Can’t Take the Heat
One evening in Phu Bai, I was laying on top of my bunk thinking about the events since I’d arrived in December ’67. It was as if I was watching a movie of someone else’s life. Could I really have been doing all of these things? Little Mikey Hayes from New Madrid, Missouri, answering the call when “Corpsman Up” rings out. I kept telling myself, in spite of my one cowardly act, I would be able to atone. No one had said anything or intimated anything, but I cringed inwardly when I thought of that moment I medivac’d myself. To this day I still do.
So far I’d been shot at with rifles, pounded by mortars, and strafed by airplanes, seen way too many NVA, some dead, some alive, and answered the call, “Corpsman Up”, more times than I would’ve liked.
Mid-March 1968, we got the answer to our unasked question: Where we going next? North, we are going north.
We’re going north of Hue City, north of Quang Tri, passing through Dong Ha, to Khe Sanh, a place the Stars and Stripes newspaper headlines tell us the Marines are still hanging onto in spite of the thousands of little bastards trenching, tunneling and running towards the brave defenders of this beleaguered outpost within sight of the Laotian Border. These stories continually drew comparisons to Dien Bien Phu, the French debacle that helped facilitate the end of the previously named conflict in this shithole. It wasn’t hard to see the signs then.
This was not good news to me. As I recalled from my time at St. Albans Hospital, no one rotated out of the 3rd Marine Division alive or unharmed. This was their territory. The “Up North” is all 3rd Division, comprised of the 3rd Regiment, 4th Regiment, 9th Regiment and 26th Regiment. Their headquarters is in Dong Ha, which is the last South Vietnamese city. North of that were: Khe Sanh, Con Thien, Gio Linh, the three Marine Corps outposts that ran from the Laotian Border to the South China Sea, no more than two or three miles from the Demilitarized Zone that separated North and South.
Once again we were loading out on trucks heading to points north. As we’re being driven, we see a road marker that’s at least a hundred years old indicating Hue only X number of kilometers away. Smith, a Marine that looked like he needed a note from his mommy to be there (a poster board looking kid, blonde, young, and not very experienced) says, “Huey” (the way he pronounced it) “is a funny name for a place.” “It’s not Huey, it’s Huế City. You know the place the 5th Marines are fighting in.” “Oh, that’s how you spell that? Geez, this is one fucked up country,” he replied. Yea, yea it was. At least we could all agree with that.
This convoy was somewhat different than the one through the Hai Van Pass. The terrain was flat grassy savannah plain, the road was paved albeit in disrepair, and as we passed through Huế City, the road we were on took us through an area of the city that seemed to escape the devastation of the epic battle fought there. Although we saw bullet holes in the walls of some of the concrete structures, it seemed as though the civilian survivors were starting to come out of their safe havens and reestablish their lives once again. Vendors were setting up shop along the road with sticks holding up a piece of plastic to keep the sun at bay as they displayed their wares for sale. With food cooking on braziers, the old and young mixed alongside the road, making for a colorful if not scary ride atop our trucks.
We were all nervous about being exposed on top of the vehicles, targets for snipers and grenade throwing kids. A satchel charge could have made quite the mess, one that would provide the local populace with debris to make shelters, sell for scrap metal, or use for booby traps that would make more American mothers sad.
To make the day really exciting, a truck somewhere in front of us broke down, so we were told to sit tight. As if my ass couldn’t get any tighter. We were also instructed not to get off the truck. “Yea, piss in your boots gunny, and for god’s sake don’t buy anything from the locals.” Water poison, food poison, and trinkets that would blow up often came courtesy of the local vendors. Despite our instructions, when the Gunnery Sgt. left, half of us jumped off the truck and immediately bought warm Tiger Piss beer and insect infested mini-baguettes and pissed where we could. After helping the local economy (no trinkets though, since you buy it you hump it), we got back on the truck, and the other half immediately did the same thing. An hour of sitting in the hot sun with no breeze, hot beer, and stale bread in our tummies, we couldn’t have taken an unmanned outhouse let alone a hill. Not a picture that would have pleased the Commandant of the Marine Corps let alone our Company Gunny. I assure you not one us gave a flying fuck what either of them thought by the time we finally departed the once proud capital of the biggest shithole we ever knew and started our northward trek once again.
