![]() ![]() Bond, was killed by enemy small-arms fire while leading the 199th in battle, the only U.S. I later found out that the unit on the assault that day was the 199th Light Infantry Brigade, and the wounded headed for the hospital included Gen. I heard another chopper had casualties on board as they lifted off for the 3rd Field Hospital in Saigon. As we orbited 5,000 feet over the scene and out of danger, I realized what a testament to bravery, personal leadership and individual responsibility I had witnessed by so many that day. Did they go in because it was their job or because they didn't want to let their comrades down? Whatever the reason, I listened to the activity below us and watched the co-pilot making notes of the call-signs with a grease pencil on the windscreen as each crew offered themselves to the battle. It's hard to describe how much I admired the courage of those men. The decision was made to pull out the troops, and I was humbled and awed as one pilot after another landed and picked up infantry off that hot LZ. I had a camera with me and still have a photograph of all three choppers down. When that was reported over the air, our pilot joined the search, and soon we were orbiting a scene of not one, but three of our UH1s down in a field, and one was smoking. ![]() One of the choppers had been hit and lifted off the LZ only to go down in a nearby rice paddy. There were still choppers circling to land and others trying to clear the area. ![]() "Victor 3, you're on fire! Get out of here!" The situation was rapidly getting worse. I estimated that we had only a few more minutes before we landed at the HQ in Long Binh when I heard, "I'm hit! I'm hit!" One of the choppers that had just inserted an infantry unit on the landing zone below us had been hit with automatic weapons from a strong Viet Cong unit dug in on the other side of the canal. I was the sole passenger, and as we flew, had earphones on so I could listen to the radios. On one trip, returning by chopper from Tay Ninh City located close to the Cambodian border to HQ in Long Binh, I had the privilege to see the Vietnam War in full color, unedited and with the original cast.Īs we cruised over the country at about 5,000 feet, I could see the entire city of Saigon out the right door and the green jungle out the left. The country from the air was a lush green with crystal clear blue water and white sandy beaches - a perfect resort area, except for bomb craters and miles of jungle where nothing would grow, thanks to Agent Orange.īack and forth from the DMZ to the Delta or from the border to the South China Sea, I rode anything going my way. This work required me to travel all over Vietnam. I shuttled between teams, introducing them and identifying expectations and out-briefing the results and recommendations a few days later. Our team's services were in growing demand, and I split the group into two teams and sent them out to different sites. The new Army HQ was not bad - metal buildings and air conditioned. I had been a "Saigon Commando" for all of 10 days. I flew up to join the team and returned with them a couple of days later, only to find that the Army Headquarters was relocating to Long Binh, so I packed up and ended my tour in Saigon. The team was currently working in Chu Lai, on the coast just south of Da Nang. Our team would check the status of their equipment and coordinate the back-up support available. I was the chief of the Readiness Assessment Team (RAT), a team that visited units that requested assistance with equipment maintenance and supply problems. The pace of operations had taken its toll, not only on the men but also on the equipment on which they relied to get them in and out of combat. I spent the next seven months as the brigade maintenance officer and then transferred to a job in the Army Headquarters (USARV) in Saigon. We flew to the coast where we boarded a troop ship, the USS Patch, in Oakland for the 22-day trip to Vietnam. Everyone took a few days leave, and we packed our gear and headed to Vietnam. We returned to Fort Benning in November and shipped all of our equipment by way of the Suez Canal so it would be there when we arrived. Readying for deployment meant much field training, and since there was not a lot of spare room on Benning, we moved to Hattiesburg, Miss., for three months of advanced infantry training. Returning from Germany after a three-year tour, I was assigned to the 199th Separate Light Infantry Brigade, a new type of organization being activated for the Vietnam War at Fort Benning in Georgia.
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