Here is a cute story that is light and humorous. Use it as you please we were flying somewhere over Cambodia and it was not a particularly busy mission. The targets were pretty solid and as an analyst, my predictions were fairly accurate, but we were just doing our thing, as we always did. Always looking for some adventure, I often asked the navigator if I could do the Doppler (dop sets) updates. I really got a kick out of playing 12 o'clock high by steering the airplane over a preset mark via voice commands to the front-end crew. The effect of pushing the button, to update our position, was like dropping the bombs.

Typically the navigators used a highly identifiable structure on the ground to be a dopset. unfortunately, too many of the navigators used and reused the same dopsets day after day, and therefore we became too predictable. but that's another story.

So here we are lumbering alone over the Cambodian skies when the navigator asked me to take us over the junction of two streams that formed a distinctive point. As I prepared to push the button for "bombs away", I made the course corrections to the pilot. ''left two(degrees), steady on 135, right 1, steady, steady, bombs away,'' I said into the mike. Remember, I was actually looking down at the ground through a telescope affixed with crosshairs. Just as I pressed the button, I saw two small boats with several people in or around the boats as they were beached on a small sandbar.

Black pajama clad people were unloading or loading boxes but they never looked up as they heard us fly over. I told the entire crew what I saw, and collectively we agreed to call hillsoro, the command & control(c&c) aircraft requesting a fac (forward air controller). Neither Snoopy or Raven were available (these were the call signs of fac's working the area). I was aghast, here found charlie out in the open, looking like a rabbit ready to run and we couldn't even get a shooter on station. We asked for some fast movers with available ordinance, but the jet jocks won't go low without the eyes of a fac.

Since we were truly alone, unarmed and not necessarily afraid, we did the next best thing a gooney bird crew could do. We made another pass over the boats sitting right on our dop set point, with "steady on course 072 degrees, correct to 1 left, drifting, drifting, left 2, steady, steady, bombs away!" at the command of bombs away, someone kicked out 5 unopened boxes of "chu-hoi" leaflets under our door netting. I tried to watch the impact to report damage at our debriefing, but the pilot said, "we're getting the hell out of dodge", as he dove away for airspeed before the fireworks started.

This warstory provided by: James D. Trozzo[email protected]

Boy do I remember the doppler runs, I actually did a lot of the navs work with my crew. I might act as navigator for the better part of a mission. I still have a very faded chart with the targets I worked over Laos. A small portion of that chart can be seen elsewhere on this site. One of my treasures of the time. The entire crew from the A/C through the RO's all signed it in a mock certificate of a qualified navigator.

I also got many an hour at the controls of the aircraft, again some days flying the better part of the mission. I vividly recall one doppler run, I was flying and our Navigator, Capt. Robert M. Harris was on the driftmeter making the heading calls. We made a good pass over the set point. Going a bit past the point our procedure was to make a 90 degree right turn followed by a 270 degree left turn and line up again on the same point to recheck the setting. I made the right turn, turned the wheel hard left and back on the stick in a pretty tight left hand 270 degree turn. After completing the run, Capt. Harris said, "Jim, that was a great doppler run but it sure got my pucker string tight."

I worked with the greatest flight crew anybody could possibly ask for. Each and everyone of us could and did operate at any of the flight crew positions. I tried the console positions several times, didn't know beans about the CW I was hearing on the headset, but believe it or not actually picked up a couple of targets from the tinny, squeaking, transmitters they were using, terrible sounding transmitters.

This story by: James C. Wheeler [email protected]

The Baron 52 incident has always been important to me because, in some ways, I feel connected with it; not just because some of those guys were personal friends, but because the whole "Midnight Smoker" operation may have resulted from an incident that happened on one of my earlier missions. You may be familiar with the incident in December '72 or January '73 on the Plain of Jars where a tank tried to cross in broad daylight, was killed after some activity by aircraft, and they found the crew chained inside. It was a diversion, and while this was going on, about 300 tanks made it South down the Ho Chi Minh trail. One evening about dusk, we were patrolling just across from NKP on the Laos side. I had just bought a pair of binoculars at the BX and was trying them out; I still have those binoculars. I noticed a dust cloud coming South on a road near the river, but whatever it was got into cover in the trees before I could make it out. We called it in, and an OV-10 in the area gave it a look. He said he thought it might be a tracked vehicle because of the tracks it left in the road. It may have been a Scout for the tank column. Soon after that we began the night operation looking for tanks that resulted in the loss of Baron 52. Eventually over 250 of the tanks were killed crossing into South Vietnam, so it would seem the effort paid off. For the families of those lost on Baron 52, it was not a wasted, senseless, or illegal mission; they served their country with pride as professionals and made the ultimate sacrifice.

This story provided by: Bruce Obermeyer - - bobermeyer(at)cox.net

It was a typical clear and sunny day over the Plain of Jarres (Plannesde Jarre, as the French called it, if I'm not mistaken). I believe we called it Mission #209C.
It was probably 9 AM, adn we were doing our "thing" when out of nowhere, it seemed that the hand of God grabbed the tail end of the aircraft and gave it one big shake. Or maybe he just chose to flick the plane's tail with his index finger. Whatever it was, it scared the living daylights out of me and probably most of the others in the backend.
Immediately, the pilot asked the navigator to check the underbelly to see if we were hit with enemy fire. We checked all over and couldn't find a thing wrong with the plane and it seemed to steer correctly, so there was probably no damage to the tail. I, however was not going to settle for that calm, casual voice of the pilot, that all was well on the Southeastern front. I put on my survival vest, checked it out and then proceeded to extract a parachute from the bin. I at least wanted a chute to lay claim to. I was sweating bullets about bullets.
What seemed like an eternity but whick was only about 2-3 minutes went by when one of those old carrier type bombers from WWII showed up on our right side. Our pilot asked that pilot to check us out because of the incident we had just experienced, when our new neighbor said that we had probably just recieved some shock waves from the 500? 25? lb. bomb he had just dropped below us. Mind you we were at about 12,500 feet. To this day I pity those poor folks who were 12,500 feet from the point of impact on the ground. If anything, I took more seriously the pre-flight check outs we did with our radios and weapons.
This story submitted by: Paul Brady - - [email protected]

