Vietnam: A Television History; Interview with Edward J. Banks, 1982

Get into the now place surely. I arrived in Vietnam in August of 66 and I was greeted warmly as I remember when I rode in Jeep from regimental headquarters to battalion headquarters. We were fired upon as we were arriving at the battalion command post. It struck me as being everything that I had heard. It was like in short Harvard. My initial feelings I'm going over there for Outlook if you want. Was that I probably would not be coming back alive. That's right. The command and. I fully expected that the odds were very likely that that would occur. My Those were my initial feelings.

What do you mean what did you think you were going to do. As I. Understood our responsibilities over there at the time. We. Were situated in an area that was predominantly occupied by local VC Viet Cong guerrilla type personnel. There was some intelligence reports of what we refer to as hard core or main force b c it was uniform. We see occasional activity of no North Vietnamese units and an elite battalion of Vietcong called sappers. They say they were commando type raid type unit that would come in and

overrun command post insulations well-planned surprise attacks that would often only last for five minutes or 10 minutes. And now they're there now they're gone. And all you had left with the casualties to show it. What was your first mission. Is that what you're saying. I mean I had never been in combat prior to going to Vietnam. Initially I became the battalion logistics officer for as it's designated. But after about four months the company commander of a company h hotel company came down and

hepatitis and the battalion commander assigned me to command telcom me. So I did get some insight into the problems and the operations that were going on in our battalion area of responsibility. Prior to becoming a company commander which helped. I could see the problems from logistics and as well as from the comment and I took over a hotel company some time prior to Christmas in December of 1966. I remember one mission we had heavy rains that winter and all the Paddies are flooded and there was a town to the north of an artillery battery where we were

stationed. That was known to have a VC some time earlier several months prior. And this Sapper battalion that I mentioned had overrun and annihilated an entire Marine platoon. We decided to send a highly skilled ambush patrol into that village in the most unorthodox fashion. Hand-picked myself and another lieutenant and several CEOs in the company we had a seven man group that we ferried in a rubber raft to the perimeter of the town over the flooded paddies where we correctly suspect that

they would never think of having lookouts watching for somebody to come. The rubber raft deposited with us and then withdrew allowing us to work our way around the treeline to which was they had barbed wire all around the treeline perimeter of the village. We slowly worked our way around looking for a place to slip through and get into the village. At one point as we were following the perimeter. The perimeter made an indentation in the form of a square and was wide open rice paddy. Instead of following the indentation we walked along the dike of the paddy as as we got spread out across that dike in the open. They opened fire on us. They found that the first thing we heard was

a splash with which it made sense. It sent us diving into the mud as a grenade that was made the Splash went off and fire opened up to our rear guard on the patrol. And. Shot one VC to the rear of us and we immediately had a rally point that we had planned to go to if we were taking under attack and had to split. So we all dispersed to head toward the rally point which was back in some grave mans back along the route we had come from. Fortunate that we had chosen that because within about two or three minutes after we were heading back toward the rally point automatic machine gun fire opened up along.

That was it was it was obvious in the traces of the machine gun fire that they had had a machine gun tree targeted on the one road that lead in to this town so they were all ready for visitors. Fortunately for us the you know that wasn't the route that we had chosen for the rally point. And they I don't think they ever realized how we had gotten into the village or in the proximity of the villages because we hadn't come down the road and. Make a long story short. We sat out there and cover of the graves all night our radio could not work. It got batteries gotten wet. We were reduced to trying to click the receiver one for yes and two for now. And and back at the command post they would they were reduced to 20 questions as to ask Gary asking us

what we wanted and what what what the problem was and where we were and what kind of trouble we were in and we were unable to communicate. We had sweated out through the night and the following morning the company came down in force with with some Antos which were anti-tank type mechanized motorized weapons. And they lined up in force to cover us while we waited up to our necks through the flooded paddies out from my position. We we we had held that night. That was my first combat experience as far as actual contact in a life situation. I do remember it almost was my last. Song.

