Chap 23 Thunder Road Thund

Chap 23 Thunder Road

     Some grunts remember it being a gateway to hell. Actually, it was not a gateway at all. It was a path to many hellish gateways. It was Highway 13. Its famous nickname was Thunder Road. Thunder Road was a 100 mile stretch of flat red dirt, which ran from the northern outskirts of Saigon almost straight north to the Cambodian border. In 1967, it was a main resupply route for many Big Red One operations. Thunder Road divided War Zone C to the west and War Zone D to the east. The most southern portion was much more heavily populated. Just north of Saigon, it ran east of the Iron Triangle. Further north was Lai Khe. Lai Khe was an American forward operating base. Just north of Lai Khe and to the west of Thunder Road was the Long Nguyen Secret Zone.

     By November of 1967 big bulldozers called Rome plows had destroyed large swashes of virgin forest on both sides of this highway, south of An Loc. Mammoth, age-old trees were slain and the vast wealth of their lumber burned. They could have remained until this very day had the war been fought with understanding. However, that kind of understanding only comes through the wisdom of God. Without it, mankind is no more capable of managing life on earth than a possum is able to manage a safe crossing of a busy highway.

     On the 7th day of November, Dick and his boys were air lifted out of the rubber trees at Loc Ninh and flown twenty three miles back to Quan Loi. B Company had stayed at Quan Loi throughout the entire battle at Loc Ninh. B Company had been chosen by Dick to stay behind mainly because it was understrength and needed to be refitted. I was due to leave the country on the 28th of November and should have been getting excited about returning to the states, but I wasn't. I was numb to those kinds of feelings at this point.

     Watts Caudill met briefly with Dick on the evening of the 7th, just after the other three companies returned from Loc Ninh. More than likely, all four company commanders were at that meeting. There would not have been much discussed personally between Dick and Watts. Caudill had missed what had turned out to be the climax of Dick's combat career. It was a climax which could not have been more exciting and dramatic. Those events would have fit nicely into the ending of Mel Gibson movie. However, back at Quan Loi, Dick did not mention details about those recent battles. He knew that everyone had performed magnificently and he also knew that they knew. No immediate pats on the back were necessary. No after action critiquing was necessary. There would be plenty of time in the years to come for sitting around singing their "kum ba yahs". He had already experienced those times once, when he had returned from Korea. Although he very much wanted to pat some people on the back now, it just wasn't quite the right time, especially in front of the B Company Commander, who had not been there. So, without any fanfare, Dick curtly gave Captain Watts Caudill his marching orders for the next day, and "held his pease" on all that he wished he could say. "Caudill, have your company on the airstrip tomorrow morning. You will be securing highway 13 twelve kilometers south of An Loc." Then, turning his head, he addressed the other commanders with the following remark. "The rest of us will probably be joining Watts in a few days, but for now, we are getting some down time. Captain Annin, your company will stay behind as ready reserve when we do pull out".

     At Loc Ninh, Dick's men had performed beyond all expectations. Even the hard to please Westmoreland, acknowledged his pleasure in a most remarkable statement. Westmoreland commented afterward that the only mistake the Big Red One made at Loc Ninh was that they made it look too easy. What Westmoreland really meant, but couldn't say, was that Dick had been the hot iron in the middle of that "easy part", steadily ironing out the wrinkles.

     The next day B Company was flown south to that position on Thunder Road. Caudill's B company relieved one of Oliver Stone's 25th Division units. Thunder Road had to be cleared of mines and secured every day to protect resupply convoys coming up from the south. However, B Company stayed at that location only one day. While they were there, Quan Loi was hit with a rocket attack. Rocket attacks were not all that common during my tour of duty. The next day, B Company was relieved by Sergeant Murry's 1/16th and Caudill's men rejoined the rest of the battalion at Quan Loi. This was probably a precaution taken to beef up defenses in case of an all out attack on the airstrip.

     Operation Shenandoah II was terminated on the 19th of November. At that time, A, B, and D Companies were flown from Quan Loi to take up positions on Thunder Road just south of An Loc. As I said, C Company stayed behind at Quan Loi. By this time, the cooks and I had been transported back to Di An. B Company stayed on that dusty red clay road for the remainder of my tour of duty in Vietnam. I was unable to say good bye to anyone in my old squad. Although I would remember Winstead, Walker, Milliron, Bartee, and Bowman for a life time, I would never again see or talk to them. Other battles continued along the Cambodian border as well as further north near the border with Laos. Yet, nothing changed Westmoreland's mind about the way he wanted to fight the war. If the events in the last months of 1967 were not clear signs that he was in a stalemate, then I do not know what it would have taken to wake him up.

     The 165th NVA Regiment had shown themselves to be amateurish in their face to face shoot-out with Mac McLaughlin's C Company on the 29th, and had gotten lost on their way to attack the Loc Ninh air field on the 31st. Never-the-less, they were the most well suited, numbers-wise, to take a hike south. Shortly after the battles at Loc Ninh were over, their commander was given explicit orders to attack American outposts protecting supply lines along Thunder Road. Why they had not done so before attacking Loc Ninh is evidence that the communist were not giving much thought to their big battle campaigns. Thunder Road was the main supply route north to Loc Ninh. The best time to have attacked this supply route would have been just before Tra lunched his attacks on the Loc Ninh air strip and not afterward. That's assuming that he had had any realistic expectations of winning his latest military campaign against us Americans. I don't believe he did. It's obvious, in the way that these attacks on Loc Ninh unfolded, that he had no such expectations. By this point in the war senior communist leadership surely knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that they could not win big battle campaigns against the might of the American military. These big battles were simply a rouse, which did not require a lot of meticulous planning because they were large scale diversions. We naive Americans helped the communist perpetuate this rouse, not by halting our bombing of the North, or failing to sever supply lines along the Ho Chi Minh trail, but by giving the communist virtually the unfettered ability to govern the country during the night time hours. During the hours of darkness, these powers of darkness had a free hand to harness the cooperation of the South Vietnamese people, through their many acts of terror and intimidation. Once the human resources of the south were harnessed, to support those insurgent NVA armies, the communists were free to continue their inapt trial and error "big battle" campaigns until we "bully Americans" got tired of chasing that red flag and went home. Why should people like Duan care about how many young Vietnamese needed to die to make his dreams of power come true. In the history of the communist party, name one leader who showed the slightest hesitation to order the mass murders of his fellow countrymen, if it meant gaining more power for himself?

     As I have said, the important thing for the communists was to buy time, while the plans for Tet were coming together. There were new conscripts from up north and war supplies streaming in from Russia and China every day. The 165th could once again field 1700 troops. The entire First Division on it's best day could field no more than 3600 actual fighting men. Still, these draftee soldiers and their "lifer" NCOs were a formidable force, when they were managed by knowledgeable leadership. Patton would have definitely wanted this new crop of S.O.B.s as he once called the men of the Big Red One. He famously said, of the First Division, "I want those S.O.B.s. I won't invade Sicily without them". On the other hand, the NVA 165th regiment's commander, Col. Nguyen Hoa had not shown himself to be the most knowledgeable commander, but he didn't need to be. He was par for the course. Perceptions were all that mattered. World leaders then and now are so easily persuaded by perceptions which have nothing to do with reality.

     There were seven outposts along the seventy kilometer stretch, between Lai Khe and An Loc on Thunder Road. These were labeled Caisson I through Caisson VII. During 1967 they were occupied by American troops in night defensive positions (NDP). During the day the American troops would work with the engineers to clear their assigned section of Thunder Road so convoys could safely pass.

