By John Hamilton

        When I arrived in Vietnam in August 1970, I was relatively clueless about a phenomenon that had infected Army units there, one that was unique to Vietnam in its scope and impact.  Something I had not learned about at West Point or Ranger School and for which I was totally unprepared. A phenomenon that had become so common that soldiers in Vietnam had even given it a unique nickname, “fragging”.

      “Fragging” was the practice of using a fragmentation grenade to wound, kill, or send a strong message to a U.S. military officer or NCO. The perpetrators were most often young, enlisted men angry about serving in a war that was highly unpopular back home and feeling no loyalty to leaders who were constantly coming and going as Army units were being withdrawn from Vietnam. 

The victims were most often junior officers and NCOs, referred to disparagingly as “lifers” because they were perceived as being overly aggressive in conducting combat operations or enforcing Army discipline. The weapon of choice in such assaults was the fragmentation grenade, which was easily accessible to most soldiers and could not be traced back to the user. There were more than 900 confirmed fraggings in Vietnam during the period 1969 to 1973, the only years official records were kept. I was one of those fragged.   

         I was in my second month serving as the night duty officer for the tactical operations center (TOC) of the 1^st Battalion 503^rd Infantry 173^rd Airborne Brigade when my boss, the battalion operations officer, walked in the door. “John, I need to speak with you in private. Stop by my office after you complete the morning debrief for the battalion staff.” Major Needham was on his second Vietnam tour with the 173^rd Airborne Brigade and was highly respected by the brigade leadership. When I arrived at his office, he got right to the point. “E Troop, 17th Cavalry has some significant discipline problems, and a more experienced leader recently replaced the troop commander. A new and very seasoned first sergeant will be arriving soon from the 101^st Airborne. You are being reassigned as the troop executive officer. I recommended you. I know you will do well in this job, but you will be very challenged. If you ever need advice or someone to talk to about a problem, don’t hesitate to come see me.” he offered.

           As I left the room, I recalled a conversation I had a month earlier with a classmate who was serving in E Troop.  Chuck Anstrom and I were close friends, having shared an apartment at Fort Riley for six months and traveled to Vietnam together. We had not seen each other since arriving in Vietnam, and he had stopped by the 1^st Battalion TOC to visit. Chuck shared with me that his recent troop commander, a member of the West Point Class of 68, had relinquished his command in protest to what he considered a lack of support from his superiors. I knew his former commander well and remembered him as a standout cadet at West Point.  I was disappointed that his military career had taken such a devastating turn. Chuck also told me about our classmate Terry O’Boyle, an E Troop platoon leader who had been killed just a few months earlier. Terry’s track vehicle had exploded from within, killing the entire crew shortly after he had left LZ English on a road march. There was no enemy action involved, leading investigators to conclude that the explosion had been caused by a freak accident or something more sinister. https://thedaysforward.com/semi-final-resting-place/

      On 24 February 1971, I joined E Troop at Landing Zone (LZ) English. When I arrived, I learned the troop was conducting combat operations in An Khe, a half-day drive by jeep. Consequently, my interface with my troop commander would be primarily by radio.  Instead, my immediate boss would be the 173^rd Support Battalion commander, who, besides E Troop, had the overwhelming responsibility for the brigade combat engineers, signal, intelligence, maintenance, and supply, as well as all civilians and other personnel living or employed on LZ English. A major, pending promotion to lieutenant colonel, he was a strong leader and someone who truly cared about those he led. He let me know right away what he expected from me. “E Troop has some significant discipline challenges and you and the troop commander and first sergeant are all newly assigned. I expect the three of you to fix the problems there. You have my full support. Please do not hesitate to come to my office when you need help.” He would be true to this promise, as I would learn.

The E Troop area was large, with multiple sandbagged barracks and a large motor pool. The troop orderly room included a communications center in the rear and a single, private bedroom where I slept. One of the first things I observed was that I had almost forty soldiers in the rear, more than a dozen of whom were addicted to drugs and awaiting discharge from the Army.

