Chapter 11 

(© 1996 Michael J. Horton. All rights reserved.)

The end of the month proved profitable for many of the men in headquarters company because promotion orders flowed like water. Among the men I knew personally, Steiger, Lew, and Alvarez were promoted to specialist 5th class, commonly called Spec-5. Barnett and Wallace received promotions from PFC to specialist 4th class (Spec-4). The promotions to Spec-5 in particular were attended by enormous frivolity having to do with the term "bird sergeant." A Spec-5 in the technical occupations was equivalent in pay to a sergeant, and the rank insignia on the sleeve patch of a Spec-5 had a large eagle in the center. Hence the appellation, "bird sergeant." I had never heard this term before, but I thought it sounded delightfully lofty and silly at the same time, and I hoped one day to become a bird sergeant. Of course, all these promotions were accompanied by substantial pay raises, which for many of the men were more important than the changes in title.

We found out later that O'Brien, our company clerk, had not been elevated to Spec-5 from Spec-4, even though he held the same time in rank as Steiger and the others. O'Brien was vociferously bitter about being passed over for promotion, and he told anyone who would listen that he primarily blamed Sergeant Greenley for his misfortune, though why he thought that was beyond me. On Tuesday after lunch, O'Brien confronted Greenley about the matter outside the latrine, just as some of us were passing by on our way from the mess hall.

"I wasn't even on the promotion board this time," we overheard Greenley say. "So I had nothing to do with it."

"Well, somebody had something to do with it," O'Brien said. "Besides, I'm sure you got your two cents in there, one way or another."

"You know, O'Brien, sometimes you're your own worst enemy," Greenley said, exasperated. "If you're unhappy about the promotions, you should talk to the first sergeant. After all, he's your supervisor." O'Brien turned away, waiving off Greenley's suggestion with his hand, as though the last thing he wanted to do was talk to the first sergeant about his complaint. Greenley noticed us passing by, and he seemed openly embarrassed by the other man's behavior.

Despite the promotions given out on Monday, the army proved again the next day that rank provided no protection against stupid assignments. Steiger, Lew, Barnett, and I were sent by Sergeant Greenley on a "short" detail around mid-afternoon. We walked two blocks south of the office to a steel storage container called a CONEX. There we were met by a supply sergeant from Cam Ranh who had come to pick up a tent that had been stored in the CONEX. The assignment was deceptively simple: move the folded tent from the container into the back of the sergeant's truck. As the CONEX was opened, it occurred to me that the tent stored in it might be the one we had used for the personnel office up until a few weeks ago. It certainly could have been, given its size. The tent of course had been "folded," but because it was so large, it had assumed the proportions of a bale of rubber. Also, it was more round than square, which made it difficult to grasp with our hands. We struggled several minutes just to get the item dislodged from the CONEX. My guess was the tent weighed about 300 pounds, not a terrible burden for the four of us, provided we could have gotten a hold of it. We manhandled the thing, moving it by fits and starts, grunting and swearing the whole time. Sweat began to run into my eyes, and, by the time the tent was in the truck, some fifteen minutes later, I was completely soaked, as were the others. The supply sergeant seemed very appreciative, but then he could afford to be, since he was dry. The climax to this adventure came later in the day when Greenley called the four of us together again to explain that "someone" had changed his mind and that we would have to put the tent back into the CONEX. In short order, we set the good sergeant straight regarding our unwillingness to participate in phase two of the operation, ill-conceived as it was. Greenley, either through fear or sympathy, agreed to recruit someone outside personnel to finish the job, though who finally did it, we never bothered to ask.

The next day a PFC named Harris came to the office from D company, just as we pay clerks were being introduced to a new form sent by the finance office in Indianapolis. Greenley interrupted the instruction so I could talk to this man, who was stationed with the structural pre-fab unit in Cam Ranh and who was on my payroll. The problem was routine in that Harris had married one week before leaving for Vietnam three months ago, and he wanted to receive his basic allowance for quarters and to have an allotment in that amount sent to his wife. Since he didn't have a certified copy of his marriage certificate, I told him to have his wife send one, so I could do the paperwork to get the BAQ started retroactive to the date of his marriage. Harris agreed to do this and to get the necessary document to me as soon as possible. Knowing the others were waiting for me, I congratulated myself for having disposed of the problem so swiftly.

