Chapter 20: What was your experience of combat in the military?

I never experienced hand to hand combat, but I could have. I will explain that later.

My first experience in Viet Nam was arriving at Cam Ranh Bay. There was a “tent city” for all new arrivals to await further transportation to our permanent bases. The base was one big beach – there was sand everywhere. The latrines and showers were in a large tent about 50 yards or more from my tent. Of course, there were boardwalks everywhere because of the sand. After taking a shower and walking back to the tent, our bodies were like sandpaper. I still remember my first night there. I and a few other guys were sitting on the boardwalk at night having a smoke. A plane was dropping super bright flares around the perimeter. The flares turned the night into day. They were looking for the Viet Cong who might be trying to infiltrate the base. Occasionally, we could see a streak of red from the planes to the ground. They were firing miniguns with tracers at the enemy. This was my first feeling that I was really in a war zone.

During my first year at Phu Cat Air Base, we were attacked by mortars and rockets a few times. The base sirens would go off and we had a minute or two to go outside into the bunker. We had to stay in the bunker until the all-clear siren and then back to our normal routine.

After my year at Phu Cat, I was assigned to Mt. Home Air Force Base in Idaho as a security policeman. I wanted to work in my original field of work, munitions, so I volunteered to return to Viet Nam. We flew out of Travis Air Force Base in California. The plane was full of army troops except me and two other guys. I sat in row 1, right next to the exit door. It was a long flight and I talked with the stewardesses a few times. I was asked to which base I was going. I told them “Bien Hoa.” When our plane was starting its approach, a stewardess came out of the cockpit and told me that Bien Hoa was under a rocket attack. She had a very worried look on her face. I told her that it was no big deal. We were up in the air and our first stop was Tan Son Nhut Air Base which was about an hour drive from Bien Hoa. Bien Hoa was nicknamed “Rocket City” because they had so many rocket attacks. After I arrived there, we didn’t have a rocket attack for 30 days. That was a record for not being hit. I still remember the first rocket attack we had. I was in bed when the sirens went off. Instead of running down to the bunker, I decided to lie under the bed. I stayed under the bed for a while. Nothing happened so I thought it was a false alarm. I stood up and looked out my “window.” We didn’t have glass windows; they were just screens. Anyway, just as I looked out, I saw a flash, heard a whooshing sound and a few seconds later, I heard the “boom.” The rocket passed right over our barracks and exploded in a field nearby.

There were several other attacks during my 18 months at Bien Hoa, but none of the hits were near where I was. One “devastating” rocket attack was a direct hit on the building where the toilet paper was stored. The toilet paper shortage during this COVID19 pandemic was nothing.

The only time that I could have possible been in firefight with M16s was during a visit to a local orphanage. When we entered the orphanage compound, we would secure our M16 rifles in a room away from the kids. There was a Catholic Church nearby on the other side of a rice paddy. A friend of mine and I decided to walk over to it and check it out. One of the sisters told us that we had to take our M16s because that area had Viet Cong. We brought them but didn’t think there would be any problems. Before entering the church, we decided to first walk around it to look at the building design. We first walked down the right side, along the back and then turned left. After a few steps, we noticed two young men, they looked to be about 15 or 16, not in uniform but they had two Russian AK47s. These were all signs that they were Viet Cong. My M16 strap was over my shoulder and pointing down. I had my hand on the grip and moved the switch from “safe” to “auto.” My friend whispered asking me what to do. I just told him to be cool, but ready. I stared at the two guys who were slowly standing. They picked up their weapons but kept them pointing down. I bowed to them, and they bowed back and slowly backed into the jungle. We returned to the orphanage with no problems. Thinking about this later, I realized that we were lucky. Once they got into the jungle, we couldn’t see them and if they wanted to, they could have shot us. They were probably told to just watch the Americans visiting the orphanage to see what we were doing.

I didn’t really have any combat experiences on the “front lines.” But my job was maintaining, assembling, and delivering many types of munitions to the fighter aircraft. While working with the munitions, they were just large pieces of metal. After seeing videos of what those munitions did and the people who died because of them, I occasionally had some very bad dreams.

The first photo are tents similar to the ones we stayed in at Cam Ranh Bay. The other photos are of the orphanage, the church we visited and the rice paddy we walked around.

“Latrines” means “bathroom with toilets and sinks.”

“The flares were about a one-meter-high tube that would burn for about three minutes with a two-million candle power.”

“Infiltrate the base” means “to secretly enter the base to cause damage to aircraft, buildings and/or people.”

“Firing miniguns with tracers” means “shooting bullets with every fifth bullet would burn a red flame so the gunner could see where the bullets were going.”

“Mortars and rockets” means “rockets were much larger, could travel farther and cause much more damage.”

“Field of work” means “type of job.”