Colonel Banks can you tell me when did you get into Vietnam as a place first of all, and when did you first go out on active duty? Can you tell me something about that?

Surely, I arrived in Vietnam in August of '66 and ah I was greeted warmly, as I remember. When I road in a jeep from regimental headquarters to battalion headquarters, we were fired upon as we were arriving at the battalion command post. Ah. It struck me as being everything that I had heard it was like. In short, horrible. Ah. My initial feelings on going over there or outlook, if you want, was that I probably would not be coming back alive as rifle company commander in ah I fully expected that the odds were very likely that that would occur. That were my, those were my initial feelings. Ah.

What did you think about, what did you think you were going to do?

Ah. As I understood our responsibilities over there at the time ah we were situated in an area that was predominantly occupied by local VC, Viet Cong. Ah. Guerrilla type personnel. There was some intelligence reports of ah what were referred to as hardcore or main force VC. In other words, uniformed VC, ah occasional activity of ah of North, of North Vietnamese units ah and ah an elite battalion of Viet Cong called sappers. S-a-p-p-e-r-s. They were commando type raid type unit that would come in and overrun ah command post insulations ah well planned ah surprise attacks ah that would ah often only last four or five minutes or ten minutes and ah now they were there, now they were gone and all you had left were the casualties to show it.

What was your very first mission ah out in the field. I take it this was your first actual experience of combat was it? What happened...

Yes. I...

What happened after, how did it strike you? Can you...?

I had never been in combat prior to going to Vietnam. Ah. Initially, I became the ah battalion logistics officer, S-4, as it’s designated, but ah after about ah four months, the company commander of ah Company H, Hotel Company, ah came down with hepatitis and ah the battalion commander assigned me to command Hotel Company. So, I did get some insight into ah the problems and ah the operations that were going on in our battalion area of responsibility prior to becoming a company commander, which helped. I could see the problems from a logistic end as well as from the combat end. Ah. But, I took over Hotel Company some time ah prior to Christmas in December of 1966.

Can you remember your first mission out in the field with them? Does that stick in your mind or not?

I remember one mission there. Ah. We had heavy rains that winter and all the paddies were flooded and there was a town ah to the north of ah an artillery battery where we were stationed that was know to harbor VC ah some time earlier ah several months prior ah this sapper battalion that I mentioned had overrun and annihilated an entire marine platoon. Ah. We decided to ah send a highly skilled ambush patrol into that village in a most unorthodox fashion, ah, handpicked myself ah and another lieutenant and ah several NCO's in the company. We had a seven man group that ah we ferried in a rubber raft ah to the perimeter of the town ah over over the flooded paddies where we ah correctly suspect that they would never think of having look outs watching for somebody to come.

The rubber rafts deposited us and then withdrew allowing us to work our way around the tree line to ah ah which was they had barbed wire all around the tree line perimeter of the village. We slowly worked our way around looking for a place to slip through and get into the village. Ah. At one point as we were following the perimeter ah the perimeter made an indentation in in the form of a square and and was, o— wide open rice paddy.

Instead of following the indentation we walked along the dike of the paddy and as we got spread out across that dike in the open, they opened fire on us. Ah. They ah in fact, in fact, the first thing we heard was ah the spla...a splash which immediately sent sent us diving into the mud as the grenade that was made to splash went off and fire opened up and ah our our rear guard on on the patrol ah shot one VC to the rear of us and we immediately had a rally point that we had planned to go to if we were were taken under attack and had to split.

So, we all dispersed to head toward the rally point ah which was back in some grave mounds b— back along the route we had come from. Ah. Fortunate that we had chosen that because ah within about two or three minutes after we were heading back toward the valley point ah automatic machine gun fire opened up along, it was it was it was obvious from the tracers of of the machine gun fire that they had had a machine gun pre-targeted on the one road that led into this town. So, they were already for visitors ah ah.

Fortunate for us the ah that wasn't the route that we had chosen for the rally point and they had ne...I don't think they ever realized how we had gotten into the village ah or in the proximity of the village cause we hadn't come down the road. Ah. Make a long story short, we sat out there ah under cover of the graves all night. Our radio could not work. It gotten...the batteries had gotten wet. We were reduced to trying to click the receiver. One for yes and two for no ah a, a, a, n, and back at the command post they were reduced to twenty questions as to how, asking us what we wanted and what the problem was and where we were and what kind of trouble we were in and we were unable to communicate.

And, we had to sweat it out through the night and the following morning the company came down in force with ah with some antos which were heavy tank type mechanized ah or motorized weapons and ah they lined up in force ah to cover us while we waded up to our neck through the flooded paddies out from from our position that we we we had held that night. That that was my first combat experience as far as actual contact in a live fire situation. Ah. Ah. I do remember it. It almost was my last...

You mentioned a couple of times ah that you were in an area which was pretty strongly VC. I wonder if you could tell me what did you think ah about the the enemy at this time and indeed, about the people who were living there. Have you, have you any thoughts about the Vietnamese in the area around...?