True to the pattern, but about 2:00 AM (as I recall), the sound of incoming rounds was heard followed by the warning sirens and small arms fire. We all headed for the bunkers between the barracks and listened as the barrage continued and became more intense. Unlike our previous experience, the incoming did not stop after the first several minutes, but continued unabated for nearly 30 minutes. Rumors were rampant that the base must be under threat of bein overrun and we would all be sitting ducks in the bunkers. The sound of the incoming was getting closer and ever more frightening. Then, still in the midst of the sound of incoming shells, a runner arrived at our bunker proclaiming that it was "all clear" and only a false alarm. It seemed that apparently without any coordination, the US Navy had a �friendly� Cruiser in the bay that was shelling enemy positions around the perimeter of the base and that is what we were hearing. Chucks E-mail address :[email protected]

Chucks E-mail address :[email protected]

On one of my 115 RC-47 missions we were tasked to do ARDF (airborne radio direction finding) on enemy targets in eastern Laos. This area was outside of our normal ground radar (GCI) flight following, so we were required to check in with the airborne command and control center (ABCCC) C-130 aircraft, call sign 'Hillsboro', every 30 minutes with a status report.

Upon arrival into the target area we checked in with Hillsboro and asked if there were any artillery or ordinance advisories for our area of operations. They replied in the negative.

As we were flying our random orbit over Laos looking for enemy transmitters to pinpoint, cruising at 9000� above sea level, we were suddenly rocked by a wave of concussions. Looking out of the left side of the aircraft, I saw at about half a mile away a line of ground concussions that created two rows of craters like railroad tracks that continued to erupt at a rate of about two explosions per second for nearly sixty seconds of devastation.

As we banked away to the right we quickly contacted Hillsboro, who rather sheepishly confirmed that a B-52 on an Arc Light sortie over Vietnam had missed his primary target opportunity and was jettisoning his load of 105 five-hundred pound bombs on a 'secondary target of opportunity' in Laos. With his altitude being in excess of 35,000 feet, he was as invisible to us as we were to him, but the continuous concussion of his bombs for nearly sixty long seconds gave us a ride of a lifetime hoping and praying that there were not more B-52s dropping bombs through our altitude from over our head! Once again, our biggest recurring threat seemed to be from friendly ordinance if not mid-air collisions with friendly aircraft.

Chuck Miller Thanks Chuck, J.C.

For more related EC-47 stories, see "The Chuck Miller Collection" in the DC-3 Online Aviation Museum Stories page at http://www.centercomp.com/cgi-bin/dc3/stories?1000 Chucks E-mail address :[email protected]

J.C.

Unexpeced Stopover

From: George B. Montague 

Date: Monday, August 10, 1998 7:41 PM

This was one of my memorable missions.  We were supporting the Big Red One
around An Loc on one of the late missions which recovered after the afternoon
Monsoon started and when it was time to head back to TSN we were advised that
the base was closed because of weather.  The Nav and Pilot talked it over and
decided that the best option was to try Tay Ninh Army Airfield.  The pilot
contacted Tay Ninh and was advised that the field was open but the runway was
being resurfaced and at the 4000 foot area there was about a 4 or 5 inch lip
where the new surface ended but if he landed very short and slowed down enough
it should not be a problem. The pilot accepted this and advised the tower that
he would contact them again when he was on his downwind approach.

When the pilot contacted Tay Ninh as he started his downwind, the tower told
him that there was a 15 foot ditch at the end of the  runway and that it was
marked by a fire in a 50 gal. fuel barrel. The pilot told him he could see the
fire and then advised the tower he would be on the ground until TSN opened up
and that he needed fuel.  The tower told him where he should taxi to after
landing to refuel and that the refueling point was manned.  After turning on
final the pilot and the co-pilot were talking about where the runway started
because they wanted to touch down very short and just as the pilot was ready
to touch down he yells "oh shucks" and goosed the power and we gain about 30 to
50 feet of altitude and then we set down hard and fast but near the 1000 foot
mark then the pilot or co-pilot starts breaking very hard then we hit the lip
where the new surface started and pop up about 20 or 30 feet and then come
down again very hard.  This time we stay down and the pilot slows the A/C and
heads to the refueling area.  What the tower operator forgot to tell the pilot,
was that the fire in the barrel was not on the runway side of the ditch and
this is where the pilot thought it was and he was aiming at the fire thinking
that that was the start of the runway.

When we arrived at the refueling area the pilot shuts down and we all exit the
A/C.  An Army refueler is there and he asks the pilot how much fuel he wants
and the pilot tells him 800 gallons and the army dude almost has kittens. All
he has is a 500 gal. trailer and some jerry cans.  The  only birds he refuels
are o-1's, otters, beavers, Etc. He tells us he will have to get someone from
the motor pool who can drive a refueling truck and that might take an hour or
so and the pilot tells him we will be on the ground for at least that long
because TSN is closed and not expected to open for at least another hour.

Eventually the truck arrived and we got our 800 gallons, then we were advised
that TSN was open so we thanked the ARMY and went home.

All I can say is I was very happy to have had some outstanding pilots up front
because that could have been a an unmitigated disaster, but because of their
skill another mission ended in the best possible way SAFELY.

I just wish I could remember the pilots name, maybe he might read this and it
might bring back some fond memories for him to.

