The hill was more of a water and mud-driven mess than when we’d all taken the Vietnam “E’ ticket Disney ride down it, only moments earlier. I wondered, struggling to gain footholds against unstable rocks under the mud, if the whole side of the mountain wouldn’t eventually cascade down into the river. I was briefly buoyed by the fact that the dreaded fifty-caliber hadn’t opened up again. Something had to be done before it got moved to a more distant location. Something dangerous. We had no more supporting fires to call on and nothing left in our inventory that could take on the big gun at the effective distance it could fire. I made it back to where my stuff was, but I only found it because the Gunny somehow came along and guided me in. I wondered if Hispanics had better night and ‘through the pouring rain’ vision than lily white people like me.
He squatted down next to my pack, which was nothing more than a big lump, only visible because the bare light, coming from somewhere through the rain and clouds, glistened softly from the poncho thrown over it. I squatted down next to the Gunny, not reaching for the poncho. I was wet clear through, and I thought the poncho wouldn’t provide much in the way of warmth or dryness. We looked across the short space separating us. Only the protection I was getting from my helmet allowed me to see anything of his large confronting form.
“The poncho’s yours,” he said, pointing.
“The captain died, and gone to heaven in my absence?” I asked, without moving.
“The poncho’s from a Marine who didn’t make it,” the Gunny stated, before delaying a second and going on. “He won’t mind.”
I gave in, and pulled my pack toward me, leaving the dead Marine’s poncho draped over it. I wondered, when it dried, if I’d find the Marine’s name on it, like Alfi. I took a few seconds to make a tent over myself and my chunky belongings, finally sticking my head up through the center hole of the protective sheet.
The poncho cut the wind out, and no longer allowed the constant drum of the rain drops to land on my body, which was a welcome relief. It was warmer. I sat there, a vertical meat slab under rubber, looking no doubt like a glistening pyramid with a round head poking out of it. My fatigue was so great I felt I might lose what little balance it took to keep me in a sitting position. I blinked once, or thought I blinked, because when I looked the Gunny was gone. The rain was still there but not coming down as hard. I knew I must have slept, or done whatever it was I’d somehow learned to do in place of sleep. I looked at Gus Grissom’s watch. It was one a.m. Water dripped from the face of the Omega, the watch a whole lot more waterproof than me.
I reached up to adjust the poncho at my neck. My hand recoiled back. The leeches. I’d forgotten about the leeches. They were feasting away, each of the five of them, as thick as bratwurst from back home. Definitely bratwurst, I decided. Hot dogs were slimmer, unless they were those giant baseball things. I reached under the poncho to pull the edge back so I could find Fusner, but he was already there, my hand running into his own.
“Needed some rest, sir,” he said, only the rain smacking into his own helmet making him visible in front of me. “Gotta get those leeches off, though.”
I didn’t say anything. I wanted to thank him but nothing would come out. I felt like I was in a trance of some sort. He took my helmet off and pulled my poncho over my head. I jutted my chin up so Fusner could go to work with his matches. The rain was too heavy to smoke a cigarette in and keep it burning. He showed me how to hold my helmet out to block the rain, and then he lit match after match, burying the burning heads into the backs of the leeches before the moisture could kill the igniting tip. It took two or three for each leech, and the combined smell of the sulfur and the tissue of the creature made me close my eyes and try not to breathe in. I wanted to throw up but I had nothing to throw up. I’d forgotten to eat again. The leeches fell like lead weights onto my knees like small sand bags, and then into the mud in front of my boots, each with a distinct little plop. Finally, he was done. Fusner dumped something into his hands, rubbed them together and then massaged my throat. I don’t know how I kept from screaming with the pain as I jerked back in shock.
“Old Spice,” Fusner said, with a laugh. “Stings a bit but it’ll keep infection out.”
I breathed in heavily, not worried about infection, but feeling almost light-headed from the wonderful aroma of home. My Dad used Old Spice. I twisted my neck, which now hurt like hell but the smell made the pain worth it.
I tried to get my thinking straight. The two problems I could not avoid loomed before me in the dark. The fifty-caliber machine gun, and the hopefully small force that was entrenched to our front between the company and the river. And then I thought about the third problem. Jurgens. He’d be out there somewhere. If he’d tossed the grenade, and I couldn’t imagine any other perpetrator, then he’d know he’d missed. He’d know that I would have to come for him in some shape or form. It was likely that only he and I knew or guessed it was him, except for the Gunny knowing, of course.
My decision was clear. The only supporting fires we had that might be any match for the fifty-caliber were the few light anti-tank rockets some of the Marines carried and the M-79 grenade launchers. Neither weapon had the range to reach out and take on a fifty set up a thousand meters or more away. Also, unless Kilo came up in the night, and it wasn’t going to, our rear and left flank remained weak and unsupportable without artillery being dumped down, and calling that in was dependent upon being able to see or hear an attack coming. The rain muffled all sound, especially sounds of men moving low down in the mud.
If the enemy could not be attacked or defended against then we only had one choice, as uncomfortable as that might be. We had to move. Our position on the hill, no matter how well dug in, was untenable. We might not last the night. We had to move, and we had to move quickly. The enemy would not be expecting that. They were getting set in and comfortable too, and no doubt planning just what kind of fire and attacks they’d make on us. I’d thought the hillside would make the company’s situation safe, at least for the night, but I was wrong. The weather was not a benefit unless we moved. If we stayed where we were then the hard driving rain was a big plus to the NVA. It provided nearly total cover, along with our inability to use the Starlight Scope. But if we moved to the objective, then the effects of the miserable weather turned to our advantage. Finally, we could not afford to be pinned down for days if the rain continued even if the NVA didn’t get the fifty online or attack. We needed resupply and medevac, which meant we had to get choppers down onto a secure landing zone.
The NVA would have their own listening posts and scouts, probably as effective as Nguyen at watching and alerting their forces to our every move. But they wouldn’t be ready for a move made in the middle of a full on artillery barrage I could call in up on top of the hill, and then down along the river. Cunningham could cover the objective we were heading toward, but the company had to get another ten clicks northward, where the valley spread out wider, for their fire to be truly effective.
The “What now lieutenant?” games we played at night in the Basic School hadn’t covered problems that included how to get a reticent commanding officer, probably hiding out in as dry a mud hole as First Platoon could dig for him, to go along with the only plan that might keep us alive until morning. Maybe a collection of my fellow officers at that school could have figured out a way in the Force Reaction Course to cross the raging river and take out the big gun, but I didn’t think so. Water was a whole lot easier to cross in daytime, and in training, especially with Navy Seals paddling around to save Marines trying to swim even short distances with twenty or thirty pounds of gear strapped to their backs. Not to mention the extreme difficulty of crossing the raging river I could hear swishing along below, just ready and willing to swallow any middle-of-the-night challengers to its dominance.
