1630 Hours Local, 17 December 1965
Braniff International Flight B1T4 near
Tan Son Nhut Air Base, Republic of Vietnam
As Bannister walked out of Russell's dispensary at Bien Hoa Air Base, Braniff International Flight B1T4, a four-engined Boeing 707, began descending from cruise altitude twenty minutes out of Tan Son Nhut Air Base, the sprawling airfield and U.S. military command complex on the northwest side of Saigon.
Braniff International, out of Los Angeles by way of Norton Air Force Base, California, was one of the half-dozen U.S. airlines flying MAC contract flights to and from Vietnam. American, World, Continental, Braniff, and the others carried G.I.s under a government contract to augment the USAF's Military Airlift Command (MAC), which didn't have enough transport airplanes and crews to ferry troops to and from Vietnam.
At first and subsequent glance, the Braniff airplane was astonishing. What the eye didn't want to believe or adjust to, was the color. From tip to tail, the 150-foot airliner was painted chartreuse. The irreverent called it the Chartreuse Goose. Inside, also under Braniff's new look plan, the girls wore Pucci ensembles of sleeveless blouses and culottes in bright pink and yellow, and flat-heeled multi-colored shoes that replaced calf-high boots worn off the plane. After hearing throaty rumbles, Emilio Pucci had decided not to change the traditional uniforms of the cockpit crew.
The plane banked left over the azure water of the South China Sea, preparing for its run up to the base. To avoid ground fire, it would not descend below 4500 feet until the last minute before landing approach, and then it would descend very quickly, more quickly than any civilian passenger would have understood, or put up with. It crossed high over the beach at Vung Tau where the sand was so white it looked like a band of purest flour.
On board the Boeing 707 were three cockpit crew members, five cabin attendants, and 165 military passengers crammed into seats better suited for small tourists on short flights.
The G.I.s, all in uniform, previously talkative and alert, became silent and glum as they stared out the window ports watching verdant jungle, peaceful looking as Hawaii, slide beneath the wings.
Oblivious to the first view of a nation where his fellow countrymen were dying, First Lieutenant Toby G. Parker, United States Air Force, blond hair, oval-shaped blue eyes, good features, good teeth, the quintessential college frat man, more eager to party than to participate in anything that might require mental or moral effort, sat in aisle seat 1C directly facing the forward bulkhead where three stewardesses were strapped into jumpseats facing aft. The configuration was peculiar in that the three girls sat knee-to-knee with the men in the front row, the row in which Parker had maneuvered to be seated.
Figuring he would see enough of Vietnam during his upcoming year-long tour, he concentrated on the stewardess he had been bird-dogging during the entire flight from Clark Air Base in the Philippines. As regulations required when their aircraft was landing, she was now buckled into the crew seat facing Parker. He had been trying for her attention since takeoff, hours earlier. She finally was settled in one place.
"Hey, really," he said, leaning toward her, "what's your name? Can I write you? Do you have a layover here or are you on a turn-around?"
Parker was proud of the lingo he had learned from dating so many stews in LA, where he had been posted to the big USAF unit, SAMSO (Space and Missile Systems Operation), in El Segundo. What he should have known was that even the newest MAC contract girl could spot a stew bum from forty seats away.
The girl, short cropped brown hair slightly awry, looked over. She read his name from the blue plastic tag over the right pocket of his tailored 1505 khaki shirt.
"`Hey, really’ yourself, Parker. Behave." Her amber eyes looked tired but faintly amused at this guy trying so hard to get her attention. Cute but boyish, she thought, as she smiled at him.
Encouraged, Toby made what he considered the best move he could under the circumstances. He reached over to take her hand and by his warmth impress her with tons of sincerity. Might even turn her on, he thought, though not too likely under these conditions. She made a movement he barely saw and suddenly his right hand felt numb from the wrist.
"Ouch. Damn. What did you do?"
"Karate." She smiled sweetly. "Just a mild chop on a nerve. I have a brown belt. I told you to behave." She adjusted her skirt and sat primly as the pilot dove the huge airliner toward touchdown at Tan Son Nhut Air Base, Republic of South Vietnam.
The plane vibrated and shook as the slipstream tore at the gear and flaps the pilot lowered in the later part of the descent. This wasn't how it was done in the States, where no one fired at you from the ground, and some G.I.s rolled their eyes at the humming and rocking movements. One, to his mind-numbing disgust, threw up quietly into his hat.
