Chris Halasz' Pictures from 1971

Chris Halasz arrived in Vietnam on 16 November 1970. He drove for Captain Swift after the 6 November 1970 mounted ambush at Xuan Loc in which Swift's driver, remembered as Ben or Benjamin, was seriously wounded. As Chris recalls, he later messed up badly with the old E-7 First Sergeant in the rear and did not get to drive for Captain Baily, who relieved Swift in December 1970. Chris subsequently made his way to the field where he settled into the first platoon's 106 mm recoilless rifle jeep.

Dave Lowe sits shirtless in the T.C.'s seat while Pvt Brown stands to his side.
From the Chris Halasz Collection

From left: Chris Halasz, Unknown, Sgt "Ski" (blond head in rear), Jim Dykes (leaning on the M-60).
From the Chris Halasz Collection

Dave Lowe and Chris Halasz jump from a bridge over QL-13 - Thunder Road.
From the Chris Halasz Collection

Life in the Rear

Kim and Sue, Hooch maids from Dion
From the Chris Halasz Collection

"Pork Chop" - the mascot at Phu Loi.
From the Chris Halasz Collection

Fire Base Judy - Where the Living Ain't Easy

You can't believe the recruiting poster about the luxurious accommodations at Fire Base Judy,
located just east of Fire Support Base Mace and lovely downtown Xuan Loc.
From the Chris Halasz Collection

At Judy, the battery of three 155-mm towed cannon were so close to our sleeping areas that the concussion from firing could blow an air mattress from under a sleeping trooper.
From the Chris Halasz Collection

The living arrangements really sucked. I shared my sleeping quarters at Fire Base Judy with a rat. It would jump from the sandbagged edge of the wall onto my cot late at night or early in the morning as it made its way from its nest to the mess hall. It occasionally landed on my legs.

Dave Lowe also had a rat at Judy that did the same thing, except that it landed repeatedly on Dave's face. Dave always objected but never so pointedly as when monsoon arrived, enhancing the rat-in-the-face-while-asleep experience to the gold level of wet-rat-in-the-face-while-asleep.

The sleeping quarters at Fire Base Judy:
wooden 155 ammo crates filled with dirt stacked two high on which was placed half a sewer pipe covered with sandbags. It made a little two-man cave with two cots aligned end-to-end.
From the Chris Halasz Collection

The rats lived in the sandbags. Both troopers and rats ate at the mess hall, which was that thing in the center of the picture with poles holding up a cover and trash and paper plates on the ground.

We were only transients at Judy, but there was little excuse for Blue Tiger officers and senior NCOs to allow the troop to live in such degenerate conditions. They owed their troopers better than they gave.

Fire Support Base Mace Was Better

Chris's pictures from Mace show that it was at least cleaner at Mace than at Fire Base Judy.

Convoy escort jeeps at FSB Mace.
From the Chris Halasz Collection

Looking east towards FB Judy over the well-maintained barracks at Mace. A one-star general spent a lot of time at Mace, which served as headquarters for the last brigade of the First Cav. The extra brass made for better living conditions.
From the Chris Halasz Collection

Looking west to Nui Chua Chan. If you ignore the sandbags,
this picture might be a bucolic scene for an agricultural calendar.
From the Chris Halasz Collection

Digging in at Tay Ninh

Chris took some good documentary pictures of one of my favorite war stories. It was about how the engineers we worked with saved us a ton of work by digging our fighting and sleeping positions for us with backhoes. They even dug a pit for my 3/4-ton ammunition truck. That meant we did not have to hump thirty 50-lb. cases of ammunition twice, nor did we have to fill sandbags to cover the offloaded pile of explosive crates.

The engineers were cooperative because we provided security for them every morning as they cleared the road of mines from Tay Ninh north to Katum at the Cambodian border.

We went to Tay Ninh as a reinforced cavalry troop, joined with a platoon of tracks and a Sheridan from the 1st of the 5th Mechanized Infantry, 25th Infantry Division.

We made a long train in our move to Tay Ninh.
This photo was taken just east of Nui Ba Dinh.
From the Chris Halasz Collection

We made camp on the east side of the road in dry rice fields
three thousand meters north of Nui Ba Dinh.
From the Chris Halasz Collection

The engineers brought in a backhoe and dug our fighting a sleeping positions.
From the Chris Halasz Collection

After we moved in, the holes made excellent accommodations.
Note the 106-mm recoilless rifle in the middle distance - It was still
mounted on a jeep which was buried in one of the engineer-dug fighting positions.
From the Chris Halasz Collection

Lai Khe

Chris took several good pictures of the damage sappers left after blowing up an A Troop Cobra.

From the Chris Halasz Collection

Bluetiger 1970-71 Home Page	"By Way of Introduction"	"Dispatches from APO SF 96289 - 1970"	"Dispatches from APO SF 96289 - 1971"	"Rogue's Gallery"	"Air Mobile"
"Delta Troop's Rides"	"Camps"	"Fire Bases"	"Anatomy of a Fire Base"	"The Move to Lai Khe"	"Working at Lai Khe"
"Sin Loi"	"Sterling Withers' Page"	"Andy Hicks' Page"	"Chris Halasz's Page"	"Thomas McGuire's Page"	"Billy McCall's Page"

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