March 10th 1968

[39mto39g]

While conducting Operation Muscatine with the Americal, we were receiving Artillery support from 2/9 or the "Mighty ninth" as they called themselves, When our BN commanded flew out to LZ Uptight just south of Chu Lai to take part in the firing of the 500,000 105 round. I guess it was a big deal, I just hoped they didn't stop to long to pat each other on the back. I hear the casing is in the 4ths memorabilia collection.
Next month the 9th would fire almost that many in a continuing operation Macarthur, That the 4th killed over 5,000 enemy while pushing 2 NVA divisions back past Kontum and into Cambodia. Ladies and Gentlemen, there is no line in the sand that marks Vietnam from Cambodia, I can guarantee we were on the C side of that line. I may have seen Kerry.
Wait that was south of here.
But that’s latter this month. And next month.

Ron

[39mto39g]

Around the 16th of March 1968 we were moving into the McCaurther AO and the 173rd area of An khe. While at An Khe I got to ride convoy to Qui Nhon. I use the term "Got to" very loosly. I took turns with two other guys sitting behind a quad 50 in the back of a duce and a half, about a 1/2 hour each. As I recall the road was red dirt a good part of the way and then asfault. I met some really great guys from the 173rd at An Khe, We drank and smoked and played cards and drank some more. I sure hated to leave that wire. An Khe was a good size place. Some in the hills , most on flat land, I don't recall a runway but it was big enough to have one somewhere. Closer to the end of March we would move west and that was not a very good time. Several times everyone had to make peace with the fact that this could (Could hell) this is the last day on earth for you. Then the sun would rise and God would extend a hand , one more time.

Ron

[39mto39g]

Convoy from An Khe to Qui Nhon was not really that. It was actually a convoy from Qui Nhon
to An Khe, I just didn't know it.
We went from An Khe to Qui Nhon and then to An Khe and then back to Qui Nhon. The next morning we went back to An Khe. I was happy to stop that cycle and shower and sleep for a day and a half. Stopping along that road was especially exciting.
At one time while stopped a Sgt came by and told us all to be on the alert. No shit. as apposed to having a ever watchful eye I guess. While stopped someone in the middle shot his gun, ( you don't want to do that with a 19 year old kid and a quad 50 at your trigger finger) one of the guys in our 3 some was on the Q-50 and opened that thing up on the hillside. WOW. I was so impressed. Although I was under cover , I did get the last 3-4 seconds of his display. Then we had to reload the Q-50 as the SGT was telling the guy he was a dip shit and WTF are you doing, we pretty much ignored him and continued re-loading. Note,,, a HOT M-2 is not real easy to load when there are 4 of them. The gage is not correct and twisting a barrel is a job for a LT, Say, LT could you give us a hand, we can't seem to turn this barrel.
THANKS


HE He He

Ron

[frisco-kid]

when James and I went to Nam together we went down that road. We drove from Pleiku to An Khe and then down the pass to Qui Nhon. A steep road with alot of switchbacks. Like all roads in Nam now, it was well paved. James had spent some time sneaking around that area as a LRRP. We took quite a few pictures along there. They still might be in the photo albums here on the Pat Files.

[splummer]

Funny, but when I was going in convoys between Qui Ohn and Anke all the quad 50's I saw were mounted on 5 ton trucks not duce in a halfs. We had one quad 50 turret mounted on a 5 ton for every 20 trucks. The gunners were regular crews of eather transportation troops or arty guys.

[39mto39g]

splummer
So the picture I posted of the Quad 50 in the back of a truck is not a 2 1/2 ton truck , But a 5 ton truck? Funny thing, I thought the 5 tons were a bit bigger. This picture seems to be showing a 2 1/2 ton truck.
Maybe the convoy's that you seen, at the time period you seen them had "Only " crews of either transportation troops or arty guys" And Personally, I would have just as soon stayed in my bunker, The convoy's that I was on had , infantry along. Although, few of us that were there, We were there.

Ron

[splummer]

It's hard to tell from the picture because a 2.5 and 5 ton cargo truck looked so much alike except for the 5 ton being larger. When I was there in Jan and part of Feb in convoys on rt 19 the idea of gun trucks was pretty new. Some Officer with the 8th Trans came up with the idea to put armour plating on duce in a halfs [2'm-60s, grenade launcher] because they were running into snipers, mines or ambushes almost daily. We had one gun truck and a gun jeep for every 10 trucks and a 5'ton with quad 50's for every 20.
In Feb 1968 we moved to the Hue Phu Bie area on LST's. [It was a different type of war/convoy thing there with us being attached to the Marines for a while. A while back you mentioned a bar in Phu Bie where you got into a fight with some Marines. Which bar was it?

[Packo]

their gun trucks were 5 ton fronts...duece and a half armoured rears. Probably all stolen, but what the hell.

Pack

[splummer]

The reason it was so different in the Hue Phu bie area is that instead of the large protected Army convoys of a few hundred trucks, the Marine convoys were smaller like maybe only 50 or so trucks. Instead of gun trucks they would have one or two, 5-tons with a 50 mounted on a ring above the cab and 20 Marines riding in the back with M-16's. No armour plating and no m-60's on the jeep leading the convoy. I remember thinking that they sure had a lot of faith in those riflemen. At night if we were in a base camp we'd be on the perimeter eather in 4 man bunkers or 12 man reactionary forces. With the exception of them calling us dogies and us calling them Jarheads we had the same 'hardships and living conditions'. We were all brothers. I guess thats why I wonder where the bar was that Ron had the fight with the Marines.

[DMZ-LT]

We are still all Brothers , Steve.Had a fight with a guy in my platoon over the last C of beef with spice sauce. I won - we both made it home.Sounds like you raised a fine daughter after. HUE to go