The pilot expertly flared the big craft, the main gear greased onto the runway with contented squeaks, then rumbled as the struts absorbed the unevenness of the concrete surface.
The Transient Alert crew of the 8th Aerial Port drove the service truck with the white steps to the front left of the liner. When the amber-eyed girl and one other unlocked and pushed open the big door, the warm, humid smell of Vietnam rolled through the cabin like swamp gas. The cabin filled with the steamy air smelling of fresh palms and fetid underbrush, of steamy jungle and rotting garbage, of perfume and formaldehyde. Over it all hung the odor of burnt jet fuel smelling like stale bus fumes. At first sniff it was sickening. It became worse with each inhale. It was an odor one wasn't likely to forget. Each G.I., as he breathed in, instinctively knew that this was a one-time moment in his life. Some, the more sensitive, shivered.
Parker was oblivious to all of this. Vietnam for him was just another adventure before he quit the Air Force. He intended to make the most of the year tour, for which he had volunteered, starting right now.
He hung back to be the last out so he could have more time to hustle the amber-eyed girl. She was busy with the others; stacking trays, opening galley hatches, letting the Vietnamese cleaning crews in the galley doors so they could watch them to be sure they cleaned and did not plant bombs in out-of-the-way places. Parker was finally urged off the plane by a G.I. greeting official, a harassed Army captain, who said to get his ass down the stairs and into the terminal or he'd kick it there. Military officers didn't talk that way in the States, Parker thought, as he grabbed his blue AWOL bag and deplaned. At the foot of the steps, Parker dug out his folded flight cap and crammed it on his head at just the right angle. The airliner's captain and navigator had already left the ship to file a flight plan for the return leg, carrying back to the States G.I.s who had finished their tour of duty in Vietnam. The co-pilot remained behind to supervise refueling.
The 707 was parked on the civilian ramp in line with Air France and Air Cambodge Caravels, a Pan American 707, and an Air Vietnam DC-4. Parker could see military aircraft on a far ramp in several new parking revetments of corrugated steel and sandbags. Other revetments were under construction from one end of the two-mile flight line to the other. There was an aura of bustle and sweat about the field. Nothing moved slowly. Blue USAF maintenance vans and dirty white French-built civilian trucks bearing airline logos raced up and down the ramp, meeting airplanes, carrying parts, or transporting harassed contractors and workers.
Civilian airliners vied with camouflaged fighters as they lined up along the taxiway waiting to be cleared onto the runway for takeoff. Civilian passengers could look down on helmeted pilots sitting in the cockpits of their bomb-laden fighters waiting for takeoff to fly a combat mission. Military control tower operators of Tan Son Nhut's dual runways were experiencing well over 800 landings and takeoffs a day and were expecting double that in the coming year. At a distance Parker could see two-story wooden watch towers on stilts alternating with brown sandbagged bunkers forming part of the perimeter defense.
Though December was one of the cooler months in the Asian monsoon season, the heat and humidity hit Parker like a fist as his lungs absorbed the steamy air. In minutes, as he walked to the terminal, he felt water starting to roll down his sides as if his body had turned on a small garden soaker. Before he reached the door, his shirt had a wide sweat-soaked Vee down the front and the back, with circular dark patches under each arm.
He shoved open the swinging glass door lettered For Military Personnel Only, and lugged his AWOL bag into the MAC side of the terminal. In less than an hour he was processed, his shot record checked, and he had retrieved his one duffel bag and slung it over his shoulder. Lieutenant Parker was on his own now and didn't have to report in until 0800 the following morning at the 6250th Combat Support Group administrative office, where he would take over as assistant to the assistant Administrative Officer or some such inconsequential job. Although he had to volunteer in his primary duty specialty as a code 7024 administrative officer, he had planned all along to seek a more exciting job once in Vietnam. He had heard such things were easy to do in the rapidly expanding wartime atmosphere.
He pushed through the milling crowd of khaki clad G.I.s and went out the door to the front side of the deteriorating French-built terminal. Headed toward the base bus stop, he glanced through the tall windows and saw the stewardesses from his airliner near the small civilian bar at one end of the long, dirty, crowded area that passed for a passenger lounge. The girls were waiting for their airplane to be released by maintenance. They looked tired and wrinkled after their long trip.
