Two Tours in the Bloody Vietnam War | Full Interview

well I want to start off by getting a little bit of background on you uh where you grew up and what life was like when you were a kid I was uh I was one of four children I was the oldest of four uh my dad was a career army officer so he was in the military for 36 years and consequently we moved every three years it was a process of going to a new school making sure you uh beat up the bully and uh get to know new friends and so he's up there those are his decorations he retired as chief of staff at Walter Reed he was a silver star recipient as well he was absolutely World War II really yeah did he talk about his service in World War II he didn't talk a lot no I know he went in he got the silver star with uh uh with having to do with D-Day he went in he was the first medical unit in uh Germany actually went in on a glider and he hurt his back pretty severely uh which bothered him the rest of his life but uh he was uh uh yeah he was my hero yeah and I'm sure that influenced how you viewed the military or as you got approached you know 18 I'm sure that had to have affected I did yeah and plus growing up in the military so you know all the kids you knew their dads were uh or their mothers were in the in the military and so um you know yeah it did influence me a bit so when did you actually uh go into the army I went into the army right after I graduated from high school I got into uh the reserves uh primarily because I was uh I needed some money helping me get through college so I was in the reserves for three years I went in I went in in 1962 and uh I was in the reserves for three years during that time I was in the uh in college also uh and I uh got commissioned when I graduated in 1966. and when you get commissioned is Vietnam on your radar at all and I can see it is it was you know it was all uh you know as you got into uh you know went through summer camp we went through jump School uh it was all we talked about you know and a lot of the guys that we were uh some of the instructors that uh we had uh had been to Vietnam one tour uh there was a guy who went through uh jump school with who'd been back from who has come back from Vietnam he was with the 173rd uh so yeah I I would say that that was on our mind sure yeah and then with cable you know I was in college from the cable and Missile Crisis was was going on and actually a reserve unit that I was part of got basically put on standby because they were concerned that you know that the the Russians had placed nukes on Cuba and so all the military uh units all the reserve units in the southern part of the country were placed on standby so did you uh so you I mean you're going through Airborne schools did you want to go to Vietnam or was that just something that uh yeah I volunteered to go to Vietnam actually I I was initially assigned to a position uh when I got Commissioned I was just assigned to a unit in Fort Lewis Washington uh and after about nine months there I volunteered and and actually contacted a friend of my fathers in the Pentagon and said you know can you make this happen so uh yeah I was I was quickly shipped off to Vietnam who'd you uh ship out with what unit uh actually I I flew over in a big yellow bran if I thought this is this is crazy I'm going to war in a big yellow airplane uh and you know as we approach the coast of Vietnam there was yeah it was full of full of other people who were coming in as Replacements uh you could see the artillery shells Landing in the distance and the explosions and and I thought yeah this is something to tell my kids you know I've yeah I flew into war on a big a big yellow brand of plane it looked like a banana and uh you know we had great great stewardesses it was wonderful uh uh so yeah that's that shipped over and I actually uh was assigned to the fourth infantry at the you know replacement Depot how did the uh guys from the fourth uh infantry treat you when you came in as a replacement did they accept you or you know as an officer it's a little different but everybody who comes in is uh you know the FNG the new guy uh you know who's stupid and who doesn't know what to do and can get you killed if you're too close to him and you know that was that was pretty pervasive throughout you know my two tours of Vietnam uh you know you had to watch out for the new guys you had to watch out for you know uh to make sure that you know they they actually they had their stuff together that they actually you know had their weapons loaded that sort of thing uh so uh yeah I would say you know I was assigned to uh on FC platoon uh as a platoon leader uh you know and there was yeah I'm sure there was a little skepticism uh among uh particularly uh uh you know among some of the non-commissioned officers but my dad had told me you know sergeants run the military and uh you know get to know them and listen to them and I took advice and so yeah I I got along pretty well pretty quickly and how long was it when you joined the fourth infantry uh before you actually started going out on combat operations it was probably two weeks you have an introductory sort of indoctrination when you're there at base camp and then uh you you know you go out with some uh on a couple of small patrols around base camp and then you're assigned to your unit and you're out in the field now uh how long was it before you made your first contact with the Enemy doing these these type of uh these patrols or these operations uh you know we were doing patrolling uh in the central Highlands uh we were uh you know aware of the enemy you know we had units uh that were with our Battalion I was assigned to the Third Battalion 8th infantry uh we had units that did get into contact uh and I would say probably it was another three or four weeks before we actually got into a situation where we walked