We continued to in-process, and we received our specific unit assignments. All four of us ended up in the 1st Brigade, located at a firebase named Jackson's Hole near the Laotian Border. We were then given detailed briefings on the tactical situation in the 4th Division area of operations, and were issued weapons and ammunition. During our brief stop at Division, we had time for a welcome hot breakfast, where we were joined by a couple of staff officers who gave us a heads-up on Colonel Richard 'Zoot' Johnson, our brigade commander at Jackson's Hole. We learned that Johnson was an impressive man — part Indian, a tough warfighter, and a totally dedicated 'no- nonsense' officer. We looked forward to serving under him.
At 1500 hours, the four of us boarded a UH-1 (Hucy) and headed about twenty-five kilometers west to Jackson's Hole.
During our in-briefing, we had been told that an intense battle was under way involving a battalion of the 1st Brigade and a
As we approached the firebase, we could see several artillery batteries firing in support of the engaged battalion. To keep out of their way, we flew through a designated 'safe-fly corridor.' After landing, we were ushered into a bunker, where we were told that Colonel Johnson wanted to talk to us before he made our assignments, but he was up taking part in the fighting and might not be back before morning. We were then given a C-ration meal and briefed on the current battle.
It later became clear that Colonel Johnson would not return that night, and we were told we might as well get some sleep. Sounded good to me; we hadn't had much since leaving the States. We rolled out our air mattresses and poncho liners on the dirt floor of the bunker, but didn't get much sleep: A 155mm artillery battery was firing directly over the bunker. Every time it fired (all night long) dirt fell right down on us out of the sandbags that had been placed on top of the bunker for overhead cover.
Soon after Colonel Johnson returned to the camp early the next morning, he sent his sergeant major to invite us to join him for breakfast. Meanwhile, the four of us had been discussing possible assignments. The three of us who weren't then up for promotion had agreed to ask for assignment as infantry battalion S-3's (operations officers). And we would recommend the fourth, Major(P) Maurice Edmonds, for the brigade S-3 job. Since Edmonds was about to be promoted, he was most deserving of higher responsibility. Owing to our training at Leavenworth, we all felt competent to do any job, but we wanted to be operations officers, which was in keeping with our backgrounds.
Over breakfast, Colonel Johnson welcomed us to the brigade, and then told us that he had checked our records a couple of months earlier and had picked us for the exact assignments that we wanted.
Before we left for our units, 'Cherokee' (Johnson's call sign and the name we came to call him) gave us some serious advice and guidance:
'We are operating in NVA country,' he told us. 'They are good fighters and must be respected as such — a heck of a lot tougher and more capable than the VC, which are few in this AO [area of operations]. You can expect to encounter, and be attacked on short notice by, regimental-size units — and you must always be prepared for such action.
'Therefore:
• 'All air assaults should be supported by a substantial and sufficient artillery preparation of the LZ [landing zone].
• 'Never maneuver a single company by itself. Always move two together. [A month before our arrival, the 173rd Airborne Brigade had lost the greater part of two companies moving separately into an NVA ambush at Dak To.]
• 'Never occupy a night defensive position with only one company. One company cannot last the night against a regimental-size attack. But two with appropriate artillery fire support can.
• 'Always have rifle companies reach night bed-down locations in sufficient time to dig defensive positions and register their DEFCONs [defensive fire concentrations] with every artillery unit in range before darkness.
• 'Leave night bed-down locations before daylight and at varying times so as not to establish a pattern. And always recon by fire before starting your movement — just in case the NVA has moved in around your position during the night.'
This sage advice reflected not only Johnson's tactical proficiency and competence, but also what he had learned in fighting the NVA. It proved very beneficial to us in fulfilling our responsibilities in our days to come.
Before I move on to my unit, the 3rd Battalion, 12th Infantry, I'd like to give you a general overview of what we were facing. But please be aware that as an infantry major, I had very little knowledge of the overall strategic situation in which I found myself. My focus was very simple: to take the fight to the enemy, and to win every battle with minimum loss of life to our troops.
I can point out, however, that our position set us athwart one of the major funnel outlets for the Ho Chi Minh Trail, which explains the predominant presence of NVA rather than Viet Cong forces. The Trail had 'exits' and troop staging and resupply facilities in the vicinity of the most strategically important locations. Dak To was one such location. Our mission was to deny the NVA control over this area. If we had failed to put the cork in that bottle, disaster would have soon followed. The NVA could have taken control of the Central Highlands carly in the war.
I didn't have to go more than a couple of hundred yards to join my unit.
The previous year, the 4th Division had deployed as a unit from Fort Lewis, Washington, and had suffered quite a few casualties during its first year in Vietnam. Replacements had been received and integrated into my battalion throughout the year, but now it was time for the original members to complete their tour and return home. When they left, the battalion would be down to about fifty percent strength, requiring a large number of replacements (officers, NCOs, and new enlisted men) and an intensive training program to bring the entire battalion back up to combat proficiency. Most new replacements had never met one another; all of them would have to be trained and integrated into the battalion.
A fourth rifle company was also added to each battalion in order to increase its overall effectiveness.
For a month, my new unit, the 3rd Battalion, 12th Infantry, was given the mission of firebase security for the brigade headquarters. The battalion was commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Pat Volmer.
Because it was my responsibility as the battalion operations and training officer, I quickly developed a training program, which was blessed by Lieutenant Colonel Volmer. As a first step, officers and NCOs with the most experience in Vietnam were cross-leveled between companies within the battalion to create a common base of experience, and within a couple of days the program was under way.
The area around Jackson's Hole turned out to be an ideal environment for training, since just about every day each unit was likely to experience some form of low-level enemy activity — sniper activity or maybe a mortar round near where they happened to be — just enough to let everyone know they were involved in serious business.
The battalion recon platoon consisted of only twelve men. Its normal
I had a somewhat different concept, which I tried out on the battalion commander, and he approved. The concept was to reorganize and train a much more capable platoon, which would function like Rangers; they would set ambushes rather than just observe and get extracted. Once the ambush was sprung, we would react immediately with on-call preplanned artillery and mortar fire, followed by the insertion of (minimally) a rifle company. This new platoon consisted of four squads of nine men each. Each squad was organized as two M-60 machine gun teams, and every man was armed with an antipersonnel claymore mine. This concept proved to be extremely effective — and the new platoon suffered very few casualties.
After six to eight weeks of day-and-night intensive training, we completed the program. We then deployed by helo to an area called VC Valley, which was located about forty kilometers east of Jackson Hole and fifteen
