When Maj. Welzant pointed to the situation map on the wall of the S-3 shop, I knew immediately where he was pointing to since this area had been a fixture in my mind for the past month. It was Happy Valley. He told me my next mission was to take Killer Kane into Happy Valley so we could screen the western flank of the 1st Battalion, 7th Marines, who would be conducting a search-and-destroy mission a few miles east of our insertion LZ. The name of the operation we would be supporting was Operation Pecos. Division had decided to launch this operation because intelligence indicated an increased presence of NVA units in the valley and a possible storage facility for the 122 mm rockets that had been used to attack the Da Nang Airbase on 15 July, causing the destruction or damage of 42 aircraft and the death of eight Americans. Signals intelligence indicated the source of the rockets was an NVA artillery regiment that had recently arrived in South Vietnam and had established a base somewhere in Happy Valley. Division wanted to eliminate this threat to Da Nang Airbase as quickly as possible. Since this operation would involve Marine infantry units sweeping east to west in our direction and likely cause the NVA to pass through our NFZ, he suggested I take my entire platoon with me on this patrol. He pointed out that the NVA in Happy Valley probably would withdraw to the west away from the advancing infantry, and this would increase the likelihood we would encounter them. One good piece of news he passed along was the infantry would be bringing in a battery of 105 mm howitzers with them, which meant we would have access to a firing battery in direct support of us. This artillery battery would establish a fire support base on the valley floor, so our patrol would be within friendly artillery range, a rarity for patrols in Happy Valley.
With this information and some maps and aerial photos from our S-2 shop, I went in search of my new platoon sergeant, GySgt. Walter M. Webb, so we could plan the patrol together. Gunny Webb was a highly experienced reconnaissance Marine who had served with force reconnaissance companies several times during his long career in the Corps. He had made well over 200 parachute jumps, was scuba qualified, and had attended all the advanced reconnaissance training courses offered by the U.S. military. I took an instant liking to this seasoned SNCO and greatly valued his advice and assistance. We both decided that we would take every available man in the fifth platoon and we would go “heavy” in terms of weapons and ammunition. With this in mind, we decided to take two machine guns with us: an M-60 machine gun and a Stoner light machine gun. We would also take an M-79 grenade launcher and two Claymore mines. Each man would take at least 300 rounds of rifle ammunition and four hand grenades, while the machine gunners would take 400 linked rounds per gun.
The men on this patrol were all experienced; we were not taking any rookies. In addition to Gunny Webb, the other members of this patrol were Borecky, Pugh, Hauxhurst, Hager, Williams, Slowick, Garner, Glor, Dobson, Combs, Bingham, Gardner, and Connor. I felt supremely confident about this team. It was a highly skilled and experienced team of reconnaissance Marines and corpsmen, a team fully capable of performing any mission assigned no matter how difficult or dangerous. Events on our upcoming patrol would prove me right.
On the day of insertion, 21 July, teams Killer Kane and Circumstance were heli-lifted into a small LZ next to the shallow but swift-moving stream that ran through a narrow part of Happy Valley. The main infiltration route for the NVA, the “Yellow Brick Road,” followed the stream, crossing back and forth along its path, looking from the air like two black snakes intertwined with each other. We took ground fire as we were being inserted, but I told the pilots to land us anyway because I knew this was the only location where we could effectively perform our screening mission. Team Killer Kane landed first in the LZ. We established security in the LZ and then Circumstance landed and joined us. Our two teams waited together for 20 minutes to see if the enemy had found us, but no one came down the valley trail from either the west or east. Team Circumstance then moved out to the south to their assigned NFZ on the south side of the valley, an area called Col de Ba Lien, while we moved out to the north up a steep, slippery hill where we hoped we would be able to establish an OP of the trail and also maintain radio communications with both Ba Na radio relay station and the 7th Marines to our east. The jungle canopy on this hill was quite high with most trees reaching a height of 90 to 100 feet. Beneath the canopy, which was so thick very little sunlight filtered through, there was thick secondary growth that made movement difficult and slow.
After an hour of climbing, we reached the summit of the hill and found it was a ridgeline running parallel to the valley below. On the ridgeline we found a well-used trail running in an east-west direction and several large bomb craters and trees that had been splintered badly, the result of a recent TPQ-10 bombing. I was impressed with the damage done by this mini–Arc Light. The twenty or so 500-pound bombs dropped by a Marine A-6 “Intruder” bomber had shattered trees as thick as a few feet in diameter and left dirt, leaves and branches in tangled masses on the jungle floor, along with many twisted bomb fragments imbedded in the surrounding trees.
I wanted to make sure I had good communication so I had the team move into one of the large bomb craters just off the trail and had my radio operators take out their ten-foot whip antennas so we could establish positive communications for the team. Both radio operators soon signaled to me that they had solid communications with Ba Na radio relay site, the 7th Marines, and the artillery battery supporting the operation. This was welcome news, indeed.
Jit Gardner in Happy Valley.
James Hager with his Stoner light machine gun.
The Yellow Brick Road, halfway to Laos.
I sent Gunny Webb and five Marines 100 yards to the west down the ridgeline’s trail while I took Sgt. Pugh and three other Marines 100 yards to the east along the same trail. Both groups set up hasty ambushes just off the trail in the hope that any enemy contemplating attacking us would approach the team using this trail. We sat in our ambush locations for several hours but nothing materialized so I had both ambush teams return to the bomb crater for the rest of the day.
When I crawled into the bomb crater I was told by LCpl. Garner that there were “voices” on our frequency but he could not understand what they were saying. He handed the handset to me and I listened for an hour but heard nothing. Later that night, one of the men on radio watch woke me and handed me the handset again. This time I could hear Vietnamese and Japanese being spoken very clearly. In fact, their voices came in more clearly than the voices of the Marines operating only a few miles to our east. One of the Japanese voices on the radio referred to “A Shau” several times, which we interpreted to be the A Shau Valley several miles northwest of us in Thua Thien Province and a major enemy base area. Later on during this patrol we would again hear voices on our frequency talking in Vietnamese and Japanese. Sgt. Pugh was the only one in our patrol who could understand Vietnamese but he only listened to the voices once and he seemed to think the voices belonged to a friendly Vietnamese unit. I asked Ba Na to check to see if any friendly ARVN units were operating near us, and they reported back that no ARVN units were within 10 miles of us.
Charles Gillespie, a New Jersey native, near the Hai Van Pass.
After an uneventful night, the strange voices on our radio notwithstanding, Killer Kane moved out along the ridgeline trail to the east in search of a place where we could establish an OP overlooking the valley to the south. We left the bomb crater before sunrise and traveled for approximately two hours moving cautiously along the trail and making many stops to listen for enemy activity and to make sure we were not being followed. Then, at 0915, Sgt. Pugh turned to me and held up his hand in front of his face, the arm and hand signal for “enemy sighted.” Ahead of him I could see LCpl. Slowick, the point man, in a crouching position looking to his left, his rifle in his shoulder. Pugh slowly moved toward me and raised his forefinger to his lips, and then he cupped his hand near my ear and whispered, “We hear VC voices below us.” As he said this, I heard the voices also and they sounded like they were very, very close to us. I will now provide the reader with the actual words I used when I recorded the events of this patrol for the U.S. Marine Corps History Division as part of their Oral History Program:
At first I thought these voices were so loud that they couldn’t be VC; they must be Marines operating in the area, because they obviously felt very secure. However, after checking my map I decided no friendly units were anywhere near us. We moved up very carefully, very slowly until we came upon four VC sitting around a fire in a ravine below us. We heard other voices indicating there were more, but we had no idea how many there were at this time. I called up one of my machine gunners, Cpl. Hager, and along with our point man, John Slowick, our backup point, Sgt. Pugh, and me, we formed a tight line facing downhill into the ravine. The four of us opened fire almost simultaneously on the VC sitting around the campfire. Gunny Webb brought up the rest of the platoon, positioned them on line, and had them fire into the enemy position below. After ten minutes of intensive fire, we had complete fire superiority; the enemy only returned two bursts of automatic weapons fire during the entire exchange. We slacked up a bit and then we threw a dozen hand grenades and gas grenades down into the ravine. We did not have to don our gas masks since the wind carried the gas away from us and toward the enemy. About thirty minutes after the engagement was initiated, five men, myself included, moved down into the ravine in order to assess what damage we had done (Oral History Collection No. 1467, History Division, HQMC).
