Medal of Honor (Undaunted Valor 2)

The Boeing 707, part of the Flying Tiger fleet of charter aircraft that the military was using, touched down and rolled to a stop. As it was the middle of the night, it was dark out except for a few lights along the flight line. Every window had a face or two pressed against it as the newly arriving soldiers were anxious to see what was waiting for them. As the aircraft came to a stop and the engines shut down, the temperature in the aircraft began to rise.

When the door in the front of the aircraft finally opened, a very tired-looking noncommissioned officer, or NCO, stepped aboard. “Welcome to Vietnam and Long Binh. When you depart the plane, line up on the two noncommissioned officers outside. Once everyone is lined up, they will escort you to a building where you will brush your teeth with the toothbrush and toothpaste provided. You will brush for one minute. Then proceed out the back and get your bag. Officers will load the light green buses, and enlisted will load the dark green buses. Any questions?” After a pause, he concluded, “The time is twenty-two thirty hours. Okay, let’s go,” and the first rows began to empty.

Private First Class Jim Dorsey was in the middle of the pack. He had the middle of three seats, with Private Dwayne Thomas and Private First Class Joe Avanti sitting on each side of him. Thomas was from Ohio and Avanti was from Brooklyn, which was obvious as soon as he spoke.

“Damn, it’s hot here,” Avanti complained.

“This ain’t hot, this is humid. I know what hot is and this ain’t hot,” Dorsey informed everyone.

“Where you from?” asked Thomas.

“Kermit, Texas, and that is hot. No humidity, just heat.”

“Ohio gets hot in the summer, but we freeze our asses off in the winter,” Thomas informed the others as the plane continued to unload in front of them. It had been a long fourteen-hour flight from McChord Air Force Base in Tacoma, Washington, with a layover for two hours in the Philippines for refueling and crew change. Everyone was anxious to get off the plane and stretch their legs. As no one had anything more than a shaving kit in the cabin with them, things moved rapidly and smoothly.

Outside, they lined up and started walking across the tarmac in two lines to a long single-story wooden building with a tin roof. Screens surrounded the top half and sandbags covered the bottom half. Upon entering, each man gave his name to a clerk, who checked the manifest and handed them a toothbrush and toothpaste.

Dorsey asked, “Why are we doing this, Sergeant?”

“Private, do I look like a dentist?” the sergeant responded with some sarcasm but continued, “You’re doing this so you won’t be seeing a dentist for the next year. You don’t want to see a dentist for the next year because the drills are all foot-pump-powered. This toothpaste has a high concentration of fluoride, which prevents cavities. Now go brush.”

Moving outside, Dorsey located his bag and moved with Avanti and Thomas to the dark green OD buses. Once loaded, the buses moved out with dimmed headlights across an almost blacked-out base. There was little to see on this moonless night. In the distance, flares appeared almost magically in the night sky with no sound and burned for a couple of minutes as they floated down, extinguishing before they reached the ground. After a five-minute ride, the bus stopped in front of another one-story building similar to the first. Going inside, they saw sixty bunk beds with sheets and a pillow but no blankets.

Once everyone was inside, an NCO got their attention. “All right, listen up. You will be staying here tonight. Pick a bunk and get some sleep. The mess hall opens at oh six hundred hours and serves from oh six hundred to oh eight hundred hours. At oh nine hundred hours, the buses will be back and get you on the next leg to the units you’ve been assigned to. If you hear a siren, then I suggest you get on the floor and stay there until it stops. That’s the safest place.” With that, the NCO was out the door and gone.

Dorsey and Avanti picked a bunk bed and tossed a coin to see who would sleep on the top bunk. Thomas took the top bunk next to them. Very soon, the only sounds were those created by one hundred and twenty men sleeping.

The next morning they got their first look at Vietnam. To the east, the sun was rising over what appeared to be a large enclosed area with barbed-wire fences as well as airplane hangars. Jet engines could be heard as a couple of F-4 fighter jets lifted off the runway. To the northwest, large tents had been set up, and beyond, a few people could be seen in the fields outside the barbed wire, planting rice or whatever was growing there. They were dressed in loose light-colored tops and loose-fitting black pants that appeared to be silk. Their heads were covered with wide, round straw hats with a point at the top. One person was walking behind a water buffalo plowing the fields. The farmers were being watched by two soldiers in ten-foot-tall watchtowers spaced about fifty yards apart with a M60 machine gun in each tower. North of the camp were sparse hardwood trees, mixed with palm trees and brush. Separating the camp from the vegetation was a double barbed-wire-and-concertina fence with land mine symbols every thirty feet.

“Guess we shouldn’t wander over there,” Dorsey said, looking at his two buddies as they walked back from the mess hall.

“Everyone on orders to the First Cav, load the first two buses; 101st, load the next two,” the NCO instructed those standing next to their duffle bags a half hour later. Several groups had already left, and these men were the last of those who had arrived the night before on Dorsey’s flight.

Picking up their bags, Avanti, Thomas and Dorsey loaded a bus designated for the First Cav as their names were called off the roster by the NCO.

As the bus pulled away, leaving the newbies standing in front of another wooden building, the NCO in charge spoke up. “You people are going to be here for five days. In those five days, you will be issued your field equipment, weapons, jungle fatigues and boots. You will be in-processed. You will be given classes on booby traps and rappelling. You will be going to the rifle range and hand grenade pits. Learn well, because when you leave here, you are stepping into the badlands. Outside the wire is the badlands.” He pointed across the minefield. “If you hear a siren at any time, hit the ground or find a bunker to get into. If you have a weapon and hear small-arms fire, move to the nearest perimeter berm and do as others are doing. Any questions?” He paused, but no one said anything. “Good. As there are no questions, we will head over to Supply so you can draw sheets. Chow is served at twelve hundred to thirteen thirty hours—follow your nose to find it. Dinner is at seventeen hundred to eighteen thirty hours. Your first formation tomorrow will be at oh eight hundred hours and begins with in-processing.”

The next morning began as promised with in-processing, which was done alphabetically by name. Avanti was one of the first to go into the room.

“Avanti, from Brooklyn,” stated the personnel clerk. He was a specialist fourth class, which technically outranked private first class.

“That’s me,” Avanti answered.

“MOS is 11 Bravo, Infantry, correct?” the clerk stated matter-of-factly, referring to Avanti’s military occupational specialty.

“That’s right.”

“Okay, you’re being assigned to First of the Twelfth Infantry.” He handed Avanti a clipboard and some forms. “Check these over and make sure they’re correct. When you’re done, give them to the clerk next to the door and go out. If something needs to be changed, he’ll correct it. Next.”

This process continued with everyone being notified of where they were going depending on their MOS. Some were going to aviation units as they were aircraft maintenance or aviation electronics repairmen. If you were an 11 Bravo, you were infantry, and that was where you were going. If you were a cook, you could go anywhere.

“Next,” the personnel clerk calls out. “Dorsey, Jim, PFC, 67A1F.” Standing Dorsey walks with a purpose to the Specialist’s desk.

“That you?”the Specialist asks.

“Yeah, Specialist, that’s my name, but I’m an 11 Bravo.”

For a long minute, the clerk looked at the papers before him. “Go sit back down. You’re an 11 Bravo, you say?” he asked.