by Eric Helm
The first man to reach the fountain was shot at. He rolled up against the side of the fountain, then fired at a window, waited and fired again. A burst ripped up the ground in front of him and chipped stone from the fountain, covering him with a fine dust.
While the one man kept the Americans pinned down, the rest of the sappers infiltrated, slipping through the hole in the embassy wall and spreading out. Some used the bushes or palm trees as cover. Others slid along the wall until they were at the corners and then ran across the grass, hoping to penetrate either the main embassy building or into any of the other structures on the four acres.
As soon as all of the men were through the wall, Le Tran followed them. She ran toward the fountain and dropped to the ground behind it, her AK-47 clutched in her hands. Using her elbows and her knees, she worked her way around the fountain until she could see the window where one of the Americans hid. There was a flicker of movement behind it and then the flashes of the muzzle as the American put a burst into the side of the fountain. She grinned as she returned the fire.
Lockridge was alone in his corner of the embassy when part of the wall near the street blew up. In his fatigues and steel pot, he was standing near a window when it happened. He saw the flash, the orange-yellow fireball and the cloud of dust and smoke. The window shattered, and the glass fell onto the floor.
He dived to the side, his heart in his throat. His chest was thumping spasmodically under his flak jacket as he tried to figure out what had happened. There was a single burst of firing from a machine gun and then small arms. Lockridge got onto his hands and knees and crawled away from the window and broken glass, moving toward the door. Without thinking, he made sure it was locked.
He moved back toward the window and glanced out of it, staying to the side so that he would be hard to see. The embassy grounds in front of him seemed to be empty. No one was moving, but someone was shooting. There were rifle shots and bursts from automatic weapons.
Lockridge ducked and crawled under the window to look out the other side. Still nothing. Only a hole in the wall, but no one around it. Lockridge wondered if someone hadn’t just tried to blow up part of it as a gesture of defiance. No one to enter, just proof that the American embassy in downtown Saigon could be a target if someone wanted it to be.
There was movement in the courtyard, near the big, round fountain. Lockridge raised his rifle, but before he could fire someone else did. He saw the tracers strike the stone and bounce off. There was a pinging sound as they ricocheted. The man crawling there returned fire.
Lockridge aimed into the middle of the muzzle-flashes and opened up. He held his finger on the trigger until it ached and the bolt of his weapon locked back, then he ducked and let the empty magazine fall to the floor. When he popped up again, there was no movement and no muzzle-flashes.
For several long minutes Lockridge searched the grounds outside his window. Overhead, there were flares bursting, throwing light onto the scene. The shifting light didn’t help matters because it put the whole landscape into motion. He tried to separate the moving shadows from the VC who were out there somewhere.
Finally he spotted something that he was sure was an enemy soldier. Aiming at it, the sights of his weapon on the middle of the shape, he pulled the trigger, putting a five-round burst into it.
Immediately there was answering fire. AK rounds slammed into the wall near him. The remaining glass in the window exploded. Lockridge could hear the bullets snap as they passed close to his head, but he refused to duck. He tried to spot the enemy’s weapons, but the muzzle-flashes were invisible. Fearing he was going to be killed, he dropped down and leaned against the wall, certain that he could feel the bullets hitting the other side of it.
Keeping to the dark, deserted streets, Gerber and Fetterman made good time. They trotted along the fronts of the buildings, stopping at the cross streets to make sure no one was lying in ambush. Then they rushed to seek cover on the other side. They kept the pace quick as they moved through the debris-strewn streets. Fires were burning on some blocks and cars had been overturned on others. It looked as if riots had broken out around them.
They came to a wide palm-lined boulevard. There were no lights. Overhead were the flares being dropped from aircraft or fired into the air by artillery. It was a half-light that shifted and shimmered, but it was bright enough for them to see a jeep pulled to the side of the road. The M-60 mounted in the back pointed at the sky and there seemed to be one man leaning against the front tires.
Fetterman eased toward Gerber and nodded in the direction of the jeep. “Wounded?”
“Or dead.” Gerber pointed to the right and signaled him forward. When Fetterman started off, Gerber dodged to the right so that he was next to the short stone wall topped by an iron fence.
Carefully, watching the ground around them with one eye on the buildings across the street, they worked their way to the jeep. They approached it from the rear, their weapons ready. In front of it was the body of one man, his helmet on the ground next to his head as if he had set it there.
Fetterman stopped near the base of a palm, his weapon aimed in the general direction of the jeep. The man there moved his head slightly, almost as if he had heard Fetterman’s approach.
When Gerber caught up, Fetterman asked, “Sir?”
“Let’s check them. I’ll cover.”
Fetterman dropped to his stomach and crawled the last few feet to the jeep. As he reached the rear tires, he got to his feet, still crouching so that his head was below the back of the jeep. He duckwalked forward and put a hand on the man leaning against the front tire.
Slowly the man turned and grinned. There was blood on his flak jacket and on his face. He was sitting with his legs straight out in front of him, his hands at his sides, the backs resting on the ground. In his right hand was a .45, but he didn’t seem to have the strength to lift it.
“Where you hit?”
The man continued to grin. His teeth were bloodstained.