There was a cartoon that circulated around that time that quite apropos or quite appropriately (clears throat again) answered that question. Ah. The cartoon showed an ah a marine NCO teaching or indoctrinating new replacements in in Vietnam and in ah in one picture or or one caption of the cartoon it said there's a picture of Vietnamese with pajamas, black pajamas and a hat on and the NCO had his point and he's pointing to that picture and saying this is the friendly forces, or these are the friendly forces. In the next caption there's an identical picture of the same Vietnamese, same outfit and the NCO is pointing and saying these are the enemy. In other words, you never knew who was the enemy and who was the friend. They all looked alike. They all dressed alike. They were all Vietnamese. Some of them were were Viet Cong. And so...

Just run out of film.

We've run out of magazine.

Cameras ready...up a little bit.

I'd like to take you back a bit again. Can you tell me, you were talking about the Vietnamese, can you tell me what you sort of felt about them as people. Did they mean, did they mean trouble? Were they just people who were there? Did you have any feelings toward them as you were in the field either as the enemy in the way they fought, or as, or as people around. What were your thoughts about them?

No ah, the area over there was, ah divided, so to speak, into villages or, or portions where the civilians were considered friendly or pro South Vietnam and other areas that were considered as Viet Cong control and, and ah, where the civilians were considered to be pro Viet Cong or anti ah South Vietnam, Ah... depending on where you were you had different outlooks as to what the situation was.

For example, uh, and this is hard for a civilian to understand, ah and maybe this is a little bit of philosophy but uh when you watch your troops move down a trail in a village that's known to be harboring, or at least it's known that there's VC activity that's been going on in that village, and here a young woman of twenty-two or twenty-three years old that's pregnant and at, in later interviews, uh acknowledges that her husband is working in the city in Da Nang and not a VC or anything, but yet she sits and watches your men walk down a trail and watches a booby trap go off and kill and wound several of your men, she knows that booby trap's there, she makes no move to warn the troops that it's there may actually have been the one that has placed that booby trap there. Who is to say whether she is any less the enemy then the twelve year old Vietnamese boy that's a VC that's in a ditch or trench, ah, behind the tree line sniping at you and actually firing a weapon at you. Which one of these is more of an enemy? Ah, I could never answer.

Were you aware then that you you seem to be saying that you weren't dealing with a situation in which people normally look at a war in which you have two armies ah facing each other. I wonder if you could just sort of think more of that.

It, it's, it's not like the San Francisco 49ers on one side of the field and the Cincinnati Bengals on the other. It's just not like that. It's uh, uh the enemy is all around you. Uh, one second you may be fired upon from the rear, the next second from straight ahead or either flank. Uh, you never know. And that was another frustrating situation that we endured over there. Uh...we were obliged to follow rules of engagement. Uh, these rules of engagement prevented us from firing unless we physically could see a weapon in the other, the, the uh uh Viet Cong's hand. What this boils down to is we had to wait until they fired upon us before we engaged in virtually every situation. Uh...

[Inaudible]

Extremely. How would you like to be walking target twenty-four hours a day, not to mention not knowing whether your next step is going to be your last because you're going to be stepping on a mine or a booby trap whenever you were operating, wherever you walked, wherever you went. The main road into the battalion CP had to be cleared every morning with engineers and mine detectors before we could allow a vehicle to leave the command post to head up to Da Nang or the regiment or anywhere.

We lost a lot of engineers, we lost a lot of vehicles...from mines the VC would come in and plant on the road huh, during the night. It's a very, very frustrating and harrowing war. Uh...some of the turmoil that is going on in Northern Ireland is about...is, gives one an idea when you never know when a car is going to blow up or some act of terrorism is going to occur. This was, this was what it was all about over in Vietnam except that you didn't have streets that they were fighting on, it was rice, rice paddies, and jungle, and bamboo, and huts and uh rivers and you name it. It was more countryside but uh that same kind of terrorism and guerrilla activity. That's the way a guerrilla war goes, it's not conventional. You don't know he's out there and you're here. All you know is you're here, and he's here, there and everywhere.

You make it sound in some respect as if you are actually in, and you must tell me whether I'm putting words into your mouth because I don't want to do so, but it's almost as if you're in enemy territory, and in fact you are surrounded by enemy as opposed to actually being troops going in and doing...did you actually feel you were in some...

That's precisely what the situation was. Each battalion was assigned uh what we code worded as a TA...TAOR which stood for Tactical Area of Responsibility. This is a defined geographic area and the battalion was assigned the responsibility of operating in that area and clearing it and securing it and freeing it of VC activity and, and maintaining control of it. Uh...the battalion, each rifle or infantry battalion consisted of four rifle companies so what each battalion would do is assign...a quarter of its tactical area of responsibility as a company operating area to each of the four companies.

And the company commanders, like myself, were responsible for planning activity in that area – uh, patrol activity, ambush activity, search and destroy activity – uh, in short, our mission was to find the VC that were operating in the area...uh, and destroy them or force them out of the area. Uh, this is said a whole lot easier than it was done.

