Chapter 15: The Voice of God  060525

      The next morning, it was business as usual for us. Those weird feelings that I had experienced the day before had by now retreated into the recesses of my subconscious mind, where they belonged. My narrow escape from that mortar barrage and the hard work of digging in had worked their magic in helping me cope. However, it should be noted that magic is only an illusion. It is never what it seems. After our continental breakfast and halfway through my half-filled canteen cup of coffee, Sergeant B. appeared from his morning briefing and immediately delivered the word that our squad would be running a patrol this morning. He and I began reviewing the route drawn on his map, while his RTO hung close and listened. As we continued to review and memorize the azimuths for each checkpoint, the other men in my squad automatically started rounding up what they needed for the patrol. They began sorting out what would be carried on the patrol and what would be left behind as dead weight. Sergeant B. had an experienced crew here, so he did not inspect each grunt. He was not a henpecker, and we liked him for that. The other four guys, including Walker, didn’t look on—as usual—while Sergeant B. and I studied the map. They couldn’t have cared less because it wasn’t their job to navigate the route. So, why should they listen to us discuss the route when they could be enjoying the last few bites of Tex’s homemade donuts and maybe a good smoke? I dread thinking about how they would have gotten home if something had happened to Sergeant B. or me, but then, I was the eternal over thinker.

      A mild drizzle began to fall as we left the perimeter. We followed our assigned azimuth to the first checkpoint. We were walking through a virgin jungle. The drizzling rain was protection against our patrol being heard by the black pajama watchers staked out around the clearing. It also muffled the noise we made. Rain also prevented the enemy from smelling us. Not far into the jungle, I walked past a few dead enemy bodies left lying around from yesterday’s battle, and I also crossed an oxcart trail. It had been drilled into us, by Dick, not to walk on those trails, and I thought that I understood the entire reason for that. However, I only understood part of it. You see, enemy ambushes on trails were not the only thing to fear. Booby traps were also to be feared, and they were almost always placed on trails, around camps, and in tunnels. However, they were never constructed in the vast expanses of undisturbed jungle where no one was likely to tread. I walked point on many patrols while serving in Vietnam, and I never walked a single trail, except for that day at Thrust. I also never ran across a single booby trap. Not walking trails was the reason for that.

      I was also raised by a father who taught me a little about navigating the woods. His lessons made a significant contribution to my survival. My father put no emphasis whatsoever on encouraging me to become involved in sports, unlike other fathers. It’s also true that involvement in these school activities helped give my classmates a head start over me in the civilized world. However, the world I was in now was not civilized. I wouldn’t have survived in this uncivilized world to return to that other world if not for the alternative lessons I learned from my father. My father had been the one to teach me how to navigate the woods at night with a compass, not the Army. Those lessons learned early meant that I had no problem holding the compass, shooting a bearing, and continually counting paces, with no help from anyone else. It would have been nice if Bill and Glen could have been there, but I didn’t need them to do my job. The distance to the first checkpoint was around 800 meters. The second checkpoint was almost twice that. Unlike our other security patrols, this was not a short security patrol. We were being used more like a recon patrol, and this patrol was by far the longest squad patrol that I had ever run. There is one more “something” worth mentioning. It was hugely essential to the survival of any patrol. That “something” was Sergeant B., the squad leader. Lately, I could count on him much more than I could when he first took command. He trusted me to do my thing, and I could trust him to do his. Today, without Bill and Glen’s help, it was more important than ever for that to happen.

      Looking back now, after analyzing various “after-action reports,” it was apparent that there were numerous signs indicating a heavy enemy presence still in this area of operation. The enemy unit that attacked the 1st and 16th battalion commander at LZ X-Ray was also the same unit that attacked Alexander Haig near the Cambodian border on April 1. That was only two and a half months ago. Now, this same unit had just mounted a full-strength attack over sixty miles closer to Saigon. Something wasn’t adding up. That was a big clue, indicating that these NVA units were not retreating over the Cambodian border every time they got shot up, as we naive Americans believed. Given time constraints, I realize now that this was not plausible. How could Thanh have Triet do that and, yet, show up again so soon, sixty miles further south? It seems to me now that our American politicians were very susceptible to the very smooth Svengali of the communists. Many very smooth but false tactical narratives about our enemy were fed to our American news media and then passed on to influence many of our politicians. Those viewpoints not only seemed to give too much unrealistic credit to the enemy’s fighting ability but also way too much virtue to the leaders of their side of the conflict. In this case, there would not have been enough time for Thanh to have reconstituted the 271st, transforming human trafficked children into what was misrepresented by major media outlets as being “fabled” and “storied” veteran jungle fighters. Here is a much more plausible picture of what was happening.

