac’s Dogface boys had taken out most of their experienced local forces and guides? These local card-carrying communists were the hardcore sociopaths who greased the wheels of any NVA unit. As I have said before, the bulk of the uniformed NVA conscripts were nothing more than young rice farmers programed to become cannon fodder.

     Of course, senior communist leadership, from Cam's position on up, were also as hardcore as hardcore could be. However, no matter how dedicated they were, their commitment alone was not going to help them win this battle. Later, they publicly admitted as much. Even as early on as this first Battle of Loc Ninh, Cam probably knew, and his boss, Hoang Van Tha, certainly knew, that they were not going to be able to take the airfield at Loc Ninh. If they did take it, they knew they couldn't keep it. However, the Henchmen of Hanoi also knew something else. They knew that America had come across the sea and onto the land like a mindless class five hurricane and hurricanes cannot be stopped. However, if America could be withstood long enough, to allow her to beat herself to death upon the land, then Hanoi also knew that America would fade away, leaving a dysfunctional codependent South Vietnam government in its wake. That government would be a government severely weakened by the whole affair. It would be then that Duan, with the logistical support of Russia and China could easily march in and take possession of the land. It's a recipe that our enemies have been using ever since and it's a Real Estate play, plain and simple. When a few people have dominion over the land then those living on the land will be forced to dance to every tune they play. How hard is that to understand? Things can be summed up this way. During this period in our history, the growing godless thinking in America was turning our country's foreign policies into nothing more than vain winds. Our vain effort did eventually beat itself to death upon the shores of Vietnam and sadly is still repeating those same vain actions in many other places around the globe. Have we now become so vain, that we shall soon beat ourselves to death upon our own shores? Without a return to God and our Judeo-Christian values, I believe that is exactly what will happen.

      As dawn broke on the 31st, everyone in the three companies of my Dogface Battalion at Loc Ninh got a welcome break in the fighting. The attack on Jim Kasik’s Black Lions and the Loc Ninh airstrip had failed just as did the one on the 29th. The 105 mm guns behind Mac's C company position had hammered away all night in support of the Loc Ninh air strip so the noise of the guns made it hard for some of the newer men in my Dogface Battalion to sleep. Older (in time served) grunts could sleep within earshot of almost any noise. However, if they were awake, I'm sure this night brought back memories of Fire Support Base Thrust and the battle of Ap Gu. As with Fire Base Thrust, Mac, Fee, and the other men of Dogface could see and hear in the distance those "Spookys" and the chopper gunships plying their deadly business around that airstrip. Just like at that Battle of Ap Gu, those gunships would have been peeing red tracer rounds toward the earth. The groan of Gatling guns and the explosions of five hundred pounds bombs could also be heard in the wee hours of that night. Now, as the sun was coming up all was quiet. The loudest noises to be heard by Mac and Fee and the others at the Dogface NDP were now being made by the big Chinooks bringing in resupplies shortly after dawn. I was at the air strip in Quan Loi early this morning too to transfer a couple cooks onto those helicopters along with some hot donuts and fresh coffee for my boys in the field. I had no idea what they were going through, nor did most others in my B Company. My entire company was just enjoying the fact that they were chilling out with me at Quan Loi, telling wars stories and watching another episode of "combat" projected onto a bed sheet each night. 

      If this day was to become a welcome break for Dick and the other three companies of my Dogface Battalion, it was to become an even better day for my B Company. B Company was "sitting pretty" and removed from the entire mess going on in and around Loc Ninh Air Strip some twenty miles away. They were in Quan Loi with me, where I too was "sitting pretty" and intending to keep it that way until my tour of duty was over, in less than a month. Little did I know that this great job which I had landed was well on the way to getting me killed quicker than I could have been if I had been with Cavazos at Loc Ninh. This day was definitely going to become one of the most dangerous days of my life and I was to become powerless to do anything about it.      

      For many years, here's how I remembered this most eventful day. First Sergeant Pink Dillard put things in motion late in the day when he corned me and then gave me one simple order. He then turned around and walked away. Now, I had successfully avoided every sergeant and every officer in my unit since accepting this new job. I worked hard at keeping it that way hopefully until my tour was over. Sergeants were people to be avoided like the plague. If I had learned anything in the Army, then I had learned this. These feelings about sergeants was even more intense for officers. When I think back, there was really only one authority figure in the entire unit who made me feel differently. I realize what I am about to say seems strange, but nevertheless true. I did not feel this way about our "Ole Man", Dick Cavazos.