You used a term which I'm sure you know the full meaning of, but I wonder whether most people who are viewing the series – what exactly was a "search and destroy" mission? It sounds quite horrific. What was it?

All right. As simply put as I can, uh search and destroy mission meant, uh, going out into a particular operating area and normally in force searching for known Viet Cong that were in that area and, uh, if you were able to encounter them, destroying them. Take, take...Engaging them and killing them, cause now you see them, and you're in contact with them and they're the enemy. Uh, uh, so you kill them.

That's as simply as I can state what a "search and destroy" mission was. A lot of times you may be searching for tunnels or caves or bunkers, uh, the Viet Cong had a propensity for uh, quite intricate hiding places. Uh, and a lot of them involved tunnels and caves and what not that they dug underground. They were quite ingenious people.

One of the things that was mentioned – perhaps a different element from what you're saying – is that they regarded, it seemed to them that the Marines went into villages and destroyed them, and it wasn't a question of destroying the VC but you were actually destroying, there were indeed many of the images that you see on the movies are houses burning, or hooches burning or whatever. Is there anything that you'd want to say about that?

Uh that there were...uh, that there were houses burned, uh there's no question. Uh, the controlling the controlling factor on that was difficult, uh...and I'm talking about the position of a company commander – one of your units is moving through a particular village area and um, even under orders not, not to burn any huts or anything, uh...occasionally a hut was burned or a house was burned and no one was going to say who did it. Again, uh, I think one has to understand uh the sheer frustration of the situation over there. Uh...

We just ran out.

Okay, you're doing all right.

Yeah sure, I'll just pose my question. Um, the area that you were operating in, in particular, I mean was it a free fire zone and what is a free fire zone, what, what does that mean?

Uh, you're testing my memory now, but as I recall a free fire zone uh...was a term designated to an area that was known to be totally unfriendly and generally any activity in that area was considered to be Viet Cong activity. Uh...as I recall, this also was an area that uh was uh...an area where you could fire artillery without, without clearance. It was not considered to be inhabited by friendly Vietnamese and uh...again if I recall completely what all a free fire zone was uh, uh, entailed, uh any...civilians in that area had been warned that it was a free fire zone and they were subject to be fired upon if they were seen in that area – it was "stay out" it's off limits. Uh, if you're in there, you're considered VC and you can be fired upon.

It's just the same as uh there was a general curfew in effect at, at dark over there. Anywhere. If there were civilians moving out, or anything moved after dark anywhere, it could be fired upon because no one was supposed to be out moving after dark. Uh, this was a free fire zone as opposed to a zone where you might have VC activity and you might be fired upon at any given time, or encounter mines or booby traps, but uh it nevertheless was considered by higher headquarters uh to be friendly territory.

Uh, this was, is incidentally cause for great frustration on the part of commanders over there...uh, I can think of five or six times off the top of my head my personal experience where I ended up having troops pinned in a rice paddy somewhere by automatic weapons fire and requested artillery fire from uh on the area from where the fire was coming and was refused because according to the maps at higher headquarters that was a "friendly area."

They couldn't convince me when I was pinned or had men pinned and I was taking casualties from the weapons fire that was coming from that so called "friendly area" but this was, this was the case and we were restricted as far as firing artillery or calling in close air support on that particular village that was, we were receiving fire from. As I said, I can remember five or six times that type of situation occurred with my companies. I'm sure it was commonplace with everyone else that commanded over there, at least throughout our area of operations.

You were talking about um free fire zones. It sounds to me to be a very difficult thing to actually put into effect, I mean how would normally would an area be warned that it was regarded as unfriendly or it should be cleared – was it psychological warfare ways or was it expected that people would just simply leave their villages and move away? How did that, how did that work out exactly?

One...uh, one way that I can recall that they did, I know that uh, that uh...that they had helicopters go over with speakers. I know they had helicopters drop leaflets printed in Vietnamese advising people in certain areas. Uh, I don't know of any other means which were taken, but I know of those two means that uh were used uh, at least. Now...uh, that wasn't exactly my total area of responsibility. I was told this is a free fire zone – this is not, and uh I had enough to worry about without worrying about why one was and why wasn— another wasn't. Uh, that wasn't my area of concern.

If we could move on to late January '67. You were in this area Thuy Bo Complex, Dien To Complex, call it what you will. You're about to mount I believe a mission to clear a couple of dozen odd known VC forces. I wonder first of all could you tell me how you came to be there, whether the area was a free fire zone, just then going through the sequence of events. Just take yourself back to the end of January in this small area.

The area that we're talking about is a place called Dong Lien. It was a free fire zone uh, our operating area itself was crisscrossed by quite a number of rivers. Uh, these rivers were deep, uh usually quite narrow, I don't think any of them were more than...uh fifteen to twenty yards wide thirty yards wide at the most. But they were deep and they were quite swift. And when you, when you're carrying forty or fifty pounds of ammunition, flack vests, and helmet and equipment, you step in a hole or lose your footing in that kind of river it's easy to drown. And we actually had some drowning casualties. Ah.