I wondered if maybe Casey would buy the plan if I came up with another name. It might look good in his ‘after action’ report. The Marine Corps was fascinated with naming every movement or attack, so it might work. I thought of the objective. We needed to reach it by morning. The gunships could arrive at almost the same time as we did, if we planned it well. They could secure the area with their rotary cannons without having to call in artillery. I thought of Vince Lombardi. I was born in Green Bay. I’d gone to St. Norbert’s, and been a first cook at the college by the time I left. I waited the breakfast line for the hung-over Packer players every morning of spring training. Lombardi never ate breakfast, but would be there in the cafeteria like a wandering bear, checking every player out without making it seem like he was checking him out. I smiled coldly. Vince Lombardi. Run to Daylight. It was perfect. I’d steal Lombardi’s patented expression he used to describe how his half-backs were such successful ground-gainers. The Charge of the Light Brigade plan had been a bust but I wasn’t going to bring that up, and there was no question that I was planning for the whole company to run away from the enemy. There was no sense illustrating that point either. Run to Daylight was a good solid football phrase and tactic. Vince Lombardi wasn’t Chesty Puller, and pro football was a long way from fighting down from the Chosin Reservoir, but hopefully that wouldn’t matter, or at least be overlooked.
My neck hurt, but I still smelled good. I pulled my poncho off to leave it covering my pack, just in case the writing materials I had inside were still dry. I crawled to where I thought the Gunny might be found under his poncho. He wasn’t there. Instead, I almost ran right into him, squatting in his Asian squat, his head wrapped with his poncho liner against the noise of the rain hitting his helmet. He wore no other protection, other than his utility uniform. I crouched before him. I felt a toughness emanate out from him to sort of take me in, and an unconscious warmth ran through my cold body.
“Better than a shower if you give it time,” he whispered through cupped hands.
Cigarette smoke billowed out from between his fingers, and was immediately swept away by the rain. The man looked just as tough as I knew him to be, and I was glad he was my Gunny, or I was his lieutenant. I checked myself out. The Gunny was right, as usual. Most of the mud I’d accumulated in the slide, or even the climb back up, was gone. I started to wash myself with my hands to hurry the process. I knew one thing though, I wasn’t going to take my boots off until it was daylight, and I had a protective ring of artillery to call in on command.
I finally stopped trying to clean myself off.
“Coffee?” I asked, having none myself, and figuring it was unlikely with the driving rain to even ask, but I was uncomfortable with the Jurgens burden. I could plan a company move in my head, and memorize all the night defensive fires the company might need, but handling a problem like Jurgens was almost beyond me.
I wanted to kill him for my own safety, but the company needed him. He wanted to kill me, and that the company needed me probably didn’t matter to him.
The Gunny was all I had.
“Coffee, in this weather?” he asked, but I could tell by his tone that he was kidding. He pulled his canteen, and went to work getting the fixings out of a small plastic sack he kept tied to his belt. He sent his cigarette flicking out into the rain and managed to light a stick of Composition B with one match. The flare of light lit us both up for a brief second, until he pulled his own poncho over and stacked it, to hide as much of the glow as possible. I noted absently that the explosive wasn’t bothered in the least by the rain, when it came to burning its small but very powerful flame. The sweet smell of the Gunny’s leftover cigarette smoke penetrated the sheets of rain separating us, and then combined with the pungent strange smell of the Comp B to make a strange aroma I found different but not unpleasing.
I started talking while the water heated up in our canteen holders. I told him the whole plan, even throwing in where I’d gotten the plan name and the downside of the failing plan that had got us where we were on the soaked hillside.
“I’m not surprised, Junior,” the Gunny said, finally, taking a few minutes to mix his coffee potion. I mixed a small bag in my own holder, having no cream or sugar. I was afraid to hold up the holder though, because I didn’t want him to see my hand shaking, so I just wrapped my fingers around the hot metal and held it to the ground.
“By what?’ I asked.
“I was wondering how in hell we were going to get ourselves out of this fix in the morning, and here you come, bouncing in like a puppy with a new toy.”
“We need to move now,” I replied, trying to stress the seriousness of what I was saying, “before they can relocate the fifty and before they recover from the artillery.”
“I like the way you sound so sure of yourself, no matter what,” the Gunny replied, sipping from his rain spattered coffee container. “Like when you figured out how to have us end up on the side of this hill in the pouring rain under constant enemy fire.”
“The enemy knew where we were going and they were waiting,” I said. “They were ready for us, and we didn’t do what they were ready for so we haven’t taken any casualties yet. Now we do what they’re not ready for again. They’ll never guess we’re going to move in this downpour.”
“See what I mean?” the Gunny replied, with a laugh. “The Charge of the Light Brigade, Mudville, and now Run to Daylight,” he went on, his body shaking with mirth for almost half a minute. “Little did I know that the chopper dropping you down that night was coming in from Hollywood.”
“Will Casey buy it?” I asked, when he’d settled down, but knowing before I asked that the Gunny was in. I knew he wouldn’t have laughed out loud if he wasn’t in. I also knew he was being funny in his acceptance and I appreciated that, but I could not make myself engage in his humor at all.
“He’ll probably buy anything that gets him out here and down to that old landing zone,” the Gunny said, glancing off into the dark. “He’s miserable with the mud, the rain, the leeches, and the jungle rot on his feet, and scared shitless we’ll be overrun.” The Gunny laughed quietly again for a few seconds.
I knew he was laughing about the repellant he’d put in the captain’s boots, but I said nothing. I sipped my own cooling coffee, noting that the rain was so heavy my holder was about to overflow after only a few moments of exposure. At least my hands had stopped shaking.
“He’s missing what you’re getting, and getting so well,” he said.
“What?” was all I could think to reply.
“You gotta grow to love it, all of it, except for the fighting and the dying. Like me, and now you. You gotta fall in love with the leeches, like they’re pets, with the rain, like it’s nothing but a freshwater shower, with the heat, like it’s a Swedish sauna, and the night, like it’s a warm protecting blanket.”
“I don’t think I see things that way,” I replied, hesitatingly.
“I didn’t say anything about seeing. It’s all about feeling. And here you are, at night, out here drinking coffee in the rain, with leech blood dripping down your chin, and your talking about our next move and probably thinking about the one after that. You’re falling in love, and the thing about falling in love is that, in the beginning, you can’t see it.”
“Will you ask Casey?” I said, trying to change the subject. Sometimes the Gunny’s talk made me extremely uncomfortable, and this was one of those times.
“Hell yes,” the Gunny said, finishing most of his coffee, before tossing the remainder into the rain. “He’s going to love it because it gets him out of here tomorrow, and to get his medal.”
“Out of where? I asked, momentarily stunned. “To get a medal?”
“You haven’t heard?” the Gunny laughed a cruel laugh. “He’s getting the Silver Star back in Da Nang at division. You know, for saving Kilo up over the ridge.”
I didn’t know what to say. I was speechless. Casey had done nothing, except file the after action report, which had apparently been enough, but what really surprised me was his getting out of combat to get a decoration, any decoration. That was new. I hadn’t heard about getting out of the field to be decorated from anyone.
“I can see the wheels turning in your head, Junior,” the Gunny chuckled.
“You’re a second lieutenant with twelve days in country. He’s a captain who’s been here God knows how long, with friends in the rear. You’re not getting some medal that’s going to pull you out of here, unless they put a bronze on your dead chest.”
“Friends that put him on this hill with us,” I replied, acidly.
“He was on staff at battalion when he tried to let the six actual know he had a drinking problem. His friends at division couldn’t save him, but they can decorate his ass off.”
