Tiger Force

by Michael Sallah

  Raised in a working-class family outside Saint Louis, Missouri, Trout had seen enlistment as his only escape. After high school, he joined the Army in February 1956 and knew the military was going to be his life. He served in Korea and Germany, but he needed combat experience to advance, and South Vietnam was his ticket.

  An eleven-year veteran by the time he arrived, he was more seasoned than nearly everyone in Tiger Force. He could be gruff, but he also acted the protector—a comforting trait to newcomers. “They followed in his footsteps,” Carpenter recalled, even if it meant occasionally getting dressed down. No one wanted to get on his bad side.

  Trout scanned the list of soldiers in his notebook to make sure it was up to date. Every time someone was killed or injured or rotated out, he would draw a line through his name. So far, he hadn’t had to cross out anyone since the Mother’s Day Massacre, but he knew that wasn’t going to last. Soon, he would be proved correct.

  CHAPTER 8

  Wearing his new tiger-striped fatigues with a lieutenant’s bar patch, James Hawkins was on his way to the battalion headquarters on July 2 to meet with Austin when he caught the attention of platoon members standing in the chow line.

  They took a long look. For weeks, they had heard rumors they would be getting a new leader, but like everything else in the Army, they were always the last to officially know.

  At six feet, two inches and 230 pounds, Hawkins was larger than past commanders, and he looked out of place. Most of the field officers were thin and agile, but Hawkins had a paunch, stooped shoulders, and arms that swung back and forth as he walked.

  For most of Hawkins’s military career, he had been a grunt, working his way from infantry soldier when he joined in 1958 to second lieutenant eight years later. The Maysville, Kentucky, native had arrived in Vietnam on April 17, 1967, and was wounded a month later during maneuvers with B Company. While recovering in a hospital, he volunteered to take over Tiger Force, which had been looking for a permanent replacement since the Mother’s Day Massacre.

  For Hawkins, it was a break for his career. Serving as field lieutenant for Tiger Force was basically like being a commander. Everyone in the platoon would take orders from him; he would have great freedom, often spending weeks in the bush without any supervision; and ultimately, if he succeeded with the Tigers, he would be promoted to first lieutenant and be on a fast track to captain. There was nothing more he wanted. He was a soldier who came from a working-class family and who disdained West Pointers—“ring knockers” who, in his view, had it easy. They were college boys and were “handed” a commission when they graduated. Hawkins didn’t have a four-year degree and hadn’t gone to Officer Candidate School—the other alternative to receiving a commission. Instead, he had proudly earned his first stripe the “hard way,” via field commission in September 1966.

  In some ways, soldiering was a dream that began when he was a child growing up on the Ohio River, playing war games. As a young boy, Hawkins was quiet and generally unassuming but seemed to come to life when he patrolled—toy rifle in hand—along the water. Even when the other kids went home, he could be seen leading imaginary troops up a hill to face an imaginary German Army.

  His father worked for Ashland Oil, moving the family to Owensboro, Kentucky, just before Hawkins started high school. As soon as he graduated in 1958, he volunteered for Army service. “I never saw myself doing anything else,” he said.

  Three years later, when he was married with a young child, his career was almost derailed. He and other soldiers had been drinking. With Hawkins driving, the men were headed to a horse farm near Fort Knox when they crashed. One of his passengers died, and Hawkins was hauled before a military hearing. He thought his career could be over, but in the end, his superiors found no cause to proceed to a court-martial.

  For the next few years, Hawkins kept his nose clean, took college courses, and found that the best way to rise through the ranks was to go to South Vietnam. Before reaching the headquarters at Carentan, he had stopped to meet Stephen Naughton, who was relieved to be giving up his acting command of the Tigers. It had been a long three weeks in a role Naughton never relished, and he was about to be reassigned within the battalion.

  Naughton told Hawkins that many of the men in the platoon were relatively new with little combat experience, and that the Song Ve was a free-fire zone. Expect the Vietcong to put up a fight for control of the fertile basin, Naughton warned.