     The traffic on Thunder Road included civilian and military vehicles. It was a very busy highway. There were all types of vehicles from large busses to bicycles traveling this road each day. These vehicles transported all types of food items, from meats to vegetables, supposedly heading for markets in other towns and villages, but some was diverted into the hands of VC support troops along the way. This siphoning provided a constant supply of food stuffs, to any NVA unit in the area at the time. Man cannot live by rice alone. This siphoning of meats and vegetables from the populace supplemented the rice which was shipped from other hidden collection points. It would have been too obvious to send large rice shipments up and down Thunder Road. (By the way, the Vietnamese were masters at shipping, storing and preserving these rice supplies in the wet jungle environment.) We Americans paid little attention to these small quantities of produce and meats being transported each day to collection points. The initiating transactions for these goods and services was done at night through intimidation and acts of terror by the local communist party members in their assigned areas of control. Much of the transport, however, was carried out during daylight hours, in front of our very noses. No one paid any attention to a farmer transporting small quantities of vegetables from one place to another. If a family had a small garden there would be stiff penalties to pay if a portion of that garden did not find its way onto the delivery vehicles, which ran up and down these major highways. These food products were then delivered to designated collection points. From there they were gathered up and delivered to jungle hideouts by VC support troops.

     Ole Westy didn't have a clue. He had always been fortunate enough to get his food steaming hot straight off the dinner table. That there existed a sophisticated logistics system operating to feed a huge insurgent army was not something his well groomed personage could ever consider. So, he didn't. Since he had never had to put food on the table, himself, by his own hard work, he had never given much thought to the fact that all dinner tables require a tremendous number of things to happen for that food to appear in time for supper. Yet, its common knowledge that an army will always run on its stomach. Had Westy given any thought whatsoever to this fact, he may have realized that these large in-country armies were not being feed by people peddling for hundreds of miles down jungle trails on bicycles. The enemy was being given the night time by us, to intimidate the South Vietnamese into becoming their grocery delivery boys. Furthermore, we Americans spent millions of our own dollars maintaining, improving, and guarding the very roads, which were their supply routes. This one thing speaks volumes to the importance of taking and securing ground where civilians can live safely twenty four hours a day. If a war leader cannot understand the importance of protecting the civilian population, then woe to the nation that puts that person in charge of anything. If we had done that one thing in Vietnam, then those insurgent NVA armies would have been starved out in no time. Petraeus understood this fact and thus turned a much worse situation around in less than a year in Iraq. MacArthur understood the importance of providing order, safety, and freedom to the populace when he became governor of Japan after the war. His Japanese successor wept when MacArthur stepped down from his powerful position. The South Vietnamese people were no more two-faced than anyone else. Yet, they were commonly portrayed as being so by many. Instead, they with cohered into playing a double minded game. Almost anyone facing similar circumstances would have done the same. Changing this situation and gaining better cooperation from Vietnamese civilians required more than dropping millions of flyers from a plane, kind words, a few handouts, and spotty medical services, which we labeled "pacification". Citizens of different countries naturally have different cultures but we all have the same basic needs. We all need to be provided with a safe and lawful living space, where we can freely go about our chosen endeavors to provide for ourselves and our families. Petraeus knew that. McArthur knew that. Westmoreland either didn't know or didn't care to know.

     On the 19th of November, when Captain Caudill and company arrived again at their assigned outpost on Thunder Road, Caudill's keen eyes noticed something. By now in his tour, he could tell what good defensive positions looked like. These were not that. It was obvious that the unit being relieved had done nothing to improve them, but that wasn't necessarily that unit's fault. Units guarding Thunder Road came and went more often than Zsa Zsa Gabor changed husbands. Caudill's men had been out here on Thunder Road just a few days before. They stayed only a day and were then flown back to Quan Loi after a rocket attack hit the air strip. Different units were always being swapped in and out of this road security duty, for a multitude of reasons.

     Immediately after noticing the poor condition of the defenses, Caudill had a face to face meeting with his platoon leaders. Together, they quickly marked positions, which needed work or re-positioning altogether. When he finished with that little chore, he started walking back to his own command bunker. As he walked, in my mind's eye, I can still imagine a knowing little smile break out cross his face. It happened spontaneously, as he looked ahead to spot the last APCs pulling onto Thunder Road. They were taking his men to their guard positions, scattered all along that road, where they would relieve the 1/16th men. Caudill's two RTOs, Fred Walters and David Eaton, could not see his smile, because they were walking behind him. The grin, itself, was Caudill's way of dealing with the fact that he felt bad about the little surprise he had in store for those men when they returned to base camp for the night. They would spend a hot day on that clay road, eating its dust, only to come home and find that they had been ordered by him to repair or maybe relocate their bunker. "Oh well", Caudill thought to himself, "it couldn't be helped". He was going to be very unpopular for a while. And yeah, he was going to hear a lot of moaning and groaning. However, listening to moaning and groaning from live soldiers wasn't so bad. Besides, he was the guy who had to write those dreadful letters to families. So, let them moan and groan all they wanted. It was much better listening to the sound of live men griping than staring into the lifeless faces of dead ones.

     Each morning, after returning to the already established Night Defensive position on Thunder Road, Caudill had his usual morning briefing with Dick. It happened over the battalion radio and it was short and sweet. Of course Dick put his weight behind Caudill's decision to repair the defenses. Anyone in supply, who didn't jump and provide us with the needed materials, like Marston matting, sand bags, shovels and mattocks would be getting a call from Dick, himself. Most, however, already knew about Dick, from the grape vine. Rarely was a personal call from him necessary. By now, the 1/18th was a smooth running machine. Every incoming NCO soon learning what was expected of them, not directly from Dick, but from their own peers. Those peers had already been thoroughly marinated in Dick's secret sauce of command. Most rear echelon NCOs never met the battalion commander face to face. However, Dick's reputation had spread far and wide. Slackers had long since been weeded out. Those who couldn't get on board with his expectations were weeded out too. The 1/18th was a completely liberated unit. Here's what I mean by that. Each infantry company and platoon was by now a stand alone entity. It was quite able to take the initiative, but so was the rear echelon people. It was an amazing thing for grunts like me to witness. However, it would be years before any of us were able to talk to each other about what we saw with our own eyes. Many years later almost everyone who served under Dick realized that they had witnessed something special and rare.

     With that said, lets get back to talking about my B Company's Thanksgiving Day on Thunder Road. I hope the following look at this day on Thunder Road can give the reader a little snapshot of the pressure junior commanders faced, while in the field with the First Division. In our case, that pressure was made bearable during 1967 by our remarkable field commander. That was not the case for so many others.

     Well maintained defenses were the difference between living and dying. Caudill had been fortunate enough to attend and then live through the O.J.T. class which taught that lesson. After arriving back at his command bunker, he handed off the follow-up of bunker repairs to First Sergeant Pink Dillard. Pink then contacted the supply sergeant. Both men were doers so it didn't take much to get the supply sergeant moving. He was given a list of the necessary work equipment and supplies to be delivered before the last supply chopper shutdown for the night.

     Mean while, civilian traffic was increasing on Thunder Road. Civilian vendors seemed to come from nowhere, to sell their wares to this new crop of customers. Cold bottles of cokes were always a favorite. An older man showed up outside the wire where he offered hair cuts and shaves. D Company had landed in an outpost further south and Dick flew in with A Company six klicks north toward An Loc. All three companies were bombarded by these Vietnamese "door to door" salesmen working the neighborhood.