And so, what I'm leading up to is quite simply it was a difficult terrain to navigate. You constantly had geographical problems. Uh...this one particular town called Dong Lie— I think it was Dong Lien, uh, was nestled uh in...more or less of an intersection of rivers. There were three rivers that uh, if you can visualize the letter "h" and then turn that "h" over on its side, in one of the pockets of that "h" or that sideways "h" lay the city or little town of Dong Lien. And that uh, that was a known hot bed or campout, you might say, of the local VC.

It was so difficult to reach. It was bordered on the west by about a thousand meters of open rice paddy, and on the other three sides was bordered by river. So it was very difficult for somebody to approach and get into that village without the VC knowing and taking an easy escape route, uh...We planned, we planned a detailed two-company operation involving Golf Company of the 2nd Battalion First Marines, and Hotel Company which I commanded. I was put in charge of the operation as a senior company commander.

Uh (cough) what we did, uh Golf Company uh formed a blocking position along the axis of the "h" uh. One platoon from my company moved in on the north side of the river across the river from the town to block up there. (cough) My command group and one of the other platoons from my company crossed in the dark of night in a little row boat uh, they actually set up a ferry line and actually two or three men at a time went across in the boat and slid across the southern portion of the town blocking there.

The plan was for the remaining platoon of my company to come across uh across the river out to the west and seal off on that open paddy area, and once we had it completely encircled or surrounded then we were going to sweep through it searching and destroying what VC we found – searching out the VC in the village and, and destroying them. Everything went according to plan except the lookouts that the VC that were in the village had (clears throat) encountered or heard the 3rd platoon which was to seal off that western end where the paddies were before they could get across. They fired warning shots...

[Inaudible]...yeah, cut it.

Colonel Banks, you were telling me about this operation. I gather it's a perfectly ordinary clearance operation, I don't think it even had a special name or anything...

No, it's strictly a small scale operation. We had all but the western portion of the village surrounded, as we started to surround the western portion lookouts...fired warning shots, and uhm, approximately twenty-five to thirty VC, looked like main force VC since they were wearing uniforms and carrying what looked like mortars and/or .50 caliber machine guns on their shoulders, all started running out to the west and southwest of the village, 'cross the open areas.

Uh, the left flank of the second platoon, which was on the extreme southwestern corner of the village, sighted them and engaged them fired machine gun at them uh...they thought they hit about three of them. A quick check, uh...they saw some bloo— found some blood trails, but no trace of any uh...this, the engagement was reported to battalion headquarters uh and either battalion or I guess regimental headquarters decided to insert what was called a "Sparrow Hawk."

Sparrow Hawk was a code name for "standby" platoon that was available to seal off the escape of VC in an incident such as this by helicopting them into an area in front of the VC to block them and uh and prevent their escape. Uh, much the same way as the old highway patrol in this country uh might radio ahead to set a road block up somewhere – same principle.

Battalion notified me that they were putting a Sparrow Hawk in, in the, in the, an area a few thousand meters to the west of where we were. Approximate position of where where we they sighted the VC headed. At the same time battalion advised me that a platoon from the first battalion 1st Marines was operating to the southwest of us and they were being given, I was being given operational control of that platoon. Uh, again in an effort to seal off the escape that had taken place, uh...this, this in fact occurred.

Uh. The platoon that uh was the Sparrow Hawk Platoon landed in an area out to the northwest of where we were and immediately were taken under fire by VC and started sustaining heavy casualties uh...they couldn't even get to the casualties without taking more casualties. The— They tried to crawl out and get one of the men that were hit and that man would get hit. Uh...the initial plan had been to box in the area and just make it a bigger sweep area. But this plan had to be aborted because of the critical nature or the critical position that the Sparrow Hawk Platoon was in.

Uh, I, meanwhile, I had joined up with the 3rd Platoon in my company, and I advised the company commander of Golf Company to take control of my other platoon, which was still on the other side of the river and uh trace behind me or follow up behind me – I was going to take the two platoons with me and head out to uh link up with that Sparrow Hawk Platoon, because they were in serious trouble, their casualties were continuing to mount. Ah...

Were these casualties coming from these twenty-five or thirty odd men?

Or more. This was a known, this whole area...

Just stop a minute, sorry.

You want me to cut?

Yeah, might as well.

What was the scale of the operation at this stage?

At this stage we weren't sure. We had, we'd sighted twenty-five or thirty VC, but we had no idea how much was out there. Ah, we did know that the Sparrow Hawk Platoon was under heavy fire. Uh, the platoon from the first battalion that had been assigned to me to the southwest was also encountering fire, and... as I started moving out the two platoons of Hotel Company that were with me, we reached the southwestern corner of this village that we had planned to search and destroy uh, and started receiving fire ourselves.

Sporadic and not, uh I, I guess you'd call it moderate small arms fire. And it was coming from an obvious long distance way, about 800, 900 yards away, across all these open paddies and tree line. Uh, I started, uh uh, I sent in the second platoon and had the 3rd platoon start moving on a skirmish line, which means kind of abreast, up to the northwest, uh...so I had them start up to the northwest first to allow the second platoon to provide covering fire for them.

