When the brilliant ball of the sun cleared the eastern horizon, Lincoln heard the first thump of a mortar, followed by a blast as the round landed inside the camp. Shouts came from the Pathet soldiers, and almost instantly, machine guns on the camp’s eastern edge started to spray into the trees on that side.
Next came an RPG. Lincoln swelled with pride as it struck the watchtower at the southeast corner and exploded. Etched against the rising sun, he could see people inside it thrown out and falling to the ground. The drop wasn’t far enough to be fatal, but the blast might have been, and it would make the men dizzy and disoriented, at any rate.
More mortar rounds landed inside the wire, including one that came very close to Colonel Phan’s headquarters. By that time, the barracks had emptied out, and the vast majority of the soldiers were rushing to defend the eastern flank.
“Here we go,” Lincoln said. There was still the watchtower at the northwest corner to contend with, and soldiers had spread out all around the camp, to defend against just this sort of attack. But he was sure those soldiers would be busy counting their blessings that they weren’t under direct fire and, at the same time, looking over their shoulders to see what was happening behind them.
He gave the signal, and two soldiers with RPG launchers at the ready fired. The first grenade just missed the guard tower, sailing to a harmless landing outside the fence. The second also missed its target, a machine gun bunker at the center of the western flank, but landed close enough to spray the soldiers manning the gun with dirt and shrapnel.
With those as a cue, the soldiers who had carried a mortar into the woods behind Lincoln’s team opened fire. One round hit a barracks, starting a fire. The next landed on the empty space in front of the colonel’s headquarters. A third barely missed a bunker Lincoln had identified as a possible ammo dump.
Lincoln grabbed Pos and held his palms together, then, keeping them connected at the base, spread his fingertips about half an inch apart. “Get back to that mortar, fast,” he said. “Have them shift their aim that much to the right of that last shot. No more, no less.”
Pos scurried off to do his bidding. The men with the RPGs had reloaded and fired again. This time, one hit the roof of the watchtower and the second fell just in front of the machine gun.
There was no more time to waste. On the eastern side, the men were already advancing, as Lincoln had shown them, alternating running forward at a crouch and covering one another. His men had to get closer, too, because the big machine guns had more killing power at this range than his ARs did.
“Go!” he cried. He’d rehearsed this with the men enough that they understood the English word. “Go, go, go!” He charged with them, his AR-30 blasting toward the defenders amassing on the western line. After running for a stretch, he dropped to one knee and provided covering fire for the next man.
On his third sprint, Lincoln heard the mortar from behind him and watched the round arc into the camp. The angle looked good, the trajectory seemed right. He winced before it hit, because he knew what was coming. Then it dropped right into the bunker he had identified, and the ensuing explosion told him he’d judged correctly. A cheer went up from his men as the ammo dump blew.
He was pleased with that result, but he could already tell the battle was lost. The machine guns facing this way were still operable, and when his men tried to cross the open space, it became a killing field. He couldn’t tell for sure what was happening to the east, but they had started with far fewer men. It seemed like more of the Pathet soldiers were shifting toward the west, to face the main attack force.
Desperate, he threw a grenade at the central machine gun. It landed a few feet short, rolled, and blew. It bought a moment’s respite, but not enough. He had lost six men—no, seven—that he could count so far.
“Fall back!” he cried. He gave the hand signal he had taught them for retreat and shouted again, “Fall back!”
The men did, gladly. The machine guns at the camp didn’t stop firing, and more of Lincoln’s men fell before they were out of range in the woods. It looked like the men on the eastern flank had retreated at the same time, but he couldn’t see them anymore.
He knew the Pathet would send out a force to mop up the retreating Hmong, so there was no time to lick their wounds and—as much as he hated to abandon them—no way to collect their dead. For that matter, some of those who had fallen might still be alive, just badly hurt. By retreating, he was leaving them to become prisoners of the Pathet Lao. Who knew what they might tell their captors, including the information that the attack had been led by an American?
He had no other option, though. His men weren’t ready for that kind of assault. He’d tried to convey that, to Corbett and via coded message to Donovan. He had been ordered to make the attack anyway, and he had obeyed that order.
It had been a tragic mistake.
One he wouldn’t make again.
From now on, he was in charge of this op, top to bottom. If Donovan didn’t like it, he could replace Lincoln. But as long as Lincoln was in charge of the men of Vang Khom, he wouldn’t risk their lives for nothing.
• • •
They rendezvoused at the far side of the jars, just below the path back up the mountain. The Pathet had given chase for a while, but their hearts weren’t in it and it hadn’t been long before they had given up.
Fourteen men were missing from the rendezvous. Lincoln was furious. Sixty men weren’t an army. American soldiers had more experience and training coming out of boot camp than his Hmong had. And Lincoln was no drill sergeant. What had the brass been thinking when they’d ordered this? Donovan was right; the deskbound fuckers at the Pentagon had no idea what was what over here.
And why had he even agreed to the mission? He had known he was unqualified for this task and that his lack of qualification would get people killed. Now he would have to go back into Vang Khom and explain to wives and mothers and children and sisters that some of their men weren’t coming back, and it was his fault.
The creed of the Special Forces said you never left your dead behind on the battlefield. Did it matter if the dead weren’t Americans? He didn’t see why it should—the Hmong men were fighting for the same cause—but trying to retrieve them would just have resulted in more dead.
He had been stupid, stupid, stupid. For the men who had willingly, bravely followed him to death’s doorway, his stupidity had cost them their lives. He would never be able to lay down that burden.
Back in the village, only one woman—Burlee’s mother—actually struck him. Two others spat on him. The rest wept in his arms, or turned their backs on him, or simply refused to react in his presence, though he later heard wailing from houses throughout the village. Kaus made the trip to Lincoln’s longhouse to tell him what a mistake he had made in agreeing to let an American stay with them and lead them against the Pathet. Lincoln agreed with him, which only seemed to piss off the old chief even more.
Later, Sho held him and stroked his forehead and tried to tell him that it was all right, that the men had known they might die and had gone anyway, that ridding Laos of communists was worth any sacrifice. She had told him the Hmong were used to sacrifice. Her people had been driven from China, had migrated into Laos and Vietnam and Cambodia and Thailand in search of someplace they could live in peace, but always they found more strife, more conflict. They were not afraid of it. Their souls would be reincarnated.
None of it helped. Not one little bit.