George's   E-mail [email protected]

My E-mail [email protected]

The crash occurred in I Corps near the city of Hue. Four years earlier, I had been to Hue several times as a Marine Corps helicopter pilot. Many of our missions involved transporting troops into an LZ that was reported by intelligence to be occupied by Viet Cong. Hue was a staging area that was used because it was considered safe. But, on one occasion one of our pilots became a casualty right inside the city limits.

We had been waiting for hours to launch. Old Vietnamese ladies would come by with small loves of freshly baked bread that we could purchase if desired. Small boys would mysteriously appear with buckets full of iced down soda pop. Where the ice came from, and how far they traveled was beyond me, but when they were empty they would gleefully run off to refill them. I had never been in a war before, and this did not seem to be the way I had imagined it. You could look over at a nearby road and see people going in both directions like this was the most peaceful place in the world.

I found out that the situation changed very fast. Without warning we heard the word to mount up! We were headed into battle and it took about 15 minutes to get there. It was as quickly over as it began. We charged in at low level running on 10% adrenaline and 90% seven up. A spotter plane had dropped a smoke grenade in the LIZ so we could see where the wind was. There was red smoke also, indicating that that LZ was hot. I did not hear any ground fire, but it was years later that I discovered that ground fire sounded like distant pop corn unless you were hit. The troops were eager to get to it and many would jump out before we had reached a full stop. Almost before you stopped you were empty and slamming on full power to clear the zone.

15 minutes later we were back at Hue with instruction to wait until the troops cleared the village before going back in to pick them up. As soon as I shut down I heard someone yelling for a medic. Sure as hell someone had been hit. I jumped out and ran up the line to where I heard the yelling. One of our pilots was half sitting and half laying in the helicopter. He was holding his lower abdomen and in obvious pain. The medic was there, but he looked perplexed. I leaned over to see better. Everybody was staring, but no one said a word. The pilot was not a member of our squadron. We all knew him from the states, but he was attached to the group and was only filling in. He was wearing a flight suit with a very large zipper. When the word came for us to mount up, the pilot was relieving himself near the tail of the chopper. He yanked up his zipper and zipped his business up at the same time. He was fairly well endowed and he had zipped up about 4 inches of skin. You could see how the skin had folded in and out over zipper. He had tried to unzip it but the pain was to great and he had flown the entire mission half sitting and half standing in the cockpit.

The medic was able to unzip it with a pair of pliers. There was some blood. The last time I saw him years later he was a full colonel. He was not wearing a purple heart.

They later named that strip Hue Citadel. Maybe it was always that name. Hue Phu Bai was the new big strip further to the south. That was where the C-47's landed. All of the C-47's that Air America had in Vietnam were on loan from the US Military. Apparently from the Air Force. I suppose the whole serial number was on the log book, but the tail number only showed the three numbers.

When I finished my tour in Viet Nam I had been reassigned to MA 36 in Santa Ana, CA. There was not much there since the Viet Nam war has began in earnest in the summer of '65. There was only one lonely old UH34D helicopter painted white that you could fly if you wanted. I asked for a transfer to fly jets and was refused. I asked for a transfer to the training command to fly T-28's and was accepted. I wanted to go back to Viet Nam, but was refused. All the squadrons that would soon deploy were filled. I was a captain by then. I had a DFC and 13 Air Medals and I though I knew how to fly. I was 25 and bored and something had to change. I bought a brand new 1965 Pontiac GTO for $3000.00 with 3 carburetors and 360 horse power. It was the closest thing to a jet I would fly until 14 years later. I sold it to my brother for $1500.00 a year later. It was not enough to quench my Desiree to go back to South East Asia where to me everything made sense. The only way I could do it was to resign my commission and hire on with Air America.

In December 1966 I was in Bangkok with all the familiar smells and sounds that I had come to love. After finishing ground school, I had been sent to Saigon . I was to fly as co-pilot for at least 6 months and flight training started immediately. I soon found out that I really did not know how to fly. The C-47 was probably the easiest airplane in the world to fly, but I never flew a tail dragger and I made some horrific landings and takeoffs when I first started. Almost all of the captains were 20 years older than I. Finally a kind gentleman by the name of Lee Howell provided me with some valuable advice. "Steer it like a car Cates. That's all there is to it." Sure enough it worked. The minimum runway length for the C-47 was 1500 feet, which is damn short when approaching, or taking off with a full load. The only navigation aids we had was ADF. So, for the most part our flying had to be conducted VFR, or versions thereof.

After a certain amount of time the aircraft had to be completely overhauled. This operation was conducted in Tainan, located in the south of Taiwan. Regardless of the weather conditions, if was time to go, we went. I only made the trip once, but after taking off of Danang, I only saw the ground when we touched down in Hong Kong for refueling. I am not exactly sure how the hell we got there. There was no way to predict the winds, so time and distance was not even a close approximate. No one could hear us for position reports. It was strictly stick and rudder-needle and ball, and that is how we flew in Vietnam.

There was absolutely no coordination with the military, and sometimes it was a little scary. All too often I found myself in the middle of a bombing pattern surrounded by F-100's who probably wanted to know who the heck I was.

During the monsoon season I Corps was dry, and of course wet during the dry season. If the weather was bad at Hue, I would take off and turn east toward the sea. When I was feet wet I would stay low and follow the coast line to Danang. If it was real bad at Danang I would contact approach control and ask for a GCA. Usually they accommodated if they could see me. We did not have transponder and if there were a lot of traffic we had to get down the best we could. On the day that 949 crashed, the pilots were Captain Howard Kelly and First Officer Milton Matheson.

