The Last Ride Home
Subtitle: A Memoir of the Vietnam War
By: FL
Publisher: Amer Book Pub
Published: February 2004
Place of publication: USA
Language: eng
Format: Paperback
Number of pages: 296
ISBN-13: 9781589821804
Subjects: Military
First sentence: The story you are about to read seems to be  light years away from twenty-first-century warfare, when unmanned aircraft located and destroyed targets; where planes flying high in in the stratosphere lauunched precision bombs guided via satellite so accurately they could discern which window of a building to attack and where armored columns rumbled through Middle Eastern deserts and cities with impunity. contrary to the predictions of some retired generals during the Gulf war, about the only semblance to the Vietnam War is that thousands of people died in both conflicts=on both sides in Vietnam and overwhelmingly on the Iraqi side in the Gulf wars. The main differences were the situation, terrain and enemy.
Description: Review Written by Bernie Weisz  Vietnam War Historian, Pembroke Pines, Florida, USA Contact:  BernWei1@aol.com Jan. 6, 2011
Title of Review:  In The Tropical Land of Nightmares, Gun Smoke, Blood and Death Had A Strange, Powerful Odor That Never Left One's Senses!

In reviewing "Last Ride Home", penned by Danny M. Francis of Syracuse, N.Y, I would feel remiss if not mentioning that this book can not be purchased anywhere. Through diligent research and application, I was able to contact Mr. Francis and purchase one of his few personal copies of "Last Ride Home" that was stamped "Advance Review Copy-Not For Sale". I could not figure out why this book was not available. Certainly, the cover had a beautiful but frightening portrait of how 60,000 of America's finest made their last journey home from S.E. Asia between 1965 and 1973. At 300 pages, it was obvious that Danny had poured his heart and soul into this book. Why is it that tons of pulp fiction jam the book stores and Internet, while important and critically revealing memoirs of historical significance are scarce and unavailable? It upsets me that the #1 lesson of history is constantly ignored. Could it be that the reason we are in Iraq today is due to the maxim of ignoring history's most important tenet: "History repeats itself. Those that ignore the past are doomed to repeat it". 

Danny Francis did not write this book to make money. He was on a mission to set the record straight about a now forgotten battle fought almost 50 years ago. The American "bloodbath" that occurred in December, 1965 in the "Que Son Valley" of the now defunct nation of South Vietnam would kill twenty marines and wound another 80. This military operation had a name that no one could say was a misnomer. Operation "Harvest Moon" needlessly "harvested" young Americans mercilessly, and Danny was there to witness this bloodbath. There is much rancor within the pages of "Last Ride Home". Mr. Francis fills the book with reasons as to why American involvement in Vietnam became a military debacle. In terms of "Rules of Engagement" (American conduct of the rules of war, encompassing everything from the usage of weapons, fighting a 9 to 5 war, to not bombing North Vietnam nor invading Cambodia or Laos), he wrote a scathing comment: "As the war progressed, we learned more of these lessons the hard way. Most of the early rules I suspect had been dreamed up by some fat office jerk in the rear who wore spit-shined boots and starch in his underwear and who got angry at "grunts" who came into his headquarters with dirty hands and boots and a few days of beard simply because he knew no better". 


In terms of clarifying what really went down in the "Harvest Moon" bloodbath, it is truly a miracle that Mr. Francis had the veracity to dredge up his horrifying memories of senseless death, bloodshed and misery. To his credit, Danny did not let the debilitating effects of P.T.S.D. paralyze him from writing this gem. Aside from his own version, Mr. Francis allows the reader to objectively measure his rendition of what transpired during "Harvest Moon" with five other juxtaposing versions. While tying them all together, he makes it painfully clear that from beginning of "Last Ride Home" to the end, "Operation Harvest Moon" and the Vietnam War as a whole could best be described by the acronym "SNAFU". SNAFU is an acronym meaning "Situation Normal: All Fouled Up" or something similar. In simple terms, it means that the normal situation is in a bad state, as it always is, therefore nothing unexpected will occur. It's usually used in jest, or as a sign of frustration. 