And I called in artillery support...uh to fire on the tree line, which was in part of the free fire zone and neutralize this fire anticipating that by the time the artillery forward observer with me had zeroed in on the target, my third platoon would be about half way across those open paddies still out of range of uh, of the effect of the artillery fire but close enough to make a final assault on that tree line once we lifted the artillery barrage. Uh, everything went just according to my visualization until we uh we reached the point where the platoon was about 3 or 400 yards away from the tree line and artillery had zeroed in on the target, but once we requested the barrage uh, we received a "check all fire in area" because uh on the line between where the guns were firing from and the target there was an emergency MEDEVAC helicopter circling trying to get in to get some of the casualties out from this platoon. So we, with that helicopter on the target line they automatically checked fire or ceased fire of any sort in the way of artillery support.Uh...

And then what happened?

This was...well, this was disconcerting, to say the least. But, uh, I was committed, so I decided on the spot to remain committed and continue pressing in just covering fire from the second platoon down the southwest corner of the village. Uh, the lead squad of, of that 3rd platoon got about 100 to 150 meters from the tree line, and uh fire increased from the tree line directly to their front and they also started receiving fire from both their flanks. They, they were in a horseshoe, what we call a horseshoe defense or horseshoe ambush that was quite commonly used by the Viet Cong over there.

Uh, the grasped the situation and informed the second platoon commander uh, whose name is Brian O'Connor, that uh he was going to have to assault the southwest or left uh portion of that horseshoe ambush. Uh. The third platoon was down in the paddies unable to even move at all, taking casualties and taking heavy fire at this point. Uh, second platoon assaulted that left flank and, and uh, and and routed what VC were on the left flank.

Uh. The command group followed behind them in their assault across the paddies, which was difficult because you were sinking almost up to your knees in water and mud as you ran across the paddies carrying about fifty pounds on you, running 800 yards like that is quite tiring. Ah, the company gunnery sergeant was wounded coming across the paddies as the bullets were flying everywhere at uh, we got in, I recall the arti— artillery forward observer ran back out about 200 yards into the paddies and got the company gunnery sergeant, put him up on his shoulders, carried him in to where we had gotten in the protection of tree lines, and uh, this left flank of the horseshoe ambush. Uh...

So how did it, so you realized that some of this was coming quite straight forward, and you got trapped in a horseshoe defense – you managed to move just a little bit forward. What has happened by the end, by the end of the first day of the operation, what is the net result?

The net result is we ended up getting to that platoon that the Sparrow Hawk Platoon about 9 o'clock that night. Uh, they had eleven men left that weren't wounded or killed...

Eleven men out of how many?

...out of about thirty.

I wonder if you could say, Of about thirty men, there were eleven left.

Out of about thirty men there were, there were ele—...

Out of about thirty men there were eleven left and we called in helicopters to come in that night in the darkness to get the wounded and killed out. The first helicopter load we got out was the last one because the Viet Cong opened up on the helicopter, wounding the pilot, and no other pilots were willing to volunteer to come in in the darkness like that and try to get any more out.

Just ran out. Right [inaudible] you start...

Rolling. Mark it. Okay and camera set.

A helicopter pilot volunteered to come in and we got a load, we got the wounded out and some of the dead out, but the helicopter was taken under fire by Viet Cong as it was taking off. The helicopter pilot was hit and no other pilots were willing to volunteer to try to come in and get what remained out. The people, personnel remaining the three, there were three dead and one wounded from Hotel Company that was wounded on the way to link up with Bravo that we, on the last leg of our efforts to get over there, and it was too dark to get him out, so, we just had him with us. By this time he was too weak from loss of blood to walk, so we ended up the day's activity carrying the three dead from the Sparrow Hawk Platoon plus our wounded out of that area and up onto the railroad tracks, which was relative high ground.

Sorry. We've run out. [Inaudible]

Just a second.

How would you describe that, that first day?

First day was pretty hectic. Uh, we ended up going some thirty-six plus hours without food or water, or sleep obviously. And uh, that is saying a lot when you consider the temperature was around 100 degrees, no water, no food, no rest. Uh, we were pretty tired Marines at the end of that first day, which was probably almost dawn the next day. Cause the operation had actually started around midnight the night before, we started moving out of battalion command post around midnight to get in position by six the following morning.

Uh, the, uh the second day and third day of this three day operation that started with what appeared to be a simple search and destroy mission were not particularly eventful. They were more or less mopping up uh, or, or, it was more or less a time of mopping up uh, and, and winding down the operation. Uh, the second day we remained on those railroad tracks while Golf Company continued through the, and and swept into our positions to make sure that there weren't any VC remaining in the area between the railroad tracks and Golf Company. Uh, the...afternoon of the second day both companies with a battalion command group out in the field with us at this point, uh moved down to the southeast uh, uh, down in the area just south of the village that we originally were going to surround and search and destroy. Ah, the following morning, ah...

The following morning, and now wer're on day three...

