with my Zippo, a gift from my brother. In the small mirror mounted on the side of my canopy, I saw Mike seated behind me. His helmet was painted black. His nickname “Hunter” was lettered on the front. He was one of the most experienced pilots in the unit.
“A recon team is trapped. Tries at getting them out have been fucked. We’re gonna join in and get this thing done.”
“Roger.” I shifted in my seat to get my chicken plate, a curved armored shield that covered my front from waist to neck, more comfortable. It sat heavily on my lap, held in place by the shoulder straps. The bottom edge dug into the top of my thighs. Most experienced gunship pilots put the plate on the floor and held it in place under their knees until they got close to their battle area. Some never used them. I endured mine for my entire first combat mission.
“We going over the border?” I asked.
“Yeah, we are. Laos. The team is out of NKP, Nakhon Phanom, Thailand. A couple of guys are still alive—maybe. The guy calling is not speaking English very well. Could be everyone’s dead and the NVA got the radio. Could be a trap.”
“Roger. Just let me know what to do.”
“Keep your eyes open. Go hot when I tell you. Look for enemy fire. Shoot when you see it. Shoot any bad guys you see. We’ll get more info when we get closer.”
“Roger.”
We flew north through a mountain pass. A broad green valley opened before us, dotted with tribal villages, each with a high-roofed communal house in its center. A river flowed north to south. After several miles, we flew over a city and big airfield.
“That’s Kontum, capital of Kontum Province, the next province north of Pleiku.”
“Roger.”
We flew up Highway 14 another twenty miles to a town sitting at the intersection of two big roads. We banked left and headed west toward the triborder area, twenty-five miles distant, where the borders of South Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia came together. A large military compound lay under our wing after we turned. It sat on rising terrain, overlooking the town below.
Mike announced, “Tan Canh, home of the ARVN 22nd Infantry Division. ARVN, that’s Army of the Republic of Vietnam. Got about a dozen American advisors down there, too.”
“What’s the town?”
“Tan Canh. Same name.”
A few miles further, off the south side of the highway, was Dak To. Two Cobras and two UH-1 Huey helicopters were parked to one side of the airstrip.
Mike landed and hovered to a refueling point beside the runway. I held the controls. He got out and refueled the Cobra, the engine and blades still running. A big, badly shot-up CH-53 helicopter was sitting off the western end of the runway. Several crewmembers scurried around it. I gawked.
Mike finished fueling and climbed back in. I asked, “What happened to him?”
“Jolly Green. Air Force helicopter. The first attempt to get the team. Looks like he got the shit shot out of him.”
“Roger that.”
I had a mix of emotions. Helicopter warfare was going to be a much closer fight than what I’d known. A rush of nausea and light-headedness was countered by a sense of exhilaration. I was getting back into the fight in a Cobra attack helicopter! Get ahold of yourself. Focus! I told myself. Concentrate on the tasks at hand.
Mike hovered over and parked the Cobra by the other helicopters. He shut the Cobra down and we got out and joined the other crews in a short briefing. The Hueys were from the 57th Aviation Company, call sign Gladiator, also out of Camp Holloway. The Cobras were from our own Pink Panthers. Captain Dennis Trigg, the Cobra flight lead and overall mission commander, gave the briefing.
“Radio freqs. We’ll be up 123.50, Victor. Understand the team is on 44.25 Fox Mike, but we’ll also try emergency push. Monitor that. Covey is up 233.00. Fly at altitude en route. Drop low level on arrival. Lots of triple-A out there. Be careful.” Triple-A was antiaircraft artillery. He had my attention.
We cranked the aircraft and took off as a flight of five headed into Laos.
As we approached the border, Mike pointed out the old Special Forces camp of Ben Het. A few hundred Vietnamese rangers occupied it with a couple of American advisors. Two Cobras were shut down on the airstrip. Mike flew over low and slow. I looked. They’d been shot full of holes. Good-sized chunks of airframe and rotors were missing from one. How had it had been able to fly at all, let alone get back across the border? Lucky crew!
“That’s Smitty’s bird. All the aircraft took hits. These two are out. You saw the Jolly Green.” Mike paused as if to let that register, and then continued. “Third time’s a charm. We’ve got to make this one work.”
We sure as shit do. I was wondering why I’d ever believed becoming an Army aviator was such a great idea. Why in hell had I pushed so hard to get back in the fight on my second tour of duty?
As we crossed the border, the chatter on the radios died down. Each transmission was all business. No more bullshit. This was big-time serious stuff. Our lives were on the line.
The Cobras dove to the jungle canopy. Yellow smoke rose from the trees part way up a hillside, marking the location of the survivors. The three gunships set up an oval racetrack right on the tops of the trees, covering each other, placing the bulk of our fire all around the billowing yellow smoke. After the run in, we broke in a tight left turn to come back around the racetrack again for another attack. Tense calls snapped over the radios. Covey, the Air Force forward air controller, was overhead directing a flight of A-1 Skyraiders, propeller attack planes. They dropped 250-pound bombs, napalm, and lethal cluster bombs on both sides of our pattern and all along the upper slopes of the hillside where the most intense fire was. Mike maneuvered our Cobra through a canyon walled with exploding bombs.
Bullets came at us from all directions. With the nose turret, I aimed the minigun and grenade launcher at the source of the tracers. A few NVA soldiers were visible through breaks in the trees. Mike was unleashing pairs of rockets from the Cobra’s stubby wings. We were taking hits. The sound of bullets cutting through the thin metal skin of our aircraft was like popcorn hitting the lid of a pan. I didn’t have time to think or pray. I had to do what I’d been trained to do: identify targets and fire.
The racetrack was established. The A-1s bombed everything around it. One of the Hueys entered the pattern, flew toward the yellow smoke, and then rocked back steeply into a rapid deceleration unlike anything I’d seen before. He came to a stop, hovering over the treetops while his crew threw ropes out both sides. Enemy fire erupted all around it.
I worked the Cobra’s weapons to cover the Huey and the other gunships. For a moment, I felt as if I were seeing it all in slow motion, a well-choreographed ballet. The performers moved with graceful precision, each perfectly executing his part. A close explosion wrenched me back to reality.
We shot as close to the Huey as we dared. After an eternity of taking enemy hits, the helicopter finally pulled up, with one guy hanging from the end of a rope. The other rope flailed in the rotor wash as the crew hauled it back in. The Huey turned and climbed for altitude, flying back out through the racetrack, while the Cobras continued to suppress the enemy fire. Then we all turned and followed the Huey, climbing as the A-1s dropped their remaining bombs on the jungle.
The