      Now, Pink had caught me flat footed. He showed up in the mess hall tent and he wasn't looking for a snack. He was looking for me. When he saw me, he made no small talk. Come to think of it, that's another reason why I hated authority figures in my life. Most had made me feel like a thing, instead of a person. Dick didn't do that. Most sergeants including Pink did. If the reader wants to be a great leader, then I suggest not doing what Pink did on this day. Take thirty seconds to make small talk. Pink just stopped and looked me straight in the eyes. He was a scary fellow when he gave someone that evil eye. He then curtly commanded me to round up the women helpers in the mess hall and drive them home. That was it. He turned around and walked off. He did not have the slightest idea what danger he was putting me in. At first, however, neither did I. I have thought about this moment for many years, and for many of those years, I must admit, that I thought the First Sergeant was out to get me. As I have already said, I now realize that was a ridiculous notion coming from my paranoid mind. None of us, including Pink, knew at the time he gave that order, that one of those girls lived almost 8 miles away in An Loc. All Pink was doing was making sure that these young women were not having to stay in camp overnight with a bunch of horny young men. There were three young women who needed a ride and the first two lived close by.

      The gravity of my situation was now really starting to sink in and with it came that other edge of the two-edged sword which defined my paranoia. I not only felt a certain disdain for sergeants, but was also beginning to feel that I was being viewed by Pink as a slacker because I was working with the support troops. Pink had not joined Dogface until late in my tour. Perhaps he did not realize that I had walked point for nine months. While mulling over these thoughts, I became fraught with faulty thinking. I started to think that I was being singled out. Paranoia of all authority was slicing up my life one stroke at a time, coming and going and I had no way of knowing. It's a very sad way for one to live their life. My mind raced. "Why was Pink picking on me?”. I knew my lane and I thought that I was staying in it. On and on my damaged mind raced, like a runaway train. "Did Pink know about my article 15, and did he have me down for a "slacker"? Did word somehow reach his ears about me giving Donut Man a mud bath? Perhaps others or maybe Donut Man, himself, had gone to Pink with a different version of the story. Maybe it was one which didn't paint me in such a favorable light. Were any of these enough reason for Pink to punish little ole poor pathetic and paranoid me?"      

     First Sergeant, Pink Dillard, was fairly new in the unit, but he was no novice. He was a Korean veteran. Our very astute company commander, Watts Caudill, thought very highly of him. A First Sergeant’s primary duty was to use his experience to keep the people in his unit lined-out in the performance of everyday matters. That was a tall order. There were a lot of routine duties to be addressed. However, Pink Dillard was second to none, in following through with these duties. In a perfect world, first sergeants should have known something about our kind of tactical maneuvering and coordinating artillery and air strikes. However, most did not. RTOs, like Fred Walters and David Eaton, were usually much better at this simply because they got more practice. Handling the radios and also listening to good radio communications executed by sharp officers like Caudill and McCall  were their training ground. Their bright minds couldn't help but learn a thing or two about tactics. Radio communications were at the heart of every battle we fought. While tactics were being applied in a fight, First Sergeant Pink Dillard did what most other good first sergeants did during a fight. He kept his head down and let the rest of his men take care of business. By October, Dick had systematically accumulated a stack of good leadership at all levels and Pink was one of the best or he would not have been there. It's just that simple. Pink was also blessed with the good fortune to be part of a well-oiled machine at this point in time. That allowed Pink to focus on another part of his job which he dearly loved. That part was putting new 2nd lieutenants in their place. Pink also had the experience and foresight to deal with many other personnel situations long before they became a problem. He had at least 120 men under his wing and a skinny paycheck to go with that responsibility. I now realize that he didn't have time to keep a case file on me. 