Parker entered and elbowed his way up to the end of the bar where the girls stood sipping warm Cokes through straws, talking about the new crew lounge that would be ready by their next trip. They had put on Portland Red wrap-around skirts over their culottes and carried identical beige purses slung over their shoulders. But no one wore the pillbox hat which Pucci had worked such long hours to design. Parker dropped his bags at the end of the bar.
"Hi," he said to the amber-eyed girl. She turned to stare at him. She showed no surprise at his being there.
"You are persistent," she said, finally. "Aren't you due some place? Like a war, maybe?"
"I don't report to the war until eight o'clock tomorrow morning. Have dinner with me tonight. There must be an Officers Club here someplace."
"There is and I can't," she said.
"Do you fly back today?" he asked.
"Right now," she said.
Toby had never seen such eyes, the amber and flecks of gold were deep and hypnotic. He was about to tell her exactly that when a dark-haired medium-sized civilian stepped abruptly between them, grabbed the girl by the arm and tried to pull her off to one side. He wore dark pants and a short-sleeved white shirt. Clipped to his shirt pocket was a red laminated photo ID card.
"Goddammit, Nancy, this time you got to talk to me," he said. His face was pursed in agitation. He exuded a faint odor of whiskey. He released her arm and stood very close, looking down at her from a two-inch height advantage.
Not the least intimidated, she set her jaw as she put her hands on his chest and pushed him back.
"Bubba, go away. There isn't anything to talk about. There never was. Go away."
The place was crowded, hot, and smoky. The other girls didn't quite catch what was going on because Parker was between them and the pair. He did hear one of the stews answer another's question by saying Bubba was Curtis Bates, the assistant station manager for Alpha Airlines.
Parker, edging closer to Bubba and Nancy, saw him grab her arm, twist and jerk it, while saying something using a lot of swear words. Never one to get involved, Parker surprised himself. Maybe it was the environment. He felt a surge of adrenalin and, without making a conscious decision to do so, reached out, grabbed Bubba's arm and swung him around. Instantly Parker found himself stomach-down on the dirty cement floor looking at ankles and mashed cigarette butts. He rolled over, jumped to his feet, swung at Bubba, missed, and was flattened again.
He got up in time to see Nancy do something with her hands and arms that doubled Bubba up and caused instant sweat to pop out on his forehead.
"Do you understand now, Bubba? Do you?" she asked, jerking his arm higher behind his back. Parker noted she had somewhat thick ankles and rounded, muscular calves. Bent over, Curtis "Bubba" Bates nodded his head and mumbled what could be taken for a yes. She released him as two Caucasian civilians pushed through the parting crowd and led Bubba away. They wore identical black trousers and white shirts, and red ID cards. A dozen feet away, Bubba Bates, face so flushed he appeared near a heat stroke, looked back at Parker, nodded to himself, then turned and walked on, slamming fist into palm several times.
Nancy, seeing the look, took Parker's arm, "Oh look, I'm really sorry. But you shouldn't have interfered, you know. Everything was under control, really it was." She reached up, surprisingly tender, to touch Parker's face, then fingered the gathering bruise under his eye. "Damn. You're going to have quite a mouse."
Not at all in control of the situation, Parker stared at her for a second. He thought he could feel his face begin to swell.
"Brown belt, huh," he said.
She nodded. The other girls had gathered around. They pointed in the direction of the airplane and said it was time to board.
Parker could only stare into her eyes. He was totally out of ideas; beginning to suspect he was outclassed. Nancy looked at him for a moment.
"Okay," she said, "write me. Here, take my card."
She dug into her purse, handed him a finely embossed card, shook her head once as if amazed at what she had done, then ran after the other girls.
Parker stood still, watching the girls move off. Nancy didn't look back to wave or to say goodbye. With a sigh he glanced down at the card he held in his hand. "Hey," he half shouted, running after her, "there's no address."
He caught up with them as they went through the Crew Only door to the flight line.
"There's no address," he yelled, waving the white card.
"Write me at the airline office in Oakland," she shouted back as the door swung shut.
Parker stopped, looked again at the expensive card in his hand. The Gothic script identified the owner as Mrs. Bradley L. Lewis.
