by Eric Hammel
As the Dusters, Ontos, quad-. 50 trucks, and truck-mounted .50-caliber machine guns virtually demolished several buildings, squads of Hotel/2/5 Marines launched assaults directly into two or three of the buildings overlooking the stalled vehicles. Most of the NVA fled. When the buildings had been cleared, everyone behind the crater converged on the trucks, mounted up, and continued to fire into the buildings. Corporal Meadows's squad and several others had by then advanced on foot about half the distance to MACV. It was as risky to return as it was to advance, so they kept going.
When Corporal Watkins and Corporal Pettit returned from the cab of their truck to the crater, Lieutenant Perkins was dead.
Unaware of what was going on behind them, they and Corporal Bill Stubbs kept blasting away at the NVA in the houses on the left side of the street. Watkins thought it was like fighting a hive of bees. Plenty of fire still came from buildings overlooking the lead truck and from other buildings farther up the street. To Watkins, it looked like NVA were all over the place.
Suddenly, without warning, the rest of the convoy careened around the stalled lead truck and ran the rest of the way to MACV. It is doubtful anyone knew the three corporals were still manning the crater because a dead officer was pinned beneath their truck. Captain Christmas assumed the men in the lead truck had obeyed orders and climbed aboard another vehicle.
Watkins, Pettit, and Stubbs remained marooned beside the truck and Lieutenant Perkins's body for many minutes—none of them knew how long. The incoming fire was intense, and just the three of them were left there. There was no way they could get the lieutenant's body out. None of them had ever been to Hue; none of them knew where they were. They only knew that MACV was somewhere farther up the bullet-swept street.
All three corporals were slightly injured, and they were all shaken by their predicament—Stubbs most of all, because that street at that moment was no place to be with less than a week left in Vietnam. Watkins had a gash in his foot and a painful hematoma on his back, where he had landed when the truck hit the crater. It didn't help their outlook when they remembered that they were hiding behind an ammunition truck.
They made one last effort to free Lieutenant Perkins's body. When that failed, they left. Their only possible course of action was to fight their way up Highway 1 to MACV, however far it might be. The three were experienced bush fighters; they made the most of the ample cover and wriggled along houses and walls, block by interminable block. The NVA were everywhere, behind cover, firing from unseen positions at ground level and from upper-story windows and roofs.
It seemed to take forever for the three corporals to get to MACV, but they did it, and without being shot. When they got inside the friendly compound, they reported that Lieutenant Perkins was still back at the truck and that another truck or a tank would be needed to move the stalled vehicle. Corporal Pettit went back with a tank and a Hotel/2/5 fire team, Corporal Stubbs was sent to rejoin Alpha/1/1, and Corporal Watkins was sent to the MACV dispensary to have the gash in his foot bandaged. When he got there, the dispensary was full of dead and seriously wounded people. An Army medic was just tying off the bandage when Pettit returned with Lieutenant Perkins's body. As soon as Watkins and Pettit officially identified the lieutenant, they also returned to Alpha/1/1.
*
At about 1600, Hotel/2/5 and the Alpha/1/1 stragglers crossed Highway 1 to join the main body of Alpha/1/1 at Hue University. By then, the NVA resistance in the massive structure had been subdued by Golf/2/5, and Alpha/1/1 was mopping up and setting in its own defenses. When the Alpha/1/1 stragglers reached the university, command of their company passed from Gunnery Sergeant J L Canley to 2nd Lieutenant Ray Smith, who had arrived with the day's convoy. Though Lieutenant Smith had only been in-country for a short time, he was Alpha/1/l's senior lieutenant. The company executive officer had been sent home the day before, at the conclusion of his tour.
Hotel/2/5 relieved Alpha/1/1 of responsibility for securing the university. The new arrivals filtered through the classrooms, looking for NVA stragglers and locating the upper-story windows with the best vistas. Though the Hotel/2/5 Marines were told that the enormous building had been cleared already, their first experience in city fighting had taught them to take no chances, and they grenaded or shot up every room they passed. The company's 60mm mortar section set up in the courtyard in the center of the university block and immediately began firing at suspected NVA strongholds to the southwest while observers in the upper-story windows called the shots. As Hotel/2/5 was clearing rooms and setting in at the university, Alpha/1/1 crossed Le Loi Street to clear several small government buildings along the south bank of the Perfume River, southwest of the Nguyen Hoang Bridge.