into a a potential Ambush we actually uh were fortunate in that uh our Point man sniffed it out and uh we were able to lay down some fire uh so it was fairly inconsequential a contact the enemy broke and ran uh but they did have a machine gun and placement and a number of people around that then we brought fire on and now your first time Under Fire you know what's that like as a new new infantry officer it's chaotic uh you know it's always chaotic uh uh you're you know first of all you have to determine where your people are maybe all of your people uh fortunately for me I had yeah I I had a tendency to walk with the point man so I was up in the front I had a good experienced Sergeant in the back uh and um I was able to know where he was know where I would we had radio contact I had my radio man with me uh so we just basically you know went to the flanks and opened you know started laying down some fire uh didn't at that time didn't call in any artillery or anything I could have but I didn't uh because it seemed like you know just a small Patrol that we'd run into and was combat in Vietnam what you expected it to be um with the Enemy and how they fought or uh no you know what uh we were basically told we were fighting you know farmers and black pajamas who came out at night and and did this and and in reality in the central Highlands we were fighting uh there were there were Vietcong but the majority of the time that we were in combat we were in combat with hardcore North Vietnamese troops and they had uh I mean they were well equipped they weren't you know guys with SKS uh single shot rifles uh they they had you know in my opinion AK-47 is a better weapon than the M16 uh they had uh you know uniforms they had helmets uh you know in one contact that uh that we had um they had flamethrowers which we didn't have uh you know and I can tell you when you're sitting on a hill and you see this people coming up the hill toward you and they got flamethrowers it makes you pause uh um so uh yeah yeah we were typically fighting uh fairly well trained fairly well equipped uh infantry uh people who were who had come down Ho Chi Minh trail and were in South Vietnamese as North Vietnamese troops foreign first tour are there any engagements that stand out in your mind as being uh you know particularly like uh stand out just to you for uh how they went down or um anything's important to your experience I guess is what I'm trying to say yeah I would say there were several um there were um you know a number of uh really significant firefight so we were we were deployed to duckto uh you know which is right on the Cambodian border and uh we were basically going to be a blocking Force this is just before the Tet Offensive 68. uh we were going to be a blocking force uh and we were patrolling very very aggressively uh to try to make contact and determine who was out there and what they were doing uh you know one of my best friends he had his platoon uh out in uh an area that was uh I was actually back in the what they call the trains area where you had your medical and you had you know your your your resupply and that sort of thing I was back in the trains area and my group would put pulled off the line uh and he was uh he was out doing a patrol and he got he he his platoon uh simply ran into a NVA NVA Battalion you know over five or six hundred people and I was listening to the thing on the radio and Charlie carried a shotgun uh you know we all carried our own uh favorite weapons I had a cut down uh 30 caliber carbine from World War II that I carried in addition to my M16 and a pistol um and uh you know you could hear Charlie yelling and screaming over the phone I mean over the over the radio uh and the last thing we heard was uh his shotgun uh you know and uh and uh and him yelling at the guy that was in the process of killing him so they wiped out probably the majority of that uh platoon my platoon went in uh right away by helicopter to reinforce them and we found three or four survivors that was about it it was about 27 people so yeah that was a pretty significant contact we continued in that area uh and we actually uh got into some very serious fighting uh we were you know going up several Hills we lost a lot of people and we actually they they had to pull our Battalion off and replace us with a 173rd because we had lost so many people up we were we were really undermanned that's that's when I got my first Purple Heart uh we were in the middle of a firefight I was behind a log with my radio man and uh I was trying to direct you know somebody to go flank this this group of NBA folks that were was in uh in front of us um and I uh I saw a group that was right close by and I pulled a pin on my grenade and I threw it uh and at the same time I heard a thump and I looked down and foreign this was between my legs it's an NVA grenade and I and I you know I I just you know I just said okay this is it uh fortunately he had not pulled a plug so he didn't he threw it but he didn't pull the plug fortunately I had pulled the pin on the grenade so I killed him he didn't kill me or or my radio man so my guys took this and disarmed it I brought her home as a souvenir so that's the exact grenade that that's exact grenade yes absolutely yeah and it's uh you know it's a wooden handle it's hollowed out it's got a fuse you pull it it's lights a fuse and then this is what this is what explodes and creates the shrapnel so uh yeah it's uh yeah it reminds me every day is precious you know sometimes the the things that you went through the memories don't they don't get any less emotional no matter how long ago it was 50 some odd years surprising well uh as a as a leader as an officer like when you would lose guys like that do you have time to process that at all or uh when you're in the middle of a firefight absolutely not you know uh as