Chapter 14
Night Hunter

T he jungle absorbed all light at night. With no major cities, there was no artificial light. What villages there were had little or no electricity, so what light they emitted was minimal. On the other hand, if you saw a light along a river or in the jungle, you found Charlie, because only Charlie used light at night. And we were looking for Charlie.

The mission was unique to the 227th and 229th Aviation Battalions. Each battalion put up a Night Hunter Killer team. The teams had two ways of finding the enemy. A large starlight scope was mounted on top of a searchlight, allowing the operator to see clearly at night, but with a green tinge to everything. Any artificial light, such as a candle, was instantly seen as the starlight scope was very sensitive and powerful. If the operator sighted something, he turned on the searchlight and the gunner sitting next to him engaged with a M2, .50-caliber machine gun. Upon engaging, the flare ship, which was flying at one thousand feet or higher, dropped a one-million-candle-powered flare, and an AH-1G Cobra gunship attacked the target with rockets and 7.62 minigun and/or a 40 mm grenade launcher while the low bird continued to engage the target to cover the Cobra. The second way to find the enemy was for the low bird to fly at sixty knots and only five hundred feet, low and slow to draw fire. If the low bird drew fire, the Cobra immediately engaged, giving the low bird an opportunity to clear the area. This night, I was copiloting the low bird with WO Mike Driscoll as AC. Mike had been in-country for about eight months and normally flew this mission when the unit received it.

Our mission for the night was to recon along the Song Dong Nai River for possible sampans moving supplies south towards Bien Hoa. Our mission brief was conducted at the Brigade TOC in Bien Hoa, followed by Mike conducting a briefing on how we would proceed. Mike had flown this mission for the past two weeks. Generally once the company received the mission, the same crews flew the mission for a month as they would sleep in the day and fly all night, opposite cycle from the rest of the crews. To add a bit more firepower to the low bird, the pilot’s doors had been removed and both pilots had M79 grenade launchers on our laps.

“Dan, be sure that thing’s on safe, and when you fire it, be sure it’s not pointed at anything on this aircraft, such as the rotor blades,” Mike warned me. Two bags of 40 mm grenades were on the back of our chairs in case they were needed. In addition, there was a thermite grenade on the back of the center console, in case the aircraft went down and we had to destroy it and especially the M2 .50-cal machine gun. Charlie would love to get his hands on that weapon.

Flying north out of Bien Hoa, we reached the river and then started following the bank northeast. As we descended from one thousand feet, we lost all reference to a horizon on this moonless overcast night. Damn, it’s dark .

“Flying low-level at night presents its own issues. First, you’re going to lose the horizon the lower you go.” Tell me something I’m not seeing , I thought. “You know the elevation and you know the height of the vegetation, so you continue a slow descent to an altitude that will give you a hundred-foot buffer above the vegetation,” Mike pointed out.

As we descended, I felt like I was going down a well as all references started to disappear into blackness. Just my luck that tonight would be a moonless overcast night. Even our instrument lights were turned down to minimum intensity, but the navigation lights were full bright.

“Why do we have the navigation lights on and the instrument lights so low?” I asked.

“The nav lights are on so Charlie can see us, all the better to shoot at us. The instrument lights are down low, all the better for us to see outside.”

Mike continued our descent and instruction. “As we approach that buffer, you’ll start to see the treetops, and that’s when you continue to descend. But slow it down until you’re about fifty feet above the trees, and then you won’t have a problem seeing the trees.” Damn, he was right! Once we reached fifty feet above the trees, the navigation lights were providing enough ambient light for us to see the tops fairly well even on a night as dark as this one.

“Jones, are you on the scope?” Mike asked the searchlight operator.

“Yes, sir. She’s operating okay. If you want to put us over the river and lower, I can get a look under the trees,” Jones replied. Jones actually worked in the vehicle motor pool as a wheel vehicle mechanic but always volunteered for this mission when it came along. Said it made him feel like he was in the fight.

Lower? Are you shitting me?

Mike slid the aircraft over the river and dropped another fifty feet. We were now flying at sixty knots and about two hundred feet above the river. Trees on the banks were higher than us. An engine failure at this altitude and we were going into the river, which, considering the denseness of the jungle, was a preferable alternative to landing in the jungle. As we continued up the river, Mike was chatting with the Cobra and watching the river. I was watching the shoreline on my side of the aircraft along with the door gunner manning the 7.62 machine gun on the aircraft. We continued for an hour and saw nothing, and we didn’t draw any fire. The return trip was equally uneventful, except I was flying this leg. When we completed the leg, we returned to Bien Hoa for fuel and a powwow between the crews.