Some time after nightfall we reached Dong Ha, another dot on someone’s map that he thought would be a good place to build a large airfield for helicopters and C-130 aircraft, the 3rd Medical Battalion, a supply depot, and Headquarters for the 3rd Marine Division. It must’ve been someone with more of a sense of humor than a sense of geography and with access to a really big, deep bunker, as this place seemed to be within artillery and rocket range of the NVA. Once again, we dismounted the trucks and were ordered off to the side of the road. We feasted on cold c-rations again (no fires for the enemy to see), and didn’t have to dig in for the night, just had to find a spot close to the truck and make sure we didn’t get lost in the night.
Quinn, Grist, and I wound up close to the truck and began chatting.
“Have you been here before?” I asked.
Quinn said he had and had hoped to not see it again.
“What’s it like?”
“Hills, lots of hills and valleys. This is where you’re not going to find booby traps. Everyone has to maneuver through the hills, and they don’t have time to map out where their mines are. They have just as much artillery as we have, they have just as many tanks as we have, and they have just as many troops as we have.”
This was the difference and the fact that, when contact was made, the NVA were not going to melt away until sunrise when our air support was available. After a less-than restful night of sleeping on a gravelly surface, digesting c-rations and thinking about what we would face as we headed farther north, we were back on the trucks and heading to a place called Ca Lu. (This place was later named Vandergriff Combat Base). We weren’t the lead unit into the area, but we weren’t the last. The place was devoid of any structures, not even a sandbagged foxhole could be seen, just green hills and a few brown threads of trails. What it did have was Route 9, a route that ran from Dong Ha all the way to the border with Laos. Route 9 also leads north to a road that leads to Khe Sanh.
At the time, we didn’t know that we were to be part of the relief column to lift the siege of Khe Sanh. We were leaving the relative safety of the southern guerilla warfare for the more conventional warfare of the north. We were stashed on a hill that contained a large cornfield. The white corn wasn’t quite ready to be eaten, but Marines being eating machines as well as killing machines filled up their helmets with water and placed them over fires to boil the corn and, for at least one day, enjoyed full tummies. Then came the screaming meemies — explosive, copious diarrhea. For about two days, we were about as combat ready as a Boy Scout troop. After the green corn finally passed (literally) followed by two more days of serious methane production, the weakened center column was once again ready to move forward. Still can’t look at a white corn on the cob without a brief memory of the one Marine running through the field spewing shit out his ass — funny then as it is now to me, although in reality there were some sick Marines. A few even needed IV fluids to rehydrate them.
I can’t recall how long this idyllic scenario played out, but one day we moved out of the cornfield and onto a hill with the rest of the company. Our side of the hill looked out over a pretty spectacular view — hills, green hills, and lots of them.
For some it was a picture worth taking. For me, I remember feeling so fucking lost and lonely and, for the first time in a long time, I was homesick. I didn’t miss New Madrid, but I didn’t want to be where I was, alone. It’s hard to explain, but I wanted to be on this hillside but with a girl I remembered from high school and to share all of this vast beauty. It was beautiful, but you know it hides ugly things — caves, caverns, disease, and death, along with the enemy.
On April 1, 1968, we were awakened before sunrise and instructed to fill in our holes and be ready to move out at first light. We didn’t quite make the first-light jump off when the sun reached the horizon lighting up the place and we heard a noise, one that was faint but growing louder each second. We looked at the southern sky and lo and behold the sky was darkened by helicopters, hundreds of Huey’s, I mean hundreds. All moving north. We guessed they were Army, since the Marine Corps didn’t have that many in its whole inventory worldwide. 1st Air Cavalry was on its way to rescue the beleaguered defenders of a place Westmoreland thought was worth the carnage it had wrought. Unbeknownst to the world, the NVA had given up — for a time at least — and had departed. The 26th and 9th Marines had kicked some major ass. This Air Cav shit was all for show and Westmoreland’s press.
