Title: Clear Left! Clear Right!
Description: Review Written by Bernie Weisz, Historian, Vietnam War Pembroke Pines, Fl. USA May 30, 2012 Contact: BernWei1@aol.com Title of Review;  "Vietnam's Hypocrisy Eventually Turned Future War Protesters Against Those Doing The Fighting & Dying!"


Victory through enemy attrition, light at the end of the tunnel, racial tension, Vietnam Vets against the war, successful interdiction of the Ho Chi Minh Trail, et. al. Was the U.S. winning the ground war? Was there a drug problem among our troops? What about racial problems? What was the American politician's "end game" plan to lead our troops to a successful conclusion? Read twenty different memoirs of different participants, all from different branches of the service and at different times in the war and you will get twenty different opinions. One thing is clear, all these different perspectives voiced were making both television's nightly news as well as newspaper headlines stateside during the war. It was this very lack of unified sentiment that served the antiwar movement's origins as well as its impetus. While on the hawkish side, Timothy Wilkerson's memoir is no exception. Arriving in Vietnam in November of 1968, Wilkerson takes the reader through his one year tour of duty with incredible clarity. He describes his method as follows; "While serving in the Army, prior to and after Vietnam, I made notes on a small calendar and on my flight logs, as well as letters to and from home and also notes made on the pictures I took during that time. I have compiled this information and retyped the notes as I wrote them and added more information from logbooks and letters."

The results of Wilkerson's endeavors are as realistic and historically fascinating as a memoir can get. Ask any pilot in Vietnam what was among his most sacred recollections and artifacts of that war and you will invariably be told that his photos and flight log are high up on the list. Not only are the photos in this book spectacular, but his desktop entries add much to the lore of this war. Why did this author volunteer for Vietnam? Explaining, Wilkerson wrote: "I did not understand all of the ideologies involved. All I heard was that a country full of people wanted to be free and not subject to communist rule. We read stories and heard of Vietnam's ability to grow rice and other plentiful crops that would feed millions of people. We read stories and heard of the "Domino Theory" of communist takeover of the world. We were shown how it was being implemented on a country I never knew existed. " To do his part, Wilkerson enlisted in the U.S. Army on August 21st, 1967. At this point of the war, it looked like the U.S. and its South Vietnamese, South Korean and Australian allies would shortly defeat the Communists. The year started off with an Operation called "Cedar Falls." This was a massive search and destroy operation of an area close to Saigon called the "Iron Triangle." Considered by U.S. intelligence to be a major Viet Cong redoubt, over 30,000 US and South Vietnamese troops were sent in to destroy the enemy. Although this operation uncovered and destroyed major enemy tunnel complexes loaded with enemy supplies, this was to be a harbinger of things to come. Skillfully evading American forces who were prohibited by our "rules of engagement" of pursuing the enemy into neutral territory, the VC fled into Cambodia, escaping through intricate tunnel systems. Not only was the area's indigenous inhabitants forcibly relocated, the entire area was defoliated and their homes destroyed. Although the U.S desperately wanted to win the "hearts and minds" of the native South Vietnamese, by this action many former inhabitants of this area joined the communist ranks as a consequence. In his "Beyond Vietnam" speech delivered at New York's Riverside Church on April 4, 1967 Dr. Martin Luther King became the country's most prominent opponent of the Vietnam War. King called the United States "the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today." Ironically, the "Summer of Love" would end violently, with the November, 1967 "Battle of Dak To" being a drop in the bucket to the clashes experienced during the January, 1968 "Tet Offensive."

While Hippies throughout America gathered in San Francisco for music, drugs and free love, the military did everything in its power to produce a victory, including the attempt to build an electronic wall sealing the North Vietnamese out of the South and seeding the atmosphere with Silver Iodide via C-130 airplanes to extend the monsoon season, thus washing out the Ho Chi Minh Trail. In early November of 1968, Tim Wilkerson arrived at Cam Ranh Bay Air Force Base to do his part. From landing at the most busiest airport in the world at the time through October of 1969 the author served in Vietnam with "A Company" of the 4th Aviation Battalion. Nicknamed "The Blackjacks," his helicopter unit was attached to the famed 4th Infantry Division. They would fly missions out of Camp Enari, II Corps, right in the enemy's backyard, the hotly contested "Central Highlands" of South Vietnam. Of this period of time, Wilkerson wrote; "The opposition to the war was just beginning because communists were grooming the protestors. I remember I wanted to do my part and help the South's defense against communism and to protect their way of life, as well as ours." Right or wrong, Wilkerson voiced his opinion of this war, which killed over 58,000 Americans; "It was a two-front war that was battled abroad and at home. City streets in the free world served as the stage for anti-war protests with deep roots supported by communism. This war was fought for an idea of freedom. The freedom of a small country of people to live the life of free choice and action opposed by those who were, and still are seeking world domination to enslave them and us." Why does the author take his stance? Wilkerson elaborated; "We saw on TV the people burning their draft cards because they opposed the war. Others were burning the American flag in protest. This was a sure sign of communists in the rank and file of the protesters." While the author's patriotic rhetoric might of been a motivating factor, the clincher was that he simply wanted to fly.

