Scared to Death of Bugs

Scared to Death of Bugs

Don Fitzwater

The National Anthrax scare somehow reminds me of how scared one can be of bugs. Let me bore you all with a little story about a bug that nearly caused many weeds and trees to be killed.

It was one hot, sweaty and dark night in the Mekong Delta of a far away place then called The Republic of South Vietnam. I was leading a squad and a half of men in a night ambush. We set up an L shaped perimeter on the corner of two rice paddy dikes near a small hamlet of less than half a dozen huts. We had waited until darkness to move the last hundred yards to the position as to not let the eyes of the bad guys know exactly where we were. Once into position we set up our weapons, and assigned sectors of fire for each soldier.

Our Base Camp called Dong Tam had been mortared every night for a week and we were looking for the mortar folks and hoped to ambush them as they moved closer to or away from the base. We were armed with a hefty bit of firepower. We had three M-60 machine guns, several 40MM grenade launchers, M16 rifles, and a passel of Claymore mines that are full of pellets and C-4 explosive and act much like a shotgun with a barrel that would be six inches across when fired. A real buncha Buckshot.

Well anyway we got all settled in and prepared to await the enemy. I kept checking to make sure no eyelids got stuck together and that everyone knew the right direction to shoot if necessary. People waking up in a firefight can turn into a frightening mess for the good guys as well as the bad. Oh does it ever get dark in Vietnam?!

Around eleven o’clock a major gun battle between the Viet Cong(VC) and the Army of South Vietnam(ARVN) about 1000 yards from our position. We could see the flashes of the machine guns and rifles as the VC advanced on the ARVN outpost. They were too far away for us to engage with our weaponry but I immediately knew that I could help those guys because I could redirect my defensive concentrations of artillery fire to hit the bad guys attacking the good guys.

I grabbed the radio handset and began talking to the Fire Direction Center and airbursts of the rounds lit up the night but not where I was telling them to put them. After several rounds the FDC told me to get off the air because he was then talking to the American adviser in the ARVN Compound. I really don’t know who won that battle but there was carnage enough laying around as we walked by the place the next morning to allow both sides to claim victory. But that is not the real story here….My story is much more fearful……..or maybe frightening.

Anyway when the FDC told me to shut up I settled back and waited for the bad guys to come after us. I knew it was almost impossible to keep your position completely a secret. Everyone was on a high state of alert after the fracas and kept rubbing eyes and whispering to their buddies to make sure they weren’t seeing things. I really didn’t worry too much as long as we had our night vision devices with us. Several in the company had malfunctioned and we had only one with us that night. It was working well until shortly after the din of battle between the VC and ARVN’s ended. The squad leader with the scope passed the word that it had failed and that didn’t sit too well with my comfort level.

Our methodology for activating or springing our ambush was rather simple and designed for maximum firepower into the kill zone. When the enemy was in the kill zone I would fire all the Claymores, each machine gunner would rake the zone with two hundred rounds of automatic fire, each 40 MM would fire a buckshot and a HE round, and each rifleman would spray the zone with two magazines of automatic fire. Each man would reload and on my whistle we would book out or as we sometimes said hook up to our alternate position as quickly as possible making sure we did not separate. All the time we were retreating to the alternate position the defensive concentrations were to be keeping any surviving enemy off our butts. That’s a mouth full isn’t it. Well anyway that was the plan if were hit.

I’d say about an hour or so after the scope went out SSG Dan Smith reached over touching my arm and whispered that he thought we were soon to have visitors because he saw something glinting in the night. It was too dark for regular binoculars to be of benefit but I could make out a luminous light coming directly toward us. Wow…Have you ever heard a monkey beating on a 55 gallon drum with a stick. I was sure I heard one but then I discovered it was my heartbeat. We had been told that most VC probably didn’t have watches so I knew immediately that I was seeing a leader with his watch not properly covered for night operations.

Dan and I immediately set about getting things in battle order not that we had much to do but the enemy was too far away to engage until they moved closer which they were doing. As well as we could we checked and rechecked whispering encouragement to our troops and trying to keep the sound of our heartbeats down to a low crescendo. I took the Claymore detonators in my hand and took up the slack several times in anticipation of the upcoming real event. I would lay them down side by side so there would be no foul ups when the time came to blow them. As I had six to blow I wanted to make sure they were blown in three smooth movements of Grab, Squeeze, Grab, Squeeze and Grab, Squeeze. Fire my two magazines and away we would go.

Have you ever heard of time standing still? Well it sometimes does. I know it does. Those darn VC just would not hurry up and let happen what was to happen. The watch swung backward and forth occasionally moving around as the soon to be dead leader seemed to be chatting with his troops. Pointing and gesturing at whatever, I haven’t the foggiest. Well anyway they were coming straight down the paddy dike so I swung one end of my L Shaped perimeter around to make it a straight line able to fire either forward or backwards should the need arise. We had to make sure the enemy was within the kill zone before we fired or they could possibly get out of range and out flank us. The last thing one wants to do is to have to attack in all directions simultaneously just to get to your alternate position.

Just writing this gets the juices flowing. Is your heart beating fast? Can you imagine the feeling of having a buncha bad guys with guns moving up to attack or at least run into you in the middle of the night in their hometown and you aren’t invited. Well now ya know how I was feelin just about that time…Dan says that they are about in range and my achy eyes agreed. I had strained to keep my eyed glued on that watch dial so hard I imagined I could see the hands and they weren’t Mickey’s. I whispered OK Guys this is it. I reached for the first two Claymore detonators, took up the slack and lo and behold just as I began to squeeze for effect that darn Lightening Bug went straight up.

So help me that is a true story of bugs in my war Don Fitzwater

Kent M. Herrick, Editor in Chief, 2011

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