At 1815 the NVA attacked the Alpha/l/l-Hotel/2/5 perimeter around Hue University and Doc Lao Park. The Communists delivered intense fire from across the river and from the southwest, down Le Loi Street. One of the Marine M-48 tanks that had been in continuous action since noon on January 31 was struck and disabled, though not destroyed, by a 75mm recoilless rifle round. Alpha/1/1 and Hotel/2/5 Marines blew off 4,300 M-16 rounds, 2,000 M-60 machine-gun rounds, ninety-five M-79 grenades, eighty-five 90mm tank rounds, and twenty-five 81mm mortar rounds. When the exchange finally subsided around 2200, no one could guess what damage all that fire had caused, but one Marine was dead, eight needed to be medevacked, and thirteen were treated for minor wounds and returned to duty. Intermittent sniper fire from across the river continued to strike Alpha/1/l's riverfront positions all night. The Marines returned fire in kind, though probably without much effect.
*
February 2 was Fox/2/5's first chance to look around the "big city," and most of the troops felt out of place after weeks and months of tromping the bush. When Lance Corporal Ernie Weiss unexpectedly stepped into a pharmacy on a street just east of MACV, he remembered that he had lost his toothbrush a week before his arrival in Hue; his mouth felt cruddy. Though everyone had been warned against looting, Lance Corporal Weiss could not overcome the impulse to replace his lost toothbrush at the expense of the missing pharmacist whose shop Weiss felt he was liberating. The way Weiss was thinking, the toothbrush was the most important thing in the world. When he finally went to use it for the first time that night, it was missing. No wonder. By then, Ernie Weiss had had a terrible day.
After Lance Corporal Weiss liberated the pharmacy, his platoon was sent back to MACV. Then, toward evening, the entire company was called out. Unbelievably, on direct orders from Task Force X-Ray, Captain Mike Downs had again been ordered to attack toward the Thua Thien Provincial Prison and eject the NVA and VC who were holding it and the Provincial Administration complex.
Captain Downs left his 2nd Platoon at MACV as the company reserve and crossed Highway 1 with his company CP group and Fox/2/5's 1st and 3rd platoons. The assigned route was southwest along Truong Dinh Street, the treelined thoroughfare along the edge of Hue University, between Le Loi and Tran Cao Van streets.
By the time the 3rd Platoon, which was leading, had slowly made its way down the first block of Truong Dinh, directly across from Hue University's southeastern wall, one of the squad leaders, Sergeant John Maloney, had somehow wound up on the point. As Maloney was rounding the next corner, the Marine right behind Gunnery Sergeant Ed Van Valkenburgh saw something that upset him, and he unloaded a whole M-16 magazine into a building across the intersection. Right away, an NVA across the intersection fired most of an AK-47 magazine into Sergeant Maloney, who went down hard beside a courtyard wall. However, all the Marines behind him were spared from walking into what Gunny Van Valkenburgh immediately recognized as a carefully plotted ambush.
The instant the shooting started, the tank that was accompanying the two Marine platoons had been hit by a B-40, and a small sliver had struck Captain Mike Downs, albeit without much effect. As soon as the tank was hit, the driver had gone bonkers and started backing up, out of any possible line of fire. The barely controlled monster machine lurched into a
telephone pole, and, in no time, all the phone cable that had been strung above the street was wound into the wheel assembly, as was a roll of barbed wire that had been lining one side of the street.
As soon as Sergeant Maloney went down, Sergeant Willard Scott, the 3rd Platoon right guide, ordered the lead fire-team leader, Lance Corporal Jim Yates, to take over the squad and get Maloney out of the line of fire. Yates was scared half to death, but he moved up. From another location overlooking the intersection, an NVA soldier opened fire. A bullet that ricocheted off the wall struck Yates in the neck, and he went down. Yates felt around in his neck and found the bullet lodged next to his windpipe. He crawled backwards out of the line of fire and ducked through the courtyard gate, where several other Marines had gone to ground. A moment later, another Marine rolled through the courtyard gate. He had a bullet wound in the shoulder.
