1966 - 1967 "B" Battery
FDC
"OPERATION BLUE LIGHT"
HOW IT ALL STARTED: My Itinerary
UNEVENTFUL TOUR:
My tour - 1966 - 1967 was really uneventful. I trained in Fort Jackson, at Fort Sill and assigned to Hawaii. I think I was in Hawaii for about two or three months maybe even six. Who knows? Anyway. I was a 13E20 in FDC ran charts and the radios. We left Hawaii for Viet Nam in Dec of 1965. I arrived in a C-141 with water tank, jeep+ trailer (we called the "Pink Kitty"). Also on board was another vehicle of some sort and I think a platoon of men. We were carrying our M-14 rifles. The runway we landed on, in the Central Highlands, was dirt and the plane turned around and took right off. Boy, it then got real quiet and we saw the Cav pulling out as they were there to pull security and now, we were on our own. That night was Pup Tents. No one dug a fox hole. I returned to California in Jan of 1967. I believe I extended for three months and thus was able to get a three month "early out". The Pink Kitty Trailer was a 1/2 ton trailer and then we built (plywood) a box on it. Inside we ran our FDC with radios and chart boards and map on the wall. I have no pictures of this (this was what we used in Hawaii). Needless to say this plywood did NOT work in Viet Nam and so in the Base Camp at Pleiku we had dug in a CONEX and covered it with sand bags and had a vent pipe sticking out the top. That was done in Jan of 1966. Then that’s that last time I saw it as the rest of my tour was in the field, keeping up with the infantry. It seems as though we moved about every three or four days, and of-course filled sand bags on each move. But I no longer have a good memory on that. I do not know when but "B" Battery was split up (sometime in Feb or Mar) - that is of the 6 - 105's (old type -split trails) one gun was left in base camp and we took the other 5 into the field with us. For awhile we convoyed around and then at some point we were moved by Helicopter (Huey, CH-47's and the big 'Crane' {SkyCrane} helicopter) for most of the Tour. The SkyCrane chopper was used when we kinked a 105 tube and they brought out a new tube, lifted the old off and mounted the new. One time I was sent back into Base Camp with the Battery Commander to pick up the payroll. I carried a .45 on my hip, but did not know how to use yet; I learned later. Anyway, my first return to Base Camp was an eye opener as we now had wooden barracks and even some sidewalks and a separate Mess hall. The next day we returned to the field and paid everyone. For awhile I drove the Commander around in the jeep. One time we in base camp and we had a little nip and I drove through a large mud puddle and we bounced kind of hard. Capt Rice yelled at me and took over the driving and did a 180 and - yes - drove right back through the same mud puddle.
The 292's {radio antennas} were always a challenge and in my memory I see them always straight and true. But I must have held my camera wrong for the 292's look CURVED in my pictures. Also in one position, we took artillery ammo boxes and made furniture. As to driving the jeep -- it was only used for awhile in base camp. MOST of the time it was our field radio power source. Thus the radios were in the FDC and cables out to the jeep. The jeep only moved when a CH-47 showed up and we would back it into the Chinook. One time we were airlifted into position and then the rain came and we flooded and so we were taken back out to higher ground.THE "PRE-CONEX" FDC DAYS
The (first) CONEX was never in the field with us and it was located back at the Base Camp in Pleiku. We would dig a horseshoe foxhole in the tent; the middle part of horseshoe is where the chart board was located. Radios were at the bottom ends of the horseshoe. Thus we felt we might be able to keep working when even under fire. Thankfully we never tested this concept. So we always worked from a GP-small with the horseshoe pit in the bottom and map boards on the sand bags and the jeep providing power. We would need to start the jeep up about every 4 hours I think. That’s all we did with the jeep and trailer except to back onto the CH-47. Actually, the jeep and trailer were pulled onto the CH-47 by a tow line from the chopper. One time I was holding the center pole while a CH-47 was flying in the pick up a load of empty brass casings, slung three on a string. Well, he got too close to our tent and the next thing I knew I was standing in the open with just the tent pole in my hand and the tent was on down the way.Ed Note: Please refer to the War Story "An Unlikely Hero". It tells the tale of a "grown up" CONEX airmobile FDC.