  If Hawkins wanted to make it, he needed to know the unit’s strengths and weaknesses. Donald Wood was his forward artillery observer—and a good one, Naughton said. Sam Ybarra was crazy, but he was one of the best point men he had ever worked beside. Just keep your eye on him, Naughton instructed. Harold Trout was a tough son of a bitch, Naughton concluded, but he was fair to his men and looked out for them. There was something else, the outgoing leader added. The job of Tiger commander was a bitch, with a history of past leaders being killed or wounded. Others were glad just to get out alive. With a handshake, Naughton left the camp.

  Hawkins met Austin and several other battalion officers, including Captain Carl James, who had a direct supervisory role over the Tigers. They were immediately struck by his eagerness to go into the field without really knowing Quang Ngai.

  By evening, Hawkins began introducing himself to the Tigers, talking in a deep Kentucky drawl about his prior combat experience and trying to act like he was one of the grunts. He even mentioned that he was anxious to get laid in the whorehouses in Duc Pho.

  But his words were worth only so much. To the Tigers, he looked more like he belonged in the rear than leading a Special Force in the most dangerous area of South Vietnam. Carpenter and others were willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. “He was with B Company, and they saw some serious shit, so we figured he was going to be okay,” he recalled. But the Tigers knew that if Hawkins turned out to be a dud, they might have to take matters into their own hands.

  That night, Hawkins and a few of the men hopped in a Jeep and drove west toward Duc Pho. Just outside the town, they were stopped at a roadblock and warned by a military policeman to turn around. The Vietcong were all over Duc Pho at night and it wasn’t safe. But Hawkins didn’t care. “He stood up in the Jeep and said he was going to get laid and no one was going to stop him,” Carpenter recalled. The MP shook his head and waved them through.

  Even before the next morning’s briefing, the rumors spread quickly through camp: contrary to plan, the Tigers were heading back to the Song Ve. The men were already packing their rucksacks when Hawkins walked into the camp area and confirmed the news. “Saddle up,” he said. “It’s time to ride.” For a moment, the men looked at one another, some frowning at the commander’s John Wayne imitation.

  “What’s this? Cowboys and Indians?” Carpenter mumbled to the others.

  No one said anything during the chopper ride to the valley. The soldiers were preparing themselves for a firefight, or worse—an ambush. Adding to the tension were the heat and humidity. Like a slow burn, the temperature was already at 90 degrees, and by noon, it would reach 100. The soldiers’ uniforms were soaked, and their eyes burned from the perspiration. It didn’t help that they were lugging heavy gear. Though some had been in country for nearly a year, no one had gotten used to the temperatures. The air would hug the body like a heavy blanket on a summer day. And for those who rubbed insect repellent on their bodies, it was even hotter because the lotion closed their pores.

  Ken Kerney felt his stomach churning and had the sinking feeling someone was going to die. Staring around the inside of the Huey, he could see the same dreadful look on the faces of the others.

  Below, the valley was covered by patches of scorched earth where the hamlets had been torched, wisps of black smoke still rising from the embers. The Hueys carrying the Tigers circled the area before hovering above a clearing. As the forty-five soldiers jumped from the choppers, the men noticed Hawkins hesitate for a moment, unsure where to go, before Trout quickly ordered the
group to follow him.

  As they neared the river, the men broke into four teams: two consisting of ten men each, one with thirteen, and the other with twelve. One team bolted toward the high ground above the first ridge. Before reaching the tree line, they stumbled on the remains of a burned-out hamlet. They stopped and noticed cooking pots and clothing scattered on the ground, indicating that someone had just been there. Within view was a raised earthen mound—a telltale sign that someone had been digging a bunker.

  Two of the Tigers crawled to the opening, while the others stood back with their guns raised, pointing to the entrance. “Dua Tay Len!” one of the soldiers yelled, a warning to those inside to come out with their hands raised.

  There was no answer.