In applying "SNAFU" to "Harvest Moon", Mr. Francis wrote: "Harvest Moon was a classic example of "Murphy's Law". From the beginning, what could go wrong usually did". Lasting 10 dreadful days in December, 1965, Danny Francis along with 100 members of Fox company were airlifted by a Heliborne assault from the deck of the "Valley Forge" in the Gulf of Tonkin to the wrong landing zone and promptly ambushed by an numerically superior enemy. Comparing it to "fish being shot in a barrel", Francis painfully recalled: "There we were, 100 Marines stuck in rice paddy mud and surrounded by thousands of VC. Later, we would find out that our company-sized unit had been up against elements of the elite First Vietcong Regiment, along with 3 independent VC battalions and several VC companies. We had been out manned and out gunned probably 50 to one. For the VC, it was a field day-like a shooting gallery. We were like fish in the proverbial barrel for about 10 long hours. I say naked because we had no cover, no concealment, no artillery support, and virtually no air support. Why we weren't wiped out that day, had the enemy charged us in full strength, remains a mystery to me to this day". 


With "survivor guilt" being an accompanying motive to write this catharsis, Mr. Francis adamantly wrote in no uncertain terms the following: "I guess I'm biased about the events of that awful day, December 10, 1965, but for good reason. I was there and lived through it. Even after all those years, I still believe my version of "Operation Harvest Moon" is more comprehensive and more personal than the official Marine Corps version. What follows is my best assessment of that one-sided battle (at least the first day of it anyway). My version comes from firsthand experience because my Marine rifle company was the first unit to step into the deadly trap on that fateful day". When one reads the other versions of this fateful battle, it is blatantly obvious that Danny's version is factually congruent with other participants, with only minor details varying. There is an undercurrent that cannot be missed in "Last Ride Home". Indeed, the main focus of Mr. Francis's book is "Operation Harvest Moon". However, if the reader looks at the portrait on the cover, you will see a coffin on a cart with an American flag draped over it. There are 3 uniformed soldiers on horse bringing a slain G. I. to his final resting place, notwithstanding his journey to heaven, having his "last ride home" to the cemetery. Although Mr. Francis concentrated on what happened in December, 1965, the reader throughout the book will feel Danny's message of the waste of lives, the futility of this war, the foolishness of America's leaders running the war effort, and wanton and needlessly reckless loss of life. This is the price America paid for it's important stand against Communism in S.E. Asia 

To elaborate more on the subtle messages of this book, it is truly a pity that it was not written nor distributed in 1966. Consider the following. There were a total of 58,236 U.S. battle deaths and 153,453 wounded in the Vietnam War. From 1956 to 1964, 401 Americans lost their lives in S.E. Asia. In 1965, the year of "Operation Harvest Moon", 1,853 young Americans lost their lives. The numbers become staggering after this. Here are the yearly KIA totals (killed in action) after "Harvest Moon". 1966 6,1543 KIA, 1967 11,153 KIA, 1968 (year of the North Vietnamese "Tet Offensive") 16,592 KIA, 1969 11,616 KIA, 1970 6,081 KIA, 1971 2,357 KIA, 1972 641 KIA and finally, 1973 163 U.S. killed in Vietnam.This means that after 1965, 90 percent of Americans that were killed in Vietnam occurred after "Operation Harvest Moon". Mr. Francis pulled no punches singling out the late Robert S. McNamara, the former Secretary of Defense under President Lyndon B. Johnson as a main culprit in the failure of this war. Mr. Francis actually wrote that what motivated him to sit down and write "Last Ride Home" was a program he saw in 1996 where on "Face the Nation", McNamara was discussing his new memoir entitled "In Retrospect:The Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam."


