Suzanne Rice

Jul 16 2021

FB Rifle Rebuild – 1971

In early April or so, I took on new mission. We were to enter a “new” AO (area of operations), reopen a road and build a first-class permanent firebase for the ARVN (Army of the Republic of Vietnam). It was the consummate Vietnamization mission. The base was to be far enough west to be in the mountains but accessible by ground. The site selected was an old US FB Rifle between FB Anzio (occupied by ARVN) and FB Brick (2^nd Brigade 101^st) and the new site was south of Phu Bai off of QL1 – the main north-south route in I Corps.

**Wayne’s Area of Operation for FB Rifle**

My Commanding Officer at the time, a UMSA 1968 grad, wanted me to take over as his executive officer. But LTC Rodolph, my battalion commander, wanted me to take on this job – quite a compliment. LTC Rodolph prevailed.

The S-3 (operations officer) would design the bunkers and base and my guys would build it. I would have under my command two platoons of my company, C Company, plus the Headquarters equipment – literally, all but one platoon of the company. The planning phase was kind of fun.

First, I had to recon the area and what was left of the old road by helicopter. To do this, I was to ride as observer in a LOH (small bubble-like chopper). My pilot was an 18-year-old warrant officer that loved to put the LOH through her paces. First thing he did was show me how to use the stick and pedals to try and set it down in case he was hit. I did not do very well. We took off and surveyed the area.

**A LOH Chopper Used in the Observation of the Area Phase**

Neither U.S. nor ARVN troops had been on these ridges or valleys for several years. As we flew the road, my pilot made like a roller coaster ostensibly to make us less of a target – but he just liked scaring the hell out of me. We would dive down at high speed and come within a few inches of the ground at high speed and then pull up. My stomach felt like the worst roller coaster ride ever. The road was narrow and overgrown and would require some clearing, new culverts, and fill. On one pass we saw what seemed like a very large lizard crossing the road as well as some real tiny deer (local “mule deer” species).

After the aerial recon, we did the next phase. We landed in on top of the saddle ridge we were to use for the base. We assaulted in and the S3 NCOs started doing a topographic survey. There were two hills with a lower ridge in between. The road would approach the near hill at a very steep incline. When we landed and secured the hill, we recognized that neither was large enough for a battery base and that the two and saddle were too large. We stayed for the remainder of the day and were lifted out at dusk.

The final plan was to actually cut off the top of the far western hill with dozers to create a large enough battery-sized base. Since we could not level the hill and occupy it at the same time, we would set up our temporary base on the near hill, using culverts for temporary bunkers and some wire, claymores, and trip flares for security. We would build the permanent bunkers, extensive wire and fighting positions on the west hill and move when complete. The road work would begin simultaneously and be based out of our position.

We made all preparations and assaulted into the saddle in early morning, supported by most of an infantry company. We received no incoming fire, but our gunners blazed away, anyway. After landing we began to clear the hill and land and assemble dozers and gear. Another platoon from C Company was to work from the existing ARVN FB along QL1 and re-open the old road. We did our best to create a secure position on the eastern part of the saddle. We landed and swept for booby traps and mines.

My guys began to use the equipment (backhoe and M450 dozer) to dig in positions. The dozer and another squad moved to link up with the platoon moving from QL1. The infantry guys loved this as the usual SOP was for them to use their entrenching tools and good, deep positions with no labor were a luxury. As I mentioned the hill had not been occupied for several years and we encountered several snakes. There were many types of snakes in Vietnam (vipers, bamboo vipers, cobras, etc,), but the troops referred to them as “two-step” or “four-step” snakes. The myth was that if bitten you could go two steps or four steps before the venom took effect. One of my guys killed a very long one and as his comrades played with it, we discovered it was a King Cobra with quite a fan. As the sun set one guy said he knew something about snakes and had we ever read “Rikki Tikki Tavi” a story about a mongoose and cobras in colonial India. “Well,” he said, “cobras always travel in pairs.” No one got much sleep that night.

Several days into the job we had another encounter with local animal life. About 0100, one of my guys on guard came up and awakened me. He said, “LT, there is somebody just down the hill and they are breathing very loudly.” I grabbed my weapon and gear and crawled to his position and listened. I heard a very long, hard “grrrrrrrrrr” that was almost a deep purring. I told him that it was not someone, but something. Just then, a trip flare went off to our right in front of the M60 machine gun position. A large tiger jumped in the light and down the hill. The machine gunner was frozen and did not get off a round – neither did the rest of us. In the morning we found tracks of a tiger and a cub all around the hill. We did not see her again.

