Then the war reared its UGLY head and reimposed itself on our senses, and we were once more on the move...this time joined by M-40 tracks.
I walked the right point flank position, receiving sniper fire directly at me three times this day. The sniper was following us around just out of sight, looking for the killing advantage...and I was the lucky one that always seemed to be right in his line of fire. Good thing he was a poor shot! My eyes were intently scanning not only for booby traps hidden in the ground, or set off by trip wires to kill and maim, but for Charley hiding behind nearby bushes, and in distant trees where snipers hide...
I couldn't help thinking about what would happen if I was killed and left this life...if for me there was no tomorrow. What would it do to my poor mother? It would kill her! But I had to forcefully cut those thoughts out of my mind or go crazy... The fear of death was a wall-to-wall, everyday thing you had to learn to live with...or not! Death could come any minute, at any hour of the day out here in the "Killing Zone." There was no such thing as a safe time.
Fighting through bamboo thickets and wait-a-minute thorn bushes...never knowing what awaited on the other side. It was a case of don't look up, keep an eagle eye open for that booby trap tamped in the ground...booby trap's can kill you and you'll never know what hit you. But don't look down, keep your eyes up and peeled for that sniper in the treeline. If you don't see them first, Sniper's can kill you dead where you stand. That's why God gave infantrymen two eyes...so he can look two directions at once. Good thing too, or he would surely die! But then, you don't expect to live forever do you?
The tracks just bulled right through, where no man could go...
Here I am again, taking five...then it's up and "Keep on Humping..." Two hours after this picture was taken, I would face war no more...The battle for me would be over. I would begin a tour of the best hospitals this man's army had to offer...
Just after our platoon passed this tranquil looking family scene, we received extensive automatic weapons fire at our backs from this hootch. One man was killed instantly, and two others wounded...
The family inside had vanished. The hootch and an extensive tunnel system we later found, were occupied by VC. Our 2nd lieutenant platoon leader called up Arty (artillery fire) and blew them away...