Fetterman moved closer and put a hand on the man’s head. His hair was clotted with blood, and Fetterman wondered if the skull had been penetrated. A bullet in the head could do strange things while a man waited to die. But there was no evidence of a hole. Just a crease in the scalp that was deep enough to have dazed him.
“My partner?”
Fetterman looked up and saw Gerber working his way to the other man. He waited as Gerber checked the body and then shook his head.
“Partner’s dead,” said Fetterman. “Sorry.”
“He was a good kid. Fresh, and a smartass, but a good kid. Shit.”
“You going to be all right?”
“I’m fine. Got a headache and can’t see shit. There’s three or four of you and you all keep spinning around.”
“You’ve got a concussion and who knows what else.”
“You sure my partner’s dead?”
Fetterman watched Gerber drag the body out of the street and rest it against the curb. He could tell by the way the body moved as Gerber dragged it that the man was dead. There was something about the way they moved — a loose-boned shifting that a living body couldn’t match. It was as if dowels had been sewn into clothes to help give them shape. Once you’d seen it, you didn’t forget it.
“I’m afraid so,” said Fetterman.
“Shit. He was a good kid.”
“Listen, is there anything I can do for you?”
“The radio is still working. I hear it sometimes. You could call this in.”
Fetterman stood up long enough to grab the microphone. He turned the gain knob and heard a burst of static, and then the air was filled with voices — nervous voices calling for help, frightened voices demanding help, quiet voices telling the others to calm down.
“Call sign is Waco. Waco One Two. Tell them we’re down and need help.”
Fetterman nodded and waited until there was a break in the traffic. He keyed the mike and said, “Waco Control, Waco Control, this is Waco One Two.”
“One Two, say message. Quit wasting time.”
“One Two is down. One dead. One wounded. Needs assistance.”
There was a pause and then, “Say location.”
Fetterman gave it to Waco Control. He was told that assistance was on the way. A few minutes later he heard the faint wailing of sirens. In the distance the revolving red lights reflected off the fronts of buildings.
Gerber moved toward him. “Guy took a round right between the eyes. Couldn’t have known what hit him.”
Fetterman looked at the man leaning on the tire. The sound from the sirens was getting closer. He said, “You’re going to be okay now.”
As the first of the MP jeeps skidded to a halt, Fetterman got to his feet. Gerber moved with him as a sergeant wearing a flak jacket, a steel pot instead of the normal polished helmet liner and an armband with MP on it leaped from the passenger’s side.
“What happened here?”
“Ambush,” said Gerber. “You’ve one dead and one wounded. Should get the wounded man to the hospital.”
The MP crouched near the wounded man and asked, “What happened?”
“VC were waiting. Opened fire. I got hit and fell out of the jeep. I didn’t see what happened to John.”
In the distance there was an explosion. Everyone hit the ground. There was a burst of small-arms fire and then sporadic shooting.
“Sounds like it’s close to the embassy,” said the MP sergeant.
“We were heading in that direction,” said Gerber. “Want to give us a lift?”
“Cruz, you and Martinez head over to the embassy and see what’s happening there. I’ll take Davis to the hospital.” He looked at Gerber and said, “You can ride with one of them.”
Cruz turned and ran to his jeep. As he grabbed the wheel, he shouted, “Let’s go!”
Fetterman followed Gerber as he swung himself into the rear of the jeep. He looked at the M-60 but didn’t stand behind it. However, when Cruz slammed the jeep into gear and he was rocked to the rear, he held on to the machine gun’s support.
Over the roar of the wind, Gerber yelled, “The next few minutes are going to be real interesting.”
CHAPTER 18
THE AMERICAN EMBASSY, SAIGON
Lockridge crouched in the darkness in the ruined ground floor. He walked around, peering out windows, looking for the enemy. Occasionally he could hear them, along with firing from inside the compound. The latter came from other Marines shooting at the sappers who were trying to get inside the building.
He took up his position at the window again, searching for the enemy. Feeling the tension, he held his weapon in both hands, his fingers locked on it. The muscles of his arms were cramping with the strain, but Lockridge didn’t care. He was nervous and afraid and alone, and he was convinced that he wasn’t going to let anyone enter the building unless they were Americans.
Outside there was movement. Lockridge threw his weapon to his shoulder and aimed. He pulled the trigger, felt the weapon fire, then looked and saw someone scramble for cover. He fired again.
Return fire slammed into the wall near him, splattering him with chipped stone and bits of brick. Lockridge ducked, crawled under the window and popped up again, staring into the half-light outside the building. Smoke was drifting in from the north, obscuring the fountain.
There was a VC in the bushes near the wall. Lockridge was sure of it. He aimed and fired, waited and fired again. When there was no return fire, he ducked under the window so that he could look out the other side. A man was up and running — a man wearing a white shirt and black pants and carrying an AK-47. Lockridge knew that none of the Marines would be outside the buildings and that any help that arrived would not be armed with the Communist weapons. He opened fire.
The man almost reached cover. One round hit him in the shoulder and spun him around. He lost the grip on his weapon, tossing it to the ground, then rolled once as he hit the dirt and tried to stand. Lockridge aimed carefully and put a bullet into the VC’s head. There was a splash of blood and the man collapsed. He didn’t move.