As we moved down into the ravine we saw that it stretched out on a flat surface that ran for nearly 100 yards to the north. On the eastern side there was a shallow stream about five feet wide that ran into the main stream in the valley 100 meters to the south. A high embankment ran the length of the stream on the eastern side. In front of us lay two enemy dead next to a small camp fire. I took some pictures of them and of the abundant weapons and equipment lying about the floor of the ravine. I wanted visual proof of what had transpired. I was not always confident that our patrol reports were taken seriously by our intelligence analysts back in Da Nang, but photos were impossible to ignore or refute.
It dawned on us that we had attacked a sizeable enemy force and they had abandoned all of their packs and supplies in their haste to retreat. I expected such a large enemy force to recover quickly and attempt a counterattack; I did not want this to occur while we were in the ravine with so much high ground surrounding us. We hastily picked up and carried the numerous packs and weapons lying around us, but we did not want to go too far down the ravine to recover all of it. I estimated we left at least half of the packs in the ravine. We carried those we recovered up to the ridgeline and conducted a quick inventory. It took five of us to go through everything we had collected.
We collected the following items: 16 packs containing 140 NVA uniforms, 15 sweatshirts, 19 towels, plastic sheeting, 15 ponchos, 15 pounds of medical supplies, six cooking pots, 16 sets of metal chopsticks, five ceramic cups, four field knives, eight gas masks, two Russian compasses, two Russian binoculars, twenty-two 30-round AK-47 magazines, 850 pounds of rice, and many personal items. In addition to the items in the packs, we recovered two new Chinese RPD light machine guns, two Chinese RPG-7 rocket grenade launchers, a Chinese AK-47 assault rifle, 19 Chinese potato masher-type hand grenades, 30 pounds of Czech plastic explosives, a wooden box containing blasting caps, and 30 feet of time fuse. Finally, one of the last items we brought up out of the ravine was a large, leather satchel that contained numerous documents, three communist flags, $256 in U.S. currency, $580 in U.S. military scrip currency, and 181,000 South Vietnamese piasters. We were stunned by this valuable haul of enemy equipment, cash, and documents. I sent a message to Camp Reasoner informing them of the captured items, and they immediately radioed back to us that we were to find the nearest LZ and stand by to have the items sent back to Camp Reasoner.
We needed to find an LZ that was close because the weight of such a large amount of gear would make it impossible to travel very far. I knew there was a strong likelihood that we would find an LZ in the valley to the south, so I dispatched Gunny Webb, Cpl. Hager, and PFC Glor to follow the stream in the ravine 100 meters south to where it intersected with the main stream on the valley floor. I felt confident we would find an LZ in that area.
Gunny Webb was gone only a few minutes when we heard rifle fire. A few minutes later, he reappeared with Hager and Glor and he was carrying a Chinese Type 56 carbine over his shoulder and smiling broadly. The three of them climbed up the trail to our position, and he told me that there was a good LZ just 100 yards south of our position and that he had encountered two NVA soldiers hiding by the stream bank. He had shot one, and Hager killed the other. He took the carbine off one of them but did not have time to search the other body.
I was relieved that Gunny Webb was unhurt and elated that he had found a good LZ so close to us. I radioed Camp Reasoner that we were moving to the LZ, and we expected to be there in 30 minutes. They radioed back that helicopters were on the way with a reaction force made up of volunteers from team Hateful led by Lt. Bob Drake. We had a devil of a time lugging all of the captured enemy packs down to the LZ even though we lightened the load by dumping the 850 pounds of rice all over the hill before we left. Still, it made for a difficult descent into the valley. Sweating profusely and laboring under the added weight, we finally made it to the LZ just as the helicopter’s pilots radioed to tell us that they were inbound and only five minutes away.
Killer Kane with captured enemy weapons and flags. Back row, left to right: Lt. Mike St. Clair, me, Borecky, Bingham, Jit Gardner, John Slowick, Gy Sgt. Walter B. Webb, Major Charles Welzant; middle row, left to right: Captain Albert “King” Dixon, J. D. Glor, Combs, James Hauxhurst, Donald Connor, unknown; front row, left to right: Gy Sgt. Gabbert, Dave Pugh, James Hager, R. Garner, Donald Dobson.
When I had heard that a reaction force was being sent out to help us, I assumed that we would be extracted along with the captured gear. How wrong I was! As Lt. Drake’s team ran out of the back of the CH-46, I could not help but notice that none of them were wearing any face paint or carrying any packs, a clear indication that they had no intention of staying on the ground. Any lingering doubt I had was dispelled when Bob Drake told me he had been sent out to help our team load the captured gear onto the chopper, and then he and his team would return to Camp Reasoner with it. Killer Kane was to remain in the field and continue on its mission. I was a bit incredulous, so I radioed Camp Reasoner and asked for confirmation that we were not going to be extracted even though we had just been in a firefight and the enemy certainly knew where we were. The terse message came back that we were to continue on our patrol.
Lt. Drake and his team helped us load the enemy gear on the Ch-46, and then he and his team boarded it and flew off to the east. Gunny Webb could not believe we were going to be left in the field after getting into such a big fight with a superior enemy force, and he made his displeasure known to me. I knew there was no alternative so I simply told him we needed to get out of the area fast! I did not want to make contact again with the enemy, so I decided to move closer to the 7th Marines and, hopefully, link up with them. To do this, we would have to move east along the valley floor following the major stream and “The Yellow Brick Road” in the valley. This was very dangerous, but I did not want to go west with the potential of leaving the artillery fan or to go north where the enemy had withdrawn after our firefight. Taking the patrol south was not an option either since that would take us into the NFZ of team Circumstance. My only real option was to move east quickly and then hide close to the trail so I could continue to screen the western approaches to the 7th Marines’ AO.
As we moved out, I noticed that not every pack had been loaded on the helicopter. Gunny Webb was carrying an NVA pack in addition to his own. I also noted that one of the men was carrying the Chinese Type 56 carbine Gunny Webb had captured. I didn’t say anything to either of these men since we were moving on a well-used trail and my mind was concentrated on this dangerous task. I told the point man to find a good OP site close to the trail as soon as possible but not to rush things since I did not want to alert any enemy who might be using the trail. I also told our rear point men to employ our tandem point system where they would leap frog with one man always covering the other as he moved. I did this because I thought it more likely the enemy would follow us and attack us the rear than from the direction of the 7th Marines to our front.
We crossed and recrossed the stream running in the valley, stopping each time to allow our rear point to obscure our foot prints in the mud. We moved along the trail for about 500 meters, and then we found a good spot to harbor for the night. It was close enough to the trail to observe movement, but far enough away to remain hidden. Around 1900, as darkness was beginning to fall, we observed a small group of VC moving southwest near the trail. We called in an artillery mission on them with excellent coverage, but we could not see any results. The foliage we were in was quite thick, and I did not want to risk moving in the dark to search the impact area.
After the fire mission, I went over to Gunny Webb and asked him about the pack he was carrying. At first, he told me he had simply forgotten to put it on the helicopter but I knew better and asked him why he had kept it. He told me that he did not trust the people in the rear to save the really good trading items for the team, and he predicted the “rear area poges” would steal most of what was valuable in the enemy packs. I sympathized with him and told him had I known we were going to be left in the field while the enemy gear would go back to Camp Reasoner without us, I would have probably combed the cache for all the valuable trading items myself. I knew many of my team members still did not possess all the equipment they needed, and the only way to obtain this valuable gear was to trade items we captured from the enemy with people who possessed the items we needed. For instance, we all needed camouflage uniforms, ARVN rucksacks, and survival kits, but only half of us possessed these things. I asked the Gunny what goodies he had stored in the pack, and he told me he had salvaged a Russian pistol, two NVA web belts with stars engraved on the buckles, a blue plastic wallet, a pair of Russian binoculars, a green notebook with poems written in it, some pictures, and a metal box the size of a standard shoe box. One of the pictures was a professionally done portrait of an attractive Vietnamese woman. When we returned from our patrol, an intelligence officer at division told us she was a famous prostitute and Da Nang brothel owner who passed out these pictures to her clients as a form of advertising. This woman later went into politics and owned a hotel in Da Nang. How an NVA soldier obtained such a photo was a mystery.