Day three, uh, we swept through to the west from that, where we stopped the night before, ah, that we encountered one or two VC a couple booby traps, what not ah, nothing nothing other than extremely light activity. Uh, we, Golf Company was up blocking on the railroad tracks, and by this point we were far south of uh, uh La Hoy where the Sparrow Hawk Platoon was, probably about two miles south and uh...there were two villages there that the battalion wanted swept and searched to see if there were any remaining VC in there.

Uh, we uh swept through the first village which I remember had particularly heavy undergrowth. It was very difficult to move through that village. Ah, we actually were moving through single file in three different columns, and uh, the command group was behind a squad of the 1st platoon in the center, ah, and the 2nd platoon of the company was tracing behind the command group. Ah, we had the easiest route through the village as we checked for any activity. We saw no signs of anybody, civilian, Viet Cong or otherwise as we moved through the village.

We were the first, the squad that we were behind in the command group were the first ones to get to the western edge of the village. Ah, as we reached the western edge of the village an open area, paddies, grave mounds in the, uh, paddies, and you could see another tree line and another village about 300 uh yards...about 300 meters to our front further west uh...The squad in front of us started taking cover behind the grave mounds, cause Vietnam was not a place you'd like to stand around and look around out in the open, you may not be living long if you did.

They, they ah started moving behind the grave mounds and the command group moved out. Uh, meanwhile Lt. O'Connor, who was commanding the second platoon, had reached the edge of the tree line and moved out to uh make a visual reconnaissance and see what the terrain looked like that lay directly ahead of us. He had just turned around and was starting to move back to join his platoon when automatic weapons fire opened up from the village and this was about fifteen, ten or fifteen seconds after the word was passed back that they had noticed some movement in the village ahead of us.

Uh, they couldn't determine at 3 or 400 yards who or what the movement was, but somebody had seen some movement in some of the houses, and next thing we knew we were receiving automatic weapons fire. Uh, Lt. O'Connor was hit in the left shoulder in, above the heart. And uh, he was bleeding quite severely. Uh...I remember sloshing back to where he went down with the company corpsman and uh, we uh started returning fire and providing a covering base of fire calling artillery in and scheduled an emergency MEDEVAC helicopter to come in and get Lt. O'Connor out.

Uh, Lt. O'Connor, I recall, was delirious. Uh, he kept trying to get up, it was taking three of us to keep him on the ground. Uh, he kept trying to get up to get to his platoon to deploy them and command them, not realizing how seriously he was hurt. Uh, the corpsman put a hemostat on the artery to, to, to stop the bleeding, and uh, we were successful in getting a helicopter to take out Lt. O'Connor at the same time as we assaulted the village two or three hundred meters to the front of us where the fire was coming from. Uh, unfortunately, the uh lieutenant jumped up and tried to get off the helicopter as it was taking off, and the, there was no medical assistant or corpsman or doctor on the helicopter. So, when he knocked the hemostat off the crew chief didn't know how to put it back on and he was dead on arrival at the battalion aid station. He bled to death. Ah, he probably would have died anyway – the wound, or wounds I should say, were quite serious.

...stop there a minute. Ah, because we're running a little bit low on film. I'd like to move you now on...stopped?

Mm hm.

Right. We're starting out voice over and then we'll roll and go back to voice over.

I think Bradley's given you most of the details before, but I'll go through it again. While we were in Vietnam they kept saying to us that there are, you know, there wasn't one My Lai. There were hundreds of My Lais. Ah. To which my reply was well if that is the case, take us somewhere. Ah. And, they ended up by taking us to the village of Thuy Bo. And when we got to Thuy Bo, we were there for only a morning, I haven't seen, neither have my colleagues, seen any of the people there. The chairman of the village met us ah and said that this, what had happened there on January 31, 1967 I want want to quote here just so there it was no, was it on January 31 a battalion of Marines, US Marines swept through this village. They shot and killed a total of a hundred and forty five persons. One hundred and fifteen were shot dead on the spot. Of these one hundred and fifteen, one hundred and five belonged to this hamlet of Thuy Bo. That's the first one. That man, I believe, was in the VC infrastructure, was actually outside the village. That's what it goes on to say. We then, thereafter, I said, I, I would like to...were there any people who were there and were alive and could give their story. One of the first things they gave us an interview with a a boy who said he was eleven years old at the time of January 31 and what he says is, I was only a boy, ten at the time. I was really afraid and ran back with a number of friends. There was artillery shells. In my house that time there were only women and children, etc., etc. The Marines come in, they shot off the ears of some people quoting, and they shot their guts to burst all over the place. They asked us about the VC and we said we didn't know what the VC was, so they shot at us, they killed all the domestic animals, um, various other charges. The boy then claims that his whole family was killed. This was all on film. His whole family was killed and he was in the pile of corpses and he went out and he showed us a wound on his arm and he has various allegations of brutalities against women, very quickly done. There was another woman aged forty-three. Basically there are six Vietnamese who basically claim that what happened on that day was the Marines came in and systematically destroyed everyone who was there and that the only people who survived survived by accident. And it's in that background I wonder if you could describe yourself the events as far as you're concerned of going through that village, and what went on. So if the camera could roll...