“Nice,” I said, more to the rain than to him. I had to admit to myself that at least Casey had been trying to do the right thing, even if it was a really dumb thing. He’d merely done what I had done on my first night, and he’d received the same reward. I didn’t care a tinker’s damn about a Silver Star, or any other combat decoration but the thought of being able to get to the rear for any reason was new.
“With your help, of course,” the Gunny added, needlessly.
“Jurgens,” I said, changing the subject to the one thing that bothered me the most.
“The grenade,” the Gunny replied, his voice going so low I almost couldn’t hear him through the narrow band of rain separating us.
“I’ve got to take him out,” I gasped out, my voice as low as his. “I can’t do what I have to do worrying about him.”
“He didn’t toss it,” the Gunny said.
“What?” I replied, in shock.
“Jurgens is a cracker asshole and a poor excuse for a human being, but he’s a Marine all the way through when it comes to surviving. He sees you as part of that survival. You don’t have to worry about Jurgens. Not that way, anyway.”
“Who?” I asked, my mind going in circles. I’d been so certain it was Jurgens, but I knew the Gunny wouldn’t lie to me about something like this.
“I’m handling it,” the Gunny said.
“I need to know who,” I said, as forcefully as I could.
“Do you trust me?” the Gunny asked, slowly getting to his feet.
I stared up at the man, water blazing off of his toweled head and pouring down his soaked uniform blouse and trousers. He looked like a frightening creature from a horror film, with makeup that’d been overdone for dramatic emphasis.
I wanted to ask him if I had a choice. I wanted to ask what my other options were, and if I could at least be in on whatever decisions were being made to deal with the problem. But the force of the man standing over me wouldn’t allow it.
“I trust you,” I said, starting to rise to my own feet.
“Stay,” the Gunny said, his voice softer. “I’ll go have a word with our war hero. Get some rest. We’ll be running to daylight before you know it.”
……Through the the Pourin’ Rain
Who witnessed the Capts heroics and signed his name to it? The Scribe I bet, just silent sneaky shits. Want out of the bush Rittenhouse, I’ll get you out of this shit.
Doesn’t explain why he’d frag you unless he was seriously afraid of you, he caught you flipping the safety in a meeting with the Capt and Jurgens. Doesn’t explain why he’d risk everyone fragging the FO. But he’s a sneaky shit like most house mouses, but that’s a ballsy move from description was afraid of everything.
Fear. The huge motivator almost always lied about.
Make people do the most bizarre of things and not very often with
a lot of rationality.
Thanks for your comment and for the support by writing it here…
Semper fi,
Jim
Jim, you’re mainlining right to the brain releasing those long ago locked up memories like a numbing euphoric junky giving in to the habit. You’re hitting home with us because we’ve wanted someone all along to understand what we experienced. I’ve tried to reach out to my son so he could understand a little what might have made me a little difficult to understand. I dropped hints,but he never wanted to hear. My other dauthers don’t have much to do with me since I’m not with their mother, it hurts. You’ve had to walk the walk to appreciate your story which is us who been there but in different forms. Your story is like a needle in my mind’s vein being able to feel that old feeling again. You got to know how theroputic your work is for us. Yea, you’re a Nam vet, they say. Get over it, they say. They just don’t know. Do they? Great story. Thanks for sharing your locked up memories.
If I can be of help…wow.
I had no idea that so many of us were out there and having difficulties
talking about any of it back in the real world. I thought it was just me.
And trying to tell other regular guys about any of it…
they would get so damned uncomfortable and I’d just keep on blathering on once I’d started.
A good way not to lose friends but not have them want to hang around you.
So here comes this story and many can just point at it and have
someone read it and say “see!” “It wasn’t a pack of lies or macho bullshit or a need for sympathy.”
“Here’s this guy and he says it the way it was for me too…”
And back here in the world…it’s still high threat but not in the same in your face way.
It’s for all the marbles but everything is disguised….like the villagers and civilians were.
Back here you have to make believe but it’s just as seriously terminal. And we didn’t know that when we went.
We found it to be true when we came back and thought it was us. But no, it’s the human condition.
It is that filled with fear. It is that selfish.
It is that tribal or you’re out in the cold and soon dead. And now knowing didn’t make us ‘better’ survivors.
It merely made us ‘aware’ survivors.
But, even so, the survival in America especially today is one of grand comfort
from the elements and from physical harm, as long as you can keep the elements of violence
which we so well sharpened in combat away from every day life or reaction.
Interesting times…
Semper fi,
Jim
Still can’t get the vision of seeing Puff work out and the gooks crawling toward me in the mud when the flairs went up out of my head. But I am following along. Good job Sir.
It was might rare to actually see the enemy in the Nam, unless it was after action and they were dead.
I saw some but almost all as dark moving shapes and not like real people at all…
Thanks for the comment and the support…
Semper fi,
Jim
Jim, I knew the shit was bad from what little I could glean from my Brother and Brother-in-law who were in MC riffle companies there in 68/69. They just could not or would put it into words just how bad it was.
Your writing and telling of your story is superb and I wish you the best of luck with your book.
Sherm
Well, Sherm, I am hoping to allow some of the people who did not serve over
there to come to terms with those who did by revealing the depth of the emotion
and bitter circumstance that has made them different from regular people.
Thanks for reading along and commenting here…
Semper fi,
Jim
Embracing the SUCK….. After I heard that from a Marine so long ago, I found it applied to the Army just as well….. Yes, Leeches in Vietnam, I remember one time sitting on a PZ waiting on the monsoon to break to continue lifts out to a new FSB the ARVN had opened up, Sitting in the side of the slick watching the rain sluice down, and seeing a strange thing across the ground in front of me, Looked like grass growing out of the ground little wiggle greenish things, rising up above the water, I watch it for a while, as the rain slowed to a drizzle, I step down to look at what was growing up out of the ground…… Thousands and thousands of leeches…… The shock of seeing that was not pretty, I only ever had a few lock onto me, But God you grunts had a living hell to deal with…. Yes embracing the suck….. Semper fi. Jim, keep up the great work, It is helping me find and deal with some thing 44+ years old, Different hells same war. Bob.
Thanks Robert, for your usual penetrating and stirring comment.
The leeches were damned hard to love, as the Gunny put it. I don’t know
how he managed that ‘love’ so well because I never saw the man with a leech attached to him.
Hmmmm. Thanks for the interest in the story and your frequent take on it…
Semper fi,
Jim
Strange, but the leeches never bothered me–not even once. One team member got a small one in his pee hole. Luckily we were near an SF base camp and an Army medic fixed him up. We got inside the wire right at dark and they provided a dry poncho liner for each of us, plus hot chocolate and something hot to eat. Before first light we were back outside the wire. The SF guys offered us ponchos but we declined. We did accept a couple cans each of C-rations. The whole night had the same pounding rain that we’d had for the whole previous day, the day before and the day before. But Recon didn’t need ponchos–according to the gunny. Who was back in a dry hooch with dry socks. Recon needed bullets, bandages and beans. You could throw a can of C-rations, but a grenade is better. The bitch was that the gunny was right. Extended for three more days of cold, wet and hungry, eyes peeled for Charles, praying not to see him.
I don’t know where you were in country Tom, but the leeches were in almost every area I operated in,
“Go Not” Island and the A Shau were loaded with them. Maybe it was different at different times of the years too.
So many little wars in the big war. And you sound tough and your unit too Tom. I wasn’t that tough.