By 2100 hours that night Parker was ready for the bar at the Tan Son Nhut Officers Club. Earlier he had checked into the BOQ and found his tiny room on the second floor. He had showered in the communal ten-head shower that had slimy slippery wooden grates over an even more slippery cement floor. The building was one of six in a row of identical pale green, two-story wooden structures hastily erected to house the lieutenant and captain company grade officers. He felt stiff, abused, tired from two days of travel, and humiliated. His eye, though puffy, was not showing the purple bruise of a mouse.
He had found the clothes-washing facilities in a service area down the hall. The white washers and dryers didn't require coins and were battered and stained from much use. Padding around in thongs and leopard skin briefs, he had sprinkled and ironed a flight suit scrounged from a supply officer friend back in the States. He had never worn a flight suit and wasn't authorized to even own one, but felt things were much different here in Vietnam than at the Space and Missile Systems Office in LA. He carefully smoothed a printed leather tag attached to the left breast that spelled out his name and rank. Non-rated people did not wear flight suits during their off-duty time, much less on duty. Being rated meant having earned a set of wings by completing the appropriate technical school. The graduate was rated as a pilot, navigator, gunner, crew chief, or other aircrew position. At a Stateside air base such an act would be considered pretentious and Parker knew the non-rated wearer would be in for heavy verbal abuse. He figured in a combat zone most personnel flew on all sorts of different missions and his flight suit would be merely one of many. He climbed into the dark green flight suit and zipped it up.
2200 Hours Local, 17 December 1965
Officers Club
Tan Son Nhut Air Base, Republic of Vietnam
Parker found the Officers Club, walked in, hesitated, then walked to the crowd, four-deep at the bar and well on its way to becoming raucous. He elbowed his way to the long wooden bar. A ten-foot, Air Force-issue, spangled MERRY CHRISTMAS banner hung, slightly askew, on the wall above the bottle racks behind the bar. He had to wait several minutes to order a double Scotch and water from one of the three off-duty G.I. bartenders. They were rushing and sweating to keep up with the demands of the fast, hard drinking officer and civilian contractor crowd. Parker sipped his Scotch and decided he should have ordered beer. The place was not like any Officers Club he had ever seen in the States. It was more like a saloon in the Klondike boomtown days. The humid atmosphere was thick with smoke and loud talk. Three ceiling fans pushed and mixed both into a stupefying mélange of sound and smell. Parker looked around.
The crowd wasn't only USAF or Army transients. Tan Son Nhut was where MACV, the command organization trying to prosecute the war in Southeast Asia (SEA), was located.
MACV was an acronym for Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, the 3200-man unified command under the Commander in Chief of the Pacific Command (CINCPAC) based in Hawaii. Air operations were controlled by the 7th Air Force under MACV. Commander U.S. MACV (COMUSMACV) answered directly to CINCPAC who had to answer directly to the Secretary of Defense, a black haired civilian who had only two years of WWII supply service before going with Ford Motor and thence to the Pentagon. COMUS MACV had 31 years of active duty of which 6 years were spent in combat leading troops in three wars.
Parker was surprised to see that most of what he took to be MACV people wore hideous Bermuda shorts, raunchy Hawaiian shirts, and tennis shoes without socks. Less than half wore fatigues or flight suits. Only a handful wore the Class B khaki uniform. It was much too hot for blues.
He stood outside the crowd at the south end of the bar, starting to relax with his drink. Glancing around, he noticed three Army men—officers he guessed—in jungle fatigues, huddled around a small black Formica table with wobbly legs. Standing on the table was a forest of beer bottles of a greenish hue with the numbers 33 in big numerals on the logo. It was a French beer made in Vietnam, called Bamuiba, Vietnamese for 33. The G.I.s called it "Bomb-me-bad" and swore it contained a large percentage of formaldehyde. It certainly smelled as though it did. Bamuiba produced monumental hangovers which drilled and pounded an area of the brain no American beer ever penetrated.
One of the men was eminently notable; sparse black hair shaved close to a squarish skull, bulky bone covered with bushy black eyebrows overhanging dark brown eyes, burly arms covered with a pelt of curly black hair. He could have posed in an ad for a Jail and Bail movie. His scowl was deep and fierce. With a start, Parker realized the scowl was aimed at him.
