The Beverwyck Review

Stories and Poems from the Writers' Critique Group of First Reformed Church, Schenectady, New York

Category: Military

The Vietnam Guys

November 10, 2023 / / 2 Comments

By Richard A. Rose, Captain, US Army retired.

Over the total of my military and civilian careers, I have had the opportunity to work with many men who served in Vietnam.  While for most you never knew about their service, except for the wearing of a pin or the First Team (1st Cavalry Division) hat, others with which I worked did let me know tidbits of their time in country.         

TOM  

I worked with a man named Tom who was every bit the older version of the Marine Corps recruiting poster.  He had a razor cut short flat top, barrel chest, the look of a guy who never joked around. Tom had been one of those whose family had always been in the Corps and for whom volunteering was not only expected, but almost required.  He said that his big Irish family was made up of Marines and cops.  Most of the men were one and then the other.  So, when he was of age, the day after his 18th birthday, he went to the recruiter and volunteered.  He would be one of the almost 70,000 Marines who, in 1966, were carrying out ground operations against the Vietcong.  Tom was an infantryman.  His days were filled with movement to contact and search and destroy, and his nights were filled with ambushes, mortar attacks, bad chow, and little sleep.  To say that it took its toll on him is an understatement.  Tom always talked rather guiltily about that, saying that his dad and uncles had withstood the like of Iwo Jima, Okinawa, and Guadalcanal, so who was he to complain about Vietnam.

I always thought that Tom was a very religious man because he literally went to church every day before coming to work.   It was good thing that our building was basically across the street from a Catholic cathedral because I could look out the window and see him crossing the street from the church every morning.  When most people say things like “every day” they are probably using hyperbole, and really mean that is happens a lot.  But when I say that Tom went to church every day, it was literally every day.

Tom was in a tough state, it was late 1966 and he had just a few days until his tour in Vietnam was over.  He had been wounded and been decorated for bravery.  He said that they handed out medals for basically just staying alive.  One afternoon, standing in the pouring rain in a three-foot rice paddy, his squad came under withering fire from Vietcong well hidden in the brush.  Tom watched his fellow Marines cut down around him for about 15 to 20 minutes.  Crouching in the sloppy water, Tom said that he asked God to save him.  He said in that in that moment he felt the strongest connection with God he had ever had.  It wasn’t being afraid.  He said later that he wasn’t afraid, just sure that his time was up unless God intervened.  Tom told God that if he got out of this alive and made it home, he would go to church every day for the rest of his life, and he meant it.  Almost the second he made his “deal”, a formation of Army UH-1 Iroquois “huey” gunships came right over his position and completely took out the Vietcong firing on what was left of his squad.  The evacuation and medical choppers were right behind them.

Tom would say in a plain tone, “God kept his bargain, I keep mine.”

ED

I had the opportunity to work with Ed for about a year, when we were rolling out the AIDS/HIV Counseling and Testing Centers in New York City.  Ed was formally trained as a nurse, but I would come to find that his medical training had started in the Navy.  Growing up a Quaker, known as the Society of Friends, Ed was and had been his whole life, a pacifist.  Core to his beliefs was the rejection of military service and war, indeed the rejection of any form of physical violence.   When he said this, my next question was logical, “So how did you get in the Navy?”  

Ed, when he told me his story, just smiled, and said that in 1968 he had a problem being an American and also holding on to his religious beliefs.  The 60s were a tough time for him personally, as well as the nation culturally.  He reconciled the conflicts in himself by taking his draft notice to the U.S. Navy recruiter and letting him know that he would not fight in Vietnam.  He was, however, willing to be a Navy Hospital Corpsman on a hospital ship or the like, where he believed that he could fulfill his obligation as an American and uphold his religious beliefs.  Ed thought that this compromise was the best and honorable thing to do given that he just didn’t want “conscientious objector status”.  By doing this he was going against the thoughts of some members of the Society of Friends, but he believed that he could reconcile it within himself.

While Ed had done a lot of thought about the moral and ethical issues, he hadn’t really understood what he was saying to the Navy.  Would they train him as a Hospital Corpsman?  Yes, but after that training, Ed was assigned to provide medical support to a Marine Infantry platoon going to fight in Vietnam.  The only time that Ed did service on ship was during the trip from San Diego to Pearl Harbor, and then to Vietnam.  His tour of duty was being responsible for emergency life-saving medical care to Marines in the middle of fire fights, care to for Marines with jungle foot rot, for Marines with festering infections, and just being the overall “Doc” to his platoon.   Through all of it, he never carried a weapon, never fired a weapon, and only acted to save everyone he could.  

