Devil's Guard- The Complete Series Box Set

by Eric Meyer

  Then we stopped. In front of us the Viet Cong had a long line of defences, slit trenches that formed part of the natural contours of the land, widened and fortified for emergencies. Even as we looked, guerrillas were swarming into the defences as if from nowhere.

  “We’ve come upon one of their main tunnel systems,” Paul said laconically.

  “I can see that, the question is how do we get past them?”

  “I think we’ll have to leave that to the Americans.”

  The gunship fired burst after burst at the defenders. A few fell but the rest sheltered behind the timber and earth bulwarks of their defences. Then they started firing with a heavy machine gun, forcing the gunship up and away from us. We could clearly see the machine gunner, squatting behind the shield of a Russian built Degtyaryov 12.7mm machine gun. The heavy bullets reached out for the gunship but the pilot jinked away and avoided the burst. Then it was his turn, once again the nose swivelled around and the awful sound of the minigun reached us, simultaneously the rain of bullets showered the machine gun position. They were clever, sheltered behind a dense shield of timber and earth and although the gunner was thrown back to fall bleeding and shredded to the ground, another man stepped up to the gun and brought it to bear again.

  The duel between the machine gun and the gunship continued. It was a one sided event, or should have been, the awesome destructive power of the gunship gradually whittled away at the defences and another gunner fell. But another one stepped up to take his place, then a second Degtyaryov 12.7mm started firing from about three hundred yards away. They’d obviously brought one up from underground and suddenly the helicopter became vulnerable. The Viet Cong scored a hit for the Cobra started trailing smoke and began limping away in the direction of Saigon. We looked around for an escape route but all we saw was a huge phalanx of Viet Cong running towards us.

  “I estimate at least a battalion,” Paul said to me quietly. “They seem determined to get us back.”

  “Any suggestions?”

  He smiled. “Not this time. Now we really do need a miracle.”

  We didn’t get our miracle, what we did get was a squadron of F4 Phantoms out of Tan Son Nhat. They swept across the countryside, flying low. I waved Helene’s bright blue bra, but it wasn’t necessary, the gunship must have given them accurate coordinates. The first two aircraft out of eight flew across the VC positions, dropping canisters from under their wings. The canisters hit the ground and huge gouts of flame flowed over the enemy, even from five hundred yards away we could hear their screams. Two more Phantoms roared in and dropped their napalm. Where the bombs landed the burning napalm spread out and dropped down into the trenches and foxholes. It was especially effective against the trenches and improvised protection they had constructed, the drainage and irrigation ditches where the enemy were spread out along a wide front. The effect was devastating, but the Phantoms were not finished. The second wing, four aircraft zoomed into the attack. They were fitted with Vulcan cannon in pods, designed for both air to air and ground attack after the early Phantoms felt the lack of close quarter armament.

  This time they were used against the Viet Cong besieging us. Both machine guns had fallen silent after the napalm attacks, now the Viet Cong had nothing to fire back with. A few AK47s fired bursts at the incoming aircraft, a light machine gun was hurriedly set up but just as quickly swept aside in a hail of cannon fire.

  The lighter minigun of the gunship had had little effect against the primitive earthworks and thick balks of timber, but the Vulcan cannon churned them into muddy splinters. The enemy battalion literally melted before our eyes, many of them destroyed by the massive weight of gunfire. But I knew it was only half the story, this area was riddled with tunnels, many of the guerrillas were simply disappearing into their holes in the ground, from where they had complete freedom of movement to move around the area and pop back virtually anywhere they chose. The firing died down, but we were still unable to move out. The VC positions lay between us and Saigon. We were back to stalemate.

  The Phantoms patrolled above us, occasionally they came in to attack when they saw the enemy moving. There was little that was visible to us, but we knew they were there. Then a Cessna arrived high overhead. Used for reconnaissance and battlefield command and control, it was obvious that the military were stepping up their rescue mission. Then a flight of gunships appeared, Huey UH-1s fitted with a door mounted minigun. They went into action, hovering over the enemy position and hosing them down with precision gunfire every time a Viet Cong soldier put his head up.

