By Guy Miller

Combat Air Crew – 1972

     So that air crews do not get overly exhausted, Air Force regulations state that pilots are not allowed to exceed 100 hours flight time within a rolling 30-day period.  The Army decided to beat the Air Force, so their regs say the limit is 110 hours max.  The Air Force regs further state that under combat conditions the max time is 130 hours, which means for the Army it is 140 hours.  Flight time is charted in the Operations section, where a 30-day rolling sum of flight hours is maintained.  Each day any new flight time is added and the 31^st day back is subtracted, so an accurate count is current for each aviator.

     Whenever an aviator reaches the max 30-day flight time, he is automatically grounded for three days.  Before he can fly again, he must be examined by the Flight Surgeon, to receive a “go-fly” slip.  If during that three-day period his rolling total has fallen below the limit, he can resume flying, provided his rolling total does not again exceed the limit.  In our unit, the interpretation was that if an aviator exceeded the limit during a mission, he would continue to fly the mission and be grounded at its completion.

     In early July our unit had just received some new birds, and were flying our asses off.  I had gotten seven days leave for late August, to meet my starter wife in Hawaii.  So, to maximize my flight hours, it had been scheduled that I had 139.5 hours rolling total the day before I was to depart.  That last day I was assigned a mission expected to last eight hours or more.  I flew that day with a high-time aviator who was about ready to become an Aircraft Commander himself.  At the completion of the day he dropped me off at Nha Trang, where I could catch a flight to Saigon, and he flew the 20 minutes back to home base solo.  My rolling total had hit 148.2 hours combat flying time in 30 days.

     Being on leave status, I was flying “space available,” which meant I was catching flights however I could to get where I wanted to go.  This was never a problem in Vietnam, and I assumed it would be no problem anywhere.  I got to Honolulu, where I was to spend seven glorious days with my bride, but things did not go well.  By the third day I just wanted to get back to my unit where they needed me, and resume flying.

     So, I took a taxi back to the military desk at Honolulu International, anxious to get back to Vietnam.  Problem was, the flight west was already full, with a waiting list.  I begged and pleaded with the Air Force senior sergeant at the desk, but being a lowly Captain, I didn’t stand a chance when the waiting list was full of officers of all services ranking higher than me.

      Determined to get back, I refused to give up.  The Air Force sergeant looked my leave orders up and down, trying to find some way to get me on the flight.      “What does this ‘Headquarters, 17^th CAG’ heading mean?” he asked.

      “That’s ‘17^th Combat Aviation Group,” I replied.

     “Wait a minute.  Are you a combat crew member?” he asked.

     “No, I’m a helicopter pilot,” I replied.

     “Well, why didn’t you say so?  Combat crew members have priority over everyone else.”  As he lined out a Navy Commander on the manifest and wrote in my name, he said, “Get your bag.  You’re on the flight.” 

     And 19 hours later I was back in the cockpit, doing my job.   

Charleston  – 1972

     I finished the Advanced Course as a newly-bachelorized young Army Captain, little suspecting that I still had some six years to go in grade before coming into the zone for Major.  I decided to travel Space-A for a while, catching Air Force transport planes to see where I could go.  I arrived at Charleston AFB one evening, but they had no flights going anywhere until the next morning.  The Air Force shared the base with the Navy, and the joint billeting office was located on the Charleston Naval Base side.  An Air Force shuttle bus took me over to the Navy side, where I got a temporary room for the night in the Visiting Officers Quarters.

     After I dropped my stuff in the room, I wanted to get to the Officers Club for something to eat, but I had no idea what kind of shuttle service the naval base had.  So, I got the number for the base motor pool, and called on the phone in the VOQ lobby.  After identifying myself, I asked if they knew how I could get a ride to the O-Club.  The dispatcher was marvelously helpful, and said, “Yes, sir, we’ll get you a ride there right away.” 

     Very impressed, I stood on the front porch of the building in my class-A traveling uniform to wait.  In about seven minutes a big shiny staff car pulled up in front, and the driver jumped out and ran past me into the lobby.  After looking around, he came back out and asked, “Excuse me, sir.  Have you seen a Captain Miller around here?”

     I replied, “I am CPT Miller,” and for the first time he looked me over.  Seeing my name plate, his shoulders drooped, and he said, resignedly, “Get in the car.” 

     As he was pulling away from the curb, the dispatcher came on the radio:  “Were you able to get over and pick up Captain Miller?”

     “Yeah, I got him.” 

     “Any problems?”

     “Well, just one.  He’s Army.”  [A Navy Captain ranks with an Army full Colonel, just below an Admiral].

     With disappointment in his voice, the dispatcher replied, “Oh.” 