I suffered a lot and I must admit that for the most part I was miserable.
Maybe my best moments were calling artillery or coming up with one of my whacked out plans to continue
but eating, shitting, enduring, carrying, sleeping and being wet and leech hurt with foot rot…
well, those things I had to somehow get by with and I somehow did.
I did like squatting by the side of the paddy, river or wherever to have coffee
with the Gunny and I liked some times I could spend with my scout team and RTO but man,
that other stuff unending was pure shit.
You handled that better, but then you recon guys were the cream of the crop.
I don’t think I ever threw a can of C-Rations. We buried ours.
Thanks for the comment and thanks for reading the story and being kind in your comment.
Semper fi,
Jim
Thank you so much for writing this. As I look back on my own experiences and those of my family who served in the Pacific during WWII I have come to the thought that it takes many years after the experience to be able to look back and talk about what you went through. Those old WWII guys didn’t talk at all for many years, it was only as they began to hit middle age or older before they would ever talk about the experience. I was in the army ’66-’68 and on, now able to talk about the things I saw and did back then. God bless for what you are doing – this is a great work you are doing. God Bless and to use the marine term Semper Fi.
Thanks a million Hal. I’m not sure about what I’m doing here. This started out as the story of my time in the Nam but has
morphed into something else because of the quantity and quality of the commentary…some of which you have added right here with
your own comment. Go happy you like the story and you think this whole thing has merit.
Semper fi,
Jim
I seen that award coming…..I did however discount you needing him.
People are strange when you’re a stranger
Faces look ugly when you’re alone
Women seem wicked when you’re unwanted
Streets are uneven when you’re down
When you’re strange faces come out of the rain
When you’re strange no one remembers your name
When you’re strange, when you’re strange
When you’re strange
The Doors
Now those are some great lyrics and so applicable to so much in a war zone.
Thanks for that and for commenting here…as usual, Brad…
Semper fi,
Jim
Found this…..
Enthralling web as always…
Edit when removing the leaches….”two or there” when you meant three…..
Thanks Paul, for the help…
And the reading….and the commenting here.
Semper fi,
Jim
Why do I see a problem for Rittenhause?
Gee, might that be your giant fucking I.Q.?
Semper fi,
JIm
Soon as we heard Jurgens didn’t do it I immediately thought of Rittenhouse.
Hmmmm. Real life. Stranger than fiction…
Stay tuned.
Semper fi,
Jim
LOL… No all of a sudden when Gunny said it wasn’t Jerguns, I remember the little confab in the Casey’s tent, and what you said about Rittenhause….. and the fact that almost every company clerk I have ever known has been a weasel…… You and what you said would have scared him shitless….. I am willing to bet His weapon has never been fired….. Bob
You guys are all sleuths and you are reading this too closely for comfort!
Semper fi,
Jim
The list of suspects is dwindling. Three could be two I hope to God not.
Interesting dilemma, this one. With death everywhere and coming out of nowhere why
is such a death dealing attempt even bothered with…other than it is always hard to accept
death from within…
Semper fi,
Jim
Starting to think your book could be titled “30 days of Eternity” Realization that ‘WE’ are only in our 12th night in country for the experiences you’ve had boggles my mind. Steep learning curve indeed. Thank you for letting us be a part of your world.
Yes, the college degree of Vietnam delivered in a month of intense education if you live.
I have lain the story down as best I could for the past five months. I didn’t think it would
take that long but some of the story details don’t tell things without difficulty to the reader….
and maybe me later on!
Thanks for liking the story and commenting here.
Semper fi,
Jim
Lt.
You must spend more time answering replies than writing; which adds immeasurably to the value of what you are writing. We all long for that recognition that we’ve been denied. You remind me how very, very much I hate having to be out in the rain and drenched to the bone. I know mud, Armor stirs up a lot of mud! Someone mentioned night ambushes; I always worried “They” could hear the rain hitting the ponchos, it made a different sound. Your writings brings back memories tucked away for 45 years. It validates to an extent that which we all share. I will be very surprised if I’m wrong who tossed the grenade and why. Is it proper for an Army puke to say Semper Fi? roy
Actually, responding to comments doesn’t take me as long as you might think.
I type awfully fast because I’ve done so much of it over the years.
It’s like talking to me, this sort of writing.
I just blather on and don’t spend much time at all in edit
or final edit or any of the things I have to do procedurally to get a segment on the site
and up with graphic art and all the rest of it.
Here I can just write away about whatever it is that someone has written in.
Thanks for being so deeply involved in the story and remember what I’ve written about the Army.
That outfit has always been one that worked very well with any
Marine unit I was attached to.
So, you may use our honorific anytime you feel the need…
Semper fi,
Jim
PS That took two minutes and forty seconds from beginning to end and yes, you are worth it.
“He’ll probably buy anything that gets him out here and down to that old landing zone,” ( perhaps “out of here” )
Seems like Gunny is finding a fellow Marine in you.
Hell, I was sure trying but the definition of “Marine” was doing a shapeshifting thing for
sure while I was there and trying to adjust to such outrageous conditions.
Semper fi,
Jim
Great Job! I will try hard to distract myself for the next couple of days, because I want more now!
Thanks for the compliment Dave. I am not it as best I can right now after responding to a few of the comments.
I will answer the rest of your comment at a later date…
Semper fi,
Jim
Your description of the rainy jungle made me really feel, for the first time, what my dad went through on Bougainville. He still suffered with immersion foot 73 years after suffering through that campaign in 1943. He was never able to talk about what he went through, so I appreciate your writing of it.
The island campaign in WWII must have been a lot like Vietnam.
Ferocious enemy with no quarter or prisoners and the brutal jungle
crap to put up with. Thanks for the comment and the compliment…
Semper fi,
Jim
Well that sure took me by surprise….Jurgens didn’t throw the grenade. Only others in the area mentioned are Casey, Gunny, Pilson, and Fusner. I think its easy to eliminate three of the four, but can’t see the a reason for the fourth. Ritterhouse was also probably close since Casey and the Gunny were there….but why would he. Oh well, just gotta wait and see what happens…..good job, Jim.
Thanks Joe for the speculation. Read on, the mystery will lay itself out right in front of you,
and the rest of us, as it did then…
Semper fi,
Jim
Thank you James for what you are doing. I know that it will help others as it is helping you. Keep up the good work. Semper Fi!
I am on it this very night in the rain, just like in the book but I’m inside and it’s warm and
I’ve got a cat next to me that doesn’t weigh eight hundred pounds and upset that I’m in his space!
Thanks for the attaboy….
Semper fi,
Jim
Hey Strauss,
The University of Iowa has, for 50 years or more, offered an 8 week “Writers Workshop”. Cathy always wanted me to sign up for it, but I never did. I was afraid of embarrassing myself. As it now turns out, I didn’t miss anything. From the very first episode of 39DHS, I have been learning what real writing is all about. Your ability to express in words and phrases the mind numbing, gut wrenching, heart aching memories of 50 years ago is a veritable “workshop”. And as the episodes kept coming, the comments coming unbidden, unwillingly, and painfully from your expanding reader base who have dredged up their own scab encrusted memories has improved the whole by a factor of 10. And, still, you send REAL replies to all of those hundreds of commenters. I have a little more faith in the publishing world than you do, apparently. Even a dolt, given the opportunity to read ONLY the comments, would know that you have struck a vein (hell, maybe even an artery) of literature than needs an outlet. Yeah, I know, it’s always about the money, but numbers equals money, and I’ll bet there’s nothing being digitally serialized out there right now that can compare to what you’ve got going.