The Army had no drug treatment program and instead simply gave such soldiers dishonorable discharges and sent them back to society. While awaiting discharge, these undisciplined soldiers may be in the rear for months, guarding the bunker line, filling sandbags, or getting in trouble. One of the soldiers I was now responsible for was addicted to heroin and spent his days passed out in an empty barracks, which he had darkened by covering all the windows. Most of the time, when I spoke with him, he was incoherent. The first sergeant and I conducted regular sweeps of our area for drugs and found them almost every day hidden under a sandbag or in the latrine or other common area. There was little else we could do besides keep our problem soldiers busy and hope their dishonorable discharge would be quickly approved and they would be returned to the States.

             On the afternoon of 16 March, I was surprised to see a South Korean major in a flight uniform standing at my orderly room door. The first sergeant said he wanted to see me about a matter involving one of our soldiers. In near-perfect English, the major explained that he was a helicopter pilot and that he had flown into our LZ landing pad. “One of your soldiers, named Ward**, approached me and started a conversation,” he said. “He was admiring my Chicom pistol and asked if he could show it to his friends while I refueled. I watched him enter one of your barracks, but he never returned with the pistol”. As I stared at the major, I wanted to say, “How could you be so foolish?” but I didn’t. He was a senior officer from an allied nation. I didn’t feel I could ignore his complaint.

       The first sergeant and I went to the barracks where PFC Ward and a half dozen other soldiers were resting. I had been the executive officer for less than a month, and the first sergeant had to point Ward out to me. He was a tall, thin soldier, only nineteen years old. I announced why I was there and questioned him in detail. With a smirk on his face and playing up to his fellow soldiers, he denied knowing anything about the missing weapon. I searched his belongings and the bunks nearby and found nothing. Back in the orderly room, I told the Korean major, “We have not found your pistol, and I have no evidence to allow me to take any action against Private Ward.” The major left, and I assumed that was the end of the matter, but I was wrong.

        I was sleeping in my room adjacent to the orderly room that night when an explosion awakened me. The air in my room was full of the distinct odor of military explosives. I noticed a large hole in the floor near the foot of my bunk, and my first thought was that an enemy mortar round had hit the orderly room. I quickly slipped on my fatigues and boots, grabbed my flak jacket and rife, and ran outside. The first sergeant was organizing our soldiers, expecting that we were under attack and needed to head to our assigned bunkers on the perimeter of the LZ. As we stood there, he looked down at me and said, “Sir, you have been hit. Blood is running down your legs.” In my excitement, I was feeling no pain and had not noticed my wounds. My jeep driver immediately took me to the aid station, where I was evacuated by helicopter to the military hospital in Qui Nhon; There, surgery was performed to remove multiple fragments from my ankles. It was not until my troop commander visited me a few days later that I learned that I had been fragged and that Private Ward had been arrested and charged with attempted murder. Those words shocked me. Had a soldier in the United States Army who hardly knew me tried to take my life over a souvenir pistol?  I returned to duty a few weeks later, but it was almost two months before I learned the answer to that question.

       In May, the first sergeant and I, as well as a half dozen of our soldiers scheduled to testify, flew to Da Nang for the trial of Private Ward. For the first time, I learned what happened that day in March. Several soldiers in the barracks that day testified that as I was stepping out after my search for the stolen pistol, one of Ward’s friends had whispered, “Something needs to be done about that, Lieutenant,” to which Ward had quietly responded, “Frag Out,”  A young sergeant testified that he was the duty NCO for the bunker guard and Ward was one of the soldiers on bunker duty that night. Ward had taken a break to go to the latrine, and several minutes later, a loud explosion had been heard. The attack alarm for the entire LZ had been sounded and Ward had come running back into his bunker. Later, Ward could not account for one of the grenades he had been issued. Ward himself did not testify, but the prosecutor suggested that Ward had walked the short distance from the latrine to the orderly room where I was sleeping, removed a few sandbags, and tossed the grenade under my quarters, clearly with the intent to kill or wound me. The court martial found Ward guilty and sentenced him to nine years in prison for his crime. He was from the Midwest and would be returning there, not to his family but to prison in Leavenworth, Kansas.