     But at least they gave me a ride to the Club.

Flying north along the South China Sea coastline from our home base at Ninh Hoa, before we got to Tuy Hoa and Qui Nhon, the Vung Ro Point, a mountainous protrusion, formed the eastern-most point of Indochina.  Vung Ro was home to some particularly unpleasant bad guys.  If we were continuing north, we would fly wide of the point at 2,000 feet elevation, flying out over the ocean [“feet wet” we called it] just far enough that we could safely autorotate back to the beach when the engine quit. 

     But if we were working in the Tuy Hoa river valley, where the Korean White Horse 1^st Regiment, with three battalions and 12 companies was located, as we frequently did, we tried to slip through the Vung Ro pass, a narrow slot through the mountains that opened into the valley.  There was said to be a radar-guided heavy machine gun in the pass, but I was lucky enough never to be able to confirm that story.  Nonetheless, we always traversed that valley either above 2,000’ if we could, or else at treetop level, zigzagging as we went.

     So, one day in May 1972, when I was still charlie-pop [new guy co-pilot], it was the end of a really long day of some forty combat sorties, flying rations, water, ammo and mail from the regimental headquarters to the dozen companies on pinnacle outposts around the Tuy Hoa Area of Operations.  Weather that day had been low overcast with poor visibility.  With my Aircraft Commander too tired to fly, I was at the controls taking us home.  The clouds kept us from flying our customary 2,000’ safe altitude, so going around the Vung Ro Point, I was nursing the aircraft along feet wet as high as we could safely fly, about 1,600 feet, still within AK-47 range.

     The most important single part of the Huey is the big nut that secures the rotor assembly to the mast.  This part, the highest point on the bird, is affectionately known as the Jesus nut.  So I was flying us along, trying the keep the Jesus nut barely in the clouds, still able to see. 

     The plan was, if we took fire, I would yank us up into the clouds and climb on instruments until we were well above the highest mountains in the vicinity [I was instrument rated, but the Aircraft Commander was not].  Then I would fly east until we were well out to sea, then slowly let down until we came out of the clouds, hopefully before we encountered the ocean, and visually navigate ourselves back home.

     So, I was tooling along at 80 knots, tensely trying to skim the bottom of the clouds, worried about taking enemy fire, ready to snatch us up blindly into in the clouds, when suddenly, WHOOSH!!!  Out of the cloud directly in front of me, just beyond the edge of our rotor disk, I saw the belly of an airplane flying straight down.  “What the hell was that?”

     With the image burned into my mind, I recognized the airplane with an engine in front and another just behind the cockpit, as what we called a ‘push me-pull you.’  It was an Air Force O-2 Skymaster, the bird that Forward Air Controllers (FAC) flew to call in and control jet airstrikes.

      That damn FAC was flying aerobatic maneuvers in the clouds, and just missed a mid-air collision with us by less than 50’.  And the idiot never knew how close he had come to incinerating us all.  Apparently he just went on his merry way, completely unaware that his guardian angel had saved him from joining the six of us on the Huey at the pearly gates. 

     Idiot fixed-wing driver!

Phan Rang – 1972

     An engineer buddy of mine told me this one.  He was a captain, heading an engineer inspection team being flown around the country, when his ride landed one Saturday afternoon to remain overnight at Phan Rang airbase.  After arranging for bunks and chow for his NCOs, he headed down to the Air Force Officers Club to see to his own needs.

     Sitting at the bar, he struck up a conversation with a couple of the zoomies based at Phan Rang.  A little before 6:00 PM the guys at the bar started to clear out, and his drinking buddies said, “Come on.  You’ve got to see this.” 

     A whole crowd of people were gathering outside, checking their watches and clearly waiting for something.  Finally, someone said, “Here it comes,” and everyone looked northwest, where a rocket plume was rising from the hill overlooking the airfield.  Dang, if a 132mm Soviet Katyusha rocket wasn’t heading directly toward them.  As they watched, it flew straight over their heads, across the runway and impacted harmlessly in a rice paddy just beyond the base perimeter.

     A cheer went up among the gathered crowd, with comments of, “Great shot,” and “All right!” and “Better than average,” and “Nine point oh, at least.”  Someone said, “Did you get all that?” and he turned around to see a medic with a Super 8 mm movie camera, who had apparently filmed the entire scene.

     As the crowd began to disperse and the club patrons headed back to the bar, my buddy asked, “What the hell was that?”  Here is the explanation he got:

     There was a lone Viet Cong soldier camped on the back side of the hill.  Every Saturday evening at precisely 6 PM he fired his single rocket over the airbase, ensuring it landed harmlessly outside the perimeter.  He then reported to Hanoi that his rocket had successfully blown up four American fighter jets, two transport aircraft and a fuel truck.  Sometimes he blew up the control tower.  And each week the North Vietnamese Army would send him one more heavy rocket, carried by hand all the way down the Ho Chi Minh trail.