Run for Daylight!
SF/PFJ
Never took a writing course John, like you.
Started with writing amateur plays for kids to perform in the neighborhood when I was a wee tyke.
Then letters, like the many I wrote home during my stay in the Nam and then the hospitals.
Then short stories. Then real screen plays and on to novels and a newspaper. I write a lot.
I especially enjoy the way in which dialogue intertwines with the expository
and the action sequences. Real life is like that and we don’t notice so much.
What has happened here is a mighty accident, as accidents go.
I had not clue that my 1970s manuscript would receive any care at all
or whether anyone would care about a luckless second lieutenant’s miserable story
about simply trying to make it to another birthday and out to anywhere but that valley
and that country and that war.
But you are right.
Here we are, wherever that may really be.
I am getting out the first book while continuing the second with a new
segment every few days.
I’m told by experts that putting the books out serially for free is a mistake and likely
to limit sales of the priced hard cover and electronic books for the future.
My lack of care about that is also driving the story. There are guys and gals reading this that don’t have a dime
and so it will continue to be free until I am done and then it’ll remain here
for free as long as this site stays an internet site.
What I’ve got going is a lot of motivation to continue and it’s not driven by one penny of anything
but the comments here and the popularity in reviewing the analytics every day
(today, before midnight, about seven thousand people will read the work I put up earlier).
Whom would have thought when I started writing five months back?
For sure it wasn’t me. What will happen in the future? Hell, I don’t know. I’m not even really here.
I’m up on that hillside this night and detailing how in the hell we got off the place I got us
onto in that downpour and under fire.
Thanks doesn’t describe my response to your interest and you continuing care.
And you write pretty damned well for not taking any classes, John!
Semper fi,
Jim
I for one plan to buy the book just as a way for saying “Thanks” for writing the story, and for responding to the comments which are just as therapeutic as the story I really appreciate your attitude that many reading may not be able to pay for it, and here it is free to them. I think it has connected all of us in a way that we have been searching for since coming home and even extends to those to didn’t or couldn’t go, or did not endure the danger and hardships you did, and does so with no accusations or judgement. I have never had any big desire to visit Wisconsin, but seriously considering a late summer trip just in the hope of getting to buy you lunch. Semper Fi
Well, Joe, you would be most welcome here, and that’s for sure.
Thank you for that very generous compliment about the therapy thing. I’m not credentialed in any of that
but I have sort of ‘been there’ and come to understand a good deal about the effects on me other survivors and
then all those touched by the war or the people who went there.
Seems simple and logical enough…although the details are intensely important.
The story is personal and I think the comments here are personal because of that fact….
Semper fi,
Jim
Wow! 7000 followers. I think a conservative number. Read comments everyday. Looking forward to first book. Thanks
Thanks Dave, it should be coming out damned soon. All the details. I have to approve the
final final final cover and spine and back on Wednesday and then that should be it.
Whew. Harder than it might seem to go from writing on here to an actual physical book.
Thanks for waiting and for caring enough to write about it on here.
Semper fi,
Jim
Not Juergens?
Holy cow, another twist in the road !
Another great read, James, and as usual, can’t wait for more !!
Thanks, I am writing away into this night and should have a bit more soon.
Thanks for wanting more and wanting it quickly!
Semper fi,
Jim
Now that you threw us all a changeup knuckleball on Jurgons not being the fragger, along with I think a clue to subtly included, I am guessing it is no NCOs like Sugar Daddy as they know you are vital to their survival. Someone of no rank and not in your Scout team perhaps. Just another great read!
Yes, the shock was mine too when the Gunny told me…and another
when he would not tell me who. Read on, there is resolution ahead…
a sign post up ahead….and thanks for the comment and compliment within,
Semper fi,
Jim
Outstanding writing once again…keep it coming…it helps…
Thank you Mark. I don’t write the story intending to help, but much appreciate the comment.
I am glad to help, as whom would not be. In writing the story though, I just do that…write the story.
It comes out, sometimes in a rush and sometimes like prying bits of walnut out of a half-shell.
Thanks for caring and for commenting here.
Semper fi,
Jim
Did you indicate that the First Ten Days book would be out in paperback or as a ebook? Will look for it on the 15th.
Reading this chapter was not as difficult on my mind as the last, but still wet and cold.
Awaiting the next installment.
The First Ten Days will be out as a Kindle and also a trade paperback
(the big one) in publish on demand.
In other words, they print the book immediately upon getting the order.
I don’t have a publisher so this is the only way I thought I could get it out to everyone.
Everyone pretty much has Amazon and I can use this site and my Facebook page to let everyone know.
Not a huge audience but enough to have some kind of impact, at least on combat veterans and others
who might want to understand what it was like and why so many of us came home a bit “different.”
Semper fi,
Jim
Your words are letters home and and it is the late 60s I do not hesitate to open an email when I receive them.By reading them as quickly as possible, it helps me get you and the rest of my friends and neighbors to the time and place when you are all, out of there.
Well, Charley, that’s a pretty cool comment to read. Like letters home.
Like Madonna’s song “When I hear your name it feels like home.” Loved those lyrics and
I love your words. Thank you. Big impact here. What drives me in the writing now Charley?
People like you writing back to me.
Thank you from the inside….
Semper fi,
Jim
I don’t think I have ever been more miserable than night ambush patrol during the monsoons. Your writings bring that all back to life, leeches and all. The scars have faded over the last 50 years or so, but the memories have not. Your study in human behavior here is absolutely fascinating and I look forward to each new chapter. Thanks Jim.
My study in human behavior. I hadn’t heard that or thought it before now Bill.
I guess, indeed, that is the very heart and soul of the entire odyssey. It’s not
the place, that’s just the stage, however bizarre that stage might have been.
It’s not the enemy, they are merely the mostly anonymous antagonist. Nope, you’ve hit
the nail right on the head. It’s the human thought and behavior. Thanks for that
brilliant analysis.
Semper fi,
Jim
I think Rittenhouse threw the grenade, He fears you.
Wow, I never saw all these investigative conclusions coming.
I guess there is a lot of mystery in this story when you don’t know what happened ahead of
time. Thanks for working at guessing…
Semper fi,
Jim
This story is addictive ..really want you and the rest to all make it out ..( though I know that you did of course ….) I was curious, as to why Jurgens …kind of a lifer … remf type though would frag you … ( and he has to know that Gunny would come for him if he did ) and wondered if it might be Sugar Daddy instead …he lives in a certain kind of world ..which requires a basic format of antipathy between groups for him to maintain his position and once he got to know you …and saw that you were different ..and that he himself might actually if not like you ..respect you a little ..and so create entropy in the hostility patterns between others in the group ..could he be worried that you were going to make changes that might affect how he controlled his world …?
Really want to find out …but suspect ..that Gunny will tell you that it is “taken care of “..which would be the best way to proceed for the welfare of the group …
Neat conclusions there and suppositions too. Fear. Almost all motivation out
there had that one single huge emotion as the driving force for almost all actions.