you uh either withdraw or as you you know defeat the enemy or or the enemy extracts themselves uh then you you know go around and you get your wounded out and you get your uh you know you get your wounded out uh uh by by helicopters quickly as you can to get them back to Medical uh you uh you don't get your your dead out uh until after the wounded are out uh unless the whole group is extracting you know you're in a situation where you have to extract the entire group uh and uh yeah yeah yeah yeah you wrap them up in their uh and their Poncho liners uh or their uh you know their their ponchos and we didn't have body bags sometimes they brought up body bags in and uh you you know you make note of who they are because you have to make make sure that that gets reported and uh yeah you still I wrote a letter excuse me to every kid's family and those were tough those were tough and I knew them all I mean I you know I got to know them uh we were out on patrol or or you know uh someplace I'd you know go around check everybody every night uh make sure they were you know their their fighting positions were in good shape and you know and go out there you know during the night and check and make sure somebody was awake uh because they were two or three guys in a hole um or my pretend Sergeant would do that uh and um it was uh it was tough you said you were wounded uh were you wounded very bad then I don't know if I cut you off on that oh clean out your purple heart oh the the uh the Purple Heart was another another event okay the uh the Purple Heart was uh where we were we were actually on a uh in at a Firebase what is the Firebase is basically where the uh the Central Command is uh and then we haven't we had an artillery we actually got uh this is uh this is probably late in my tour my my my unit or my entire company the entire company at my unit was with was was into was defense was defense uh and we were uh you know around the perimeter of the Firebase uh we got attacked by a very large Force this is the same area on the Cambodian border that we were involved in uh and um the uh I got you know a mortar round landed you know right next to me and I got travel up and down my body uh and we were actually overrun we ended up calling artillery strikes down and our strikes on ourselves you know we got into the bunkers uh the Via North Vietnamese got into the bunkers uh they actually took over uh or we spiked the guns because they were going to take over the artillery unit that was there uh and so we ended up that night uh calling because we had we had all kinds of air resources we had this is right before Ted uh we had spooky up and they were shooting you know all kinds of ammunition down uh we had a number of air strikes we had uh our artillery was firing as fast as they could they eventually you know came into the perimeter we spiked the guns they took over the artillery uh we had some quad 50s up there they they uh we had to burn up because they were going to take those over and we ended up going going uh once they they never they over ran us and we called artillery and airstrikes on ourselves uh then they pull back uh but they were still North Vietnamese in our within our perimeter so we had to go bunker to Bunker and basically do uh you know not hand to hand but basically you know spray at it yeah throw a grenade in that sort of thing so yeah there were a lot of us that were I was wounded there were lots of people on that Hill that were wounded so yeah I remember uh I had a very close friend uh his name was rad r-a-d Dutton and he was a lieutenant and uh I remember uh after when we were about to be medevik he he popped up and he was covered with blood I was covered with blood he thought I was dead I thought he was dead we great we grabbed each other and uh and gave us the other hug and uh that was yeah it was tough it was a tough tough night so I assume that was the end of that that first tour though you're getting wounded like that or I got wounded I got back um and um yeah I think I think that was uh they they medeviked me then I came back to my unit uh they brought in my replacement and I and I went back to to the states yeah and uh when you got your silver star was that the second tour or was that the first the Silver Star was the second tour okay so okay okay yeah the um yeah yeah okay too is yeah go ahead oh the the Bronze Star too is that I got a bronze star I got a Purple Heart from that event and I got uh soldiers medal uh which is basically the highest award you get for life saving because I I pull somebody out really yeah wow so uh when you go back to the United States are you thinking I want to go back to Vietnam really I guess because I uh uh yeah I don't know what I was thinking I just you know I went back I was assigned to uh actually I I had uh requested to go to Ranger school so I went to Ranger School uh then I was sent back to uh Fort Lewis basically as a training officer to uh to be a training officer uh for uh Reserve units that were being called up and uh and and sent to Vietnam uh and that was that was kind of anti-climatic uh you know it was kind of miserable you know I knew where those guys were going and I you know the the interesting thing is you've once you're gone you feel like you're you're you should be back uh you know that's where all your friends were that's where your men were uh you know you needed to take care of them uh so I had that you know that same sense of I'm not uh you know I'm not supposed to be here somebody else is supposed to be here I'm supposed to be back there uh so uh actually it was kind of a a a funny situation that led to me actually requesting to go back uh I was a training officer there was a a medical unit that was sent to Fort Lewis from Cincinnati uh and they were basically um they were a National Guard unit so they were really they really needed