What did you think. It is indeed about the people. There was a cartoon that circulated around that time that quite apropos quite appropriately. Answered that question the cartoon showed a Marine NCO teaching indoctrinating new replacements and in Vietnam and then in one picture or one caption of the cartoon it said it was a picture of Vietnamese with pajama's black pajamas and a hat on. And the NCO had his point and he was pointing to that picture and saying this is the

friendly forces are these other friendly forces in the next caption. Was an identical picture of the same Vietnamese same outfit and the NCO is pointing and saying these are the enemy. In other words you never knew who was the enemy and who was the friend. They all looked like they are dressed like they were all Vietnamese. Some of them were were were Viet Cong. Tell me trouble. Did you have any feelings toward them any more.

Now the area over there was divided so to speak into. Villages or portions where the civilians were considered friendly or pro South Vietnam and other areas that were considered Viet Cong controlled and and were that where the civilians were considered to be. Pro Vietnam anti South Vietnam. Depending on where you were you had different outlooks as to what the situation was for example. And this is hard for a civilian to understand and maybe this is a little bit of philosophy but.

When you watch your troops move down the trail in a village that's known. To be. Harboring or at least it's known that there VC activity that's been going on and in that village and here a young woman of 22 or 23 years old that's pregnant and then in later interviews acknowledges that her husband is working in the city and the demand. And not a VC or anything but yet she sits and watches your men walk down the trail and watches a booby trap go off and kill and wound several of your men and she knows that booby traps there and she makes no move to warn the troops that it's there. This may actually have been the one. That has placed that booby trap there. Who is to say. Whether she is any less.

The enemy than the 12 year old Vietnamese boy. That's visi. That's in a ditch or trench behind the tree line sniping at you and actually find firing a weapon at you. Which one of these is more of an enemy. I could never answer your question. You seem to be saying what the situation is. You win the war in. It it's not. It's not like the San Francisco 49ers on one side of the field in the Cincinnati Bengals on the other. It's just not like that. It's. The enemy is all around you. One second you may be fired upon from the rear the next second from straight ahead on either flank.

You never know. And that was another frustrating. Situation that we endured over there. We were obliged to follow the rules of engagement. These rules of engagement. Prevented us from firing. Unless we physically could see a weapon. In. The other. The Viet Cong hand. What this boils down to is we had to wait until they fired upon us before we engaged. In virtually every situation. This is extremely. How would you like to be a walking target 24 hours a day. Not to mention not knowing whether your next step is going to be your last because you're going to be stepping on of a booby trap. Wherever you are operating wherever you walk wherever you went. The main road into the battalion C.P. had to be

cleared every morning with engineers in mind take detectors before we could allow a vehicle to leave this command post to head up to denying that the regiment are anywhere. We lost a lot of engineers. We lost a lot of vehicles from mines. VC would come in and plant on the roads during the night. It's very very frustrating and harrowing war. Some of the turmoil is going on. In Northern Ireland is about is. Gives one an idea. You never know when a car is going to blow up but some act of terrorism is going on. This is. This is what it was all about over Vietnam. Except you didn't have streets of there fighting on. It was rice rice paddies and jungle and bamboo and huts and

rivers and you name it. There's more countryside but that same kind of terrorism and. Guerilla activity. That's the way a guerrilla war goes. It's not dimensional. You don't know he's out there and your ear or you know you're here and he's here there and everywhere. You you are actually do. And then he said to us around the fire. They feel you in that. That's precisely what the situation was. Each in each battalion was assigned what we code word as a t l t o r which stood for tactical area of responsibility.

This is a defined geographic area and the battalion was assigned the responsibility of operating in that area and clearing it and securing it and freeing it of VC activity and maintaining control in the battalion. Each rifle or infantry battalion consisted of four rifle companies. So what each battalion would do is assign. A quarter of its tactical area of responsibility. As a company operating area to each of the four companies. And the company commanders like myself are responsible for planning activity in that area patrol activity ambush activity search and destroy activity. In short our mission was

to find the VC that were operating in the area. And destroy them or forced them out of the area. This is said a whole lot easier than it was done. It. Simply put as I can. Search and destroy mission men going out into a particular operating area. And. Normally enforced searching for known Viet Cong that were in that area. And. If you were able to encounter them destroying them take take engaging them and killing them because now you

