9 “The Marine Combined Action Program,” National Archives; Corson, “Combined Action Program, Vietnam,” Reference Branch Files, USMCHMD; III Marine Amphibious Force, Presidential Unit Citation Recommendation, 1968, copy in author’s possession, courtesy of Annette Amerman; Klyman, “An Alternative Not Taken”; Corson, The Betrayal, pp. 183-84; Telfer, Rogers, and Fleming, U.S. Marines in Vietnam, 1967, pp. 187-91. The best single source on the daily patrols, firefights, and general war of wits between the CAPs and the VC is Bing West, The Village (New York: Pocket Books, 2000). The book covers the activities of one CAP in Binh Nghia over the course of several years. As a young officer, West was a participant as well as an observer/chronicler of the team’s actions. Despite being overrun twice, the Binh Nghia CAP succeeded in forging strong ties of kinship with the villagers. Because West’s fine book has been so heavily utilized by other CAP historians, I have chosen to rely upon other, lesser-known sources.
10 Eagan, oral history, USMCHMD; Edward Palm, “Tiger Papa Three: The Fire Next Time, Part Two,” Marine Corps Gazette, February 1988, pp. 67-73; Palm, “Tiger Papa Three, Part One”; Donovan interview; Hemingway, Our War Was Different, pp. 35-37; Goodson, CAP Mot, pp. 222-31, 84-88.
11 FMFPAC, AAR, April 1967; 1st Combined Action Group, AAR, February 1969; III Marine Amphibious Force citation recommendation, all copies in author’s possession, courtesy of Annette Amerman; Corson, “Combined Action Program, Vietnam,” Reference Branch Files; “Interview with survivors of CAP 6, 3rd CAG,” oral history, #3222, both at USMCHMD; Jack Shulimson, Lieutenant Colonel Leonard Blasiol, Charles Smith, and Captain David Dawson, U.S. Marines in Vietnam: The Defining Year, 1968 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Marine Corps History and Museums Division, 1997), pp. 620-22; Flynn, A Voice of Hope, pp. 68-73; Hemingway, Our War Was Different, pp. 59-60, 86-92; Peterson, The Combined Action Platoons, pp. 56-59; Goodson, CAP Mot, pp. 91-107.
12 Donovan, “Combined Action Program,” pp. 31-32; Charles Smith, U.S. Marines in Vietnam: High Mobility and Standdown, 1969 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Marine Corps History and Museums Division, 1988), pp. 291-94; Cosmas and Murray, Vietnamization and Redeployment, 1970-1971, pp. 144-47; Hemingway, Our War Was Different, pp. 95-96, 166-69; Goodson, CAP Mot, p. 29; Peterson, The Combined Action Platoons, pp. 60-62.
13 “The Marine Combined Action Program,” National Archives; FMFPAC Monthly Operations Reports and Command Chronologies, 1965-1967 (these reports are of such questionable veracity that they are still known as “Krulak’s Fables”); III Marine Amphibious Force, Command Chronologies, 1965-1966, all copies in author’s possession, courtesy of Annette Amerman; Major R. D. King, “Future of Combined Action,” October 12, 1970; Corson, “Combined Action Program, Vietnam,” both in Reference Branch Files, USMCHMD; T. P. Schwartz, “The Combined Action Program: A Different Perspective,” Marine Corps Gazette, February 1999, pp. 64-68; Palm, “Tiger Papa Three: The Fire Next Time,” p. 76; Sherman, “One Man’s CAP,” p. 62; Donovan, “Combined Action Program,” pp. 31-32; Kopets, “The Combined Action Program,” pp. 8-9; Donovan interview; Klyman, “An Alternative Not Taken”; James Trullinger, Village at War: An Account of Revolution in Vietnam (New York: Longman, 1980), pp. 115-32; Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports , p. 166; Cosmas and Murray, Vietnamization and Redeployment, 1970-1971, pp. 148-49; Walt, Strange War, Strange Strategy, p. 105; Hemingway, Our War Was Different, pp. 56, 83, 177-78; Peterson, The Combined Action Platoons, pp. 86-94. The North Vietnamese Army official history, Victory in Vietnam, is completely silent on the combined action platoons. Given the propagandistic tone that is prevalent in much of the work, perhaps this absence of commentary on the CAPs is a veiled recognition that they had some success.