Just before dark, I noticed that Gunny Webb had left the harbor site to answer the call of nature. He had with him the entrenching tool we used to dig a cat hole for a hasty latrine. When he returned, the pack was not with him. I assumed he had transferred the items in the NVA pack to his own and ditched the empty enemy pack in the bush somewhere. I also noted that the man that I had seen carrying the Type 56 Chinese carbine was no longer carrying it. Following the usual procedure, he had disassembled it and hidden it in his rucksack. I knew it was wrong to not turn these captured weapons over to the Division G-2, but I also knew these weapons were prized trading items. Once they were surrendered to the G-2, we would never see them again.
The next day, the 23rd, our patrol continued in a southeasterly direction following the stream and trail in the valley. Where the valley began to open up, we found a VC farm that measured 200 meters by 100 meters with a well-constructed fence made of bamboo surrounding it. Millet and rice were growing in the farm’s well-tended fields. Since Happy Valley was not inhabited, we knew the only people doing any farming in the valley were enemy soldiers. We expected to encounter the enemy at this farm but it was deserted, at least temporarily. We moved on a bit further and found several well-constructed bunkers had been placed every 100 meters along the “Yellow Brick Road” south of Hill 417. From their construction and orientation, it appeared these well-camouflaged bunkers were part of an elaborate ambush scheme. Fortunately for Killer Kane, the ambush site was not occupied.
At 1500 on the 24th, Killer Kane was extracted from an old, abandoned rice paddy field a few hundred meters north of the “Yellow Brick Road” (Team Killer Kane Patrol Report, 24 July 1967). When we arrived at LZ Finch, we were amazed by the number of people there to greet us. It looked like half the 1st Marine Division staff was there, along with a host of officers and men from the 1st Reconnaissance Battalion. There were also reporters and photographers from the Sea Tiger and the Stars and Stripes military newspapers. We were asked to pose for some photographs with the three communist flags and the weapons we had captured and then military reporters interviewed us before Lt. St. Claire had a chance to debrief us.
It was nice to be the center of all of that attention, but our enthusiasm was soon dampened when we asked where all the captured gear was. Mike St. Claire told me that when the helicopters landed at LZ Finch, several intelligence officers from division quickly took charge of the gear and removed it from Camp Reasoner so it could be analyzed. I asked him if we could get everything back after they were through with it, and he said he would ask. Capt. Dixon then told us that when the gear came in he was able to only retrieve the three communist flags and the weapons from the pile unloaded on LZ Finch. He told me he feared that the rest of it was in the hands of various staff officers at division.
I was very disappointed and angry over this news. I told Capt. Dixon that my team had captured that gear. Many of the items we had captured were of no intelligence value but of great value to the team for trade items. He agreed and said he would do his best to get everything back for us that was not deemed of intelligence value. I then told him that we had captured a lot of U.S. and Vietnamese money, and I wanted this returned to us so we could use it to have a platoon party and buy ARVN rucksacks for everyone who did not already have one. He looked at me strangely and then he produced an inventory made by the Division G-2 team of what they took with them when they left LZ Finch with our captured gear. The inventory did not contain any mention of money, and it was clearly a truncated list with most of the valuable items missing. My anger grew, and I nearly lost my temper. However, I knew Capt. Dixon and Lt. St. Claire were not responsible for this brazen thievery. This had to be the work of some person who was totally devoid of integrity.
To add insult to injury, Capt. Dixon informed me that Gen. Robertson, the division commander, had mentioned that he would like to have the weapons we had captured and the three communist flags so that these items could be put on display in the division headquarters and later given to the Marine Corps History Division. Now, I was really angry, and so was GySgt. Webb, who was standing nearby and overheard our conversation. I made some very profane and injudicious comments about senior officers and staff “pukes,” all of which evoked looks of commiseration from Lt. St. Claire and Capt. Dixon, but did nothing to help the situation. Both officers told me to make a complete list from memory, and they would take it to the Division G-2 and ask them to return any items on our list, including the money that was missing.
After I had cooled down somewhat, Gunny Webb and I went back to my hootch where I took out the list of items I had inventoried, and we combined it with the list he had made. We then took the combined list to Capt. Dixon, who thanked us and immediately went up to the division headquarters, even though it was getting dark and most of the division staff had gone to chow. Gunny Webb and I went to eat chow at the recon mess hall, and while we shared a beer before eating he berated me as only a Marine SNCO can berate a lieutenant about trusting people living in the rear with captured goodies. I felt very bad about letting so much valuable gear out of our sight, and I apologized for my naïveté and misplaced trust in the Marine intelligence community.
As I was beginning to wax eloquent about how stupid I was, he confided in me, telling me that “all is not lost.” He said he would talk to me in the morning about it, but for now we should just get some hot chow and a few more beers.
The next day, Capt. Dixon came over to my hootch, and I could tell he was angry. He told me that he had taken the list Gunny Webb and I had written to the Division G-2 and had been told they had only taken a few items and that someone else must have the rest. In effect, the Division G-2 told Capt. Dixon they were “lost.” I could see that Capt. Dixon was as angry as I was, and he made several remarks about the perfidy of people who would take such items from a recon team. He then said he was going to discuss it personally with Gen. Robertson.
As it turned out, the missing items were never returned, but Gen. Robertson invited Capt. Dixon and me up to the command bunker so we could present him with the three flags we had captured, one of which was quite large and made of colorful silk. This flag had been presented to the 402nd Sapper Battalion by the Da Nang Central Committee of the Lao Dong (Workers) Party. At first, I told Capt. Dixon I did not want to go, but he convinced me that Gen. Robertson had nothing to do with the missing gear, and it would only make for some very bad feelings if I refused his request. Reluctantly, I agreed to go with him.
The next day, the two of us trudged up Hill 327 to the command bunker where Gen. Robertson had his office, and we dutifully reported to him. Capt. Dixon had the flags with him, and we both noticed that someone had already mounted the weapons we had captured on the command bunker wall for display. I managed to smile as a photographer took our picture as we presented the flags to Gen. Robertson. Then the general made a few complimentary remarks while a reporter from Stars and Stripes took notes. After the ceremony, we left General Robertson’s office and walked back down the hill to Camp Reasoner.
When we returned to Capt. Dixon’s office, he asked me to sit down while he pulled a flag out of one of the drawers of his field desk. It was the large, ornate 402nd Sapper Battalion flag we had just presented to Gen. Robertson. He put the flag back in the drawer smiling. At first, I thought maybe he had talked Gen. Robertson into giving back the flag but that was not the case at all. Some enterprising Marine, probably Gunny Webb, had suggested that the original flag be taken to a local seamstress in Da Nang and copied. This was done in a single night, and the copied flag was the one Capt. Dixon took with him and presented to Gen. Robertson. The original flag we captured was retained by the company. I never knew what happened to the original because, like everything else we captured, it later disappeared as well.
Several days after the ceremony in Gen. Robertson’s office, I received a copy of the picture that had been taken showing Capt. Dixon and me presenting the flag to Gen. Robertson. An inscription written by Gen. Robertson on the photo read, “To Killer Kane, the most productive reconnaissance patrol from an intelligence point of view that has ever been conducted in Vietnam by the Marine Corps.” This was high praise, indeed. When I showed the picture to my platoon and they read the inscription from Gen. Robertson, it had an immediate and dramatic effect on all of us. It lifted our morale and made us forget our disappointment over the lost trading items we had captured in Happy Valley.
I knew we had captured a treasure trove of enemy documents, and I was curious to find out exactly what these documents told us, so I went up to the Division G-2 shop to find out. There I found a SSgt. who had analyzed the captured documents, and he told me that our team had attacked the 1st Company of the 402nd Sapper Battalion, one of the most elite enemy units in I Corps. According to a roster we had captured, the company had an active strength of 43 troops with ninety percent of them coming from North Vietnam and only a handful from South Vietnam. The Marine SNCO went on to tell me this unit had been responsible for several attacks on the Da Nang Airbase in April and July, an attack on the ESSO fuel storage facility north of Da Nang, and the attack on the anti-aircraft Hawk missile battery on Hill 327. He told me they were well equipped with new weapons from China and had received their sapper training with the 320th NVA Reconnaissance Regiment in North Vietnam before infiltrating south along the Ho Chi Minh Trail. The documents we captured included code books, unit rosters, unit code designations, maps with various NVA positions marked on them, correspondence with the Da Nang Central Committee and other communist military units and political committees in Quang Nam Province, and the names of several VC agents who were responsible for buying local goods for the unit and transporting them to Happy Valley. Several of these documents were highly classified and referred to an upcoming major offensive against targets in Da Nang and several district headquarters in Quang Nam Province. I asked the Marine SNCO when this “big offensive” was scheduled to take place, and he said the communists were always talking about major offensives and this probably had more to do with keeping up their morale than any real plans. He said he doubted they could mount any sustained attack on Da Nang, but they were capable of limited sapper attacks against any number of targets in the province. The last thing he told me was he had found a Marine utility uniform with the name “H. P. Ostdszewski” stenciled on it inside one of the enemy packs. I wondered if this enemy unit intended to use this uniform to try to infiltrate into the division AO to perform one of their sapper missions.