     My buddy asked, if they knew where this bad guy was, why didn’t they just go out and pick him up?  The answer was, then Hanoi would just send somebody else who would probably try to actually do some damage. 

     They had a nice arrangement going.

** A Katyushs rocket is 57 inches long, 95 pounds, warhead 12.4 pounds TNT.

Blackbird – 1972

     One afternoon in August ’72, I was now an Aircraft Commander with my own unique callsign.  This late in the war, the American forces had really been drawn down, and I realized we had not seen another helicopter for several hours.  When you are flying over bad-guy country in a single-engine aircraft, the idea that no one is around anywhere to hear a ‘mayday’ call if you are going down is troubling. 

     While my charlie-pop continued flying our mission, to assuage my concern I reached out and flipped our radio to the universal emergency channel, called “guard.”  I keyed the microphone and called, “Commo check on guard.”  No response.  Again, “Commo check on guard.”  Absolutely nothing, which was beginning to make me nervous.  Once more, “Commo check on guard.  Is anyone there?” 

     Back came a response, “Aircraft calling on guard, this is Blackbird 081.” 

    “Blackbird 081, this is Ghost Rider 8.  Good to hear your voice.” 

    “This is Blackbird 081.  You sound like a helicopter.  If you are in trouble, I’m afraid I can’t be much help.  I am at Angels 85, but I could try to relay.” 

     He had just told me he was flying at 85,000’ altitude, which meant he was an Air Force SR-71 spy plane, flying over 2,000 mph.

     “Blackbird 081, Ghost Rider 8 is a UH-1 at Angels TWO!  No emergency, just wanting to hear another aircraft.” 

     “Ghost Rider 8, Blackbird 081.  Rog ….”  In the time we were talking, he had already flown over the horizon.  At least I knew the guard channel on my radio worked.

The “Tales from Nick’s FARRP” series are a fictionalized version of real events and are dedicated to the memory of friends and classmates from the Class of 1969.

“So, Tony, were there any funny or crazy things you remember from Vietnam?”

*     *     *     *     *     *

     I was talking to my beer-drinking customer Tony, known to the Army as Major Williams, sitting on a stool on the other side of the bar from me in “Nick’s FARRP.”  That was a drinking establishment for Army guys in Fayetteville, North Carolina, just outside Fort Bragg, that my Uncle Nick left me when he died.  Some chemical he was exposed to during his three tours in Vietnam as a helicopter pilot, or as they like to call themselves, “aviator,” gave him cancers that he eventually died from. 

     I know nothing about the Army, so I am always asking the guys in here questions.  My name, by the way, is Gil Edwards.

*     *     *     *     *     *

     “Well, Gil,” Major Tony replied, “anyone who ever served in any of the military services can tell you about the crazy and funny things that happened during their time in.  Most of the stories you hear these guys here talking about are the crazy things that happened to them.  So, yeah, I suppose you could say I have some stories.

     “Silliest thing I remember from Vietnam was in late summer of 1972, when three Special Forces guys in a jeep turned up at our aviation field.  They had heard that there was a former Green Beret, now an aviator in the 60^th Assault Helicopter Company at Ninh Hoa.  Our airfield was located along the South China Sea in central Vietnam, some twenty miles or so north of Nha Trang, so they wanted to look me up. 

     “They had a proposition for me.  It seems that they had a “perfectly good” Bravo-model Huey helicopter they wanted to trade to us for eight cases of steaks.”

     “Are you kidding me?” exclaimed the guy sitting next to him, a short younger soldier I knew as Captain Kenny.  “They wanted to give you an operational helicopter, in trade for eight cases of steaks? How much does a helicopter like that cost anyway?”

     “That, my young friend, is a question I can answer,” replied the stout older Army guy on the other side of Major Tony.  I knew him as Chief Warrant Officer Rod Jordan, a long-time Army master aviator who had been best friends with my late Uncle Nick.  He had been flying Army helicopters for nearly twenty years, since they had graduated flight school in 1962 and gone to Vietnam for their first flying tours.

     “A Huey helicopter, regardless of the model or year delivered to the Army, cost $238,000.  When the first operational B-models began deliveries in 1962, Bell Helicopters negotiated a fixed price with the Army.  Later on, as the Huey models got bigger, more advanced and more powerful, the Army insisted that the fixed price of $238,000 each remain in place.

