COMBAT STORIES FROM Vietnam

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Showing : Vietnam Videos

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  Bill Crossley - Army +15 Total Videos

  Provisional Artillery Group, I Field Force

  Bill Crossley was always scrambling to improve security at his artillery fire bases. He sent a meteorological platoon to one battery just to get some more gun barrels in case of attack. He had also scrounged a 75mm recoilless rifle, which by pure chance wound up insuring the base against mortar attacks.

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  Jack Jeter - Army +9 Total Videos

  2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Air Cavalry Division

  Jack Jeter was a little older when he was drafted, 23 years old. His training was at Fort Polk, over the hot Louisiana summer of 1968. He didn't think any place could be hotter or more miserable. Then he got to the jungles of Southeast Asia. (Caution: strong language.)

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  George Crockett - Army +4 Total Videos

  1st Cavalry, A Company, 228th Assault Helicopter Company

  George Crockett remembers the worst day of Vietnam, when he was in an intense firefight and injured from a bullet.

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  Jack Fishman - Army +6 Total Videos

  319th Transportation Company

  Jack Fishman describes the daily grind of running the resupply convoys that brought everything to the front line troops in Vietnam. The constant work, the rats in the hooches, and the iffy food. If that wasn't enough, a shot or a mine could blow an ammo truck and leave a crater in the road.

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  Gilbert Howland - Army +16 Total Videos

  Multiple Units

  Gilbert Howland had already served with Merrill's Marauders and was there at Pork Chop Hill in the next war. He shipped out for his third war in 1966 as an ARVN advisor in the Central Highlands of Vietnam. He felt lucky that his Vietnamese counterpart spoke English, which made the job much easier. (This interview made possible with the support of DAVID W. MARQUEZ.)

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  Pat Richardson - Army +8 Total Videos

  Multiple Units

  Pat Richardson had served three years and was at at college when he went back for more. His first service was as a nuclear weapons technician, which instilled a good sense of procedure and precision. This helped him tremendously in his later duty as an aviator.

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  Bob Atkinson - Marines +17 Total Videos

  K Company, 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment

  Home had not been much better than the war but Bob Atkinson's life began to look up when he saw an ad for hypnosis to stop smoking and he tried it and it worked. Would the hypnotist try taking him back to Vietnam? "Oh, hell no," came the answer, but it did happen and it was another step on the road back. Part 3 of 3.

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  Ernest Banasau - Army +17 Total Videos

  A Company, 4th Infantry Division

  On patrol, Banasau's platoon steps into a firefight during the Tet Offensive, where he and 2 others are hit. He does his best to keep fighting until help can arrive. Part 1 of 2

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  Allen Robinson - Navy +4 Total Videos

  USS Jamestown AGTR-3

  They left on charters and returned individually, alone or in small groups on commercial flights. Only Mom and Dad were there to provide a homecoming. That's how Vietnam veterans like Allen Robinson went to war and returned.

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  Bob Atkinson - Marines +17 Total Videos

  K Company, 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment

  As the battle at Kilo One continued, Bob Atkinson's mortar team ran out of ammo and he had to crawl to another mortar pit under heavy fire to get some more. They kept getting incoming rounds until they hit the enemy firing a recoilless rifle from their own chow hall. The fright turned to bitterness as he ended the night alone on watch. Part 2 of 3.

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  Richard Hawes - Marines +6 Total Videos

  Multiple Units

  After his first tour of Vietnam, Marine pilot Richard Hawes was assigned first to Corpus Christi and then to the Mediterranean. His second Vietnam tour took him to Thailand, where he was chief of Staff for Task Force Delta, a group operating over North Vietnam. His job was to run all operations and "keep the General happy."

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  Les Carter - Army +6 Total Videos

  1st Battalion, 502nd Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division

  When Les Carter traveled by helicopter to the action in Vietnam, he often had the local Vietnamese District Chief along. A doctor or a chaplain also might be on board, along with the crew of four.

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  Mike Waugh - Army +10 Total Videos

  128th Assault Helicopter Company, 11th Aviation Battalion, 12th Aviation Group

  He surprised his wife after returning from his second Vietnam tour, but then his dog surprised him. Mike Waugh had planned to make the Army a career, but it didn't work out, so he was worried about what he would do. He mailed out resumes and got one reply.

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  Henry Dunn - Army +9 Total Videos

  2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry

  After the enemy faded away from the ambush at Landing Zone Albany, the really hard work began, finding the dead and wounded. There were more of them than there were men standing. Henry Dunn says the stench of the burned and decaying bodies in the tropical heat never left his nostrils. Part 4 of 4.

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  Bill Camper - Army +13 Total Videos

  Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (MACV)

  "No one in Vietnam needs these." That's what Bill Camper thought when his district was sent boxes of laxatives by mistake. The civilian advisor told the doctor to hang on to them and that led to victory over a North Vietnamese unit that had moved into the area. "It was kind of like biological warfare."