The firing was less than a minute old, and the entire 3rd Platoon was under cover except for Sergeant Maloney, who still lay where he had fallen. The platoon commander, 2nd Lieutenant Donald Hausrath, moved up to the courtyard and assessed the situation. Then he turned to Lance Corporal John Griswold and said, "Griswold, you take your fire team out there on the street and bring Sergeant Maloney back." Griswold was a veteran, as experienced a bush Marine as Fox/2/5 had. Nevertheless, the order caught him short. He stared at the lieutenant for a moment and asked, "You mean by ourselves?" He was incredulous. "Yeah," Lieutenant Hausrath rejoined, "by yourselves. We'll give you support." Griswold looked at the other two members of his fire team—Lance Corporal Ernie Weiss and Private First Class Mike Sowards—and said, "You gotta be shitting me." But Griswold went back out into the street, leading Weiss and Sowards toward the intersection.
Lance Corporal Griswold's team had almost inched up to Sergeant Maloney's body when the NVA cut loose again. There was so much fire going crack-crack-crack-crack-crack right over their heads that Lance Corporal Weiss could not even hear himself shout, and the rounds were striking the street so close to him that puffs of dirt were constantly thrown into his face. Many of the AK-47 rounds ricocheting off the compound wall, to their left, ricocheted again off Weiss's helmet—ping-ping-ping-ping-ping.
Lance Corporal Griswold finally reached the corner and grabbed a handful of Sergeant Maloney's clothing. Maloney was dead, and the prone fire-team leader found that he was impossible to budge. Griswold got up on his knees and started yelling at Sowards and Weiss, "Get your asses up here and help me!" Sowards, who was right behind Griswold, looked back over his shoulder at Weiss, who said, "Go ahead, Mike. Go ahead." Neither of them jumped right in to help, but it quickly came to the point that Griswold was yelling and screaming so violently that they were more afraid of him than they were of the NVA fire. The two lurched forward, and Sowards grabbed a handful of Sergeant Maloney's clothing while Weiss started firing his M-16 at anything that even looked threatening. It wasn't good enough. In desperation Weiss yelled at Sowards, "Mike, throw me your rifle." Sowards complied with alacrity, and Weiss simultaneously fired both M-16s while Griswold and Sowards hauled the dead squad leader out of the intersection.
As Ernie Weiss fired both M-16s into a building on the opposite corner, he thought of a Marine he had once seen who had been shot in the face. Involuntarily he twisted his head to the right so the same thing wouldn't happen to him, but he never stopped firing. Bullets continued to strike the ground around him, and he knew he was going to die. That's when he lost his fear. Defiant now, Weiss turned his face toward the enemy, coolly reloaded both Ml 6s, and coldly fired into the window from which he was certain one or more NVA were firing at him. Weiss was livid with an unreasonable, unquenchable rage by the time a Marine armed with an M-79 appeared in front of him and began pumping 40mm fragmentation grenades into the window with which Weiss had been dueling. Weiss reloaded and fired one of his M-16s from right beside the grenadier's head. The grenadier turned and bleated, "Hey! What're you doing?" Weiss replied, "Well, get outta the way. I was here first!"
Then Captain Downs called the night attack off and ordered everyone back to MACV. When Downs left Truong Dinh Street, he was carrying a wounded Marine in his arms.
Lance Corporal Ernie Weiss helped to carry Sergeant Maloney's body back to MACV. He wouldn't have had it any other way. That evening, he cried for John Maloney.
Ironically, the Thua Thien Provincial Prison finally fell to NVA and VC forces on the night of February 2. Guided by one of the few ARVN soldiers known to have gone over to their side, the Communist troops managed to sneak into a key guard post and overwhelm the occupants. After that, the entire prison fell in short order, and 2,200 inmates—criminals and political prisoners—were freed from their cells and escorted to the Tu Dam Pagoda, south of the Phu Cam Canal. Following a political exhortation, anyone who wanted a weapon was given one. Many of the political prisoners naturally joined VC militia units, but many of the criminals disappeared into the night to ply their trades and, while they were at it, sow additional confusion and dismay among the citizens of Hue and their would-be liberators.