     “Over the years, the B-models got supplemented with Charlie-model gunships, and later D-model troop carriers.  The helicopter war in Vietnam kept on growing, and Bell couldn’t deliver new models of Hueys fast enough.  The Marine Corps got in the act, buying E-models, so the Air Force had to get their F-models as well.  In the later years of the war, the extended-cabin more powerful H-models became the mainstay in Vietnam, but always the price remained exactly the same.” 

     “Hey, Miss Peggy, bring me another beer if you would,” Chief Rod interrupted himself, before continuing.  Miss Peggy is my bar manager and mentor, the widow of Uncle Nick and Rod’s life-long buddy, Miguel.

     “Through 1972, Bell Helicopters delivered over 13,000 Hueys of various models to all the military services, always for the same flat price.  Lady Bird Johnson, who was the primary shareholder in Bell Helicopters, got really rich off the Vietnam war.  So did lots of politicians.  But I guess that’s how it has been since time began.” 

     Captain Kenny looked puzzled.  “So then, why did these Special Forces guys want to trade a Huey for eight cases of steaks?  There must be some story that goes with that.”

     “As a matter of fact, there was.  Back around 1966, a Special Forces sergeant from a Green Beret A-team in the Central Highlands of Vietnam got approved to go to helicopter flight school as a Warrant Officer Candidate.  He went all the way through the program, but two weeks before graduation, there was a scandal at Fort Rucker over a colonel’s daughter, and he was bounced out of the class and straight back to Vietnam.

     “Eventually his Special Forces A-team learned of a B-model Huey that had been written off the Army’s property books as a combat loss, just because some aviation unit didn’t want it anymore.  Knowing how to fly, this sergeant went out and flew the Huey back to the team camp in the Central Highlands.  It became the private helicopter of the Green Berets for the next year and a half.  He flew it into the refueling points throughout central Vietnam, topping it off with jet fuel and keeping the oil levels up. 

     “In 1970 the sergeant was rotated back stateside to Smoke Bomb Hill at Fort Bragg, so the helicopter just sat there abandoned for two years.  In all the time it had been flying, the sergeant had never kept track of the flight hours he put on the bird, and no maintenance had ever been performed.  There were no maintenance records at all for the helicopter.

     “The deal the Green Berets were offering us was this:  They were all being rotated back to Fort Bragg and wanted to throw a party for the Montagnard villagers they had supported and fought with for all those years.  For eight cases of steaks the helicopter was ours.  All we had to do was fly it out.  But with no flight records and no maintenance ever having been performed, there wasn’t a single aviator in our company, not even that crazy AMOC warrant officer I told you about earlier (https://thedaysforward.com/amoc-1978/), who would dare even crank it up.  As far as I know, it is probably still sitting there, waiting for someone brave enough to try to fly it.” 

     “Wow,” I responded to Major Tony’s story.  “Tell me another story from Vietnam.”

     “For the price of another beer, Gil, I will be glad to.”  As I drew him a fresh beer, Tony continued entertaining all of us at the bar.

     “In February 1972, an AH-1G Cobra from my unit, callsign Gun Runners, had finished its mission and was heading back to our airfield, when the Aircraft Commander (AC) decided to have some fun.  QL-1 is the main Vietnamese national highway that runs along the South China Sea coastline from Saigon to Hanoi.  The AC and his front-seat copilot were zipping along low-level on QL-1 at 120 kts about five feet above the road.  They were flying south between Qui Nhon and Tuy Hoa, having fun honking around the turns and up and down the hills, just barely off the pavement.

     “Cresting a small hill, they were surprised by a 5-ton cargo truck rumbling north, which scared the crap out of both the aviators and the truck crew.  The AC yanked his Cobra up, but not before the truck driver and his assistant saw helicopter skids slam right around their heads.

When the Cobra hooked its skids through the canvas bows on the truck, the impact ripped the entire skid assembly off the bottom of the gunship.  The shocked truck driver and his assistant found themselves still driving in the truck cab, surrounded by the framework of the Cobra skid assembly.  I have no idea what the story was they told when they got back to Qui Nhon.

     “Lacking any landing gear, the Aircraft Commander radioed ahead to our base that he wouldn’t be able to land the bird.  The airfield commander rounded up every spare man to come down to the flight line and start filling sandbags.  While the Aircraft Commander held the gunship at a two-foot hover, they built a sandbag cradle the length and width of the Cobra belly, being extra careful to stay clear of the tail rotor.  That tail rotor works like an 1,100 horsepower vertical weed eater, which can turn a man into a pink cloud in an instant. 

     “Once the troops had built the sandbag sidewalls up about three feet high for lateral stability, the Aircraft Commander was eventually able to set his bird in the makeshift sandbag revetment and shut it down.  Since so many aviation units had stood down by that late in the war, it took two weeks to get a replacement Cobra skid assembly delivered in country.

