by Michael L. Kelley

Army veteran Mike Kelley is the “Gunner” half of the superbly-written dual memoir, The Gunner and The Grunt: Two Boston Boys in Vietnam with the First Cavalry Division Airmobile (Casemate). Vietnam Magazine praises the book as “a standout for any reader with an interest in the airmobile aspect of the Vietnam War.” But the book’s unique value is not so much its vivid account of early airmobile combat operations, both on foot and in the air, but its candid portrayal of two youthful personalities caught up their generation’s world-changing event. Each answers the call, but reacts and responds as the unique individuals they are. Mike Kelley was the more reluctant warrior of the two. In the adapted excerpt below, Mike describes his welcome to Vietnam and his first terrifying exposure to combat. You can order The Gunner and the Grunt from Casemate or booksellers everywhere.

The plane took off and I settled in for the long flight to San Francisco. Next to me sat a mother and her pretty, teenage daughter. We chatted some and they asked me where I was from and how I liked Army life. As we talked, the stewardess came by and passed out some magazines.

She handed me a copy of Time magazine, and on the cover was a bleak photograph of wounded soldiers in a battle at a place called the Michelin Rubber Plantation in South Vietnam.

“Pardon me ladies, but I would like to read this if you don’t mind.”

I turned the pages to read the story of the battle. As I got deeper into the magazine, another story caught my eye. The 1st Cavalry Division had engaged in battle in the Ia Drang Valley with a large North Vietnamese unit. Casualties were heavy. There were black and white photos of some of the wounded. My face turned ashen, and I began to sweat.

“Are you ok?” I looked up to see the young girl in the seat beside me looking concerned. “Are you getting air sick?”

“Yes.” I didn’t want to let on the real reason for my diminished pallor. “Please, excuse me for a moment.”

I went to the lavatory to try and regain my composure. I looked into the small mirror and saw a very scared boy looking back at me. I splashed some cold water on my face and returned to my seat, trying to act like everything was okay. If anyone noticed my trembling hands, they made no mention of it.

The war had changed a lot between the skirmishes of 1963 and the large-scale unit battles of 1965. The insurgent war had been fought by small bands of Viet Cong, who were being replaced by the North Vietnamese infantry battalions infiltrating down the Ho Chi Minh Trail into South Vietnam. By November 1965, it was a whole new war. And Uncle Sam had invited me to his new war game. It was called “Search and Destroy.”

When I arrived at the 1st Cavalry base camp at An Khe in early December 1965, the clouds were hanging low and a misty rain covered the surrounding mountains. The Air Force C-130 cargo plane that dropped us off kept its engines running at full power. As soon as we scrambled off the ramp, outgoing troops ran up it, and the big silver bird quickly taxied away before the loadmaster had closed the rear ramp door. Those Air Force pilots must be in a hurry to get home for dinner. I soon found out they were moving fast because the local Viet Cong enjoyed dropping mortars onto the runway.

I was in a small group of new soldiers, and we stood in a light drizzle, getting wet as we waited for a ride to the base. A beat-up looking Army 2 1⁄2 ton cargo truck arrived and picked us up to take us to the repo depot, where I’d be assigned to one of the division’s units.

The 1st Cavalry had over 400 helicopters, and as a mechanic, it would be only natural that I should be placed in a maintenance support unit.

When my orders were finally processed, they said I was going to a unit called the 1st Squadron, 9th Cavalry. I had no idea what kind of unit it was, but I thought for sure it was some kind of maintenance unit.

My new commander of Troop C (Charlie Troop), Major Billy Joe Nave, from Tennessee, soon straightened me out.

“We are in dire need of replacements like you. We just came out of a battle in the Ia Drang Valley and need all the help we can get. We especially need good crew chiefs. I am going to assign you to be crew chief on our Hueys. You will be placed on flight status immediately.”

“Flight status?” I don’t want any part of flying in Vietnam. “There must be some kind of mistake. Sir, I am a mechanic. I just work on helicopters, I can’t fly in them as a crew chief. And besides, I never went to tech school for the UH-1 Huey. I’m only qualified on OH-13s and CH-21s.”

Major Nave grinned. “Kelley, did that OH-13 have a large main rotor and a small tail rotor?”

“Yes sir, it did!”

“Good, so does the Huey! Now get your ass down to the flight line. Dismissed!”

Like it or not, I was now a Huey crew chief in a front-line combat unit. Our unit’s job was to fly recon missions, scouting patrols at treetop level to search for enemy forces in the jungle. In other words, they went out looking for action every day. I was in the last place I wanted to be. Right in the middle of the shooting war at the point of the spear.