see them when you're in contact with them and they're the enemy you kill. That's as simply as I can state what a search and destroy mission. A lot of times you're maybe searching for tunnels are caves and bunkers. The Viet Cong had a propensity for. Quite intricate hiding places and a lot of them bought tunnels and caves and whatnot that they dug on the ground. They were quite ingenious people. They. Seemed to agree with him but it is this point he wanted to destroy these things and destroy the baby. That they were that

there were houses burned. There's no question that controlling the controlling factor on that was difficult for him. And I'm talking about the position of the company commander. One of your units is moving through. A particular village area and even under orders not not to burn any huts or anything. Occasionally hut was burned or houses burned and no one was going to say who did it. Again I think one has to understand. The sheer frustration of the situation over there.

Yes. It is. You're testing memory now. But as I recall a free fire zone. Was a term designated to an area that was known to be totally unfriendly and generally any activity in that area was considered is considered to be Vietcong activity.

If I recall this also was. An area that. Was. An area where you could fire artillery without. Without a clear. It was not considered to be. Inhabited by friendly getting to me. And. Again if I recall completely what. All a free fire zone. Was entailed. Any. Civilians in that area had been warned that it was a free fire zone and they were subject to be fired upon. They were seen in that area. I was out off limits. If you're in there you can see the VC. And you can be fired upon. Just the same as there is a general. A effect.

And dark over there anyway there were civilians moving out anything mood after dark anyway. It could be fired upon because no one supposed to be moving after but. This was a free fire zone as opposed to. A zone where you might have easy. Activity you might be fired upon a given time or encounter mines or booby traps but. It nevertheless was considered by higher headquarters. To be friendly territory. This was incidentally cause for great frustration on the part of commanders over there. I can think of five or six times off the top of my head. My personal experience where I ended up having troops pinned in a rice paddy somewhere.

By automatic weapons fire and requested artillery fire from the area from where the fire was coming and was refused because according to the maps it had high headquarters. That was a quote friendly area. They couldn't convince me when I was pinned. Had men been and I was taking casualties and the weapons fighters coming from that so-called friendly area. But. This is this is the case and we were restricted as far as firing artillery calling in close air support on that particular village. We were receiving by they say I can remember five six times. That. Type of situation occurred with my company. I'm sure it was common place with everyone else the command that over there at least at least throughout our area of operations. By. Me. Very difficult thing to actually.

It Back with. Me with an area of the warm and down the road that way that people could be the way. How did that work. One the one way that I can recall that they did I know that that they had helicopters go over with because I know they had helicopters dropped leaflets printed in Vietnamese rising people in certain areas. I don't know of any other means which were taken by I know of those two. I mean do we use them. At least now. And that wasn't exactly my area of

responsibility. I was told. This is a free fire zone. This is not. And I had enough to worry about without worrying about why one was going why wasn't another wasn't the. Answer. That wasn't my area of concern. In that area. But I don't mean to play all. But tell me. How you came. To be in the area to get that to take it back. At the end of all the area the area we're talking about. A place called Donley and. It was a

free fire zone. Our operating area itself. Was crisscrossed by quite a number of rivers. These rivers would be. Used quite now. I don't think any of them were more than. 15 to 20 to 30 yards wide at the most. But they were deep and they were quite square. And when you. When you are carrying 40 or 50 pounds. Of ammunition flak and how many of them the equipment. You step in a hole lose your footing. And that kind of river to drown. We actually had some drama. So what I'm leading up to is quite simply it was a difficult. Terrain to navigate. You. Constantly had geographical problems. This one particular.

Town Called the story and. Was. Nestled. In. Wallace at the intersection of rivers there were three rivers that if you can visualize the letter H and then turn at h over on its side in one of the pockets of that age with that side with H. Lay the city little padded down again and that that was a known hotbed camp out you might say of the local B.C.E.. It was so difficult to read. She was bordered on the West by about a thousand meters of open rice paddy. And on the other three sides bordered by a river. So it was very difficult for somebody to approach. And get into that village without the VC knowing and taking the easy.

Escape route. We planned. We planned a detail two company operation involving a Golf Company of the Second Battalion First Marines and hotel company which I commanded. I was put in charge of the operation as a senior company commander. What we did. Gulf Company. Formed the blocking position along the axis of the age. One platoon. From my company. Moved in on the north side. Of the river. Across the river from the town to block up there. My command group and one of the other buttons from my company crossed in the dark of night in a little rowboat. We actually set up a ferry line and actually two or three men at the time and cost them a boat. And.