  We waited a little longer and sure enough, a troop carrying helicopter came in towards us, a Sikorsky S-61R military transport helicopter, the backbone of the search and rescue operations during the Vietnam War. With a crew of three it could carry more than twenty passengers, even when fitted with door gunners, as this one was. Two M60 machine guns were mounted, one either side, each crewed by a gunner wearing a heavy flak jacket. The helicopter touched down twenty yards away from us, we were already moving towards it. The loadmaster appeared in the doorway, beckoning us on. A burst of machine gun fire hit the body of the Sikorski, then the Phantoms swooped and the machine gun fell silent.

  Ritter was the last man aboard the aircraft, even as his foot left the ground we shot up into the sky. Another machine gun opened up but he missed completely, then it too was obliterated by the thunderous gunfire of the Vulcan cannons. We were still climbing, soon we were out of range of all but the heaviest guns of the enemy and the pilot set course for Saigon. The helicopter was going flat out, behind us the gunships were keeping station, but it was no escort. The Phantoms flashed past, leaving the area, then the first of the bombs began to fall. The loadmaster shouted across to us.

  “They redirected a strike on the Ho Chi Minh trail, when the brass heard you were in trouble they alerted the bombers. They were passing overhead anyway, so they’ve just been waiting for us to clear the area.”

  The first bombs hit, we couldn’t hear the whistle of them falling but when they hit the shock wave seemed to hurl the helicopter forward, it staggered in the air and the pilot fought to keep it in level flight. The next salvo of bombs fell, once again our helicopter lurched and staggered. It went on and on, an endless rain of destructive power, the most awesome explosive devastation that has been unleashed from the sky, short of the two atomic bombs dropped on Japan in 1945. Even when we approached Saigon we could still hear their destructive power smashing the countryside for miles around the paddy fields and fortifications that lay to the east of Trang Bang. Then we were hit, the aircraft mortally wounded.

  The pilot expertly brought the Sikorski down for a landing, the burst of machine gun fire from the ground had hit something critical and both of the General Electric T58-10 turboshafts had cut out almost instantaneously. We landed in a field, overhead the gunships had started to hunt for the machine gun, they fired burst after burst and only stopped firing when it fell silent. Jack Bond asked the pilot for our position.

  “We’re about eight miles out from Saigon,” he said. The crew were arming themselves with M16s, ready to take on a Viet Cong assault if it came. Where there was one enemy machine gun position, there could well be others. And assault troops.

  “I’ve radioed for a pick up, they need about ten minutes to reach us,” the pilot said.

  I nodded and looked around. “I don’t think we’ve got ten minutes, my friend, I think it’s time to get out of here.”

  Diem took command, as was his right. He pointed southeast. “We’ll head off at a tangent, follow the contours of the ground, let’s go.”

  “Major,” Ritter shouted, “give me half a minute, we’ll take the M60s.”

  Diem nodded. “Hurry, we’re running low on time.”

  Ritter and Paul unclipped the machine guns from their mounts and draped the ammunition belts over their shoulders. The door gunners looked sheepish at their weapons being commandeered, but they were planning on abandoning them, so there was little a
rgument. Besides, they still wore their heavy flak armour, I suspected the added weight of the M60s would prove to be too much for them to carry if they were to keep up.

  Diem led the way and we stumbled along after him. I helped Ritter with the burden of his M60, the loadmaster saw what I was doing and helped out Paul. We kept away from the enemy fire that swept overhead occasionally. The gunships had headed back to Saigon, obviously to refuel, but the Phantoms came back and circled overhead, but this time their targets were much better hidden, or they were cleverer. They waited for the Phantoms to be furthest away, then they popped up and took pot shots at us. Fortunately, no one was hit and we made good time. We were heading for a line of trees, a thin strip of jungle, when a group of Viet Cong stepped out and started shooting at us. Every time the Phantoms came around they ducked into the jungle and disappeared, then raked us again with gunfire when they sky was clear. We had to take cover and couldn’t move any further, the ground ahead was empty of cover, if they caught us there we’d be mown down.

