them.
I met Captain Kinh in the pickup landing zone as we waited for the helos to come in. I would coordinate with the pilots and wanted to be sure we were ready for a “hot” zone in case the situation had worsened. I was not confident that our briefs had given us a clear picture of the conditions on the ground.
I was glad to see my best Vietnamese friend, Captain Hoa, and his company would be one of the two companies going in our lead helo lift. The other company was also a good unit, and I felt reassured with this team of experienced fighters. Everyone seemed somber; we all shared the uneasy feeling about this mission.
The helos landed, we went through our briefs, and then lifted off toward the north and whatever awaited us.
As our helos started their descent into the landing zone, I looked out to get a quick sense of the situation on the ground.
“There’s no sign of hostile fire,” the pilots told me. But I could see the devastating aftermath of truly fierce fighting. The once lovely villages were totally destroyed, and the terrain where the ARVN were located looked like a moonscape, pockmarked by shell craters and scoured of trees and brush. I had a quick flashback to the beauty and serenity of the area not long ago.
As the helicopters slowed close to the ground, we got another disturbing sight. Panicking ARVN soldiers were running for the birds, many discarding their weapons and equipment in their dash for the helos. Though a few officers made halfhearted attempts to stop them, they couldn’t check the stampede. Our pilots, meanwhile, were very unhappy about the safety problems this mad dash was causing.
Our Marines glared at the ARVN soldiers in disgust as we debarked from the helos and rapidly took up defensive positions around the LZ. My immediate concern — as well as Captain Kinh’s — was that the VC might be aware of the apparent mayhem and see it as an opportunity to attack.
The helos lifted off with ARVN troops clinging to the skids and frustrated helo crew chiefs giving up on trying to push off the frightened soldiers. It was clear that this ARVN unit was beaten and useless in any action that might follow.
Kinh, Hoa, and I looked around in disbelief, our grim expression mirrored on the faces of the other Marines.
Kinh instructed the company commanders to quickly get their positions prepared to protect the zone for the follow-on lifts and not to depend on the units already there for security. He then told me to join him. “Let’s try to find someone in charge,” he said.
It seemed strange that no officer had approached us by now.
We moved from position to position, until we came to a very deep hole with radio antennas sticking out of it. To my surprise, an ARVN brigadier general was inside. When he realized we were there, he jumped out and started screaming at Kinh. He was so frightened and panicked it was difficult to understand what he was saying. He was clearly over the edge. But the gist of it was orders to Kinh to launch into the attack.
Kinh yelled back at him. “We will attack,” he said, “but given the size of the enemy, we should wait for the rest of the battalion, and preferably wait for both battalions of Marines to get on the ground.”
The general kept screaming, “No, you have to attack now! You have to attack now!”
Kinh glared at the general with such total disdain that I feared he’d hit him on the spot.
At this point, I decided to walk away from the confrontation. I didn’t think it was my place to be there as these two Vietnamese commanders were screaming and yelling at each other. My job was to do what I could to help Kinh and the Marines. I knew another American unit was in the area. I wanted to get a fix on them to see if we could link up with them. I also wanted to check to see when the rest of the battalion was going to arrive.
But the first thing I did was hook up with Hoa, who told me that the flank of his company was reporting U.S. armored personnel carriers a short distance away (the American unit I’d wanted to link up with). He and I walked over to take a look. As we got there, U.S. soldiers were making their way toward us, led by an Army captain whose company had shared a security position some weeks back with one of our Vietnamese Marine units. He was a good officer and I was glad to finally see something positive in this mess.
After we greeted each other, he told me that his mechanized infantry company was supporting the ARVN regiment, but had suffered some casualties, including losing a couple of their M-113 armored personnel carriers in futile attacks that were poorly conducted by the ARVN. The ARVN infantry had held back in the attacks and then fled, leaving his tracks exposed to VC “spider traps”—camouflaged holes from which the VC would spring up and hit units after they’d passed by. In this case, the VC had fired rifle-propelled grenades (RPGs) into the rear of the M-113s.
Just then, the Marines behind us began to pick up their equipment, preparing to move out. After checking in on his radio, Hoa confirmed that.
This seemed crazy. The VC were dug in below in strong positions at the edge of the village. There were a lot of them, and they were in good shape (we thought), while we were not yet up to full strength. The three of us hurried toward Kinh’s location to find out what was happening.
Kinh was furious: The ARVN general had persisted in his order to attack the dug-in VC.
“This is insane,” I told Kinh. All the air and artillery strikes and ground attacks had so far failed to break the VC. Two light infantry companies would be slaughtered.
“You’re right,” he shrugged angrily. There was nothing he could do. He then gave me a bitter look. “I don’t want you to go in this attack,” he said.
I looked at this man whose warrior spirit I greatly admired. “There’s nothing on this hill worth staying for,” I told him. “I want to be with our Marines.”
He smiled.
Then the U.S. Army captain added his two cents. “If you attack,” he said, “my company is going with you. I agree. Nothing on the hill is worth staying for.”
Kinh smiled again.
We quickly coordinated plans and made preparations for the attack.
As we walked away, the Army captain asked me to make sure the Vietnamese Marines stayed in front of his tracks this time.
Hoa had overheard him. Before I could answer, he’d shoved himself inches from the captain’s face. “We are Marines,” he said. “We will always be in front of you.”
The captain smiled at me. “I like this guy,” he said.[18]
After issuing orders and coordinating our attack, we formed up and moved out.
It would have been nice to lay down air strikes before we hit the VC, but we were out of luck this time. Though we had some air on station, we did not have any discernible targets for them. We knew the VC lines were at the base of our hill and on the edge of the village complex beyond it, but I could not see any indications of the enemy. Since they were masters of camouflage, this was not significant.
It turned out that our worries were groundless.
As we moved closer to the base of the hill, I expected heavy fire; but we were met only by light, sporadic shots. Our lead troops returned them.
Moments later we were on top of the VC defensive positions, and there was still no serious fire. They were withdrawing. They did not intend to fight. The light fire had obviously come from their rear units trying to delay us and protect their retreat.
At that point, we made three quick assumptions: that they had not observed the ARVN chaos, that the sight of the helos landing had convinced them that reinforcements had arrived, and that they were in no