Ed’s goal to not be around the death of war was a complete failure.  He was perhaps more morally challenged than any of the Marines he protected, because as a pacifist, his mere presence amid all of that killing and death felt morally wrong.  While serving his tour, Ed realized that the elders were right, that he shouldn’t even be there, but he came to realize in the years later that his experiences in helping to save lives, perhaps made him a stronger and better person.  It made him more compassionate and dedicated to peace.

As we worked on the establishment of AIDS/HIV Counselling and Testing Centers during the AIDS crisis this strength came through.  While he had seen worse in his lifetime, his compassion and ethical strength made him a guiding beacon for so many in such a difficult time. 

MIKE & BOB  

A long-range reconnaissance patrol, or LRRP, is a small, well-armed reconnaissance team that patrols deep in enemy-held territory.  By April 1966, each of the four Battalions of the 173rd Airborne Brigade had formed LRRP units.  By 1967 formal LRRP companies were organized, most having three platoons, each with five six-man teams.  LRRP training was notoriously rigorous and team leaders were often graduates of the U.S. Army’s 5th Special Forces Recondo School in Nha Trang, Vietnam.  Such was the Vietnam experience of Bob and Mike; the Recondo legends.  Bob was the tall lanky distance runner type while Mike was more the 5’8” super muscular stereotypical commando.  Both were field medics and had gone through basic jump school at Ft. Benning in the same class after completing Army medics training.  They had met while in Medic’s school and were sent to Airborne.  Mike and Bob had been rivals competing for top honors in Medic’s school and competing against each other for the Iron Mike trophy in Airborne.  When they graduated from Airborne, they were both assigned to the 173rd Airborne Brigade (“Sky Soldiers”).  The brigade was the first major United States Army ground force deployed in Vietnam, serving there from May 7, 1965, to 1971 and losing 1,533 soldiers.  Brigade members received over 7,700 decorations, including more than 6,000 Purple Hearts.  Both Bob and Mike would be among those Purple Heart recipients, as well as earning Bronze Stars.   

The rivalry would continue in the 173rd, as each was assigned to a different LRRP.  Their patrol areas were different, rarely overlapping and they would only reconnect when they arrived at the base camp.  There they would share stories of missions, compare the remarkable feats of military medicine that each performed in patching up their patrol members and generally complain that the other just wasn’t as good as they were.  

When their tour ended, they were scheduled to fly back to “the world”.  Both had been talking about going home.  For Bob, home was western Pennsylvania, with its coal mines, steel plants, and farms.  For Mike, home was back to west Texas and the wide-open spaces filled with cows and oil wells.  But something had happened in their time in the Army.  Indeed, something had happened in Vietnam.  Neither had been from Hawaii, but both had decided as the plane landed in Honolulu, that they were not going back to their pre-Vietnam homes.  It just wasn’t home anymore.  The first leg home became their last flight anywhere.  

As civilians, they had transitioned to Honolulu Emergency Services as Emergency Medical Technicians and had both gone through the Mobile Intensive Care Technicians (MICT) training program.  Always gently competing and keeping each other on their professional “toes”.  Both had families, as stable or not as each could handle.  When I met them, at least six years after returning from Vietnam, they were still playfully handing out jibes about which one was the better this and the better that.  All said with a smile and a pat on the back.  Bob and Mike were truly friends who had been able to survive by having a friend who had gone through it with them.  Their comradeship was their greatest strength. 

LEWIS

I had worked with Lewis for a few years and always found him to be able to see the nuance in practically any situation.  Lewis was the Vietnam age but remarked on a few occasions that he didn’t go.  I suspected that the reason was a college deferment, or some other mechanism that lots of people used who avoided military service.  We were travelling on a train from New York City back to Albany and somehow the subject of my service in the Army came up.  He said that I must have been crazy to actually volunteer.

For some reason he talked quietly about the matter-of-fact version of how he avoided going to Vietnam.  Lewis had received his draft number and could see the writing on the wall.  He knew that he had three choices, two of which he discussed with his parents.  He talked about just going and probably being sent to Vietnam, it was 1970 and things didn’t look good.  He also talked about escaping across the Canadian border to evade the draft, becoming a criminal and draft dodger.  Strangely, his parents were ok with this option because they had no desire to see their son needlessly lose his life in what had become a confusing mess of a war.  The third option, which Lewis only spoke about in very hushed terms, was the option he took.  

Somehow, he was able to get medical documentation for a condition which would prevent his service in the military.  In other words, he made himself look medically unfit.  While he never did say how he did this, he did say that there were contacts that, in those days, could for a fee, have a medical history prepared which would pass examination and give him medication that would, for a short time, mimic the condition.  So, he reported, handed in his paperwork, and was subsequently declared unfit.  He never said what medical condition he supposedly had, nor how the actual process worked to get the documents, but apparently the “underground” was well situated to make it happen.  

