Tracks
Subtitle: Memoirs of a Vietnam Veteran
Publisher: Self Published
Published: 2010
Place of publication: USA
Format: Paperback
Number of pages: 161
ISBN-13: 9780615396576
Description: Review Written By Bernie Weisz, Historian, Vietnam War January 21, 2011 Pembroke Pines, Florida, USA  E Mail Contact: BernWei1@aol.com   Title of Review: "In Vietnam I Was Important. Once Back in The U.S., I Was A Baby Killer. What's Wrong With Society?"  This is a rare Vietnam memoir indeed. The majority I have dealt with are catharsis oriented, with the Vietnam Veteran wishing to get rid of the old cliche: "You are only as sick as your secrets." That was not Clyde Hoch's goal. Nor was it to tell his children his life story before his final demise. Neither was it to settle an old score and set the record straight. Completely selfless, Mr. Hoch declares it in his dedication as such: "This book is dedicated to all of my brothers who fell and rose back up, but we were never whole again." Although the reader is treated to a historically rich memoir of Hoch's tour of duty at age eighteen in "C Company, First Tank battalion, First Marine Division from February of 1968 to April of 1969, the realization of the injustice doled out to these brave, patriotic warriors that never received credit becomes readily apparent. He makes it abundantly clear how unrealistic Hollywood's portrayal of Vietnam truly was, and that the only way to really find out what it was like to be there is to sit down and listen to a Veteran that was really there. Most importantly, Mr. Hoch cogently elucidates to the reader that despite being in the sweaty jungles, leech ridden swamps and mosquito laden rice paddies risking his life and made to feel important, he returned to a stateside society that indignantly viewed Vietnam Veterans as homicidal, unsociable baby killers. Elaborating as such, Hoch asserted the following: "I was 21 and responsible for 2 to 3 tanks and 8 to 12 people, 7 days a week, 24 hours a day, in high stress combat situations. It was really a lot of responsibility for someone that age." However, the author compellingly summed up his feelings upon return by the following: "When I returned to civilian life, I was just one of many punk kids who just got out of the military. I received no respect and worked very hard to fit back in civilian life. I was told once, "you lost that war. It was the only one that the U.S. has ever lost." The men and women who served in Vietnam never lost a major battle. In my mind, our politicians and the American public lost that war." 

The exasperation of his inexcusable mistreatment upon his return from Vietnam can historically be contrasted to the ticker tape parades, ballroom dances and the camaraderie of Veterans of Foreign War meeting halls returning World War II Veterans experienced. Vietnam Veterans experienced none of that. Commenting on this, Hoch lamented: "I risked my life for the our government, only to come home and be treated like dirt. I was not allowed to talk about Vietnam, but in some ways, it was a nightmare that I cannot forget to this day. Some people had it far worse than I did, and some much better." In a typical paradox common to many returning Vietnam Veterans, they counted down the months, weeks, and eventually days to return to the U.S. to conclude their tour (known as "Date of Estimated Return from Overseas Service or the acronym DEROS). However, either as a consequence of "adrenalin withdrawal," or societal mistreatment, there were those that shortly after their return couldn't wait to go back to S.E. Asia. Clyde Hoch, for reasons of his own, was part of that group. Explaining his rationale, he elaborated as follows: "It was extremely hard for me to get used to coming back to the states where there was so much backstabbing, selfishness, and arrogance. I almost felt like going back to Vietnam." Ending his military career in Vietnam as Marine Corps Platoon Commander, his adjustment to being an insignificant, unappreciated ex Veteran was arduous and painful. Explaining why, Hoch wrote: "I left Vietnam feeling important and useful to society, even though I felt as though society did not like me. Society hated us because we were trained killers." Again and again, upon his return from S.E. Asia, instead of the public expressing gratitude and appreciation for his contribution in the war effort, he was asked to his chagrin: "What was it like to kill women and children?" 