The new document we were learning to use was an OCR allotment authorization form whose typed data supposedly could be scanned into a computer by an electronic device without operator intervention. This was quite a novelty. The only problem was that each letter typed on the form had to fit precisely inside its own little box, otherwise the scanner would reject the form. We practiced on these new documents for a while without much success, because sooner or later we all typed a letter that impinged upon the side of a box, ruining the form. This was difficult to avoid because the spacing of the data boxes was different from the normal spacing of the typewriter carriage, so that letters initially centered gradually crept to the left in the boxes until it was necessary to throw in an extra space with the space bar, which pushed the next typed letter far to the right within the box, sometimes onto the line. This could be overcome by releasing the carriage tensioner and shifting the form in the typewriter, but the result of this maneuver was completely haphazard, for we never knew exactly where the next keystroke would fall. Everyone agreed the new form was an abomination, but Greenley politely told us to get with the program because in 60 days the new form would be mandatory. Steiger sagely concluded that I should be responsible for typing all the new forms since I knew how to touch-type. To which I replied, "Nice try."

Immediately after this training session, Greenley informed me I was leaving for Ban Me Thuot on Friday, June 2nd, to take pay complaints from 40 men from company A who were attached to the 155th assault helicopter company. He didn't seem surprised that I offered no resistance this time, and indeed I didn't, knowing it would be pointless. Nevertheless, I was not pleased about making another foray outside DBT. Ban Me Thuot was also in the central highlands and about the same distance away as Bao Loc, but north of the latter by 78 miles.

I left early Friday morning with my field file, rifle, and helmet to go to the airstrip at DBT. This time I was assigned to a Chinook helicopter for transportation, and I was excited by the prospect of riding in something other than a Huey. The Chinook had a fuselage that was more like that of a fixed wing aircraft, and it was about 50 feet long, 9 feet high, and 13 feet wide. All this mass was lifted by two rotor blades, one at the head and one at the tail of the craft. Inside, the cargo area was huge, and ours was filled with crates, boxes, and other freight strapped to the floor in the center. Six other passengers and I occupied nylon web seats attached to the inside wall of the fuselage. Because I was constrained by my seat belt, I couldn't see out the windows to the ground.

We flew just fine at first, but after we had been aloft for fifteen minutes, the helicopter began to roll erratically from time to time, which was very annoying and probably dangerous. Finally, a Spec-4 sitting next to me stood up and made his way to the cockpit door, holding onto the safety straps as he went. I could see him crack the cockpit door about a foot and peer into the cabin where the pilot and co-pilot were. He stood there for the longest time, looking through the door, while the helicopter continued to roll wildly from side to side every two or three minutes. I was becoming increasingly concerned for our safety, and, at the same time, exasperated at not knowing why we were going through these gyrations. I left my seat and joined the other man at the bulkhead door. Peering over his shoulder into the cockpit, I perceived the source of our problem. Behind the pilot and co-pilot stood two donut dollies, each holding onto the seat back of one of the aviators. The aircraft was no more than 100 feet off the ground and directly above a two lane highway, whose course we seemed to be following. Each time the roadway turned to the right or left, the pilot turned also, keeping the road beneath us. When the highway turned 90 degrees, the helicopter turned 90 degrees, causing the fuselage to roll sharply as we banked to complete the maneuver. The two girls giggled approvingly with each flip-flop of the aircraft.

Disgusted, I returned to my seat and buckled myself in tightly. It made me angry that the pilot was risking our lives merely to impress these women with his flying skills, conduct that was unprofessional and deserved to be reported. It was to me beyond belief that a pilot would add any incremental risk to the operation of a helicopter, a type of aircraft universally known to be the most dangerous ever flown. We continued on, zigzagging our way to Ban Me Thuot, which we reached safely some twenty minutes later. I was so happy to be alive that I decided not to file a complaint about the childish behavior of the pilot.

