Our Year of War Page 18
JUST AFTER NOON on April 22, the village chief of Phuoc Thien reported that the VC had moved into his village, just west of Route 15 and about five miles south of Bear Cat. He contacted the 9th Infantry Division headquarters and demanded help. Normally, such bleatings were ignored unless the local South Vietnamese official had a really good reputation. This guy did not. But it had been a long time between contacts, and the 2-47th battalion commander was desperate to placate Ewell. So Lieutenant Colonel John Tower gave the order to Company B. Search and clear the cluster of buildings that made up Phuoc Thien.
Company B’s captain received the mission. He had 3rd Platoon twenty-five miles to the east, way out on Route 1 past Xuan Loc, protecting the engineer rock quarry and signal relay site at Gia Ray. The other two rifle platoons operated much closer to Bear Cat.5 Either would do. The company commander tagged 2nd Platoon.
Chuck and Tom Hagel were with 2nd Platoon when the call came. The Americans had been guarding a bridge, one of the mundane tasks allotted to 2-47th. While keeping the bridge intact secured a key U.S. supply line and permitted the South Vietnamese to get to and from the farmer’s market, it offered almost no possibility of meeting the enemy, especially in daylight. The U.S. troops were bored. The radio message to go search a VC-held hamlet got the men interested, particularly the new guys. But most of these missions came to naught. In daytime, right near Highway 15? This smelled like a wild goose chase. So guessed the old-timers.
Those wary veterans now included Chuck and Tom Hagel. Their lacerations from the March 28 engagement had healed enough. Chuck served as a squad leader. He’d lead some of the riflemen that would dismount from the track once they got to the village. As usual, the infantry rode on top of the boxy armored personnel carrier. With all the ammunition packed inside, one hostile land mine would pulp anyone below the deck. So the riflemen sat on the armored vehicle’s flat roof, hanging on to antenna mounts and tie-down rails.6 Nobody expected trouble, but you never knew. Because he and his brother remained reliable navigators, Chuck’s squad would lead the way.
Tom was Chuck’s track commander, standing in the M113’s little open-topped turret to man the M113’s .50-caliber machine gun. On his head, Tom wore a small combat vehicle crewman helmet with built-in earphones and a mike. By flipping a switch, Tom could talk to his driver in a private intercom or switch to the radio to talk across the platoon or higher. When Chuck and the other soldiers hopped off, Tom and the other track commanders intended to stay mounted, covering the movements of those on the ground.
It took the platoon of four M113s about a half hour to reach Phuoc Thien. The run down Route 15 crossed through a washed-out, ashen dead zone, stark tree trunks and bare branches without a hint of green on them. The cleared area came thanks to a lot of sprayed defoliant chemicals, the infamous Agent Orange, as well as some Agent Blue and White, too. U.S. Air Force C-123 “Ranch Hand” propeller planes dusted the stuff all along both sides of the roadway, weed killer applied thousands of gallons at a time. In the dry season, it worked, and created what Tom Hagel later described as a “moonscape.” Once the monsoon rains came, the chemicals washed away, the greenery rose resurgent, and the spray planes had to go back to work.7 Agent Orange’s long-term effects on the Vietnamese farmers who lived in it, not to mention the U.S. soldiers who walked through it, remained to be seen. But even in 1968, just looking at the desiccated mess, you knew planeloads of toxic chemicals could not be good for all things great and small. As the Americans approached, Phuoc Thien and its immediate set of trees and fields stood out of the gray background like some lunar colony, a spot of color and greenery in the prevailing defoliated wasteland.
The four tracks slowed to turn into the place. From his vantage point up in the lead M113 turret, Tom Hagel noticed the burnt-out French villa near the village entrance. It had been a nice place once. But now only a blackened shell stood there, a mute monument to France’s colonial regime.8 Nobody had time for history lessons.
The tracks rolled into the center of the hamlet in a row, one behind the other. Ideally, Americans established a cordon before searching such a settlement. That required outposts to block each of the key egress routes.9 To encircle this aggregation of a couple dozen dingy houses, huts, and sheds would have tied up all of Company B. And even then, a determined guerrilla—in other words, a standard-issue VC—might easily find gaps in the cordon, typically by slipping out through a tunnel or working slowly through heavy vegetation, clandestine paths the locals knew well and the Americans did not. Pressed for time and bristling with firepower, the U.S. mech platoon just plunged right into town. The M113s spread out as best they could, with the .50 caliber gunners like Tom scanning the thinned, defoliated woods. Nothing.