When the sky parade ended, the grunts of 2/3 were ordered to move off the hill and sent onward to another hill. Which one didn’t matter, they all looked alike. 1st platoon was anointed point position, so we were the first to move off. As we started down the hill, what sounded like a freight train came thundering down, landing on the top of the hill with a deafening explosion. I was half knocked down and half thrown down from what we later learned were 3 rounds of 4 duce mortar rounds. 2nd and 3rd platoons, along with the Company Command Center, were decimated.
They’d all been standing around or putting on their gear, waiting to move out after us when the mortar rounds, large enough to kill and maim a lot of Marines that morning, struck almost exactly on top of the hill. I dropped my pack, grabbed my medical kit, and headed back up the hill. I was stunned at the devastation I witnessed. The huge, strong Marine carrying the flamethrower was decapitated, several others had missing limbs and there were shrapnel holes in a lot of chests. There were sucking chest wounds, sucking back wounds, and air-departing lungs through holes that shouldn’t be there in the chest and back. When all of the wounded and dead were finally evacuated, 2nd and 3rd platoons were combined into one platoon. That’s a lot of dead and wounded.
Before the evacuations were even started, 1st platoon was ordered to proceed alone to the first day’s objective, another dot on someone’s map. We didn’t see the rest of the company for several days. What we did see when we were on high ground to our right was Route 9, a windy brown thread of road with tanks and Marines and hillsides devoid of any cover. There were bomb craters and scorched earth consisting of burned grass and trees without leaves from the napalm. Each hill we climbed we thought, “This is the one filled with the little bastards, and we’ll be in the shit.” Nope, just another hill and then down to a gully filled with heat so bad you couldn’t breathe, or if you did you’d likely die from drowning in the humidity or suck in heat that’d burn your lungs.
We got meager amounts of water every day or so, but our limit was one canteen per day. Even as a medic that’s all I got, and I shared mine with the heat casualties. Did I mention how hot it gets? And the humidity? Hot and humid. The heat would take such a toll on all of us that one day each company would be called to halt to receive a pep talk from the company commanders who had been mandated to instruct us to take off our flack jackets and place them in a pile for pick up later by another lucky outfit. Every one was to take a minimum of eight salt tablets a day, and no one was to be medivac’d due to heat prostration or any kind of heat related injury.
Love you too general. Oh and fuck you and your salt tablets. That’s so WW2, but ok if you say so. Barely enough water to go around so you’d choke them down with your piss. I got no piss. I ain’t pissed in two days thank you.
Lt. Dito even joked, “If I catch any one of you pissing, I’ll court-martial you for wasting water.”
On we went marching in the gullies between hills in the heat. I got heat exhaustion on a daily basis as I was treating several cases. I did manage to get one Marine evac’d due to heat stroke. Heat stroke is really one step away from death. At that point, you’ve stopped sweating, your body has no more liquid to spit out, and your core temperature is reaching 110 degrees if not higher. Heart failure is close, and brain damage will occur. I don’t remember this particular Marine’s name, but he didn’t return to us.
I hope he made it, so yea, he was one step away from death. That was a bitch of a day, and I’m betting Lt. Dito got his ass chewed out for that by higher authority. I also got ribbed for misplacing my medical kit going between the heat casualties. I was so close to being one myself. Grist and another Marine were helping me stumble from one heat casualty to the other we had so many. Oh, did I mention, Lt. Dito made 1st Lieutenant somewhere during this period. He had also turned almost human, but he was still a Marine Lieutenant first, and by now we were all glad we had him around.