some training up and so they assigned me uh they asked me to go and even though I was an empty officer go in and train up this medical unit so I got them out in the field uh you know I did a number of things so there was uh there were a couple of officers including a major who was like the quartermaster officer so I had taken his people out in the field and made sure they understood about booby traps and you know this kind of thing and um and so the uh the the higher headquarters said okay we need to get these people out in the field have them set up all their equipment do this that and the other so I had arranged to uh to have a position uh that they would go out and set up their their tents and up actually start operating as a master unit without any casualties except simulated casualties uh and the first thing you you needed to do was to uh because it was under simulated combat conditions so you had to go in and secure the site so I said to the major uh okay I'll take a small group of people that I'll train up and we'll go out and we'll secure the site uh at about you know five o'clock in the morning and then everything else is loaded up in the trucks and you you take you know the Convoy out there and set things up so that's the way we were going to do it so about five o'clock in the morning I was down there uh making sure that everybody had blanks and their weapons because we were gonna have to do a simulated combat and uh he came down and he was very gung-ho he's very excited about going to Vietnam uh and he had on his you know battle uh gear and uh he he said oh oh can I can I have a clip for my 45 I said no sir you cannot hey so he goes back because he's the quartermaster officer he goes back and he brings out this this box of uh uh tear gas grenades it's the kind of thing that at that time given what was going on in the United States that the National Guard would use and they were called the they were they were Bakelite they were almost like plastic and you'd throw them up and they'd explode and the tear gas would come down and he said he said well maybe we got to take a couple of these I said no we don't need any tear gas grenades so uh I I you know I put him back on the shelf and I got my guys together we went out and you know we had a machine gun and and we you know we we fought the aggressors off that was nothing it was kind of funny then I get this call from sergeant major and sergeant major says Lieutenant you got to get back here we're in big trouble and I said what what's going on he said just you just got to get back here so uh it turns out that the major had gotten everybody you know gotten everybody and being gung-ho he had gone back down in there and gotten up one of the hand grenades uh the the the the seat the C4 hand grenades uh and then he had gotten in his Jeep and he had a radio that he was supposed to talk to me on and it was connected to the Jeep it was bolted to the body and he took the cord and he put it around he put it also on his web belt up here and so and he had his clipboard because he always had a clipboard you could tell he was definitely not a combat officer with a clipboard uh and so they're rolling through the post the main post about seven o'clock in the morning and uh at about 12 miles an hour and um that you know just about the time that people are going to work or kids are starting to you know walk to school this that the other they're right in front of the elementary school and he drops his clipboard out of the Jeep so he doesn't want to stop the Convoy in the middle of the road so he jumps out of the Jeep to get his clipboard not realizing he's still connected to the radio that's attached to the Jeep and the Jeep is still rolling at about 10 miles an hour so he reaches down to get it and it pulls him off his feet and he realizes that he's connected to the Jeep by the microphone cord so he tries to pull that instead he pulls the grenade it goes off blows off two fingers the boy has to stop the tear gas goes over to the elementary school I get a I so I I arrived at this scene you know and there's a three-star General who's standing there going who the hell is in charge of this goddamn Ragtime outfit and I I said sir the the captain that's being treated by the medics is and he said well who are you and I said well I'm the training officer and he said Lieutenant you've got three minutes to get your ass and all these people out of my goddamn Street and I say yes sir the captain end up not going to Vietnam they actually changed his orders and after his hand got patched up they sent him to Alaska so after that event and when they you know they finally sent another major out that night um I called up uh my immediate Superior and said I got to get back to Vietnam it's too dangerous back here so I I uh and and I had been waiting for a position uh with 101st Airborne so I was uh I was shuttled off to Vietnam uh and uh became commander in the 101st and what year is this now this would have been uh 69 68 69 yeah so uh when you're going over there the second time now there's a pretty big gap between you know 66 and 69 now how is the you know public uh discourse about the war changed or has it oh it's gotten much more uh anti-war uh you know and uh you know it was uh uh it was getting to point I don't think Kent State it happened yet uh but it was it was quite you know uh there was quite a lot of opposition uh I can remember you know when I came back from my second tour and I was talking to my dad because I had an offer they were going to send me to Baylor and get me a give me a master's degree and promote me to Major uh I said to my dad what do you think and he said no get out he said uh you know right now it's bad it's gonna get worse it's going to be soldiers and dogs keep off the grass so uh he gave me that good advice yeah which is why I decided not to