No VC fire greeted the tracks. Rather, the bewildered South Vietnamese inhabitants stopped whatever they’d been doing and stood there, no doubt wondering why these four U.S. armored personnel carriers clanked onto their central dirt road. That village chief? Well, nobody could find him. Like many in the corrupt Saigon government, he did not live among “his” people. Now it fell to twenty-five Americans to figure out if Charlie was really here, had ever been here, or seemed likely to return.
Chuck Hagel and his five riflemen slipped off the track. The men shook themselves out. The machine gunner carried his long black M60 pig and, criss-crossing his body like some Hollywood bandit, two belts of gleaming 7.62mm rounds, two hundred each.10 Another man had the M79 grenade launcher. The rest, including Chuck, carried M16 rifles. Two other squads also dismounted. Sergeant First Class William E. Smith took charge. The platoon didn’t have an officer (again). The company had lost another lieutenant a week ago. So Smith, an eighteen-year veteran, ran things by himself, as good platoon sergeants do.
Searching a ville took time. Soldiers had to enter every structure. One man covered, weapon at the ready, while his partner checked out each place. Even at midday, the hovels were dim inside. Pawing through civilian clothing, bedding, pots and pans, and rice jars hardly endeared the Americans to the Vietnamese. Every turned cloth smelled pungent. Flies buzzed lazily here and there. The abject poverty just stared you in the face. These people had nearly nothing, and now big men from the far side of the world insisted on rooting among what little they had.
The small, slight Vietnamese, to a man and woman, regardless of age, wore faded black pajama trousers. Certain of the people, perhaps the fashionable sorts, sported white or pastel-colored shirts. Most of the older ones wore matching black tops. Sometimes “experts” announced that the VC uniform consisted of black pajamas, which is another way of saying the opposition didn’t have a uniform. It would be like telling a security patrol in America to look for the guy wearing a T-shirt and blue jeans.
As usual, only women, children, and old men sullenly eyed the inquisitive Americans. No young men hung around. Maybe they all had jobs in Saigon. Well, they had jobs, all right… Tom summarized later: “You never knew who your friends were, or if you had any at all.”11
Trying to figure out what you saw made the search doubly difficult. If you found a big ceramic jar of rice, did that serve to feed the family? Or had the VC made them keep it? If a military item turned up, even an innocuous thing like a canteen cover, did that reflect a VC quartermaster’s work, a stolen ARVN-issue item, or a child’s souvenir? A paper map might feature pencil marks identifying property limits or cultivated fields. Or maybe those light etchings demonstrated carefully gathered intelligence about U.S. and ARVN locations and movements. Everything had dual uses. Everybody seemed to have two faces. Most of these quiet civilians looked to have hedged their bets. In the old game of with us or against us, they’d checked both boxes.
Many of the homes had what U.S. intelligence officers referred to as “bunkers.” These were really just holes in the ground with a plywood cover and a rug on top. Used to having Americans comb through their belongings, smart Vietnamese never left rice or anything remotely military in the family hidey-hole. That allowed them to shrug and
claim the dugout strictly as a prudent safety measure, what with the constant fighting in the region. Naturally, any shrewd VC guerrilla could move in and move out as suited him. As Chuck Hagel summarized: “They were very inventive.”12
Now and then, the rummaging unearthed a real VC tunnel. Those tended to go right out of town. If one of them turned up, then the fun started. The Americans had some smaller soldiers—tunnel rats—picked and trained to crawl into the tight spaces, .45 automatic pistol in one hand, flashlight in the other. Alternatively, you could just toss in a hand grenade or three and call it a day.13 This afternoon in Phuoc Thien, Chuck Hagel and the other riflemen found no tunnels.
Soldiers also checked out pigpens and chicken coops. The VC liked to squirrel away weapons and ammunition in unpleasant, slimy, smelly spots. So all had to be examined. The U.S. riflemen poked around. Nothing appeared out of the ordinary.