       Fraggings in Vietnam were incredibly hard to prove, as a grenade thrown into a leader’s armored vehicle or a foxhole might also be the result of enemy action. By one estimate, in addition to the more than 900 officers and NCOs wounded or killed in known fragging incidents, another 1,400 died under mysterious circumstances, my classmate Terry O’Boyle being one of them. It is estimated that fewer than 10% of those who tried to kill their leaders were ever caught, tried, and convicted.

      In response to the attempt on my life, the pace at which problem soldiers in the 173^rd were discharged improved dramatically. By the time, I returned from the hospital, all the E Troop soldiers pending discharge for drug use were gone. The final five months of my time as a troop executive officer were challenging but without any major incidents.

      In August 1971, the 173^rd Airborne Brigade, the first major combat unit deployed in the Vietnam War, folded its colors and returned to the States. More than a dozen classmates and I returned that same month as the very last officers to serve in the 173^rd in Vietnam.  Our war was over.

** Ward is a pseudonym.

In early November 1970, it was announced that the 25^th Infantry Division would be ceasing combat operations before the end of the year. That same week I was helicoptered from the field to the squadron headquarters at Chu Chi to receive, along with a dozen other soldiers, a Purple Heart resulting from my injuries in September.

Despite the short time remaining, the squadron had been assigned a new commander whom I met for the first time. With Army units being withdrawn throughout Vietnam, there was a concerted effort to provide “combat command time” to as many officers as possible. My West Point classmates and I, who began arriving in Vietnam in the summer of 1970, would suffer from this unofficial practice more than any other academy class. In my first ten months in Vietnam as a Lieutenant I would serve under five Captains and four Colonels, not a good situation for any junior officer in wartime.  

     The final four weeks in the field would be a period of intense activity for me and my platoon. We provided security while combat engineers recovered Bailey bridges, used our demolitions to destroy contaminated fuel at an abandon artillery fire base, conducted a final recon of previous areas of enemy activity, and provided road security for numerous truck convoys. As our divisional units withdrew our local Viet Cong used the opportunity to mine our withdrawal routes and harass us with occasional mortar fire while avoiding any significant engagements.   

     The main road we were responsible for securing was unpaved and ideal for the use of antitank mines. We were particularly wary of the many civilian mopeds from which a mine could be dropped undetected into a puddle of water. We quickly learned that when local traffic started avoiding a spot in the road there was probably a good reason. Many of my NCO’s, had first-hand experience with mines and stayed away from them. Some of my younger soldiers, however, loved the challenge of being the first to find one and to probe it with their bayonet. I was impressed with the skill with which they could disarm a mine and their bravery, or maybe foolishness.

     In mid-November my platoon was given the mission of conducting reconnaissance in a remote area. The only access to the site was along a old logging road bordered by dense jungle. The dirt road was only wide enough for a single vehicle, and as the road narrowed, I became very anxious about the potential for my APC’s running over a mine. I decided to dismount my vehicle with four infantry soldiers and walk in front of the lead vehicle, hoping to find any mines in shallow soil. We had gone about a half mile when there was a huge explosion, the force of which blew me and my infantry to the ground. The third vehicle in my column, in which my platoon sergeant was riding, had hit a large mine.

     I immediately ran back to the vehicle to see if anyone was wounded. The first thing I noticed was that the heavily armored cupola that sits on top of the vehicle with a 50-caliber machine gun had been blown off and was nowhere to be seen. I did not see the track commander who had been sitting in the cupola either. I immediately assumed the worst. I climbed on the top of the vehicle and looked into the crew compartment to see my platoon sergeant and two other soldiers staring at me with dazed eyes and blood dripping from their ears, a sign of a concussion. “Are you ok?” I yelled. They looked up at me, saying nothing, and I immediately shouted, “medic.” I looked down into the driver’s compartment and saw the unconscious driver with his head hanging down. As I reached down to pull him out of his seat, his head fell back, and I noticed a large piece of metal from the floor armor had been blown up into his neck and that he was bleeding from several wounds in his stomach.  Doc, our medic, was right behind me, and he and several others lifted the driver out. Doc immediately began trying to stop the bleeding from the driver’s neck and stabilize his condition.