     There was maybe an hour of daylight left. It was that and the realization that the one woman lived in An Loc which made my gut begin to tighten. I also knew that all patrols and road guards would soon be returning to positions inside the wire. The road between Quan Loi and An Loc would then become an very lonely uninhabited ghost road, with the very real possibility of a big boogie man lurking in the rubber trees somewhere between Quan Loi and Loc Ninh. My stomach tightened even more. It was at this point that I felt I had been thrown to the wolves. Enemy regimental size units surrounded Quan Loi. It was located just a few miles from the Cambodian border. On July 11, 1967, the enemy had launched a fairly large raid on Quan Loi. I had been on a number of patrols around Quan Loi earlier in the year, so I had experienced firsthand the enormous amount of evidence of enemy activity surrounding Quan Loi Air Strip. Enemy sappers continually plied their deadly trade every day, in the rubber trees, along the roads, and after dark they owned that stretch of road which I would be traveling at twilight.

     The first girl lived just outside the perimeter of Quan Loi. There would be little danger in dropping her off. The second girl lived just a couple miles, or so, down the road from there. It was the long distance I needed to travel, to drop the third girl off, which presented the problem. If I didn't get moving soon, darkness would fall, and the road guards would be gone for the night. There was a good chance that I would be driving into the large town of An Loc, at dusk, with no other Americans around, whatsoever. Every American soldier, who had been in country as long as I had, knew that no American in his right mind would ever venture out this time of day, to gallivant across the country in what was essentially only a pickup truck. Even armored units didn't travel these roads this time of day unless they traveled in force and were loaded for bear.

     Fortunately, my company was not having to pull perimeter guard and so my old squad members were close by. Somehow, one of them learned of my plight and passed along the situation to others in my squad. Five or six of them soon showed up armed to the teeth. Every man there seemed as alarmed as me about my plight. Every single man was fully aware of the danger. That was soon made apparent because they had brought extra ammo, a thump gun and even an M-60 machine gun. At the time, I am sure not a single one of those men had hesitated in making the decision to go with me. I still have a hard time understanding their selfless motivations for doing what they were getting ready to do. I believe it's possible that they volunteered to go with me because they remembered things that had gone well for us while I walked point for the squad, and perhaps thought I had been responsible. However, I am here to reiterate that every good outcome we shared was the work of the Holy Spirit. Nevertheless, obviously a bond had been forged between us. None of the cooks were volunteering to go. It was only those men who had faced death over and over again with me, who were now going with me. Once more every one of those men had to know that they would possibly face death on that road which we would be traveling down. One of them declared that they were going with my "sorry behind" so I wouldn't get lost. The most outspoken was that cussin red-faced guy. He quickly declared that he was going to ride shotgun. He then raised his pump shotgun as he climbed in the front seat. The rest wasted no time gathering up their weapons and about ten boxes of extra ammo. For years I have replayed this day in my mind. I have pondered whether or not these guys got permission to go with me or not. I don't think they did because there wasn't a single sergeant around to see us off. I do vividly remember that the cussin soldier had that kind of look on his face that said, "I'm going out in a blaze". That pump shotgun he carried was not particularly good for jungle fire fights but was perfect for this occasion. As a side note, I am sure that the cussin soldier was still reeling over his wife leaving him for another man. He seemed to be in that same devil may care mood after all these months. In most cases that kind of mood could be disastrous. However, being suicidal was just an absolutely perfect attitude to have on this particular little road trip.

     Without any fanfare the rest of my guys climbed in the back along with the three girls and off we went, through the gate and down a little bank toward a row of ten huts maybe a half mile outside the air strip perimeter. Those ten huts were in the first village where one of the girls lived. As I was driving through it, the girl started hollering to be let off. She realized that I was not slowing down for her stop and then started screaming. We could see the fear on her face as she began to cry. There was sheer terror in her voice as her screaming turned into a loud moaning. She had no idea that she was only giving us more confirmation that I was doing the right thing when I had decided to drop her off on the way back. I punched the gas pedal to the floor and kept rolling. Several of the guys riding in the back tried to explain to her what we were doing. Their explanations fell on deaf ears.

     We had already determined that we would use these he girls as an insurance policy against an enemy ambush. Yes, they were human shields, but at minor risk to them because we were not a high value target. The enemy would not want to kill them, just so he could kill us too. We were just not that important. If we had not taken that precaution, I am convinced that our little joy ride would have turned out to be the ride from hell quicker than it takes Mel Tillis to say, "On top of Ole Smokey". Shortly after passing the first girl's stop, all the girls became noticeably quiet, and they sat very still. The next girl in line to be let off sat silently as we passed through her village. Tears were still streaming down that one girl's face but at least she was quiet.