One final location got attention. In soggy areas, the Vietnamese interred their dead in stone crypts, about six inches of which protruded above ground. A big slab topped each tomb. Hard experience taught the Americans to look inside. Soldiers hefted the heavy rectangular lids. The VC often stashed AK-47s, RPD machine guns, PRG launchers, and ammunition in grave sites. But not this time. Annoyed villagers “said we were desecrating graves,” Tom Hagel remembered.14 It was one of the few times that day when the locals said anything. The older ones learned long ago that when the Americans came calling, go with the poker face. Anything else might get you taken away.
Americans took away two kinds of Vietnamese. Clearly, if the platoon met resistance, prisoners of war went out for interrogation. In the lull after Tet, the entire 9th Infantry Division took only 203 battlefield prisoners. But they took ten times as many “detainees,” people in civil dress scooped up on sweeps. These needed to be screened as possible bad guys. Of 2,303 detained, only 853 were eventually classed as innocent civilians and released.15 The other 1,500 or so went into long-term captivity as VC or NVA.
Because the hostiles hid in plain sight, any VC or likely VC was nabbed, and that meant a younger man with a weapon (even a single AK bullet), or military web gear, or a bellicose stare. A military-age male, anything from twelve to fifty or so, who couldn’t account for his daily activities usually became a detainee. Women also found themselves apprehended if they possessed military gear or communist documents; the VC included many female members, including fighters and leaders. When in doubt, Americans picked up anybody at all shady. Better safe than sorry.
The Hagels’ platoon didn’t take anyone captive. The search found no VC material, either. It took all afternoon, right into the dusk. But the Americans came up empty. With night coming on quickly, the platoon needed to get out of Phuoc Thien and get back on its bridge site. Sergeant First Class Smith ordered his men to mount up.16
Chuck Hagel and his guys scrambled aboard. Chuck sat just behind and left of his brother Tom, still in the turret. That let Chuck, as squad leader, pull up the radio handset through the open cargo hatch. The radios were on the track’s left side, just below where Chuck sat. Once all his men were on top and set, Chuck Hagel notified Smith by radio: good to go.
At that, Smith’s track gunned its diesel engine and the 12-ton aluminum box spun about like the Batmobile—very nifty. The tracked M113 could turn two ways. For wide moves, the driver up front on the left side yanked on a lever to brake the tread in the direction of the turn. Pull the right lever, and the right tread slowly halted while the left one kept churning. And the track swung about like a garbage scow, fast or slow, depending on how far down the driver pushed the acceleration pedal. But for tight spots, like Vietnamese villages, the driver had the option to use two little curved handles hanging from a sideways fixture just above the normal driving levers. Those smaller handles allowed pivot steering. Pull on the right one, and the right side stopped instantly as the left side kept going.17 That’s how an M113 turned on a dime.
All four tracks quickly slewed into position, one behind the other, a 180-degree reversal in how they entered the ville. Tom and Chuck Hagel now had the fourth track to head out. A light wave of dust settled. The lead track spouted some exhaust, hard to see in the near darkness. But even over the radios and rumbling motors, you could hear it. With a squeak, the first M113 headed out.
The second one allowed about ten yards, then followed. After a short delay, another ten yards, and number three rumbled forward. Finally, the Hagels’ track jolted a bit and crawled forward, slowly creeping out of the hamlet. Behind them, a few cooking fires twinkled in the cloud of dirt raised by the departing American vehicles. Well, so far—
Ka-whang!
The dusk lit white, a bolt of hot ground lightning, a flashbulb the size of a house. The explosion shot up the left side of the Hagels’ M113, tossing the 12-ton sideways like a toy. Then came the yammering of RPD machine guns and AKs, green tracers reaching out of the dark village. And for every bullet you saw, there were four you did not. Those VC nobody found? Well, here they were.
For Chuck. the tracer display played out in near silence. No Americans shot back. Chuck Hagel’s left eardrum had been perforated. So had the right one, although not as badly. His entire left side felt like he’d been roasted on a spit. Bright flames climbed up the side of the track. Along with Chuck and the radio rack, the explosion blew right under the APC’s 95-gallon tank of diesel fuel. Diesel didn’t explode, but it burned just fine. And the M113 was full of ammunition.18
Chuck couldn’t hear much, but he quickly took charge. Get the guys off this thing before the ammo goes. The other riflemen slid off okay. One had finally started shooting back. Then the pig gunner joined in, a healthy dose of red tracers back at Charlie.
