An Khe

[39mto39g]

Doing patrols around An Khe was the hardest patroling I did in VN. The terran was hilly, (to say the least) You could walk all day and only be one or two ridge lines away from where you started.
on top of one of those hills I called for resupply , the pilot, after touching down, said the wind was 65 knots about 30 feet up from where we were standing. And Rockets, there were rockets. They would get on a ridge line and shoot a rocket at us and be gone down the backside of that ridge line before there rocket hit.
I don't think there are anymore sandbags left in VN after An Khe, I was sure glade when the 101 came and took over our bunkers.
Ron

[splummer]

QL-19 through the An Khe pass was a bad road to be on. I was in a lot of convoys from Quhon to An Khe to Pleiko. In November or so 1967 the 8th trans group started putting together gun trucks to protect the convoys. [usually duce in a halfs with make shift armour plate and m-60s.]

[39mto39g]

I got a picture of that An Khe pass from the passengers side of a jeep. Winding dirt road from hell that VC could be just about anywhere. My Lt wouldn't let me drive, he said it made him look like the not important one? I don't think that was right.
Ron

[DMZ-LT]

I tried to make the RTO get two persons behind me when on the ground. You were the first person they wanted to shoot, Big Ed , my RTO ,always bent the antenna over anyway. He made it home. It was right.
















9Big Ed

[39mto39g]

I stayed in the middle of the pack , the LT was all over the place. Except when we (he ) needed to talk on the radio. I carried a short and long antena (the long one was a break down) the short one was kinda like a flat peace of metal that everyone bent over. I also carried a speaker about 4 or 5 inch square. The handset was wrapped in a plastic bag that the battery came in to keep it dry, When wet it squeeeeeeled. The only and I repeat, ONLY good thing about being the LTs RTO was that I didn't have to walk point. Mabe this was not the case in other units but it was in ours.
Ron

[splummer]

I think I mentioned this before, but when I was a real new guy I broke down in that pass. It looked peaceful enough to me but when the wrecker and gun jeep came I wondered why those guys kept their guns pointed at the hill side. [that probably was my first week in-country]

[Stick]

The first guy the APU lost was going through that pass flying classified mail. They said that it wasn't due to hostile action, that it was due to mechanical malfunction but the H-13 went down in the middle of the pass and to this day I know that it was due to the unfriendly folks down there. I got the assignment of carrying classified stuff after that until I was assigned to the guard detachment and ended going through that pass I don't know how many times. I can still picture that pass in my mind today (PTSD?). When you're in an H-13 (flying bubble) there's only you and the guy flying the thing. There ain't no door gun and you can only shoot what you carried aboard out one side of the chopper. If the guy flying the thing is hit you're either going down with him or learn to fly real quick. I hated that pass.

[39mto39g]

If this was the An Khe pass or the Hai Van Pass, They were both dangerous places
Ron

[Robert Ryan]

Remember when the Division moved from Pleiku to An Khe, company was on a 2 week stand down then, and had to move the whole damned 1/22 inf Hqs and companies to Radcliff at An Khe, I ony had about 2 months left on my 2nd tour when that happened. Remember the pass. But the 1/10 Cav provided a lot of road security for the move, with their tanks and APC's. The 4th MP's did a lot of convoy escort during the move with their V 100's and gun jeeps. Yes Ron An Khe was definetly hilly. It strange that move was compleed by Mar 1970, and the Divsion left in Dec 1970, a battalion I believe was sent to Tuy Hoa then, but I don't know which one was.

[39mto39g]

I would bet it was the 1st BN, There were 3 BN in the 35th and the 1st most always was at the head or bringing up the end of some move or operation somewhere.
Ron