For a period of time I can’t recall, we continued to go up and down the hills. Other than the heat casualties, nothing much occurred until one day we found an abandoned bunker complex. Our point man discovered a trail at the base of a hill. As we went up the trail, we found a stairway dug into the side of the hill. We followed it up the hill to a small complex of caves and dugouts. Couldn’t have been more than a look out position for a company size of the enemy. I went into one of the caves, just like in the movies, with smooth dirt walls and floors. Definitely not large enough for a real person to standup in, but tall enough for one of those little enemy bastards to stand in. We found several rifles and a couple of shovels left behind — nothing worth taking with them I guess. The rifles were rusted and dirty, but seemed workable. This was early in the day, so there was no sense in leaving the caves for some lost soul to use, so by using prodigious amounts of C-4 explosives, we rendered them no longer useful to anyone. We almost blew out the side of the hill. Grunts like explosions.
Eventually, we were ordered to a specific spot and ended up meeting with the rest of Fox Company. It was an open grassy field, large enough to put each platoon in a single file and land helicopters in somewhat of an orderly fashion. The only thing we were told was that we were going to be picked up by helicopter and taken to an unknown destination. This was not good news to a Marine grunt. When you’re in the field and suddenly someone offers you a helicopter ride, it usually means that someone else is in the shit and you’re the help. The Marine Corps doesn’t give helicopter rides to Marines whose feet hurt; they give a ride because they want you somewhere and quickly. Once again, pucker up, you’re heading for the shit. When asked about where we were going, the Lt. answered, “Don’t know, but when you come off that helicopter be ready for anything.” Well no shit. Thanks for those words of wisdom.
The last time we had to be “ready for anything,” somewhere around the peninsula outside Huế, we boarded 46’s to envelope (get behind) an entrenched NVA group. As usual we were the ones to come in from behind to set up a blocking position and ended up under fire coming off the helicopters as the NVA were moving out. We got into position and managed to divert the flow into another direction. Charlie Company 1/1 was taking the brunt of that one. There was a lot of air support for Charlie Company, bombs, napalm and strafing.
When we entered the hot Landing Zone that day, we hit the back ramp running. We were in knee-high grass, with a tree line thirty yards in the distance and a rice paddy dike in the way. There were loud noises — so loud!!! Explosions, sounds of gunfire and the smell of cordite. RPG rounds, mortars, cacophony of rifle fire. The sound a .50 caliber machine gun makes is unmistakable coming from the helicopters, trying to give suppression fire, trying to help us get to the dike or tree line as they leave to get more Marines or just get out of harm’s way. Artillery explosions. This is where you don’t realize what you’re doing, you’re running straight into the people trying to kill you.
I kept telling myself, Don’t get hit, keep moving, move, move goddamn it. Gotta get to the dike, not to the tree line. Keep moving until you can’t. Please no one get shot, no shrapnel wounds. I don’t want to stop in the open like this.
These memories were all I could think about during our long, cool, and uncomfortable ride. As we spiraled downward in nice tight concentric circles, we steeled ourselves as best we could, expecting the worst. Suddenly, the tires hit the ground and the ramp in the back of the CH-46 opened up. We came off the helicopter expecting a firefight at best and landing in the midst of an overrun position at worst. What we witnessed instead was a bunch of Air Cav dudes sunning themselves and getting a good laugh at our expense. When we came off the helicopter, we had a guide meet us so that we didn’t run off the side of the hill. He pointed us to the left where Bravo 1/12, our artillery battery, was setting up what would be their home for several months.
We had arrived at Landing Zone (LZ) Hawk, a wide space along Route 9 that overlooked Khe Sanh. This was our first glimpse of the historical place, and it was a “What the Fuck” moment for a lot of us. I’m a 19 year old who just fell off the turnip truck, not knowing anything about anything. Being instructed to put something that was supposedly so important in a valley like this was, how to phrase it? So French. It was surrounded by hills, an absolutely dumb place to put anything let alone American military personnel. Oh well, we would be eating a lot of red dirt for the next few weeks. This place was all red dirt when it was dry. The rain turned it to red mud, and five minutes after it quit raining, it was once again dirt that was being blown around and getting into everything.
The day we landed at LZ Hawk, Operation Pegasus was officially over.