     “The million-dollar attack aircraft was saved, but that Aircraft Commander was never again allowed to fly in country.  He spent the remainder of his tour filling out maintenance forms and records.” 

“Yeah, Tony,” I responded, “but I want you to tell me a story about you.  What was the craziest thing you personally experienced?”

“Well, I suppose that would be one afternoon in mid-1972, at the finish of a long day of ‘ash-and-trash,’ resupplying the companies in a Korean regiment of their Tiger Division.  We were returning to our base after more than eight flying hours, after over 40 direct combat support sorties.  It was …”

“Wait,” I interrupted.  “What do those words mean?”

“Right, my young civilian friend,” Major Tony replied.  “I forget you don’t understand all the Army jargon.  ‘Direct combat support’ is the term for our missions flown to support the combat troops out in the field.  DCS means we weren’t under enemy fire at the time, and we didn’t have Cobra gunships flying cover for us.  But we were still in bad-guy country, flying over territory where we could take fire at any time.”

“All right, then.” I replied, “but what is ‘sorties?’”

“A sortie is one take-off and one landing of an aircraft on a combat mission.  For an Air Force bomber or cargo crew, a sortie might last ten hours or longer.  When we Army guys were flying single-helicopter ‘ash-and-trash’ missions bringing rations, water, ammo and mail to the troops in the field, a sortie could be ten minutes or less, just the time it took to fly from the regimental logistics pad up to a company of troops on a pinnacle and land to off-load their supplies.  Then another sortie back to the pad, to pick up a load for another company.

“On a typical DCS day, we would do that all day long.  We got really good at landing heavily loaded on mountain pinnacles in turbulence, and the troops were always glad to hear the famous Huey WOP-WOP-WOP as we were bringing them stuff they really wanted.

“So back to my story.  As the Aircraft Commander, radio callsign Ghost Rider 8, in the left pilot’s seat, I was letting my new-guy co-pilot get some extra stick time flying us back.  I decided it was time to light up the cigar I had been carrying in my pocket all day long.

“We were cruising home at 2,000 feet above the terrain, straight and level, with 80 knots of airspeed whipping through my left-side window.  True story.  As I put the cigar in my mouth and started to look for my lighter, out of nowhere a hand reached in through the open window, flicked a Zippo open and lit my cigar.”

“WOW!!” was the simultaneous exclamation from everyone at the bar listening to this story.  “How on earth could that happen?”

Major Tony took a long sip of his beer, paused, then replied.  “My crew chief, riding in the left rear well of the Huey, had seen me reaching for my cigar.  So he unbuckled from his station, climbed outside the helicopter and walked forward balanced on the skid up to my window, and reached inside.  He told me he just wanted to see the look on my face when he lit my cigar.”

Thanks to Zandy.  In memory of Bill and Terry and Eddie and Jerry

From 1972 till 1975, the First Cavalry Division at Fort Hood was an experimental test bed for the US Army, trying all kinds of innovations.  The division was called TRICAP [Triple Capability] because its first brigade was an armored brigade, the second brigade was the Air Cavalry Combat Brigade, with three different types of aviation units, and the third brigade was an airmobile infantry brigade.  When I took command of Charlie Company, 8^th Engineer Battalion [“SkyBeavers”] in 1974, it was organized and equipped as an airmobile combat engineer company which directly supported the third brigade. These airmobile troops are transported to the battlefield by helicopters from their own division unlike airborne troops that jump out of airplanes flown by the USAF.

     During 1975 the Army converted the 1^st Cav to a conventional armored division, with three brigades of mixed tank and mechanized infantry battalions.  On paper, C/8^th Engineers was reconfigured as an armored engineer company, with M-113 armored personnel carriers as squad vehicles for each of the nine combat engineer squads.  In reality, creation and conversion of the division’s airmobile infantry battalions to mechanized infantry took up all the M-113 APCs in the Army’s stateside inventory.

     Eventually, the Army learned that the North Carolina Army National Guard had a cannibalization lot of old M-113s they had junked for new APCs years ago.  So, the NCARNG transferred nine of these old junkers to Charlie Company, Skybeavers.  I was fortunate to have the finest maintenance section in the whole 1^st Cav, but even so, it took my guys several weeks to get all those old rags off deadline and operational. 

     Next mission was to qualify my tracks and their crews in their new equipment.  First step was taking my engineers to the range and qualifying them on the nine M-2 Cal .50 machineguns that came with their APCs. 

     Finally, we had to demonstrate the amphibious capabilities of the tracks by taking them swimming. Fort Hood has a designated track swimming site located on the banks of Lake Belton, many miles from the cantonment area of main post.  I submitted my training plan for the upcoming week through our S-3 Operations Officer to the battalion CO to swim our tracks Thursday morning. 