Chapter 7
1 4th Infantry Division, “Battle of Dak To,” After Action Report (AAR), Record Group (RG) 472, Records of the 29th Military History Detachment, Box 200, Folder 2; General William Westmoreland, National Press Club Press Conference, November 21, 1967, RG 319, Records of the Office of the Chief of Military History, William C. Westmoreland Papers, Box 32, Folder 4; General William Westmoreland message to Admiral Ulysses Grant Sharp, November 22, 1967, RG 319, Records of the Office of the Chief of Military History, William C. Westmoreland Papers, Box 32, Folder 5; General William Westmoreland to Admiral Sharp, December 10, 1967, Records of the Office of the Chief of Military History, William C. Westmoreland Papers, Box 33, Folder 1, all at National Archives, College Park, MD; William Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports (Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1976), pp. 236-38; Victor Krulak, First to Fight: An Inside View of the U.S. Marine Corps (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1999), p. 201; Ted Arthurs, command sergeant major of the 4th Battalion, 503rd Parachute Infantry, claims in Land with No Sun: A Year in Vietnam with the 173rd Airborne (Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 2006) that the soldiers of his unit coined that unhappy moniker for Dak To; Robert Barr Smith, “A Lousy Place to Fight a War,” Vietnam, October 2005, pp. 28-30; Dale Andrade, “Why Westmoreland Was Right,” Vietnam, April 2009, offers a spirited defense of the general and his attrition strategy. The official People’s Army of Vietnam (NVA) history, Victory in Vietnam: The Official History of the People’s Army of Vietnam, 1954-1975 (Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 2002), hardly mentions the 1967 Dak To battle. Some historians believe that the NVA lured the Americans to Dak To so that they would not be in place to oppose the massive Tet Offensive of 1968, which mainly focused on populated areas. The NVA history does not specifically confirm this, though.
2 4th Infantry Division, AAR; 1st Brigade, 4th Infantry Division, December 9, 1967, AAR, Box 200, Folder 5; 5th Special Forces Group, November 6-December 3, 1967, AAR, Box 200, Folder 6; 173rd Airborne Brigade, “The Battle of Dak To,” AAR, Box 200, Folder 3, all in RG 472, Records of the 29th Military History Detachment; General William Peers, briefing to MAC-V commander’s conference, December 3, 1967, RG 319, Records of the Office of the Chief of Military History, William C. Westmoreland Papers, Box 33, Folder 1, this and all previous sources at National Archives; William Peers, oral history, Box 1, Folder 1, William R. Peers Papers, United States Army Military History Institute (USAMHI), Carlisle, PA; Barr, “A Lousy Place to Fight a War,” p. 28; Shelby Stanton, The Rise and Fall of an American Army: U.S. Ground Forces in Vietnam, 1965-1973 (New York: Ballantine Books, 2003), pp. 136-38, 166-69; Edward Murphy, Dak To: America’s Sky Soldiers in South Vietnam’s Central Highlands (New York: Ballantine Books, 2007), pp. 56-81, 133-34; Victory in Vietnam, p. 212.
3 4th Infantry Division, AAR; 1st Brigade, 4th Infantry Division, AAR; Major John Ramsay, G3 Air, AAR, Box 200, Folder 6; 4th Infantry Division, Artillery, AAR, Box 200, Folder 3; General Order #404, PFC Clinton Bacon, Army Commendation Medal Citation; General Order #361, Spec-4 Cecil Millspaugh, Bronze Star Medal Citation, Box 205, Folder 6, all in RG 472, Records of the 29th Military History Detachment; 1st Brigade, 4th Infantry Division, Presidential Unit Citation (PUC), RG 472, U.S. Army Vietnam, Adjutant General, Awards Branch, Box 9, Folder 4, this and all previous sources at National Archives; Bill Vigil, interview with the author, April 7, 2008; Steve Edmunds, unpublished memoir, pp. 1-2, copy in author’s possession, courtesy of Mr. Edmunds; www.ivydragoons.org Web site.