It is easy to overlook that from back here in the comfort of our homes. I have gone on
to do many more dangerous things in my life but never come close to that quivering shivery
and slimy fear that permeated everything I thought, ate, spoke, or did…
except maybe my fake writing home.
The war for me is far from over after only twelve days and part of night.
Real on, as reality can be more mystifying than fiction in some cases.
Thanks for that depth and the support…
Semper fi,
Jim
No need to post this- I merely am offering suggestions
his large (confronting?) form- maybe not a necessary word
Maybe a collection of my fellow officers at that school could have figure (figured?) out a way in the Force Reaction
I waited (in)? the breakfast line
“He’ll probably buy anything that gets him out (of?) here and down to that old landing zone,”
Hey, 68, of course I am posting it. To let people know that there are
some smarter people helping me out and also to publicly say thanks
to quiet people like you, back there in the background, but not really…
Semper fi,
Jim
Were you under your desk when the fireworks went off down the fairway? Funny how the reptilian brain recognizes the little wave of air pressure change at the explosion and you’re moving before the sound reaches your ears.
You know Ron, you were there. You had to be to know that thing about pressure waves.
I’m not sure about the physics. I don’t know if they travel faster than sound waves but I had that same sense
and it takes some time taking fire to get it.
Thank you for that,
Semper fi,
Jim
OK Jim … Sound travels at 343m/s , depending in the atmospheric conditions. The shock wave from HE will travel at 6,900m/s, also depending on the atmospheric codtions.
Just FYI
You are exactly correct. I went to the internet after you sent that message. In spite of my ballistics training and use,
I was unaware of the exact nature of blast waves. Should have guessed it though. At certain levels of energy things can get very fast.
I only found out a few years ago that tsunami waves are not limited to subsonic either. The wave and the water itself can go supersonic.
Lordy! Anyway, thank you for making that clear here.
Semper fi,
Jim
Sometimes the Head dog gets a lot of the dogs around him killed and they give him a medal from saving the rest. And he ends up a General
There is no telling in and around a combat zone. Lord of the Flies.
What would have happened on that mythical island in that story if
the Navy hadn’t showed up?
Thanks for the comment and that conclusions…
Semper fi,
Jim
Rittenhouse again!!
Carl, I dont know what to tell you but you sure have your thinking cap on!
Semper fi,
Jim
When things really start to suck, you have to embrace the suck.
Yes, the Gunny was spot on, as usual in such circumstance, and tougher
than an old car bumper too.
Semper fi,
Jim
So Gunny is a rather large hispanic, no wonder he was able to get along with first and fourth platoon leaders, along with his rank of course.
One wonders how Gunny was able to get all of the horrid past details about his alcoholic C.O.? Not too many officers would be willing to share such details with enlisted. However, one did have to take care of a C.O. who flew in Vietnam and was trying to erase the past, by imbibing large amounts of alcoholic beverages. Command did their best to keep him afloat until they could retire him.
Great twist with the grenade mystery man. One would have to assume that it was one of Jurgen’s protectors trying to please his boss. Perhaps that is why Gunny would not divulge what he knew. Gunny was a lot like Lombardi, observing his men without letting them know he was observing them. Vince was a great football coach!
There is a bit of confusion in direction and maneuvering out of your current location. Were you going north or south? Which way was the L.Z. and was that not the direction that the NVA was planning on the company moving to? It would appear that you are surrounded by VC on three sides, was that the case?
Nope. The NVA were down the hill in front of us, some between us and the river and some in the distance with the .50
Then there was a force I jarred loose in the rear, on a hill beyond the back side of our hill.
We prevented the flank attack so had not NVA on the southern flank.
We were headed north, basically, to the old destroyed landing zone.
But had to go down before going north.
Alcoholics were extremely common in the Nam, especially in the rear area.
Out in the shit only local stuff was available except for one beer delivery.
Semper fi,
Jim
So you did have NVA to the north, east and west of you then, right? Had Kilo been in place on the other side of the hill, they would have been caught in the barrage of Arty that you had called in. Perhaps that is why they did not come to your companies’ rescue.
As one understands the story thus far, you were headed north to another landing zone, from the one that you had been ambushed at the day before. Now it would appear that the enemy is trying to drive you back to the first LZ. That would be the strategy for the VC sending men across the river to the north of you.
To reverse their strategy, you would have to take out the VC who are just north of you and on your side of the river, where Sugardaddy and his troops are supposed to be. That means Sugardaddy and his men have problems in front of them and from behind, friendly and foe one might say. Looks like a main character is about to exit the story.
Hey, Kilo would have had come up along the ridge from the south. We were only protected by the steepness of the slope up to the high ridge. I called the first artillery strike on the western hill beyond our hill. We were departing to the north, but to go in that direction we had to come down the hill to the east toward the river. I don’t think the NVA were driving us so much as reacting to us and trying to figure out where they could trap us and take us out.
Thanks for your intense interest and following along closely.
Semper fi,
Jim
Very interesting…So, it wasn’t Jurgens. I thought it was. You got me to thinking whom it my have been. I pay close attention to everything that you write. It’s there for a reason, as in movies where everything is said or there with a purpose. Like the casual comment about seeing the Gunny walk away with a case of bug juice way back. I knew immediately what that was all about and was right. I think I know who did it but, I won’t say now, because I haven’t figured out why. Like a deadly game of “Clue”. You’ve certainly got what it takes, realistic “put you there” descriptions, great dialog, brash, unforgettable characters, and of course, the cliff hanger at the end of the chapter that makes the reader demand more.
Well, you are a deductive sort and it’s fun to watch you puzzle the whole thing out.
So much more understandable to me now then it was back then, but more clear now since I’ve been
writing this story than ever before. And more forgiving in my mind. I’ve had some anger issues over
the years and not a small bit of guilt myself.
Thanks for the comment and the in-depth support…
Semper fi,
Jim
Whoever says time travel is not possible, has not been reading these stories, James. I have found myself transported into another place and time with each perusal. Thanks for taking us along on your journey with your own unique style of taking us there, and, as always, Semper Fi LT.
Thanks William. I’m not so sure my ‘style’ is very original or unique but I certainly accept the compliment.
That I’ve reached the people I’ve reached and so many of them from out in that jungle with me back then is
kind of a shock but a wonderful shock. Thanks for your interest and for liking it so much..
Semper fi,
Jim
You’re style is unique ,in that it is from the heart and doesn’t seem to embellish your part, at the price of someone else’s part. Honest and to the point. If Casey were writing, he would be the consummate hero leading misfits despite their misgivings.
That’s interesting. I don’t find the style unique or different, of course. I am writing from the inside
and you are reading from the outside. I don’t know how ‘honest’ it is.
It’s almost impossible to get it all right and not to make myself a better guy than I really was.
Casey won’t be writing.
Semper fi,
Jim
You mention in a ‘reply’ that looking down on the valley today via ‘google’ just doesn’t do the pictures in your mind ‘justice’…it never will….nothing will be able to replace those sounds and smells…when you are laying face down in the river of mud and actually start to laugh at the situation…’what the fuk else can they throw at me?’ That place always looked so pretty from the air…. We came up and over that ‘ridge line above you on the right..and dropped down into the East side of that Valley and came upon an “R&R” site..had to be for the NVA Officers….raised pagotas, BBQ’s Hammocks…all very nice and clean..all tucked in and protected at the base of the ridge…shake your head and wonder what planet you’re on….Semper Fi
I wonder what it would be like to go back Larry. Would I be uncomfortable, shocked
or would it all sweep me backward. There are some things about that damned valley they
could not have changed, I am sure. Those colors. Those smells. That rain….