The work progressed well, and we had the culverts in along the road except for one large stream crossing just before the populated areas and large elephant grass. We would leave that as a low water crossing. We had to sweep the road each morning for booby traps and mines and used to position our new XM 203s (a rifle and grenade launcher combination) on the front and to the flanks. We had some “shotgun” rounds for the M79 part of the XM203s and had them loaded as we moved along. The jungle and high grass were close. On one sweep, the grass rustled loudly, and my guy fired the shotgun round. We moved forward and discovered we had bagged a rather large boar. It was sling-loaded to the battalion rear and mess hall for a “luau” for the colonel.

Early in the job my relationship to my company commander had to be “clarified.” He showed up one day by jeep and started to give directions to me and others. He was not very helpful and really a REMF (Rear Echelon Mother F*&%) in my mind. Maybe, that was not fair – Engineer CPTs in their first tour had gone somewhere else after graduation and had already missed the platoon combat experience. They wanted that, but really, they were inexperienced to those of us lucky enough to be engineer LTs. Anyway, his command tour of C Company was coming to an end (six months was the norm) and he would soon be replaced by another.

LTC Rodolph landed subsequently and asked what I needed. I said that having the Company CO moving around giving sometimes conflicting orders was not helping. The Colonel talked with him for some time and came back and told me everything was understood – my CO was moving to the S-3 and would eventually monitor the job from Battalion. My company commander would not come to the hill again, and he was given other duties with what remained of his company until his change of command. Amazingly he gave me more than the benefit of the doubt and a great efficiency report. The efficiency report system was very inflated and you were rated on part of the report on traits from 1 to 4, all “1”s were the norm. He did ding me with a “2” for tact. That was an understatement!

The only Vietnamese supposed to be in the area were wood cutters and Division designated a “wood cutter’s box” frequently to allow the locals to get firewood, etc. Everyone else we found were deemed enemy and it was a free fire zone. The infantry guys would often send out patrols at night and set up ambushes. These often included what we called mechanical ambushes – claymores rigged to trip wires to eliminate anyone on the paths. One such ambush was very effective and the next morning they brought in several bodies. One was an NVA medical doctor and he had a pith helmet as the NVA regulars wore. Inside was a photo of his wife and daughter. It was a bit disturbing to me.

Anyway, after Mai Lai and the trial of LT Calley, the Army was hypersensitive to civilian deaths in Vietnam. One morning a staff sergeant in the infantry battalion working our area was leading a patrol and let his guys sleep an extra hour. They did not take in the mechanical ambush on time and some wood cutters were messed up. The Division picked up the SSG and took him away and charged him with manslaughter we were told.

Jul 16 2021

Welcome to Vietnam – 1970

My first memory of Vietnam was the pilot announcing, “we are approaching the coastline of Vietnam.” I was still half asleep, suffering from two days of travel from North Carolina to McChord Air Force Base in Washington State before finally arriving at Tan Son Nhut Air Base near Saigon. My Pan Am flight looked like any other Pan Am flight that I had taken, a commercial aircraft with attractive young flight attendants, which was the norm at that time. The primary exception was that almost all the passengers on the plane were wearing a uniform. Most were in Army khakis, others in Navy and Air Force blue, and a few in civilian clothes, Department of the Army civilians and contractors. As I looked out the window and saw the coastline coming up and the rice paddies and mountains in the distance, I expected to see artillery and bomb explosions or tracers streaming into the air, but it was utterly peaceful. There was no sign that this was a country at war. Our plane landed at Tan Son Nhut, and we started deboarding down the portable stairs onto the tarmac. As I stepped out of the air-conditioned plane, I was struck by a tremendous wave of hot, humid air. It was my welcome to Vietnam and the climate I would be living in for the next year.