The presentation of false captured enemy flags to the commanding general of the 1st Marine Division in his office on Hill 327. From left, Andrew Finlayson, General Robertson, Captain King Dixon.
On 27 July, all the members of Killer Kane received the Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry for the patrol where we attacked 100 enemy soldiers near Hiep Duc. I was pleased by this but found it ironic that the South Vietnamese Government seemed more appreciative of our efforts than the U.S. Marine Corps.
After our platoon had finished a morning run to the Freedom Hill PX and back, Gunny Webb asked to speak with me about “a confidential matter.” I asked him if he wanted to come to my hootch to talk, and he said he would prefer to have me come to his hootch since he wanted to show me something he had in his foot locker. I followed him to his hootch, where he invited me in and asked me to sit down at a small table he had fashioned out of spare lumber. He then went over to his foot locker and unlocked it. In a low whisper he said, “Lieutenant, when I was on the LZ waiting for Hateful, I knew they were going to take that gear away from us and we would never see it again, so I took one of the packs and stowed this money in it. We can use it for a really good party for the platoon.” Now I understood why he told me the night before that “all was not lost.” Two weeks later, we used the $256 of captured U.S. currency to purchase a case of 100 New York–cut steaks and several cases of Japanese beer from an Air Force friend of Gunny Webb’s.
A few days after we had returned from our Happy Valley adventure, GySgt. Webb told me one of the Marines in my platoon, Cpl. Anthony Allen, wanted to request mast with me. Request mast is a naval term used by the Marine Corps to describe the formal procedure where a subordinate requests a personal audience with his immediate superior. I asked the Gunny what the problem was and the Gunny said Allen was having some “emotional problems” and “wanted out of the bush.” I could tell that the Gunny was not very sympathetic toward Allen, so I asked him if he thought Allen really had a problem or he was just shirking. He said he thought Allen had “lost his nerve on the last patrol in Happy Valley” and he was “short,” meaning he had only a few weeks to go before his tour of duty was complete. I told the Gunny to send him over to my hootch immediately, and I would talk to him.
Tony Allen normally went out with my other team, Brisbane, so I did not know him as well as some of the other men in the platoon. He always performed well and never caused me any trouble, so I was a bit surprised by his request to leave the field. We sat down together on my back porch while he told me he knew in his heart that he would die if he went out on another patrol. He said he had prayed to God for guidance, and he had “received the word of God” that he must leave the field or die.
I found his comments bizarre, but I also sensed that his fears were real and, given his long record of good performance, he was sincere in his beliefs. As he spoke to me, he began to cry and beg me to allow him to stay in the rear until his time of departure arrived. I was worried about setting a precedent for the other members of the platoon, so I argued that I could not allow every Marine who wanted to take a break from the bush to request mast and stay in the rear. He continued to cry and begged me to believe that God had decided he must die if he continued to go to the field. I sought a compromise because I could tell from his emotional state that he would be more of a liability on patrol than a help if I made him go on another patrol. I asked him if he would be willing to go to Hill 452 as part of a radio relay team, and he immediately accepted my proposal. We both assumed that spending a week on Hill 452 would be safe and would take him another week closer to his rotation tour date. I shook his hand, and we both went off to the company office to arrange for him to go with the next team scheduled for Hill 452.
Sadly, while Cpl. Allen was on Hill 452, lightning struck the RC-292 radio antenna on the main bunker, and this caused a case of fragmentation grenades to explode, killing Allen and another Marine, LCpl. Luther Stowe. I attempted to locate his mother in Philadelphia a year later, but no one answered the phone at her house. I wanted to tell her what a good Marine her son had been and what a good man she had raised.
After surviving another dangerous trip into Happy Valley, the members of Killer Kane thought we would get a respite with some easy patrol, but that was not the case. Originally, Maj. Welzant told me he intended to insert Killer Kane into the Que Son Valley area, and he had even given me the operation order and told me to begin planning for that patrol. However, just 24 hours prior to insertion, he canceled that mission and assigned us another one right back into Happy Valley.
III MAF G-2 had reason to believe the NVA were planning to launch missiles from Happy Valley using a new, long range missile. The enemy had used both 122 mm and 140 mm unguided rockets to attack targets in I Corps, but never anything with the range or payload this new missile possessed. If the enemy did, in fact, have such a missile and it had the range to reach the Da Nang Airbase from locations in Happy Valley, this would significantly degrade the security of this vital airbase. Adding to everyone’s concern, we had to take a radiac meter with us to ascertain whether or not there was any source of nuclear radiation in the area. There was a fear that this new missile was now part of the inventory of the NVA’s 368B Artillery Regiment, and it had both a conventional- and a nuclear-warhead capability. Killer Kane was given the mission of finding these missiles and to place particular emphasis on a hill on the north side of Happy Valley where an aerial observer had spotted what looked to him to be a construction site or a missile-launching pad. As if to stress the importance given our mission, Maj. Welzant told me that Gen. Robertson had specifically directed that Killer Kane be assigned the job of finding these missiles. Our patrol area was in a part of Happy Valley that had once contained rice fields but was now abandoned and overgrown with elephant grass and jungle. Because this mission had such high level interest in it, Maj. Welzant said he would go with us in the insertion helicopters to make sure we were inserted in the correct LZ and as close to the suspected launch site as possible.
Tony Allen, who died on Hill 452.
On 29 July, Killer Kane, consisting of seven men, was inserted into a small LZ approximately 1,000 meters north of Hill 575, the location of the suspected missile site. Hill 575 was also known as Tam Dieo Mountain. On our approach into the LZ, we took ground fire from the northeast. As we settled into the LZ, Maj. Welzant asked me if I wanted to choose another LZ or abort the mission since we had taken fire on our approach. I told him we would continue, and I signaled everyone in Killer Kane to exit the helicopter. From the air, the ground in the LZ looked like it consisted of waist-high elephant grass. After landing, we found that there was nearly a foot of water in the LZ, and we sank into mud up to our boot tops as we waded toward the cover of some trees on the southeast side. As we approached the trees, we came across a very well-used trail running perpendicular to the direction we were moving. It was obvious that many people had been using this trail recently because the ground was beaten down firmly, and there were many Ho Chi Minh sandal tracks on it.
After the helicopters left us, we moved 100 feet into the trees and thick brush and listened to see if the enemy would react to our presence. PFC Glor and our new corpsman, HN3 Donald Connor, were our rear point and backup rear point respectively and were less than 30 feet from the trail. From where I was sitting, I could see Glor and Connor clearly; both were facing toward the trail we had just crossed and both were sitting, like me, with their backs resting on their packs. We had been sitting silently for nearly 30 minutes and I was just about to signal our team to get up and continue moving when Glor turned toward me and gave the hand signal that always sent a rush of adrenalin coursing through my body. He raised his hand in front of his face and then pointed to the trail. There moving across our line of vision was an old man dressed in white pajamas and behind him was a younger man dressed the same and carrying a large pack.
For a moment I wondered why peasants would be so far from the lowlands and walking through Happy Valley, a place many miles from the nearest village or hamlet and where only NVA and VC lived. My question was soon answered when I saw five young men in black pajamas and camouflage uniforms walking behind the men dressed in white. I could also see that they were carrying rifles at the ready and looking from side to side. They continued to walk east on the trail and out of sight. A minute later, two or three more men in white followed the first group, and one of them was carrying an RPG rocket grenade launcher. After they passed, I thought we might be in the clear, but then I saw one of the armed men come back and stop at the point where we had exited the LZ and crossed the trail. He looked in our direction but he did not appear to see us. Then he spoke to his companions and they gathered around him on either side. I was sure they were going to come into the bush looking for us. None of us moved since we were not yet sure they had seen us. Even Glor, who was no more than thirty feet from them, went unobserved. Glor was so close he could easily make out the details of the men’s faces and uniforms as they peered in his direction.
