War Story 12: Coming Home From War

I woke up early in the morning in a dark, damp, insect, and rat-infested bunker in Vietnam.

The musty smell and bugs were typical but still distasteful.

Emptying my rat traps, I shaved and dressed in my best jungle fatigue uniform.

It was after a full year of chasing “Charlie” in the putrid rice paddies, sand bars, jungles, and mountains, and this was the day I cherished.

Today, I would start my journey back to what we called “The World.”

As a 23-year-old first lieutenant, I commanded a platoon in combat for months before getting promoted to Company Commander on a firebase southwest of Da Nang.

My platoon often experienced combat with Viet Cong and North Vietnamese Regulars (NVA). Not looking to be a hero, I firmly believed that the best survival chances were based on offensive tactical actions. I often repeated to myself, “Keep the enemy on the defensive.” I preferred being on the attack, never wanting to be a sitting duck waiting for the bad news.

But my thinking would change in these closing days.

My gear, consisting of one duffle bag, had been packed for days. My “jungle rot,” or skin lesions, continued to be annoying, and I remember feeling very apprehensive these last days.

Now is not the time to make a stupid mistake.

For the first ten months, I felt little fear and anxiety. It was only a week after arriving in Vietnam that during my very first mission “to observe and learn,” we hit a horrific booby trap that critically injured two, including the lieutenant I was following. I realized I would likely not survive. I convinced myself not to worry about it. After all, my “fate” was already determined; I simply did not know how and when.

In the meantime, my job was clear and compelling: save my soldiers’ lives and kill as many enemies as possible. I felt strongly about this as I spent two long, grueling years enduring intense training at four different Army posts, the last of which was in Jungle School, Panama Canal Zone. Those intense years were outstanding preparation for conducting effective small-unit combat operations. I felt I was ready. My head was clear and focused.

However, in the last two months of a 12-month tour of duty, I felt increasingly nervous that I might make it out alive. Yes, I might be able to do it!

My fears grew that I would get cut down any day, at any moment, by bullets, rockets, booby traps, or a simple accident.

At the sprawling firebase known as Hawk Hill, I walked past the battalion building that suffered a direct hit from a rocket just two weeks earlier. Then I reflected on the Medical Aid Station where the wounded are treated. I saw the blood trails leading into the bunker. I was treated at this same place not long before being sent to the Division Hospital in Chu Lai.

I crossed the open tarmac with red dust clouds bellowing from several helicopters. I boarded a Huey and gazed out over the always-busy helipad. I could see other Hueys also loading soldiers for deployment to go in harm’s way, somewhere out in the rice paddies or jungle. The activity and noise were deafening. I sat back and felt some relief I was going in a different direction and wished them well.

It was to be a terrifying ride.

I had already flown on choppers many times, including 27 combat assaults into enemy territory. I had seen them shot down and always felt nervous getting into these flying coffins. I did not realize the pilots knew I was going to Da Nang airport to process out.

Soon after boarding, they revved up the engines and flew at max speed just a few feet off the paddies at over 120 mph toward tree lines with every joint straining. Hueys had no doors on them, and I was holding on for dear life. At the very last second, they pulled up in an ear-splitting climb with blades groaning in the familiar “whop, whop, whop” sounds. I thought the blades would break off under such stress and we would crash into a sloppy rice paddy below.

The joker pilots smiled at me when we arrived at the airport. I walked away shaking in my boots but pretended to be unaffected.

Even then, I thought the NVA would lob in a few rockets and blow us up.

When we boarded the commercial passenger airplane, the nervousness did not stop. I had no control over my heartbeats. After the plane cleared Vietnam’s airspace I took a deep breath and tried to calm down.

I was exhausted and soon fell asleep.

When the plane landed in Washington State, the raised arms and clamorous applause and cheers on board was a time of celebration.

I was offered a promotion to captain if I signed the paperwork, but it would mean another tour in Vietnam in 1972. I opted out.

At Fort Lewis, Washington, the process was formal, administrative, and cautionary. We knew little of the latest news of protests, riots, shootings, and other anti-war activity in the States.

The first sign of potential trouble was the admonition from a master sergeant: “Let your hair grow, don’t wear your uniform in public, put on civilian clothes before leaving the post, and stay away from groups of potential protestors.” In other words, “maintain a very low profile as there are a lot of crazies who will attack you.”

I remember that my “khaki shirt” had a chest full of ribbons pinned on it and I was proud of them.

I did not listen. I wore my khaki uniform on the flight from Seattle to my home in Boston.

In Seattle, I did avoid protesting groups and went straight to my gate. I was visibly shunned, and I could see the frowns and disgust on the onlookers' faces.

To hell with them, I said to myself.

Arriving in Boston, I walked off the plane and into the arms of my wife and family and held my 16-month-old son for the first time in a year.

It was the only group I cared about, and I missed them so much.

Later, I would run into those who were opposed to my service. I did learn to minimize any discussion of Vietnam for years. Yes, I was called names. Yes, I was very disappointed by the impressions of others, especially by women more than men.

In my new role as husband and father, my approach would be the same. I went back on the offensive to be the best sales executive for Xerox Corporation possible.

It was to be a new kind of competitive challenge; instead of body count, it would be getting sales orders. Having scrutinized my background, the recruiter inexplicably asked me if I would have “call reluctance,” making cold calls and knocking on the doors of area businesses to sell products. He said many people are afraid of such direct activity.

Confused, I asked if they had guns on the other side of the door. The recruiter laughed and said I was hired.

Today, 46 years later, with two children and five grandchildren, fate did play out, and life was good to me.

I am so very thankful, yet I still grieve every day for those not so lucky to live their lives as they wanted. They truly sacrificed everything.

Yes, every day.