You came through the village...

We started assaulting the village two or three hundred meters to the front at the same time as the emergency MEDEVAC helicopter carried Lieutenant O'Connor away. Uh, there was quite a bit of movement activity in the village as we assaulted. Uh, understand the, uh psychological aspect of an assault is to create panic, is to create fear on the part of the enemy. Everyone is on line generally abreast firing as rapidly as they can at anything that moves.

Ah, this is to break down the regime or the discipline of the enemy and instill fear in order that they panic and route. Uh...in the midst of an assault you do not stop to pick targets. If it moves, you're shooting at it. The assault took anywhere from two to three minutes maybe five minutes at the outside. As quickly as I could determine that there were or there was no longer any fire being returned, I ordered cease fire and consolidation.

Uh, I would say that uh, I recall uh three civilians that I saw go down being shot in the midst of that assault. One was a little boy, two were women. Uh, they were running, and if you can envision running into a line of fire, ah, you can envision what happened. Anyone can get hit. Just like if there's a robbery and a gunfight on the street, there may be several there may be several, there may be several bystanders that are hit ah, even though no one is aiming particularly at them.

There's no...

Ah, the most that I could anticipate that may have been killed in that village in the way of civilians during that assault, and I'm being generous when I say this, it might have been ten or twelve or fifteen civilians. Ah, we weren't, we remained in the village checking out to see if there were in fact any VC remaining in there, possibly five, or ten minutes, twenty minutes at the most, and we commenced to return toward Highway 1 and eventually back to the battalion command post.

Ah, as one element of the assault force reached the external or the, uh, the other side of the village they observed VC and, and took them under fire y'know crossing a river or somebody of water down to the southwest, southwestern end of the village, but we were in no position to continue on in pursuit or engagement. We were ordered to sweep, our initial orders were to sweep that village and uh, and, and, or those two villages, and we had done that. We had obviously routed the VC that were in there, and we held up right there, and our next orders were to turn around and return, the whole operation was, was closed and we were heading back to the battalion command post. That's uh, that's what I recall, what I remember of what happened, uh, and I was there.

We're not on film, but we're still running on and I'd like to sort of get a couple of more questions just on sound only, if I may. Why was it that you were in the village such a short period of time? Did you do a search and destroy job on it or did you just decide there was nothing there to worry about? Or what it seems given all this that's going on, you've lost a man on the outskirts, and yet here you're saying you went through the village in say fifteen minutes. It seems very fast to an outsider. Please explain.

That's not very fast. We, uh, we did not do a, uh, we did not do what you'd call a thorough search of a village. In other words digging around and probing around for tunnels and secret caves or anything like that. Uh, fifteen minutes is quite a lengthy time to search every house in the village. When we talk about a village we are talking about not villages as we understand of five or ten thousand population. We are talking about a, a cluster of anywhere from eight to ten houses – little – when I say houses, I'm talking about one room little straw, y'know tin roof and straw hut, or maybe straw roof houses and, and built of bamboo. Uh.

Uh. Nothing fancy, one or two room houses. And then maybe a half a dozen of them at the most, or ten or twelve in a given ville. It's not (chuckle) any lengthy operation to – unless you're in there on a, on a thorough search mission where, where you ah, would be actually digging and probing and trying to find tunnels and everything. Otherwise it's just searching this room, or, or, or searching five or six buildings, one story buildings. How long does it take to search and check the bushes and check all around and, and, and see who's remaining and see what's in there? Fifteen to twenty minutes is plenty of time. And, and I'm not...I'm going from memory as to how long, I'm guessing it was about fifteen to twenty minutes, it might have been thirty minutes, it might have been ten minutes. It was, I do recall that it wasn't long, because we turned around and got word we were heading back. That's uh...

We have been talking, though, not on film, and you're the first person in the US that I've spoken to on film...

Mm hm.

...about these things. We have spoken to a whole variety of men both in— involved in that whole operation and your men in Two, and in Three and One. Some of the men, it's fair to say, do remember the incident as being one of the more nasty ones that they were engaged in, to put it no more than that. Uh, others that we talked to basically it is of no more significance than the event that you just described.

However, a couple of them, and I'd like this to be recorded so that your answer can be recorded, a couple of them have intimated that as far as they were concerned the instructions that they were given was that everybody in the village was to be destroyed. Now, would that be misinterpretation? Not so? Or, now there's one of the guys said y'know the instructions were quite clear. We were to go in to destroy anybody who was in the village. Now, would that be a fair summation of the orders as you conceived them?

No. I never in my life gave anything inferring ah, ah, any such type of action. Ah, or even intimating in any way that, uh, that that was to be done. Uh, on the contrary in the actual assault itself, the moment that it was obvious that there was not being any fire returned, and uh, that the only thing that was moving around in the village were civilians, I personally vocally and physically yelled up and down the line to cease fire and consolidate the position. Um...

Okay.