My journey to Vietnam had started in March 1969. My class of 800 West Point cadets had gathered in Thayer Hall to select our first assignments. The selection process was based on class rank, and although there were hundreds of classmates in front of me, assignments in Europe, stateside, or Vietnam were still open to me when my name was called. Many of my classmates planned to get married or were engaged and wanted to avoid service in Vietnam as their initial assignment. Others did not feel ready to serve in a combat zone and preferred to go to Europe or a stateside location to gain experience. I selected Vietnam. There were many reasons. I had received a free education paid for by my country and felt an obligation to serve. My father had served in World War II, as had many of my uncles. The war was not going well, and there was a shortage of good junior leaders, and I felt like I could make a positive contribution in a difficult situation. Lastly, I did not have a fiancé nor steady girlfriend at the time, so I had only myself to consider.

When I deployed to Vietnam in August 1970, the war that began in 1965 was not going well for the US side. The Vietcong had demonstrated during the Tet offensive of 1968 that they could still control the countryside. Many Americans no longer supported the war, and daily antiwar demonstrations were the norm in the states. By 1970, 40% of the junior enlisted soldiers serving in Vietnam were draftees, the vast majority of which were disproportionally serving in ground combat units. Most were good soldiers, but they were young and inexperienced. The average age of the 2.7 million veterans who served in Vietnam was 22 years old, versus 26 years old for those who served in WWII. Unlike in WWII, drugs and racial strife were common problems in most American units, especially among support troops.

I had requested an assignment in the 11th Armored Cavalry Squadron, a prestigious unit near Saigon. When I arrived in Vietnam, however, this unit had all the lieutenants it needed. Hence, the Army assigned me to A Troop, 3rd Squadron, 4th Cavalry Regiment of the 25th Infantry Division, located in a large US base camp at Chu Chi. This unit was

operating about 60 miles northwest of Saigon in what was called the “Fishhook” as the border of Vietnam with Cambodia curved like a fishhook in that area. The entire area of operations consisted of flat terrain made up of miles and miles of rice paddies and jungle with small Vietnamese villages scattered throughout.

The chief terrain feature in the area my unit had to protect was an inactive volcanic mountain several thousand feet high, called Nui Ba Den, or “Black Virgin Mountain”.

The Army had a radio relay station on the summit, which came under regular attack from the VC. Consequently, the mountains’ sides had been bombed and hit by artillery so often that almost no trees were left standing. The most significant benefit of the mountain was to help those of us on the flat terrain surrounding it to navigate. By taking a compass reading from our location to the mountain, and another reading from an airburst of US artillery, we could use triangulation to determine our position on the flat rice paddies and

high grass. This primitive method of determining location was not without error and sometimes resulted in artillery fire missing the enemy, or even worse, falling on friendly positions. On the road from Saigon to Cu Chi Base Camp, we passed through the city of Tay Ninh, which is the home of a small Buddhist religion called Caodaism. As we passed by the beautiful Cao Dai temple, dozens of young monks in their orange robes moved around outside and in the neighborhood. The Cao Dai faithful believe that there are 36 levels of Heaven and 72 planets having intelligent life. The first planet is closest to Heaven, while number 72 is closest to Hell. Earth, sadly, is close to Hell at number 68. Maybe it was because the land they inhabited had been at war for more than 25 years.

When I arrived, I found that my unit had just come in from field operations on weeklong maintenance and rest stand-down. It was an ideal time to arrive in that I had a chance to meet my platoon and fellow officers in an environment other than combat operations. My troop commander was serving his second tour in Vietnam and was shortly due to return to the states. He was a senior captain and an experienced leader and went by the radio callsign “Alpha six.” I was assigned as the first platoon leader and went by the radio call sign “Alpha-One-Six.” Steve, the second platoon leader, “Alpha-Two-Six,” was an ROTC, 1st lieutenant who had been drafted to serve in Vietnam and was not happy about being there. Frank, the third platoon leader, “Alpha-Three-Six,” had arrived in Vietnam about a month before I did. Although we were fellow armor officers, we had not previously known each other. He was friendly and welcomed me to the unit.

I had been a tank platoon leader at Fort Riley, with five M60 tanks and crews. In Vietnam, I would lead a reconnaissance platoon equipped with six M113 armored personnel carriers (APCs), each of which carried a crew of four or five soldiers and was armed with a 50-caliber machinegun. These APCs had tracks instead of wheels and could navigate through rice paddies and light jungle. The platoon also had three Sheridan Armored Reconnaissance Vehicles (ARVs) or light tanks. Each was armed with a 152mm

cannon capable of firing a Beehive round against ground infantry or conventional tank rounds against bunkers. Each Sheridan had a four-person crew and was equipped with a 50-caliber and 7.62mm coaxial machine gun.