Cripes almighty, what now? Parker thought as he looked away. He decided to try conversation with the man standing next to him.
"How late does the bar stay open," he pleasantly asked a thin first lieutenant in Army fatigues.
The lieutenant turned and studied Parker's wingless nametag a long moment before replying. "Beats me, I`m usually drunk by ten." The first john turned back to his companions, pointedly ignoring Parker, who was beginning to get the idea something was wrong but he couldn't quite put his finger on what it was. He thought maybe his face was swollen. He reached up and touched the skin around his eye. The area throbbed but didn't feel swollen.
He swiveled his head around and, uncontrollably drawn, glanced back at the three men at the table and wound up staring at the black pieces of cloth stitched where their rank should be. Still scowling, the burly man caught his eye and motioned him over. Parker turned away to order a beer.
He gave a slight jump when a raspy voice too close to his ear said, "What in hell you doon, flyboy?"
Parker tried to ignore him but was trapped by the crowd from moving more than a foot or two. From the corner of his eye he could see the man stood at least three inches shorter but wider, much wider, than himself. He smelled like an old tennis shoe left too long in the bottom of a locker.
The stocky man grabbed Parker's arm and spun him around, "What you doon, flyboy?"
Parker saw the name Lochert stitched in black letters parallel to the man's slanted right pocket flap. On each shoulder he saw brown bits of cloth in the shape of an oak leaf. He decided he was confronted by a Lieutenant Colonel Lochert who, for some reason, wanted to know what he was `doon.'
"Nothing, Sir, just drinking," he said, considerably more cheerful than he felt.
"I can see that, scheisekopf. I wanna know what in hell you're do-ing." He dragged the word out to two syllables. Parker thought he was drunk and fairly belligerent. Why, he had no idea. He decided to play it safe. All in all, it had been a hell of a day.
"Nothing, Colonel Lochert, nothing at all. As a matter of fact, I probably don't even belong here. I'm not even a--“
"I'll say you don't belong here," the man interrupted, "and I ain't no colonel."
Thoroughly confused, Parker tried to ease away. Lochert, christened Wolfgang Xavier, grabbed him again. Breathing the staggering smell of used Bamuiba into Parker's face, he boomed out in a voice more suited to drill fields or heavy combat, the perfectly articulated words "My rank is major. I'm a grunt, a snuffy, and you, you straight-backed, perfect-toothed blue eyed scheisekopf have eye-runned your frapping flyboy suit. You ain't no fighter pilot. Fighter pilots don't eye-run their flight suits. They like their green bags DIRTY."
He held Parker by the bicep in a grip that nearly paralyzed his arm. It was getting to be a bit much, especially considering what Mrs. Bradley L. Lewis and Mr. Curtis "Bubba" Bates had already done to him that day.
"Were you out dropping bombs today? Are you the scheisekopf who short-rounded two of my Viets today? Are you the Air Force puke that killed my men?" The surrounding crowd took notice now and moved to form a circle around the two officers. Parker's face was absolutely white as he stared at the Army major who mistook him for a pilot. He had no idea on earth what to do. He could feel his heart thumping in his chest. He reflected briefly that he had never been in a fight in his life before being flattened twice earlier this very day.
The major looked even meaner, glared more fiercely at Parker as his voice boomed "I said what the fuck--"
"WHAT THE FUCK WHAT?" Parker suddenly screamed back, out of control now, acted on by the heat, the flight, the girl; flattened twice already, he just wasn't going to take any more of this. He grabbed the lapels of Major Wolfgang X. Lochert's jungle fatigues and tried to shake the man. He expected death at any minute, but was too far gone to care. It was like trying to shake a hundred-year old oak tree. The major gave a mock look of surprise and started to say something when a tall slender man in shorts, tennies, and an abominable sport shirt with the word "Jammer" sewn across the back, wedged himself between the two. He pressed on Lochert's forearm with his thumb in such a way that he released his vice-like grip on Parker's arm. Parker, resisting the urge to rub his left bicep, his temper cooling rapidly, stepped back as the slender man in civvies whispered something into the Army man's ear. Lochert's eyes squinted in concentration as he listened, thought for a second, then nodded his head. He looked at the guy in civvies, said something so low even those close by couldn't hear, glanced once at Parker, pulled his lips back from his teeth in what could have been either a grimace or a grin, boomed a loud cackle that might be construed as a laugh, and strode back to his table.
