The radio music transmissions were supposed to stop at night but it was not full dark when my small team of scouts and radio operator went to work setting up shelter halves around them. I was afraid of the radio transmissions giving our position away. I smelled heavy cigarette smoke wafting in the slow-moving air around me. The air felt like cobwebs passing over my face, as it was so full of heated moisture. I folded my Iwo Jima flag-raising envelope in half and stuck it into my right front thigh pocket. No matter what happened in the night I was determined to make sure that I sent the letter off aboard the resupply chopper supposedly coming in the following morning.
Stevens had a small transistor radio playing the Armed Forces Radio Station. “Ninety-Nine Point Nine FM,” the announcer said in a tinny voice, followed by one of Brother John’s short baritone comments: “Here’s Chicken Man.” There was a pause in the transmission. I wanted so badly to order Stevens to turn the damned radio off but I was afraid to order anyone to do anything. And I was afraid of the feeling it gave me to be afraid of doing that.
You did great. I’m a youngster (served 88-92). I was born about 10 months after my dad got back from Nam. He was an army Medic. The only thing I really have detailing his service since he didn’t talk much:
http://i198.photobucket.com/albums/aa160/bobbyminchew/dadarticle_zpsa234ee53.jpg
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Thank you ever so much Bobby. I am trying my best to churn it all out. Medics and Corpsmen were and remain special people.
Essentially unarmed they came when called, even through the worst of fire. Beloved men in almost every unit. Thanks for adding
those things to the site here and your genuine comment.
Semper fi,
Jim
I swear the guy with the map & the mustache above is then SSG Wayne P. Freebersyser. He served with the 1st Air Cav, 196th burning rope & Americal as a platoon leader. He was gut shot in 69 & medivaced He was my 1st SGT in the 63rd EOD from 71-72. He left EOD (Explosive Ordnance Disposal)in 65 or 66 to go back to his primary…11B. He was that kind. Drunken, violent, promiscuous, but one of the finest NCOs in anyones Army when it came to mission or the troops. After a bad mission where I & another FNG showed we could & would follow dangerous orders he took us under his wing. I realize now he had deep PTSD & another person in the unit later confirmed it. Smart crazy SFC. I wish I could post a picture of him from 72, you would know it is the same guy.
Thanks for your comment, Tom.
The images we have been using for the story are taken from Internet, (Pinterest) mostly.
We have no information images or personnel
Great account of hell on earth. Semper Fi. Lima 3/5. 0341.
It sure as hell was not heaven. Maybe a form of purgatory, although I don’t think I sinned
that much when I was younger. I sure worked those sins off, only to commit some rather more violent ones
while in purgatory! Thanks for he comment and the reading.
Semper fi,
Jim
Brings back so many memories and fears that were hard to accept. Gunny was right in that the unknown becomes the
reality you expect. 1st Eng. Battalion been to An Hoa. Great writing. Please continue Lt. Semper Fi 69 – 70
Thank you Gary. Quite unexpectedly, I have received a lot of comments
like your own. So many of the guys discuss the fact that all of us remember so
many of these things so vividly but go through life kind of avoiding triggers that might
take you back or somehow upset the apple cart about making it home. I’m putting it all down
more for posterity (and why is that important I’m not at all sure) before I get to a point where I
can’t anymore. I didn’t think so many veterans would be so open about wanting to hear it. So
I will continue.
Thank you most sincerely,
Semper fi,
Jim
I found this segment to be So Real, from what I have heard from Others. I am glad you are getting it all down in writing for Others to read. It is Important…. It is Valuable, and enlightening… Many feel ashamed, and humiliated, and scared of what People will think. People have No Idea, what Being Scared is really like. Being scared, and trying to save yourself, so you can save others, when you have No experience… Tough Times For Sure… I appreciate, all that You have given and taken… It was a HELL of a run !!!
Indeed!!!!
love,
jim
Well written, Jim. I appreciated the honesty… and your Gunny’s advice. I spent a year in Nam with with 1st Cav (1970) as a Chemical officer at Div. HQ, so I never experienced the horrors of combat that you did. My Dad, a WWII marine NCO, told a similar story about getting terrified men to move out of a mortar kill zone on Bougainville… His only advice before I left was, “Find a good NCO and listen to him.” Semper fi.
Thanks for the supporting words Mike. This is a hard one to lay down
and write about because it is so damned sensitive for me and others who
read it. Some don’t agree at all that any of this could really have
happened the way I am writing it. I do not know if the critics were those guys int he rear
with the gear or not, or were even in the zone. Anyway, thanks for what you did and
your dad too!!!
Great work , Welcome home Semper Fi and God Bless Sir/Brother .
Thanks Jeff…….
Even though many of us have “been home” for 45+ years, some things seem to linger
Hey, Jeff. Thanks for the welcome. I’m not at all sure its possible to
‘come home’ simply because it’s not the same place you come back to after that.
I mean it really is, but you don’t come back being able to see it the same
way anymore, and that was horribly unexpected. My wife literally did not
know me to look at or talk to. That cut me to the quick more than
anything…and showed me that ‘home’ was not the place I’d left.
Appreciate your honesty writing skill .
Thank you Fred, it’s been a long time since all that stuff went down. The return home, even on a gurney, was almost as shocking as the whole
war thing. I just could not recognize the same world I’d left not so long ago. I could not accept that the world was the same but that I
had so changed. Take care, and thanks for reading and commenting….
Semper fi,
Jim
Just found your post on Facebook tonight. Enjoyed reading the first one. Will look at the rest I have missed. 11th Armored Cav., 68. I also am in my 7th decade. Keep them coming.
Larry. I much appreciate your comments, especially coming from someone who served with the Black Horse at the same time! I am laying it all out for whatever the hell its worth, which is something to those of us who went I hope. I saw Platoon and thought it was kind of a big close, but not nearly dirty, stinky or rotten enough to portray my war…and your war. Thanks again for reading and, in your own words, finding me okay!
Allons
Jim
Got to have been there with in-coming to understand it – ain’t too sure I like going back there.
My brother was an Army Ranger Jim. Unfortunately, he didn’t make it. They never told us we didn’t have to be in combat at the same time. Life.
He got it down at Bien Hoa while I was up at An Hoa. It’s not a comfortable story, you are right but I thought it was important to get it all down, finally, after all these years. I share you pain while I write.
Semper fi,
Jim
Great stuff
Appreciate the compliment, William.
Always feel free to share your experiences on this site.
It is my desire to let coming generation know the reality and not the false images portrayed
though film and other media.
There is nothing nice about situations like this.
Nice piece, kept me in until the end !
Appreciate that Kirk.
Have you signed up for the updates?
Keep it coming brother.
It was short lived…….
but more is coming. Thanks for your support Jon