Fled across the southern portion. Of the town blocking them. The plan was for the. Remaining two of my company to come across. Across the river out to the west and seal off on that open Pattee area. And once we had it completely. Encircled us around it that we were going to sweep through it and search and destroy and what we see we found searching out the VC in the village and destroying them. Everything. Went according to plan. Except. The lookouts at the VC that were in the village had. Encountered or heard the 3rd Battalion which was to seal off that with the men with Pattie's were before they could get across. They fired warning shots. What have.

You been telling me about this operation. Gather you said it's a perfectly ordinary operation and it is easy. But a special name or anything you just don't know is strictly a small small scale operation. We we had all but the western portion of the village surrounded as we started to surround the western portion lookouts. Fired warning shots. And. Approximately 25 to 30 VC look like made for us we see since they were wearing uniforms and carrying what looked like mortars and a 50 caliber machine gun on their shoulders all started running out to the west and southwest of the village across the open areas.

The left flank of the 2nd Platoon which is on the extreme southwestern corner of the village side of them and Gage's them by machine gun at them. They thought they had about three of them. A quick check maybe they saw some blood found some blood trails with no trace of any of this. The engagement was reported to battalion headquarters in either battalion or I guess regimental headquarters decided to insert what was called The sparrowhawk. Span. It was a code name for standby for tomb it was available to seal off the escape of VC in an incident such as this by helicoptering them into an area in front of the VC to block them

and. And prevent their escape. Much the same way as the old highway patrol in this country might radio ahead to set a roadblock up somewhere. This same principal battalion notified me that they had put in the span of walking in the in the area a few thousand meters to the west of where we were approximate position of where they. Were we sighted the VC it at the same time. Battalion advised me that a platoon from the 1st Battalion First Marines was operating. To the south west of us and they were. Being given. Up. I was being given an operational control of that platoon again in an effort to seal off the escape that had taken place.

This in fact. Occurred. The Pretending that. Was the span of opportunity and landed in an area to the northwest of where we were and immediately were taken under fire by VC and started sustaining heavy casualties. They couldn't they couldn't even. Get to the casualties without taking more casualties. They try to crawl out and get one of the men that were hit. That man would get hit. The initial plan had been to box in the area and just make it a bigger sweep area. But this this plan had to be aborted because of the critical nature of the critical position that the span of opportunity in. I mean I had joined up with the 3rd Battalion of my company and I advised

the company commander of Gorkha me to take control of my other two which are still on the other side of the river and trace behind me or follow up behind me and I was going to take them to the Tombs with me and head out to link up with 15 because they were in serious trouble and the casualties were continuing to mount. He's 25 or more. You know this is unknown. This whole area is not a state operation. At this stage we weren't sure. We had sighted 25 or 30 VC but we had no idea how much was out there. We did know that. The

platoon was under heavy fire. The entomb from the 1st Battalion that had been assigned to me to the southwest was also encountering fire. And as I started moving out of the superintends hotel come in there with me. We reached the southwestern corner of this village that we had planned to search and destroy and started receiving fire ourselves sporadic and not. I guess you call it moderate small arms fire. And it was coming from an obvious long distance away about a hundred nine hundred yards away across all these open panties treeline. I started I said in the second battalion and. Had the third detune start moving on a skirmish line which means kind of abreast. Up to the north

west. So I hadn't started up to the north west first to allow the second midterm to provide covering fire for them and I called in artillery support to fire on a tree line which was part of the free fire zone. And neutralize this fire. Anticipating that by the time the artillery flowed it was over with me had zeroed in on the target. My third platoon would be about half way across those open paddies still out of range of the effect of the artillery fire but close enough to make a final assault on that tree line. Once we lifted the artillery barrage everything went just according to my visualization. Until. We reached the point where the fighting was about three or four hundred yards away from the treeline and artillery had zeroed in on the target.