Both pilots were retired military and had received ample training. Howard had been flying in Vietnam in the C-47 for several years. He probably had several hundred hours in just 949. So how did this accident happen? We may never know for sure. Howard had bailed out over Germany in WW-2 and walked out to Spain a hero. He was very proud of the Air Medal he had received from the experience. Perhaps Howard was shot down and the evidence obscured by the crash damage. The crash was listed as pilot error, but many other times that evaluation had proved to be false.

After taking off from Phu Bai the tower had told Howard that there was reported ground fire near the airport. I would assume that Howard would turn east and run to the coast to get feet wet. I had flown 949 several times. It was as good a airplane as could be found and there was nothing mechanical wrong with it that was reported. The plane never slowed down until it hit the mountain at full force. Howard was ejected from the airplane and was found 1500 feet from the crash. Death was instantaneous. To the best of my knowledge, this was the only Air America C-47 that was destroyed in Vietnam, and each one flew daily for several years and logged thousands of hours.

Mr. Matheson was only going to stay long enough to save money for a ice cream franchise. I hope his family was able to carry on. I did not know Howard well. I liked flying with him because he was always in good humor. I hope both pilots rest in peace.

Allen Cates

It took Al about a month in-country to become adjusted to his surroundings. He was understandably reluctant when Lt. Bloom approached him with a Request For Transfer form. The 360th Tactical Electronic Warfare Squadron was creating its own nav shop and was in need of volunteers. Located across the flightline next to the main runway, they were tired of constantly having to borrow technicians from the 460th. I applied for transfer immediately. It wasn't that I didn't like the job I had or the men I'd worked with for the past eight months, I needed a change and this was it. For one thing, as a ground crew member working on recon jets, I was unable to acquire any flight time. The EC-47's in the 360th had a lot more room and just might accommodate an extra, bug-eyed, camera laden passenger.

Al carefully examined the pro's and cons of this proposal and after much deliberation he agreed to join me. The lieutenant patiently awaited his decision for the mandatory two seconds. We were about to become the infamous "clipboard confiscators" of Tan Son Nhut. The next morning we reported to our new OIC, Captain Roman. In his late twenties, he was a good natured textbook example of an officer. Though he was a desk jockey, he would have looked perfect in the command seat of an F-4 Phantom.

The captain happened to mentioned one day that he was raised in Healdsburg, California. I told him that I once lived in Sebastopol, only twenty miles away and started to ask if he knew a girl I had once met from Healdsburg. I stopped in mid-sentence when it dawned on me how ridiculous a question that was. "No, go ahead. What was her name?" he prodded, optimistically. "Vicky Tankerson." I replied. Captain Roman's jaw flopped open like a mailbox door.

"Tank! Shucks! I've known her since she was born! She's lived next door to my family all her life." We talked about her for awhile but it was mostly a one-sided conversation, I really hadn't known her very well. I'd met her while tooling around Santa Rosa one Friday night. I pulled into the "Scarf N Barf" with two of my buddies to grab a quick burger and there she was with a girlfriend. They asked us to follow them to her place in Healdsburg for a party. I don't recall a thing about the party but I'll never forget Vicky.

The captain and I were astonished at how small the world really was. Imagine him happening to know the only person from Healdsburg I had ever met. The captain always treated us like friends. He did a lot towards changing my negative opinions of the species of creatures known as officers.

Being a newly-formed maintenance squadron, we needed a building to house our test equipment and workbenches. The equipment arrived immediately, however the benches had to be built plus the only available building was nothing more than a twenty by forty foot storage shed. It featured screened walls similar to my barracks and had a bare concrete floor.

The only people with any carpenter experience to speak of were Al and myself. I was placed in charge of the doppler shop during night shift but by working twelve to eighteen hours a day we managed to fabricate workable benches and erect inner walls. Due to a serious shortage of building materials, things were progressing very slowly.

Eventually Captain Roman became desperate. Calling the two of us aside after roll call, he explained that the reason he was unable to obtain building supplies was because of the recent damage inflicted throughout the base from rocket attacks. The repair of damaged structures had top priority.

A new mailroom was under construction near the heliport. Understandably the brass felt a nifty new mailroom was more urgent than a decent maintenance facility. The exterior walls were up and the building was functional though still far from completion.

Stacked outside like cards, were hundreds of sheets of plywood and a huge pile of 2x4's. These were likely surplus because we had been in the building many times and had seen no apparent need for these particular materials. "Sure is a shame to see all that good material just laying there going to waste," remarked Roman, in reference to the mailroom. We sadly agreed.

"I'm going to ride back to the officers billets with one of the pilots," the captain informed us. There was a glint in his eye as he continued: "By the way, I left the key to my pickup on top of the visor. If you two guys need to go to the mailroom for anything, just make sure that it's parked back here when I arrive for work tomorrow morning." At that, he turned and walked out the door.

We were shocked at this sudden turn of events. It was unbelievable! Two enlisted men with a set of wheels! Hell, it had been so long I didn't know if I could still drive! There was something about that look Roman had given us when he departed that implied he had more in mind than enabling us to tool around Vietnam.

Al once described a supply problem that he'd solved at McChord AFB. His super- visor needed a desk, and it seemed that desks were on back-order. Grabbing a clipboard he drove a truck to an office belonging to another squadron. He informed the airman 3rd inside that he'd come from Major So-and-so's office to pick up a desk for re- deployment.

Carrying the blank clipboard under his arm he scurried around beneath a couple of the newest and largest desks and quickly jotted down one of their serial numbers. He then asked the airman to verify that the number on the clipboard matched the number under the desk. The clerk verified this and cheerfully helped him empty out all the drawers and haul it out and load it on the truck.

We knew what we had to do. Grabbing a clipboard we drove to the mailroom. It was getting dark by the time we arrived and we soon had about twenty sheets of plywood stacked in the back of the truck. We were about to molest a nearby stack of 2X4's when a couple Air Police dudes in a jeep cruised toward us. I held the clipboard in plain view and casually scrutinized the top sheet, which incidentally, had already been filled out with the items we intended to liberate.