  “Time for some SS tactics”, Ritter shouted. “Give us a few minutes, Paul and I are going to set up the M60s on the flank.”

  I nodded and kept my head down, I held Helene close to me. She’d been in a few actions but was not a trained soldier, I didn’t want her to get hit due to an incautious look at the enemy. My two friends disappeared, hiding in parallel folds in the ground, I spoke rapidly to Diem and explained what was needed.

  “You’re right, the longer we wait here, the more reinforcements they’ll call up to stop us. The whole countryside is alive with Viet Cong, they’re obviously still pressing the Tet assaults on the city.”

  The helicopter crew declined to have any part of our mad plan, but Jack Bond was with us. Three of us against at least a platoon of Viet Cong, but we had our ace in the hole. They were too crafty to be caught by the fighter bombers patrolling overhead, it was time to see what a more basic tactic would achieve. The bombers circled away and the first of the enemy faces appeared in the jungle ahead, then they all broke cover. We charged. We screamed and shouted, firing from the hip. I hadn’t done this since the days of the Indochina war, where necessity had sometimes demanded that we meet the enemy head on. I’d have preferred to fix bayonets, they always had a psychological impact, twelve inches of cold steel at the end of an assault rifle charging at you was a sobering prospect, but we didn’t have bayonets.

  They were too stupefied to react at first, they had us outnumbered and outgunned, we were supposed to be cowering behind cover. The few seconds of delay were enough, I felt a bullet graze me arm, then we reached the first of the enemy and we were in amongst them.

  We kept up a barrage of gunfire, emptying clip after clip. When we were amongst them we had a decided advantage, wherever we turned we had targets to shoot at, they were hesitant, demoralised by our astonishingly reckless tactics.

  We were fighting hand to hand, forced to draw out knives and start a series of bloody struggles, for a few moments the tide turned against us as their greater numbers began to tell. Diem took a knife thrust in the shoulder, he manfully pressed on the attack but he was bleeding profusely. Paul and Ritter had to stop firing because of the danger of hitting us, Jack Bond was limping as he fought, a bullet lodged in his upper thigh. I thought we’d had it when Ritter and Paul came howling in from the flanks and the pilot and gunners, seeing the urgency and desperation of our struggle, ran forward to join in. It was enough to tip the balance, the Viet Cong turned and ran, disappearing into the jungle.

  We stood panting for a few minutes, looking at the carnage we had created. The Phantoms had hit some of the Viet Cong when they first arrived, we had killed at least another ten by the time the fight was over, the bodies lay festooned on the ground. Helene came running up and began to check out our wounds, but there was little time to spare. As soon as the enemy recovered their wits they’d come back at us, we needed to get as far away from them as possible.

  The Phantoms were still circling, so we had our air cover. Helene was putting a bandage on Jack Bond’s wound, but I dragged her away.

  “There’s no time for that, we need to get away from here fast.”

  “But he’ll bleed to death if I don’t finish dressing his wound,” she protested.

  “He’ll bleed to death from the next Viet Cong attack if we’re not out of here right away,” I told her. “He’ll have to manage, let’s go.”

  She noticed my arm then. “Jurgen, you’ve been hit too.”

  I shook my head. “Scratched it on a branch, let’s go.”