     On Thursday morning, as we were forming up in the motor pool to move out, my second platoon leader rushed up to me and said excitedly, “Sir, we don’t have to go all the way to Lake Belton to swim the tracks.  I found a perfect place, and it’s really close to us.” 

     I made a command decision on the spot, and said, “OK, Rob, show me what you found.”  So, our convoy moved out, with my second platoon leader in his Gama Goat (a six-wheeled semi-amphibious vehicle that my platoon leaders each had) leading my jeep.

     Behind us came my two other platoon leaders and our nine resurrected APCs. 

Each track had a driver and the squad leader as track commander.

     My lieutenant led us to a beautiful pond about 200 meters in diameter, just a few miles distant from main post, with a really fine ramp for entry and exit.  The most important item to check on APCs before taking them into water is to ensure that the hull drain plugs are installed good and tight.  Many an officer has seen his career dissolve when he discovered that APCs without drain plugs sink to the bottom in about 20 seconds.  I wasn’t going to make that mistake.

     After final drain plug checks, we began swimming the tracks, one at a time, starting with my second platoon.  Gently drive into the water, steer forward about 100 meters using the tracks for propulsion, turn around, and drive back up on land.  Mission accomplished.  Next track.  Everything was going smoothly.

     With just one APC left to swim, I told my first platoon leader, my senior lieutenant, to go ahead and take everyone who had finished swimming back to the motor pool to begin the post-swimming maintenance.  I would bring the last APC in myself as soon as we finished.

     Before he rolled into the water, the last track commander told me, “Sir, my bilge pump ain’t working.”  I told him we were just going in and out, so that wouldn’t be a problem.  So out he went.

     About 75 meters into the pond, his track began to turn left.  Confused, I watched him swim two circles.  Then he stopped, and began to reverse, re-tracing the circles he had just swum.  When I finally signaled him to idle the engine, he hollered to me, “Sir, we threw the left track.  With only the right track working, all I can do is go in circles.”  Meanwhile, with no working bilge pump, the APC was riding lower and lower in the water.  He continued telling the driver to go forward and reverse, hoping that something would enable him to get to shore.  With just my jeep, there was nothing I could do but watch.

     About this time, we heard the” WOP, WOP, WOP” of the division commander’s helicopter landing behind us, and out stepped the two-star general, followed closely by my battalion commander.  Unbeknownst to me, the division staff had forwarded our swimming exercise to the Commanding General as “training highlights.”  They had flown out to Lake Belton looking for our swimming exercise and were quite unhappy not to find us.  Just by chance, the pilot had seen our track in the pond.  Surprise, surprise!!

     In the 30 seconds it took me to describe what was happening in the pond, I could see steam rising from my colonel and the general.  They walked down to the edge of the pond and offered a few inane suggestions on how to get the APC ashore, just in time to watch the M-113 abruptly sink to the bottom.  Fortunately, my track commander and his driver escaped and swam for shore.

     It turns out the pond was the Fish and Wildlife fish hatchery, completely off limits to all military traffic.  When the M-113 sank, about 50 gallons of diesel fuel got released and killed some 30 million baby fish.  My battalion CO was severely embarrassed in front of his Commanding General.  That was not one of my better days as a commander.  That single ‘aw shit’ wiped out several hundred ‘atta-boys.’  But we all survived.

     I had made the command decision to change the swimming location without telling my chain of command.  Everything that could go wrong did go wrong.  I owned full responsibility for everything my company did or failed to do and took my ass-chewing like a gentleman.

     On top of that, the 50 gallons of diesel completely contaminated the entire fish hatchery, and the USDA wound up spending $2.3 million in remediation expenses [in 1975 dollars].  

     Here are the leadership lessons:  

1.  My battalion CO never burned me for that.  He certainly could have.  All he ever said to me was, “I wish you hadn’t done that.”  [I continued in service, getting accidentally promoted two more times after this event.]

2.  The Division CG never burned my Engineer battalion commander, who went on to pick up two stars of his own.

3.  The Division CG got his third star when he left the Cav.

4.  That lieutenant was the best platoon leader I ever had, and I maxed all his report cards.  I don’t know where he ended up.  [No one but he ever knew why I made that fateful command decision.]

5.  I spent the rest of my time at Fort Hood being known to 42,000 troops as the ‘fish killer.’  

     Stuff happens in training.  Sometimes you survive, sometimes you don’t.

The “Tales from Nick’s FARRP” series are a fictionalized version of real events and are dedicated to the memory of friends and classmates from the Class of 1969.