4 4th Infantry Division, AAR; 1st Brigade, 4th Infantry Division, AAR; General Order #4563, PFC Nathaniel Thompson, Bronze Star with “V” for Valor Medal Citation; General Order #4561, PFC William Muir, Bronze Star with “V” for Valor Medal Citation; General Order #320, Spec-4 John Kind, Bronze Star with “V” for Valor Medal Citation; General Order #94, PFC John Trahan, Bronze Star with “V” for Valor Medal Citation, all citations in RG 472, Box 205, Folder 6, Records of the 29th Military History Detachment; 1st Brigade, 4th Division, PUC, RG 472, U.S. Army Vietnam, Adjutant General, Awards Branch, Box 9, Folder 4, this and all previous sources at National Archives; Bob Walkowiak, e-mail to the author, March 25, 2008; Robert Babcock, ed., War Stories: Utah Beach to Pleiku (Marietta, GA: Deeds Publishing, 2001), pp. 566-71.
5
4th Infantry Division, AAR; 1st Brigade, 4th Infantry Division, AAR; G3 Air, AAR; 4th Infantry Division, Artillery, AAR; 4th Aviation Battalion, Box 200, Folder 3; 52nd Combat Aviation Battalion, AAR, Box 200, Folder 3; 4th Infantry Division, Outline and Statistical Summary, Dak To Operation, Box 200, Folder 4; General Order #4502, Captain John Falcone, Silver Star Medal Citation; General Order #370, Lieutenant William Gauff, Bronze Star with “V” for Valor Medal Citation; General Order #4285, Staff Sergeant Raymond Ortiz, Silver Star Medal Citation; General Order #1187, Captain John Mirus, Silver Star Medal Citation; General Order #148, Spec-4 Stephen Edmunds, Bronze Star with “V” for Valor Medal Citation, Box 205, Folder 6, all in RG 472, Records of the 29th Military History Detachment; 1st Brigade, 4th Infantry Division, PUC, all at National Archives; Walkowiak e-mail; Steve Edmunds, unpublished memoir, pp. 1-3; Larry Skogler, interview with the author, April 18, 2008; Babcock, War Stories, pp. 571-77; www.ivydragoons.org; www.virtualwall.org, John Falcone entry. Lieutenant Colonel Belknap was killed in a helicopter accident a couple weeks after the Battle of Hill 724. Several Ivy Dragoons told me that the crash destroyed many of the battle records, making 724 somewhat anonymous in the history of the Dak To campaign. I hope that my account has redressed that anonymity somewhat.
6 173rd Airborne Brigade, Dak To, AAR, RG 472, Records of the 29th Military History Detachment, Box 200, Folder 3; 173rd Airborne Brigade, Presidential Unit Citation, Dak To, RG 472, Adjutant General Award’s Branch, Box 5, Folder 9; 1st Battalion, 503rd Parachute Infantry Regiment, Operation MacArthur, AAR, RG 472, Box 1101, Folder 1, all at National Archives; Thomas McElwain, interview with the author, March 2, 2008; Ken Lambertson, interview with the author, April 9, 2008; David Watson, interview with the author, January 25, 2008; Terrence Maitland and Peter McInerney, The Vietnam Experience: A Contagion of War (Boston: Boston Publishing Company, 1983), pp. 170-71; Arthurs, Land with No Sun, p. 159; Murphy, Dak To, pp. 56-81, 174-84. Every Task Force Black veteran with whom I spoke was effusive in their praise for McElwain.
7 173rd Airborne Brigade, Dak To, AAR; PUC, National Archives; Jerry Cecil, interview with the author, January 10, 2008; Ken Cox, interview with the author, April 21, 2008; McElwain interview; Jerry Cecil, e-mail to the author, February 16, 2009; Rick Atkinson, The Long Gray Line: The American Journey of West Point’s Class of 1966 (New York: Owl Books, 1989), p. 241; Murphy, Dak To, pp. 184-88; Maitland and McInerney, Contagion of War, pp. 170-71.