Aside from "Last Ride Home" coming from Danny's disgust at what he saw on that television program, he clarified his revulsion as such: "McNamara started explaining the decisions he and President Johnson had made during the early days of the war. He basically said that the two of them ran the war from the basement of the White House. They would issue orders and they expected their orders to be carried out in the field thousands of miles away. McNamara expected orders would be carried out without question. Most of them were; that probably helped us begin to lose the war. Troops at that time were loyal, but our leaders back home were not; it's that plain and simple to me." Moreover, Mr. Francis further clarified his indignation as such: "I was watching the former highest-ranking Defense Department official use TV to sell his latest book, and apparently he did not care one iota about the 55,000 or so who had died thanks to his faulty decision-making skills. What really got me angry was that he actually admitted that he and Johnson made bad decisions and knew those decisions were bad at the time they made them." Mr. Francis made it very clear that there is no excuse for making a decision that one knows is designed to fail. In terms of the Vietnam legacy, McNamara and L.B.J. knew their decisions on the Vietnam War were wrong and were doomed to failure, yet they continued for political reasons the charade of diligent leadership. 

Aside from "Last Ride Home" coming from Danny's disgust at what he saw on that television program, he clarified his revulsion as such: "McNamara started explaining the decisions he and President Johnson had made during the early days of the war. He basically said that the two of them ran the war from the basement of the White House. They would issue orders and they expected their orders to be carried out in the field thousands of miles away. McNamara expected orders would be carried out without question. Most of them were; that probably helped us begin to lose the war. Troops at that time were loyal, but our leaders back home were not; it's that plain and simple to me." Moreover, Mr. Francis further clarified his indignation as such: "I was watching the former highest-ranking Defense Department official use TV to sell his latest book, and apparently he did not care one iota about the 55,000 or so who had died thanks to his faulty decision-making skills. What really got me angry was that he actually admitted that he and Johnson made bad decisions and knew those decisions were bad at the time they made them." Mr. Francis made it very clear that there is no excuse for making a decision that one knows is designed to fail. In terms of the Vietnam legacy, McNamara and L.B.J. knew their decisions on the Vietnam War were wrong and were doomed to failure, yet they continued for political reasons the charade of diligent leadership. 
 

Danny Francis felt that McNamara and L.B.J's conduct in Washington bordered on the criminal. To explain this, Francis wrote: "They both knew we weren't winning the war, yet they went on the same old way. They had no guts to tell the American people, or did any work to get this country out of Vietnam. McNamara at one point said, "We couldn't tell them with all the student rioting going on. It would have wreaked the country." While "Operation Harvest Moon" was going on, Mr. Francis described the troops mind set as such: "In 1965 and 1966, during my tour of Vietnam, none of us in the service, that I knew of, thought or even suspected that our leaders were misleading the public about the war. Some members of Congress may of suspected, but I did not. Trust, military obedience, and blind faith were the order of the day. I would have never thought differently in those days. We thought our leadership was bright and smart, and that they were making sound, rational judgements on our behalf. Little did we know that most of them were incompetent lackeys for McNamara. 


In terms of 2010 and what is going on currently in Afghanistan and Iraq , Danny Francis's work is still relevant. As of March of this year, there have been 4,201 battle deaths and 36,906 non-mortal wounding's. As for the current situation, Mr. Francis had this to say in this book: "Sadly, we see many incompetents serving in congress. They are professional politicians not professional citizens. Many never served in the military, let alone in combat. Nonetheless, they still hold the lives of so many young men and women in their hands. They expect blind loyalty, yet they return nothing except pandering for more votes. They cater to the military hoping those in uniform will salute and say, "aye, aye, sir!" Beginning in 2004, accounts of physical, psychological, and sexual abuse, including torture, rape, sodomy, and homicide of prisoners held in the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq (also known as Baghdad Correctional Facility) came to public attention. These acts were committed by personnel of the 372nd Military Police Company of the United States Army together with additional US governmental agencies. 