I arranged a ride for myself and my file to the location of our contingent from A company. As we drove the short distance there, I noticed that BMT seemed to be on a plateau and not so closely ringed by mountains as Bao Loc had been. What mountains could be seen were at least five miles away. Also, the clouds were less threatening here and the landscape more arid than Bao Loc, though it was clear from the dense vegetation that there was no lack of rain. We passed a tent whose entrance sign said: 1st Airlift Platoon/Ride a Slick to Hell and Back. Another sign farther on said: Detachment #10, 5th Weather Squadron/Dust Bowl to Mud Hole. From this and other evidence, I concluded that most of the troops stationed at BMT belonged to air force units.

I was greeted personally by Captain Conover, the officer in charge, and it was evident he had been expecting me. I set up my franchise at a desk in the corner of the operations tent and awaited my first customers. The A company officers wore insignia of rank on their helmets, which put my mind at ease regarding snipers. After observing for an hour or two, I noticed that the work atmosphere here was less tense than Bao Loc had been, and the EM treated the officers more like supervisors than superiors. This informality had been taken to such an degree that the EM never saluted the officers, either inside or outside the tent. Moreover, I gathered by their demeanor that these officers had not been saluted by anyone in a long time and didn't expect to be.

The few men who came to see me in the morning had questions about their pay but no need for any actual changes. I took lunch with other EM from A company at the air force mess hall, and the food was first-rate, much better than army chow. This lent some credence to the old saying that the army bought some of the finest ingredients in the world, but the cooks destroyed them. Other advantages to air force life, which I discovered on my way back from lunch, included a tiled swimming pool 30 feet square and five feet deep. Beside it was a sign that said, "No Swimming When Raining, Lightning, and Thunder." As if the pool weren't startling enough, farther on I encountered a concrete latrine with flush toilets. Unbelievably, this facility had standard, white ceramic toilet bowls and urinals hooked up to actual water pipes. I was practically beside myself with incredulity. Next, the unfairness of it all struck me: where did these people get off having this kind of crap when the rest of us were living like pigs. After digesting this and other philosophical reflections that occurred to me as I stood there like some moron staring at the commodes, I returned to work.

The rest of the day proved as easy as the morning, with a few men needing only minor changes to allotments and, of course, the inevitable bond cancellations. One man wanted to know if it were true that he wouldn't get hostile fire pay for the whole month if he were killed. "That's true," I said. "You only get hostile fire pay up to, and including, the day you die."

"Not the whole month?" he asked.

"No, not the whole month," I repeated. "So, you see, the later in the month you get killed, the better off you are." The man shook his head and went away, apparently satisfied with this explanation, though still looking confused.

After dinner, it sprinkled lightly for several minutes and threatened to do more, but that didn't stop me from exploring my surroundings further. As I walked around the compound, I saw a man standing beside a truck about a thousand feet outside the last line of tents, though still within the perimeter. After some hesitation, I decided to approach the vehicle to see what the man was doing. I was beginning to understand that PFC's, like me, could get away with practically any intrusion, since most people attributed our forwardness to inexperience. The truck, I discovered, was a 3/4 ton pickup, covered with a tarp to protect some large pieces of radio equipment secured in the back. After introducing myself, I found out the man was a radio operator with one of the infantry units stationed at BMT, and he was killing time during his off-duty hours by reading comic books and monitoring the field operations radio traffic. As we were talking, the radio crackled to life. "This is Tango Leader to Tango 4. Come in Tango 4. Over." While we waited for the response, the man explained to me that Tango Leader was the operations command center and Tango 4 was a daylight infantry patrol sent outside the perimeter for reconnaissance.

"This is Tango 4 to Tango Leader. Go ahead Tango Leader. Over."

"Tango 4, where are you? Over."