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  Jim Lawrence - Army +12 Total Videos

  2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry

  As a returning Vietnam veteran, Jim Lawrence disappeared into his own life, along with all the others who were ignored or worse by the public. He is happy about the respect returning vets get today, but is disturbed by what he considers the same mistakes being made by politicians.

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  Jim and Tuy-Cam Bullington +8 Total Videos

  US Department of State

  Jim Bullington's first Foreign Service post was Vietnam. He arrived along with the troops in 1965 and was assigned to the consulate in the old city of Hue. There he met many of the reporters who also followed the soldiers to Southeast Asia and, more importantly, he met Tuy-Cam, a translator at the consulate.

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  John Walker - Army +4 Total Videos

  170th Assault Helicopter Company, 1st Aviation Brigade

  John E. Walker is haunted by memories of Vietnam. One thing that is still in his nightmares is the grisly way the commander of his base would treat the bodies of the dead. Also in his dreams is the grim fate of a rescued helicopter pilot who desperately grabbed the skids to a rising aircraft.

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  Kenneth Moorefield - Army +12 Total Videos

  Advisor, 21st Infantry Division, ARVN

  He was an ARVN advisor in the Southernmost part of the Mekong Delta. There were no American units in the area, recalls Kenneth Moorefield but he did have air support. They were so far down the supply chain that during the Tet Offensive, his unit was running out of ammunition.

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  Jack Martin - Army +9 Total Videos

  Multiple Units, Corps of Engineers

  As a battalion commander, Army engineer Jack Martin had a host of problems. From whether there were enough personnel to get the job done to keeping wayward enlisted men from abusing the Vietnamese civilians. Then there was the grim task of writing condolence letters. (This interview made possible with the support of BARBARA SHELDON in honor of Joseph Graham.)

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  Duwayne Balk - Army +4 Total Videos

  95th Evacuation Hospital

  Duwayne Balk remembers the team effort that went into bringing mass casualties and doing the best you can to treat everybody. After arriving home, he remembers trying to keep a low profile as a Vietnam vet at that time in America.

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  Al Copeland - Army +5 Total Videos

  A Company, 3rd Battalion, 7th Infantry Regiment, 199th Light Infantry Brigade

  On Saturdays, Al Copeland's unit had to go on Air Mobile Assaults. Choppers would pick up the men and ferry them from one landing zone to another, wherever there was intelligence that the Viet Cong were present. This was tough in the Mekong Delta, where you stepped in mud up to your knees.

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  Omer McCants - Army +8 Total Videos

  162nd Assault Helicopter Company, 13th Combat Aviation Battalion

  His home town in Alabama was completely segregated. To Omer McCants, it wasn't good but it was "even." In the Army, there was no outward expression of hostility, but he knew he was excluded. He came in knowing he had to work twice as hard and that worked out for him.

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  Jim McCurry - Navy +8 Total Videos

  U.S. Navy, USS Newport

  Mr. McCurry describes what it was like to be a part of the intensity of "Operation Linebacker."

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  Bill Crossley - Army +15 Total Videos

  6th Artillery Battalion, 27th Field Artillery Regiment

  Once the Tet Offensive began, it was the "Wild, Wild West" for Bill Crossley's artillery. He had to move an entire battery forty miles in the dark, secure an unguarded bridge in Saigon, and then begin the counter attack. While it was a disaster to Walter Cronkite, the troops who had long been searching for the VC knew that they finally had them.

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  Mack Angel - Air Force +4 Total Videos

  13th Tactical Fighter Squadron

  After getting a new assignment in Vietnam, Mack Angel flew over the country with his company in a special "Wild Weasel" program.

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  Sardo Sanchez - Marines +5 Total Videos

  Combined Action Program, Group 2, 4th Unit, 2nd Platoon

  Sanchez shares a story that takes him from his final days in Vietnam, through his career as a criminal investigator and into retirement, where he makes time to reunite with fellow CAP vets.

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  LTG Larry Jordan - Army +11 Total Videos

  Multiple Units

  Larry Jordan only talked with his wife a few times over his year in Vietnam. His son, who is in the modern Army in the age of instant communication, wonders how he dealt with that. When he returned home, he was told he might want to change into civilian clothes to avoid confrontation. He refused.

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  Kenneth Moorefield - Army +12 Total Videos

  9th Infantry Division

  It had always been his wish to command an infantry company and on his second tour of Vietnam, Kenneth Moorefield was put in that position. Unfortunately, the war had changed and from the top down, a new outlook that was reluctant and defensive had taken hold.

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  John Jones - Marines +9 Total Videos

  Marine Medium Tilt Rotor Squadron 165

  John Jones recalls the time when his helicopter was rerouted to pick up a Viet Cong fighter waving a white flag. When he returned home, he knew he'd had enough of the service and he never flew again.