     I ran to my command track and called on the radio for helicopter medevac of my five wounded soldiers. As I was doing so, the track commander, who had been sitting in the cupola came staggering out of the jungle. The mine had blown him into the air and landed him fifty feet away. Miraculously, he had not been seriously wounded or injured. Four of the soldiers, including my platoon sergeant, would be medevac’d but would recover and continue their Vietnam tours. The seriously injured driver, however, was flown to Japan for further medical treatment. The division surgeon would later credit my medic, with saving the driver’s life that day.  

     One day on road security, we had a break, and I directed my vehicle commanders to use the time to clean the trash out of their vehicles and burn it.  Specialist Carson was my track commander and one of the most professional soldiers in my platoon. He immediately dug a sump pit and began throwing our vehicle trash inside. In keeping with a common practice in the field, I cut a piece of C4 explosive and tossed it in the hole, knowing that it would not explode but would create a very hot fire. I picked up a half empty C ration box and without thinking, threw it in the hole. In my haste I failed to notice that the box included a can of baked beans that had not been opened. Specialist Carson, who was about six feet away from the burning fire, started to say something to me, when suddenly “Crack.” The can of beans suddenly exploded. Carson walked over to me, blood dripping from his face and I realized a piece of metal from the exploding can had struck him right between his eyes. As he stood there, I reached with my hand, pulled the piece of metal from the bridge of his nose. He insisted he was alright, but I ordered him to “Go see the medic and get it bandaged.”  He came back later with a small band-aid on his nose, which brought relief and laughter to all of us. I still feel bad to this day that I had been so careless.

       By the end of November, we were in the last week of combat operations. For our last night in the field our new squadron commander brought elements from all three cavalry troops together in a single night position. In the middle of our defensive perimeter were a half-dozen M577 squadron command and control vehicles with their large tents extended. We made an easy target for any Vietcong who might want to fire a mortar or rocket. As it turned out, one did.

      A single enemy soldier crawled in a ditch along the road near our position and just before nightfall, fired a rocket-propelled grenade at one of our Sheridan tanks. Each Sheridan carried a roll of heavy mesh wire placed in front of the vehicle at night to protect against just such a threat.  When the RPG hit the mesh wire, it detonated prematurely but several men relaxing on the back of the Sheridan were hit with fragments.

     Hearing the explosion and the call for “medic”, we all ran to our armored vehicles and prepared for action. For a moment, everything was quiet. As I glanced across the perimeter, I observed a crewmember hastily trying to fire a night flare that was not well aimed. It hit the 50-caliber machine gun and bounced back, creating a bright flash inside his vehicle. The appearance to everyone was that the track had been hit by enemy fire.

     Suddenly the entire squadron spontaneously opened fire with 50-caliber machine guns and small arms. The noise was deafening as three cavalry troops unleashed tens of thousands of 50-caliber rounds from our position. After several minutes of continuous firing and total confusion, “cease fire” came over the radio and the firing stopped almost as quickly as it had started. This “mad minute” was probably one of the few times in the entire war that the squadron had fought as a single unit. We had three soldiers slightly wounded and no confirmed damage to the enemy. it was a fitting ending to our last night in the field.

     After almost five years of deployment in Vietnam, 3^rd Squadron 4^th Cavalry returned to Cui Chi for the last time on 1 December 1970. That day was one of the last we would all be together as almost immediately reassignment orders started arriving and vehicle and equipment turn-in in Long Bien began. There would be no “job well done” formation except for the small contingency of officers remaining a month later with nothing but the squadron colors. With my platoon sergeant still in the hospital I had no time to reminisce or rest before I departed myself for my new unit four days later. Before I left, I walked around and said good-by to those remaining soldiers from my platoon and fellow officers that I could find. It was not what I would have wanted as a farewell after the experiences we had shared together, but it was what the situation provided. Except for one officer, I would never see any of those I served with in A Troop again.