"We're on the other side of the river, about one mile north of the coordinates we gave you earlier. Over."

"Tango 4, did you say you've gone across the river? Over."

"Yes, Tango Leader, we forded the river about ten minutes ago. Over."

"Lieutenant, I want you to get those men back across the river immediately. You never, ever, take your men across water if you don't have artillery support or close air support. If you get pinned down over there, there's not a damn thing we can do to help you. Now get those men out of there and back across the river. Is that understood? Over."

"Yes, Sir. Understood. Over." The radio fell silent, and five minutes passed with no further communication. I didn't wait around to see if the lieutenant got his men back across the river. Presumably, he did. I went in search of the EM club and left the radio man to pick up the thread of his comic book, where he had left it when I interrupted him.

I found the club soon enough, and it, also, belonged to the airmen, as evidenced by its unusual circular shape and the bright colored lights with which it was festooned. I bought a beer and watched some men shooting pool and playing pinball machines. The place was well lit and definitely much nicer than our club in DBT. The amenities aside, however, I wasn't sure I would want to be stationed here in Ban Me Thuot, isolated as it was in the central highlands. I stayed, drinking, about an hour but didn't have the energy to meet anyone new, so I retired to my temporary cot to acquaint myself with Emily Post's rules of etiquette.

In the beginning section on "The Art of Conversation," I learned that a young person is always introduced to an older person, and a less important person is always introduced to a more important person. I covered my face with the book, and I was reflecting upon the apparent conflict these two rules would produce in the case of an old sergeant and a young lieutenant, when I fell asleep. I awoke next morning with my left cheek on page 3, and a spot of drool punctuating the question: Are there occasions when first names aren't used? Still half asleep, I concluded that, yes, if the name were Victor Charlie, probably Mr. Charlie would do just fine in the event of a chance meeting in the woods. Viet Cong, VC, Victor Charlie. I had probably heard that over a field radio. Gradually, as I lay on my back on the cot, the fog began to lift, and it occurred to me that reading Emily Post might not be considered a mentally healthy thing to do in my present circumstances.

I reported back to operations, where I spent a dull morning waiting for more men to come forward with pay problems. By noon, however, it became obvious that no one else needed my attention, a fact that didn't escape Captain Conover, who sat at the desk next to mine. He offered to drive me personally back to the airstrip for my return to DBT, and shortly, after I gathered my equipment and field file, we were on our way in his jeep. Captain Conover seemed withdrawn, and he said little as we drove. At the dispatch shack, he helped me unload the file, after which he shook my hand and thanked me sincerely for coming to Ban Me Thuot to help his men. He climbed back into the jeep and said good-bye. Before he drove away, it occurred to me, almost as an afterthought, that I should salute him, which I did. A confused look came over him, as though he didn't understand what was happening. Then, suddenly, he returned my salute, and a big smile spread slowly across his face. He dropped his salute smartly and drove off, still smiling. I really wasn't sure whether he smiled because he felt good that I had saluted him, or whether he smiled because he thought me naive for having done so. In either case, it made no difference to me, so long as he derived some satisfaction from my gesture.

After an hour's wait, I was assigned to a Huey for my return to DBT. Once aloft, everything went routinely for the first twenty minutes, and I was happy to be able to see the terrain below as we flew. Unexpectedly, however, the pilot stopped our forward motion, and we hovered in the air as the helicopter swung slowly around 180 degrees, until we were facing the direction from which we had come. We hung in the same spot for a long time, during which the starboard door gunner and a second crewman craned their necks out the side of the Huey so they could look at something forward of the aircraft. Finally, my curiosity got the better of me, and I tugged on the sleeve of the second crewman to find out what was afoot. He turned toward me, and, recognizing I had a question, he removed his headgear. I put my face close to his ear so he could hear me over the chopping of the blades, and I yelled, "What's going on?" He put his hand on my shoulder to steady me from the rocking of the helicopter and shouted back at me.