The jeep pulled up and a sergeant hopped out and walked toward us. He nodded a greeting and continued past to the door of the mailroom office. He shined his light in a window and jiggled the door knob a couple times, thus completing a thorough inspection of the building. Satisfied that all was secure, he turned and walked past us, nodding once again before climbing back into the idling jeep. As they drove away, our confidence soared. The Air Police were on constant vigil watching over us.

The next morning we were deliberately loitering near the captains office when Roman arrived. He glanced at our stacks of plywood and lumber as though they had been sitting there for months. Later that afternoon he called us aside to ask if the truck had given us any trouble. Truthfully, we told him that we had only driven it to the mailroom and back. He added that he was surprised that someone had delivered all that material without bothering to get a signed receipt. He added that if the mysterious benefactors should ever be apprehended, he would back them all the way. Even if it meant saying they had acted on his direct orders. This took a lot of weight off our shoulders.

The truck remained parked each afternoon with the keys over the visor. Every morning, when the sun came up, Captain Roman would find fresh stacks of build- ing materials out behind the shop. We had been careful not to take too much from any one building site at one time. That helped to ensure that no one would put out the alarm and start a serious investigation.

Soon the 360th nav building started to take on a finished appearance. Someone appropriated a torch and applied a flame to the plywood paneling. That high- lighted the wood grain and with a quick coat of varnish, it had a very modern look. Torched wood was in vogue those days.

Bob White came in one day carrying a thirty pound box of linoleum floor tiles. He brought one in every day strapped to the luggage rack of his Honda 90. Soon the concrete was concealed beneath a shiny new floor. Next, he started hauling in a box of acoustical ceiling tiles every day. We tried to discover his source of supply but he refused to comment.

Mr. White was a civilian tech rep from Litton Industries. He lived in a hotel in downtown Saigon and commuted each day on his motorcycle. He probably made ten times as much money as we did, but he always considered himself as "just one of the guys." We suspected that he bought those materials on the black market with his own money.

One day while walking to the shop I noticed Bob's red and white Honda chained to a banana tree next to the latrine. Though Bob always parked it there, I'd never seen him chain it up. I noticed something else as I walked by. The gas tank had a bullet hole in it.

Bob White, one of the friendliest, most warm hearted guys I've ever known had been shot through the head from a rooftop somewhere in Saigon. It was his second year in Vietnam. He was close to retiring and was saving his money to buy a farm in upstate New York. Tough way to buy it.

We had tragically lost a good friend. We dealt with this by shutting out all memories of the man that might surface from time to time. In fact, we never mentioned Bob's name again. Death was a subject that was rarely discussed. People were being paid to kill you, and understandably, no one cared to talk about it.

Captain Roman proudly informed us one afternoon that the building was completed beyond his expectations. It turned out that on that very morning he had finally received written authorization from command for some of the long overdue build- ing materials. Well, that was SNAFU for the military; Situation Normal, All fouled Up. He added that he desperately needed a dozen chairs for the new de- briefing room, and cast a familiar look towards Al and myself.

On this, our final quest for adventure, we faced a dilemma. All of the items "appropriated" up to this point had been left outside in un-lighted storage areas. No one was fool enough to leave chairs out in the open, un-chaperoned. We concluded that we would have to confiscate the chairs out from under people's noses this time. After scoping out a dozen likely locations, we settled on the snack bar at the Saigon airport terminal.

The parking area was practically deserted so we were able to park the truck right next to the door. We entered the small restaurant and approached the counter. There were only three employees at that late hour. Two were busy mopping and cleaning up so we told the cashier that we had to pick up a few chairs for repair. "Nyap chon wa coo nip hoo louie louie!" she exclaimed. "Yeah, sure. We'll get 'em back tomorrow morning, boo-coo, chop, chop!" I told her. She stood there watching as we strolled off with an even dozen plastic and chrome chairs. They were the cheap form fitting type and bright orange, but we knew the captain would love 'em. For the next two weeks there were a lot of customers "standing around" at the airport snack bar.

We loaded the chairs in the back of the truck and started to leave when we beheld a beautiful sight next to the departure gate. A ten-foot black-and- chrome leather couch was sitting along the wall to the right of the double doors. This was primarily for the comfort of dignitaries to use while waiting for their flight out. Hundreds of VIP's from Nixon to Bob Hope had graced that squeaking leather with their sweating backsides. We were greedy now. Roman would just love it if he found something like this in his office! What a grand finale for our last caper. Al backed the truck up to within a few feet of the thing and we jumped out and started tugging on it.

"This is impossible, Nick." Al grunted. "What's the problem?" I asked. Then I saw that it had been chained to a nearby water pipe. No doubt in anticipation of our arrival. Suddenly, the headlights of an Air Police jeep lit up the side of the dark building as it swung into the parking lot. Highlighted were the shadows of our hunched forms struggling with the sofa. We were really caught in the act this time! I quickly whipped out the old clipboard and approached the vehicle as it rolled to a stop. Caught red handed, I had nothing to lose so I decided to go for broke.

"Evenin' sarge, wonder if you could help us out?" I called to him, in a some- what desperate pleading voice. "What seems to be the problem?" he asked. He seemed friendly enough and I didn't detect any suspicion regarding our activities. I explained that General Westmoreland was flying in at 0700 hours and MACV Headquarters wanted the couch set up in their front office by then. While fabricating this story I kept praying that he didn't need confirmation because the sheet of paper on the clipboard was completely blank. I kept it facing away from him. "Colonel didn't tell me the thing was chained up!" I said.