  The soldiers waited sixty seconds before entering the twenty-foot-deep bunker. Though no one was inside, the soldiers emerged a few minutes later with three helmets worn by North Vietnamese Army regulars, along with rucksacks, ammunition, and other equipment. It took but a second to sink in: The Tigers weren’t going to be fighting just the local militia. They were going to be taking on the NVA.

  Another team walking along the first ridge found a hut and, inside, a cache of weapons, including 60mm mortar rounds, three rockets, grenades, and two North Vietnamese textbooks on military discipline. From the color of the green thatch, the huts appeared to have been built just two to three days earlier. That made it clear the NVA was settling in. The Tigers had been away from the valley for just a few days, and the NVA were already “crawling all over the place,” recalled Carpenter.

  Gradually, as planned, the four Tiger teams moved to the center of the first ridge, and by the time the sun was directly over the valley, the platoon was united. Wood estimated they faced “probably a company of NVA.” That would mean they were outnumbered three to one.

  Shortly after Wood’s prediction, a Tiger team broke from the platoon and began walking the ridge north of the river. The VC had been systematically stealing the rice from the locals and stashing it, even keeping detailed maps of the hiding places. The Tigers knew this and, as part of their mission, were supposed to ferret out the rice caches, some of which might contain tons.

  The soldiers came upon a thicket of brush and found two large wooden structures. Carefully, the soldiers looked inside. No one was there, but there was room for an entire regiment.

  Wood immediately got on the radio and ordered an air strike, providing the map coordinates to the U.S. gunships off the coast. Quickly, the soldiers moved out of the way before the artillery shells struck their targets.

  The explosions were enough to draw the attention of NVA infantry soldiers in the foothills, and as the Tigers began walking toward the river, shots were fired at them. After falling to the ground for cover, Wood quickly scanned the perimeter with his binoculars and noticed the fire was coming from a thicket across the river—a safe enough distance to call in another strike without hitting the Tigers. But before he could order the assault, Hawkins was on the radio, providing coordinates to the gunships. Wood protested the order, saying the coordinates were wrong.

  “Lieutenant, you’re going to get us killed,” said Wood.

  Hawkins yelled back that he was the commander and he would give the orders, but Wood refused to obey, grabbing the radio and halting the strike. Hawkins was furious. He didn’t like being shown up in front of his men, especially by another officer. Wood walked over to his commander and held up a grid map of the valley, pointing to the coordinates on the map. “Look, Lieutenant, the strike should be here,” he said, his finger on the coordinates. Hawkins looked carefully at the map and turned away. Wood immediately called in the correct numbers, and within minutes, the strikes began—directly hitting the target across the river. No one said a word. That night, Carpenter and other veterans gathered at their campsite in the foothills and began to talk among themselves. “He could have gotten us killed,” Carpenter said of Hawkins.

  That night, they set up camp along the river. Shortly thereafter, the first grenade was hurled down, exploding one hundred meters from where most of the Tigers were sleeping. Ybarra, on watch duty, yelled for the men to take cover. As is, the Tigers were sitting ducks. Quickly, some soldiers scurried to the riverbank but were forced to crawl back to the camp after additional grenades began exploding in the water.

  “Where the hell are they?” Green blurted out. No one knew. Ybarra began firing his M16 into the foothills, but Wood quickly shouted for the point man to stop firing; by shooting, they were giving their positions away. Wood grabbed the receiver from the radio telephone operator and called headquarters, requesting an artillery strike at coordinates just north of a major bend in the Song Ve River. It was the closest he could estimate the enemy’s position. The voice on the other end of the radio urged the Tigers to hang on. There were no planes in the area, and those that were available were assisting troops thirty kilometers north, near Chu Lai. “We need artillery now,” Wood barked into the phone. “We need it now.”

  The soldiers waited on their stomachs in the grass for another fifteen minutes before the shells began falling. Wood knew from the sound of the first explosion that 20mm rounds were being dropped from C-47 aircraft—one, then another, then another. “The sky just lit up,” recalled Carpenter. The blasts were so close the men could feel the earth shake as they huddled closer to one another for what seemed like an eternity.

