Men in Green Faces (26 page)

As Jim fired, Brian ran straight back until he was behind Doc, the last man in the squad. The first thing he’d do back there, Gene knew, was reload, then wait until it was his turn again to open up. The Australian peel-off. They’d fire, then peel off until contact was broken, or they got to an area where they could flank the enemy and sting them to death.

Gene grabbed Jim as he passed. “I’ve got three hundred rounds hooked up. When I open up, put some distance between us. Take everyone. I’ll level the area, and meet you four hundred meters at eight o’clock.”

Jim nodded, kept going. Roland yelled, “Go!” and peeled off to the rear.

Gene opened up with the 60 in rapid three-to-five-round bursts. The clock system was effective in telling everyone where the enemy was or where to head in breaking contact. The patrol’s heading was always twelve o’clock. Jim would take the squad four hundred meters in the direction of the 8 on a clock face to reload, set up, and wait for him.

The jungle started to fall. Gene saw two white flashes firing back. Standing, he screamed, “Willie!” and bore down on the flashes. Not in bursts. He held the trigger down. Seconds before the belt ran out, the flashes stopped, and there was nothing. No sound. No gunfire.

He dropped on one knee, broke off another belt from around his chest, and reloaded. He stood, waiting. For the first time, in all the ops, he felt no fear. He wasn’t worried about whether he’d make it. He wanted contact. And then he heard movement.

Staring into the darkness, he listened for a clue of what was, or what was not, out there. It could be Jim or one of the others come back. God, he hoped not. There! Noise over to the right…about two o’clock. There it was again. He spun and headed out in the direction of eight o’clock.

Moving through the thick brush, the trees, he watched for signs of the squad. He weaved in and out through the heavy green foliage. The shadows were dark on dark. He felt relaxed, moving easy. Any other time, he would have been scared. Not now.

After one hundred and fifty meters, he stopped, squatting to listen. Was the noise still there? Was anyone following, thinking he’d lead them to the others? Hearing nothing, he rose and continued, to link up with Jim. He should be getting close now. He had to be careful, had to hear the password. Count it off, he told himself, count the steps…

He traveled approximately four hundred meters. No one was there. Had they left? Which direction? Where were they? He kept moving.

“Purple.”

He froze.

“Purple.”

“Haze,” he answered, and men in green faces stood up from their concealed positions, spread left and right before him.

“Had to say purple twice, Gene,” Jim said. “Anyone following?”

“No.” Throat dry, he felt the charge of adrenaline receding. He’d heard about the two SEALs before his tour. They hadn’t heard the challenge, hadn’t answered with the password. The rest of the squad had blown them away. Just riddled them. But they’d lived. Only humans he’d heard of who’d survived a SEAL ambush.

One by one, Jim called over a man at a time to tell them they were changing direction. “Everyone out here knows we have to go south to get out,” he whispered to Gene, as he had to the rest. “We don’t have much ammo left and we still have a long way to go.”

Gene nodded and stepped back. The sun was starting to rise, but it was still raining.

When Jim had spoken to everyone, he waved for Brian to move out, and pointed north. They were going farther into enemy territory.

Gene stepped over rocks. They were headed back, around the objective. Maybe they could get into an open area and call in for an airlift. He walked on, Roland in front of him, Alex behind.

Suddenly the rain stopped. He glanced up to see beams of sunlight coming through the trees. They seemed to reach out, to stretch, to touch the ground.

A thousand meters from the point where they’d been hit, things were quiet. Jim signaled to Brian to head east. An hour later, he called for a break. The squad circled, took security positions, and sat, keeping eyes and ears focused outward from the center.

Gene counted his remaining rounds. He had about a third left, with a long way to go. It was full daylight now, but still dark under the triple canopy, with rain pouring down again and covering their tracks. It was a blessing.

After the break, still weary, they continued north, farther and farther into enemy territory. They were agreed they’d traveled approximately five miles north of the target.

Brian’s hand went up. They froze, and stood fast while Jim went forward. Brian had stopped just prior to a clearing.