*          *          *

Being the new man in a combat unit is one of the worst things to be. Most of the men in the weapons platoon avoided me at first, and I felt alone in my fears. That first night in the tent they kept to themselves, sitting under the one 60-watt bulb, playing cards and smoking cigarettes.

Most of the men in the platoon had been together since their Fort Benning days with the 11th Air Assault Division. I was an outsider, and in some cases, probably an unwanted one in the tight knit group that I had found myself in the middle of. I was going to have to prove myself as a worthy member of the platoon if these guys were ever going to accept me.

The rest of the men in the platoon looked at me as a “cherry,” meaning I was a virgin to combat. Both untested and unreliable. I was issued a flak jacket, a .45 caliber automatic pistol, a survival kit, and an M-79 grenade launcher. On a shake-down flight over the jungle a few miles outside of our base camp, I was allowed to fire my M-60 door gun to get a feeling for it. I had never seen an M-60 before Vietnam. Later in the war, the Army required all new troops to go through a pre-combat training course. But in 1965, there was no time to be giving formal classes on warfare and everything was “learn as you go.”

My first big mission was during Operation Clean House. The troop was sent out over the Soui Ca Mountains east of An Khe, north of Highway 19, in a place the veterans called “Happy Valley.”

Instead of turning wrenches with the 15th Transportation Battalion at base camp like I had expected, I was flying at treetop level over the Gia Mang-An Khe Pass in a fully armed Huey gunship with my M-60 on my lap.

I had a 100-round assault pack attached to the belt feed and the wind blowing in my face as we cruised along Highway 19 East at 80 knots. My feelings were mixed—exhilaration, fear, and excitement. My mind would sometimes flash back to the street corner where I spent all my non-productive teenage years, and I would realize that I was now in more action that I ever could have imagined.

My eyes took in the sights of the mountains and the jungle valleys while my ears took in the sounds of flight—the whine of the Lycoming jet turbine engine, the steady thumpity-thump of the rotor blades, and the radio traffic as pilots spoke with each other, with the chase ship behind us. Then, a call came in from our troop commander, Major Billy Nave, or Thirsty 6.

“Thirsty 23, this is Thirsty 6!”

“Thirsty 6 this is 23. I copy you clear.”

“Thirsty 23, what is your location? Over.”

“Thirsty 6, we have cleared the pass and are covering the road convoy due east.”

“Roger 23. What is your ETA to the AO?”

“Ah, 6, we estimate our ETA to the CP at 0900.”

“23, report your ETA to the forward CP on their freq, do you copy?”

“6, roger that. We copy. 23 out!”

The terms confused me at first, but I caught on quickly. ETA was easy, Estimated Time of Arrival. AO was area of operations, CP was for command post, and freq meant frequency. We had to keep our communications as short and cryptic as possible in case the enemy was listening in.

During Operation Clean House, I was off to a good start with one of the best pilots in our troop, Chief Warrant Officer Mike Bogdue. We flew cover for a 3rd Brigade truck convoy making its way on the dangerous, twisting road down the mountain pass.

Our pilots brought in our birds to hover over a parking area on the south side of the road. We got out and secured the weapons systems. The pilots walked over to the tactical communications center (TOC) to find out if they had any other missions for us. A few minutes later, more aircraft from our unit arrived. We set to checking the aircraft for hydraulic leaks and cleaning our weapons.

Pop! Pop!

A noisy firefight broke out across a wide-open rice field that appeared to be about a mile away. It was exciting for me, being the first battle that I had heard.

The radios from the TOC were crackling with urgent messages as staff officers and infantry commanders talked over the radio net. Out of the mountain pass came a loud roar. I looked up to see about 50 UH-1D Huey Slicks of the 229th Assault Helicopter Battalion flying into the valley towards the firefight. The sound of their rotors thumping the air and the long line of formation flying was majestic, and I stared at the sky in awe.

It was something I would never forget. The Slicks began to descend and turn, landing in groups near the area where the battle had been raging a few minutes earlier. It’s just like one of those old Western movies, when the cavalry rides to the rescue. I was sucked into the excitement, not knowing I was about to be a part of it very soon.

“Get ready to take off!” our pilots shouted to us as they returned from the TOC.

SP5 Walt Titchenell, a 24-year-old career Army man, was my partner in this mission. He and I put the barrels back into the outboard guns and took the safety off the rocket pods.

“Ready to Rock and Roll!” Titchenell shouted.

We took off, headed towards the area where the battle had just occurred.

Titchenell leaned in towards me. “Keep your gun on safe! Don’t do anything until I tell you, understand?”

I gave him a weak grin. My heart beat faster as I curled my finger around the trigger. I was so scared and excited I could hardly breathe.