continue in the military can you tell me about that that tour with 101st as a company commander and uh kind of what that looked like 101st was a really you know it was a Strack outfit uh they were they were gung-ho they were they were all airborne troops uh you know the main uh my mate one of my main concerns uh was that everybody was so gung-ho that I had to sit down with my Medics because each platoon has a medic and and then the company has a a senior medic uh and say look guys there's 30 guys in those platoons 29 can shoot their rifle you're the only guy that can patch them up I don't want you throwing your medical bag down and grabbing a Tommy gun or or you know M16 or something you can carry a personal weapon but I don't you're not your main thing is to patch people up so you know I had to continually reinforce that because everybody was very very aggressive uh and you know they were trained to be uh it was a good it was a very good um outfit it was very well very well trained very well managed well when you guys go out in the field as a company Commander uh what is your I guess what is your position when you get maybe to like a firefight or something like that uh I don't know if there's an instance that stand out in your mind of what what you're doing when you're engaging the enemy as a company Commander uh you're you're basically controlling things and you're also uh you're also uh managing uh artillery strikes you're managing uh air strikes so you're talking to former air controller uh you're talking to the artillery people back in the back uh you know the main thing is to understand your map uh and to know where your units are um and who's in contact and who needs to be you know who needs to go in over you know move five clicks South to help a unit that's already in in uh in contact uh you need to have good communication with your platoon leaders so that you under yeah I mean you obviously can't see them you can't see what they're doing or what they're going through so they have to all it all has to be Word of Mouth conveyance and if they're stressed or if they're under Fire or if they're um you know frightened or something like that you you gotta you know manage their fear man can you know tell them that you know look you know it's okay control your troops you know tell me what's going on on let me know exactly where you are get out your map tell me exactly where your front lines are because if I'm going to call an artillery and airstrike I don't want to call it in on you when I was a platoon leader there were a number of times where uh I had napalm in front of my position it really was uh sends my eyebrows it was that close and I was very happy about it because it was burning up the guys that were trying to get to me so uh you know but you you know you don't want to have green on green activities uh so you got it you know you got to get really good communication you got to get really good feedback and you got to really know you know your map coordinates so I would say those are the keys uh also you know you got to have really really good uh non-commissioned officers because they're they're the guys that really you know help you help you run things I was very fortunate I had a very good uh first sergeant uh in the field and then uh about two months into my tour he rotated back to the States and uh I had uh I had a sergeant uh kid kid out of San Francisco State uh and he was extraordinarily gung-ho uh I mean he carried an old 45 grease gun I don't know where he got it I don't know how he got ammunition for it but he always had it with him uh his name was Buzz kind and uh and he was uh I I made him my field for sergeant because uh the first sergeant I got in replacement was great guy but he was near the end of his 30 years or 20 years uh he was about a hundred pounds overweight and when I went back to meet him uh I flew back on helicopter to base camp and I looked at him and I said you know how old are you and you know your weight and and I said I said okay you're gonna be my first sergeant but you're going to stay back here and you're gonna get into every single Supply officer uh and Supply Sergeant because I said I got kids out there we were the tip of the spare but we were the end of the we were the very end of the uh supply line so I had kids out there running around with their ass hanging out of their of their britches because they you know their their fatigues were wearing out the souls were coming off of their boots and I would yell and scream and I wasn't getting much back and so I said okay I'm going to send you a list every Friday and if what I need is not on that is not on that helicopter coming back to me your ass better be and I'm gonna have you out on the field here uh you know seeing seeing the problem so every Friday from then on I had I had new uniforms if my guys needed them I had new boots I had a hot meal if that was available I had a bottle of Scotch every Friday for the colonel uh I was I was the cosmo of uh the second of the 501st ah you know I had officers uh not not yeah well I don't I don't know if they were I had officers that were uh friends of mine uh who were not married who would go on r r uh to various sundry points like Hong Kong Taiwan uh and they'd come back with uh the clap and as an officer that is literally a a serious offense uh so I would uh I was the guy that they could call up and my medic would go over there with a penicillin shot because I had access to penicillin through my supply sergeant most Medics don't have Penicillin so uh you know I was I was I was pretty uh pretty comfortable if I needed something I could get this guy was great Sergeant Hamas well uh can you tell me about the uh the Silver Star action and uh kind of how that came about uh we were um we were involved in a in a pretty serious firefight uh and uh I was up with with the