Did he feel bad about his choice those many years ago? No, for he too had the feeling that if he gone to Vietnam, he would have never returned alive. 

The Cold

November 10, 2023 / / 4 Comments

By Richard A. Rose, Captain, US Army retired.

Bill remembered thinking when he got his draft notice that he was in trouble.  He didn’t have any reason for a deferment so it was clear that he would be drafted.  Conventional wisdom at the time said that you were treated better and had more choices if you volunteered rather than waited to be drafted.  All that seemed crazy to him now. He had volunteered, and he was told that he was to be a mortar base plate carrier in the infantry.  How exactly was that more choices?  A mortar is an indirect fire weapon which had a three-man crew: the base plate carrier, the tube carrier, and the ammo carrier.  Together they made up a mortar team.  Somehow the benefits of volunteering didn’t really come to pass even here.  The base plate is simply a 50-pound iron disk to which the mortar tube is attached.  To fire, the rounds were dropped down the tube until they exploded the powder bags, projecting the round high into the air.  So, basically Bill carried a metal plate.  

It was not a good time or place to be in the infantry.  It was November 1950, and Bill was assigned to the 7th Infantry Regiment of the 3rd Infantry Division in Korea.  What happened that November was something that Bill rarely talked about, except to say that he never wanted to be cold again.  From November 27 through December 13th the Battle of the Chosin Reservoir pushed people to their limits.  Along with members of the 7th Infantry Division and 1st Marine Division, the three regiments of the 3rd Infantry Division survived the extreme cold and overwhelming numbers of two Chinese Field Armies.  In the first few minutes of the first day in combat Bill went from being a member of a three-man crew to being the entire crew.  He carried the base plate, tube, and ammo. With the human-wave type of attacks by the Chinese army, the mortar went from being an indirect fire to a direct fire weapon.  Bill wedged the base plate vertically in the frozen ground, attached the tube and literally threw rounds down the tube creating a makeshift cannon.  The battle lines became set with the Marines on the west side of the reservoir and the Army in the east, with the Chinese surrounding both.  

Only once did he speak of the battle, relating a story of a night stuck on the frozen reservoir.  Bill and two others had been sent from the Army lines on the northeast side of the reservoir to deliver needed medical supplies to the 5th Marines near Yudam-ni on the northwest. This meant that they would be skirting the edge of the Chinese 27th Army.  To do this, they would take a jeep across two sections of the ice.  It was night, and they started slowly driving across the frozen water.  Once they got to the middle of that section of the reservoir, the Chinese dropped three mortar rounds on them.  The ice was cracked, and the jeep wrecked.  The three soldiers were thrown out onto the ice.  Bill had managed to grab the canvas bags full of medical supplies.  They were faced with a choice: stay put and hope for help; expose themselves and probably be killed on the spot with more mortar fire; try to slide back the way they had come; or creep on toward where they hoped the Marines were entrenched.  

Years later, Bill would laugh about the three of them arguing in the dark while laying prone on a frozen lake.  Years later, it would seem so silly and ridiculous, knowing how sound probably carried across the ice, that some Chinese officer was listening to them debate the best course.  If only he could speak English, he would have known their plan.  At the time, it was cold, it was dark, and they were terrified.  Eventually, they realized that staying put was a death sentence, and that they had lost their bearings not knowing which the correct way was to go.  They could see a small light on the coast and decided to slowly move toward it hoping it was the Marines.  They crawled across the ice avoiding any of the exposed water or cracked areas created by the mortar shells earlier.  

As pre-dawn eventually began to illuminate the shore of the reservoir, they could see far behind them the upturned jeep, and in front of them a frightening realization.  For the last several hours, without knowing it, they had been crawling toward a Chinese machine gun emplacement.  As the sun rose, Bill and his two comrades could see three Chinese soldiers staring right at them.  Were they still unseen in the shadows on the ice, or perhaps the Chinese wanted to shoot them as they got closer, or worse yet take them prisoner?  Exhaustion, cold, and fear drove them forward.  They quietly let each other know that they would go down fighting.  They might die on the ice and snow, but they would take those three with them.  The Americans braced themselves for a final mad dash toward the Chinese position with the one rifle and three bayonets they still had.  Strangely, Bill still carried the medical supplies.  