     Two days later I was flying north from Tan Son Nhut Air Base to the highlands of II Corps to my new assignment. Nothing had surprised me more when I had received my orders than to see that my new assignment was the 173rd Airborne Brigade, and specifically the 1^st Battalion 503^rd Infantry. I was an armor officer, about to be “detailed” as an infantry officer and assigned to an “leg” infantry unit. I couldn’t imagine what job they might have for me, but I was excited about the prospects.

      On 22 August 1970, ten days after I had arrived in Vietnam, A Troop, 3^rd Squadron, 4^th Cavalry Regiment to which I was newly assigned left base camp for six weeks of combat operations. Our primary job was to conduct “search and destroy” operations to find and battle with the Viet Cong. In practice, we also performed other missions such as providing security for logistics convoys and serving as a quick reaction force for other units in the field. Each platoon had an area each day that they were responsible for searching for signs of enemy operations or encampments. Mostly, we conducted these operations riding in our M113 Armored Personnel Carriers and Sheridan Light Tanks, but occasionally when the terrain did not allow, we dismounted and conducted short patrols. Because the American role in war was coming to an end, the enlisted men often called these “search and avoid” operations. With some significant exceptions, most soldiers preferred to leave the enemy alone and return home free of battle scars. Officers and career noncommissioned officers, on the other hand, were expected to be aggressive in making contact with the enemy, and therefore were frequently at odds with those they led.

      My first night in the field, the troop commander elected to have the entire troop encamped at one location. Maybe because I was the new lieutenant, he directed that I lead a dismounted ambush about three hundred meters east of our location along a creek bank. Following my Ranger training, I picked six platoon soldiers, gave them instructions for the operation, and inspected to make sure everyone had sufficient ammunition and grenades. I had ordered one soldier to bring a Claymore mine, an essential weapon for small ambushes during the Vietnam War. The Claymore mine when activated, sent dozens of steel balls flying at high-speed, disrupting the enemy formation, and killing or wounding everything in its path.

      We left for our ambush site at sunset, arrived and began setting up our position. At that time, the soldier with the Claymore and I went forward to place it in position.  It was then that I discovered that the carrying pouch for our Claymore did not include a trigger or activating device. This device is connected to the Claymore by a long electrical wire, and without it, the Claymore is useless. I had to decide whether to spend my first ambush without Claymore protection or go back to the troop night position and get the firing device. I chose the latter, and so one of the men and I hastened back in the near dark.  I had called on the radio to alert those on guard at the troop night position that we were coming, but it was still a risky path to take.  Any of the guards that had not gotten the word could have mistaken us for the enemy as we pushed our way through the neck high elephant grass. That would have quickly ended my first day in the field. As it turned out, we got the device, made it back to the ambush site, and spent a rainy and miserable night without any enemy contact. In hindsight, it was clearly a “green Lieutenant” decision to go back after that firing device. In the next 12 months, I would experience too many incidents in which American soldiers mistook their own as the enemy under similar situations, resulting in “friendly fire” casualties.                              