“So, Kenny, have you ever done anything with any other military branches?”    

*     *     *     *     *     *

I was talking with an Army guy sitting on a barstool across from me in my bar, named Nick’s FARRP, in Fayetteville, North Carolina.  Captain Kenny Wayne has told me lots of stories about his time as a paratrooper here at Fort Bragg, just outside town.  My Uncle Nick, who served three tours as a combat helicopter pilot in Vietnam, opened this bar, the FARRP, after he had to leave the Army because of cancers he got from some chemical over there.  When he finally died, he left his bar to me.  My name, by the way, is Gil Edwards.  Since I know nothing about the Army, I am always asking questions of the Army guys who hang around here in the FARRP.

*     *     *     *     *     *

“Well, Gil,” began Captain Kenny, after draining his mug of beer, “the first thing is to get the terminology right.  The word ‘branch’ means one of the different career fields in the Army, such as infantry, armor, artillery, or in my case now, engineers.  If you are talking about the other parts of our military forces, the proper term is ‘service.’

“There are three military services:  the Army, the Navy, and the Marine Corps, plus the Air Force, who are almost military.  So that makes four, unless you count the Coast Guard.  They only come under the Department of Defense in wartime, where they serve as part of the Navy.  Coast Guardsmen are taught that their service is ‘that hard nucleus around which the Navy forms in time of war.’

“Hey, Peggy,” Captain Kenny went on, “could you bring me a refill on my beer?”

Miss Peggy is my manager of the FARRP.  She is the widow of an Army helicopter pilot who was a close buddy of my Uncle Nick.  Her husband was shot down on his third tour in Vietnam.  When my uncle opened the bar, he asked Miss Peggy to be his manager.  She actually runs everything here, but at least she lets me hang around, so I can pester these Army guys. 

“It’s kinda confusing,” Captain Kenny continued, “because the civilian oversight of the military services in the Pentagon is organized with three Defense Departments, working under the Secretary of the Army, Secretary of the Navy, and Secretary of the Air Force.  The Department of the Navy oversees the military services of the Navy and the Marine Corps, plus sometimes the Coast Guard.

 

“So, Gil, I think your question was, have I ever worked with any of the other services?  Thank you very much, Peggy.”

“Right, Kenny,” I responded.  “Sorry about the wrong word.  Have you?”

“Well, Gil, I have made over 60 parachute jumps from Air Force aircraft.  The Air Force works closely with the Army for tactical airlift, including parachute drops, troop and equipment transport and special supplies, as well as close air support from the Air Force fighter guys.  We call them ‘Zoomies.’”

“Gil,” interrupted the stout older guy sitting next to Captain Kenny, the one I knew as Chief Rod Jordan.  “The various services are really different in a lot of ways.  They don’t even speak the same language.  Take a simple word like ‘secure.’ 

“If you tell a sailor to secure a building, he will turn out the lights.  If you tell a soldier to secure a building, he will lock the doors.  If you tell a Marine to secure a building, he will post a platoon on guard around it.  And if you tell a zoomie to secure a building, he will buy you one.” 

“Yeah, Gil,” added a tall Army guy I knew as Major Tony, sitting on the other side of Captain Kenny at the bar.  “Take the machine that pulls a train.  The Army calls that an engine.  The Air Force calls it a locomotive.  And the Marines call it ‘choo choo.’ 

“Or take the helicopters that Chief Rod and I fly.  To the Air Force they are known as ‘rotary wing aircraft.’  Army guys call them ‘choppers.’  To the Navy they are ‘Hee-loes.’  But Marines just point in the air and grunt ‘uhhh.’” 

“Hey, wise ass,” replied Chief Rod.  “Don’t make fun of my Marines.  They have more determination and willingness to sacrifice than any other service.  I flew in support of them during the Tet Offensive in 1968, and they poured out their blood and guts retaking parts of I Corps in Vietnam.  They may do things the hard way, if that is what they are ordered, but guaran-damn-tee they will pay whatever price is required to accomplish their mission.” 

“If you old-timers would allow me to answer the lad’s question, I’ll go on,” resumed Captain Kenny.  “The main time I worked with the Air Force was on my first tour here at Fort Bragg in 1970.  Back then I was an Armor lieutenant assigned to 1-17^th Cav, the airborne armored cavalry squadron of the 82^nd Airborne Division.  The squadron designated me an Air Movement Officer (AMO), so I attended a two-week course run by the Air Force.  They taught me how to plan and prepare Army units and equipment for deployment on Air Force cargo aircraft, primarily the C-130, a stout four-turbine prop plane with incredible tactical versatility, and the C-141, the four-engine jet cargo plane.