     As soon as Caudill returned to the command bunker, Walters and Eaton quickly unharnessed their radios off their backs and started examining the repairs needed for the fortification. Both men had learned the hard way that they must be pro-active on this sort of thing before First Sergeant, Pink Dillard, got involved. If not, he undoubtedly would require more work, than necessary. That was just the man's nature. Once his controlling steel trap of a mind latched onto an idea, any idea, there was no way for a grunt to pry it open for reconsideration. It was his way or the highway. Caudill loved his "bad cop" attitude but even he would admit, if only to himself, that it could be a little tiring at times. All Walters or Eaton knew for sure was that the more they could keep Pink from getting involved the better things would turn out. Not even the smooth talking Milliron, who was undoubtedly the best schmoozer in the unit, could change Pink's mind on how something should be done. If they didn't want the joyous experience of digging in the hard ground half the night, then they knew that they had better get to work on bunker repairs fast. Even better, it would be wise to be on the lookout for opportunities, perhaps coming across their radios, which might allow them to divert Pink's attention to other problems at another location on the perimeter.

     Caudill was overall commander in charge of this little band of brothers guarding Thunder Road. That meant that he needed to let his men continue to work on bunker repairs while he swapped gears and thought about other things. There were two mechanized units operating with B Company. "Fred, give those two commanders of the mechanized units a call, so we can get acquainted. I want to meet them personally before I have to reach out to them later in a hurry. I also want to talk to them about repositioning their armor after dark and I sure don't want to do that over the radio. The wrong ears might be listening." Repositioning of armor was done to confuse any spying going on during daylight hours. Thunder Road spies would mark locations of our armor so enemy mortar teams could shell them after dark. While Fred was contacting the mechanized units, Caudill turned and spoke briefly with his forward observer. He addressed him by his first name. "I want to make sure that we are on the same page, when registering those rounds outside the perimeter", Caudill said. "Show me your registration points on your map." The forward observer (FO) held up his map, but a gust of wind caught it. Both men dropped to their knees at the same time, grabbing a corner and spreading the map out on the ground in front of them. Caudill pointed with his finger to two different locations on the artilleryman's map. "I want to add these two spots here and here. Be sure and mark them plainly", Caudill added. "Do you understand?" The young Lieutenant acknowledged back, raising his voice slightly. "I understand that, sir". As Caudill rose to his feet again, that can of peaches hidden away in his ruck sack, started calling his name. But no. Better take a good look first, at where to place his ambush patrol. He knew he needed to position his ambush patrol in a spot which afforded as much good cover as possible. With that thought, Caudill reached inside his jungle fatigues' pocket and pulled out his own folded map. As he did, his eyes wandered toward First Sergeant Pink, who had abruptly broke off a conversation with Walters and was heading for the far side of the perimeter. "Where is Pink going?", Caudill ask Walters. Smiling, Walters replied, "He's taking a look at a problem with the interlocking firing lanes cut for two bunkers on the other side of the perimeter". Caudill did not answer, but grinned that funny little grin again. Still grinning, he turned his head and looked Walters straight in the face. That grin said it all. It told Walters that his commander was not stupid. Caudill knew exactly what Fred Walters had done to Pink. Walters sheepishly grinned back at his captain. Caudill continued to unfold his map. As he stared at it again, a troubling thought popped into his mind. He now realized that he needed to think a little more carefully about the placement of his ambush patrols. Those locations needed a little more scrutiny than usual because he had armor in camp. As he began to pour over the map again, he was interrupted this time by something Eaton was doing. David Eaton had broke out in a funny little grin of his own, as he watched Pink spouting out orders to a grunt on the far side of the perimeter. While still grinning and watching Pink, Eaton had mindlessly reached down and started removing sand bags off the top of the command bunker. One of those bags landed on Caudill's feet. Eaton's careless actions broke Caudill's focus on the map and made him grimace. Eaton saw the grimace and began to explain his actions. "These wooden support poles on the roof are rotten, Sir. We need to replace them with steel plates." Turning to Fred, Eaton ask, "Fred, will you contact the supply sergeant and have him add them to the list for me?" Fred grunted, "Yes", as he reached down to help Eaton. Caudill listened but said nothing. He knew the proper name for those steel plates was Marston matting but it didn't matter. Though he had tried to be careful not to show it, he couldn't be more pleased with his two RTOs. He was convinced that he had gotten the pick of the litter. Both could handle a radio but their work ethics were also great. "They sure took a lot of routine headaches off his mind. However, Caudill would never tell them that. Instead, he thought, "If we live long enough, maybe some day I will get the chance. But not now. Now is not the time." All this flashed through Caudill's mind in an instant, while Eaton and Walters continued to tear into the command bunker. Turning again to Fred Walters, Caudill raised his voice just a notch. "Fred, when Pink gets back, remind me to tell him to note reasons on the roster report for why people are leaving the field tomorrow". "Yes sir", Walters replied. "Sir, you know my name will be on that list soon. The day after Thanksgiving I am going on R & R to Japan". Caudill replied to Fred also with a "grunt". Then, he looked down at the map one more time. "Ah yes". He now not only realized what was bothering him, but also what to do about it. In the event of an attack, his ambush patrol would almost surely be caught in a deadly cross fire if they were placed only 500 meters out. Why? Because those armored units would undoubtedly open up with those formidable fifty caliber machine guns. However, if he located his ambush patrol further out, say, 1000 meters, they would have a much better chance of sitting out an attack undetected and out of range of their own friendly fire. This was not standard procedure but Caudill knew that Cavazos would back him. Thank God he had a battalion commander who understood the need to stray from normal procedures once in a while. Completely gone now were any thoughts of eating his little can of peaches. He again addressed his artilleryman. Together, they plotted registration points for the night's ambush patrol. Caudill would stipulate the actual location and mention to the young officer to be sure and drop rounds on a couple false locations as well. He didn't want to give away the real location to a smart enemy. Finally, Caudill took a breather. He started helping his grunts tear into the roof of the command bunker. It felt good to give his full attention to something which really didn't require that much thinking. If the truth be known, he too was glad Pink was on the other side of the perimeter barking out orders instead of lending a hand with the command bunker. However, that was another thought which would not be shared with his grunts.

     By the time Pink returned to the command bunker, the sun was starting to set. A Chinook, making the short flight from Lai Khe sit down in a nearby makeshift landing pad. Several guys were heading toward it to help unload. Looking up, Caudill stopped what he was doing, to see who was getting off that chopper. One of the guys was the supply sergeant. That was good. It was good because he needed to nonchalantly mention to him that his grunts were clearing a spot for the big tent. That would be a good way of reminding the supply sergeant that he darned sure better see that the big tent showed up on time. You see the big tent was an important part of one of the most enjoyable times a grunt would have during his entire time in the field. That fabulous event, was called Thanksgiving Dinner and it came with all the trimmings. The big tent would make this whole delicious affair possible, because it allowed the cooks to serve that scrumptious meal protected from the red dust blowing off Thunder Road.