As the fateful time came, they clearly saw the Chinese soldiers. The machine gun was trained on them.  Yet no one fired.  The three frostbitten Americans moved as quickly as possible rushing the Chinese machinegun.  What they found would stay with them for the rest of their lives.  The three Chinese soldiers, waiting for their prey on the ice, were dead, frozen solid.  What had kept Bill and his two fellow soldiers alive was simply movement.  The Chinese stood still and on that frigid night died because of it.  

Years later, as Bill got out of his heated pool in the 100-degree heat of El Paso, Texas, he mused, thinking back to that dawn in 1950, and the promise to himself that he would never be cold again.

How to Win a Bronze Star, Get the Girl, and Live Happily Ever After

June 6, 2023 / / 5 Comments

By James Gonda.


In early 1945 I was on my Harley delivering another dispatch. The leather pouch contained a communique for two of General Patton’s units. His subordinates were coordinating his crossing of the Rhine on March 25. The General had no tolerance for SNAFUs—so, this message had to get through. I was also behind schedule (I blew a tire) and decided to take a shortcut. This was in Luxembourg near the village of Rosport-Mompach, on the Mosel River. On the other side of the river was Germany. I glided over a slight rise, traveling at a reasonable speed, and then encountered a group of Jerries. Twenty or so. I squeezed the brakes and skidded to a stop. Those guys were not the welcome wagon with homemade strudel. They scowled at me with rough, unshaven faces. They surrounded me and poked me in the chest with their rifles. Their tone was harsh, and I reminded myself that German always sounded harsh. It was pure German, by the way, and not the water-downed stuff I heard back home. I knew a few words here and there. One of the Jerries, the leader, took my sidearm—he thought he was a real tough guy. They forced me off the bike and motioned to push the machine over the bridge and onto their turf. A sign said RALINGEN – 2 KILOMETERS. This baffled me. Intel said this area was free of Krauts. So, how were these guys even here? Another German offensive? Were they forward observers? I pondered whether to run or not to run. I elected to keep pushing the bike. They led me to a farmhouse on the outskirts of town. The ground was muddy, and the air reeked of manure. My captors forced me inside and tied me to a wooden chair.

                                                                  ***

After D-Day my duty was to deliver messages on a motorcycle from Patton to his unit commanders. D-Day was June 6, 1944. I was 19 years old, and my official title was Dispatch Rider. Before the war, I had never ridden a cycle but saw one or two back home in Pennsylvania. I thought they were loud and obnoxious. I was also an orphan. Mom had passed in the 20s from typhoid and a mining explosion had finished dad during the Great Depression.

I am of German extraction and knew some German. Guten Tag, good day; bier, beer; Gott segne dich, God bless you. When the war came, I took the bus to the recruiting station in Pittsburgh. I signed on the dotted line: Henry C. Becker. But everyone calls me Hank. To be honest, I was not motivated by love of country to join. I’m claustrophobic and knew working in the mines would kill me like it did Dad, but in a different way. So, my motivator was fear. I also chose the army over the navy for the same reason—too many confined spaces on a ship.

Before D-Day, I had slogged through North Africa and Sicily as a foot soldier in Patton’s Second Corps. I picked up military life fast and shot to the rank of sergeant. Then while in England waiting for D-Day, I got into a pub fight. One too many biers clouded my judgment. I don’t remember why I slugged that limey prick, but the incident got me busted down to private.

I found that being a Dispatch Rider was an important and sometimes fun job. I operated six to 10 miles from the front. I worked alone and unsupervised. I usually rode through safe, unoccupied territory. Scenic landscapes fit for a postcard.

In December 1944 I transported orders that had turned thousands of troops 90 degrees. I raced at breakneck speed to get there—65 miles per hour, almost crashing on a few turns and freezing to death. I was delivering a dispatch that ordered Patton’s Third Army to turn northward. Their mission: reinforce the GIs hunkered down in Bastogne, Belgium. This was during the Battle of the Bulge. I delivered the message, and our guys went on the offensive. It satisfied me to know that my small bit helped save the day for those boys in Bastogne.

                                                                 ***

So, what was next for Hank Becker, bound to a hard chair in a smelly farmhouse? Will they notify the SS? Or the Gestapo? Will they find the dispatch in the courier pouch? It told everything about Patton’s whereabouts on March 25. What a prize! Old Blood & Guts was the biggest thorn in their Nazi flesh. Imagine if they shot him or blew him up—the war would take a new, dark turn.

A young fraulein was at the stove making soup. I was sure it was potato—Mom had made the same-smelling soup years ago. The potato-onion aroma transported me back to childhood, a safe and simple place. This “trip” brought some comfort. One of the soldiers said her name, Anna, and she called him Hans. They had a certain familiarity, but they were not a couple—more like sister and brother. She brought me a bowl of soup and I nodded thanks. She had blonde hair, blue eyes, and a sturdy, curvy frame. I thought: the Master Race got this one right.