My platoon was authorized fifty-one men, but there were always positions unfilled, soldiers processing in or out of the country, sick, or recovering from wounds. Consequently, fewer than forty soldiers were available on most days. Almost every noncommissioned officer qualified to serve in a tank or cavalry unit had already had a Vietnam tour by 1970, so there was a significant shortage of qualified NCOs in all platoons. My platoon sergeant, a staff sergeant, was assigned in the position usually held by a sergeant first class. He was not experienced and was not enthusiastic about the job placed upon him because of his seniority. He commanded the three Sheridan tanks as they could not navigate rice paddies and had to remain mainly on the roads. Consequently, my platoon often acted as two units rather than one. The APCs under my control conducted reconnaissance while the Sheridan light tanks under my platoon sergeant’s control escorted supply convoys or provided road security.

With my platoon sergeant frequently absent, I depended upon a less experienced staff sergeant who normally was only responsible for a five-man APC crew. He did a respectable job under the conditions but was little help to me in my first combat leadership role. As the platoon leader, I did not command a track vehicle but instead focused on the entire platoon. Specialist Carson was my M113 carrier commander, responsible for its maintenance and care and supervising the crew. He was a tall, lean soldier who was always professional and knowledgeable and greatly benefited me.

Sgt. Hancock was the leader of my infantry squad and looked the part. Physically fit, striking in appearance, and a natural leader, he was my most reliable noncommissioned officer. Any time we were in a situation where there was danger, he was always the one I wanted with me on the ground. “Doc” was our platoon medic. One of only four minority soldiers in the platoon, he was well trained, highly motivated, and much respected by the other soldiers. Doc enjoyed his job and the prestige that went with it. PFC Campbell, one of my favorites, was a short, baby-faced infantry soldier who loved to tangle with danger and embraced every opportunity to disarm a mine in the road or plant an explosive charge. Another colorful character in my platoon was Private Johnson, an American Indian, who wore a headband and looked like an Apache warrior.

**Standing on the Left With My** **Platoon**

My father served in the same Marine unit for three years in the Pacific during WW II, where he developed life-long friendships. My experience in Vietnam would be different. My fellow soldiers and I would be respectful and cordial with each other, but there was little to bind us in our short time together except getting about the business of war. With one exception, I would never see any of these officers or soldiers again after our unit was deactivated four months later.

Jul 12 2021

Off to War – 1971

During the class of 1969’s tenure at West Point (1965-69), the peak of the Vietnam War occurred. US combat units were dispatched in 1965, the bloodiest week of combat occurred during Tet of 1968, and the peak strength of 549,500 was reached in 1969. Our daily lives, especially with respect to military training, were inundated with war-themed events. When the time for branch selection and assignment preferences arrived, a significant percentage of us volunteered for Vietnam.

In June 1969, we graduated, took our 60 days of leave and the vast majority of us went on to Airborne School, Ranger School and the branch basic officer’s course. Army policy at that time mandated that all Vietnam volunteers had to complete two months of stateside unit duty, before deploying to the Republic of Vietnam (RVN).

I had been assigned to Fort Carson, Colorado to the 5^th Infantry Division (5th ID), later redesignated the 4^th Infantry Division (Mechanized) (4th ID Mech), which had rotated back from RVN. I was the battalion Assistant Operations Officer (Asst. S-3) in the 2/10 Infantry. My new bride, JoAnne, who had a degree in education, but was unable to find work as a teacher, did secure temporary employment using her sewing hobby skills as an associate in a fabric shop. Since nearly a year had passed without me receiving my orders for Vietnam and Jo wondering when I’d be leaving, I decided to call Infantry Branch. I was connected to a major, whom I’ll call Prevaricator. I identified myself, explained the situation and waited while he pulled up my file. After a few minutes, he said, “Let’s see. Oh, yes. Well, with the drawdown of US troops in country, the earliest you’ll be there is March of ’72. Now, I just finished filling an October requirement for 150 Captains, but I could swap you out for someone on the list and get you there sooner.” I respectfully declined and said that March of next year would be soon enough. Before hanging up, I repeated March of ‘72, which he confirmed.