      The NVA who filled the communist ranks were “ravaged conscripts,” some as young as twelve years old, who would be very fortunate indeed to survive the criminal war tactics imposed upon them by their communist masters. After the battle of Ap Gu, the surviving conscripts of the 271st kept moving south. Their ranks were replenished on the march. They paused to resupply and rest at numerous base camps scattered from Cambodia to the outskirts of Saigon. These NVA forces were not “long-time” veterans, as we supposed, but instead, they were “doped-up” brown and green uniformed teenage conscripts, whose jungle fighting skills were limited to a brief ten-minute lesson on how to fire an AK-47 or a handheld rocket launcher. They were also given a short lesson on how to respond to a whistle or a bugle, so their hardcore communist cadre could more easily herd them into their suicidal death charge positions. I guess that anyone refusing would have been immediately shot in the head. 

      Not long into Westmoreland’s visit, a new guy in B Company 2-28 named David A. was making his very first security sweep, just outside the perimeter, along with Staff Sergeant J. and the team’s RTO, Buck Sergeant G. Point man Guy C. was leading the patrol. New guy, David A., had been assigned to Guy C.’s position soon after he arrived the previous afternoon. When he arrived, his brand-new jungle fatigues were already bloody from riding to X-Ray on a blood-soaked Chinook. It had been evacuating the wounded. Before loading aboard, at Lai Khê, David A. had watched in horror as many of the Chinook’s walking wounded had helped others stumble down the off-ramp. When David A. arrived at LZ X-Ray to join his unit for the first time, my unit was already there. He was assigned to Guy C.’s squad. He arrived too late to take part in the big battle, so he and Guy C. immediately started digging in and talking nonstop. With only their entrenching tools, they dug their DePuy bunker, which took almost the entire night to complete.

      Now, as the tired David A. began his first full day in the field, I am sure he had no idea that he was about to earn his Combat Infantry Badge so soon. Here is how that happened. Since Westmoreland was nearby and walking the perimeter, someone sent David A. and members of his squad to investigate one of those treacherous oxcart trails. That’s when trouble found him. His fire team had walked only a little way down the trail when they surprised some sappers assigned by Triet to keep an eye on the American forces. When the firefight ended, David A. had earned his CIB and lost his newfound buddy, Guy C. This event occurred entirely within David A.’s first twenty-four hours in the field, while my squad was on patrol. I thank God that we had a commander who unilaterally took the initiative to enforce an order for us to stay off trails. Again, we crossed trails, walked beside them, and ambushed them, but we never walked on them. I was now leading my squad alongside a well-traveled oxcart trail, which skirted the bamboo ticket to my left. The twenty-five meters of jungle foliage between us and the trail, however, concealed our movement, and the wet jungle deadened the sounds we made. No one traveling that trail would have known that we were there. Another reason why we went undetected was that we slithered through the jungle instead of chopping our way through it.

      I am sure my patrol was still close enough to hear the sounds of David A.’s first firefight at the NDP. However, random shooting was common. If we heard shooting coming from that firefight, we would not necessarily have associated it with being an actual firefight. It could have been practice-firing. Furthermore, while on patrol for noise-abatement reasons, no news of a small firefight would have been transmitted to our ears by radio. Generally speaking, “command” rarely contacted us unless we called them first. So, I continued to lead my little band further and further into the virgin jungle, skirting the thicker stuff to my front, by going left this time and right the next time. This technique effectively canceled out navigation errors. Staff Sergeant B. walked along silently about ten meters behind me.

      About halfway to the first checkpoint, somewhere deep in the jungle to my front, I heard what I now believe was the shrill shriek of a blue pitta. It could be heard above a chorus of other jungle birds. There were also bands of gray langur monkeys hiding high in the treetops, being completely quiet as we passed by. I didn’t spend a lot of time looking up. I knew that most threats would come from stumbling upon a patrol or a base camp, rather than from tree snipers looking to ambush a small patrol like ours. So, that’s where I trained my gaze. We were passing through rather thick secondary undergrowth. It would have been tough for a tree sniper to look down and see me as we passed by. Besides, why would snipers try to ambush us in the vast expanse of empty jungle, given the low probability of us traveling that way in the first place? The answer to that question is, “They wouldn’t.” I used my peripheral vision to check for movement around me continually, and at the same time, I kept my gaze fixed on the front. There were always possible spots on the ground where threats could be looming. When I walked point, I had to switch my focus from spot to spot, always to my front. I just did what I had done in the George Washington National Forest of Virginia so many times before. Hour after boring hour, I would give my full attention to spotting “out of place” details or movements. I was hunting. I had also recently picked up a little trick from Walker, which helped a lot. Like him, I started draping a green towel around my neck to periodically wipe the sweat and rain from my eyes so I could see more clearly.