While Hoch's mistreatment as a returning Vietnam Veteran is a primary theme of this memoir, there is so much more to this historically speaking concerning the American conduct of the war never to be found in high school or college textbooks. Another theme that runs right through the book from the beginning to the end is immortality. In his introduction, Hoch asserted a chilling statistic: "Statistically, I am one of 2,709, 918 Americans who actually served in the Vietnam War. We are dying at a much higher rate than the average person who did not serve in Vietnam." For the entire fourteen months Clyde Hoch was in Vietnam, he was faced with death virtually every day until he became filled with the following belief that fortunate for this memoir, it did not become a self fulfilling prophesy: "There were so many times I went to sleep thinking that I would not last the morning sun come up. There were so many days I woke up and said to myself, "This one will surely be my last day on earth.". Surprisingly, even on his last operation before he returned home he expressed similar sentiments: "I had it in my mind I would never leave Vietnam alive. I felt that if nothing else happened, the plane would get shot down on the way home." However, this book is not only about Vietnam, death and societal rejection. It is also about the "tracks" in his life, hence the title of his book. Not only are the treads of his tank's imprints left in the Vietnamese soil covered, but this is a memoir of Clyde Hoch's accomplishments, failures, emotions, memories and lessons learned. Written 41 years after he left Vietnam, Hoch explained the time lapse: "I did not write this book earlier in my life because no one wanted to hear about Vietnam. I write this now from memory, in the hopes that someone reads it, gains knowledge, and maybe understanding from it. With the current plethora of "Fake Warrior Vietnam Veterans" that claimed they were there when they actually weren't, it is now fashionable to be a Vietnam Veteran. However, Hoch explained: After coming home from Vietnam we seldom mentioned being there at all because it usually broke out into an argument or a fist fight. As everyone knows, we Vietnam Veterans were considered the scum of the earth by most civilians of the U.S." It is truly sad that a memoir as important and revealing as this almost didn't find the light of day. Furthermore, we must ask, how many Veterans had historically important stories and experiences to tell which they tragically brought with them to their graves? 

Clyde Hoch's Vietnam experiences are memorable and a historian's treasure chest of facts. Hoch starts the book with a saying in the Nam: "If you were rich, you went to college. If you were poor, you went to the Nam." From a poor family in Pennsylvania and goalless after high school, the draft for Vietnam was in full gear. Knowing that he would be conscripted, Hoch volunteered at age 18, in March of 1965 for the U.S. Marine Corps. He described the rigors of boot camp and basic training at Parris Island, South Carolina, and later infantry training at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. Following his graduation, and a cruise to the Mediterranean, where he described hilarious hi jinks, he was assigned as a tank driver. Hoch commented: "I am not quite sure how I ended up on the tanks, but I was not upset about it." Incredibly, Hoch was promoted to Sergeant, and was offered a way out of going to Vietnam, as part of the "Military Drill Team" in Washington, D.C. Hoch responded to that offer as follows: "I joined the Marines to go to Vietnam and fight for my country." He was transported to Vietnam on a commercial airliner like scores of other veterans described in their memoirs. However, his initial impressions upon landing at Danang in the northern part of South Vietnam designated "I Corps," is memorable: I had seen poverty before but nothing like the poverty in Vietnam. When we think of poverty in America, we think of people on welfare that might not always have heat or food. In Vietnam, some of the people literally had nothing but the clothing that they wore. These people did not go to a local food shelter. They scavenged for food in the jungle. As detailed in Mark Purdy's book "The River Rats of Vietnam," Hoch asserted:"The "Black Market 
was very prevalent. Sometimes we bought military equipment from them." Ignoring the sage advice of never volunteering for anything, Hoch immediately acquiesced when asked by a Warrant Officer the following: "I need two more people to man a tank." The die was cast in Vietnam for Clyde Hoch. 

In his third day in Vietnam, the author was sent on a mission he would never forget. Usually accompanied by anywhere from 2 to 5 other tanks, Hoch commanded his lone tank and was sent to a communications tower that was manned by a dozen grunts. The tower overlooked a hill, and Hoch's tank was to guard it in a support role. Unbeknown to him, he was about to square off against an entire North Vietnamese battalion heading right his way. When informed of the odds of one tank against an entire NVA battalion with no U.S. reinforcements coming, he wrote: "It is an odd feeling thinking that you know you are going to die in a couple of hours. I was barely old enough to drink in the U.S., but soon I was going to die for it." As the enemy shelling erupted, and the N.V.A. drew perilously close, Hoch thought about becoming a prisoner of war: "A statement from jungle training that stuck in my mind was "Always save one bullet. No matter what happens, don't be taken alive." However, Hoch was about to witness a scene that would save many American ground forces during the conflict: "Soon I heard a plane and saw a florescent red rope falling form the dark sky. What the hell is that? I was told it was Puff, but not to worry because it was one of ours." Hoch was referring to a converted C 130, with call signs of "Spooky and Puff, the Magic Dragon." this was a gun ship that was developed by the U.S. Air Force during the Vietnam War. It was felt that more firepower than could be provided by light and medium ground-attack aircraft in some situations when ground forces called for close air support. The plane had three 7.62 mm mini guns that could selectively fire either 50 or 100 rounds per second. Cruising in an overhead left-hand orbit at an altitude of 3,000 feet, the gun ship could put a bullet or a glowing red tracer (every fifth round) bullet into every square yard of a football field-sized target in three seconds. And, as long as its 45-flare and 24,000-round basic load of ammunition held out, it could do this intermittently while loitering over the target for hours. When the North Vietnamese saw this, they smartly vanished. Unfortunately, as this memoir documents, there would be battles where Puff never came or was unavailable. 