Titchenell lowered the green visor on his flight helmet and gave his M-60 a final check. He reached over and slapped me on my knee.

“We gonna get us some Cong today!”

That was when I started to panic. What the hell is this crazy guy so happy about? Who in their right mind looks forward to getting shot at? Not me!

Our gunship passed over what looked like a small village of thatch-roofed homes surrounded by tropical palm trees. People scurried about in every direction. They look like a bunch of rabbits on hunting day. We had orders not to open fire unless we could confirm enemy contact.

The pilots took us down on the deck at treetop level. No enemy ground fire. So far, so good. We cleared the village and flew out over a wide expanse of rice paddies. As we reached the end of the field, we saw eight or so men walking through some tall grass near the tree line.

“Over there!” Titchenell pointed. “Get closer! I want to check them out!”

We flew right over them and saw they were dressed in black pajama pants with khaki shirts and what looked like packs on their backs. They were not armed. We pulled up and turned in a tight circle to prepare for another pass.

“What do you think, Titchenell?” Waters steadied the craft.

“They look like Cong to me, sir. PAVN.” This was short for People’s Army of Vietnam.

“We can’t take them under fire unless we confirm.”

Just as we came around for a second pass, we came under fire from the tree line to our right.

“Looks like you were right on that call, Titchenell.”

We pulled up in a steep climb and began to line up for a gun run. Waters requested permission to open fire over the radio to our TOC. They replied, “Negative. Hold your fire!”

“We’re receiving fire, now!”

Then Waters opened fire with our outboard quad machine guns, blasting away at the PAVNs in the grass. They had their weapons hidden, and when we had come back for that second look, they picked them up and fired on us. The chatter of firing guns was all around us.

“What do you want me to do? Get out and ask these guys for an identity card?”

There was a long sigh over the radio from the TOC.

“Permission to fire granted.”

Titchenell and the door gunners from our chase ship opened fire and peppered the grass with hot 7.62 rounds, bracketing the troops. Then we pulled up and made a run on the tree line with our 2.75-inch rockets, blasting the trees with high explosives. Through all this, Titchenell never gave me the order to fire my weapon. He was so busy shooting the targets that he forgot about me. I just sat there and watched the action. It was like a war movie, only the bullets were real. They were trying to kill us!

After we finished the gun runs, we returned to our forward CP to reload the weapons systems and top up our fuel tank. As Titchenell talked with the other crewmen about the mission, I sat quietly, listening to him tell them what happened.

It was like I was an outsider, not a part of the action. That was okay with me. I was in shock. I couldn’t believe what had just happened. I had a sinking feeling in my gut as I realized that it could all happen again within a matter of minutes. And it did.

We got a new mission and took off, heading north. We flew along the left side of Highway 1, which ran along the coastline. It was a lush, tropical paradise, more like a place to build a seaside condo than to wage a war, with white sandy beaches and the beautiful, greenish-blue South China Sea. We saw some railroad tracks a little inland from the road and turned off to follow them north. We had gone about five miles when our pilots decided to turn back and check out a different area. We started to turn when a sound came from the rear of the bird.

Crack!

“We’ve been hit!”

The words had barely made it out of the pilot’s mouth when the Huey went into a steep turn with the craft banked over so far to the right that I became grateful for the safety harness that was barely holding me in place. Palm trees flashed by my face like pickets on a fence. We were doing around 60 knots, but we had slowed down in the turn. It was sheer pandemonium.

“Follow us for a gun run!” I heard the pilot shouting to the chase ship as we came out of the turn and lined up on the enemy. Titchenell had somehow managed to drop a white smoke marker when we had been hit and it was now billowing smoke from the palm trees near the railroad tracks. It seemed like everyone was yelling out commands above the noise of the helicopter as our gunship rapidly climbed into attack position.

“Where did that fire come from?” our pilot asked as he glanced briefly at Titchenell.

“There’s a small building under the trees!” Titchenell leaned out the door and pointed towards the tracks. “Right there! Right there! Do you see them little bastards? Get closer so I can rake them!”

With the smoke as his guide, the pilot soon saw the target. Viet Cong were lining up alongside the hut as one guy passed out weapons. The pilot lined up the bird and Titchenell let go a long burst of machine-gun fire. His tracer rounds arched down into the earth, chewing up the dirt near the tracks as he walked them right up to the building, hitting the VC dead center. The enemy fell like bowling pins, like it was a Saturday night “Duck Shoot.”

Hot brass flew all over the aircraft cabin and burned my neck and face as pieces of it hit me. The floor of the gunship was covered in expended shell casings. The gun smoke that filled the cabin smelled good. The sweet smell of victory.