But once we requested the barrage we received a check or fire in area because. On the line between where the guns were fired from and the target there was an emergency. Medivac helicopter circling trying to get in to get some of the casualties out from this potentially. We with that with that helicopter on the target line they automatically checked fire a cease fire of any sort in the way of artillery support. This was well this was disconcerting to say the least. But I was committed so I just decided on the spot to remain committed and continue pressing in with just the covering fire from the second into the southwest corner of the village.

The lead squad of that 3rd Battalion got about 100 to 150 meters from the tree line and fire increase from the tree line directly to the front. And they also started receiving fire from both their flanks. They were in a horseshoe what we call a horseshoe be fans a horseshoe ambush that was quite commonly used by the Viet Cong over there. The grass the situation in form the second into command. His name was Brian O'Connor. He was going to have to assault the Southwest left. Portion of that horse you ambush the 3rd Battalion was down in the Pattie's unable to even move at all. And taking casualties and taking heavy fire at this point. Second Lieutenant assaulted that left flank and. And

routed what we see were on the left flank. Of the command group followed behind them and then assault across the paddies which are difficult because. You're sinking into almost to your knees in water and mud as you ran across the paddies carrying about 50 pounds on you run of 800 yards like that is quite tiring. The company gunnery sergeant was wounded coming across the panties as bullets were flying everywhere. We got in. I recall the the Aadi artillery forward observer ran back out about 200 yards into the paddies and got the company gunnery sergeant put them up on the shows carried him in to where we had gotten the protection tree lines and this left flank of the horseshoe ambush. He was quite playful and in fact. You did.

Say to him just don't be fooled by the by the end of the first day of the operation what is the net. The net result is we we ended up getting to that detune the special opportunity. About nine o'clock that night. They had 11 men left that weren't wounded or killed. Out of about 30. Out of about 30 men were very low and out. About 30 men. There are 11 left and we called in helicopters to come in that night in the darkness to get the wounded and killed out. The first helicopter load we got out was the last one because the Vietcong opened up on the helicopter room and the pilot and no other pilots were willing to volunteer to come in in the darkness

like that and try to get any more out. Putting it in 1966. And all we had to do since 61 were putting in a short interval 50 feet. And in 66 my. Helicopter pilot volunteered to come in. And we got a load we get the wounded out of some of the dead out but the. Helicopter was taken out of the fire by being calm as it was taking off. Helicopter pilot was hit and no other pilots were willing to volunteer to try to come in and get what remained out of the people personnel

remaining the three. There three dead and one wounded from hotel company that was wounded on the way to link up with Bravo that we were on the last leg of our efforts to get over there and it is too dark to get him out. So. You know we just had him with us. By this time he was too weak from loss of blood to walk. So we ended up in the day's activity carrying the three dead from the hospital. Plus I wounded out of that area and up onto the railroad tracks was his relative high ground. You. Describe. That. First day was pretty hectic. We. Ended up going some 36 plus hours without food or water or sleep obviously and

that is saying a lot. When you consider the temperature was around 100 degrees no water no food no rest were pretty tired Marines at the end of that first day which. Was probably almost dawn the next day. The operation that actually started around midnight the night before we started moving out of that time command post at midnight to get in position by 6:00 the following morning. The. Second day and third day of this three day operation that started with what appeared to be a simple search and destroy mission. Were not particularly eventful late. They were more or less mopping up. It was more or less a time of mopping up. And winding down the operation. The second day.

We remained on those railroad tracks while golf company continued the and swept into our positions to make sure that there weren't any VC remaining in the area between the river tracks and golf company. The. Afternoon the second day. Both companies with a battalion command group out in the field with us at this point. Moved down to the south east. And down in the area just south of the village that we originally were going to surround and search and destroy. The following morning. They say day three were on. We. Swept through. To the west. From where we stopped the night before. That. We encountered wanted to see a couple booby traps one. Nothing.