The bar noise resumed as the crowd nearby realized the entertainment was over. Parker figured he had better make the acquaintance of someone who could tame a wild man so quickly. "Buy you a drink, Sir?" he asked as the man started back to the group he had been standing with.
"I have one, thanks anyway. But you come join us."
Flattered, Parker followed the man back to the group whose members ranged in age from mid-twenties to late forties. They all wore Bermudas or cutoffs and had a variety of shirts with nicknames stenciled or sewn on the back. Tweaks was talking and laughing with Buzzer as they and Flash Cart greeted Jammer as he led Parker to the group. An older man, with a cartoon black bird holding binoculars and the words "Old Crow" embroidered on his shirt, handed Jammer his drink.
"Nicely done, Boss," he said to Jammer. He knew better than to ask what Jammer had said to the major. Not so Parker, who, as he entered the group, blithely asked Jammer what he had said.
Jammer only laughed and introduced Parker all around. No names or rank were given, just the nicknames. This flustered Parker, whose name and rank were obvious from his own nametag. He didn't know whether to say Sir or not to the others. He decided to do so based on age. They all greeted him in a friendly enough fashion, then, all but the Old Crow, turned to their own conversations. Parker thought it strange that no one asked him where he was stationed or why he was at Tan Son Nhut. He listened to them chatter among themselves and answered a few questions put to him about when he arrived and where he was last stationed. After a half hour of this he'd had about enough drink to be, as he thought to himself, boldly inquisitive.
"What do you guys do, anyhow? Are you Air Force, at MACV, 7th, or what?" Parker asked.
"A variety of things," the Old Crow said. "Some of us are 13th Reccy Tech, others TAC Recon, PI, stuff like that."
Parker caught on. It confirmed what he had begun to suspect. These people were in the reconnaissance business; photo, electronic, and maybe other kinds. Whatever it was, he figured it might be exciting.
"Look," Parker said, "I'm looking for a job here at 7th. You guys got any use for an admin type?"
"Can't say at the moment," Old Crow replied, "come see me tomorrow if you can. Bring a copy of your orders. Here, take this." Old Crow scribbled in a pocket notebook and tore it off. Parker looked at it and read "Col. Leonard Norman, Tiger Switch ext 5777."
"Thank you, Sir, thanks a lot. By the way, what do you think Jammer told that Army major?"
"I think Jammer told the major he was being addressed by Major General Maurie Stack and that he, the major, had best be nice. And," he said, eyeing Parker's wingless nametag, "he probably told him you are non-rated and couldn't possibly have short-rounded his troops. He's known the Wolf for a long time."
"The Wolf?"
"Wolf Lochert. He's an advisor to the ARVN (Army of the Republic of Vietnam) in III Corps. Yesterday an F-100 from Bien Hoa dropped a short round that killed some of his people. But understand, the Wolf was in deep trouble and had called the air strikes in close. When he debriefed us he said he figured they'd all be dead anyway, so the short round was a cheap price to pay for survival. He didn't even officially report it. Maybe he knew you were non-rated and was only testing you. He's a good guy. Tomorrow, he'll probably be in church."
"Short round?" Parker asked.
"A short round is what we call any ordnance that hits or falls on friendly forces. When the artillery guys do it, it's called friendly fire."
My God, Parker thought, there's a whole new language and way of life out here. How can being shelled by your own side be called friendly? And some idiot Army guy testing me. Is bashing my brains out, for who knows what reason, a test?
"Thanks, Colonel Norman. I'll call you tomorrow about the job." Parker pocketed the colonel's card, had two more drinks, and left the club. Several men in flight suits and shorts had gathered around an old upright piano in a corner and were starting to warm up with some dirty fighter pilot songs. Nuts, Parker thought, walking out, the sound of a song about a girl named Mary Ann Burnes fading, I'll never belong here.
As First Lieutenant Toby G. Parker, USAF, stumbled through the dark to his BOQ, he realized he never should have worn a flight suit without wings. He made two vows. He would never wear the flight suit again unless he flew, and he would somehow learn how to fight.
Far to the east, lightning rumbled and flashed. Artillery did the same to the west.