     The following week we were conducting platoon operations when I heard a loud explosion in the distance. Voices suddenly begin crackling on the troop command radio net. “Alpha 26, this is Alpha 6. What was that explosion?” After a long pause, Steve, the second platoon leader, responded in an unintelligible, mumbling voice. As the troop commander asked him to “say again last transmission,” we heard shots fired in short bursts from what sounded like an US Army M16 rifle. After another long pause, Steve, breathing heavily, finally responded. “Alpha 6, this is Alpha 26, Three of my men and the scout dog went down a trail a few minutes ago.  I heard a loud explosion. I don’t know what happened.” The troop commander immediately responded in a firm voice, “This is Alpha 6. Dismount and take a squad down that trail and report back to me on what you find”. Everyone on the command net waited anxiously for a response but it didn’t come.  The troop commander called again, “Alpha 26, do you Roger?” Again, there was silence, and after a long pause, I heard the troop commander in an agitated voice calling the platoon sergeant who was second in command “Alpha 24, Take a squad and go down that trail yourself and do it NOW.” The platoon sergeant immediately responded, “Roger Alpha 6”.  A short while later, the platoon sergeant reported that he had found the patrol. It appeared that the scout dog had hit a tripwire, detonating an enemy mine.  The explosion had killed the dog and handler and one of our infantrymen. The third soldier who had been firing his M-16 to get our attention was mortally wounded. I expected that my fellow platoon leader would be relieved of his duties, but he wasn’t. Like me, he had only been in the field a few weeks, and this was his first exposure to combat. My very experienced troop commander apparently took this into consideration as he made no changes in the platoon leadership. It gave me some assurance that at least with my current boss, mistakes were allowed.  I never learned what really happened that day as neither Steve nor my troop commander every spoke of it. Except for the loss of life, it was as if it had never happened.

     On 4 September, only my second week in the field, I was leading a platoon reconnaissance operation with our M113 track vehicles. Mines were the primary danger in Vietnam by that time in the war. Consequently, our practice was to fill the bottom of our vehicles with boxes of ammunition and other gear in the hopes this extra material would provide additional protection against a large blast. This left little room inside the vehicle for all the crew, so most armored troop carriers had two or three soldiers riding on the top deck. In my unit, a canvas seat had been welded on the left rear of my command track for me to sit and control the platoon. Sitting next to me, I had a fire support coordinator, a sergeant, whose job was to call for artillery fire, when necessary.

       We were moving in a wedge formation along high ground marked by a path used by Vietnamese farmers to get from the rice paddies back to their village. I had my command track straddling the path to stay in the middle of the formation. I noticed a small tree about 8 feet high along the trail. My driver, not wanting to run over the tree, steered right to go around it. When he did, the left rear of the vehicle where I was sitting moved over the path, and there was a massive explosion. My next memory was lying on the ground on my back, unable to sit up because of the pain. Concerned that we were being ambushed, I reached around trying to find my rifle when several of my men ran up to give me aid. As I lay there, I saw that the entire left rear of my command track was missing. I would later learn that we had run over a large mine and that my artillery coordinator had been blown in the air and had landed on top of the armored vehicle, breaking his arm. I had apparently been catapulted into the air and had landed several feet from the vehicle on my back.  A medical helicopter evacuated me to a field hospital, where an x-ray showed that my pelvis was slightly dislocated. My medical records recorded it as a compression fracture of my lower spine. That was just one of my painful injuries, as every part of my body hurt. The energy from the explosion that had severely damaged the vehicle had also passed through my body, with the concussion bruising every muscle.

     The doctor decided I would not require hospitalization as I had no broken bones or open wounds. Instead, I would remain in the field hospital until I could walk. To this day, I remember him directing two orderlies to put my arms over their shoulders and carry me to a patient bunker. As I got off that X-ray table, the pain was tremendous, and I screamed at the top of my lungs for them to “go easy.” They assisted me to a heavily sandbagged bunker. It was a field hospital and there were no nurses or medical beds, only medics to care for the few patients there   

     The only pain medication the Army had at the time was Darvon, which was not much more potent than extra strength aspirin today. It was excruciatingly painful for me to go to the bathroom or sit up or even eat my meals. I lay in bed for three days before I could walk. I was flown by helicopter back to our base camp at Cu Chi, where I recovered for another two days before catching a resupply helicopter back to the field. As I limped slowly from the aircraft toward the encampment, one of the senior Troop NCOs stared at me, not saying a word. His expression said it all; “Welcome to the Vietnam War Lieutenant.”  My pelvis was so sore that for the next few weeks, I could not sit down. Instead, I stood- in the cargo hatch of my vehicle as we maneuvered across the rough terrain, causing more bruises to my ribs. The artillery sergeant and I would receive Purple Hearts in November, but we both would have preferred to have been spared this award.