lead platoon uh and we uh pull back uh we we didn't uh we didn't uh extract the units we just pull back a little bit and then we set up a fighting position uh and we had a listing post out in front and uh there were I think two guys in in two positions out in front and we got attacked that night uh and it was a pretty serious attack lost contact with the two guys uh uh who were out in front of me and so I took my medic and I went out to check and see if they were alive if they were dead whatever one of the kids was dead uh the other kid had been badly wounded uh as I was this is my second purple heart too uh as I was uh leaning Down in the Hole to pull him up there had been a sniper out in front and he shot and it went through my neck and it went through the medic's chest and uh so I uh you know I pulled both of them out I was able to drag them back to the unit get the medical care they both survived and uh so I I got a purpler and a silver star well can you uh describe to me what's the sensation of getting shot through the necks I can't imagine it's like somebody hit you with a baseball bat it built you know basically you know or if they hit you in the shoulder if they hit you in the chest you know it's just like whack and and it it feels like wow what the hell was that uh and then you know you you reach up and you go oh crap uh but you know uh there was nothing else to do you know my medic was at a sucking chest wound I was able to you know put something over that and wrap him up and and the other kid was in worship uh so you know you just do what you do and when you're doing that uh how do you physically feel or do you feel like like you've been shot in the neck as you're trying to drag those guys out no there was adrenaline was was surging you know I I uh I was able to call in an airstrike uh and uh you know lay down some napalm in front of us for whoever was out there whatever was out there and uh you know so I was I was just you know my mind was racing uh uh to try to you know do do the things you need to do in the immediate time you need to do them so uh I didn't really uh know how bad my wound was until I got back in you know the senior medic it was you know with me uh not not he I had I taken one of the one of the platoon Medics out uh he looked at it and said we got to get you out of here we got to get your blue you know you're bleeding out so uh did that end your tour in Vietnam or no it didn't actually I went back I got stitches uh you know I was uh I was in the medical uh tent for you know uh back in uh Evac Hospital Sunday night the uh avac housebo for a couple of weeks and uh then I went back to my unit uh and finished out my tour was there anything else in that last bit of your tour that you think is important that should be recorded or shared uh you know that was the time period where you had fragging of officers and uh you had uh lots of racial issues uh I never I was fortunate I never had that I you know I I knew knew all of my men uh I think they respected the fact that uh as a captain uh if I was told that uh you know because a lot of the times they would send units out Simply looking to have somebody uh stumble onto a larger uh unit of the enemy uh so they could pinpoint where they were and then bring our air power and our artillery power and literally so you were a pawn you were really a pawn out there uh in many cases you were out there to to get shot at uh so that they could hone in on who was shooting at you uh and there were a number of instances where you know my uh my Superior people that you know the people who were running the Battalion would say okay we want you to go from hilly to Hill B uh and there's this Valley in between and we think there's an NVA division or a regiment or something like and I thought holy crap you know I've got 76 or 78 men and you're going to send me into a situation that's got 500 or 600 of the enemy uh and uh you know we would we would sometimes do that and we would sometimes go instead of from Hillary to till B we'd go from Hillary to hold X to L B and go nope didn't see a thing and my my men realized that and you know I I was not going to put them in a situation where I I felt that uh you know they were being used as collateral so were there any issues with drug use I've heard that was a problem with some of you there was uh you know I had some great guys who uh smoke weed you know and I knew they smoked weed and I wasn't upset about that because if you had a guy who smoked weed and you got into a firefight he could get himself together enough to defend it to defend his position if you had a guy who drank heavily and there was booze all over the place who drank heavily and he got enough you know and you got in a far fight when he was drunk he couldn't do squat so I said if you want to smoke weed I'm not gonna I'm not gonna do anything about it you know now I had a couple guys who use Coke and I and those guys I tried to you know get back off the line and into medical so that they could do something you know about them before they got fully addicted I you know I don't know if that had a difference because it's probably more prevalent to back there than it was you know out in the jungle but uh yeah I mean I was aware of that uh you know it's you know you know everybody smoked cigarettes were free uh you know they came with a with a accessory pack for your C rations uh you know I'm these guys were out there in the jungle it was raining you know particularly during monsoon it's not only rain but it's cold rain and uh you know you can't find any hardly any cover uh they were uh you know constantly on guard uh you know against attack if they went back to base camp and they you know they were they rotated the units back after you know a couple weeks so you'd get out of the field for a couple of days they were treated as if they were extra