Gene moved up in response to Jim’s wave. A large village area lay before them, with a lot of enemy. There were fifty to a hundred of them. About sixteen hootches. Training exercises seemed to be going on. In one area, strings of barbed wire were lying on the ground, with men weaving through them. In another, a group of men attacked an unmarked target. Others were flanking another group.

“An NVA training camp,” Gene whispered.

Jim and Brian agreed.

Gene followed them back to the rest of the squad. They moved out to the west. Staying inside the jungle’s edge to remain out of sight, they moved with great speed and caution, sweat pouring down their faces, for the following two and a half hours.

Finally Roland attempted radio contact. Nothing. Distance and jungle prevented them calling in their Wolves to extract them. They patrolled on.

Jim snapped his fingers. Brian turned. Jim pointed southwest. The patrol changed direction and followed Brian, who never led them wrong.

They’d missed their pickup at the extraction point. The boat crew that had been waiting there would have moved back down toward Seafloat by now, Gene thought, as was planned and ordered in the PLO. If the squad hadn’t made it to the extraction point by 0900, the crews would know they’d be coming out at a different location. Soon, though, Seafloat would be sending out air patrols to see if contact could be made, or to see if the squad could be located by air.

No good, Gene thought. The air patrols wouldn’t even be in the right area, since the squad had changed direction several times. He ducked under draped vines. Twenty-four hours after the planned 0900 pickup time, the boats would return upriver and wait for radio contact, knowing that if the squad was still alive, they’d patrol back to the Son Ku Lon and then head west toward Seafloat.

But if no contact were made within a seventy-two-hour period, they’d assume the squad members were all dead.

He stared through the greenery looking for anything unnatural. All the shades of green, all the shades of brown. So damned many bushes, vines, tendrils, trees…He felt smothered, buried, within all of it, with the steaming heat pushing down, the clinging heavy mud…Boy, were they coming out in a different location—somewhere. The enemy must all have gone south looking for them. Smart move to head north, farther into enemy territory.

Gene stopped dead in his tracks at the sight of Brian’s fist held high in the air. Brian had spotted a small enemy force through the thick brush and trees and was pointing to their location. Sure enough. An NVA patrol of fifteen to twenty men was thirty to thirty-five meters away. The NVA were patrolling parallel to them, but heading in the opposite direction—moving into the area they had just left.

The squad hadn’t moved except to aim all weapons in the enemy’s direction. The trigger of the 60 felt warm and smooth under Gene’s finger, as the enemy patrol moved through their kill zone. They didn’t want contact now. They had very little ammo left, no radio contact, no friendly forces…they were isolated.

We could take the patrol out, Gene thought, and take their weapons and ammo, but that would give away their own position. That would bring a lot more than the fifteen or twenty walking by. Silence, he told himself, was golden.

The enemy patrol walked past and out of sight. Five minutes passed. The squad remained still. Gene breathed softly, smelling for any scent of more enemy, alert for trouble.

They’d crossed several small rivers. The dirty brown water had felt cool, and relieved some of the heat, and washed some of the stinking mud off their hands, weapons, bodies. But the coolness hadn’t lasted long. He stood immobile, awash in sweat, thinking that patrolling out so far during daylight hours was dangerous, and they’d been out almost all day. There were about four hours left until dark. They’d be able to pick up the pace then.

Jim signaled Brian to go southwest. Glad to be moving again, the squad headed out. Later, about twenty meters into an area so thick with foliage they could hardly get through it, Jim stopped the patrol and signaled a break. Staying in file formation, maintaining their fields of fire, they came to a halt.

One by one, Jim told each of them to rest. “We’ll be here until sunset,” he said, before sending Doc and Cruz out to cover up their tracks and their point of entry into the thick brush.

As they settled in, Gene listened to Jim and Roland, in soft, low voices, trying to make radio contact.

“Manger…Manger. This is Silent Night…Silent Night. Do you copy?”

Roland tried several times before putting the handset back on his H-harness, the two straps over the shoulder with a cross-strap in the back forming the letter
H
that they all wore.

