Good Morning Vietnam!

Following his leave of absence, Darryl returned to Fort Lewis and soon he and his fellow 4th Infantry Division troops boarded the USS General W. H. Gordon, a World War II-era troop ship, and journeyed to Nha Trang, South Vietnam. Darryl’s unit, nicknamed “Dragoons,” arrived early September 1966 and promptly flew by helicopter to Tuy Hoa Air Base located at the South China Sea. They immediately began establishing their new base camp but due to random Viet Cong sniper fire they began perimeter patrols and night ambushes the very next day. During Darryl’s very first night patrol they experienced a hard rain so he and a buddy took cover under a tree, not realizing there were monkeys in that tree. We had a saying in Vietnam after muddy patrols, rainy nights and enemy contact: “I feel like I’ve been shot at and missed but S _ _ T at and hit.” Well, that perfectly summed up Darryl’s first night patrol in Vietnam. Central Highlands Action At daylight the next morning, Darryl and his pals ventured into the village and captured a lone Viet Cong with his antiquated single-shot rifle who had been sniping at them. Once back to base camp for three days, Darryl’s unit resumed establishing their area until they were then whisked off on Huey helicopters to the Central Highlands mountains. For the next three months Darryl and his fellow grunts were on patrol seeking Viet Cong guerilla fighters, dealing with snipers, booby traps and numerous firefights. During one enemy encounter at a small hamlet, Darryl’s platoon leader called in a Huey to transport a captured Viet Cong suspect so he told Darryl to pop a smoke grenade. As Darryl proceeded alone, a black-pajama-clad Viet Cong with an AK47 rushed around from behind a hooch intending to kill him point blank, but Darryl beat him to the draw.