8 173rd Airborne Brigade, Dak To, AAR; PUC, National Archives; McElwain, Cecil, and Cox interviews; Murphy, Dak To, pp. 187-89; Maitland and McInerney, Contagion of War, pp. 170-71. The critique on the strategic implications of the defensive tactics is purely my interpretation. McElwain advanced no such opinions.
9 173rd Airborne Brigade, Dak To, AAR; PUC; 1st Battalion, 503rd Parachute Infantry Regiment, Operation MacArthur, AAR, all at National Archives; Ed Kelley, interview with the author, April 4, 2008; Jerry Curry, interview with the author, April 15, 2008; McElwain, Lambertson, Watson interviews; Murphy, Dak To, pp. 190-91; Maitland and McInerney, Contagion of War, pp. 171-72. Kelley told me that he has never forgiven himself for bypassing the machine gun and, as of 2008, he still felt enormous guilt about it.
10 John Barnes, Medal of Honor citation material, RG 472, Medal of Honor Awards, Case Files, Box 2, Folder 11; 173rd Airborne Brigade, Dak To, AAR; PUC, all at National Archives; McElwain, Cecil, Cox interviews; Murphy, Dak To, pp. 193-94. Cecil received the Distinguished Service Cross for his actions.
11 Barnes, Medal of Honor citation material; 173rd Airborne Brigade, Dak To, AAR; PUC, all at National Archives; Kelley, Curry, McElwain, Lambertson, Cox, Watson interviews; Murphy, Dak To, p. 193. To make sure that the vaporized men would not be listed as missing in action, Curry later signed a sworn statement attesting to the fact that he had seen them die. The after action reports claim that Hardy was hit twice in the chest, rather than three times in various places, as Watson recalled. Because Watson was so close to the captain when he was hit, I have relied on his account.
12 173rd Airborne Brigade, Dak To, AAR; PUC; sworn statements of Lieutenant George Brown, Sergeant Robert Lampkin, Spec-4 James Townsend, and Spec-4 Robert Ferry, located within Barnes Medal of Honor citation material, all at National Archives; Jim Stanzak, interview with the author, January 28, 2008; Lambertson, Curry, Watson, Kelley interviews; Maitland and McInerney, Contagion of War, pp. 171-73. The grenade that killed Barnes was a Chinese “Chicom” pineapple grenade. By this point in the battle, though, the NVA were also using American grenades. They had captured them when helicopter crews attempted to resupply hard-pressed Task Force Black but, under heavy fire, dropped their loads outside the perimeter, in terrain controlled by the enemy. The Task Force Black survivors have nothing but deep respect for the bravery of the aviators that day, especially Warrant Officer Gary Bass (code-named Flower Power), who routinely risked his life to help the grunts.
13 173rd Airborne Brigade, Dak To, AAR; PUC; 1st Battalion, 503rd Parachute Infantry Regiment, Operation MacArthur, AAR, all at National Archives; Chuck Clutter, interview with the author, January 15, 2008; Jacques “Jack” deRemer, interview with the author, February 8, 2008; McElwain, Kelley, Curry interviews; Murphy, Dak To, pp. 191-93. Every Task Force Black survivor with whom I spoke expressed considerable dislike for Schumacher. In my interview with McElwain, he was quite forthright in describing his disdain for the battalion commander. He also told me that he did not have a very high opinion of Captain Jesmer, whom he thought of as overly cautious and a bit disingenuous. McElwain, and some of his men, resented Task Force Blue’s inability to provide any help on November 11. From the Task Force Black point of view, Jesmer’s unit was only dealing with moderate sniper fire and should have put forth a much more aggressive effort to relieve Task Force Black. Some of the men even told me that, a couple weeks after the battle, a grieving McElwain picked a fight with Jesmer and beat him up at the officer’s club.