Lockridge turned his back to the wall and slid to the floor. He held his M-16 in both hands, the butt on the floor and the muzzle pointed at the ceiling. It was the first man he had killed. The first one that he had watched die. For a moment he was sickened by what he had done, and then suddenly he was elated. He had shot an enemy soldier who would have killed him if given the chance.
Instead of worrying about it, Lockridge got to his knees and looked out the lower corner of the window. All around there was shooting. Chicom grenades were popping and shrapnel was rattling against the side of the building.
Lockridge looked around again. He had shoved the desks, chairs and tables against the doors that led into the room. He had pushed the filing cabinets into the center of the room to give himself a nest if he needed it. Papers, files, cans, pencils, maps and dozens of other small things littered the floor. The windows were broken and the air conditioner was roaring, trying to cool the room. The humidity of the early morning was seeping in. Lockridge was covered with a light coating of moisture that was nervous sweat. His skin itched.
The jeeps stopped short of the embassy grounds. Gerber and Fetterman leaped out of the back and crouched, trying to figure out what was happening. There was shooting all over the embassy grounds. A machine gun nest manned by Americans had been established on the roof.
“Now what?” asked Fetterman.
Gerber shrugged. He noticed the hole blown in the wall and wondered why someone would go to that much trouble. The gate was the weakest point and could probably have been penetrated with little or no noise. Blowing a hole in the wall would alert everyone inside.
Gerber stood and took a step into the street. There was a single burst of fire from inside the compound. The bullets struck the concrete, bouncing and whining into the night. Gerber dived back for cover.
“Shit. Didn’t expect that.”
Fetterman scrambled around to the left so that he was on the side of the jeep opposite the embassy. He peeked over the seats, but couldn’t see anything other than the wall, the tops of trees and the upper stories of the embassy. From inside came plenty of shooting, but it was single-shot or short bursts of assault rifles.
Gerber joined him. “I believe it’s not much more than a squad. Maybe two.”
“I agree. If there were more of them, they’d have overrun the place by now.”
Gerber ducked his head and looked at his watch. “It’ll be light in about an hour. Maybe less. At first light we should be able to figure out what to do.”
“You mean we wait?”
Gerber nodded and then crawled around the master sergeant. He saw the jeep’s driver kneeling near the front, peeking around the headlights, his eyes on the embassy.
“Cruz,” he hissed. “Can you check on the status?”
“Whose?”
“People inside. See if there are any reinforcements coming.”
Cruz glanced at Gerber, at the embassy and then crawled into cover. He pushed by Fetterman and snagged the microphone for the radio. “Waco Control, this is Five Five.”
“Go.”
Before he could speak, a rocket flashed out of nowhere and hit one of the embassy walls. There was a spectacular explosion. Debris rained down and smoke began to pour from the side of the building.
“Five Five, what in hell was that?”
“Waco Control, that was an enemy rocket. We’ve taken no casualties here. Say status of reinforcements?”
“We have men on the way.”
“Roger.”
Cruz looked at Gerber, who nodded. “Yeah. On the way.”
Fetterman moved to the rear again and studied the hole in the wall. He then returned and said, “We put some people in there, we might be able to take the sappers from the rear before they can get into the building.”
“Hang loose, Tony.”
“Excuse me, sir,” whispered Fetterman, “but those people have a
ttacked American soil now. We have to take them, or the world is going to look down on us. We let some fifth-rate guys walk all over us…”
Gerber wiped a hand over his face. He turned and peered over the top of the jeep. The enemy was still invisible. There was one machine gun nest on the roof, manned by Americans. From the sound of the firing, the Marines still held practically everything.
But Fetterman had a point. Embassy grounds were considered to be the soil of the country they represented. The VC had symbolically attacked the United States. The longer the enemy stayed in there, the bigger the insult. If they could kill and capture all of the enemy soldiers, then the sting would be gone.
The only problem was that he didn’t know the size of the attacking force. From the indications around them, it wasn’t a large force. The last thing he needed, however, was to go off half-cocked.
“Captain,” said Cruz, “we’ll have some people here soon. It might be wise to lie low until the reinforcements arrive.”
“Captain?” pressed Fetterman.
“Tony, we’re going to hang loose for a few minutes until the reinforcements arrive. Then we’ll recon and see what we need to do.”
“Yes, sir.”
Le Tran hid in the bushes and watched her carefully laid plan go up in smoke. They had gotten into the embassy grounds easily, but the Marines had stopped them short of the buildings. She couldn’t believe it. The Marines were all soft children who chased women, drank and talked too much. How could they stop the men of the elite C-10 Sapper Battalion?
She crawled forward slowly, using the techniques she had learned long ago, being careful not to disturb the foliage, using it to hide her movements. She came to the edge of a large expanse of lawn and studied the scene.
In front of her was debris blown off the building by the rockets: chunks of rock, metal from the shutters, papers and dirt. There was one body. She couldn’t tell who it was but knew it was one of her men. His white shirt and black pants were obvious. His weapon lay near his outstretched hand.