  We stumbled across the open ground, away from the Viet Cong. There was a clump of trees ahead of us, the other side an open piece of flat ground. Two Hueys were on the way to take us off, I wanted a screen between us and the enemy while we were embarking. We reached the trees and stumbled through the tangle of vines and undergrowth that plucked at our legs. It slowed us down and I was worried we wouldn’t make it. Then we emerged from the other side and into the open ground. In the distance the Hueys were approaching, we quickened our pace towards the open space where they would land. Then the Viet Cong opened up again with a heavy machine gun. We threw ourselves flat and the stream of heavy bullets flew overhead. They’d somehow flanked us, anticipating where we were headed and brought the machine gun around to bear on the landing ground. Another machine gun started to fire, this time at the Hueys. They shot up into the sky, too vulnerable to the weight of ground fire to risk coming in to land. Then two more Hueys hurtled towards the battlefield, but these were not UH-1’s, they were Huey Cobra armoured gunships.

  The miniguns started their song of death, the ripping, tearing sound of thousands of metal jacketed slugs hurtling towards the enemy. They’d set up in the jungle, out of sight of the patrolling aircraft, but the slower moving Cobras were able to calculate their positions and send their rain of hot metal directly into the area where they sheltered. The bullets were part incendiary and I could see smoke rising from where they had struck. It was enough for the Phantoms, still patiently patrolling overhead. Now they had a target. The jet engines roared in, the Cobras politely flew to one side to give them space and the Vulcan cannons started hurling huge quantities of explosive shells at the targets that the Cobras had lit up for them. We never saw the end result, it was hidden behind the screen of the jungle, but the machine guns stopped abruptly and when the guns stopped firing and the aircraft flew away, we could hear some of the screams faintly in the distance.

  The Hueys came in to land close by and they helped us on board. Helene, not to be deterred, took the opportunity even before the helicopter left the ground to start bandaging our wounds, starting with Jack Bond’s leg that was a bloody mess. We left the ground and the pilot set course for Saigon. I thought about our mission, we lost two men, Aaron Goldberg and Jack Russo, but the blow we’d dealt the enemy was enormous. I’d like to have killed Major Ba with my bare hands for the torture he’d inflicted on Goldberg, but had to content myself with the possibility that he would be dealt with by Hanoi for allowing us to escape. We’d killed Dung Vo Phuc, the VC commander in charge of the assaults on Saigon, I wondered if it would slow them down. Probably not, but what we had achieved was bringing small and even medium sized units to battle and seeing them destroyed in the process, whether by gunfire, explosives in the tunnel system, B-52 bombing raids or the devastating miniguns and Vulcan cannon of the Hueys and Phantoms. That, in itself, would certainly slow down the attacks on Saigon, the simple mathematics of attrition, killing the enemy. If we were to look at any real success of the mission, it would be there, in sapping the enemies will and ability to fight. Then I thought about Son.

  Helene came to me and started to bandage my arm. Our eyes met.

  “Thank God it’s all over,” she said to me. But it wasn’t over, I explained about Son. “Didn’t he remind you of anyone?”

  “Yes, I believe she did.”

  “We’ll need to deal with it as soon as we get back,” I said firmly.

&nb
sp; “I don’t want any more deaths, Jurgen.”

  “We nearly lost everything. We can’t just ignore it, we could get hit again at any time.”

  “No more killing, Jurgen, please!”

  I didn’t reply, I didn’t always have a choice in these matters. The crewman came across to have a word with us, shouting over the roar of the engines.

  “We’ll be landing at Saigon racetrack, Sir. You know they took out the helipad at Tan Son Nhat?”

  I nodded. “I do, yes.”

  “Ok. Well, the racetrack has been allocated as a temporary landing field, so they’ll lay on transport to take you on from there back to Tan Son Nhat, they want you to report in at MACV.”

  “Very well.”

  He went back to speak to the pilot. Helene rested her head on my shoulder as the aircraft flew on, soon the racetrack came into view, covered with helicopters, vehicles, refuelling tankers, armourers and men running everywhere to keep the Hueys flying. The skids touched the grass and we climbed stiffly out onto the ground. Helene had just said ‘thank God it’s over’, but it wasn’t over, not by any means. The Viet Cong, repulsed from the city, were counterattacking.

  * * *

  'I've seen major changes in Vietnam, however there are still problems and difficulties that need to be overcome.'