Thanks for the comment and your others before too…
Semper fi,
Jim
I went back about 15 years ago. Great trip. It was good to see that the country survived and even is thriving now.
I actually took the road from just north of the airport at Danang and went past the area at Freedom Hill where I used to see Charles Robb and his rear echelon buddies playing volleyball next to a Skycrane detachment.
Good trip, only allowed good thoughts to be with our little group of vets.
Thanks for your great walk back in time and for your unique understanding of “our” war.
Stan
Glad you went back and enjoyed it. I have friends who have gone back and they all enjoyed it too.
I don’t really think I would be one of those, however. Not sure why. Left too many and some are still there…
Semper fi,
Jim
So now we have Casey in perspective. It’s worse than I had thought. I have a firm grasp of scared but no comparison to scared and “in charge”. Pretty sage advice from the Gunny, I’m thinking you would need to start loving your actions just to maintain a little sanity. And Jurgens didn’t toss the grenade? Can’t wait for that revelation. Thanks again for what you’re doing and as always, HURRY UP!!
I am working on it Walt. You know I don’t just sit around and write, you know.
Or maybe I guess I do, when I’m not doing foolish meaningless errands or such.
Anyway, thanks for the nice compliment with the hurry up routine..
Semper fi,
Jim
“I’m not surprised, Junior,” the Gunny said, finally, taking a few minutes to mix his coffee potion. I mixed a small bag in my own holder, having no cream or sugar. I was afraid to hold up the holder though, because I didn’t (want) him to see my hand shaking, so I just wrapped my fingers around the hot metal and held it to the ground.
Seems to need (want)
Dang I am late to the reading what a great surprise on the quick addition. Looks as though the Gunny is giving you your Gunny approval badge of honor. The surprise of it not being Jergens that tossed the grenade is a twist I never expected. Got me feeling my neck for leeches like I do when someone talks about ticks. Will be watching for the Running to the daylight segment.
Thank you Peter. Yes, some of the chapters just flow on out and others, well they’re not so easy.
I’m on the next ridiculously named plan I came up with. I would never have remembered those without
the old manuscript. Back in 1970 it was pretty much burned in.
Semper fi,
Jim
I look forward to every one of your new chapters coming out — stop what I’m doing to read it. It amazes me how you can take yourself back again and again into the belly of the beast to capture and write so incomparably well about the infinite and horrific details of the moments. Absolutely superb writing! Thank you.
Semper fi.
RVN 1969-70
Thanks Bill, the details just keep on coming the more I write.
Pretty good reference stuff too from the letters and the old manuscript.
Can’t believe I wrote 800 pages of cursive in pencil one after another back then.
My diary from the time is such a mess from the rains that it’s hard to get too much
out of but some of that is pretty good too. Wish I’d had a camera.
Semper fi,
Jim
Jim,
Now the malaria will start to sap the company, resistance is down, fever will keep you warm. FNGs will start jettisoning equipment as waterlogged and heavy. All you need is elephant grass for that close up combat experience. To truly get that pissed on miserable experience keep skipping sleep and meals.
Clean your .45 they rust fast in the rain and mud. Stupid way to die in a sea of stupid ways to die.
Looking forward to the run to daylight!!!!
Just enjoying the memories and the ghosts.
Love the bleakest optimism, truly catches the joy of war.
You have a gift, continue using it to healing your soul.
Butch
How can your read ahead when I have not written it yet? I think your credentials about having
been there and done that are pretty secure through these kinds of comments Butch…not that you need any fucking credentials.
Yes, to all of that. Cleaning the .45 in that mess. I least I had the Hoppes to get high on under my poncho!
Semper fi, and bloody well thanks for that comment mate…
Jim
Old Spice and my Dad sure hits home with me too ’64-’66 USAFSS out of country…..
Funny how smells can kick off such instant and deep memories.
That Old Spice. My dad is gone now but I still use the Old Spice
I began using when I got out of the hospital. Used to use the shaving
cream too until they stopped making it. Deodorant too!
Thanks for that comment,
Semper fi,
Jim
just an omitted word, around coffee with gunny: “because I didn’t him to see my hand shaking, so I just wrapped my fingers around the hot metal and held it to the ground” — want may ought to be in between I didn’t and see.
i saw another but was too engrossed to stop and note it, now can’t find it. i like your story.
Compliments thrown back over the shoulder….maybe the best kind of all.
Thank you Ed and for the work of editing too…
Semper fi,
Jim
Totally enthralled with every segment. Can taste,feel,smell all the story. Terrific writing!
Me too Geoffrey, and I guess that is coming through. I am hard at it in the rain
pouring over the third part of the twelfth night….
Thank you!
Semper fi,
Jim
The dog has now joined my wife in wishing I would (could) stop reading. Been keeping the dog up some nights, too. You have eclipsed my experience, dealt with the monsoon and a typhoon while REMF. I had more diversity during my year. Bush, Clearing Company, Hospital, supply runs, Security NCO at the Hospital when I got burned out on the wards, ER, Surgery and Graves Registration….especially Graves Reg.
Keep up the writing, I WILL keep up the reading.
Thanks for what you’re doing, LT, it helps.
The dog. Shit. I am writing for the dog…or against the dog’s fondest desires.
You are cracking me up here. Thanks for staying at the reading.
I know it’s not easy sometimes for those of us who were out there.
Somebody called me to have me join a dysfunctional vet site
and read the stuff there but I just can’t do it.
My brain is full with Thirty Days and I struggle sometimes getting through a segment…
and my nights are not inactive or filled with sleep these days either.
You cannot go back without going back.
Thanks for calming your wife, the dog and probably keeping a .45 somewhere
where they don’t know it’s there….
Semper fi,
Jim
Jim; I search everyday for a new writing from you. I do not want to be critical but all i found were a couple of typo’s this time. When you said it took two or three matches you used there for three. love your work keep it up. Was NSA Danang all of 68.
Thanks for the corrections Bob. There are a few of you out there helping with that.
Editing is hard stuff because my brain either sees what is not there or the word
correction stuff changes stuff back after I correct it! What the hell was NSA
doing in Da Nang at that time? I never even heard of the NSA until the later in the
seventies. Thanks for the compliment (for looking for a new segment) and the correction work.
Semper fi,
Jim
NSA…Spooks? Yes, in the rear, You could spot them, They had a unofficial uniform Yep, Wrap around sunglasses, Levi Jeans, and a White short sleeve Dress shirt…… Things always got interesting when they showed up, almost as bad as Colonel Samuel Flagg … Captain Pratt … Yes, the fun and games of REMF’s
They only ones I heard of hung around a the special compound they’d
built for Charles Robb at Ah Hoa.
He was protected his whole stay and rumored to be in charge of drug planes
going out of the country.
Rumor, though. I know nothing.
Flagg. I forgot about him.
When I was with the agency the dumber guys would all repeat the
‘I’ll tell you but then I’ll have to kill you,’ line that scriptwriter pioneered.