"Hey man, no sweat!" He swung out of the jeep, reaching behind the seat in one smooth motion, he appeared with a massive bolt cutter in his hand. "Well, this outa take care of the chain", he testified. In a few minutes we were headed for the shop, the rear of the pickup sagged from the weight of our booty.

A week later, after an official ribbon cutting ceremony, the captain called us into his office. He poured us a each a double shot of bourbon and motioned for us to be seated. He then informed us how impressed the 7th Air Force was with the new facilities and how they were astonished at what we had accomplished with no resources whatsoever. He raised his glass and continued: "The 360th is being put in for a Presidential Citation and I want to thank you both and tell you that you are primarily responsible." The three of us, grinning, clinked our glasses together and gulped down the booze. Our captain happily gestured toward the door and said: "Now get off my couch and get back to work!"

Nik's Email Address: [email protected]

I kept dropping not-so-subtle hints to Captain Roman about how much I'd appreciate flying a mission. My career field didn't authorize me to draw flight pay since the equipment could be readily tested on the ground with test equipment simulating flying conditions.

Eventually the captain informed me that "009", (which we so lovingly refferred to as "Balls 9"!) had returned with an intermittent radar tracking problem and "asked" me if I could provide a man from our shop to monitor it when it took off the next morning. I assured him I'd find "someone" who could handle it.

Half an hour before takeoff, I was in the flight office being issued flying gear. My flight vest was made of gray nylon mesh with several pockets for standard emergency equipment: a pen flare (a small cylinder that when twisted a certain way would shoot a flare skyward), a first aid kit, C-rations, a compass, and a sturdy survival knife consisting of a four inch blade with saw teeth on the back.

Great, I surmised, if we crash and a VC attacks with his automatic weapon, I'll just stab him or saw his head off. Maybe I could bribe him with some tasty C-rats. I slung a parachute over my shoulder. We didn't have to wear them but flying regulations insisted that you had to carry one with you while airborne. This one was free. Before, when flying on military planes from base to base when going on leave, I was charged a dollar for a chute. The money was non-refundable but at least the parachute was guaranteed. If it failed to open for any reason - you got your dollar back.

The military mind confused me to no end. They fed you, clothed you, took care of your teeth and health. They housed you and trained you, taught you the fastest way to kill people, all of this was FREE. They even PAID you! But they dinged you a lousy buck for the rental of a parachute!

On my way out the door a sergeant handed me a pistol belt with a loaded and holstered 38 pistol. "Now we're talkin'." I thought. It felt wonderful strapping that little piece of iron around my waist. Although a tiny pop-gun like that can't hope to defend a person from an onslaught of enemy automatic rifles, mortars, or artillery, it still is a comfort to feel its weight on your hip. Writing down its serial number, I signed for it and headed for the plane.

The crew was already aboard when I climbed in with my 35mm camera and two lenses, a super 8 movie camera and a sack full of film. At the last second I remembered to bring my tool bag and a technical manual, just to look good. My eyes took a few seconds to adjust from bright sunlight to the dim interior of the plane. The crew was busy flipping circuit breakers and pressing "press to test" lights. They looked very business-like and competent yet bored. This was merely another "day at the office" for them. I struggled to appear equally bored but failed miserably.

I flopped down into a metal seat, the back of which was bolted to the curved sooty green skin of the aircraft. The walls were completely without paneling or insulation. It seemed as though I was perched in the stomach of a great hollow whale. I counted its ribs. No stewardess hovered over me to ensure I was snugly strapped in, no fluffy pillow for my head. I watched the navigator casually turning the knobs on "my" radar control panel. He removed a large aerial map from a compartment above the chart table and expertly spread it out in one quick motion.

There was a loud "peeeer-shrum-cough-cough" and the port, number one, Pratt- Whitney engine gasped into life. The pilot, going through his checklist, then cranked up number two engine which began a series of coughs and belches, emitting puffs of black smoke as it did so. He worked the throttles until both engines were synchronized and running smoothly. C-47's are noisy, they shake, they shudder, they rock, they roll, and they stink of hot metal and oil - but they fly, boy do they fly.

Each of the thirteen Electronic Countermeasure Gooneybirds of the 360th TEW squadron flew with a crew of five; pilot, copilot, navigator, and two ECM operators that compiled surveillance data. This was just another mission, no one paid any attention to me. I was merely excess baggage as far as they were concerned.

The pilot must have completed his check list because the engines suddenly throttled up and I felt a slight bumping as the wheels began rolling across the rough pierced steel planking of the parking ramp. Looking behind me, over my shoulder, I peered through a tiny square window and watched the maintenance -shop slide into view then swing around and away as we executed a 90 degree turn. Soon we were perched with the nose pointing down the long shimmering ribbon of concrete.

The navigator turned and said something to me but the engines drowned him out. He smiled and handed me a headset. I plugged the dangling cord into the receptacle he indicated and put the thing on my head. There was a small gray microphone jutting out from one of the earphones and I swung it up in front of my mouth. I saw the man's lips move and his voice rasped in my ears. "I'm Lieutenant Bremmer," he said, "Welcome aboard."

I cleared my throat somewhat nervously which emanated loudly from the earphones. "Thank you, sir." I replied. That was the end of my oration. I still felt about as useless as an candle in a hurricane and wanted to just sit tight and maintain a low profile. The Lieutenant then sat in a seat near mine and fasten- ed his safety belt. I followed his lead.

We sat poised at the end of the runway, wheels locked and the engines cranking out the Rpm's for several seconds. The blast of air hurtled aft by the huge three bladed propellers made the aircraft shudder and rock. Again I felt the plane surge forward as the brakes were released and we began to move.