Our pilots were overjoyed at the gunner’s skill. They pulled our bird up and away from the target, so our chase ship could make a run and finish off anyone who was left.

“Kelley! Fire that weapon and give us some cover!” the pilot ordered as he pulled the bird up and away. I pointed my M-60 out the door and squeezed the trigger. It coughed out about ten rounds of fire and then jammed up. Just my luck! I frantically tried to unjam the weapon as we prepared to go in for a second run on the target.

“Goddamit Kelley! Get your head out of your ass! Fire that weapon!” This time it was the co-pilot who was getting mad at me.

This just added more tension to my situation. My first combat action and my gun is screwed up, my officer is on my ass, and somewhere on the ground someone is trying to kill me. It was not a good day for me. When we returned for the second run, hawk-eyed Titchenell had spotted some more Viet Cong hiding in a trench under some palm trees. These were probably the ones who had taken us under fire on the first fly-by.

He hung out the side door like John Wayne as the pilot slowed down the birds forward speed. Titchenell dropped some canisters of Willie Peters right over the open trench. They hit the palm trees and exploded in a white, flowery air burst, showering the Viet Cong with a nasty cloud of white phosphorus  .

That was a fate worse than instant death. It was a slow death. Those poor bastards must’ve suffered something awful.

We kept flying, looking to the distant tree line for possible enemy fire. As we reached the end of a rice paddy with a 200 or so yard dike, a lone Vietnamese man jumped out from behind it and took us under fire.

Bogdue started yelling again.

“Cut him down Titchenell! That crazy bastard is trying to take us on!” He’s definitely right about that guy being crazy. It looked like that VC was committing suicide, the way he was standing in the open and shooting at us. Titchenell opened fire with his M-60 and for a minute they were firing almost point blank at each other and nothing was happening.

Pop!

Titchenell’s gun stopped firing as the sound from within the cabin echoed in my ears. I turned to Titchenell and he was laying against the rear bulkhead with his flak jacket covered in bright red blood.

“I’m hit! I’m hit!”

The lone VC had got a lucky shot off. He hit the assault pack on the side of Titchenell’s gun, causing the ammunition to explode and shatter shrapnel into his face, arms, and legs.

“Kelley! Get the first aid kit and help him!”

I heard Bogdue yelling at me, but I was in shock and could not move. What just happened? It was like a nightmare. Only it was real.

“Dammit Kelley!” Bogdue climbed out of his seat and over the control console. “What the hell’s wrong with you?”

I watched him pull the first aid kit down from the side bulkhead. He took out some bandages and began to wrap them around Titchenell’s head and arm. One end of the bandage unrolled, and I watched as it flapped in a long, bloody trail in the slipstream.

“It’s going to be alright, Titch. You’re going to be alright.”

I wasn’t sure if Bogdue was trying to convince Titchenell or himself. The door gunner’s face looked ashen and it appeared he was going into shock.

We got back to the CP in about 10 minutes.

Later that afternoon, I was paid a visit by SFC Guadalupe.

“I hope you learned what you needed to out there today, Kelley, because I don’t have anyone else to assign to train you. From now on, you’re on your own. Tomorrow you get a new door gunner and you are officially the crew chief.”

My new door gunner arrived shortly after that, set up his equipment, and checked over the weapons systems. I had been told that the door gunners took care of the aircraft weapons system and the crew chief oversaw maintenance. A good team of door gunners and crew chiefs would help each other, though.

The next day we got a new pair of pilots and flew some missions up in the Happy Valley but made no contact. The valley had been worked over by elements of the 3rd Brigade and they had flushed the enemy out.

That night, after evening chow, our pilots told us to get our gear out of the gunship. We were to set up a tent on the ground and they were going to sleep in the bird. We did as we were told.

Just before dark, a tall, lanky figure walked into our camp.

“What do you boys think you’re doing?” The squadron commander, Lieutenant Colonel John B. Stockton, was making his rounds of the perimeter.

“We’re getting ready to get in our sleeping bags and get some rest, sir.”

“This is your ship here, right?”

We looked and acknowledged him ever so slightly.

“No one sleeps in your ship but you! Pick up your gear and put it back in that ship now!”

With that said, he walked away into the closing darkness. A few minutes later, our pilots returned and picked up their gear, disappearing into the night without saying a word. The colonel had apparently informed them of the situation. I found out later that he had a reputation for taking good care of his enlisted men.

That night, we had a good laugh and a good night’s sleep away from the damp, snake-infested ground.

It was one of the times that made me realize that it was good to be an enlisted man in the 9th Cavalry.