“In the Mekong Delta, South Vietnamese rangers killed 33 Viet Cong in a battle southwest of Saigon. In fighting which raged for several hours, seven Vietcong were captured along with four crew weapons and two mortars.”
—Atlanta Constitution, August 17, 1967
August 19, 1967
I was ready to pull the trigger.
If I had to kill, I could do it. I was trained, and I knew if it came to that, I would commit myself to the chilling prospect. After all, I had grown up hunting small game in south Georgia, my grandfather had presented me with a shotgun at fourteen, and I bought my first pistol at sixteen. I followed the buildup of hostilities in Southeast Asia for two years in high school, four years in military school, and another year in the U.S. Army. The military had steeled my spine and conditioned my mind and body for the trials I was to face. I was proficient in an array of destructive tools, a soldier anxious to take my place on the battlefield.
I tasted the salty sweat on my upper lip. My khaki shirt clung to my back from the tortuous non-air-conditioned car ride. I welcomed a flight to the other side of the world, to a place I had studied from afar. The worst part of it was this, the very beginning. I waited with the two most significant people in my life, my mother and father. We stood in awkward silence, not knowing what to say to one another.
I was a trained professional, prepared for every hardship man or nature could throw at me—petrified by what I had to endure. Passengers moved about us in the busy airport in Jacksonville, Florida. Despite the cooled air in the terminal, I was very hot and uncomfortable. My father was dressed in a jacket, tie, and hat; my mother was in a Sunday-best dress. I felt we were at a funeral—mine.
My mother broke the awkward silence. “What will you be doing in Vietnam, son?”
Oh, I wished she had not asked that question. I knew I was going to be an advisor to the South Vietnamese army. But I had been in the army for only a little over a year myself. I knew that I would respond to my personal challenges, but I didn’t really think I had much advice to offer people who were already fighting their war.
“I’ll work with the South Vietnamese, Mom. I won’t know my job until I get there.” I tried to sound confident and in control. “I’ll write as soon as I can.” A trickle of sweat crept down my leg. For a moment, I thought I had wet my pants. I excused myself to go to the bathroom, just in case. Using paper towels, I dried my chest, waist, and legs beneath my uniform. The image of a pale soldier in the mirror startled me, since I believed I was alone. Then I recognized my own reflection. No wonder my mother looked at me as if I were a dead man—I looked like one!
Returning to the passenger area near the gate, I noticed that my parents had taken a seat on a bench. I wished they hadn’t done that because I felt better standing. My mother had tears in her eyes, and my father’s chin quivered as he asked, “You’ll be going to San Francisco?”
It was a question I knew had already been answered. “Actually, I’ll fly to Atlanta and take a connecting flight to San Francisco. There, I’ll take a helicopter to Oakland, and then a taxi the army depot.” I reviewed the itinerary again for the third or fourth time.
My father had served in the U.S. Navy in the Pacific Theater in World War II. I remembered sitting on the floor with my mother when I was two years old, listening to a seventy-eight rpm record of his voice talking to us from Hawaii. We listened to it over and over. Despite that, I didn’t think he knew how I felt. He had gone in a general mobilization to save the nation from attacking forces of Japan. No one was sure why I was going to this little guerilla war. But even without clear definition this was my grand adventure. The purpose would evolve later, along with the outcome. I was going to war in Vietnam; my country wanted me to go, and I was a volunteer. That was good enough for me.
My flight was announced. I shook my father’s hand and hugged my mother. “I’ll write,” I promised. I was not afraid of the war, but I was terrified of losing control of my own emotions at that moment.
“Goodbye.” It sounded so final as my father said it.
“Write when you can, and take care of yourself,” my mother added.
“Bye,” I managed as I turned to walk up the gangway to board the plane. No further discussion was possible just then, although our feeling’s were about to burst out all over. No utterance could be allowed that might trigger that eruption.
Some things never change: young, idealistic men going off to war, breaking the hearts of their mothers and fathers, fiancées, and children; fearful of the undertaking ahead, but more afraid of showing anxiety or breaking down at a defining moment of manhood.
I had already spent a year in the stateside army after being commissioned a Regular Army second lieutenant through the ROTC program at North Georgia College. In the 101st Airborne Division, I had taken my responsibilities as a platoon leader and company executive officer seriously; I had also taken every possible opportunity to attend training, and I mastered basic airborne, jumpmaster, pathfinder, and the infantry officer’s basic training before receiving my orders to the dreaded Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, known as MACV. I aspired to go overseas with my own beloved 101st Airborne Division, not as an advisor to the Vietnamese but as a fighting man in a U.S. combat unit, so I had been disappointed at the advisor’s role assigned to me.
Nevertheless, I had trained at the Military Assistance Training and Advisors Course at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, learned about Vietnamese culture, geography, organizations, and a little of the language, and after all this preparation accepted my assignment as a start, not an end, to my campaign as an American soldier. I had very little understanding then of what could really be changed by one person, much less an army or even a great nation. I’m not sure I really cared—I just wanted to break away and ride the waves of time and history.
As I found my seat on the plane, I could envision my parents swallowing their emotional strain all the way home. Their stoic natures had not allowed for a public expression of their emotions any more than mine had. For myself, I was shaking inside so badly that it must have been written on my face. I didn’t know what to do with my hands. I hoped drinks would be served soon, but I would have to change planes in Atlanta before taking the long flight to San Francisco.
I found myself sitting next to a beautiful girl about my age, who was anxious to make small talk. Just my luck that this was the only time in my life that I was sitting next to an attractive stranger who wanted to get acquainted, and my heart pounded so fast that I couldn’t catch my breath. My windpipe was so constricted from holding back a groan that I might never talk again. I spent the rest of the flight trying to master my swirling emotions. After a couple of beers in Atlanta and on the flight to San Francisco, I finally felt that I was in control again, at least of the present situation if not the future. I was almost grateful to have lost the beautiful stranger in the airport; I couldn’t have carried on that charade any longer.
Oakland and San Francisco were a blur of in-processing and out-processing. The army had, of course, long before mastered the art of processing people. You started by standing in line, and after that, just followed the leader. Oakland Army Depot seemed sleazy, but it was nicer than the surrounding neighborhood. I met another officer at the processing center and we decided to make the most of our last night in civilization. I don’t remember his name or much of the evening except for singing “I Left My Heart in San Francisco” at a little bar in Jack London Square.
The journey had finally begun. I was on my way to make my own personal history, and discover whether I would blink in the face of it. My father had gone to war and returned, and our ancestors had done the same. History repeats itself. This wasn’t anything new. But it was incredibly new to me, and that’s what counted.