Acknowledgments

Grateful acknowledgment is made to: A soldier on Firebase Rendezvous at the edge of the A Shau Valley during Lam Son 719, Spring 1971.

He said to me, “You can do it, Man. You write about this place. You been here a long time. People gotta know what it was really like.” And thus this book began.

To Dr. John Henry Hatcher, Archivist, The Center for Military History, to First Lieutenant Kevin R. Hart, Division Historian, 101^st Airborne Division (Airmobile), and to Miss Gilbert, Librarian, The Army Library, for documents, assistance and information; To Dr. Byron J. Good and Dr. Mary Jo Good, University of California, Davis, for help with the theoretical constructs of war causation; To Lee Bartels, a soldier with the 101^st Airborne at Khe Ta Laou, for assistance with the story; To Jane Vandenburgh, Susan Harper, F.X. Flinn, Alan Rinzler and Kathleen Moloney, for editorial assistance; To my parents, relatives and friends for moral support; And to the Ratcliffes, without them I would have quit after Chapter 23.

For the Warriors Publishing Group Edition:

When one’s career spans multiple decades one hopefully has gained deeper perspectives; one certainly has developed a vast multitude of additional individuals deserving thanks—far too many to name.

As I gaze back upon my long-ago time as a soldier, I am overcome with great awe at the incredible good fortune I had to serve with such valiant men lead by such strong and professional commanders. From brigade to battalion to company and platoon, their leadership and dedication to the cause of freedom in Viet Nam—often misunderstood at the time by a skeptical Spec 4—was second to none. I wish I could thank you each in person.

This anniversary edition owes much, as always, to the support of family and friends—Frank A. Del Vecchio, Elena and Joe Rusnak, Mary-Jo and Byron Good, Bruce Ratcliffe, Doug Esposito, Gerry Kissell and Tom Waltz.

A very special thanks goes to Julia Dye of Warriors Publishing Group for her inspiration and tireless resolve.

Without all the above, not just this book but the entire career would have withered after its first flash and gasp of life.

Note on the Maps:

Although a novel, The 13th Valley is a real place where American soldiers fought and died in August 1970. During the writing of the book, copies of the U.S. Army 1::50,000 topographic maps of the area were consulted. For this 30th Anniversary edition, all new maps—topographic in style and more accurate than the relief maps in earlier editions—were created by Nate Del Vecchio.