The reader is put within the pages of "Track" on Hoch's M 48-A3 medium tank during his fourteen months of traversing his two primary bases of operation, "Battalion Headquarters, which was on a hill outside of Danang, and "Charlie Company Headquarters," south of Marble Mountain. Hoch teaches the reader the ways tanks were used in Vietnam, the type of ammunition tanks in Vietnam used, i.e. everything from white phosphorous, flechette, canister and what was called a "HEAT Round," to the different functions the crewmen of the tank would perform. Hoch noticed the children of Vietnam, who always hung out with the tankers. Hoch remarked "I thought to myself that I wish I could take some of the children home and give them a better life." He wrote that early in the book prior to witnessing the slaughter of innocent villagers as the result of an American artillery barrage. There are both horrid and vivid descriptions of what Hoch deemed "collateral damage, to which the author would react by writing: "I felt uncomfortable seeing women or children killed. It was one thing for men, but women and children made me feel worse. Women and children and children should not be involved in a war." As a truism throughout any of mankind's conflicts, Hoch quoted an African proverb which stated: "When elephants fight, it's the grass that suffers." Although it bothered the author, other Americans were hardened to the brutality, the killings and the stresses of war. Hoch, although it sounds suspiciously similar to the dreaded doctrine of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi's, wrote the following: "Many of the people I served with hated the Vietnamese. They felt that they were enemies and should be eliminated. They talked about the boat method. You take all the good Vietnamese and put them on boats, kill all the rest, and then sink the boat." There are two sides to this story. Although Hoch didn't mention it, an American solder also became polarized and inured against the enemy after seeing enough of his buddies step on command detonated NVA booby traps and land mines, U.S. captives skinned alive or units barely surviving a deadly, ruthless Viet Cong ambush designed not to leave a legacy. 

There are many salient points about the war Hoch exposed. During the conflict, the term "Hearts and Minds" was a euphemism for a campaign by the U.S. military to win the popular support of the South Vietnamese people. Instead of being the "policeman of the world," it was hoped that one day, South Vietnam , though its army, the Army Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) could militarily stand alone against its aggressive Northern counterpart, and it's bellicose policies. In hindsight, this prospect of U.S/ARVN cooperation was doomed for failure based on Hoch's observation. Stationed in a small village called Nui Kim Sahn, Hoch wrote of his dealings with the ARVN: "There was an ARVN platoon stationed there. We did little socializing with them. They would stare at us as they went by, but they didn't seem to like us much. They were in and out of the village constantly. You could not help wondering which side they were on." In regard to winning the hearts and minds, there was an incident where Hoch's Battalion headquarters was raided at night by fifty North Vietnamese sympathizers. The next morning, the Battalion barber was found dead in the concertina wire surrounding the compound. The barber turned sapper was shot dead trying to kill Americans. Hoch recalled: "What a great spot to plant a spy,in the local barbershop to see and hear everything. I remember getting a shave from him when I was back at Battalion. When he was done cutting your hair he would wrap a warm towel around your face then lather it up and sharpen the straight razor on a leather strap. It felt good, but I didn't like him that close to my throat with a sharp razor. I guess my instincts were right on." Another point about winning the "hearts and minds" that Hoch elaborated on, was that the North simply did not play fair. Hoch elucidated: At times, the North would send executioners into a village friendly to the Americans, take young males for their military, and threaten to come back to kill their families if they didn't cooperate. The North would have the villagers plant mines and booby traps. Then, when the villagers harassed us, we would retaliate against them. The villagers were just like pawns to the north. It did not seem like fair game to me." 