Thanks for the comment. Apropos, of course…
Semper fi,
Jim
NSA is Naval Support Activity. We did a number of things like getting the Marines their supplies from of the container ships. Also did Hue river security on the Perfume river i was assigned to the river security out of Tan My which was at the mouth of the Perfume. We had a pipeline out to a buoy in the ocean and we held 5 million gallons of jp-4 above ground. I later went down to Danang and was attached to Civic Action, a team of four that lived out in the village. Actually to gather intelligence and pass it up the ladder.
Civic Action. Civil Affairs Group. The CAG. That was rather risky dangerous
duty back in the day. Three guys to back your play? Man. And thanks for the NSA
explanation. I was thinking the other NSA and thoughts of Mel Gibson in that
Vietnam movie came to mind….
Semper fi,
Jim
Wow! Great segment! Quick turnaround on this one Jim, thanks for that. Gunny is becoming more of a romantic figure. Waxing poetic about love, leeches,and pouring rain. Great writing. Run to daylight seems the only logical plan. We’ll be standing by! Not Juergens? Good thing you didn’t act too soon! Anxiously waiting the next chapter. Semper Fi Lt.
The Gunny was a romantic figure from the start. Part Father, brother,
priest and harsh taskmaster. He was the way I picture most Gunnery
Sergeant’s are in the corps to this day. I was a bright, eccentric college
kid making believe I was some sort of commander of men. Today the word
“really?” comes directly to mind! or the Princess Bride word “inconceivable!”
Thanks for the compliment and I am again hard at the writing…
Semper fi,
Jim
Jim, the twist and turn keep on coming, I thought for sure it was Jurgens but now I don’t Know it could be anyone.Can’t wait for the next chapter and the book. (Like I said before your one hell of a writer)
It was a roiling time up and down in that valley that comes back as
so feely touchy to me even now. I know that valley. Except I look
at Google Earth in wonder. They put a highway down there! They built
towns down there. I can’t synch that with my memories. Whom would be
there by choice, my memory shouts. Thanks for the liking the story
and commenting about that here.
Semper fi,
Jim
I love the read on all of this.Awesome
Thanks Ed. The first book “The First Ten Days” should make it out by the 15th.
When it comes out make a comment on Amazon like this one. Maybe some other readers will smile like me…
Semper fi,
Jim
Just keeps getting better!
Thanks George. Sunday morning. It’s raining here. How appropriate. Some guy had
a fireworks show in the neighborhood last night when I was finishing the last segment.
He probably had no idea what I was writing about but man was it right down the fairway…
Semper fi,
Jim
Thank you sir. Enjoying your writing.
Thanks Jake.
Laconic praise. Sometimes the best kind.
I’ll keep at it..
Semper fi,
Jim
Again with the “What now Lieutenant?” paragraph, the word reticent explaining the Captain–“Stonewall” Jackson was reticent; he kept his plans secret. The word ‘recondite’ which may be more appropriate for the situation is all your call, Jim. I hope it helps. S/f.
Reticent is a word most understand, even if not the most appropriate word to use.
Only people out at the far end of the standard deviations from the mean on the bell shaped curve
understand recondite. Hmmmm. Is there any doubt where you are on that line?
Semper fi,
Jim
Accept it. That’s the caliber of folks you’ve got along on this runaway train now, Strauss.
Well, the ‘caliber’ of this crowd is certainly up there and deep down there too. What a bunch
of sincere ‘straight from the heart’ men and women somehow collected here to commiserate and understand together
what it is that the combat theater of life’s grandly painful theater was and remains all about.
I have not doubted the caliber, any more than you have John, and I have not failed to respond to these comments
because of my innate work ethic or industriousness. I know who is here. I know what is here. As I am here.
Semper fi,
Your friend,
Jim
Damn… LT, just when I thought it could not get any better…Bravo Zulu!
Thank you Dan. You made me smile this morning as I got to work on the third part of that outrageous night.
I never know how any of the segments will be taken and it’s funny to
read the words of people predicting what will happen next. Those were not predictable times,
at least not down in that valley during that time. Not predictable
by what we consider normal human social process today, anyway.
Thanks for the motivation.
I am hard at it…
I finish reading as the words to “Lucky Man” go circling through my brain…….Great writing sir!
I was all of that while feeling that I was none of that. In truth, I never considered
my fate at that time being a product of luck in getting me into the mess but I did consider
myself extremely lucky when I survived for another day, night, hour or minute sometimes while I was going through
it. Thanks for comment and the read….
Semper fi,
Jim
First sentence “…than…” is an unnecessary adjunctive (?) in the structure and that word should be deleted… is enough for me. Toes aren’t at 45 degrees anymore with parade stance? (Sorry, bad joke). S/f.
Now you have me thinking about the position of Parade Rest. Hmmm. 45 degrees?
I am also looking for the humor, even if bad, it’s got to be there somewhere. I just know it.
I like it when other people are smarter than me….I just don’t necessarily like to say it.
Yes, on “than.”
Semper fi,
Jim
Perhaps deviation in dress code😉,general appearance, conduct, strategizing some aspects of what you were preparing to strategize (Jerguens) about! Rules of the jungle as opposed to Marine Corps rules!
Thank you Christine. Rules of the Jungle. Almost like a reality Tarzan kind of a thing.
Not me, of course, I was too short to be Tarzan (5’8″) and not that tough.
Marine Corps rules were not nearly so important to me then or back here as it was to simply be a Marine
and think of myself and my men as me and them on Guadalcanal or maybe deep in Belleau Wood.
We were frightened children but in some strange way, too difficult to explain here,
we had a mission, we mostly kept to that mission with intent, and we had honor.
We were Marines. I still think of myself as one.
Semper fi, and thanks for writing on here…
Jim
PS When I went to the Wall in D.C. I didn’t look up at my block of granite and leave right away
because I didn’t want to honor my men.
I did it because I wasn’t tough enough to stay.
Maybe if I’d been alone, at night, in a monsoon rain.
It might have felt right.
The Wall is a hard place for me for a lot a reasons and I am sure each of us has their own thoughts on it. I always wounder why them and not me. Keep it coming Jim.
Thanks Mike, there is always the ‘why them and not me’ for the guys
who lost so many right next to them….and even the guys in the rear who had
to deal with the loss of the people they knew in the field. I used to
talk to a man who worked as a helicopter mechanic on a carrier offshore.
He recalled with agony the crews he was friends with that just didn’t come
back. The mystery of it and the loss of the friends was so hard even though
he never got off the ship himself.
Thanks, as usual, for the comment…
Semper fi,
Jim
Referring to grammatical exactness in publishing content, and how scrutiny for perfection can be so demanding, and I had a brief flash of that word “Attention”, and inspection from the head to the toes. I meant no sleight against the formal dress, and apologize for the abstract analogy on concrete values concerning ‘edit’. Dammit…I meant to be simple. Good call on the guard, Jim. S/f.
It’s pretty damned important to get the grammar and the diction and the rest of it right when you come to
final publish copy. And it is hard, but not impossible. It’s time that is the biggest enemy, because, with
the exception of a very few out here (and I am not one of them) there are other things that have to be done
and taken care of other than writing and editing.
Thanks for the comment and the care…
Semper fi,
Jim