Pt. 11 - The Old-Ultra-Violence, Pt. 3

About halfway through my Vietnam vacation the first boat I worked on embarked from Cat Lai on what would become its final mission.

As usual, we were sent out to the Pineapples region to support another firebase. We spent two or three weeks there doing the usual stuff: inserting and picking up ambush patrols (including LRRPs), occasionally spraying Agent Orange, and delivering supplies when possible. On one of our trips around the area, the boat hit a submerged object that bent one of the propeller shafts. When the coxswain put that transmission into gear, the bent shaft made a very loud banging noise, so the coxswain was forced to leave the engines running but leave the transmission in neutral until we could return to Cat Lai for repairs.

One day we were assigned the task of transporting the 199th Infantry located at the firebase to another location closer to Saigon. Another boat from the 1099th Medium Boat Company was scheduled to meet us at the firebase to drop off replacement security soldiers and drop off supplies. The operation was running late, and the two boats left the firebase about two hours later than planned. Two Huey helicopter gunships circled overhead, following us.

The late departure was a problem because the rivers and canals in the region were subject to the tidal fluctuations associated with the South China Sea. Even though the mike boats only drew about two to four feet of water, sometimes the water levels in the canals could get so low that the boats had to wait for the tide to rise again before proceeding. On this particular day, when our boats reached the final canal branch to our destination, the tide was so far out that we could not proceed. It looked like we were going to be stuck there for two to four hours.

So we parked on the beach at the mouth of the canal and waited in the mid-day heat. Local village children came to the boats to sell us pot and to warn us that there were "beaucoup" VC (Vietcong) waiting for us to move down the canal. Shit! There was no reason not to believe them. A two to four-hour wait would be plenty of time for them to set up an ambush for our two boats.

Finally, the tide came up and our two boats moved out down the canal. We were accompanied again by the two Huey helicopter gunships. The first part of the trip was quite spooky. Apparently, a B-52 bomb strike had hit the area recently, and a long line of giant water-filled craters crossed both sides of the canal. The vegetation on all sides of the craters was totally mowed down as far as you could see. If not for the sound of the boats' muffled exhaust, you could have heard a pin drop...The whole crew with the exception of the coxswain was stoned.

Suddenly: WHUMP! WHUMP, followed by two large geysers of water on the starboard side of the boat.

Our boat had been hit by something, and the crew started firing the M2 guns and the M60 gun (me) into the jungle on both sides of the canal like maniacs. The quarterdeck became ankle-deep in machine gun brass in nothing flat. The infantrymen in the cargo deck were also firing their weapons off of the side of the boat into the jungle. The coxswain had jammed the idling engines into drive and the bent propeller shaft was banging away like a sonofabitch. All of this noise was insanely loud and disorientating. I looked behind the boat and saw that our accompanying boat was also firing at both sides of the canal with their weapons.

Somehow, the coxswain got my attention and told me to check out the boat's engine room. I had been shooting the M60 gun from the side of the wheelhouse on the starboard side of the boat. I put the gun down on the deck and walked around to the front of the quarterdeck in front of the wheelhouse where the hatch was for the engine room. There I noticed that the seaman manning the M2 gun on the port side of the boat had been knocked down by the body of a black infantryman that had been hurled up from the cargo deck. This man was still wearing his helmet and flak jacket, but all of the rest of his body from his flak jacket down was gone. I swear that I saw him take one last breath. The seaman was trying to kick this horror show off of him. I also noticed at that time that the quarterdeck and wheelhouse were covered in blood splatter and bits and pieces of gore from this person.

I undogged the engine room hatch and jumped down. I took one step forward and broke my sunglasses in half on the steel post in between the engines. After taking a few seconds to recover, I surveyed the engine room. I climbed out of the engine room to report that there was a large hole in the forward bulkhead of the engine room that I couldn't plug and that the engine room was filling up with water. We were in danger of sinking in the shallow canal.

Now the helicopter gunships joined the party and started firing into the presumed ambush zone with their miniguns and 2.75" rockets. When they were out of ammo a couple of Air Force F-100 fighter bombers strafed the area with their Vulcan cannons. Next up was a barrage of 105mm artillery fire from some local firebase.

Apparently, at that time we were out of the ambush zone and our sister boat came alongside next our boat, tied up to us, and dragged our boat up on to a beach. Now, something really weird happened - The seaman on the port side of the sister boat was manning their M2 gun. The barrel of the gun was smoking from all of the rounds that had been shot through it. It was pointed directly at our boat's wheelhouse. Our coxswain asked him to point the gun elsewhere, which caused the seaman to start screaming that "nobody's going to tell me what to do with this fucking gun and I'll kill all of y'all if I have to!" The two coxswains got him calmed down somehow and we all lived to fight another day.

Next up: On the Beach!

Pt. 10 - The Old Ultra-Violence, Pt. 2

There were two more memorable incidents that occurred while I was on my first boat in Vietnam. The second one resulted in the boat being sunk. The first one went something like this...

One day we were assigned to transport a platoon of the 199th Light infantry guys out to an area where they were going to do a sweep looking for bad guys. This was an unusual mission for two reasons: (1) we were doing it during daylight, and (2) we were quite a way from the firebase where these guys were responsible for security. Our destination was a bend in a large canal and there was a steep hill directly behind the stern of the boat. As usual, we parked on the shoreline and lowered the ramp so that the troops could exit the boat.  They exited and disappeared into the jungle, and we waited for their return.

After a few minutes, someone on the hill behind us started shooting over the boat at the recently departed soldiers with automatic weapons. GAH!

This time the two M2 guns on the quarter deck were manned by the boat's seamen and they started creating carnage on the hillside behind us immediately. The guns worked just fine this time. As usual, we couldn't see the people that were shooting at us, but we could see the general area where their weapons' tracers (usually green) were coming from. My job was to keep the two guns supplied with ammunition, which I hauled up from the boat's well (cargo) deck. The standard M2 ammunition box only holds 200 rounds which don't last long in a situation like this, so I kept pretty busy hauling ammo until the shooting stopped.

Why did the shooting stop? We will never know. Maybe we killed the unseen bad guys or maybe they had had enough and decided to retreat and lick their wounds. After a while we retrieved the 199th guys from the jungle and motored back to their firebase. Thankfully, no one was killed or injured.

Curiously, the Army thought it fitting to give the crew the Army Commendation Medals with a "V" device for this incident which were pinned on us when we returned to Cat Lai. Rumor had it that our 1st Lieutenant platoon leader and 1st Sergeant both received the Bronze Star for this same incident even though we hadn't seen either one of them since we left the base. 

Go figure!