A C-47 rests low in the rear on a small pivoting tail wheel. When at rest on the ground its nose always points upward, as if yearning for the sky. As we picked up speed the tail began to lift until the floor was level. Only the large tires beneath the wings were touching the concrete now. Then the noise and vibration halted abruptly as the wheels broke contact and we lifted smoothly into the air. I peered at the ground below and watched earthbound things dwindle and shrink. Our mission was underway.

We quickly reached our operational altitude of two thousand feet. Any higher and our electronic surveillance capability would suffer, lower and we would present too easy a target for enemy guns.

When Lt. Bremmer unfastened his lap belt and returned to his console I felt it was safe to do a little exploring. Peering over the shoulders of the ECM officers was disappointing. I had no idea what they were doing and besides it fell within the boundaries of top secret and I did not have the "need to know". Technically, with only a "secret" clearance, I shouldn't have been allowed aboard.

The Lieutenant tapped me on the shoulder to ask if I wished to see our course plotted on the chart. I nodded enthusiastically and he proceeded to pinpoint our exact position with a pair of dividers and then, grinning, compared his figures with the digital readout from the doppler radar. I felt goosebumps raising on my arms. The coordinates were identical. I felt honored, very few technicians had the privilege of watching the equipment they repaired actually performing in action.

The floor tilted slightly as the pilot swung the aircraft around to a new heading. The navigator promptly forgot my presence as he furiously twirled dividers and calipers to track our changing coordinates. I took my leave and walked, rather unsteadily, toward the cockpit.

It was strange looking straight ahead through the windshield. The ground slowly rolled beneath the plane, totally unfelt. During a turn, if the pilot is talented enough, he will keep the center of gravity perpendicular to the floor of the aircraft. The people on board will barely feel a thing. Looking out the windshield the horizon itself will appear to tilt, not the plane.

Our pilot was very good. The floor would lift and sway occasionally but this was due to the temperature variations on the ground beneath us and the result- ing turbulence.

The cargo door at the tail had been permanently removed and a canvas webbing was hung across the space to keep things from falling out. Like me! I spent most of the flight taking pictures through this opening. During steep left turns I could look straight down at rivers and rice paddies far below without obstructions of any kind. It was a little breezy with the wind blasting in but it felt great.

We landed without mishap at Phu Bi, a small army base not far from Saigon. The pilot told us we were to take off in one hour and not to wander very far. I jumped down three feet to the runway apron and walked towards some small buildings a couple hundred yards away.

Back on the ground it was hot and Perhaps I 'd find a cold beer or soft drink to cool me off. I soon found a village woman selling watered down cokes out of wicker baskets that dangled from each end of a stick carried across her shoulders. It was reasonably cold but I saw no ice. I never could figure how they managed that. Probably kept the bottles wrapped in wet leaves or something.

Taking a big swig I scanned my surroundings. We had landed in a large flat valley ringed by small mountains, hills really. Across the single runway stood a shelter built from PSP placed across the tops of 55 gallon drums. I noticed some men squatting beneath it and decided to investigate.

As I approached I realized they were U.S. Army artillery men sitting in the middle of their ammo dump. Containers filled with powder bags were stacked off to one side and stacks of huge shells lay here and there. The crew was busy eating something.

Sitting in the sand beneath the sandbagged roof was a five gallon cardboard container of vanilla ice cream, a delicacy these men probably hadn't experienced for months. Perched around this centerpiece were five disheveled men with table- spoons, Melting ice cream decorated their happy chins as they greedily shoveled it into their mouths. They watched me approach and one of them, a corporal with a white frothy grin, held up an extra spoon. I ripped a flap from a cardboard box to use as a plate and dug right in. I felt right at home, nodding and smiling right along with them.

One thing I hadn't seen from my vantage point earlier was the gun. It sat baking in the hot sun directly behind the shelter. A track gun: an eight inch gun mounted on a track like a tank. It sat on the sand like an immense black dead insect. Painted with affection on its long black snout were the words "BLACKHAWK II". The breach was open and when I sighted through the barrel I saw the tip of a green hill in the distance, a few "clicks" away.

I was looking at "Green Hill". One of the soldiers, a corporal, explained that they had just finished bombarding that piece of protruding real estate for two hours and were now taking a smoke break. He went on to say how they were continually getting rocketed from positions on that hill and no matter what they did, the attacks continued unabated. I wondered what happened to "Blackhawk I", but didn't ask.

Three days earlier a C-130 cargo plane took aboard dozens of 55 gallon drums filled with JP-4 (jet fuel), and dumped them out the rear loading door while flying over the hill. The VC were dug in deep and the foliage had to be removed in order to reveal their positions. Attack jets then rolled in and set off the fuel with napalm. The hill was left black and smoking, but the next morning, right on schedule, the VC continued their attacks. Business as usual. Now, Just three days later, that same area was covered with a full rich carpet of dark green tropical foliage.

The corporal said they were scheduled to resume shelling the hill in an hour and invited me to stick around. I was disappointed because I had to leave shortly. This was my first opportunity to watch a "big" gun in action and I'd miss it by only a few minutes, but I got some excellent pictures, and asked plenty of questions. I've always been fascinated in the subject of artillery. Had I joined the Army, artillery would definitely have been my chosen career field.

Far more enemy were killed from artillery than from all other ground weapons combined. In Vietnam, an estimated 340 shells were fired for each enemy casualty, compared to 300 rounds in Korea and 200 at Anzio in World War II. When you take into consideration the cost of each shell and the immense amount of powder required to fire it, the dollar amount is staggering. War is an expensive proposition. It costs a lot to kill people.

Other costs include the maintenance of heavy artillery. Most people don't realize that the tremendous heat generated in launching heavy shells quickly wears out the barrels. For example, A 105mm howitzer barrel has a life expectancy of 20,000 firings, but the 175mm and eight inch gun barrels last for only 400 full charge firings, after which, replacement is necessary.