In addition to my regular duties, I performed “other duties as assigned”, to include sitting on a brigade board considering promotions to the grade of Staff Sergeant (E6). About three weeks after I talked with the Infantry Branch assignments officer, one of the brigade administration NCOs, who had played on the brigade softball team with me, appeared before the board for an interview. After the board adjourned, as I was leaving brigade headquarters, he approached me and asked how he did. As I was not permitted to discuss actions of the board, I told him I couldn’t reveal the results. He jokingly said,” Well sir, if I don’t get promoted to E6, I’ll have to put you on orders for Vietnam.” I simply smiled.

I continued assisting the Battalion Operations Officer (S-3) in planning field operations and riot control training for the Battalion. Then one day, I received a call from that brigade admin NCO, who said (somberly, “Sir, I’ve got some bad news; I just received a Request for Orders (RFO) for you for Vietnam. “Back in those days an RFO was the precursor to receiving a hard copy of reassignment orders. Thinking this was part of a joke, I glibly responded,” Sure Sgt., and let me guess, I‘ve gotta be there in two weeks.” “No sir, not two weeks, but by 1 November.” I could tell from his tone that he was serious. Just having been assured by the assignments officer that the soonest I would be there was March of ‘72, I assumed somebody had screwed up.

I waited until the following day to call Major Prevaricator and when I finally got a hold of him, he said he had just received a rush requirement for another 150 captains and was scrambling to fill it, by moving everybody up to a sooner deployment. Since there were few American troop units still remaining in Vietnam, he told me I would be assigned to Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (MACV).

Later that night when I got home, I told JoAnne about our accelerated schedule and suggested we revise our calendar to shift to the earlier date. Like the fine understanding Army wife that she is, she contained her consternation and decided that we would make the change sooner rather than later.

At the appropriate time, we completed the Permanent Change of Station (PCS) process, spent time with family, said our farewells, and I boarded the “big iron bird” headed for Oakland Army Air Terminal enroute to RVN.

Once I arrived in-country, 1 November 71, I began in-processing. During my initial reporting in to the administrative Specialist 4 (Spec4) at Military Region III (MR III) headquarters, he looked at my orders, glanced at me, uttered an epithet, followed by, “Sorry, sir, the last thing I need is another captain. I‘m not sure what to do with you, since I have no open slots.” This revelation appeared to contradict what Major Prevaricator led me to believe. Fancy that.

In the midst of doing the initial processing at Bien Hoa, I was suddenly told to report to the MR III adjutant. When I did, I found out that it was our classmate who was better known as the hockey team captain, who had just been tasked to recommend a Captain (O-3) for consideration as the MR III deputy commander’s aide de camp. He was reviewing files of O-3 officers who met the criteria and saw my name. Not wanting to put him in a bind and being somewhat curious, I agreed to be interviewed by the general (whose name I’ve forgotten). During the interview, I expressed appreciation for the opportunity, but thought I’d be more effective in that role after some combat time in the field. He appreciated my honesty and deferred to my wishes.

I was assigned to MACV Team 89 in Dat Do District, Phuoc Tuy Province, 50 miles southeast of Saigon on the South China Sea.

With Richard Nixon’s Vietnamization program in full swing, our orders were basically: “don’t get wounded, captured, or dead.“

For the most part, activity consisted of inspecting Vietnamese local force units, gathering intelligence and setting ambushes and patrolling with those local force units. We had a few enemy contacts, but activity was relatively “quiet”. The village in which our team compound was located was stable, although in other parts of the district, there was some guerrilla activity, typically handled by the Vietnamese. During this time, Jo and I stayed in touch via mail, and once I was even able to break away to the US base at Vung Tau, to my south, for a MARS call (the telephone/volunteer ham radio connection. (To learn more about a MARS call, read: Keeping in Touch With A Soldier). We began planning for my Rest and Recreation (R&R). Every soldier in Vietnam was permitted one R&R during a year’s tour of duty. One had to complete 30 days in-country to be eligible. Of the various choices, we had decided on Hawaii, which allocated seven days (including travel time). I put in my request and waited for the dates to be assigned. Jo, who was living with her parents, was then enrolled in a graduate program in education at the State University of New York (SUNY) – Oneonta, which would factor in to the logistics of us meeting in Hawaii.