     As I said, my red-faced companion was riding on the passenger side. On the final leg of our journey, he calmly pulled a cigar out of his fatigue pocket and lit it. What a scene It made, as I watched him take his first slow puff. He then turned his head slowly toward me and grinned like Jack Nicolson in "The Shining". Instead of an ax in his hand, he was carrying that pump shotgun. Yes, as I glanced over at him, I was definitely convinced that he was suicidal. The entire scene was surreal. It could easily have been a build-up to a climax in a Mel Gibson or Clint Eastwood thriller. He had gotten that first dear John letter during Operation Junction City, and since then his wife had divorced him, taking the children with her into the home of her new lover. It now seemed as though he had little to live for. The wild-eyed expression on his grinning face said it all. His demeanor squeezed from me another memory of those final scenes from “The Wild Bunch". His facial expression said, "Why not go out in a blaze of glory?". I must admit that I did love the part about the glory, but I was really having a problem with that other part about going out with it.

     After taking those first few puffs on the cigar, my friend took the shotgun, which he was clutching in his other hand and gently laid it across his lap. On we went. Both his and my heads were pointed to the front now, while the guys in the back scanned our flanks.  Rows of rubber trees flew by us in a blur. Although I knew exactly what this crazy red-faced partner of mine was thinking, I don’t remember exactly what was going on in my own mind. Obviously, it was a tempered version of his thoughts, but I also know that it had something to do with a feeling of absolute and utter helplessness. Squeezing everything that the ole truck could muster, while listening to the gears whine, I managed to stay focused on the task at hand, which was to get there as quickly as possible and do the same coming back. Truth is, at this moment, I would have gladly given this truck driving job up in a second to be walking point again, in pitch black, with my trusty M-14 in my hands, and Dick Cavazos watching my back.

     We were completely alone on the road. I saw no one walking. There was not a single bicycle or even a single three-wheeled Lambretta. This was a bad sign. It was downright spooky. I knew any enemy patrol would be able to hear my truck coming for miles. That would give them more than enough time to set up an ambush. However, to say that I or anyone on the truck was fearful, in a normal sense, would be wrong. We were all ole guys to combat which meant that each one of us had been pushed beyond the limits of fear on multiple occasions. There was a place in each of our minds which had already been hardened to endure more readily what we might now soon face. It's not easy to describe. The fear we felt was more a knowingly apprehensive type of fear rather than a knee-knocking fear. Everyone who has gone through repeated exposure to combat knows what I am talking about here. There is a hardened place in a combat veteran's mind which allows him to do what needs to be done. That hardened place shuts down all normal thought processes in the brain. That includes all thoughts of home, family, allegiances, friendships, and yes, even the mind-numbing fear of living or dying. In turn, it heightens the senses which help recognize and eliminate the threat. Hollywood war stories have rarely, if ever, got this right. Today's tantalizing media creations are masterfully mesmerizing, and also very persuasive to a gullible viewing audience. However, when it comes to capturing the real feelings of the average combat grunt, those portrayals are usually wrong, wrong, wrong.      

     When we approached the outskirts of An Loc, the road from Quan Loi snaked to the right and down a rather steep incline, before it opened up into a large market square on flat ground. The street was wide and packed with people. To my left, the center of the street had a very wide esplanade, and vendors were crowded together up and down the length of it. They were selling all kinds of food stuffs and other merchandise. Their products were displayed on many varied types of structures. There were several large trucks as well as a number of Lambrettas squeezed in between these structures, and they were loaded with mostly vegetables and fruits, but some had other merchandise too. Off the street to the right was a line of single-story huts, with their rusty corrugated tin roofs rising above the items for sale to their front. I am sure that these tin huts were permanent residences as well as the owner's store.

      The high-pitched whining of the truck gears took on a lower tone as I geared down. Every man could sense that something wasn't right. Every weapon except mine was at the ready. Both my hands were glued to the stirring wheel. One could cut the tension with a knife. No children were running toward my truck looking for handouts as they normally did. The three girls were beyond emotions now. They each had a more permanent wide-eyed and frozen look of fear on their faces.

