Wannabe?

[frisco-kid]

This is so cool! It MUST be him! This has to be the guy that flew that Huey to Hanoi to extract us after we made that H.A.L.O. [High Altitude Low Opening, to you non-heroes] jump to do a recon of Ho Chi Minh's personal bunker. I'm so glad he made it. And he works with you? What are the odds?

Bust his ass. In front of somebody.

Good talkin' to ya Sunday, Bro.

[1CAVCCO15MED]

That's the guy that flew in our group of attack mules into Laos. We had little blades on the front of our mules to cut ditches across the Ho Chi Minh trail. It was fun watching those poor suckers ride their bicycles off the edge. It didn't kill them but it was hell on morale. We were called the Roman Mules.

[Keith_Hixson]

These people are to pitied. They don't have a life of their own and they have to make one up. Sad indeed. But, when they take away honor from those who deserve it they have gone too far.

Met a guy once wearing a fatigue jacket with all kinds of ranks and medal hanging on it. Said he earned them all. I asked what each one stood for and he didn't the difference between an eagle for colonel (navy captain) and a medal. Who do they think they are fooling. He had the first cav and big red one patches and didn't who or what they stood for.

You don't whether to laugh, cry or belittle them.

Keith

[Packo]

When I was a biker and belonged to a "club" and flew colors, me and a couple of the bro's, one a combat medic, 9th Div., (a member of the famous "Fightin' Gimpy Brigade), were in this large bar/dancehall. We were watchin' the dancin' and listening to the band,(playing Whipping Post by Alman Bros), when we noticed some guy lighting ever cigarette for people he could. I mean if you pulled one out he would rush to light it. Anyway he was near me so I had to see what this asshole was up to. I pulled a Marlboro out and bingo, he's there. As he fires up the Zippo, I notice a CIB on it and a Big Red One, with Vietnam under it. I immediately said, "Hey bro, if your gonna be one....?" and he looked at me and said, "Ahh, yeah man". I repeated, "If you gonna be one". "Yeah man, cool" was his answer. Well, anger control in those days for me was not sumpin' I knew much about and proceeded to show him the hard end of my right arm. I told him to get up and unless he could convince me and "Big Ed" that he was a Vet with the 1st Div, he was in big trouble. He then made the mistake of saying, "Oh, this was my best friends lighter. He died in Vietnam and willed this to me". Well not the answer "Big Ed" wanted to here and believe me, he was bigger than me. This poor fool paid a serious price but doubt he ever played the Vietnam Vet again. We sent the lighter to Zippo, who used to do everything they could to find the owner.

A wonderful moment in Packo's Life!

[Andy]

During my short stint in aviation a Cobra or a Huey (D model usually) with mini-guns and rocket pods was a "Gun". All other choppers in the comapny, Huey's, were slicks except for the old man's chopper which was just known as Six. This was the second half of '68.

The word (name) Huey was the name given to the pilot who was the current "goat". The guy who had most recently done a bad landing, flown to the wrong location, thought he was talking on the intercom when he was really talking on battalion freq. I'd think the pilot you talked with has the given name, Huey, and he earned it!

I don't think NCO's were ever allowed to fly choppers. If he was demoted to a Sgt. what would he have done? If he were a problem child, it seems they would have simply de-exed him.

Maybe he actually flew the XUH-1Bull, a secret weapon better known as the Magic Carpet. He no doubt too part in Operation Magical Myster Tour and supplied troops with white lamp black.

Stay healthy,
Andy
PS: Our gun ship platoon was known as the Rat Pack. The pilot or co-pilot who "met" the most young ladies was known as Frank - get it?

[Seascamp]

The one I prized was from the USS Pollax, AKS 4. This was where I did my very first cable drop from a Marine helicopter and that was an enough to get the mokish looking light a taillight. Total training was some hand signals from the door gunner, then strapped into a harness and out I went. The hand signals meant, ?don?t forget to send the life belt back up on the hook?, like I understood everything he signed, not. Anyway, I got a lighter, ash tray and ship?s patch from the Pollax?s shipper for the work done. This served as a guest lighter on my coffee table for ages until it went missing. Later it turned up in the dick skinners of an acquaintance and I grabbed it back. This guy had served with the Marines in Gitmo and missed the VN deal. An OK guy usually but full to the gills with Gitmo Marine legions and lore. Sounds like a scary place back during those times but my lighter didn?t have anything to do with that, I?d say. It had to do with me being a scared, green, kiddo, overcoming fear and doing what was expected, that?s all. Not a big deal in retrospect but a real big deal at the time. Alas, the real scary stuff was yet to come.

Fair seas, Bill

[exlrrp]

Some basic facts not right.
Throw the bastard out and horsewhip him

James

happy just to be alive

[phuloi]

February or March,1968(I still had a tan) I`m in a pizza joint in Boston`s infanous "Combat Zone",and this idiot is espousing his heroics in combat in Vietnam to everyone in the place.Smelling a rat,I asked him where all this had taken place.He answered with a garbled response of some Korean town,and told me he was a Marine officer and that I would refer to him as "SIR"...WRONG ANSWER,ASSHOLE!I brought a right from somewhere behind me near the floor up under his chin,and I swear to God,it lifted him a foot off the deck and square through a store-front window...just like you would see in the movies.Your correspondant casually slipped through the hole in the wall and mingled into the crowd.

[Packo]

Was in one of our biker bars on "the Island". A former member of the "club" and I went in the back to play pool. The former member "Tubby" was drivin' 18 wheelers and making collections for the local Sicilian's. His fist was every bit as big as Jame's head. Anyway he started shootin' pool with this ass who out of the blue states he's a former Air Force Ranger and Vietnam Vet. I said "great man, where were you stationed"? "Taiwan Vietnam" was his response after pondering the question for a couple of minutes. "Not close you lying asshole" I responded. Tubby looked at me and said, "Hey Packo, don't be so mean...how do you know he's lying?" (Tubby was a great guy but not the brightest bulb in the basket) "Tubby, I said, Taiwan is China, not Vietnam." Tubby, holding the Q-stick buy it's ends, left on top, right on bottom, snapped that sucker right in half. (I must admit, have tried that a bunch of times and could never do it. No knee, just arms.) and proceeded to chase that punk out of the bar using the thick end. I asked him why HE was so pissed at that guy and Tubby replys..."I may have been a draft dodger, but you went, and my brother went, (82nd Airborne), and it just pisses me off to have a guy say he went when he didn't".

Better that guy than me!

Packo

PS James, ask Dan about Tubby sometime and him teaching Sallie to play Craps. A FUNNY FUNNY STORY!

[sivallib1973]

I agree that the guy is a wannabee. But why bash the guy or guys? I would just carve the word "liar" into their foreheads and let them go at that! Then everyone they meet know they are liars! Me? I served in Nam but for such a brief time that it almost doesn't count! I was in Dong Tam in the Mekong Delta area with the 39th signal battalion for only a couple of weeks before I was med evaced to Japan where I was reassigned never to return to Vietnam. I guess I spent a total of one month in country. It took a while to finally get to Dong Tam. First we went from Saigon to Long Bienh and spent a few days there and then we flew to Vung Tau for a few days and then finally on to Dong Tam. The final few days in country were spent in the hospital at Can Tho.