     Oh yeah, there was just one more thing for Caudill to remember. It was very important to make sure that those sleepy eyed tank commanders moved their armor back to their daylight positions before the sun came up. "Fred, you need to be sure and take last watch so you can wake me early", Caudill announced in a monotone voice. Again, this was just one more thing to add to just one more thing. This time the final thing was Fred's reminder that he would soon be going on R and R. That reminder was timely. He really did need to think about who would be a good substitute for Walters while he was away. So it was for one company commander in one infantry company in 1967 Vietnam. The grind went on. Caudill's mind kept going as the sun dipped lower. It bathed that last faded green Chinook in a golden hue, as it climbed higher, turning it's big nose toward Lai Khe. There would be no time to wrap his mind around writing to Sally tonight. When sleep finally found Caudill, it was several hours after sunset and soon to be interrupted by a problem on the perimeter. A couple hours later it was interrupted once more by a non-life-threating problem with the ambush patrol. Most of the time these problems could be dealt with in short order so he could catch another nap. Day after day, however, the grind was relentless. Not only did a company commander have to endure the same hardships as their troops, but they also had to think and think and think.

     This was a typical day. It was one day to be added to a catalog of many other vain days, which composed the American saga of Vietnam. However, here is a great truth. God does not stop working, ever. Nor is he surprised. Nor is he a respecter of persons. Those, who seek his will as lord over their life, can be assured that an eternal legacy is being mapped for them. That mapping has only one prerequisite. That prerequisite is that we chose beforehand to confess Jesus Christ as Lord of all. The mapping, itself, takes into account a multitude of considerations. Among those considerations is whether we die young or old, violently or peacefully. Here is a great irony. Two people can be side by side sharing the same day and the same endeavor. One can die on that very day, being assured of an eternal legacy. The other can toil for many more years, only to die in the vanity of their own mind.

     During the days leading up to Thanksgiving, which was on the 23rd of November, Thunder Road was packed with civilians. Young vendors would peel off from the other traffic and approach my B Company guys, who were stationed in guard positions along the route. Each day the same young merchandizers showed up, becoming more friendly and more engaging with each successive visit. They in turn were drawn to the overall good will of the average American grunt. That good will dispelled fears of the night, creating a respite, and welcomed atmosphere. This atmosphere promoted civilized behavior between us grunts and the thousands of civilians, who passed by these positions each day. It was an atmosphere which was not much different than that experienced by Americans tourists visiting any other less developed country, which was not at war. I spent a lot of time amongst civilians in all types of populated areas and heavily traveled roads in Vietnam. I never witnessed a single terrorist event. Truth is, by 1967, blatant "out in the open" terrorism was recognized by the communist as being bad for business. Indiscriminate bombings in heavily populated areas would disrupt the shadow government logistics, which the local political arm of the communist party, with our help, had worked so hard to establish. With over a 100,000 North Vietnamese conscripts living inside South Vietnam in 1967, the Ho Chi Minh trail could not supply everything needed to sustain them. It was a no brainer for an amoral communist regime to resort to surgical murders and torture to facilitate the aid of the average South Vietnamese. Our strategy which catered to an industrialized war left no room for us to prevent this sort of exploitation. We gave the communist the night time to carry out their secret coercions of the civilian population. Local card carrying communists kept an eye on everyone in their assigned districts. They gave directives to the local civilian leaders and expected those directives to be carried out or there would be terrible consequences. This shadow government had a free hand to exercise its power of life and death over local villages and towns. Their mandates included everything from attending propaganda classes to digging so many feet of tunnel each day. Those with gardens and crops and live stock were expected to deliver a portion of those to a collection sites. They were also expected to pay taxes, make drawings of military instillations, and report neighbors who were speaking out against this shadow government. The inhumane actions of these local communist rivaled any of the crimes against humanity which the Gestapo committed during World War II. Sadly, they were enabled by us. We gave them the night to enforce their mandates because we refused to recognize the necessity to provide security twenty four hours a day. In the beginning we could have easily harnessed the power of the South Vietnamese Army as a national police force to root out these local communist enforcers, as Petraeus did in Iraq. Yet, every night we abandoned the very people we claimed we wanted to help. We didn't do it intentionally. We did it because it is very hard for any industrialized nation like us to invest the materials and manpower necessary to help a underdeveloped nation like Vietnam without creating some kind of return on that investment. Sure, some got rich off this industrialized war, but there were also a lot of jobs created for ordinary Americans. Some associated with defense contractors also became wealthy, but more importantly big national defense companies got the shot in the arm which they badly needed to keep outpacing the Russians in the cold war. Still, the following statement is a fact of life. This kind of industrialized war fought by a super power on behalf of a developing nation never ends well. At some point our leaders had to know that we would have to leave. When we did, the underdeveloped South Vietnamese, who had been taught to fight a war on an industrialized scale, had no hope of carrying on. Sure, we left them some mighty powerful weapons but what were they to do for spare parts. The South Vietnamese soldier was the equal of any soldier in the world, though they suffered sorely from poor senior leadership. Yet, they had been trained with our artillery pieces, and our planes and our tanks. What were they suppose to do when things started to break? Were they to fight Russian tanks with sticks and stones?

     Guarding Thunder Road south of An Loc was quite different from guarding it closer to the Cambodian border. Traffic flow was much heavier but quite peaceful. That day, when Bill and I had pulled road guard further north about twenty miles west of Thunder Road, things could not have been more different. There were no civilians on that road. While we listened to Alexander Haig's recon patrol shooting it out in the distance, we also had to watch intently for sappers trying to sneak up on us. It was a totally different environment. Here on this part of Thunder Road, however, there were civilians galore, and no violence to deal with anywhere. Some of the young men approaching grunts here would offer to provide prostitutes and dope, but more often the interactions were friendly bantering over the price of items such as a cigarette lighter, or sunglasses. These road vendors offered an array of merchandise, as they peddled past the grunts of B Company, on their three wheeled cycles. Most were very young, usually ten or twelve years old. Cold bottles of coke were very much in demand and there was no bartering for a bottle of coke. These were kept in coolers on ice. Their potential customers were sweaty grunts standing in a blazing hot sun. We gladly paid the outrageous price of 50 cents. The money was paid in scrip. (military payment certificates).

     By Thanksgiving Day a routine had been established within B Company. Every bunker had been reworked. By the eve of Thanksgiving there was not much for anyone to do. Those who guarded the road were dropped off to stand around all day and those who stayed behind at base camp sit around on a sand bag all day. Lowly grunts like me tried hard to become as invisible as possible while in camp so they wouldn't get picked for some "s__t" detail. It was boring for everyone. Gone were the monsoon rains. It was the beginning of the dry season with a scorching hot sun beating down the entire day. Temperatures reached the high nineties but dropped to the seventies at night. These conditions once again made poncho liners coveted items amongst the shivering new guys who didn't have one. At night their bodies told them that they were freezing but of course they weren't. Civilians were not allowed inside the camp, but the barber came faithfully every day. He would sit up his chair outside the wire, a few feet off Thunder Road. I always got my hair cut at a big base, which had electricity. The coke boy showed up toward noon each day and sold out fast. "Mike" platoon leader, Dale McCall, told me years later that coke boy was the son of the barber. That big tent had been pitched by now and provided a meeting place during the day. However, most of the time everyone hunkered down around their own bunkers, especially at night. So, the big tent stood empty. It loomed in the darkness at the center of the compound, silhouetted against the night sky by the light of little more than a quarter crescent moon. Someone, somewhere, along that perimeter would always be "doctoring up" a canteen of instant coffee with whatever else he could find in his sundry pack. The concoction would be heated in their canteen cup over a ball of C-4. Captain Caudill got caught up on his letter writing to Sally.