     As I entered the crowded market square, my red-faced companion rose from his seat, with the cigar butt still clinched between his teeth. The canvas top on my truck had been removed before we left Quan Loi, so it was easy for him to stand and position his shotgun, pointing outward over the windshield. I brought the truck to a complete stop. There were scores of armed men scattered around us on all sides. Unlike us, however, they did not appear to have been indoctrinated into the same American ideals of truth, justice, and the American way. All were wearing black pajamas, and all had AK-47s or M1 carbines slung over their shoulders. Several guys to our front started slowly moving from the side of the street to positions directly in front of my truck. They were obviously not going to let me pass. Another man came out into the street, from a tin hut on our right. His AK 47 weapon was unslung but pointed down. He joined the others blocking our front. It was quite obvious that they were working things out in their minds on how to make this our last day on earth. Our last day, that is, without causing a mess in the marketplace.

     My red-faced companion started traversing his shotgun back and forth, briefly stopping and shaking the barrel at each man blocking my path to our front. This act had the heart numbing effect of making these would-be attackers freeze in their tracks. I am sure that they realized what buckshot could do to a person at this close range. “Come on! just make a move! And I’ll let you have it!” my companion repeated over and over in a loud but distorted growl. His voice was distorted because the stub of that cigar was still clinched between his teeth. With each jerk of his gun barrel a glowing red ash would shake loose and float down across my truck's windshield. At this point, in sight of hundreds of onlookers, there could be no doubt in our road blockers minds that we would exact a costly price for our lives. The blood red number one on each man's left shoulder removed all lingering doubts, of that. Fortunately, he took his posturing just far enough, without winking, as Doc Holiday had done in the movie, "Tombstone”. His actions slowed the cognitive thinking of these fellows just long enough, without triggering a deadly reflex in return. It was years later, before I realized what a masterful job my red-faced friend, flaunting his shotgun, had done that day. Maybe he wasn't so suicidal after all.

     The one girl who lived in this town had a rather large bag to gather up and she needed to be helped down from the truck, so it took a few seconds. They were the longest few seconds of my life. When I heard someone in the back yell, “Let’s go!”, I quickly gassed the truck and immediately cut the wheels to the left. I made one of the sharpest U turns I had ever made in that truck. As I straightened out, heading in the opposite direction, several armed men in black pajamas jumped to my right and out of the way. I am sure that my boys in the back were making gestures to them, which made them think twice about doing something which might ruin their dinner plans. I gunned the truck for everything it was worth. Now, kids were running toward us, but not to ask for hand-outs. They were throwing rocks and sticks and anything else that they could get their hands on. It was just another verification that these were Viet Cong, which we had just encountered, and not South Vietnamese special forces. The kids were showing off to impress them. During the day, I had driven through An Loc and these same kids were as friendly as they could be. I couldn’t help but think, as I topped the hill, and headed out into rubber tree country again, “What duplicitous little rascals they really were".

     We left the outskirts of town without a shot being fired, but it was definitely what could be categorized as a Mexican stand-off. As tensions subsided, the girls who were still on the truck started chatting again, while I started pondering what had just happened. I have not stopped pondering that over fifty years later. Until this day, I can never forget those few seconds while I was sitting still, surrounded on all sides by scores of enemy soldiers in black pajamas. I remember looking at my hands at the ten o’clock and two o’clock positions on the stirring wheel and thinking this was the way that I was going to die without any chance whatsoever of defending myself. Obviously, these Cong had come in from the boonies to take a little break and do some shopping and obviously they had timed their shopping hours to coincide precisely with the American withdrawal of daytime security on the roads and in the town of An Loc, itself.

     Now, years later, it is easy to armchair reasons why we did not get killed that day. For one, they had no idea we were coming so there was no time to prepare an ambush. Number two, if a fire fight had ensued, children and civilians would have gotten killed, including the remaining girls on the truck. The collateral damage would have been too much, for such a small prize. Furthermore, these were local forces, so they had family and friends mingled amongst them. Of course, there was another nagging question to be asked. If we were smart enough to make the girls ride all the way over and back, why didn't we also think to stop at the top of the hill and let the girl out there instead of driving down the hill into the crowd? Here is my thinking on that. The reason we didn't do that is because we were very naive. Like I said, I had driven through this town during the day by myself. We expected a possible ambush on the road, but we never expected the enemy to be crawling all over the marketplace. Here is another disturbing thought about what we witnessed on that day so long ago.

