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(EDITOR'S NOTE: Charles Black, Enquirer military writer, is on his fifth reporting assignment in Vietnam, and en route to the war zone has visited various military hot spots in the world. This is another of his daily articles about combat missions on which he accompanied U.S. troops.)
DI AN, Vietnam - Burly and solid as a rock, his face set in tired lines around a jutting cigar which inspired his radio alias of "Stogey Six", Maj James T. McManus was an old friend.
Like so many others in the 3rd Squadron, 17th Air Cavalry, Mac had been with the 1st Air Cavalry during its battle-noisy arrival here in 1965. He had commanded a company in the 2nd Brigade.
He asked about Brig. Gen. William (Ray) Lynch, the brigade commander then, whom I'd spent three weeks with over in Korea where he is now the 2nd Division's assistant commander.
"He is the greatest soldier I ever saw. Him and that "huckleberry stick" walking cane he used to carry every place! It used to make you feel good to see that man plant his boots down in your area," Mac said.
I told him Lynch hadn't changed much since he had served under him as a 1st lieutenant and captain.
Mac is presently Troop B's commander.
Original First Sergeant
He introduced me to a man who looked like an artist's conception of the original tough first sergeant, James M. Connolly.
"Let's go to the mess hall and get some coffee instead of standing out in this damned sun like a pack of halfwits" Connolly growled by way of opening greeting.
Bravo Troop lives in a collection of luxurious half-wall half-screen hootches with tin roofs. They have concrete floors and showers rigged out of barrels, old fuel tanks, etc., scattered behind them, near the helicopter pad.
The mess hall is neat and cool, and the K.P. who brought the coffee looked on nervously like a wine steward until Connelly sampled it and reluctantly agreed that it was fit for use.
(The chow and coffee at Bravo Troop's mess hall are the best I've run into in Vietnam. I had a feeling it would be worth listening to Connelly discourse on the matter if it wasn't.
Mature Quickly
Lt. Col. John Phillips, commander of the squadron, had told me he had become a very mature 2nd lieutenant very quickly when he went to the 82nd Airborne Division and took over a platoon - with Connolly as platoon sergeant - many years ago.
"He was the kind of an NCO who shortens a young officer's time of youthful folly to an absolute minimum," Phillips told me.
Connolly and Stogie Six made a matched team. Mac is a laconic, crisp-tempered, efficient manager and a no-nonsense combat leader.
I once heard a a characteristic exchange between him and some very high ranking officer from one of the many headquarters this war grows like mushrooms which was characteristic of him.
The headquarters brass was high over an action Troop B was conducting, riding in a command helicopter, very curious, very inquisitive, cascading radio messages on the hard-working Stogy Six chopper down over the affair. They were getting brief and intermittent attention from the harried McManus.
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Stiff Reply
Came the final exchange:
"Are you monitoring this frequency?" (From brass to Stogy Six)
"I have been on this frequency. I will continue to be on this frequency. This is my command frequency. I monitor my command frequency," came the reply, stiffly.
Silence while the high flying command chopper considered this, took the hint and quit bothering McManus until he had his operation finished.
It was in character with McManus, that exchange. There was nothing disrespectful in tone or word in his reply, but it clearly conveyed his displeasure at being harried at the wrong time.
Solid Operator
His operations are as solid as the impression he and Connolly make. His helicopters are maintained and ready, his orderly room quiet and efficient, his operations as slam bang and flamboyant as any cavalryman could ask, but marked with cool common sense even with action at its most hectic.
Mac was working along the river approaches to Saigon, looking for enemy infiltrators from Cambodia. The mission called for Bravo Troop to make armed aerial reconnaissance with LOH 6 scout choppers backed up by Huey Cobra gunships to locate any advance which threatened the enemy's final objective, the capital city. His rifle platoon was charged with checking what the scouts turned up by landing and moving on the ground.
The area where he was working was, and is, a real nasty place, with or without enemy assistance in creating that condition.
Feel Tide's Effects
Rivers and canals wind and intermesh throughout the area. Lines of low, scrubby, palmetto-like nipa palm, old paddy walls and dikes, thick patches of trees and brush, and always mud and water and reeds and rice.
The rivers and canals feel the effects of the South china Sea tides all the way to Cambodia. When the tide comes up, the area is more water-logged than ever. Enemy traffic by sampans is assisted by tidal currents.
Infantrymen moving in this area are plagued by "immersion feet", leeches and the peril of being caught while struggling through the mud and water open areas by enemy hidden hedgerows or nipa palm cover on the lines of higher ground.
The little scout ships are the daredevils of all this. They poke and snoop right down on the surface, a kind of cat and mouse game most would believe would be impossible to accomplish in combat - but which is the daily chore of the LOH (called "loach" conversationally) pilots and observers.
McManus had a scout mission going out. He introduced me to Capt. Michael C. Vecellio, his aviation section leader when we left the mess hall and went to his orderly room.
"He used to run my scout platoon until I moved him up here. Mike likes to keep his hand in, still. You and him go get a loach and go out and look at the area. You can check out a couple of VAR (visible aerial reconnaissance) missions we've got, while you are at it," Mac said.
"Oh, take him out and show him where you got shot down while you are at it, Mike," he said, with the grand air of someone doing me a favor.
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