     On several evenings RTOs Fred Walters and David Eaton sat within earshot of First Sergeant Pink Dillard, listening to his Korean war stories. Truth is, all Fred could do was stare at Pink's mouth but he wasn't listening to a thing Pink was saying. He was too busy dreaming about his upcoming R and R to Japan. Neither he nor Eaton realized that Pink didn't care in the least whether they listened or not. His motivation for talking about his horrific experiences in Korea was not to entertain his troops. Instead, he was desperately trying to convince himself of something which was of a much more primal concern. He was desperately trying to make himself believe that he was going to live through the current mess. The recanting of old war stories was the only way he knew to generate at least a faint hope of doing that. He had survived in those stories so maybe the telling of them could convince his mind that he would survive this. Of course, it wasn't working. Each time we looked at Pink, we grunts were looking into the face of a man who had already been there. He had already lost what we would lose too. That lost thing is sometimes called the invincibility of youth. Another bad thought also haunted Pink. There was nothing he could do about that either. It had to do with our present commander, Watts Caudill. Watts was a dream come true, so why was Pink having bad thoughts about Watts? Watts gave Pink the run of the place. He also showed him the respect he needed to be shown in front of the men. Even better, Watts was quick to take up the slack, where he knew Pink had misgivings. One of those misgivings was Pink's lack of confidence on that darned radio. Pink knew that Watts knew, but he never belittled him for it. Instead, Caudill just found a reason for Pink to be doing something else when he , himself, could not be near the radio. Besides, Walters and Eaton were more than capable of handling anything which came up on the radios. Watts just had a knack for knowing when and how to shelter the respected position of his First Sergeant. Watts quenched a multitude of little annoyances, which in totality, could have degraded his standing in the eyes of the men. The radio was just one example of many. No, the problem concerning Watts did not stem from any personal problem with his commander. Instead, it was the hard cold fact that Watts would be rotating soon. That was bad because Pink knew that there was a good chance that he would be getting some "Yankee Doddle" who didn't know his butt from a hole in the ground. When the business of the day died down, the only way Pink knew to stop thinking about those things, was to keep reliving over and over the certainty of the past. Telling his Korean war stories seemed to be a convenient way to do that. The alternative would be silence, and that silence could be deafening. Besides, his war stories were a common denominator for everyone listening. He certainly was not going to talk about his private life in front of grunts.

     I have no explanation for why our unit's cooks were stationed at Di An, which was miles south of my B Company's position on Thunder Road. Nevertheless, I went where the cooks went. Our forward base at Lai Khe would have been much closer. Yet, the cooks and I were at Di An and Di An was miles further south of Lai Khe. I remember this so well, because of other events which transpired during this time. I hope my explanation for one of those events will help clarify the workings of a Christian legacy just a little better. Its a memory which has been etched into my brain like stone, but I never realized the significance until recently. Its a seemingly minor episode in my Vietnam experience but with profound overtones. It indicates just how far I had become separated from the legacy, which God had purposed for my life. If I were to give this little story a title, I might call it, "Slopping Hogs for Dummies".

     While my grunt buddies were guarding Thunder Road, I remember taking the mess hall slop to the local dump each of those days. That dump was several miles away from Di An. The half liquefied and smelly stuff was stored in fifty five gallon barrels. These were loaded on my truck by the guys in my unit who were pulling KP. (If the reader doesn't know what KP is then ask a Vietnam era veteran who has served as an Army grunt and he will tell you.) I drove to the dump by myself, because those KP grunts had potatoes to peel. The cooks were not about to spare them so they could go with me. When I arrived at the dump, I popped the lids on the barrels of slop and tipped the barrels to pour the nasty stuff off the back of my truck. Here is why I remember this otherwise most forgettable chore. As I began to pour the stinking stuff, there would be at least a dozen Vietnamese men fighting each other for positions under that rotten garbage. They tried to catch it in all types of containers. The gooey mess splattered all over those, who managed to claw their way closer to my barrel. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. I certainly didn't understand it. Yet, this happened each time I went to the dump. I mentioned this puzzling phenomenon to another vet, after returning stateside, and he provided me with a plausible answer. "This garbage was probably very good food for hogs", he said. A light bulb went on immediately in several of those under-worked neurons in my brain. I should have known that from living on a farm. However, I was too self-absorbed to care to know anything which did not pertain to me at that very instant in time. Even so, having learned this fact too late, I still did not feel any regret for not taking the time to distribute the contents of those barrels in a way which would have made it easier for everyone to fill their containers. I wasted a large quantity, as I intentionally tried to dowse those closest to the barrel, just for the fun of it. Truth is, these were probably people who's lives had been uprooted by the war. Maybe one or two of them were among the six thousand inhabitants of Ben Suc who had been removed from their ancestral farm lands around Ben Suc, during Operation Cedar Falls. Those Vietnamese had been placed in a government holding pen not far from the dump. Regardless of their circumstances these dump people were just trying to feed their families, by raising hogs. Now, they were being treated bad by me just because of my blind ignorance. I know my insensitive actions were a small thing, but lives are changed for better or worse by small things. A believer's power to promote life giving change is rooted in how that believer handles the small things in their life. God's favor is measured by how well we deal with the small adversities of life. His grace takes care of the big things. Truth is, I failed at manifesting what should have been one of the easiest acts of kindest to display. I was a prodigal far removed from God's best for my life, not realizing how close I was to the hog pen.

     After finishing what I considered to be a most detestable job, I drove my truck to the nearest river and washed away the smell. Then I took a nice dunk in the fast flowing waters. After that, I drove back to Di An. As I drove, I let my wet fatigues dry out in the breeze generated by the wind blowing past the open roof of my truck. Every night, until I rotated, I joined the cooks, who would fix nice thick prime cuts of sirloin, with all the trimmings. We would do this after the mess hall closed for the evening. That mess hall at Di An was better stocked with various food stuffs than many restaurants stateside. Sadly, I did not know about the situation which my fellow grunts faced on Thanksgiving Day until many years later.

     On Thanksgiving morning, traffic was the same as usual on Thunder Road. The workload for B Company was also the same as usual. Those who were assigned ambush patrol on this night would not pull road guard duty today. However, it was business as usual for everyone else in the unit. First Sergeant Dillard oversaw the rotation of personnel assigned such things as ambush patrols, but Captain Caudill picked the location from that map which he pondered for so long. It was also business as usual for the armored units assigned to Caudill's B Company. There were three tanks and four APCs from a platoon of the 1st Squadron, 4th Cavalry Regiment and eleven APCs from two platoons of the 2nd and 2nd Infantry Battalion (mechanized). The 2nd and 2nd was one of the nine battalions of the Big Red One. One of the most important items of business for these armor unit guys would have been to refuel. That fuel would arrive in some of the first trucks in the resupply convey headed north. My guess is that the fuel would have been carried in 5 gallon "jerry cans". These units had not burnt that much fuel in the last few days and sending a tank truck meant sending a bigger temptation for sappers to target. I know what I said previously, but whether there were civilians around or not, a tank truck was a very tempting target. My B Company cooks probably fed the armor crews Thanksgiving Dinner on our dime.