Fortunately for our team, the enemy soldiers and their civilian companions did not come into the brush in our direction, but instead spread out and began to move away from us to search the marshy LZ. Evidently, they thought we were in the LZ hiding or they were hoping that we might attempt to follow them out into the open where they could fire at us. No matter what their intentions were, they moved away from us and out of sight. We did not move for several minutes, and soon we were left listening to only the normal sounds of insects and birds.
Our patrol’s objective was Hill 575, the location of the suspected missile site, so I had the team form up and move slowly in that direction. We found a finger that led up to the summit of the hill, and we traveled along this for approximately 500 meters. Our movement was exceptionally slow because the undergrowth consisted of many vines and vegetation with thorns and briars. LCpl. Slowick often had to stop and quietly use his K-bar knife to cut a path for us through the tangles of this prickly vegetation. It was hot, hard going for him, so I relieved him with Sgt. Pugh an hour after we started. We would stop every 20 minutes to listen and watch in a 360-degree circle, but during these stops we heard nothing out of the ordinary. I worried about all the cutting we needed to do because I knew anyone following us could pick up our trail by just following the cut vegetation. Cut vegetation is a sure sign of humans, but I did not want to make any noise crashing through the bush so we went with what we hoped would be the lesser of two evils.
In the afternoon, we began to hear chopping and sawing sounds coming from the direction we were heading. At several spots along our route, we came across areas with trees that appeared to have been cut with a saw recently. The Vietnamese would often go into the mountains to cut firewood, so we did not automatically think this cutting and sawing was the work of the enemy. However, it was definitely the work of humans, and we did not want to encounter whoever it was. We continued to hear these woodcutting sounds for the rest of the day coming from the direction of the summit of Hill 575.
We were fairly close to the summit when we saw a small structure made out of logs and earth right in front of us. It looked like a bunker built between two large trees but it had a thatched roof over it about three feet above ground level. The earth used in its construction appeared to be fairly fresh, something that alarmed me and the other members of the team. We suspected that this structure might be part of a perimeter defense for whatever was on the top of the hill in front of us. We all agreed that this structure would be a great place to use as a machine gun nest since a machine gun would be able to fire at ground level directly down the finger we were using for 100 yards. Since it was getting late in the day, I decided to stop the patrol at the bunker and spend the night there. I did not want to make contact with the enemy late in the day since I knew the weather in Happy Valley often made it difficult or impossible for helicopters to fly, and we would need them to fly if we called for an emergency extraction. We formed a tight 360-degree “stand to” posture until an hour after sunset, and then we set up our radio watch. I knew it would be impossible for any enemy to approach us without making a terrific racket so I felt confident we were safe, at least until daylight. During the night, Sgt. Pugh woke me so I could stand my hour-long radio watch, and he told me that during his watch he had heard an elephant trumpeting north of us near our insert LZ.
Early in the morning of 30 July, just before daylight, we heard the distinctive sound of a mortar round fired over our heads. We estimated it had been fired from a location only 200 meters north of us, back in the direction of our insert LZ. It passed directly over our heads and landed approximately 1,000 meters to our south. We could not figure out why the enemy would fire one mortar round like this. It made no sense, but we did not think much of it aside from the fact that our enemy possessed this lethal indirect fire weapon and did not seem to mind firing it at nothing in particular.
There was a heavy mist covering the northern part of Happy Valley as Killer Kane set out on patrol. We could only see ten to 15 meters in front of us as we slowly began to ascend the finger leading to the summit of the hill. Just as we started to move, we heard some strange sounds that we could not identify off in the distance to our east and north. We stopped to listen but the sounds stopped, and no one had any idea what made them. The sounds we heard were similar to an animal screaming in pain.
I thought we could cover the remaining distance to the summit before noon. I hoped to get close enough to see what was on this hill without being spotted and then have enough daylight left to move down the hill and find a good place to hide for the night. I asked LCpl. Garner, my primary radioman, to let me know if we ever found ourselves in a radio “dead spot” because I did not want to make contact with the enemy when we did not have communications with the Ba Na radio relay site. Each time we stopped to rest and listen, he would give me a hand signal telling me whether or not we had solid communications.
We had been moving for about an hour when I decided to take another ten-minute “rest and listen” break. I looked at my field watch, and it said 0830. As we sat there in a slight depression, we began to hear the sound of brush breaking behind us. At first it sounded like it might just be bamboo creaking in the wind, but after a few seconds we all realized this noise was made by humans moving through the thick tangle of vines and brambles behind us. They were not far away. I was confronted with a dilemma. If the team stayed where we were, the enemy would certainly find us, and we would have to fight them off and then try to find an emergency LZ to be extracted. If we moved farther up the hill, we risked making a lot of noise and running into whoever was on the hill, maybe the same people who had built the bunker we had found not far behind us. In either case, it did not look like we were going to accomplish our mission of covertly observing the summit of the hill.
I knew from previous experience that the VC and NVA did not carry a lot of ammunition with them, usually only one or two AK-47 magazines and, perhaps, 100 rounds of linked ammunition for their machine guns. I also knew that they normally did not respond well to us when we initiated the contact and inflicted casualties on them. Instead, they often pulled back after taking casualties to assess their situation and receive instructions on what to do next. In order to escape, I knew we would have to initiate the contact at close range and try to kill as many of them as possible in the shortest time. I decided that we would stay where we were and wait until they were right on top of us and then we would hit them as hard as we could. Each man took up a firing position facing in the direction of the sound of the breaking brush, except for LCpl. Slowick and Cpl. Hager, who took up firing positions facing up hill toward the summit. I was facing toward the sound of breaking brush but only a foot away from Cpl. Hager who had the patrol’s Stoner light machine gun. As my eyes strained to see through the dense jungle growth, I felt Cpl. Hager tap me lightly on the shoulder. As I turned toward him, I saw that he had his hand in front of his face, the signal that he had spotted the enemy. Almost instantaneously, I saw LCpl. Slowick point his M-16 rifle uphill. There, only a few meters in front of him, were two North Vietnamese soldiers, their AK-47 rifles at the ready, peering in our direction. Slowick fired and both NVA soldiers dropped. At the same time the rest of the patrol opened fire at NVA soldiers behind and below us. The NVA were shaken by this, but they did not withdraw. Soon, several NVA were firing back at us but their rounds passed harmlessly over our heads. I saw two of them to the right of the two shot by Slowick, and I fired at them from a range of no more than 20 meters, but I could not tell if I hit either of them. Around this time, we proved the value of the Stoner light machine gun, especially when in the hands of a brave and aggressive Marine. Cpl. Hager used it to great effect by firing short, five-round bursts at the enemy approaching us from the south. Cpl. Hager and his Stoner light machine gun gave the team the fire superiority we needed to survive this attack by a superior NVA force.
After five minutes, the enemy fire slacked, and we saw one NVA soldier dragging another off into the brush. LCpl. Garner told me he had the AO, Black Coat 1–0, on the radio and he was headed our way. Garner told him to tell Camp Reasoner that we were in heavy contact, and we needed an emergency extraction. I took the handset from Garner and asked the AO to help us find an LZ for us and to call in artillery and air on the enemy forces attacking us. I told him I would direct him over our position and give him a mark as soon as he passed overhead. I also told him I would pop a smoke to confirm our location. He acknowledged my request, said he would be over our insert LZ in 30 seconds, and asked me to direct him from there. I told him we were only 700 meters south of the insert LZ, and soon I could hear the engine of his plane passing north to south. When he was directly over our position and above the jungle canopy, I gave him a mark, and he said he knew where we were and did not need for us to use a smoke grenade. He began to mark the area south of us with white phosphorous rockets and a few minutes later we heard fixed-wing aircraft diving overhead and the thunderous explosions of 500-pound bombs ripping through the jungle near the summit of the hill. Black Coat 1–0 also called in an artillery mission to our north, which he walked up the finger from the insert LZ to only 100 yards from our position. I marveled at how good this AO was and how he was able to juggle both an air strike and an artillery mission so effectively and with such precision.
As I was coordinating with Black Coat 1–0 on the radio and beginning to feel fairly confident that we had sent the enemy on his way, Cpl. Hager stood up behind a tree and began firing his Stoner light machine gun at two enemy soldiers who were attempting to set up an RPD machine gun. He killed both of them. Other NVA fired at him but missed. Then they threw several grenades at us, wounding Cpl. Hager and our corpsman, “Doc” Connor.