Clyde Hoch also patrolled an area called the "Mud Flats," which had an alias of "Little Khe Sanh." Also a Korean Marine area, Hoch found them attached to him, since they did not have tanks in Vietnam. Aside from John Culbertson's memoir "A Sniper in the Arizona" and Robert Blackburn's "Mercenaries and Lyndon Johnson's More Flags," very little is known about South Korean participation as America's ally in Vietnam. Aside from South Korea's payback for America's bailout in 1950 when they were almost overrun by the North in the "Korean War," it is not widely known that American taxpayer money completely footed the bill of the Republic of Korea's (ROK) military contribution. The first South Korean personnel to land in Vietnam was in 1964 with ten non-combatant Taekwondo instructors, along with thirty-four officers and ninety-six enlisted men of a Korean Army hospital unit. In total, between 1965 and 1973, 312,853 South Korean soldiers fought in Vietnam, killing 41,400 N.V.A. soldiers and 5,000 civilians. According to Blackburn, 4,407 ROK troops lost their lives during the conflict. Hoch gives a rare account of his dealing and impressions with the soldiers of South Korea, eating with them "kim che and rice" with almost every meal. Included is the gory incident of two Korean soldiers obliterated in front of Hoch as they stepped on a powerful land mine. Hoch reports of N.V.A. psychological warfare they tried on the ROK troops that fought alongside Hoch: "On many occasions the North Vietnamese talked to the Koreans with loud speakers.0 Always during these sessions the Koreans had a strained look on their faces, a look of fear. I would sometimes ask the Koreans what the North Vietnamese said. They would tell me what they said, "We are the same type of people, don't support the evil Americans!" I would worry that we may have an uprising from the Koreans. The North Vietnamese would do this for hours. I was glad when they stopped." 

The author both doled out and escaped death. Clyde Hoch watched a RGP (rocket propelled grenade) shoot right at him and narrowly miss killing him as well as watch 600 hardened, fully outfitted N.V.A. soldiers stand up and start walking towards his tank position. He wrote about that, describing: "It was probably what Custer felt like, seeing hundreds and hundreds of the N.V.A. stand up and start walking towards us." Out in the jungle, he wrote: "We got so used to drinking warm beer, that once we had a cold one, it didn't taste right." Shortly before his tour ended, Clyde Hoch was in for a surprise. Conversing with a soldier that just returned from "the World" (the U.S.) he was told the following: "They hate us over there. They spit at us and call us baby killers. They throw dirty diapers at us." Hoch's reaction: I could not believe what I was hearing! We were risking our lives every day, living in sometimes horrendous conditions so they could have their freedom. What the hell is wrong with those people? It was a great shock for us. I thought we were kind of heroes. Instead we were viewed as idiots and barbarians." As a foreshadowing of what Jane Fonda would later do when she toured North Vietnam in 1972, during which she cozied up to the enemy, posing for photo op's with communist troops and broadcasting anti-American rhetoric, Hoch wrote: "I had heard later that college kids and some actors were hoping for the N.V.A to kill all of us Americans. They were wishing for our death while we felt we were protecting them. They were actually supporting the North Vietnamese. This seemed so unpatriotic to me. They did not know me. I was there to help my country." The balance of this memoir underscores this ambiguity. It is actually impossible for the reader to not be in Clyde Hoch's tank with him, to watch the carnage, the bonds formed with his fellow tankers and to vicariously experience the anguish he felt when the very people he was protecting treacherously turned on him. "Tracks" is a memoir that reads like a novel but stirs your gut like very few others will. It is an absolute "must read" for every American to read, particularly with our forces now coming back from the Middle East. The disappointing return home to the country and people Clyde Hoch and others gave so much for will stay with you not only after you have finished "Tracks," but forever. An absolute essential read for any historian of the Vietnam War!
Table of contents: title: P. 3  A Marine In Vietnam; title: P. 4 Dedication & Acknowledgements; title: P. 5 Introduction; title: P. 6 Table of Contents; title: P. 7 Eighteen; title: P. 8 Growing up; title: P. 10 Boot Camp; title: P. 21 Infantry Training Regiment; title: P. 27 The Med Cruises; title: P.39 Back at Camp Lejeune; title: P. 45 Second Day in Vietnam; title: P. 52 Tanks; title: P. 57 The Village of Nui Kim Sahn; title: P. 65 The Mud Flats; title: P. 74 Mud Flats: Search & Destroy Missions; title: P. 83 Back at the Mud Flats; title: P. 90 Cau Do River Bridge; title: P. 95 Drugs in Vietnam; title: P. 97 Communications Sergeant; title: P. 99 Marble Mountain; title: P. 106 A Visitor; title: p. 108 Military Payment certificate; title: P. 109 The Mine; title: p. 113 The Leper Colony; title: P. 117 South China Sea; title: P. 121 Tet; title: P. 123 Fifty Caliber; title: P. 125 The Guys; title: P. 130 Welcome home!; title: P. 135 retrospect; title: P. 140 Stories From Fellow Vietnam Veterans; title: P. 162 Resources