Time passed, Thanksgiving came and went and a month later Christmas care packages arrived. Jo even sent me a small tree for our hooch. My mother-in-law, bless her heart, sent me a hip flask of bourbon (verboten) and a puzzle of the 1971 Playboy Playmate of the Year. That’s right – my mother-in-law! She always was very cool.

The American holidays of Christmas and New Years were mere precursors to the Lunar New Year (Tet) which was celebrated by the Vietnamese during the February timeframe. Prior to 1968, the holiday had been the occasion for an informal truce in the Vietnam War between South Vietnam and North Vietnam (and their communist allies in South Vietnam, the Viet Cong). But the fiasco of Tet of 1968, while an overall failure tactically, but a victory psychologically, put an end to that notion. We paid close attention to intelligence reports, planning operations carefully. All indicators were positive so we cautiously and optimistically, were still hoping for a “come home early surprise” – a 60-day drop. In any event, Jo and I had Hawaii to look forward to. When I finally received my R&R orders, the timeslot was a week, including Memorial Day on the front and & my 25^th birthday on the back. Jo made arrangements to stay at the Honolulu Hilton, and we would meet after my flight arrived and go to the hotel. This was done via snail mail, since Al Gore had not yet invented the Internet. Jo was, and still is, a master at vacation planning.

**Honolulu Hilton on Waikiki with Marblehead in the Background**

Little did we know then, what was in store…

Jun 29 2021

NRAS – 1973

In the fall of 1973, I was a lieutenant in a Howitzer Battery, 2^nd Squadron, 11 Armored Cavalry. The squadron was stationed at Daley Barracks in Bad Kissingen, Germany.

Our mission was to watch over the East German border portion of the Iron Curtain near Bad Neustadt in the Meiningen Gap. Our border camp was at Wollbach.

On October 6, 1973, The Arab Coalition started the Yom Kippur War with a surprise attack on Israel. West Pointers are trained military leaders, so it was no surprise that every classmate and graduate I knew paid very close attention to the conflict. (Related story: https://thedaysforward.com/panic-1973-war/)

Israel didn’t do so well during the first week of the war. Egyptian forces crossed the Suez Canal and drove deep into the Sinai desert. Syrian armor threatened to overwhelm the Golan Heights. The nation of Israel was in danger of being cut in half. Israeli losses of armor and aircraft were horrific. In spite of this, Israel held at the Golan and began to push back in the Sinai.

Now, lieutenants are not privy to a lot of military secrets, but they do hear rumors, and between October 10^th and October 22, there were rumors a-plenty. Rumor was, the US was pulling ammunition, M-60 tanks, artillery, armored vehicles, and F-4 Phantom jet fighters out of European war reserve stockpiles and flying them to Israel as fast as aircraft came available. Other rumors said the Russians were doing the same for the Egyptians and Syrians.

What the lieutenants didn’t know was that the Russians sent a letter to President Nixon early on October 23. The letter said Russia would unilaterally enter the fight against Israel if the US did not join them to force a cease fire. Russia alerted seven Soviet Bloc airborne divisions to be ready to move to the Mideast. One division, with its air transport, mobilized at an airfield in Yugoslavia. In addition to this, the Russian fleet sortied 97 combat ships into the Mediterranean to shadow US Navy assets. Both fleets were ready to shoot.

Israel was in danger of being destroyed if the Russians entered the war. Golda Meir authorized the IDF to arm some of its nukes. The Russians, in return, moved a ship with their nukes into a harbor in Egypt. World War III was in the air.

Around midnight, DC time, on October 23, the Nixon Administration ordered the US military to DEFCON 3. The DEFCON scale defines stages of US military readiness with 5 being normal and 1 being war is imminent or underway. DEFCON 3 directs selected US forces to increase readiness for deployment. The US wasn’t about to allow unilateral Russian intervention. US action made that perfectly clear to the Russian government.

Midnight October 23 in Washington DC is early morning October 24 in Germany. The day dawned as a beautiful crisp sunny autumn morning at Daley Barracks in Bad Kissingen, Germany. Around 0830 on Wednesday, October 24 (midnight October 23, Washington DC time), an NRAS B Team member and I, an NRAS A Team member, were called to the 2/11 ACR HQ to decode an NRAS message.