Cpl. Hager’s bravery surely saved us that day because no one had seen these two NVA soldiers until they were almost ready to fire on us. Had that machine gun been put into operation by the enemy, we would have certainly taken casualties. Cpl. Hager, wounded and bleeding, returned to the depression and told me that there was a large trail right in front of us and that this trail was how the enemy had gotten so close to us without being heard or seen. He said he saw three NVA dead lying on the trail, and he thought there were more enemy up ahead where the bombs from the air strike had landed. Neither Hager nor Connor were badly wounded, but at the time all I saw was blood on their faces and uniforms so I was not sure how serious their wounds were. I asked them about their condition, and both men laughed and said they were “fine.” Despite having been wounded and just participating in one hell of a firefight at close range with a superior enemy force, these two men were still full of fight and looking for more targets to engage.
It was obvious now that the enemy had spotted our insertion on the first day and had begun to search actively for us shortly after we landed. They found our trail leading off to the south but decided not to follow us with just four armed men. Instead, they got reinforcements and set in motion a plan to herd us into the direction of an ambush on the large trail near the summit. They deliberately made a lot of noise behind us hoping we would move away from them and into the ambush they had set. Their plan did not work because we stopped before we reached the trail. This caused their colleagues to move along the trail looking for us: a deadly mistake on their part since we were able to see them and they could not see us. The old injunction that Clovis Coffman had told me several months previously proved right again: “Firefights are like fist fights, the one who throws the first punch usually wins.”
Black Coat 1–0 gave me the grid coordinates of a good extraction LZ 200 meters west of our position and told us that helicopters were on their way to pick us up. I was afraid the enemy might be waiting for us to move out of the small depression we were in so I had each man throw a CS grenade along the path we would take and then we moved out between the clouds of gas. We moved downhill rapidly until we came to a rather large open space that had been used for agriculture long ago. Fixed-wing aircraft controlled by Black Coat 1–0 strafed ahead of us with 20 mm cannon. The LZ had waist-high elephant grass in it, and the ground was wet and in some places ankle deep with dark, muddy water. The helicopter landed over 100 meters away from us so we had to wade through the wet elephant grass to reach it, an arduous process that took nearly five minutes, all the time expecting the enemy to fire upon us as we moved toward the helicopter. No one fired on us until we lifted off in the helicopter, which took six hits in its fuselage. From the time we made contact with the enemy until the time we boarded the extraction helicopters just a little more than an hour had elapsed, but it seemed a lot longer than that. We stopped at Charlie Med on the way back to Camp Reasoner to drop off Connor and Hager so they could have their wounds treated (Team Killer Kane Patrol Report, 30 July 1967; see also Newsweek, 21 August 1967, pp. 40–41; and, Finlayson, Oral History Collection, No 1510, “Recon Team Killer Kane,” History Division, HQMC”).
At our patrol debriefing that afternoon, we told Lt. St. Claire that we had not reached the summit of Hill 575 or seen anything like a missile-launch site, but the fact that we heard a lot of woodcutting in the vicinity and that it was aggressively defended by at least 20 NVA or VC soldiers clearly indicated it was an important piece of real estate for some reason. We recommended that a Marine infantry force be inserted into the vicinity of Hill 575 to conduct a reconnaissance-in-force operation to ascertain whether the enemy was constructing a missile-launch site there. Our battalion commander, Lt. Col. Steinmetz, was present at the debriefing, and he made several very complimentary remarks about the team and conveyed the regards of Gen. Robertson, who had specifically requested Killer Kane for this mission. He also told us that I was to spend the better part of the next day talking to the 1st Marine Division and III MAF G-2 staffs about what I encountered on the patrol and my general impression of what was going on in Happy Valley.
On 1 August, I was asked to come up to the company office to meet a journalist from Newsweek magazine. When I arrived at the company office, I saw a rather portly, middle-aged man dressed in casual, civilian clothes accompanied by a Marine corporal from the division public affairs office. The man introduced himself as Mr. Perry, and he told me he wanted to do a story on our last patrol for his news magazine. He explained he had already interviewed an Army lieutenant who commanded a long-range reconnaissance platoon (LRRP) doing similar work, and he wanted to compare the two methods. He seemed friendly and genuinely interested in our work, putting me at ease. I had never spoken to the press before, and I knew nothing about the ground rules for dealing with the press, so I was initially reluctant to discuss anything of substance with him. He asked me if there was some place where we could talk without being disturbed, and I told him we could talk on the back porch of my hootch. The PR Marine said he would wait for us in the company office.
Mr. Perry and I sat down on two beach chairs overlooking the paddy fields of Phuoc Ly hamlet and talked while water buffaloes grazed just outside the perimeter wire. The journalist asked me to tell him about our last patrol to Happy Valley. In general terms, I told him the details of the patrol, and then he asked me some questions about the type of men serving in my platoon. I told him they came from all walks of life. He asked for specific details about the men, so I told him Mike Borecky had graduated from high school and spent a lot of time as a surfer on California beaches and doing underwater construction before joining the Marines. I also told him that another of my men had attended college for a year and dropped out to fight in Vietnam, while yet another had dropped out of high school before joining the Corps. He asked me if I had any draftees in my platoon. I told him there was only one, and he was one of my best men. I spent most of my time telling him about how brave and competent my men were and how much I valued their talents and abilities.
After a while he stopped taking notes, and he seemed to lose interest in my description of my men and began asking questions that put me on guard, even though he attempted to ask them in a rather friendly and low-key manner. He told me that he did not notice many black Marines at Camp Reasoner, and he asked me why that was. I told him I had not noticed this, but that two of the fifteen men in my platoon were black. He asked me how well they performed and whether there was any racial tension in my platoon. I told him that both of my black Marines performed very well, but all of my Marines performed their jobs well. He began asking me how many of my men were from the South. I told him I did not know, but I would check my platoon leader’s notebook and provide him with this information. He demurred after I added that several of my Marines had led itinerant lives as kids growing up in different parts of the country.
Mr. Perry kept asking questions about race, so I told him I didn’t think there was any more I could add to that topic. He agreed, but then he started to ask me about how my men felt about the anti-war movement in the States and whether what they were hearing from back home was affecting their perception about the morality of the conflict. I thought he was way off base asking such a question, and I told him so. I reminded him of his reason for our interview, which was to discuss the team’s recent patrol in Happy Valley and to compare our patrolling methods with those of the U.S. Army. He only said that the anti-war movement was interesting to his readers in the U.S., and he had heard many military servicemen express disenchantment with the war. I was beginning to feel uncomfortable talking to him about this topic, so I said I needed to do some work and it was time to end the interview. I escorted him back to the company office, shook his hand, and turned him over to the PR corporal, who escorted him to our main gate.
Later that month, his story was published in the August 21 issue of Newsweek, and in his article he misquoted me, saying I had called my Marines “juvenile delinquents, beach bums, and high school dropouts.” Naturally, the PR office at division was not pleased with the article, and they asked me to explain my comments, which I did. They warned me about being manipulated by journalists and told me I should, from now on, only talk to a member of the press in the presence of someone from their office. I told them that I had no desire to talk to any more journalists under any circumstances.
A month later, Mr. Perry returned to Camp Reasoner, and he denied that he had sent the alleged “quote” to his editor in New York City. He contended the editorial staff in New York had taken my words out of context when the article was edited. I learned a very valuable lesson from this first encounter with a member of the fourth estate and that was to always have a witness present when being interviewed. Unfortunately, this initial exposure to the press left me with a lasting sense of distrust. From that moment on, I was always on my guard when talking to the press, and I tried to avoid talking to them throughout my Marine Corps career. I never had the feeling they would represent my views fairly or accurately.
On 2 August, Capt. Dixon and I drove over to the III MAF headquarters on the west side of Da Nang. There I was interviewed for an hour by a team of senior officers from the Marine Corps Tactics Board who were in country to study the tactics used by our enemy. Gen. Robertson chose me to talk to the board because our team had had a lot of recent contact with the enemy and had been successful whenever we made contact. The interview was taped, and I was very impressed with how interested these colonels and majors from Washington, D.C., were in the tactics Killer Kane used whenever we got into a firefight with the enemy. Although the interview covered just about every aspect of ground reconnaissance tactics, they were especially interested in how we dealt with the enemy’s counter-recon teams. They told me that the Army’s Special Operations Group (SOG) and Marine reconnaissance units operating in western Quang Tri and Thua Thien provinces were suffering heavy casualties due to these enemy counter-recon teams, which they described as “special NVA units” trained and equipped specifically to deny U.S. recon teams access to certain key NVA base areas and infiltration routes.