On the harness, they could carry ammo pouches, first-aid gear, knife, flares, grenades, and anything they’d need on a patrol. You-O wore a vest Velcroed in front. It had small elastic straps. He carried his 40 Mike-Mike for his grenade launcher with it. Probably he’d rather be carrying his little black book of who owed him what, and be back on Seafloat putting everybody in debt about now, Gene mused.

He reached to take the narrow line being passed along from man to man. He connected it to himself and passed it on to Alex. If someone fell asleep, the person next to him would pull the line to wake him up, or if they took turns getting a little shut-eye, they could use the line.

Sitting there, he picked up a small twig and removed mud from his ammo belts and the 60 while he listened to the jungle. From time to time, he zeroed in on sounds that turned out to be natural. He kept a sharp eye on the ground around him for snakes or creepy-crawlies and glanced at the others, from time to time, to make sure they were all right.

It seemed as though only a short time had passed when word came down to move out. He stood up, stiff and sore. Jim waved
forward
, and the patrol picked up and headed west.

The mosquitoes were out in force by the time they came to a fairly large river about twenty meters across. Its banks were covered with thick jungle. Brian signaled
danger crossing
, and the patrol stopped. Jim called each of them up, instructing them to inflate their life jackets halfway.

Gene nodded as he listened to Jim’s whisper. Holding to each other, they’d use the outgoing current to take them out of the area.

“Don’t let go of the man in front of you,” he said. “Brian will keep us close to the bank.”

Gene studied the river. It was a dark night. No moon, no stars. Jim had his act together, no question. With a little effort, they could make it to the Son Ku Lon before daybreak.

Holding onto each other, they slid into the water. The current was swift-moving. Carried along by it, they were getting closer to being able to make radio contact. Friendly forces and food would be damned welcome.

Moving next to the bank with the current was a scary business. What-ifs set in. What if they floated into a village or an enemy crossing? What if this? What if that? Holding on to Roland’s H-harness with his left hand, Gene kept the 60 above water with his right. At his back, he felt the pull of Alex’s grip on his own harness.

Overhanging branches and trailing vines, tree roots and twigs, seemed to reach out and grab as he floated past. It began to rain again. Though it made it hard for them to see and to hear, the rain made it just as hard for the enemy.

Suddenly the squad stacked up. Gene pushed into Roland, and Alex pushed into him.

Brian had moved into the bank and held on. They’d all floated into him. One behind the other, they pulled themselves tight into the brush and froze.

Gene held his breath as he watched three sampans pass. Brian had heard the splashing of oars in the water, grabbed a tree root, and stopped the squad, giving them enough time to hide under the brush while the sampans went by. Their point man was good. Damned good. He doubted that anyone other than Brian would have picked up that sound among the other water and jungle noises surrounding them. Damned good, Gene thought again as they moved back into the current, about two feet from the bank.

After they’d floated for almost three straight hours, they were cold. Even though the water and the air were warm, they weren’t 98.6 degrees. The squad’s body temperatures had dropped. Hypothermia was setting in. To create body heat, they had to leave the water and walk. Jim took them out of the river and back into the jungle.

Patrolling felt good. As they moved south, Gene felt the sweat begin to roll down his body again.

After about seven hundred meters, and no enemy sightings, Jim signaled another break. Resting, Gene listened to the insect hum, the jungle sounds. It was almost 0400. Enough time had passed that the enemy probably believed the SEALs had just disappeared, as usual. Daybreak coming soon. Too soon. He heard Roland get on the radio.

“Manger…Manger. This is Silent Night. Over.”

“Silent Night, this is Manger. What is your location?”

Around him, Gene caught glimpses of smiles in the darkness and heard the sighs of relief.

“Manger, this is Silent Night. Stand by.”

From a few feet away, Gene watched Jim and Roland study the map, then radio in a code telling the squad’s exact location, before asking, “Manger, what is your ETA? This is Silent Night. Over and out.”

“Silent Night, this is Manger. Estimated time of arrival is about twenty minutes. Over and out.”

Like shadows, the squad left the area to return to the river. There they set security and waited for extraction. It wasn’t until the boats came into view that Gene realized how tired, cold, and hungry he was. Friendly boats…their boats. The sight was so welcome. He tried to swallow over the lump in his throat.