NRAS stands for Nuclear Release Authentication System. This system is designed to prevent a single individual from exploding an atomic bomb. The system works by requiring classified codes to be stored in a safe with two locks, an A Team Lock and a B Team Lock. Each lock has a different combination. Access to any coded material under two-man control requires the presence of an A Team member with the A Team combination and a B Team with the B Team combination. Armed guards prevented any monkey business.

Higher headquarters often transmitted NRAS messages to 2/11 ACR via 3-character alpha-numeric code groups. The first code groups of a message identified a specific sealed plastic card. Popping the seal on the appropriate card allowed us to open one of two books and get instructions for decoding the message. The first book was the “practice” book. The second was the “real” one. There was little distinction between the “practice” books and the “real” books.

2/11 Howitzer Battery NRAS teams were very experienced. Practice messages came in several times each week. All of us had worked together for 18 months and decoded dozens of practice messages and we were good at it. On October 24, we unlocked the safe, opened the practice code books, decoded the message AND THE CODE DIDNT BREAK.

So, we tried it a second time and THE CODE STILL DIDN’T BREAK.

We looked at each other and in a split second, in unison we said, “Oh Shit, it’s real” This was not a practice message. We opened the REAL BOOK and popped the sealed WAR RESERVE card. THE MESSAGE DID BREAK AND IT WAS A REAL NRAS ALERT. We and the US military all over the world were at DEFCON 3, one step away from war.

The message told us info we never imagined. It sent units all over the world to alert assembly areas, it released weapons we never heard of and put us one step away from sending our wives and children to Rhein Main Air Force Base for evacuation to the United States.

Suffice it to say, this presented Howitzer Battery, in Bad Kissingen with a serious issue. Our 2/11 Squadron E, F and G Cav Troops and the H CO M-60 tank company were doing tank gunnery at Grafenwöhr. Graf is a long way from Bad Kissingen. This meant the only thing patrolling our section of the East German border around the Meiningen Gap was an under-strength artillery battery with 6 155mm howitzers.

We didn’t have enough people to move out of Bad Kissingen to our alert position.

So, how do we tell our Battalion Commander about this? Turns out we got him on the phone and suggested he go have a conversation with any neighboring nuke capable 155mm artillery battalion commander about current events. He did. Before he could arrange rail transport to bring the 2/11 tanks back to BK, cooler heads prevailed. A truce was arranged in the Mideast and the alert was called off before the end of the day.

I didn’t play any kind of an important role in this incident, but I did get to see a tiny part of history.

Jun 27 2021

Adventures of a Firefighter – 1974 – 2007

Fort Lewis, WA was my next assignment after returning from Vietnam in 1973. It was at Fort Lewis that preparation for a second career began. I joined the local Fire Department (Thurston County District #3 (Lacey)) as a volunteer and became a certified Firefighter and Emergency Medical Technician. I started a Paramedic class in Pierce County but was dismissed when they excluded everyone who did not reside in Pierce County. When next assigned to complete the MP Officer Advanced course at Fort McClellan AL, I enrolled in the Paramedic course at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. This involved driving to Birmingham on Tuesday and Thursday evenings and living in my van on weekends when completing the hospital clinicals at various hospitals there. I had joined the Anniston Rescue Squad, was licensed as an Alabama Paramedic in 1978 and was the first Paramedic in the Rescue Squad. There, I saw more blood and guts than in the Republic of Vietnam. Disputes involving knives and shootings were a frequent occurrence.

Next selected for a graduate Fellowship in Forensic Medicine at the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, I also completed a master of Forensic Science degree at George Washington University. Then assigned to the 172^nd Infantry Brigade in Fort Richardson Alaska, I volunteered with the Palmer Fire Department for about two years years. Later, in response to a request for an overseas assignment, I was stationed at the Army Training Center at Fort Irwin CA for four years as the Provost Marshal, and later as an Engineer Officer in J3, Force Modernization, US Forces Command located at Ft. McPherson in Georgia. After arriving in Georgia in1989, my family and I settled down in Peachtree City and I joined the Peachtree City Fire Department as a volunteer firefighter/Emergency Medical Technician. Since Georgia did not have reciprocity for Paramedics with Alabama, I took the Paramedic course again to be a Georgia-certified Paramedic. For two years, I served in a Volunteer capacity as a FireMedic. I retired from the Army in 1992 as the O-6 board was convening. Regardless of the outcome of promotion, it seemed apparent that I would finally be sent overseas, and I was determined not to disrupt the education of our two sons who were close to graduation as had happened to our eldest son. I decided that if I was going to continue in emergency service, I might as well get paid something. So, I became a career FireMedic with Peachtree City Fire Department working 24 hours on and 48 hours off. I responded to virtually every kind of known emergency: significant residential structure fires, industrial fires, numerous vehicle accidents and fires, aircraft crashes, flood rescue, and various accidents and injuries. In the early days we responded to calls of “general weakness”, which often turned out to be a patient in respiratory and/or cardiac arrest.