        The same week I was wounded, my classmate and fellow Armor Officer Hank Schroeder, who I had just served with at Fort Riley, would suffer devastating wounds from multiple mines while trying to aid his injured tank crewmen. He would be awarded the Silver Star and spend two painful years in Walter Reed Hospital. Hank and I would serve together again at Fort Knox, and despite his significant physical handicaps resulting from his wounds, he would complete an eighteen-year Army career before being medically retired. Four years after retirement, exactly twenty-one years to the month after he was wounded in Vietnam, those wounds would finally take his life.      

  

     It was a warm day in the summer of 1972 when my evening meal was interrupted by a phone call.  I was a bachelor, living in a small, three-room apartment outside the gates of Fort Knox where I was serving as a troop commander. Anytime you are commanding troops and the phone rings, your first thought is one of dread that one of your soldiers has gotten himself in trouble or been in an accident. I was pleasantly relieved to hear my mother’s voice on the line. She shared the bad news with me right away. “Woody’s plane has been shot down over North Vietnam. It was a cloudy day, and no parachutes were seen by the accompanying aircraft. Woody is missing in action. Vernita wants you to call her.”

     Ernest Sherwood Clark, who went by the name of “Woody”, was my closest friend. The same age, we had grown up together in the same neighborhood, and attended school together, often in the same class. We had been members of the same church and Boy Scout Troop. Upon graduation from high school, we both had gone to military academies, Woody attending the Air Force Academy and myself West Point.

      While singing in the Academy glee club, Woody had met Vernita, a beautiful young lady from Everett, Washington. After graduation, they had married, and Woody had trained to be a navigator on reconnaissance aircraft. Shortly after I had returned from Vietnam, I had heard that Woody was being deployed to Thailand. It did not cause me much concern, seeming much safer than ground combat in Vietnam. What I did not appreciate was that from Thailand, Woody would be flying daily reconnaissance missions over North Vietnam.

     I had only met Vernita once and did not know her well. My mother told me that she and their one-year-old daughter were temporarily living in my hometown near Woody’s parents. Grieving myself about likely having lost such a close friend, I was feeling very inadequate and uncertain about my phone call to her. I had learned from my own experience that war does not discriminate, it kills good people as well as bad.  Furthermore, the term “missing in action” was used much too often in Vietnam to describe someone who was likely “killed-in-action.” I felt the best case for Woody would be that he somehow had made it safely to the ground, had been captured, and was facing an uncertain future in a Hanoi prisoner of war facility. After much thought, I decided that when I called Vernita I would be hopeful in suggesting that Woody was probably a prisoner of war and would eventually be coming home safely.

     After I settled my emotions and collected my thoughts, I called Vernita.  As expected, she was very emotional, and our first few minutes of conversation were interrupted by sobs and occasional periods of silence. She shared with me what few details the Air Force had provided her which were more encouraging than my mother’s report. The Air Force had evidence that two parachutes had opened and reached the ground, although they had not had any communication from either pilot or their locating beacons. Both factors suggested that they were either injured or had been immediately captured.

     Before I had the opportunity to share my “hope speech” with Vernita, her own emotions took control of our call. “Woody is too smart to get killed or captured. He is too good a person for God to take from us. He is going to be coming home to me and our daughter.” I was concerned with her unrealistic optimism and worried that the outcome would be even more crushing for her than it needed to be. I tried to push back with “he probably was captured and will be a prisoner of war,” but she would have none of it. I finally gave-in with a simple “Ok” and let her have the only hope that was comforting to her. As I hung up the phone, I thought of the many families that surely prayed for the safe return of their loved one from Vietnam and had been disappointed. I could not help but feel that there would be disappointment here too, but I was wrong.