hands to do crap work and and as a as a lieutenant I had really taken I'd drawn the line and said no I'm not gonna let that happen uh and as a captain I definitely drew the line on that you know if somebody came into one of my platoons and said you go you guys are going to go out there and build this bunker on the perimeter of the base camp uh you know they pick up they you know they they find me and I'd go back I said that's not going to happen you know that's not going to happen you just go find somebody else to do that uh there was one time when I was a platoon leader that uh it's kind of funny because uh the we we got told that we had to go out and uh and build a new bunker on the perimeter of the fourth infantry's base camp and they showed us where they wanted it to build and you know we we built all kinds of bunkers so we just started digging it it was raining and it was muddy and everybody was you know nobody had a shirt on and uh so this major comes by and he goes uh what are you people doing I said well we're he didn't know I was an officer so I put my jacket on and showed him my go you didn't wear any any uh rank recognition of typically officers would put it underneath their collar and if they needed to they'd flip it up so I flipped it up and I said I'm Lieutenant Crosby and he said he said the he said well that's in the wrong spot I said no sir it's exactly I can show you the stakes that they told us where to put it he goes no no it needs to be five feet over that direction he was obviously a new staff officer who had just got into Vietnam you could always tell the new guys because they you know when they move you by helicopter the guys had been there forever would sit in the door like this you know with their feet hanging out and the other guys would like hold on to something because they were afraid because the doors were never open I mean they're never closed so uh you know they were afraid they're going to fall out when the helicopter did like this uh anyway the major uh and you could tell from his fatigues they were all they were all they weren't muddy uh so I'm covered with mud and he and and he said yeah you got to move it 10 feet I said yes sir I understand that and I said but what we need is I said the engineering unit that's attached to the base camp here uh as part of the division has a hole mover and I said they they will bring that out and they will move it over 10 feet yeah and and I and I said they need you they'll need you to go with the Engineering Battalion and tell them they need to bring their whole mover out so they can move that and I said my guys have dug this hole so they'll just move the hole over of course that was there's no hole mover he wanders off Mr bunker and am PS gray and uh I don't know whatever happened to the major or whatever you know he probably got got uh his his face into a full kernel engineering type and the engineering type said you want a what it was like a left-handed monkey wrench so uh you know there was always those kinds of things I I did not like going back to base camp uh you know invariably uh you would uh you would encounter some you know there were people back there that were living in connexes with air conditioning uh you know there were officers who had uh you know boxes of uh uh you know uh starch fatigues because they had a housewife I mean not a housewife a house Girl house boy who was ironing up shining their boots this that and the other it was a whole different world I you know I I one time I went to I got to Saigon because uh this is when I was a lieutenant uh we were uh we had a kid that was bit by a dog because there were all kinds of little dogs all around you know you know a 19 year old kid I love dogs you know he loves dogs that's sort of thing anyway he got bit and they were concerned that the dog might have rabies so I had to they killed the dog they cut his head off that's how you tell they put me on a chopper and said fly down find a medical unit that can do this autopsy on the not on autopsy but basically check the dog and make sure he has rabies uh so I flew down there and I got off the helicopter and um uh you know I got a Jeep and I was walking down and I had I had given them the dog's head they were going to give me the report the next day so I was going back to the uh Bachelor officers quarters and I I am completely covered in dirt and dust man you know and the semp stops me and he goes what the hell are you doing here and I said because I had weapons I had three or four weapons hanging off me and he said Can General Westmoreland says your uniform has to be pressed your boots have to be shined and uh you know you cannot carry a personal weapon and I flipped up my collar and I said but I I said I said Sergeant get out of my face or I'm going to shoot you and the guy who was with me said yeah he will so so you know those kind of things I had very very little and that night I was I was in the bachelor's officer's quarters and they came up and they said we expect to be attacked tonight and there was one uh sort of a sandbag position in front of this building it was a four-story building and it was one MP in there and they said we need officers to go down and pull shifts to back him up just in case and so I was rooming with two pilots two Navy Pilots so they brought I because I had all my weapons they brought these two m14s up and they showed them they gave to the Navy and said okay you've got the shift from 10 to 11 you've got the shift from 11 to 12 you get to 12 to 1. and these two guys who flew Jets uh you know they look at these things what the hell do we do with these they didn't know how to load them they didn't know how to shoot them so I said you guys you sleep good night have a good night's sleep I'll go down a pull three hour shift because I wouldn't sleep when you guys were down there so you know