It was impossible to fall asleep that night. The Jerries were debating some issue. I heard the word Amerikaner several times and they glared at me. It seemed they were discussing my fate. So, who was on my side and what will the outcome be? After a long time, their back-and-forth stopped, and I dozed off.

In the morning one of the Jerries jabbed me with his rifle. “Steh auf!” Get up! Mom had said those words many times, with the same stern tone. In my slumber I forgot where I was. Then memory kicked in and I was filled with dread. They led me outside, my hands still bound. I was hungry and needed to pee. The sky was gray—colorless—and the air misty. They placed me in front of two rows of soldiers. Too close for a firing squad—but what? Then the Jerry named Hans approached me with a butcher knife. His face betrayed nothing. I figured that was it, he’s gonna slit my throat and I’m gonna bleed out like a slaughtered pig. It was true what they say—your whole life does flash before you. Images flickered through my head like a newsreel. Childhood, Mom, Dad, the orphanage, boot camp, Patton, Africa, Sicily, England. Then the frau appeared in my mind’s eye—where did she come from? I cracked a little smile. Without saying a word, the Kraut took the knife and cut the cord binding my hands. Then he stepped back and dropped the blade. The other soldiers unslung their rifles and piled them onto the ground. They all looked at me and raised their hands over their heads—a mass surrender. I didn’t know what to think. seemed to be free with twenty German prisoners on my hands. How and why did this happen?

Hans tried to explain. He spoke in German with a few English words. Our conversation was confusing and convoluted. I pieced together that last night’s debate was to decide what they did next, keep fighting or surrender? One side believed that Germany was invincible. The other side thought they were dying for a lost cause. Around 3 am or so they voted to lay down their arms. They also concluded that surrendering to the Yanks was better than to the Brits. And anything was better than giving up to the Reds.

I led the Germans back into Luxembourg. The Harley became a mule, loaded with their rifles. I found the MP station and told an amazing tale of discovery, cunning, bravery, and victory. My “prisoners” backed up the story and the MPs believed everything. I also assured the powers-that-be that the dispatch was never compromised. And, to my knowledge, no other Jerries lurked in the area. They wrote me up for a Bronze Star and gave back my Sergeant’s stripes.

I took a few days of R & R before returning to motorcycle duty. Then I engineered a way to get back to the farm to check on Anna, to see how she was doing . . . .

                                                                 ***

After the war ended most GIs went home, but not me. I did not have a real home in the States—my parents were gone, and I was an only child. So, I stayed. I knew the area well and liked what I saw. And that included Anna, whom I courted and then married in 1946. I also helped her brother Hans and the others who had surrendered to get out of the POW camp. I wrote a letter explaining they could have killed me but didn’t—and that counted for something. I also said they were not war criminals or even true Nazis. The Army “looked into it” and before too long agreed. Hans and his buddies were set free. Hans became my best man and Anna and I went on to produce six children—four boys and two girls.

On my last visit with Mom before she passed, she told me that everything happened for a reason. And that included her early departure from Dad and me. So, a punctured tire made me late which forced me to take a shortcut. The altered route got me captured and then matched with Anna and a new life.

Mom was right.

The Flower Child Helmet

November 8, 2022 / / 2 Comments

By Richard A. Rose

Much of the nation was in turmoil over the Vietnam war protests, the flower children, and the hippies. We lived on an Army base where you did your duty and served your country. It was spring of 1968.

My sister, at eleven years old, chose to challenge the status quo. She was the right age for her mini-protest and was lucky to have a mother who was an excellent artist. Sis got her hands on a U.S. Army helmet liner. With mom’s clandestine help, they sanded off the rough olive drab green and, in its place, spread a glossy white. Atop the helmet mom drew the flamboyant flowers common in the later 60s. Those bright colors with big petals transformed the helmet into something unique. My sister wore the helmet to a teen party on post and it was a big hit. But it didn’t go over well with our father. The impact of the psychedelic 60s on his children concerned him. After the party, the helmet sat up in my sister’s room, forgotten for a couple of years.

By the end of 1970, Dad’s ideas about the war were changing. His stalwart support of America was succumbing to skepticism, confusion, and disappointment. This was true for many in his generation. There was the Kent State shooting. The political loss of territory won by soldiers’ blood. The growing sense the military was failing, and it was OK to fail. These events took their toll. One day, dad took the flower child helmet and put it in his office. It came to symbolize his sense of change about the justification and conduct of the Vietnam War. It stayed in his office until he retired fifteen years later.

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