Nothing other than extremely light activity. We. Got caught up blocking out a railroad on the railroad tracks. And by this point we were far south of. Where. Highway where this black hawk Petunia was probably about two miles south. And. There were two villages and at that time Wantage swept and searched to get to see if there were any remaining VC. And then. We. Swept through the first village which I remember had particularly heavy on the grill. It was very difficult to move through that village. We. Actually were moving from single file and three different columns in and the command group was behind a squad of the first platoon

in the center. And the second meeting that the company was tracing behind the command group. We had the easiest route through the villages we checked for any activity we saw no signs of any anybody civilian Vietcong or otherwise. As we move through the village. We were the first the squad that we were behind in the command group were the first ones to get to the western edge of the village. As we reached the western edge of the village or open area Pattie's grave mounds in the paddies. And could see another treeline another village about 300. Yards of 300 meters to our front further west. The squad in front of me started taking cover behind the grave use. Vietnam was not a place you'd like to stand around and look around out

in the open you may not be living long if you did. They said they started moving behind a grave man in the command group moved down. Meanwhile Lieutenant O'Connor who is commanding my second battalion. Had reached the edge of the tree line and moved down to make a visual reconnaissance to see what the terrain looked like that lay directly ahead of us. He had just turned around and was starting to move back to join his platoon when automatic weapons fire opened up from the village. And this was about. 15 10 15 seconds after the word was passed back that they had noticed some movement in the village ahead of us. They couldn't determine three or four hundred yards who or what the movement was made see some movement. Some of the houses and next thing we knew were receiving automatic weapons fire. Lieutenant O'Connor was hit in the left shoulder and above the heart and

he's bleeding quite severely. I remember sloshing back to where he was. He went down with the company corpsman and. We started returning fire and providing a covering base of fire calling artillery and schedules and emergency Medivac helicopter to command and get Lieutenant O'Connor around. Lieutenant O'Connor I recall was delirious. He kept trying to get up the stairs taking three of us to keep him on the ground. He kept trying to get up to get to his platoon to deploy them and command them not realizing how seriously he's hurt the calm and put a hemostat. On the artery to stop the bleeding. And we were successful in getting a helicopter to take out Lieutenant O'Connor at the same time

as we assaulted the village two or three hundred meters to the front of the house where the fire was coming from. Unfortunately the. Lieutenant. Jumped up and tried to get off the helicopter as it was taking off and there was no medical assistance and a corpsman a doctor on the helicopter. So. When he not his dad or the crew chief didn't know how to put it back on him and. He was dead on arrival at the aid station. But that it would have died anyway. It was we should say we were quite serious. So some 29 31 Some people said Campbell

66 is 75 years 60s when you asked me for these twins. You in 1982. Mr. Banks Yes Campbell 1966 and what we saw a last week. We just don't want to see that ever starting over again. I think bodies give you most of the details before I really get lost. We were in Vietnam. They kept saying to us that they're all you know it wasn't there wasn't one line doing hundreds of lives which my reply was but if that is the case take the salt mine and they ended up taking us to the decision to leave. When

we got to 20 minutes. We were there in the morning. I hadn't seen either my colleagues none of the people that the chairman of the village met us. And said that this what happened on January the 13th just 1967. It had just moved. On. Thirty first a battalion of the U.S. Marines swept through this village. They shot and killed a total of 145 persons. One hundred and fifteen were shot dead on the spot. To them these 115 105 belong to this hamlet of people. That's that's the first stage that I believe was the VC infrastructure was actually outside that he was going to say that they are wrong. I said I I would like to have him but the only people left

who are alive. So one of the first thing that they gave us an interview with the boy. Who said he was 11 years old at the time. So the first time what he says is I was only 10 at the time. I was really afraid that the number of friends. There was artillery shells. In my house at that time there were only women and children. We were only women children eccentrics said. So the Marines come in. They shut off the ears of some people. And then they shot up and causing the gas to burst all over the place. They asked us about that they say we simply didn't know what the PC was. So they followed us. They killed all the domestic animals. There is other choice the boy then claims that his whole family was killed. I'm telling you this was his own film with his

whole family was killed. He was in the palm of his hand. He went to. He showed us the wound on his arm and he has there is some occasions that I can tell that he's up against one of the women. Very quickly done. The other woman age 43. Basically there were six six Vietnamese who basically claim that what happened on that day was that the Marines came in and systematically destroyed. Everyone who was there. Any people who survived survived. By accident. And it's in that background I'm wondering if you could. Describe yourself the events as far as you are concerned of getting to that age. A woman went on the camera and roll. My guns