I was down there chucking a driver with the MP and we had a good time drinking coffee and watching the street to make sure nobody got attacked hahaha so you talked about it a little bit uh when you get back from that second tour um you know what is that adjustment like uh you know reintegrating yourself back to America and it was tough um you know they they flew us back to McCord Air Force Base uh in Seattle um we were told we had to change into a Class A uniform they had a Class A uniform but it you know obviously uh and and fortunately they you know put the rank and this and the other on it uh I got uh uh I actually flew back with a guy that I had known in basic training uh and you know we've gone through uh summer camp together uh just you know I didn't even know he was Envy enough and so we were you know chatting we got a cab together to go to Seatac because I was going to fly back uh to uh Illinois uh where my wife was um and um we were in the back of this cab and we were chatting away and you know we're obviously in uniform and as we get out the taxi guy well he was he was listening to us and and he said you know the only thing you guys mean because uh apparently you know the country was in some kind of recession also because of the war spending so the only thing you guys mean to me is more unemployment and I thought you son of a you know and then uh uh and then you know you got in the airport there were people protesting uh you know when I went to apply to graduate school I was still in the military I was in uniform and uh I got uh uh you know I walked I was walking by to the to the bursar's office so I was registering for uh class and uh I got spit on and so you know I that kind of thing I you know those two gentlemen ended up on the floor with cuts and bruises and their table and all of their pamphlets got kicked over but you know wasn't me couldn't have been me so uh now as you look back on the Vietnam War what do you think about your experience and kind of what that event means or I guess what's it what's it mean to you oh that's a tough question you know I mean I I I I wouldn't give up those experiences that I had and the people I got to meet and and uh and the things I got to do um I think you know America has unfortunately not learned the lesson that there are Wars that we shouldn't do that we shouldn't go into that was certainly one yeah it's the old story uh you know Vietnam you you you had the government that was uh asking you to do this stuff but you go out in the in the jungles or you go out of the mountain yard Villages and we went we we did a lot of work with the mountain yards uh or you go out to uh just a small uh uh Villas uh villages uh and all they cared about was nobody raped their wife nobody killed their buffalo and nobody molested their kids or burned down their Hooch that was it I mean they didn't care who was in power as long as they could grow rice and the Buffalo was good and their kids were okay and their wife was fine uh and I think that's you know that's the same situation in so many areas where we end up being going in to be the good guys ending up to be the bad guys so you know and I think if you know first of all we have too many politicians who've never served the military uh so they don't have that experience you know they can beat their chest and and you know send kids off to for foreign lands and and kill you know black and brown people and and other people uh uh they should you know they should be the first to go or their kids should be the first to go so they understand the the reality of it there needs to be an understanding of warfare uh and the cost of all Warfare I mean you look at you look at the statistics about 22 or 23 of the kids that came back from Vietnam were classified by VA as being disabled of some you know ten percent fifty percent seventy percent uh that's an ongoing cost to the American public it's an ongoing cost to their families uh in Afghanistan and Iraq 47 of the kids who went over there came back disabled either because of the IEDs or because of the fact that we've developed more weapons that can that can do more harm to the body plus we've also developed more Medical Treatments we get them off the we get them off the battlefield into the medical tent a lot quicker so you've got kids that would have otherwise died on the battlefield in World War II or or even Vietnam that are now coming back and they're you know maybe they're missing two limbs or maybe they're missing both legs I mean they're going to be a uh they're going to be uh it's going to be a problem for them and their families for the rest of their lives and and yes we we are we we deserve they deserve our support and we pay them every month for their disability but by the same token uh you know we I mean there's a there's a huge cost there's a huge residual cost I mean we see it with a number of kids that commit suicide 22 still 22 veterans a day commit suicide so uh it it you know I mean I still have nightmares you know my wife well I've been diagnosed with PTSD uh my wife will wake me up and say you know you're flailing around you're yelling uh you know and I'll be back I'll be back in the jungle so uh it's uh we don't we don't think about that we just beat our chest and and send off the military

Channel: The Vietnam Experience

Views: 116,454

Keywords: Vietnam veteran, Vietnam veteran interview, Vietnam vet, Vietnam war, Vietnam vet interviews, Vietnam veteran interviews, Vietnam songs, Vietnam war songs, Vietnam music, Vietnam war music, Vietnam war stories, Vietnam vet stories, Vietnam veteran stories, Vietnam war movies, Vietnam war documentary, Army Ranger, Lrrp, Vietnam movies, Medal of Honor Vietnam, Vietnam vet story, Vietnam veteran story, Medal of Honor, Special forces

Id: PF7rM2C-Hm4

Length: 56min 35sec (3395 seconds)

Published: Fri Jan 13 2023