     The cooks worked hard all day getting the big feast ready. Our head cook, Tiny, had long since rotated. I don't remember who the new head cook was. There were three of our companies spread out along Thunder Road. Each would have had a big tent and cooks to man all three. There was also a battalion mess hall at Di An which was tasked with serving a Thanksgiving Day meal for the rear echelon people like me. Thanksgiving day was a lot of hard work for our cooks. I smashed my big toe by dropping a block of ice on it while loading ice from my truck onto a waiting Chinook. The big meal was not served until 1700 hours. That's because serving time had to be coordinated with road closure for the day. The men were well versed on the importance of keeping the serving line short. As they returned from their guard duties along Thunder Road, each grabbed a paper plate of food and went straight to their bunker. Soon, after eating, the ambush patrol readied themselves to leave the perimeter. Civilian traffic along Thunder Road began to thin quickly. A few civilian stragglers could be seen hurriedly scurrying along so they wouldn't get caught on the road after curfew. If they were caught, then they were at great risk of being shot.

     The men of my B Company were not the only one's who ate well on Thanksgiving day. Colonel Nguyen Hoa's conscripts ate well too although they had a lot less to be thankful for. By the end of the first week in December at least 1/3rd of them would be dead and many of the rest severely wounded. They had arrived in camp a few days before, marching non-stop from the Loc Ninh area. They had traveled two abreast down the same well mapped ox chart trails, which where there when Uncle Hoa fought the French. Local guides were switched out in succession along the way. The march, itself, had taken less than three days. Upon reaching their destination, a good meal was waiting. The strength of these skinny teenagers was not being replenished from stores of rice being supplied through the Delta or the Hoa Chi Minh Trail. It was domestic rice coming from domestically produced supplies. The evidence for what I am saying is buried in the statistics showing a drastic decline in rice production in 1967. I believe that huge decline was caused by the siphoning of local rice production onto the black market, thus never getting counted in the official annual rice production numbers. As I have already mentioned, numerous vegetables and meats were also siphoned off from local growers and transported to Colonel Hoa's hideout daily by black pajama support troops. No doubt, hundreds of NVA support people passed by our noses daily. I personally passed all types of vehicles transporting food stuffs up and down Thunder Road on Lambrettas. Each of these could have easily carried enough vegetables to feed at least fifty people and there were scores of these Lambrettas everywhere I looked. It was impossible to keep track of their activities. However, there was something else which I never witnessed. I never witnessed a single enemy attempt to disrupt civilian travel on these main highways during the day. Why would they? The enemy did not want to interrupt its own logistics support. Sure, military conveys were targeted, but they were always attacked away from heavy civilian traffic areas and during the hours when only military targets would be on the roads.

     During November, as Hoa's conscripts waited a few days in a hidden base camp near my B Company, they "dry fire" trained on certain jobs they would be required to perform during an assault. As usual, new replacements were trained to make those suicidal human wave charges in response to whistles or bugles but the cleared ground around B Company NDP was not conducive to that kind of tactic. Also, the Americans had armor with them. Human wave attacks across open ground with those big American fifty caliber machine guns blasting away didn't make sense even to a heartless commander like Hoi. However, recently he was being supplied with more and more RPGs. This allowed him to assign more and more of his pith helmet teenagers to train with sapper teams tasked with breaching the perimeters of American defenses. These youngsters could be trained to do the up close dirty work, while the savvy sappers, themselves, directed them from a safer distance. Behind those teams would be scores of RPG teams trained to use those RPGs as a mobile artillery. This tactic was designed to keep the American's heads down, while the others worked on breaching the perimeter. Other conscripts were trained to man heavy machine guns further back still, firing from any protruding wood lines. They would open up first, after everyone else moved into position, during the first mortar attack on the Americans. They would fire over their own troops and pepper the armored vehicles as best they could. Never mind that the American commander, Watts Caudill, would soon direct fire down on them from American gun ships. Those gun ships could make the short trip from Lai Khe in minutes and kill them all in only a few more minutes. However, these young machine gunners were never told this gruesome fact. However, Hoi knew. Yes Hoi knew but so what? He also knew that he could later spin the story anyway his superiors wanted to spin it. That was one of the nice advantages of being a communist at his level of leadership. Where could an opportunistic sociopath like Hoi find a better position in life than this one? New NVA replacements never knew what fate awaited them until it was too late. Those who survived their first horrible experience, would then gladly accept any job ask of them. Hoi knew this too. Heck, all NVA commanders knew it.

     Since B Company had now been on Thunder Road for five nights, Caudill, even with his many interruptions, had gotten to know that map "pretty good". He was, however, running out of different directions to send ambush patrols. Over time, in command, Caudill had developed a real queasiness about having to send out patrols in the same direction twice. However, there were only so many directions on a map. Fortunately, for the last four nights he had been blessed to have experienced squad leaders, who could work with their platoon leaders to deploy ambushes and even help pick a spot. All Caudill had to do was approve the location. They also knew how to be very sneaky going and coming, even if they did go in the same direction twice. However, tonight was different. Tonight it was the "wet nosed" kid's turn to lead an ambush patrol. That automatically caused both his platoon leader and Caudill to reach for the Rolaids. This young sergeant had been with the company for only a short time while B Company was "ready reserve" at Quan Loi. Although he had checked all the right boxes after he enlisted and made sergeant fast, he had virtually no combat experience. Like so many others It was all "on the job" training for him. Caudill knew this and the young sergeant's platoon leader knew it too. That's why both joined the huddle to make sure the T's were crossed, before the ambush patrol left the perimeter. Caudill showed up at the very last minute, but stood silent as his platoon leader did all the talking. I believe Lieutenant Johnson in my November Platoon was that platoon leader's name, but I am not sure. The platoon leader, whoever he was, quickly emphasized to the young sergeant that he was to follow the azimuth paralleling Thunder Road until his path crossed an old railroad bed. there , he would hide until dark and than deploy his ambush in a wood line about 150 meters due west of there. Hopefully, no spying eyes would see him make that move. That wood line would be their best cover and concealment. From that wood line, using a starlight scope, the ambush patrol could take turns watching the brushy area to their front. The meeting was "short and sweet". Caudill had not uttered a word but was very pleased with his platoon leader's prepping of the new sergeant. At the same time, he wished he could feel as certain about his young sergeant. However, that same feeling of confidence was just not there. What was there, however, was a little twinge way down deep in the pit of his stomach. "Fred", Caudill asked, as they headed back to the command bunker, "Do you have any of those Rolaids left?"

     Caudill approached the command bunker, sucking on that Rolaid. By the time he reached the command bunker, only a short distance away, he had already shook off his concerns about the new sergeant. In their place, he began thinking about something of much less importance. He began thinking about how nice it would be if First Sergeant, Pink Dillard, would skip the war stories for tonight. With that thought in mind, Caudill was pleasantly caught off guard as he approached the command bunker. Glancing toward the bunker, his face "couldn't help but brighten", as he observed Pink. The First Sergeant was stretched out on the ground with his upper body propped against the sandbag wall of the bunker. His head was down and his eyes were closed. "Thank God", Caudill thought to himself, "There would be no war stories tonight". The First Sergeant was sound asleep. Those extra pieces of pumpkin pie had "done the trick". Pink was ending his Thanksgiving Day a little earlier than most other days. Seeing this, Caudill quickly mustered his most compelling command voice and addressed all within "ear shot". "I want everyone to let the First Sergeant get some rest. If you need something taken care of than come to me". When Caudill finished, he noticed a little smile break out just on the very corners of Pink's mouth. However, the First Sergeant remained completely motionless.