On 3 August, Killer Kane was assigned a mission to establish an OP in the hills overlooking the Hiep Duc Valley in support of the 1st Battalion, 5th Marines. To be honest, I was pleased our team was not going back into Happy Valley, even though I knew Hiep Duc was never an easy area to patrol. I was told I would be taking along Lt. Joe Taussig, a classmate of mine from the Naval Academy and a good friend. Joe had gone to Vietnamese language training after Basic School, so he came into country six months after I arrived. Joe came from a distinguished naval family that dated back to the Revolutionary War. He was the first in his family to serve as a Marine officer and not as a Navy officer. While at the Academy, he finished near the top of our class, far above me in the academic standings, and he also excelled at sports and public speaking. Everyone who knew Joe expected him to become a general officer one day. I was both happy and proud that my friend would be going out on his “snap in” patrol with me.
I spent most of the day doing all the routine preparations for our insertion, including a thorough map study and an aerial recon of our proposed NFZ, along with issuing rations, ammunition and special equipment followed by my patrol order, the inspection of our equipment, and a rehearsal. Throughout this process, Joe took careful notes and asked great questions of me and the other members of the team. The evening before our patrol, Joe and I went up to the division officers’ club to watch the nightly movie and relax for a few hours before turning in. It was great to see Joe again and talk about our time at the Academy. One of my best friends at the Naval Academy was Lt. Perry Graves, USMC, and Perry had married Joe’s younger sister, Susie. Joe’s father, who lost a leg at Pearl Harbor and won a Navy Cross for his heroism on that day, wrote the textbook we used at the Naval Academy to study military law. His father was a friend to every midshipman at the academy. He graciously allowed me to keep my TR-4 sports roadster parked in his driveway after I bought it since we were not allowed to keep our cars inside the grounds of the Academy until just before graduation.
Lt. Joseph K. Taussig, III.
On 4 August, our team was inserted into an LZ overlooking the Hiep Duc Valley and the main road running through it, but bombs dropped in the LZ started a brush fire that forced us to be extracted four hours later. Unlike the terrain in Happy Valley, the grass and brush on the slopes of the hills surrounding Hiep Duc Valley were tinder dry at this time of year. Also, many of the streams in the hills were dry, a situation that made thirst a primary concern for any patrol above the lowlands.
On 5 August, Killer Kane, consisting of two officers, six enlisted and one U.S. Navy corpsman, made a second attempt at insertion, and this time we had no brush fires in the LZ. Our LZ was a good one on flat, grassy terrain halfway up the southern slope of Nui Chom Mountain, an LZ approximately two miles from the LZ we used the previous day.
As usual, LCpl. John Slowick led the way as point, followed by Glor, Finlayson, Garner, Taussig, Hager, Connor, Williams, and Powell. We moved off the LZ, passed through a stand of tall trees, and then proceeded to climb a hill to reach our OP site overlooking the valley. On the way, we had to walk through a fairly open area that I feared made our presence easily detected by the enemy, but we had no other way to reach our OP. I had the patrol spread out, extending the interval between each man to nearly 30 yards and walking in a tactical staggered column, a precaution in the event we were observed by the enemy and fired upon. I did not want our patrol bunched up so a single enemy mortar round or grenade could cause multiple casualties. Although we walked in the open for nearly 300 meters, it appeared no one saw us, and soon we found a fairly good OP site on a narrow finger overlooking the valley.
The sun was brutally hot, so I chose an OP that had some five-foot-high brush, which afforded us a modicum of shade from the intense rays of the sun. Still, we were far above any source of water so all of us rationed our water as best we could. Lt. Taussig, Slowick, Garner, and I occupied the OP and started to scan the valley below us with our binoculars and spotting scope while the other five set up security higher up the finger behind us. We had to stay in the OP three days, something I did not like to do. The odds of the enemy finding us and organizing an attack were dramatically increased if we stayed in any one location for more than 24 hours. I took the risk because moving further down the finger toward the valley would expose us in open terrain, making it impossible to remain unobserved from the densely populated valley floor. If we moved higher into the canopy, we would have a very limited field of vision, and this would take us even farther from any potential source of water. It was one of the many Hobson’s choices I had to make. I decided to stay put, accomplish our mission as best we could, and preserve our water.
From the 5th to the 7th of August, we made twelve separate sightings of VC and NVA troops moving north through the hamlets of Thuan Long (3) and An Long (1). We called in twelve artillery fire missions and directed two air strikes against the 121 enemy soldiers we observed. Even though we used a lot of artillery and air strikes on these targets, we only observed four confirmed killed due to the distance between our OP and the impact areas and the foliage where the artillery shells and bombs landed. We had very good response times from the artillery batteries supporting us and outstanding coverage of the targets, so we assessed an additional 27 probable kills. Several of our fire missions had to be delayed or abandoned because the enemy was moving through villages, and the South Vietnamese district headquarters would not grant clearance because they feared the artillery would kill or wound innocent civilians. I pointed out to Joe, who was getting a very good introduction to the use of supporting arms, that the enemy often traveled through densely populated areas deliberately because they knew we could not get clearance to fire on them if they were close to civilians. The enemy was also adept at moving along military unit and civilian administrative boundaries since this required more than one clearance. This enemy tactic often delayed many fire missions to the point where they could not be fired effectively, if at all.
Team Killer Kane waiting for their insertion helicopters at LZ Finch. Sitting in the back row, from the left, are Donald Connor and James Hager (the two men standing and the pilot in black squatting are unidentified); middle row: J. D. Glor and me; front row: Dave Powell, R. Garner, and Clarence Williams.
By the 7th, despite our best efforts to conserve water, we found that we were taking our last sips from our canteens. The heat was becoming more and more intense. I knew we would need water soon, or I would have to ask for an extraction. I radioed Camp Reasoner, and they told me a water resupply would be sent that afternoon, and it would be dropped to us via poncho parachute from a low altitude so the likelihood of the enemy observing it from the valley would be minimal. I had my doubts, but I said we would be standing by for the drop.
In mid-afternoon a CH-46 flew over our position and dropped the water. The loadmaster in the helicopter dropped the bundle right on target but the speed of the helicopter caused the parachute to only partially open so all of the plastic bags of water were broken on impact. We watched with dismay and disappointment as the precious water sank into the parched ground. An hour later, we were told we would be extracted early the next morning. Throughout the rest of the day and into the night, I had dreams of ice-cold drinks.
In the morning of 8 August we were disappointed time and again as Camp Reasoner told us our extraction would be delayed for one reason or another. Finally, a little after noon, we were told the helicopters were on the way, and soon after that we were extracted from a rather poor LZ on a narrow finger east of the summit of Hill 623 (Team Killer Kane Patrol Report, 8 August 1967). When we landed at LZ Finch, our company Gunny, GySgt. Gabbert, had two gallons of ice water and a case of cold beer waiting for us. I paid the Gunny for the beer, and the entire team sat down and drank our fill of water and beer. I never tasted another cold beer as good as the one I had that day.
On 9 August, my old platoon sergeant, SSgt. Thompson, stopped by Camp Reasoner to say hello and to tell me about his new job with the CIA. He said his job was classified and it involved training former VC to conduct reconnaissance and espionage missions. I asked him to tell me where he was living now, but all he would say was he was living in an “embassy house” in I Corps, and his living conditions were a lot better than mine. He was interested in our most recent patrols, so I took out my maps and showed him where we had been and what we had done since his departure. When I reminded him of the patrol where he knocked himself out trying to retrieve a parachute drop that was supposed to be water but turned out to be rations and ammunition instead, his mood turned sour and he began to curse and rant about the time we nearly died of thirst while on that mission in the Que Son Mountains during Operation Union II. He was still angry about the fruitless three-hour climb he had to make in the blistering heat to retrieve rations instead of water.
Capt. Dixon asked me how well Lt. Taussig had done on the patrol, and I told him Joe was ready to take out a patrol immediately. Joe had called in several artillery missions during our patrol and had observed me calling in the air strikes, so I told Capt. Dixon Joe was certainly ready for any Stingray mission. I could tell Capt. Dixon was pleased with Joe and thought highly of him.