Right out of high school, the only branch of service not requiring a college degree or prior military service as a prerequisite was the Army. Wilkerson would get his chance alright, accumulating over 1,135 hours of combat time which this vivid memoir gives graphic testimony to. Tim Wilkerson did not write this account for the reader with just a passing interest in history or the Vietnam War. There is no glossary and the majority of this book has notations extracted from his daily flight log. However, if you are knowledgeable about this conflict regardless of whether you served in Vietnam or have an interest in American military history, this book will have you spellbound. Wilkerson asserts his beliefs early in the righteousness of America's military endeavors in Vietnam;"Freedom is not free. It is earned, won and fought for on all levels at home and abroad. The defenders at the Alamo, Wake Island, in Korea and in many other lonely places gave their lives for freedom. Many of those who had given their all may never be known for their sacrifices for the very freedom that gives us the right to protest or to love our country." Why did Wilkerson write this? Ho Chi Minh, the North's communist strongman during the war insisted that America wanted to imperialistically impose its will on a reticent South Vietnamese population. Uncle Ho insisted that this so called "civil war" was really a desire for a country to run its own affairs without foreign interference. Needless to say, Wilkerson's viewpoints are graphically validated by simply reading prisoner accounts of anyone mercilessly thrown into torturous communist "Reeducation Camps" after the Fall of Saigon in April of 1975.

Notwithstanding political motives, "Clear Left! Clear Right" goes far beyond the causes and effects of the Vietnam War. This is a book about a God fearing man and his love of aviation. Wilkerson shares the apprehension he felt prior to his first solo helicopter flight as well as glory he experienced in successfully becoming an officer. So strong was his passion for flying, Wilkerson actually named the book using the commands from his instructor pilot at Fort Wolters, Texas. The book's title were safety words taught to Wilkerson prior to starting up a helicopter's blades to full operational speed, ensuring peripheral safety. From being tossed in a pool, a tradition following a pilot's first successful solo to his success in not being captured at Fort Rucker's "Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape" school, Wilkerson's twenty seven year aviation career was launched. If you read through Wilkerson's flight logs, you will find that Wilkerson did it all in his helicopter, a Bell UH-1 Iroquois. A staple of the Vietnam War, his "Huey Slick" flew everything from troop insertions and extractions under full battlefield conditions, medical evacuations, and flare drops to illuminate areas at night to transporting VIP's (very important people such as generals, politicians, etc.) Another side of the war rarely shown is Vietnam's raw beauty and danger. Wilkerson includes beautiful pictures he personally took from his Huey of Vietnam's Central Highlands, from flying over mountaintops and cascading waterfalls to remote firebases. Also shown is "Toolbox," a dog that loved to fly. Also used by the perimeter guards at Camp Enari, Toolbox was one of many German Shepherds that at war's end sadly never came home. In an attempt to make it as much like home as possible, all types of animals were kept as pets, with vivid photos Wilkerson took of "Tippy" the parrot, and even "George" the monkey. Dangerous to our troops, wild Bengal tigers roamed around Vietnam's jungles. Wlikerson includes a graphic description where his helicopter hovered over a tiger, tracking it to an armored unit to be killed. Wilkerson even flew the slain tiger back to his brigade headquarters. The author's flight logs show the good, the bad and the ugly of the Vietnam War. Pilots were shot down and killed by enemy fire, and helicopters crashed after hitting barely visible tree stumps and cloud obscured power lines at low levels.

Wilkerson also mentions that drugs had become a major detriment in 1969, adversely affecting America's fighting capability. Personally witnessing this, Wilkerson wrote; "I had to take a stand when I found out that one of our aircraft gunners was using drugs. I learned firsthand from those who witnessed the actions, and I had to remove him from my aircraft. We needed a crew that was alert and could respond quickly and effectively when the need arose, and it usually did when flying in combat." Wilkerson also commented on the American conduct of the war, unsuccessfully using enemy "body counts" as a measure of success; "I noticed that the Allies would take over hilltops or primary control points. I further noticed that after a period of time, based on the enemy's situation, the Allies would pull the units out of the hilltops and move to other locations to attack or stop the enemy." Wilkerson mentions that while he could never bring himself to "hate" the enemy, he respected their ability to conduct guerrilla warfare. Wilkerson demonstrated this by refusing a commander's orders to land alongside an area where a landmine had killed a truck full of Vietnamese citizens. The aforementioned is just a small part of "Clear Left! Clear Right." Tim Wilkerson gives us a scarcely told and riveting perspective of the Vietnam War rarely delivered elsewhere. This is an indispensable account, an absolute "must read" in anyone's collection of Vietnam War memoirs!
Subjects: United states, army, biography, Soldiers