On February 2, Fox/2/5 sustained one Marine killed and sixteen Marines wounded. That night, a Fox/2/5 veteran of about two weeks in the bush cracked up. He lay on a bed, hallucinating, whimpering, and talking to himself, until members of his squad tied him down and one of the docs dosed him with morphine. In the morning, he was carried—babbling and raving—down to the MACV dispensary on a stretcher. Many of his fellow Marines cursed the man out loud, but many others wondered who would be the next to crack.
***
PART IV
The Treasury
***
Chapter 15
Inside the Citadel on February 12, the multibattalion ARVN sweep from the 1st ARVN Division CP compound continued, but at a severely restricted pace. Outnumbered by Brigadier General Truong's ARVN battalions, the reinforced 6th NVA Regiment had lost the initiative and gone over to the defensive, but the NVA were dug in and apparently willing to fight to the last man.
Outside the Citadel, the 4th Battalion, 3rd ARVN Regiment, remained surrounded by elements of the 4th NVA Regiment's 804th NVA Battalion. In spite of heavy casualties, however, the ARVN battalion was edging closer to U.S. Marine-held positions east of MACV. The 2nd and 3rd battalions of the 3rd ARVN Regiment remained pinned against the south corner of the Citadel, unable to advance or withdraw.
*
Throughout the first three days of the Communist occupation of Hue, VC cadres backed by NVA units had picked up scores and then hundreds of South Vietnamese citizens who worked for or were thought to openly support the GVN. There was no end of potential victims because Hue was the major government center in the north—South Vietnam's third largest city, a provincial capital, and the seat of both district and municipal governments. Like such cities in the United States, Hue was jam-packed with politicians and bureaucrats of all ranks and stations, and all of them—and their families—were potential grist for the Communist mill.
In 1971 the official Communist chronicler of the battle for Hue went to great lengths to describe the breadth of the general uprising in Hue. However, no such uprising took place. Hundreds—perhaps thousands—of Hue's citizens who were Communists or committed anti-GVN activists did rally openly to the NLF banner. But the vast majority of Hue's men and women stayed home or fled for their lives. By 1100, February 3, some 1,900 civilians had found their way into U.S. Marine lines and were being cared for at the liberated District Headquarters compound, adjacent to MACV. On the other hand, perhaps several thousand civilians who were not able to reach friendly lines had been impressed into Communist labor battalions and forced at gunpoint to dig trenches and other field fortifications.
From the start, VC political teams had been rounding up American civilian officials and checking on Hue's many non-American foreign guests—mostly medical workers and missionaries. A number of the Europeans were taken into custody while, for unfathomable motives, others were not. Americans, including bona
fide civilians with no ties to any government program or agency, were invariably led away into captivity when they could be found. A number of them were executed, but others, including at least one senior CIA official, were not. No pattern seems to have been in effect with regard to the killings.
Fortunately for Jim Bullington, the Communists had no reason to suspect that he was even in town, so his name did not appear on any of their lists. If they had known he was in Hue, they certainly would have tried to capture him because of his work in the city during his previous tour in South Vietnam. Bullington had gone to ground in the home of two French priests, whose identities certainly were known to the local Communists. Though many priests—particularly Frenchmen—were being rounded up or at least visited by the Communists, Bulling-ton's hosts were not even visited.
Bullington had had little to do for two days except worry and look out a window from time to time to see what he could see. The incessant sound of gunfire told him that battles continued to ebb and flow in other parts of the city. But, except for an air raid over the Citadel on February 1, he had seen no signs of fighting or even occupation. On the morning of February 3, Bullington looked out a second-story window of the priests' home and saw four NVA soldiers in the courtyard of the power station, two compounds away. The soldiers were dressed in neat khaki uniforms and each carried an AK-47. Except for the soldiers, the area was absolutely deserted that morning. Later in the day, from time to time, Bullington could see civilians carrying huge bundles of belongings down the main street behind his safe haven. The high point of the day came when Bullington and the priests heard a rumbling that could only have been a tank. The low point came minutes later, when the three saw the source of their highest hopes: it was an ARVN M-41 tank all right, but it was manned by several men clad in black pajamas.