Almost in passing, Capt. Dixon told me that Killer Kane might be assigned to the Special Landing Force (SLF) in September. He explained that the Marine Corps maintained a floating reserve of one battalion landing team (BLT) aboard U.S. Navy amphibious ships, a sort of 911 team in the event reinforcements were needed anywhere along the South Vietnamese coast. The SLF battalions had different units attached to them, such as an artillery battery, a tank platoon, an engineer platoon, an amtrac platoon, and a recon platoon, which gave these battalions as lot of extra firepower and capability. I told him I had hoped to be sent to scuba school in the Philippines, but I would go wherever I was needed. He said it might be possible to do both. Although it sounded to me that he had made up his mind to send Killer Kane for this assignment, he told me not to give it too much thought for now since the decision on what recon team would be going to the SLF had not been made.
When I asked Capt. Dixon what, if anything, I should do to prepare for the SLF, he recommended that I should begin training my platoon on the use of the company’s rubber boats and participate in the upcoming parachute jumps scheduled for later in the month. This was the first I had heard of any contemplated parachute training, so I was intrigued as to why this training was beginning now. He told me that division was planning to insert our entire company by parachute in a future operation “out west,” but he said he was not sure yet of the actual location. I would have to wait for a few weeks to find out where the destination for this parachute jump would be.
The evening of the 10th, Joe Taussig and I met with three of our Naval Academy classmates who were back in the 1st Marine Division’s area to receive some training. We decided to take out a Weapons Carrier (WC) truck from the motor pool and drive to the Stone Elephant Officers’ Club in Da Nang. This was my first visit to this officers’ club since the unpleasant experience we had when we were asked to leave the club, and I wondered if the club manager would remember me or not. As it turned out, he did not remember me, and we all enjoyed a delicious steak dinner and some good music afterwards.
This night, there was a very attractive Vietnamese woman singing with the band. Her name was Khanh Ly, and she was one of the most popular singers in the country. She recorded many of the songs written by Vietnam’s most successful song writer of the day, Trinh Cong Son. She sang both Vietnamese and American popular songs with great ability and emotion, even taking requests from the audience, demonstrating a rich knowledge of both country’s musical tastes. I would encounter Khanh Ly again during my second tour of duty in South Vietnam.
On the 14th of August, Killer Kane was inserted on top of Hill 478, four miles south of Hiep Duc with the mission of observing the Hiep Duc area south of the Song Thu Bon River. Since we had encountered problems with brush fires started by fixed-wing bombing of our LZs on previous patrols, I had asked the pilots of our insertion helicopters not to request prep bombing on this insertion. However, my advice was either ignored or forgotten because 250-pound bombs were dropped on the insertion LZ, and this started a raging brush fire, making a landing on Hill 478 impossible. Instead, we had to pick another LZ more than a mile away. This LZ was a good one, but it was several hundred meters from the jungle canopy, requiring us to walk in the open where we could easily be observed by any enemy in the vicinity. When we reached the canopy, I stopped the patrol and we waited and listened for any signs of enemy activity. After I had used my compass and map to determine our exact location, I started to tell my radioman, LCpl. Dobson, to send a position report, but before I could finish a sentence, I heard a grenade explode toward the front of the patrol, no more than 30 meters away. There was a pregnant pause, and then I heard Cpl. James W. Hager begin to fire his Stoner light machine gun. He was soon joined by LCpl. John Slowick firing his M-16 rifle. Because the ridgeline we were on was steep and thick with secondary growth, only Slowick and Hager had seen the four NVA soldiers who had come down the ridgeline and thrown the grenade. I brought the patrol on line, and we began to fire and maneuver up the hill in the direction that Hager and Slowick had been firing. There were no return fire and no blood trails, but there were several sets of Ho Chi Minh sandal prints in the moist earth and an NVA pith helmet, which we quickly deemed outstanding trading material. Slowick placed it in his rucksack.
I asked Hager what had happened and he rather sheepishly admitted that he had laid his machine gun down when we stopped to take out his canteen to drink some water. As he was taking a drink he saw the enemy coming toward the patrol. When he moved to retrieve his machine gun, the enemy saw him and threw the grenade which, fortunately for him, hit a tree next to him and exploded harmlessly behind the tree. Aside from a ringing in his ears, he was unhurt. Slowick got a good look at the enemy troops as they ran away and told me they were wearing the ubiquitous gray-green field uniforms of the NVA. The lesson learned for Cpl. Hager and everyone else in the patrol was to always keep your weapon in your hands, even on a break. We lost a very good opportunity to kill or capture some NVA because of this mistake, but no one was more remorseful than Cpl. Hager, one of the best men in my platoon and a Marine who seldom made any mistakes while on patrol.
We moved southeast and came upon a well-used trail. Since we had made contact earlier, I decided it was too risky to travel on it. We noticed there were a lot of elephant spores on this trail, which surprised us since we were relatively high up in the hills. Normally, we only found elephant feces on low ground near sources of water. I moved the patrol off the trail and into an area of dense brush where we harbored the rest of the day and that night. During the night we heard elephants trumpeting repeatedly. It is often difficult to gauge distances by sound in the jungle, but we all agreed these elephants were fairly close to our position, perhaps as close as 100 meters. I wondered what action I would have the patrol take if the elephants decided to take a walk through our harbor site at night. I imagined the letter the Marine Corps would send home to my parents informing them that their son had been trampled to death by elephants.
The next day we moved to several different OP locations but we saw very little going on in the valley below us. At times, it seemed as if the valley was deserted, but periodically throughout the day, we would observe a few farmers doing the normal chores that Vietnamese farmers perform in the summer months, such as carrying shoulder poles with buckets of night soil for fertilizing their fields, or cutting wood, or maintaining their paddy dikes. During the three days we observed the valley, we only saw VC one time, and these seven enemy soldiers fled when we called in an artillery mission on them. Although we had good coverage of the target and we started some good brush fires near where we sighted them, we could not observe the results due to the distance and the terrain.
The only other thing we saw on this patrol of note was a tiger. One of my men was scanning the low ground to our north when he spotted a tiger prowling in an open area on the side of a hill approximately a half mile to our northwest. At first, I did not believe him since I knew tigers were nocturnal animals and usually avoided humans. But when I took his binoculars and looked at the open area he pointed out, I saw the tiger clearly as it moved back and forth on the side of the hill. Everyone wanted to see the tiger so we spent the next five or ten minutes sharing the binoculars until the tiger moved off into the jungle. That night, as I drifted off to sleep, I hoped that tiger did not pick up our scent and try to make a meal of us.
On the 17th at 1530 we were extracted from the same LZ we used for insertion and replaced by a recon team from Chu Lai (Team Killer Kane Patrol Report, 17 August 1967).
While we were back at Camp Reasoner our team participated in the first parachute training the company had done since coming into country. We made five jumps at the Red Beach drop zone (DZ) out of CH-46 helicopters: three without equipment and two with a full combat load. Lt. Charlie Campbell, a former SNCO who won a combat commission, was the jump master. The weather was perfect for our jumps, with clear skies and only a light wind, blowing off the South China Sea. The Red Beach DZ was large and sandy, so we had no problems with injuries or damaged equipment. Many of the men were curious about the motive for this training, but no one, including our CO, seemed to know exactly what was being planned. Capt. Dixon told us that we would be told when we needed to know.
Parachute training at Red Beach.
Parachute training at Red Beach.
As the “Summer of Living Dangerously” came to an end, Killer Kane took its last patrol to Hill 452, spending an uneventful week on this rocky pinnacle overlooking the Song Thu Bon River and the Nong Son Coal Mine. Our twelve-man patrol occupied the bunkers on this radio relay site and spent each day looking south for enemy activity in the western entrance to Antenna Valley. In a letter home to my parents written the day after the patrol’s return, and in our team patrol report of 29 Aug. 1967, I described this uneventful patrol this way:
My patrol to Hill 452 was just seven days of looking at rice paddies, water buffaloes, farmers, villages and hills. We didn’t see any VC the entire time so it wasn’t a very interesting patrol. I did manage to read four books while I wasn’t on watch and to eat plenty of C rations and to experiment with the new and very tasty Long Range Patrol Ration. In the afternoons and the early evenings it rained a great deal making it impossible to observe and very uncomfortable, as well. In the mornings the entire area below us was covered with fog and low clouds, making us feel as if we were angels in heaven looking down on the earth below. Never were “angels” so dirty, so unshaven, so mean-looking ... waiting to hurl 8-inch artillery thunder bolts at the slightest sign of the VC.