and. We. Started assaulting. The Village. To 300 meters to the front. At the same time as the emergency. Medivac helicopter. Carried lieutenant. O'Connor away. There was quite. A bit. Of movement activity in the village as we assaulted. Understand. The. Psychological. Aspect. Of an. Assault is to create panic to create fear on the part of the enemy. Everyone is online. Generally a brast firing as rapidly as they can and anything that moves. This is to break down the

regime or the discipline of the enemy and instill fear in order that they panic and rap in the midst of an assault. You do not stop to pick targets if it moves you shooting and. The assault took anywhere from two to three minutes maybe five minutes at the outside as quickly as I could determine that they were or there was no longer any fire being returned. I ordered cease fire and salvation. I would say that. As I recall. Three. Civilians that I saw go down being shot in the midst of that assault. I was a little boy. Two were women.

They were running and if you can envision running into a line of fire. You can envision what happened. Anyone can get hit just like if there is a robbery and a gunfight on the street there may be several that maybe several bystanders hit. Even though knowing that no one's aiming particularly at them. The most that I could anticipate that may have been killed in that village and the way civilians during that assault and being generous when I say this might be 10 or 12 or 15 civilians we weren't. We remained in the village checking out to see if they were in fact any VC remaining in there possibly five or 10 minutes 20 minutes at the most and we commenced to return toward Highway 1 and eventually back to the committee that the tank command. As one element of the assault force reached

the external the the the the other side of the village. They observed VC and took them on the fire. You know crossing a river. Somebody's water down to the southwest southwest and then to the village. But we were we were in no position to continue on in pursuit engagements. You know we were ordered to sweep it and its laws were to sweep that village in. And what are those two villages. And we had done that and we. We are obviously rather the VC there were in there and we held up right there. And our next door is what was turned around and we turned that the whole operation was was closed and we were heading back to the command post. That's that's what I recall when I remembered what happened.

And I was there with the. Why was it in the village such a short period of time did you do it. When you do a search and destroy job on it or did you just decide that was there was nothing there to worry about or what it seems given all of this that's going on. You've lost the man on the outskirts and yet you say you went at that age you say 15 minutes it seems very fast to an outsider. I mean please explain them. That's not that's not very fast. We. We did not do a you know we did not do what you'd call a thorough search of a village and I was digging around probing around for tunnels and secret caves or anything like that.

Fifteen minutes is a quite lengthy time to search every house in the village when we talk about a village we were talking about not villages as we understand a five or ten thousand population we are talking about a cluster of anywhere from. Eight to 10 houses little and when I say houses in my one room little straw you know tin roof with straw you know maybe straw roof houses and built a bamboo. Nothing. Nothing fancy one or two houses and then maybe half a dozen of them at at the most. All 10 or 12 in a given bill. And it is not a lengthy operation to town unless you're in there. You know on a thorough search.

Mission where you. Will be. Actually digging and probing and trying to find tunnels and everything. Otherwise it's just like searching this room or searching five or six buildings one story building. How does it take the search and check the bushes and check all around and see who's remaining and see what's in there. That's 15 20 minutes is plenty of time. And I know that I am going from memory as to how long I'm guessing it was about is about 15 or 20 minutes might have been 30 minutes might have been 10 minutes. It was I do recall that it wasn't long term because we turned around and got where we were heading back at. We have been talking with us. Oh. Yes.

Some of them say. Do you remember the incident as being one. No. The one day. Was just a couple of hours into me as stuff they were given was that everybody in the village was to be destroyed. Would that be misinterpretation. No that was one of the guys but you know the instructions were quite clear to me which is to destroy anybody. And would that be a fair summation of the orders as you see them now. I never in my life. Gave anything inferring.