      I quietly announced our arrival at the first checkpoint. With little ado, Sergeant B. nodded. I then shot a new compass bearing. It was on an azimuth, which would take us almost due north. I don’t remember whether Sergeant B. allowed the men to pause for a smoke. More than likely, he did. The rain had now stopped completely as we started the second leg of our journey. It would be almost a mile to our next checkpoint. It was an easy walk. The route took us up a gentle incline, where the undergrowth thinned slightly. The thinner undergrowth allowed me to travel in a much straighter line toward our second checkpoint. I could sight in my compass on objects that were much farther away. This longer distance saved time since I did not have to stop and reshoot bearings as often. The sky cleared, and the sun above us was brilliant. Shards of almost liquid sunlight pierced the canopies of giant jungle trees. These brilliant columns of light streaming from above to the jungle flooring below created the sensation that I had just entered the interior of some grand cathedral. If not for the present circumstances, I am sure that this little spot of earth could have fooled even an angel of God into thinking that he was walking through the Garden of Eden. Thirty meters to my front, a mongoose hopped from spot to spot. While watching the mongoose, the same peaceful feeling came over me that I had experienced months ago, as I sat along the riverbank. I know now that it was the peace associated with the rising of the Holy Spirit in my soul. He knew something that we didn’t know. He knew if we were left to our own devices, we wouldn’t live long enough to reach our second checkpoint. And He had known this since before the beginning of time. That’s one reason he had already ensured that my squad now had the right squad leader and the right battalion commander for what was going to happen next.

      On and on we went. The men following behind me were being unusually quiet in their movements on this patrol. They weren’t dumb. They had arrived on the same chopper as me. They, too, had seen all the black body bags of our boys who had died in that battle the day before. They, too, had walked by the same enemy corpses strewn about in the jungle around us as we went about our business of preparing and improving our DePuy bunkers. Those sights had already set a somber mood for our patrol.

      Furthermore, most of my squad members had been on enough security patrols to realize that we were going much further this time than usual. That meant we would be much further away if we needed help. The further we went, the more I could sense their growing fear. I could also feel that same fear starting to overshadow the brief peace I had allowed myself to experience, as I momentarily soaked in the majesty and prehistoric grandeur of the jungle around me. Somewhere to our front, I could hear the cry of another blue pitta. Within seconds after hearing his shriek, the voice spoke. I listened to the voice. It was not an audible voice. It had a much more powerful effect on me than if it had been an audible voice. This voice momentarily overrode everything that my five senses were telling me. It was the voice of the Holy Spirit, and He said, “If you go any further, then you are going to die.”

      That message made me freeze in my tracks. I then slowly turned and stood, staring at Sergeant B., which broke the one cardinal rule that I had always obeyed. That rule was never to take my gaze off the jungle before me. Sergeant B. was fifteen paces behind me. He knew I had something important to say, so he kept walking toward me until he was within whispering distance. His radio man followed close behind. The rest of the squad remained motionless where they were before he started walking toward me. He closed the gap between us, without uttering a word, while never taking his eyes off mine. When he stopped, his face was just five feet from mine. He just stood there as quietly as if he were a churchgoer waiting for the prayers to start. In that instant, as I stared into his handsome twenty-six-year-old countenance, his features became so ingrained in my mind that I can still see them today, as clearly as I did then. He was five feet nine, with sandy blonde hair, blue eyes, and fair skin. I can also see the droplets of sweat “beading up” on his face and dripping off his nose and chin. He had a very compliant expression, which said that he was willing to receive whatever I was about to say, with the same respect due the voice of God. At this instant, with all his faults, our squad could have asked for no better leader than Sergeant B.

      “They are just in front of us,” I whispered in a very matter-of-fact tone. When this communication was given, Sergeant B.’s trusting demeanor never changed. There was not a hint of doubt on his face. He had just heard the gospel truth, and he knew it. However, I had no natural proof to confirm what I had just said. Without that proof, no other squad leader in the entire 1st Infantry Division would have taken my word alone for it. Over the last few months, however, Sergeant B. had developed the rare ability to trust the rest of his men and me much more than before. You see, trust breeds trust just as suspicion breeds suspicion. By now, Dick had laid a solid foundation for that trust to grow throughout the ranks. However, Sergeant B. trusted me more than I trusted myself. If he had questioned my judgment this time, as he had done when he had first become our squad leader, there would have been no pushback from me. I would have been the first to agree with any second-guessing from him. The truth is, I had no proof that anything was out there. Yet, Sergeant B. ran with my original, unfiltered announcement. That announcement had come straight from my heart, and Sergeant B. acted on it before I had time to second-guess myself. That was a fantastic milestone in our working relationship. Looking back now, I realize that God had handpicked the one in a million lifer sergeant who would take me at my word. He had complete faith in those words. However, the final decision on whether or not to continue our patrol did not rest with him.