     There were significant events taking place in that marketplace, unfolding before our very eyes. Those events were much more significant events than just Charlie buying banana bread for dear Ole Uncle Ho. You see, Vietnam was invaded and dominated first by the Imperial French and later by the expansionist Japanese. Both occupations, one after the other, created an almost perfect learning environment for the Vietnamese to become adept at running, not only a shadow government, but also a shadow economy, while coexisting with their much more powerful enemies. My research suggests that on this particular day, while I was moonlighting as an Uber driver, I just happened to witness the workings of a shadow economy in full swing. It was a shadow economy which contributed greatly to the support of the large main force units located throughout South Vietnam. Rice production figures fell significantly during 1967, not because we Americans were trampling through a few rice field or not because we dropped a few bombs in those rice fields, but because farmers everywhere were transacting deals to siphon off large portions of their production to be delivered into the hands of communist support troops. Deals were made at night in town all across South Vietnam like An Loc. In my III corps area, this rice was then transported by support troops, at night, to cache points throughout War Zone C and D. As I sat for those few seconds, helpless, in that driver's seat, I was looking at the first link in an enemy logistics chain carrying on its business in that An Loc marketplace. That business began at dusk, within minutes, not hours, after we Americans went home for the day. This particular logistics link began at An Loc and ended up feeding and resupplying NVA conscripts, who were trying to kill Dick and my boys at Loc Ninh. What I have just described was happening all over South Vietnam. Hardly any food supplies came from over the border. That rice was consumed just getting those warm bodies down the Ho Chi Minh trail and into South Vietnam. For rice to make it from local growers to the mouth of an NVA conscript, however, hundreds of transactions on price, delivery and quantities had to be continually negotiated between local farmers and buyer agents for COSVN. We had just witnessed some of those negotiations taking place and they had twelve hours out of every day to carry out these business deals. And it wasn’t just rice. Commodities of all kinds were being acquired in this and other marketplaces across the country.   

     An army runs on its stomach. Shutting down access to these marketplaces, by providing twenty-four-hour security would have been a major step in shutting down large scale enemy operations in South Vietnam. No, it would not have been the only step needed, but it certainly would have been a major step and a much more effective step than the shedding of American blood in those horrific search and destroy operations. Essentially, Westmoreland gave our enemy 12 hours out of every day to raid store house South Vietnam. Food growers were glad to do business with COSN. Why not? It was a relatively safe way to go, for Vietnamese farmers to be able to generate a living for their family. COSN was not going to harm the hand that fed them, and we Americans were oblivious to the problem, so I say again, why not sell their goods to the communists? Sure, shutting down these markets for our enemy would have required a massive effort but in the long run, it would have been more effective, then that other massive effort that we were already exerting, to blow up things and kill more people. Retraining and repurposing the Arvin Army to provide twenty-four-hour security would have been a big job, but it was doable. Petraeus did that very thing in Iraq, and it stopped the insurgency cold in its tracks. 

     The short of it is this. One cannot hope to win a war if he does not possess the will to possess the contested lands twenty-four hours a day, providing rule of law for everyone living there. Communist regimes still have the will to do that, but communist ideals create laws which strip their occupied lands and the people living there of all inalienable rights. Those inhabitants of that forcefully occupied land then become slaves to the decisions of those few at the top of the political ladder. Outside of a world ruled by Jesus Christ, himself, enforcing laws based on Judeo-Christian principles is the only way to maintain a civilized society which does not enslave it's people. History has proven over and over that my words are true. Even if those at the top of that political ladder start their reign as the most fair, honest, and just administrators in the world, no human being will ever possess the wherewithal to protect those inalienable rights. Only enforcement of a written constitution based on Judeo Christian ideals can do that. I certainly cannot do it, nor can the reader. No one, but Jesus Christ is able to wear the ring of total power, not even Frodo.