Any such type of action. Or even. Intimating in any way that that was to be done. On the contrary in the actual salt itself the moment that it was obvious that the word was not being any fire returned and that you know that the only thing that was moving around in the village was civilians. I personally vocally and physically yelled up and down lying to cease fire. And consolidate the position. I'm not saying that a. That is the possibility of a subordinate. Or a junior commander. May have. You know his orders

as they were passed on to his men. May have been interpreted that way. That is a possibility. And I am not. I would not discount. That. Having occurred although I doubt that a carrot but I would not discount that possibility I might add one other thing that I think is relevant concerning the discussion we had as to Vietnamese allegations that a lot of civilians was killed the first day of this three day operation. One of the things I do recall. In talking to the company commander of golf company who's who is endeavouring to catch up with us and also get to that Petunia's about. But soon

he came up and alerted me on the radio that the Viet Cong were using civilians as shields. And trying to slow his movement. He and both he and the first platoon commander. Of hotel the hotel company first lieutenant commander reported that to me. While we were down in southwest the that the Viet Cong was firing from behind civilians using shields. I don't know how many civilians were killed. I chose to keep moving. That side with the man that you had with you at the time the experienced soldiers good soldiers and the special good Marines.

They're exceptionally dedicated Marines there. There's no question that some of them you know had lost some people that they. They were very close to again trying to project yourself into a situation that existed over there is extremely difficult. If you can imagine sleeping day and night. With somebody and you knew your life depended on that person because he's by his side and he had he had firepower and support back for you you know and. And watch him. Go up in the air. And. You know. Live and dead. Know. Full of shrapnel from a booby trap in mine. After three or four months of living day and night with that same

individual. What do you feel in your mind. Well you know I saw a lieutenant who is supposed to be an example of this plan was an outstanding officer. I had to physically disarm him. He's ready to shoot and obviously see he's a VC suspect. But he had fresh bleeding wounds from an area where we was receiving a rash from the night before. And well one of this. One of the men in this the tennis platoon was killed. He wanted to kill this VC right on the spot in frustration and anger over the loss of his man. I had to disarm and. I can't describe what goes through your men's heads over there. You know that the sheer frustration and fury

at the atrocities that and and the disasters and calamities. That these men experienced. Part of their comrades and themselves. Is that anything that you feel that you. Think that means we put him pretty fully fully that day. I mean do you think that it said that you feel that I've either left. Or you would like to die that day is it. Or is it that the whole thing. I mean I appreciate you getting to me. You've been extremely straightforward. Come on Wednesday night. You know this is what we've been getting to has been a very nasty business to put it back. But do you feel there is something that I. Either Has you or that you would like to add to say.

Yeah. There's one thing. There's definitely one thing too. That anyone viewing is should. Realize. That. Any comments. From Vietnamese not comments necessarily from Vietnamese civilians with you know their comments that you know the the enemy that we fought they killed and wounded and maimed American soldiers the American Marines. This enemy was Vietnamese. It was the people that we will be friendly to. In South Vietnam we're also Vietnamese. But it's quite easy for someone to hear

Vietnamese who during the war was or still is now. A Viet Cong and consider the Americans their enemy. It's quite easy for them to stand up and make allegations of atrocities that Americans committed over there. It's not exactly the same as a Vietnamese who is simply sympathetic with South Vietnam government and not in league with the Viet Cong standing up and saying the same thing. You know. Which was it this village that you're talking about was a free fire zone. There's no mistaking that the casualties that I personally witnessed over there it wasn't civilians find weapons or set booby traps and this you know young men around you know

young men who were pro South Vietnam did not live in Viet Cong occupied an active areas over there. And young women who were pro South Vietnam didn't stay at it because we are tortured them and that they literally recruit them into or conscript them into the service of the Vietnam if they're found out they stay they were the enemy was if they were out there and you know they if they we were frustrated by not being able to say they are the enemy because they didn't have a weapon in their hands as I said earlier who's to say they are less of an enemy than a cave with weapons that if they set the trap or watch watch and hoping that someone is about to die and they can stop a person raising their hand and mourning the person but they don't. They just watch them as like when someone walk in front of a car and not stop them or try to

yell and watch out for the car the less sense me is what don't sense that you perhaps feel the bitterness towards him now more than these people that you came in contact with them but that would be a sad state. I don't feel bitterness toward. The Vietnam War. I feel bitterness toward the way it was handled that I feel I've been this toward the. I feel bitterness towards the. Way. It was presented to the people in this country. You know a lot of people were maimed for life or were killed Americans were over there. In an environment where we were not permitted. To use all the weapons. At our disposal. Site. It's like Ted

Thomas and Cisco they can go play Cincinnati tomorrow. But again with this