Danny Francis described actions like this as the "William Calley Syndrome" which he described as such: "Salute, follow orders, but don't question superiors". Stating that the "My Lai Massacre" and Calley's actions were the result of the aforementioned syndrome, Vietnam had permanently changed Danny Francis. To expound upon this, Danny wrote: "As for me, I'm long past the stage of blind obedience. Vietnam changed that part of me forever.  I don't mean disobedience or disloyalty; I mean raw skepticism and basic distrust of government. Apathy is a killer just as much as a bullet in combat! I'm determined to do what I can to prevent any more McNamara's from abusing power and trust. In 1965, honesty and leadership apparently did not go hand in hand for many of our trusted public officials." Mr. Francis also pointed out that Washington incorrectly applied inept and inappropriate military strategy unsuited for victory with the constraints involved in Vietnam. 

Search and Destroy referred to a military strategy that became a notorious component of the Vietnam War. The idea was to insert ground forces into hostile territory, search out the enemy, destroy them, and withdraw immediately afterwards. This strategy was the result of an over reliance on the helicopter; which resulted into a new form of warfare, the fielding of air cavalry. This strategy was supposedly ideally suited for counter-guerrilla and jungle warfare. This entailed sending out platoons, companies or larger detachments of US troops from a fortified position to locate and destroy Vietcong or NVA units in the countryside. These missions most commonly involved hiking out into the "boonies" and setting an ambush in the brush, near a suspected VC trail. The ambush typically involved the use of fixed Claymore Antipersonnel Mines, crossing lines of small arms fire, mortar support, and possibly additional artillery support called in via radio from a nearby firebase. As stated earlier, it is really a shame that the following comments couldn't be read by Military Assistance Command Vietnam (MACV) in 1966. Mr. Francis asserted: "As I reflect on those Search and Destroy operations we conducted in Vietnam, I remember thinking "What a lousy way to run a war". The biggest problem was the Pentagon's micro management of each and every single event. as it turned out, practically every unit movement had to be approved in Washington, They were approved by those with their "bunker/hunkered down" mentality, like it was a chess game and we were the pieces to be moved there, stopped here, and the like." 

There is so much more to this book than just the Vietnam War. Mr. Francis wrote about being a child of adoption, his quest to find and locate his biological parents and the consequences psychologically resulting. He also wrote of a miracle, where a soldier was forsaken for dead on the battlefield, narrowly escaping being zipped into a body bag. This soldier's story, by Capt. Jim Page, is self narrated at the end of this book. There is also the story of heroism exhibited by Medal of Honor winner Harvey C. Barnum during "Operation Harvest Moon." Barnum, in country only 2 weeks, ran under intense enemy fire to where a critically injured radio operator was, took the radio off the injured G.I.'s back and hurried back to his original defensive position to call in artillery on Communist positions. It is a travesty that this tremendous book, written by an amateur author with no formal training or coaching, is unavailable anywhere. Fortunately, it can be read courtesy of Mr. Francis in its entirety on the Internet. I have spoken to Mr. Francis about the unavailability of this book. After an initial run of books, the original publisher refused to republish an additional lot, despite the general public's demand for additional copies. Aside from reneging on their promise to give editing assistance to Mr. Francis for the first lot of books, they refused to publish new copies nor release the manuscript back to Mr. Francis without financial compensation. Claiming that they would "sell the rights back" to Mr. Francis so he could seek another publisher, Mr. Francis could not afford to take on that task. Why Mr. Francis would have to repurchase the rights to "Last Ride Home" when he wrote the book is beyond me! Nevertheless, this book sadly remains only available via the Internet. If ever there was a book about American involvement in Vietnam that should be republished and have mass distribution, it is definitely this one! Take the time to sit down at your terminal and read this from cover to cover! You are in for more than you bargained
Notes: This book can be read in it's entirety at the following web address. Cut and paste the following web address on your web browser to read "Last Ride Home". Thank you, Mr. Francis, for making this possible!


http://www.scribd.com/doc/15603504/LAST-RIDE-HOME-A-Memoir-of-the-Vietnam-War