Mike laid his map out in the TOC and we huddled around with the intelligence officer from the brigade. Pointing at locations on the map, the S-2 indicated possible enemy locations off the river but close by. “We have a trail network in this area, all moving towards the river, with a crossing point here, here and here. Since last night, Mr. Driscoll, First of the Seventh found another crossing point north of their location about here.” I had done a couple of days resupplying First of the Seventh and was somewhat familiar with the area. They were located on a firebase at a bend in a smaller river that fed into the Song Dong Nai. We hadn’t gone into their area as of yet tonight.

“We’d rather not get into an area where friendlies are operating as we don’t want to light up any of our guys. What about this area here, along the river?” Mike asked.

“Down here, the Navy has a patrol boat, but they’re aboard tonight and there are no friendlies operating in that area. There are some supposed friendlies living south along the river, so you’ll have to get clearance to engage unless engaged. We have the call sign and frequency for the Navy, and I’m sure they’d be happy to have you working the area.”

“Okay, we’ll wait a couple of hours and then go into this box,” Mike said, and we headed back to the aircraft.

“Why are we waiting to go back out?” I asked.

“Jones needs some time to rest his eyes. Looking through that scope in a moving aircraft will get him airsick if he doesn’t get a break after two hours. Also, the later we go out, the better the chance we’ll catch someone on the water. They saw us working the area earlier. Right now they’re moving their boats to the river and loading them and will shove off, staying close to the shore to hide in the overhang, if we come back. Last two nights I worked up north, so they’ve probably set up some ambush in that area, thinking we’d be back tonight. Wrong. Never fly the same pattern three times in a row. If you do, you’re just asking for trouble. If the ground commander wants you to work the same area a third night, try to talk your way out of it, or certainly change how you work it. Fly two nights north to south, the third night northeast to southwest or east to west. Change it up somehow, but change it up.”

Arriving back at the aircraft, the crew was into a case of C-rations. No one offered me the lima beans this time but asked what I would like. Then it came. “Hey, Mr. Cory, is this your first Night Hunter mission?”

“Yeah. And I’m buying the beer in the morning,” I added with a smile.

“Just glad you know, sir,” Jones interjected with a smile to the crew chief and door gunner.

After a couple of hours, Mike conferred with the other crews and we prepared to head out. As the power came up, Mike said, “I got it,” and I turned the controls over to him. The crew gave a positive “clear” and we departed towards the river. This time, Mike took us to the vicinity of the Navy patrol boat. Since we had to call for clearance to engage anything on the south side of the river, we positioned the aircraft so the starlight scope was on the free-fire side of the river.

As we approached the river, however, Mike told me to take it. I started down from one thousand feet. Damn, it’s still dark out . I felt like I was in a pitch-black basement and going downstairs very carefully, putting out my foot and reaching for the next step, without a banister to keep me from falling. Okay, two hundred feet above the trees; one hundred feet; wait one. Okay, I can see the tops now. Ease down another fifty feet. Yes. I didn’t fall down the stairs . As we reached the river, I turned south and reduced airspeed. Jones was watching the bank. The vegetation in this region wasn’t as dense as in the Quan Loi area, so the scope was more effective.

“I got a light!” Jones bellowed and turned on the searchlight, but we saw nothing and commenced shooting, hoping to draw some fire. A flare ignited from the flare ship above, and the Cobra was poised to attack, but nothing. We continued on our way up the river. This scenario played out several more times in the next hour.

After about an hour and forty-five minutes, Mike said, “We’ll make one more pass southbound and then call it a night.” I had the controls and was about a hundred feet over the river. The south side of the river was on the side with the starlight scope, and we had to get clearance to shoot in this area. Dawn would be in about thirty minutes. As we rounded a bend in the river, Mike and I simultaneously spotted a dim light on the southern bank even before Jones called it.

“Jonesy, light ten o’clock on the bank!” Mike yelled. The searchlight came on, and son of a bitch—two sampans with four guys and rockets in the sampans were sitting there. They knew they were cooked and scampered up the side of the bank into a house. “Hold your fire while I get clearance,” Mike instructed the gunners.

“Badger Six, this is Chicken-man One-Six, over.” Mike was calling the Brigade S-3 air.

“Chicken-man One-Six, this is Badger Six India, go ahead.”

“Badger Six, enemy sighted with two sampans, four pax and several Katyusha rockets.” Mike gave the coordinates. “Request clearance to engage, over.”