14 173rd Airborne Brigade, Dak To, AAR; PUC, National Archives; Mike Tanner, interview with the author, April 18, 2008; Mike Tanner, unpublished memoir, pp. 67-68, 168, copy in author’s possession, courtesy of Mr. Tanner; Bill Connolly, interview with the author, July 2, 2008; Lynne Morse, interview with the author, June 17, 2008; McElwain, deRemer interviews; Murphy, Dak To, pp. 200-204; Maitland and McInerney, Contagion of War, pp. 173-75. Task Force Black actually lost at least twenty-two killed because the two missing men were the machine gunners whom Staff Sergeant Curry saw disintegrated by a rocket. Apparently two more men were missing as well and many of the survivors were tormented by guilt for years because they thought the missing men might have become POWs. These two men were later confirmed as killed, though. The artillery support on the evening of November 11 disfigured some of the Task Force Black bodies that were lying throughout the battle area. Several of the men said that Captain Hardy’s body was headless when they recovered it the next day. Ivan Pierce, the forward personnel officer, later confirmed this. His job was to process and account for all casualties. He personally saw Hardy’s remains and wrote about this in his memoir, An Infantry Lieutenant’s Vietnam (El Dorado Springs, MO: Capsarge Publishing, 2004), pp. 78-79.
15 173rd Airborne Brigade, Dak To, AAR; PUC, National Archives; McElwain, Kelley, Stanzak, Watson, Curry, Cecil, deRemer, Lambertson, Clutter interviews; Murphy, Dak To, pp. 204-06; Maitland and McInerney, Contagion of War, p. 174. In the weeks following the battle, McElwain quarreled again with Schumacher when the colonel tried to turn down PFC Barnes’s Medal of Honor citation because “we don’t decorate people who commit suicide.” Fortunately, McElwain did not back down in the face of such disrespectful idiocy and the young soldier received the medal he so richly deserved. McElwain later told me: “I’m kind of surprised that he didn’t relieve me.”
16 2nd Battalion, 503rd Parachute Infantry Regiment, Operation MacArthur, AAR, RG 472, Box 1125, Folder 1; Carlos Lozada, Medal of Honor material, RG 472, Medal of Honor Awards, Box 14, Folder 3; 5th Special Forc
es Group, Dak To, AAR; 173rd Airborne Brigade, Dak To, AAR; PUC, all at National Archives; Leonard B. Scott, “The Battle for Hill 875, Dak To, Vietnam 1967,” paper prepared for Army War College, USAMHI; Combat Zone: Hill 875, Vietnam, Military Channel documentary, 2007; Murphy, Dak To, pp. 248-58; Maitland and McInerney, Contagion of War, pp. 179-80. Typical of many battalion commanders in Vietnam, Steverson was in a helicopter above the action and thus did not have much feel for what was happening on the ground.
17 2nd Battalion, 503rd Parachute Infantry Regiment, AAR; sworn statements of Spec-4 James Kelley, PFC Anthony Romano, and First Lieutenant Joseph Sheridan, in Carlos Lozada Medal of Honor material; 173rd Airborne Brigade, Dak To, AAR; PUC, all at National Archives; Combat Zone: Hill 875; John Steer, “True Valor at Hill 875,” Vietnam, June 1990, pp. 42-43; Murphy, Dak To, pp. 261-64; Maitland and McInerney, Contagion of War, p. 180. Lozada left behind a young wife and baby girl.
18 2nd Battalion, 503rd Parachute Infantry Regiment, AAR; 173rd Airborne Brigade, Dak To, AAR; PUC; sworn statements of First Lieutenant Bryan McDonough, Staff Sergeant John Gentry, Sergeant Paul Ramirez, Sergeant Jimmy Stacey, and Lieutenant Colonel John Hulme, RG 472, Medal of Honor Awards, Box 23, Folder 18, all at National Archives; Scott, “Battle for Hill 875,” USAMHI; Combat Zone: Hill 875; Kelley interview; Murphy, Dak To, pp. 266-67, 269, 274-75. Scott claims that eleven out of thirteen of the 2nd Battalion medics were killed and the other two wounded. There is no way to be sure when the eleven were killed.
Grunts: Inside the American Infantry Combat Experience, World War II Through Iraq Page 62