What about Tom? What of the driver? That land mine—and it was a mine, a 500-pounder, maybe a former U.S. Air Force bomb repurposed by the ingenious Mr. Charles—knocked them out. The driver, up on the left but a bit away from the detonation, stirred some, then woozily crawled out of his hatch, seemingly oblivious to the green tracers zipping overhead. Thank God Charlie shot high.
Tom Hagel didn’t move.19 Chuck grabbed him under the arms and pulled up. The intercom wire popped loose. Chuck tossed his brother bodily off the track then fell on him. Not exactly proper first-aid technique, but staying low was a good idea right now.
Chuck pulled off Tom’s crewman’s helmet, working the earphones loose. Even in the dark, the firelight showed blood trickling from Tom’s ears and nose. Trouble, for sure.
About then, the welcome hammering of .50 calibers announced the return of the other three M113s. That drove Charlie away. As the firefight petered out, strong hands grabbed both Chuck and Tom and bundled them into another track. Someone—a medic, maybe—rubbed some kind of ointment on Chuck. Tom was alive but not moving and not conscious.20
As the platoon cross-loaded their men into the three intact vehicles and the stricken track burned, with bullets cooking off like deadly firecrackers, it occurred to a few Americans that the Vietnamese settlement had just done duty as a shooting gallery. All of the mayhem couldn’t have been a happy thing in the ville. But Sergeant First Class Smith and the other U.S. NCOs didn’t have time to deal with that. Smith focused on pulling out his guys, getting out onto the open highway, bringing in a medevac chopper for Tom Hagel and Chuck, too. Tom lay still as death.
When they finally flew out, Tom remembered almost nothing: noises, lights, people talking that he couldn’t hear. Chuck, in extreme pain from his raw skin, later mentioned hearing Linda Ronstadt and the Stone Poneys, maybe while waiting in the other squad’s M113, maybe even on the medevac helicopter, singing about traveling to the beat of a different drum.21 Linda sure got that right. This one beat damn hard.
TWO BROTHERS, THREE weeks, four Purple Hearts, all in a period of allegedly low-intensity enemy activity—what the hell. At this rate, the Hagels didn’t look like a good bet to see Nebraska again. Being a good soldier in Vietnam put you at risk. And the brothers were fine soldiers, acting NCOs. They liv
ed in a degree of danger unimaginable to those back home. And just like drill sergeant William Joyce told Chuck way back at Fort Bliss, people counted on both brothers.
Blown eardrums healed. So did second- and first-degree burns. Both men, Tom more than Chuck, also endured an unseen wound, what later medical researchers termed traumatic brain injury. It’s what happens when the brain slams a few too many times against the unyielding skull bone. Boxers get it, as the sad later lives of Joe Louis and Muhammad Ali taught many. Football players suffer also, as did Chicago Bear Dave Duerson and San Diego Charger Junior Seau. Combat soldiers face this peril, too. If you sustain too many concussions one after the other, the brain gets permanently damaged. Over time, paranoia, depression, homicidal urges, and suicidal tendencies can result. By luck, rather than design, both Hagels benefited from the exact right treatment—a break, a chance for their bruised brains to repair battered cells before getting scrambled again.22 For almost two weeks after the mine blew, both men did only light duties around Bear Cat.
Chuck’s burns, mostly severe first degree with some second-degree blistering, kept him swathed in bandages “like a mullah.”23 He had salve to apply, easy to do in base camp. Doing that out on missions looked to be pretty tough. But at least for a while, that wasn’t an issue.
The April 22 explosion didn’t move the ball, at least as far as Major General Ewell reckoned matters. The division scoreboard showed “negligible contact” at the cost of two wounded in action, one M113 “damaged” (burned to aluminum slag), and no VC body count. To Sergeant First Class Smith’s credit, he refused to game the system and claim phantom dead opponents. But the 2-47th Infantry battalion commander couldn’t let this go on. On May 4, 1968, Captain James B. Craig, an officer with a superb combat record in the 101st Airborne Division, took charge of Company B. He was the outfit’s fourth commander in a bit more than three months.24