“Our cav squadron had twelve Sheridan light tanks, but there were no training ranges at Fort Bragg large enough for tank gunnery qualification.  So that April our entire squadron deployed by air to Camp Pickett, in south central Virginia, for thirteen days of tank gunnery qualifications. 

“The Sheridan is a very light tank, but it still weighs over 17 tons.  The maximum load for those early model C-130s was 35,000 pounds, almost exactly the weight of our Sheridans.  Because I was AMO qualified, I was supposed to supervise the loading of our tanks, one each on twelve Air Force C-130 aircraft. 

“During the AMO course, I had learned how to calculate the dimensions of all the Army vehicles, as well as the clearance dimensions of all the Air Force cargo aircraft.  Checking the technical manuals, I compared the height of a Sheridan’s highest point, the tank commander’s machine gun mount, with the clearance between the back of a C-130 cargo floor and the top of the cargo ramp.  To my astonishment, I found that our tanks were two inches too tall to fit through the C-130 cargo ramp.

“Fearful that our tanks would rip apart the Air Force cargo plane, I rushed up to the Air Force loadmaster who was supervising the first Sheridan getting loaded into the aircraft.  Breathlessly, I told him the tank was two inches too high to fit into the C-130.  The loadmaster replied, ‘Thank you very much, lieutenant,’ and continued directing the tank up the cargo ramp into his bird.

“In fear that the steel machine gun mount would rip apart the aluminum C-130, I watched the tank slowly climbing the rear loading ramp.  As my tank continued up the ramp and began to cross the point where the angled ramp meets the flat cargo floor, the road wheels of the tank track compressed about three inches.  With almost no room to spare, the tank cleared the ramp and proceeded into the aircraft.  Completely chagrinned, I kept my mouth shut for the rest of the loading operation.

“When all twelve C-130s had been loaded with our tanks, they began to take off.  With the Air Force crew members plus the tank drivers and their gear on board, the cargo aircraft were actually loaded slightly heavier their legal rating.  Each aircraft used every foot of the Pope AFB runway trying to get aloft, and they barely cleared the fence at the base boundary as they struggled to gain altitude.

“In those days the Air Force was just starting to receive the gigantic cargo jet called the C-5A.  One was assigned here for the ACE Board to develop Army jump procedures for the aircraft.” 

“Wait a minute, Kenny,” I interrupted.  “What does ‘ACE Board’ mean?” 

“That’s Airborne and Communications Electronics Board, a special Army organization located at Pope AFB, just on the other side of Fort Bragg.  Their job is to develop Army doctrine for working with new Air Force equipment.  Every type of cargo aircraft that comes into the Air Force is required to be certified for Army parachute operations.

“Most of our troop training and tactical jumps are from the C-130.  To jump from the -130, troops are taught to vigorously jump ‘up and out’ of the side doors, so they will clear the tail of the airplane before their parachutes deploy.  It is usually a pretty rough exit.

“But jumping from the Air Force cargo jet, the Lockheed C-141, is totally different.  The -141 has a blast deflector in front of the jump door, so it requires a weak exit.  You simply step out the door and drop.  It is the most beautiful jump in the world. 

“When Lockheed designed the C-5, they used exactly the same jump door as the C-141 had:  same dimensions, same blast deflector, measured exactly the same distance back from the nose.  When the ACE Board began jump testing the C-5A, to be safe they started with dummies.  They put the test dummies out the door with a weak exit, the same that works so well with the C-141.  Trouble is, the C-5 is way longer than the -141, so with the jump doors so far forward, the dummies smashed all the way down the side of the aircraft, ‘bam-bam-bam-bam.’  Live jumpers weren’t going to like that very much.

“So next they tried the vigorous ‘up and out’ exit required for the Lockheed C-130.  The dummies were ejected directly into the jet blast of the huge turbofan engines of the C-5, where they and their parachutes were incinerated.  That wasn’t going to work either.

“After months of unsuccessful testing, the ACE Board decided to use a half-and-half technique, a weak-vigorous exit.  This time, the dummies were sucked into the jet blast, where they were incinerated, then flung back against the side of C-5, where they left flaming scorch marks as they went ‘bam-bam-bam-bam’ all the way back.

“Finally, the ACE Board gave up using the jump doors.  They got some Green Beanies from 6^th and 7^th Special Forces Groups to jump one time from the tailgate of the giant bird.  Trouble there was that the C-5 was never designed to have the tailgate open during flight, so the aircraft became highly unstable. 

“The Air Force screamed they would never allow that again, but the ACE Board replied, “Never mind.  We accomplished our mission, which was to jump-qualify the C-5 with live jumpers.  Now we will never jump the damned bird again.”

In memory of Bill and Terry and Eddie and Jerry