     The hours of darkness ticked by. There was just a sliver of a moon in the sky. Several hours after dark Hoa had his guides lead 300 of his troops down the ox cart trail coming from the west and running almost due east straight through the middle of the American camp. He also had others take any path they liked and approach the American camp from the east side of Thunder Road. In the darkness, they planted antipersonnel mines in the strip of ground between the road and the wire and then skedaddled. If all else failed this surely wouldn't. It would be just another nasty little surprise for the Americans to discover, after the fighting was over. Just thinking about it made Hoa's face brighten into a sinister smile. Hoa knew that this Company was part of Dick's unit, which had been left behind at Quan Loi during the fighting at Loc Ninh. If he had to guess, he would guess that it was also Dick's most inexperienced company. Whether it was or whether it wasn't didn't really matter, however. Hoa had thought for several days now about how he was going to attack these Americans and he didn't see anyway his plan could fail. The cleared ground around this particular NDP was perfect for the idea he had in mind. This night would be dark and the Americans had declared a cease fire for Thanksgiving. It was a perfect night for Hoa to initiate his plan as long as he moved fast before these Americans had time to respond. Westmoreland was not the only one who wanted to rack of large body counts. Every one of Duan's field commanders, including Hoa, dreamed of doing the same thing and Hoa believed he had come up with the perfect plan. On this dark night, he would have his sappers stealthy move into place, blow the wire with Bangalore torpedoes, allowing RPG teams to quickly breach the perimeter and destroy a bunch of bunkers and armor before the Calvary arrived. Would most of his attackers die in the process? Hoa knew the answer to that question but it was a question which Hoa and all those above him would never have to ask. On the other hand, American leadership would have to answer that question and that's exactly what gave him hope that his side would win in the end. So what if a few million nameless souls had to die to purchase for him and his friends what they wanted?

     When Hoa's troops reached the clearing in front of the American camp, they fanned out in the edge of the triple canopy wood line on both sides of the trail. The cleared ground between them and the American camp was not conducive for a human wave attack because Hoa's troops would have almost two hundred meters of this open ground to cover in their attack. Instead, he deployed numerous sapper teams with Bangalore torpedoes. As I said, they were followed by RPG teams coming along behind. The machine guns were positioned along the wood line to shoot high over the sapper teams as soon as the shelling of the camp started. These machine gunners were given orders to wait and shoot high over those troops in front of them. This fire was not intending to kill Americans. The objective was to keep heads down. As I have already explained, while Americans had their heads down, young dumb teenage sappers positioned earlier would blow holes in the Constantine wire. RPG teams would then rush through those holes and take out the bunkers and armor. This was Hoa's plan and it depended on stealth and the speed of his sapper teams.

     Right on cue, and shortly after midnight, a salvo of mortar rounds landed around the mortar pit. The mortar platoon leader, Dennis Zuberg, was blown out of the pit and badly injured but survived. Other salvos landed harmlessly where the armor used to be, before it was repositioned after dark. Automatic weapons opened up 200 meters away in the wood line to the west. Within a few seconds, everyone inside the perimeter were manning their battle positions. The over use of tracer rounds by both sides in Vietnam was a big mistake. Some of the more astute "ole guys", with M-14s, began aiming at those wood line locations where green tracers were originating. I am sure my thump gun buddy, Walker, had a wonderful time dividing his attention between targets illuminated by flares in the clearing and those targets along the wood line marked by green tracers. Trip flares were going off and lighting up almost the entire west side of the perimeter. Men who were manning the ports of their DePuy bunkers would not have been able to see very much. The third man, manning the entry way, would have had more visibility but was also less protected from flying shrapnel and incoming rounds. There would have been a tendency for some to waste ammo. As a matter of fact, my studies suggest that this was a big problem for most units in a fire fight. Men tended to just spray bullets all around and high instead of taking time to place three round bursts into a particular area to their front and then traversing their fire. This tendency did nothing but aggravate the jamming problem inherent to the M-16. My research also indicates that Dick was well aware of this problem. So was Caudill. Word was passed very quickly for everyone to hold their fire until given the order or until the volume of incoming fire indicated that the enemy was pressing the attack and not just shooting to draw the Americans into over reacting too soon. Radios were blaring everywhere around the perimeter. Mortar rounds and RPG shrapnel ripped holes in the big tent. Within minutes Caudill was on the horn with Dick, giving him a sitrep (Situation Report). Dick waited for Watts to finish. Then he reminded him to make sure that everyone held their fire as I have just explained. "That order has already been transmitted, Sir", Caudill responded in an even tone of voice. Before he finished his conversation with Dick, mortar teams attached to the armor unit were shooting flares high into the night sky. A "spooky" from Lai Khe soon arrived to drop more parachute flares. Soon, the entire area was as brightly lite as an nighttime Oiler's game at the Astrodome. That was good for the men inside the perimeter but bad for the Americans on those listening posts.

     Dale McCall, as well as another platoon leader immediately had a problem. All three of Dale's listening post guys were badly wounded within a matter of moments after the fighting started. They radioed for help getting them back to the safety of the NDP. Without hesitation, after hearing their cry for help over the radio, McCall immediately crawled out of his bunker and ran toward the wire, leaving his weapon behind. That cleared ground outside the wire provided very little cover and concealment. With flares now eliminating the entire area it would have been easy for McCall to spot his three men. Unfortunately, these men were more likely spotted earlier by enemy sapper teams too, because the ground was so open. When McCall reached the perimeter, he was stopped by strands of Constantine wire. Adrenalin flowing, he picked up a heavy piece of Marston matting lying nearby and slung it across the razor sharp wire. As he began to use it as a walkway to cross the wire, he again was stopped in his tracks. This time a sapper was starring at him from outside the wire. Fortunately for McCall instead of a weapon, the sapper had one section of a Bangalore torpedo in his hands. Manny Rivera had noticed that McCall forgot his weapon. Manny followed him out to the wire to give it to him. When Manny got to the wire, he saw the VC and McCall just standing there staring at each other. Manny shot the VC dead. Without hesitating, McCall ordered Manny to wait at the wire, while he ran continued to run across the wire and the fifty meters or so further on to help his wounded men. They were mobile enough to make it back to the perimeter but not without McCall's help. All this time our armor units were blazing away with their deadly 50 caliber machine guns. All three men on another platoon's listening post were killed. Several men whom I interviewed believe that these men were killed by this friendly fire coming from those armor units. Here is why I don't believe that this was the case. B Company had been operating with these armor guys for several days. Listening posts had been going out each day on this open ground. Those guys could see our listening post details going and coming every day. This meant that they were well aware that there was going to be Americans outside the wire during an attack. However, some one else was also watching them. It's a sure bet that Hoa's troops were watching from that wood line and it's a much more likely scenario, that Hoa's machine gunners are the ones who took out our listening posts as soon as the shooting started. With the open ground and with our artillery flares eliminating the entire area brighter than the noonday sun, its highly unlikely that those armor crews would have mistaken Americans for the enemy. It's much more likely that they became good targets for enemy machine gunners and sappers. I have been under flares at night. An American wearing a steel helmet would have been easy to distinguish. If the ground had been thick jungle then "yes", I would believe that they were possibly killed by friendly fire. I had been in a situation earlier in the year when a mechanized unit was operating with us in thick jungle. It was daytime but they couldn't see through the thick jungle. They mistakenly opened up on us during contact. However, I don't believe these men in this particular instance were killed by friendly fire.