"There's some ground fighting two miles back, and the pilot is thinking about going over there to help out." Having said this, the crewman stuck his head back out the door of the hovering craft. I sat down again, somewhat worried about the outcome of the pilot's decision. My simple trip back to DBT might turn out to be more exciting than anything I wanted. Another three or four minutes passed as the pilot apparently mulled over the situation in his mind. Then, just as suddenly as it had started, it stopped. We swung around again and proceeded on our way, going in the original direction. I felt a sense of relief.

We were soon flying over the city of Da Lat, said to be the home of the emperor's summer palace, though who the emperor was I had no idea. Da Lat and its environs were lush and green, and the city was built on hills that, judging from my perspective high above, could easily have been small mountains. Dotted through the tree tops were red roofs that appeared to be made of tile, and gardens of flowers smiled at us from the ground. Of all the places I had been so far since coming to Vietnam, Da Lat gave me the warmest feeling yet, even though I was chattering along above it at 100 miles per hour. I wondered what it would be like to see Da Lat from ground level. Before long, we had descended to the barrenness of the coastal plain that surrounded DBT.

I had barely finished unpacking my files when Sergeant Greenley approached me to say that the first sergeant wanted to see me right away. Somewhat alarmed, I asked Greenley if he knew why Sergeant Johnson had sent for me. He said he didn't know, but he suggested I go immediately. After looking in several places, I found the first sergeant sitting at a table in the mess hall, drinking a cup of coffee. The dining room was otherwise empty except for a Spec-5 who sat two tables away from Johnson.

"Excuse me, Top," I said. "You wanted to see me?"

"Oh, Horton, it's you," he said, as he looked up and recognized me. "I want to ask a favor of you." A sense of relief came over me when I realized I hadn't done anything wrong, which is what I had feared.

"Sure, Top," I said, "what can I do for you?"

"Well, we have a soldier of the month panel coming up," he said, "and I was hoping you'd agree to represent headquarters company." I watched the sergeant's face carefully as he finished saying this, looking for any signs of a smirk. Soldier of the month, indeed. Who did he think he was fooling? I decided not to be taken in by this ruse.

"You're kidding, right?" I said. He was taken aback.

"Kidding? I don't think so," he said. "We take this very seriously. The company NCO's are very competitive when it comes to this monthly event because it's a way for us to make our units distinguished. Besides, our company...." Suddenly, he stopped speaking and looked past me toward the table where the Spec-5 was sitting. I turned in that direction and saw that the Spec-5 was watching us. He must have been eavesdropping on our conversation. "Am I talking to you?" Johnson said to the man. The Spec-5 just stared at us blankly, probably afraid to say anything to such a high-ranking NCO. "Am I talking to you?" Johnson repeated. "I don't think so. You're not the only one here." Embarrassed, the man stood up and walked from the room, leaving his cup behind.

"Now, where was I?" Johnson said. "Oh, yes. As I was saying, I've won this...well, I mean... headquarters company has won this competition five of the last ten times, which is not a bad record considering there are five companies trying to win. If you're picked as soldier of the month, you get a three day R&R in Vung Tau. And, it certainly can help you when the promotion board meets."

I finally agreed to do as he asked, primarily because I didn't feel I had any real choice in the matter. It would have been totally stupid of me to deny the man a favor. My reluctance stemmed from not wanting to take on any added pressures and not wanting to disappoint the first sergeant in case I did poorly. Once I had agreed, Johnson warmed to the subject and explained to me that I needed to memorize my general orders, practice breaking down my M-14, review guard procedure, learn the chain of command from the president on down, and read the Stars and Stripes for current events. He said the judges were big on current events. Beyond that, I needed to wear a clean, pressed uniform and to spit shine my boots. He told me to bring him a uniform, and he would get it starched and pressed.

As I walked back to the barracks, I tried to decide whether I should mention this competition to any of the bunker crowd. The best thing, I concluded, was to keep the matter to myself and just do it when the time came, a week from now. Otherwise, these jerks would ride me unmercifully.