Rolling Thunder
Page 48
CAPTURED PILOT
His teeth clenched involuntarily as he suddenly remembered Lartéguy's Lieutenant Kervallé who roamed the streets in a drunken haze looking for his parachute battalion comrades lost at Dien Bien Phu.
"I don't think I'll be happy here," Court Bannister said. The pictures of the humiliated Ron Bender and the smiling Apollo crew alternating in his mind's eye. "Maybe...maybe I'll meet you back there." With machine gun rapidity he absently flicked the lid of his Zippo with the rubber band around it.
Parker swung around to look at the two of them. "I'll be there," he said quietly, thinking of Phil Travers, "just as soon as I graduate."
The Lear flew on over the brown desert toward Las Vegas, engines purring steadily, away from the green hell of Vietnam.
If we kept on flying, Court thought, we would circle the globe and wind up right back at Bien Hoa.
T H E EN D
of Book One of the Five- book Wings of War series to be continued in Book Two, Steel Tiger. There are many of his short stories, many free, available on all Ebooks. See his web page at www.vietnamwarpolitics.com
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Mark Berent had three voluntary tours of combat in Southeast Asia and is the holder of the Silver Star, two DFCs, the Bronze Star, numerous Air Medals, Legion of Merit, the Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry, and the Cambodian Divisional Medal. In his first tour he flew F-100s with the 531st TFS at Bien Hoa AB, South Vietnam. Two years later, he returned as an F-4 pilot, assigned to the only USAF all-night-flying outfit in SEA, the 497th TFS at Ubon RTAFB, Thailand. While there, he also commanded the Forward Air Controller unit called the Wolf FACs. His third tour was in Cambodia where he flew things with propellers on them as well as earning Cambodian jump wings and pilot wings.
AUTHOR AND HIS F-100 IN A REVETMENT AT BIEN HOA AIR
BASE. NOTE 500LB MK-82 SNAKE EYE BOMB WITH FOLDING FINS
UNDER WING.
For questions or comments contact Mark Berent at fly@markberent.com
SPOTTERS
GLOSSARY
6/27/15