      I would later learn that on the day Woody was shot down, he was serving as a navigator in an RF4 Phantom aircraft on his 108^th combat mission. The aircraft was fifty miles north of the DMZ when it was hit by a surface-to-air missile. Both Woody and the pilot ejected and landed in the jungle without serious injury but separated by almost a mile. The pilot was quickly captured, but Woody would evade capture for seven days as North Vietnamese soldiers searched for him. On one occasion a soldier got within an arm’s reach but did not see him. On another, a sudden heavy downpour caused the search dogs on his trail to lose the scent and allowed him to slip away. After days of exhaustive movement with little food and water, Woody decided to take the risk of using his rescue beacon. An aircraft from his unit in Thailand, on its final day of searching for him, picked up his signal.

     A daring and dangerous rescue was launched the next day.  As a helicopter hovered and lowered its jungle penetrator to Woody, two escort aircraft laid down cannon fire to suppress the North Vietnamese soldiers engaging the helicopter with small arms and hand-held surface-to-air missiles. Woody was extracted safely, and all three aircraft returned to Thailand with no casualties. As Woody stepped off the helicopter, filthy and unshaven, he was handed a bouquet of roses by a young lady from the Red Cross. The Associated Press took a picture which would be on the front page of the Stars & Stripes the next day and later appear in many stateside publications. Woody’s successful evasion and rescue from North Vietnam would be one of few highlights for the American military during the final years of the Vietnam War.

     Woody returned home to his family and was welcomed as a hero by his Air Force brothers. He would later be reunited with his pilot, who after three months of extensive interrogation, had been released from a Hanoi prisoner of war camp With a growing family, he resigned from the Air Force a few years later and joined the Air National Guard as an active-duty officer. He and I were both assigned to the Pentagon in 1985 and enjoyed bringing our families together and renewing our personal friendship. Woody and his family later move to Reno, Nevada, where he served as the National Guard Air Base Commander. In 1991 he led his unit’s deployment to Bahrain during Operation Desert Storm and flew 18 combat missions, one of the only pilots to fly combat missions in both Vietnam and Iraq. He retired in Reno shortly after. I did not see him for many years, until one day fate brought us back together again.

      In January 2005 I lost my two business partners in a tragic plane crash during a time when our business, a supplier to the Department of Defense, was experiencing tremendous growth. The next year would be the most stressful and demanding of my life as I struggled with a grieving staff and monumental business challenges. In April I called Woody to discuss my situation and he invited me to come to Reno for a long weekend to go skiing. I flew out early on a Thursday morning and we headed straight to the ski slope.

      I stayed at Woody’s home where I had the opportunity to renew my friendship with Vernita with whom I had always felt a special relationship because of that phone call. We never discussed that call, or what happened to Woody in Vietnam, preferring to keep these painful memories behind us. Sometimes, however when we were enjoying Woody’s company, our eyes would lock on each other and we would smile, bonded with the realization of how special these moments were. These visits were incredibly therapeutic for me, like rubbing a cool salve over a severe flesh burn. I would continue to visit during ski season for the next five years.

      On my last visit in 2009, I felt the need to close this chapter of our lives. I did not know when I would see Woody again, and I wanted him to know about that phone call. I also wanted to hear Vernita’s side of the story. On my last day there, we retired to their den after supper and sat by the warm fire enjoying hot cider. In a quiet moment in our conversation, I looked at Vernita who was sitting across for me, and asked “Do you remember when I called you about Woody being shot down?” The room became deathly quiet, as Vernita and I stared into each other’s eyes and time seemed to stand still. Suddenly, Vernita’s eyes were flooded with tears as her head fell in her lap and she began sobbing. Tears filled my own eyes as her wave of pain hit me. The wound that Vietnam had inflicted on us had suddenly opened itself up forty years later. Woody walked over to Vernita’s chair, kneeled on one knee by her side and clasped her hands in his own. For the first time, he heard the story of that phone call and the faith that his young wife had in him that day. How nothing I could say would shake her confidence that he was coming home soon to her and their daughter.

       My experience with Woody and Vernita that evening made me realize that some of the most painful wounds in war are inflicted upon family members and friends, more so than those of us serving in the war zone. In Vietnam, 58,148 Americans lost their lives, and 304,000 more were wounded, but these numbers pale to the suffering the war cost their loved ones at home.