     While McCall was addressing his problems in his own personal way, Capt. Caudill had another problem and it had nothing to do with fearing that his camp was going to be over run. With all the American fire power on full display around him, being over run was not something to worry about. Less than thirty minutes into the attack, however, he had lost a couple listening posts. There was nothing he could do about that now. However, Eaton was handing him another problem on his company radio which could turn deadly if he didn't do something about that and do it fast. It was the "wet nose kid" on the other end of the transmission. "Sir, he hears noises and wants to blow the ambush", Eaton said, as he handed over the mic. Upon hearing that, Caudill's, quick mind visualized the gravity of what was being requested and just for an instant froze with anger. Yet, a thousand past command experiences told him that his anger was not the right tool to use when taking command of "stupid". So, Caudill let go of the anger before grabbing the mic. "November One this is Bravo Six. November One, I am ordering you to sit tight and do not broadcast unless absolutely necessary. Do you understand?" "I understand came the answer from the other end of the transmission". But the young Sergeant didn't really understand. He called back at least three more times requesting to blow the ambush. He was drowning in his own fear and Caudill was "momma" to him. In a perfect world he should never have been leading an ambush patrol in the first place, but he was. Each time he called, Captain Caudill rejected his pleas. The enemy had no idea of his location but with every transmission he was giving that enemy more and more opportunities to learn that location. So, Caudill had to each time time be brief with him, but firm with repeated "stay put" command. It didn't dawn on the young sergeant that trying to reach the safety of the base camp during an enemy attack would be suicide. I wonder if after every thing was said and done, that young sergeant realized that his captain had saved his life that night by making him stay hidden until the battle was over?

     Off course the attack was not a success for Hoa and the battle was over by 0130 hours. There was just too much fire power coming from the American camp for Hoa's pitiful fighters to have any chance whatsoever of breaching the perimeter.

     Years later, I learned of a very troubling event which happened during this attack. Both the barber and his young son were found dead in that clearing to the west of camp where 55 enemy dead were also discovered after the battle was over. A map of B Company's NDP was found on the barber. This would tend to lead some to believe that both the father and son were VC. On the surface it seemed that they had been in cahoots with the communists. However, I don't believe that was the case. I believe they got cross ways of the communists by not carrying out explicit instructions given to them by their communist overlords who ruled over their village by night. The smoking gun for what I am saying is the fact that the barber was found with the map on his person. If he had been working with the communist, that map would have been turned over to Hoa to be analyzed. It would not have remained on the barber. No, it was planted on the barber after he was murdered by communist sociopaths. Not only was he and his son murdered in this manner but so were thousands of other hapless Vietnamese who would not cooperate fully with their communist overseers. We Americans were oblivious to this fact of life which most Vietnamese citizens lived with every day. We Americans have never had to deal with a political environment like that. It was commonly believed by most Americans, including myself, that many South Vietnamese willingly supported the communists. That belief was false but was promoted as much as possible by leftist propaganda. Of course, some did, but most were not given any other choice. We should have made sure that we gave them that choice. Instead, we chased around the jungle, looking for some one to shoot. I was there. I observed the Vietnamese people with my own eyes. I looked into countless Vietnamese eyes which said, " I am looking for nothing more than to be given a chance to make a life for myself and my family, and I will do whatever it takes to protect that life. If that means cooperating with that communist shadow government, than so be it". The Vietnamese wanted the same chance, that MacArthur gave to the Japanese after the Second World War. The common false belief was that the Vietnamese people worked their rice fields during the day and killed Americans at night. Human behavior 101 says that's just not true. As I said, some did, but those were the exceptions. To believe that this was the heart felt desire of most Vietnamese is to be very naive. I have said it once but it bares repeating. Most human beings across the globe have the same basic desires. They want security, for themselves and their family and the ability to provide for that family. After that, they want the freedom to go and do what they please. A representative form of government like our republic, with fairly run elections provides the best political framework for that to happen.

     I remember the sun rising on the 28th of November. The rest of the details of that day are sketchy. On second thought, I don't remember the sun coming up, but it had to come up, because that was the day of my resurrection, of sorts. That day I checked in all my field gear, donned my kaki uniform, and reported to the orderly room. From there I caught a buss to Tan Son Nhut Air Base. I don't remember saying good bye to anyone at Di An, not even the motor pool sergeant who was instrumental in saving my soul. All the guys whom I was closest to were still in the field guarding Thunder Road.

     Hoa would attack D Company on the 3rd of December and A Company on the of 10th of December. During Hoa's December 3rd assault on D company, Sergeant Chesnut would chase some sappers into the brush beyond the perimeter, killing several of them. One of those sappers, who got away, turned around and followed him back to the wire, shooting him dead just as he approached the safety of the perimeter.

     I believe Dick had already finished his time in the field when Hoa attacked A company on the 10th of December. His predecessor, George Tronsrue, was more than capable of taking care of the situation. It helped that he had trained under Dick before taking command.

     Had the motor pool sergeant not offered me a job, I would have been in all those big battles toward the end of the year, including that Thanksgiving Day battle on Thunder Road. No, I would not have been killed. However, I would have had to kill other human beings and that would have been okay in God's eyes for most others in my unit, but not me. No, not me. You see, if the cause is just, it is not a sin to kill the enemy, with one exception. One should never glory in the taking of human life. That is the one exception and I gloried way too much in doing just that. I only volunteered one time during my military service. I jumped at the chance to volunteer for sniper training. In itself, that was not wrong. However, I did not volunteer so I could save lives or advance our just cause in Vietnam. I volunteered so I could have a better chance at taking trophies. In other words I gloried in the kill. The American sniper, Chris Kyle, did not glory in what he did. As a sniper, he took lives to save life. God is not happy about any violent act, but the taking of human life is not sin in his eyes, if the cause is just. As I have said, if I had been with my unit during those big battles at the end of the year, I would have had to take lives. I would have gloried in that. That's not okay with God. Plainly put, I was a "sick puppy". The motor pool sergeant saved my soul from the corrupting consequences of a sin which could have scarred me for life.

     On the 10th of December a Montagnard Village near Loc Ninh was massacred by the communist, women and children included. That incident was hardly reported. It is becoming increasingly hard to pull data on the internet about the communist atrocities committed in the Vietnam War. Using Google, every search result on this topic displays page after page of results pointing to the American incident at My Lai. However, my early research indicates that the American crimes against humanity over the years, Vietnam included, pales in comparison to those human rights crimes committed by the communist. I left Vietnam for good when I finished my tour. I will never return in this life. After reading what I have written, some may suppose that I hate the communist who now run Vietnam but that's simply not true. I love the Vietnamese people including that 3% who are card carrying communists. It may surprise my communist friends to know that I also believe that the communist ideals are very noble. However, those ideals are based on mankind creating governments which are the final authority on how noble ideals of equality are implemented. Making mankind the final authority on anything will always led to disastrous results and tremendous pain and suffering. I believe America has been a proving ground for a better way. We have created a government rooted in principles taken from the word of God and not from the noble aspirations of mankind. We have not done that perfectly but we have strived to do so. now let us continue. Let's strive to rightly divide those principles, abiding within them, to bring true equality of opportunity for all. When we do that, we also create the safest haven to be found this side of heaven.

     After 1975, with the communist in complete control of Vietnam, another estimated three million Vietnamese would die violent deaths, during the first ten years of the communist taking over. Many would be deliberately murdered by the government.

     Early in the "wee hours of the 29th of November I returned to that safe haven. my plane literally rolled back time as it flew east, refueling in Hawaii and then on to Oakland. There I was welcomed home with a steak dinner and a hot shower.