A couple of the more memorable calls included a small boy (3 ½ years) who had fallen and struck his head on the brick fireplace. That had created an obvious bruise and a laceration which was freely bleeding. The boy was near hysterical and no one had been able to calm him. When I walked into the room, the boy saw me, came running over to me and jumped into my arms. We stopped the bleeding, applied a temporary bandage and transported him to the hospital where they could close the wound. No one knew why I had such an impact on the child; perhaps it was because I had ten grandchildren of my own.

Another case involved a multiple vehicle wreck with multiple victims and a vehicle fully involved in fire. As we were working to extinguish the fire, we noticed a man slumped over in the front seat. Shortly thereafter, we noticed that he was still alive and pushed the fire away from him as we proceeded with extrication attempts. This was complicated by the fact that the boot on his right foot was melted into the base of the floor shifting mechanism. He had survived the fire because he was wearing heavy hunting clothing which shielded him. He was airlifted to the burn center where he lived for about three weeks before succumbing to respiratory distress.

The next incident involved a man who was operating a Bobcat loader on which one of the side safety screens was missing. He managed to get his head outside the cab while the hydraulic arms were in motion and they sheared off the top half of his head. He was still breathing so he was intubated and transported to the nearest hospital where the physician on duty observed his condition and immediately determined that further medical treatment was futile.

In 1997, I was designated as the department Accreditation Manager and began working on the many issues needed to improve the Insurance Service Office (ISO) rating which effects the insurance rates for property within the city and achieve National Accreditation. In December 1999, the current Fire Chief died after a battle with cancer. In January 2000, I became the third Fire Chief of the Peachtree City Fire Department. I continued in office until my retirement in April 2007 and remain the only retired Fire Chief of Peachtree City.

**Presentations for Peachtree City Firemen**

Like many Fire Departments, it had started as an entirely volunteer organization with minimal equipment, minimal training and minimal funding. Some members had mortgaged their homes to get money to buy the first fire engine, a 1949 Chevy 750 gallon per minute (GPM) pumper. The city grew and was continuing to grow, and the Fire Department had not grown with it. Since I had been the first person in the Department to attend the National Fire Academy, I immediately started increasing training opportunities and acquiring more modern and capable apparatus and equipment.

Morale increased, and both fire and medical service provided was excellent. In response to a request for help to recover from Hurricane Katrina, The Peachtree City Fire Department sent an ambulance with Medics and provisions to Louisiana for about one month. During my term as Peachtree City Fire Chief, no firefighter was killed or incurred significant injury in the line of duty. No fire apparatus broke down while fighting a fire and no ambulance broke down while transporting patients to a hospital.

On September 11, 2001, I was at a Mass Disaster Operations class. Just before the class started, we received a phone call urging us to turn on a TV set and watch the news. It was activated just in time to see the second aircraft strike the Twin Towers, and everyone knew instantly that it was not an accident. Within minutes, everyone’s pagers started activating calling them back immediately to their primary duty stations. I and the rest of the class returned to our duty stations to begin immediate checks of apparatus, equipment and staffing in preparation for whatever might next occur.

When we moved to Georgia, we were looking for quality schools for our sons, quality emergency services for a safe place to live, and some activities and amenities to keep our sons involved in wholesome activities. My 33 years in the fire service and 29 years as a Paramedic have clearly demonstrated that most persons have the same outlook. Also, that whenever most people need directions, information or help, they almost always call the fire department either first or when they cannot find someone else to help them. The quality of the fire/emergency medical service is definitely a major determinant in how the community’s quality of life is perceived and maintained.