Full moon
 

If you can see the time of this posting you can see that I can't sleep too well tonight. Blame it on where I been years ago. You see before I went to bed last night I noticed a full moon and I remember that it was during a full moon that we were scared the most when going to the towers at night. That's when we were the best target and the towers had no fewer troops assigned to them during the oh-two hundred to oh-six hundred shift than they had on the fourteen hundred to eighteen hundred shift.

Re: Full moon
 

Stick
Ummm not to appear ignorant or insensitive but what towers ar you talking about? The only towers I saw in the NAm were the rappelling towers in Recondo school but you can't mean THAT.
As for me, I spent time last night looking at the goregeous moon, sitting in the middle of my field on my lawn chair. Just me and my .45. It was great. Sitting in my chair with my .45 in my lap makes me feel safe, a cold steel feelything that comforts me when I'm all by myself. Jus me and .45 against the world--I'm good!
stay good
James

John
 

Over on 3/5 Cav web site a fellow trooper said this past veterans day he was invited to a reunion of A Co 1/28 Inf. because his best friend was KIA with them. Said he was welcomed as a brother in arms. The message he wanted to tell his fellow Cavalrymen was that in his conversations with them , most of them said " Shit , I always felt so much safer when the Cav. was around". He thought it was the greatest compliment that could have been given, that just our presence made other Americans feel safer............................ John , the people here are your Cavalry. We are around if you need us. Scouts Out !! :af:

Yup guard towers could be scary at night. Was in a guard tower the night the TET offensive broke out, it was the first time I came under fire, and my first look at real combat. Sure did change some after the Tet offensive. Was much better prepared when the May 1968 Offensive broke out. My first tour in Name came under fire twice the Tet offensive, and the May offensive. My second tour with the 4th ID changed all that. Much more then two time under fire.

For my unit, we feared "dark of the moon" most. A full moon helped us see better outside the perimeters of our firebase or night laagers at night. Plus our experience was that ground attacks against our firebase, always occured during the dark of the moon. But I can see what the difference would be for people exposed in a tower. Our firebase perimeter had low profile bunkers. And we were right on the ground when in a night laager.

Stick ... you weren't alone last night, even though you didn't know it.


One thing about triple canopy jungle ... full moon or not, it was dark ... in fact it was kinda dark during the day too. Now at a firebase, a full moon was both a blessing and a curse. A blessing because you could see real good and far but a curse because it meant that Chuck could see you real good too.

Never could see much use for guard towers. Seemed like to much of a temptation for RPG target practice.

LOL, posting at the same time!!!!

Towers
 

Never got in a tower, But many a guard bunker stuck out in the middle of an open area between the wire and the hutches or tents.
I never gave a shit if it was a full moon or not, F-um, They couldn't hit shit in the daytime let alone when they couldn't use there sights and if they did fire, Shame on them.

Ron

I can't figure out why some bases in Vietnam had towers and some had low profile bunkers. In I corp I never saw a tower only bunkers except in Danang. People I talked to told me that in later years Camp Eagle had towers changed from bunkers?? What about Dong Ha? When I would be over at Pleiko in 68, the guys that were in the towers complained about being sniped at during the night. Towers never made much since to me.
Full moons never bothered me but, I think I remember there was usually a time just before dawn when it would get cooler and pitch black, where you couldn't see more than a few feet in front of you. I hated not being able to see.