Date: 2008-01-08
To: "War Stories"
Miles today: 0.0

For the next several journal entries I thought I'd recount some past events in my life - what you might call "war stories." If you aren't interested (most likely) or are bored (a significant possibility) then just skip ahead.I graduated from high school in 1974. At that time there was only one thing I wanted to do ¢ join the Marines. I went down to the enlistment center and had to get a physical. I learned I had a heart murmur. I was devastated because I would be ineligible for the Marines. There was one last chance, go get a second opinion from a cardiologist. Amazingly, he passed me and wrote a letter that said strenuous activity would help, not hurt me.So I was off to the Marine Corps Recruit Depot in San Diego for some "strenuous activity" (and they weren¢t kidding). I did well in boot camp because it is primarily a ¢mind game¢ where you do what you are told and work as a team. I was trained to be a 81mm mortar man (which will mean nothing to most of you) who got to carry a 35-lb mortar tube everywhere we hiked. This may well have been my first exposure to carrying something heavy on my shoulders.In 1975 I was assigned to a unit on the island of Okinawa, in the Pacific. During the first part of the year the South Vietnamese troops were retreating toward Saigon. Although American troops were no longer in Vietnam in April the American embassy was in danger of being overrun by the North Vietnamese. Our unit was sent into Saigon and landed on the two landing pads at the American embassy. Our job was to keep non-Americans from entering the embassy while the American diplomats and families got out by helicopter. It was a madhouse. People who should have been allowed into the embassy never got the chance. At one point there were no helicopters remaining on the landing pads, and we wondered if we had been abandoned. Eventually the choppers returned and we left. We flew out to a nearby aircraft carrier and landed there. There were a ton of helicopters trying to land because the South Vietnamese were trying to escape in their own helicopters. To make room on the carrier deck we were told to push the empty copters over the side of the ship, into the sea. Pure madness.Only one month later, on May 15, 1975, the Cambodians captured one of our merchant marine ships (the Mayaguez). There were around 30 Americans on board. Our intelligence said the Americans were being held on a small island called Koh Tang. Turns out our intelligence was wrong (wouldn¢t be the last time!). But we didn¢t know that then. Two of our companies (about 150 Marines) were flown by ¢Jolly Green Giant¢ helicopters to assault the island.As we approached the island I could see what looked like little red streaks coming up towards us. They were RPGs (rocket-propelled grenades). Two helicopters were hit and crashed into the sea. A third crashed on the beach. The rest of us landed under a lot of machinegun fire. It turns out that this supposedly safe island probably had over 800-1000 Cambodian troops with heavy weapons.Anyway, to make a long story short, we hugged the ground for the rest of the day. When it got dark, a navy destroyer came in close to the island and sent some small boats to pick us up. When all was said and done, 32 Marines had died for nothing accomplished ¢ the American were not there. Worse, somehow in the confusion of leaving the island a three-man Marine machinegun team was left behind. Later reports indicated that they tried to survive on the island, were captured by the Cambodians, tortured, and killed. The remainder of my four year tour in the Marines was spent at Quantico, Virginia, helping to train new Marine officers. A fellow Marine happened to live not too far in Hagerstown, Maryland. One day he told me about this trail near Harpers Ferry. He said he would drop me off on a weekend if I wanted to check it out. I took him up on the offer and soon had my first glimpse of the Appalachian Trail.