“Chicken-man One-Six, wait one.” After a minute or two, “Chicken-man One-Six, are you taking fire?”

“Badger Six, that’s a negative. The pax ran up the bank into a house. The boats are on the water. Are we cleared to engage the boats?”

“Chicken-man One-Six, wait one.” Again we wait. “Chicken-man One-Six, this is Badger Six India. You are not, repeat not, cleared to engage.”

“Badger Six, the damn boats are on the water. Let me sink the damn things.”

“Chicken-man One-Six, I repeat, you are not cleared to engage.”

“Hey, Badger Six, if I ain’t cleared to engage, then what the hell am I doing out here all night? You can eat these damn rockets tomorrow night. Chicken-man One-Six is end of mission and returning to the Chicken Coop. Out!”

Mike was pissed. I was pissed. The crew was pissed. The Cobra jockeys were pissed. No one said much as we headed back to Lai Khe. As we pulled into our assigned revetment, other aircraft were cranking up and departing on their missions for the day.

“After we get the aircraft serviced and cleaned up,” Mike said, “let’s meet at the mess hall for breakfast and a mission debrief.”

Over powdered eggs and coffee, we discussed the night’s events and how we could change our game for tonight to maybe catch the sampans before they got to the south shore. One of our pilots who had the day off strolled by.

“Good morning, ladies.” Bob was a big guy with a shaved head and a handlebar mustache that would make a walrus envious. He was dressed in flip-flops and pants, no shirt. An unlit cigar of fine quality was in one hand, along with the latest Stars and Stripes newspaper, a cup of coffee in the other.

“Hi, Bob. I take it you’re not flying today,” Mike said.

“Nope, got a down day. This head cold has me all stopped up. Just heading to the library for some reading. See you later.” And he strolled off toward the latrines, which we referred to as the library, about seventy-five yards away. I noticed Bob going into one and the door closed.

Mike continued with the debrief. “Tonight, let’s first work the area around the Navy—”

KABOOM!

The sound of an explosion cut him off in mid-sentence. I looked up to see the door of the latrine Bob had just entered fly off its hinges as Bob was propelled through the screen with a fireball launching him. We were all up and moving to get out of the mess hall, not sure if we were under attack. And we were heading towards Bob.

“Medic! Medic!” called others that were closer and attempting to help Bob. Our medical officer, Doc, arrived and started assessing the burns on Bob’s back, ass and genitals. Two medics arrived, and we gently picked Bob up and placed him facedown on a stretcher.

“Get the ambulance. We need to get him to the MASH unit now,” Doc said to one of the medics, who sprinted off to get the jeep that was used as an ambulance. When it arrived, six of us picked up Bob, who wasn’t hurting as bad now since Doc had administered a shot of morphine. Bob’s burns were already starting to blister.

The first sergeant asked, “Doc, how bad is it?”

“I would say it’s bad. Looks like second-degree burns, maybe third. Might have someone start packing his stuff as he’s probably going to be medivacked back to the States,” Doc stated. About then, the XO arrived. Better late than never.

“What happened?” he asked no one and everyone.

One of the soldiers who’d been in a tent close to the latrine area spoke up first. “Sir, the latrine just blew up.”

“Latrines just don’t blow up. What happened?” the XO fired off. No one wanted to answer now for fear of getting their ass chewed out for answering. Finally the first sergeant spoke up.

“Sir, let me look into this and I’ll get back to you as soon as we have it figured out.” It appeared that a cooler head was prevailing here.

“You do that, First Sergeant, but I want some answers.” And with that, the XO walked off. He never bothered to ask how Bob was doing. The XO was still sporting the rash on his neck from the other night’s mortar attack. Seemed he had run out of his tent, heading for our one bunker, and plowed right into a tent rope holding the sides of one of the GP Medium tents. Nearly hung himself on the rope. He put himself in for a Purple Heart, but no one would sign as a corroborating witness, not even Doc.

The latrine that had exploded was destroyed, but there were two others available for use and the first sergeant started his investigation there. It didn’t take long for him to determine the cause of the explosion. Instead of putting diesel fuel in the cans under the latrine, the village idiot on shit detail had apparently used JP-4 aviation fuel, which was highly explosive. Bob must have lit the cigar after he’d sat on the toilet and it ignited the fumes from the JP-4. Diesel fuel and JP-4 had distinctly different odors, but with his head cold, he’d probably never smelled the difference. The other two latrines also had JP-4 fuel in the cans as well. Immediately, all the latrines were closed and the first sergeant went looking for the kid who was on shit detail. So did some of the other soldiers.