The gun resting ominously before me could fire its 170 pound shell over twenty miles. The shells were too heavy to be loaded manually. Two crew members placed them on a loading tray from which the shells were shoved into the breach hydraulically. The third member of the team then loaded the required number of powder bags dictated by the range and closed the breach. I never got to witness this because ten minutes later I was strapped into the belly of "009" and rattling down the runway.

We landed at Tan Son Nhut and went directly to the debriefing room. There, the pilot, copilot and navigator began filling out their paperwork. The ECM guys had disappeared the moment we touched down. They evidently had a debriefing room of their own. There was a coffee pot in the corner of the room and Lieutenant Bremmer invited me to have a cup with him. He was interested in my job and had many questions, mostly technical things about the navigational equipment he operated.

He related to me a mission he'd recently flown, where a snipers bullet had struck the plane shortly before it turned on its final landing approach. He had been strapping on his seat belt when he heard a "clack!" He felt a tug at the crotch of his flight suit and his microphone flew off. The bullet had pierced the thin aluminum skin beneath the floor of the plane. It narrowly missed the various control cables and hydraulic lines concealed there, then burst through the floor panel directly between his feet. Grazing the front edge of the metal seat, it passed through the crouch of his flight suit and his boxer shorts, waved hello and continued upward to shatter the tiny microphone attached to his headset. A small hole in the aircraft's roof marked its departure.

He was now wearing that very same flight suit and showed me the bullet hole. It was his "lucky" suit, he said, and he refused to fly without it. He had mailed the shorts to his wife.

Nik's Email address: [email protected]

Bob's Email address is: [email protected]

This war story nearly cost me, I don't even think there is any record of this...never-the-less here it is.

About April 14th of 1969, I returned from a mission out of Nha Trang and decided to go down town for a bite to eat and drink. I rounded up my fellow 203 linguist Sgt. Al Martinez and took the duc-duc (the little motor taxi) to Nha Trang city. We found a cafe and went in and ordered a beer and thinking about what should we eat. The mama-san came over to us and asked us to help.

Seems a drunk or crazy GI was in the back room with a gun. We walked into the backroom and there he was holding 3 young girls at gunpoint. He was a tdy Air Force Sgt. saying that he did not like Vietnamese and that he was going to shoot them. Sgt. Martinez and I went over to him and asked him to let the girls go and that it wasn't worth it. While talking to us the girls slowly left the room and we told the Air Force Sgt to put the gun away and go back to the base.

As we all walked out of that room, he suddenly put the gun to my head and said that if I didn't believe him that he would shoot me. Without saying anything he cocked the gun then pulled the trigger....click! He started to talk a little crazy and I forget what he said but he again put the gun to my head and cocked it! I was in deep trouble then. I had remembered in our training that we were told to alway have 5 rounds in with one empty chamber. Not knowing if he had fired the gun or what, I said to him that I had a gun issued to me exactly like that. I asked him what kind of bullets he used and could he open the gun and show me. He, foolishly, lowered the gun, opened it and there were 5 rounds and the next one had my name on it (I felt). Do or die, I then knocked the gun from him and ran like hell out of the room.

Outside the room was Sgt Martinez, who had gone for the MP's. They came and arrested the crazy Sgt. To this day I still feel the barrel of that gun at my head. We did free the girls but I don't know the end result of what they did to that crazy Sgt. I flew about 10 more missions before returning to Conus...happily!

Sgt. Doug Milton USAFSS Doug's E-mail address is: [email protected]

This took place on/about Dec. 4th, 1968. Flying another mission out of Pleiku took us to Laos. This area was a favorite of mine because occasionaly we made a pit stop in Nakhon Phanom, Thailand. A few hours into our mission, sitting in the Z1 position, which is the right forward side, I was looking out the window at the nbr 2 engine when the Pilot said something like "What the Hell was that!" It was a VNAF A1E flying back to Vietnam. However it was at the same altitude as us, and I could clearly see the VNAF pilot's head looking right at us a few yards off our wingtip. Almost a head-on!

Sgt. Doug Milton USAFSS Doug's E-mail address is: [email protected]

On/about Nov. 12, 1968 I was sitting in the Z1 position of the EC-47 on a mission out of Pleiku Air Base, when the pilot indicated that we will make a stop at Da Nang. We landed safely on the Marine-side of the airstrip and were told by the tower to taxi and hold at the cross over strip.

While sitting there for a few minutes, the tower came on rather abrubtly and told our pilot to taxi post haste to the other side because a Marine F4 Phantom was coming in hot and we were in his way. Looking out the left window I saw the F4 screaming down, hit the runway and skip into the infield heading right for us. No sooner we taxied, I looked out my window on the right side and he slid rather rapidly right by us, just missing our tail. Another close one.

Sgt. Doug Milton USAFSS Doug's E-mail address is: [email protected]

A Tale from John Pferdehirt 6994th Security Squadron at TSN and Pleiky, 1968/69.

A couple of items always come to mind. I was on the aircraft the Maj Felock was flying when we were being bombed by the B-52's. I was in the rear of the aircraft looking out the rear door with just a cargo net when I saw the first 500 pound bomb go past the wingtip. We made a rapid departure from the area.

The second item came from an extended TDY at Pleiku. I was sitting on top of a revetment in our parking area when a rocket attack started. The area toward the main base housed base ops and the parachute shop. The area in front of the parachute shop was PSP (metal strips used for temporary parking and taxiways). The PSP had a number of low areas that were full of water at the time. As the rockets were going off near the runway and taxiway, I saw a young airman come flying out of the parachute shop. He was going so fast that he was still pedaling in mid air. When he hit the ground, he tripped and slid into one of the water holes. I can still hear him yelling at the top of his voice. " They don't want me. They don't want me. I just a god damned parachute packer."