  As soon as the assault concluded, the Tigers bolted for the tree line about three hundred meters from the river and waited. For the rest of the night, they stayed awake, expecting another attack, jumping at every sound. But nothing happened.

  The next morning, everyone was tired and edgy. The Tigers hoped the rest of their time in the Song Ve would pass more easily, but to Trout, the mission was a loser. The troops had to be on the valley floor to make sure the hamlets were clear, but being so low in an area without cover opened the soldiers to attacks from the high ground. “We were beginning,” he said, “to get nickeled-and-dimed.”

  For the next few days, the valley was quiet. For whatever reason, there were no more attacks. The Tigers suspected some villagers were returning—possibly escaping from Nghia Hanh—but were hiding. To the soldiers, the more pressing concern was the whereabouts of the NVA and Vietcong.

  “They’re still here,” Trout warned the men.

  No one could really relax, especially at night. They knew from several days earlier that the enemy was capable of targeting them from the high ground, but the orders from headquarters were firm: stay on the valley floor.

  Just as the men settled down for camp on the north side of the river—after a full week of patrols—they heard the haunting sound of a whistle echoing from the foothills. It was a mortar, and within seconds it exploded in the river, just fifty meters away. “Take cover!” Hawkins yelled.

  Within fifteen seconds, another mortar exploded, this time on the other side of the river. Then another, this time landing along the bank closest to the Tigers.

  The men gathered their gear and hugged the ground—they had nowhere else to go. Kerrigan shook in the darkness and whispered a prayer. Kerney, Bowman, and Teeters huddled close to one another. They waited for the next round, hoping it would miss the mark. For several minutes, nothing happened. One Tiger began to rise, but Wood ordered him to hit the dirt. They waited, but the only noise they heard was a splash in the river, nothing else. Once again, things were quiet.

  The next morning, several Tigers openly talked about killing anyone they saw—including villagers. “I ain’t taking anyone to any relocation camp,” snarled Sergeant Doyle.

  Wood heard Doyle but didn’t say anything until he and his team separated from the rest. “No one’s going to kill unarmed civilians,” he said wearily. “We’re all tired. We’re pissed off. But we stay under control.”

  Already, fatigue was setting in, and that wasn’t a good sign. Exhaustion in battle can cause soldiers to get anxious, even jumpy—just the opposite of someone in civilian life. One s
ound—a twig breaking under a soldier’s foot—can cause a soldier to needlessly fire his gun. Simple orders are often forgotten and warning signs for booby traps and other obstacles are frequently overlooked. The Tigers were wearing down.

  Kerney and others began to notice that the platoon members were starting to break into factions. Soldiers such as Ybarra and Doyle wanted to just start shooting. Others, like Wood and Sanchez, wanted to toe the line. Newcomers, including Kerney and Kerrigan and Bowman, found themselves caught in the middle.

  Kerney kept telling himself over and over to stay strong. Don’t get crazy. But Kerrigan was already on the verge of losing it. He would try to calm down by thinking about the nights in Southern California when he would walk the beach and stare at the sky. In the Song Ve, the stars were incredible: bright and sparkling against the darkness. He would close his eyes and make believe he was on the beach just to keep from shaking. As a surfer, he could ride into a storm on powerful waves and never think about dying. But nothing in his life had prepared him for this. Here, death could come from anywhere, at any time.

  The Tigers were able to take their first real break when the entire platoon set up camp near a burned-out hamlet along the river on July 23.

  The soldiers removed their rucksacks and watched a supply chopper fly over and drop several cases of Black Label beer, containers of hot food, and supplies. Not since leaving Carentan had the men been able to relax. “Everyone, including myself, was pretty well uptight,” recalled Sergeant Forrest Miller.

  With the sun glistening on the river, the men tossed cans to one another. The Black Label was warm, but they didn’t care—it was beer and it tasted good. They opened their rations, removing hot plates of spaghetti, beef tips, and vegetables. The men watched as Hawkins drank one beer, then another. By dusk, he was loud and obnoxious. He staggered as he walked back and forth between the radio and the supplies, and at one point nearly tripped over another soldier.