I'm not saying that, that uh, a, that, that the possibility of a subordinate or junior commander may have – his orders as they were passed on to his men, may have been interpreted that way. That is a possibility. I'm, I'm, I'm not, I would not discount uh, uh, that having occurred, although I doubt that it occurred, but I would not discount that possibility. Uhm...I might add one other thing that I think is relevant concerning a discussion we had as to uh Vietnamese allegations that a lot of civilians was killed.

The first day of this three day operation uh, one of the things I do recall, uh, in talking to the company commander of Golf Company, who is endeavoring to catch up with us and also get to that platoon, that Sparrow Hawk Platoon, he came up and, and, alerted me on the radio that the Viet Cong was using civilians as shields, and trying to slow his movement, he and, both he and the first platoon commander, uh, uh, of Hotel Company First Platoon commander, reported that to me when we were down in the southwestern end that the Viet Cong were firing from behind civilians, using them as shields. Ah, I don't know how many civilians were killed. Ah, I told them to keep moving. I— Yeah...

The, and don't, this is a sideways question, so don't feel you have to answer. The men that you had with you at the time – experienced soldiers, good soldiers, anything special about them?

They, they were good Marines. Ah, they were exceptionally dedicated Marines, and uh, there's no question some of them uh, had lost uh, some people that uh, they considered they were very close to. Uh, again...trying to project yourself into the situation that existed over there is extremely difficult. If you can imagine sleeping day and night with somebody and y'know you knew your life depended on that person ‘cause he was by your side, and he had fire power and support power for you and watch him go up in the air and y'know...lie there dead, y'know...full of shrapnel from a booby trap or a mine...

After three or four months of living day and night with that same individual...what do you feel in your mind?...Y'know, I saw a lieutenant who is supposed to be an example of discipline and was an outstanding officer...uh, I had to physically disarm him, he was ready to shoot an obvious VC, he was a VC suspect, but he had fresh bleeding wounds from an area where, where we were receiving [incomprehensible] from the night before, and, and, where one of this, one of the men in this lieutenant's platoon was killed.

He wanted to kill this VC right on the spot in frustration and anger over the loss of his man. I had to disarm him. I...ah, y'know, I can't describe what goes through ah men's heads over there. Ah, ah, the sheer frustration and furor ah at, at ah, the atrocities, that, and, and, and, and, the disasters and calamities that these men experienced part of their comrades and themselves...

Is there anything that you feel that you, and I think we've been through pretty, pretty fully of the day, I mean you're fully aware of the sort of things that have been said. Is there anything that you feel that I have either left out or that you would like to either add about that day as a postscript or as about the whole thing? Y'know, I appreciate, you've been extremely straightforward with us and to come all the way here, you know, basically what we've been going through has been a very nasty business, to put it [incomprehensible], but do you feel there is something that I have either not asked you or that you might like to add and to say about that whole affair?

Yeah. There's one thing...uhm, there's definitely one thing uh...that anyone viewing this should uh realize that any comments from Vietnamese are not comments necessarily from Vietnamese civilians. But, y'know, their comments, the, the, the enemy that we fought that killed and wounded and maimed American soldiers, American Marines, this enemy was Vietnamese. It, uh, it was, the people that we were befriended to in South Vietnam were also Vietnamese.

But, it's quite easy for someone to hear a Vietnamese who during the war was or still is now a Viet Cong and considered the Americans their enemy, it's quite easy for them to stand up and make allegations of atrocities that, that Americans committed over there. It's not exactly the same as a Vietnamese who is sympathetic with South Vietnam government and not in league with the Viet Cong standing up and saying the same thing.

Y'know, which was it? This village that you are talking about was a free fire zone uh, is no mistake in the casualties that I personally witnessed over there. It wasn't civilians firing weapons or setting booby traps, and, and this, no young men around. Y'know, young men who were pro South Vietnam did not live in Viet Cong occupied and active areas over there, and young women who, y'know who were pro South Vietnam didn't stay out there because Viet Cong were torturing them, and, and, they, they'd literally recruit them into, or conscript them into uh, the service of the Viet Cong if they were found out there. So they didn't stay out there where the enemy was.

Y'know, if they were out there, y'know, they if they, we were frustrated by not being able to say they were the enemy because they didn't have a weapon in their hands. As I said earlier, who's to say they're less of an enemy then the kid with the weapon in his hand? If they set the booby trap or watch knowing that someone's about to die and they can stop it by raising their hand and, and warning the person, but they don't. They just watch them, it's like letting someone walk in front of a car and not stop them or trying to yell at them to watch out for the car.

Would it be...I sense that you perhaps feel a bitterness towards Vietnam war or to the Vietnamese people that you came in contact with over there. Would that be a fair statement?

No. I don't feel bitterness toward the Vietnam war. I feel bitterness towards the way it was handled, I feel bitterness toward the...uh, I feel bitterness towards the...uh way uh it was presented to the people in this country. A lot of people were maimed for life or were killed, Americans that were over there, y'know, in an involvement where we were not permitted to use all the weapons at our disposal. It's like, y'know, it's like telling San Francisco they can go play Cincinnati tomorrow, but again, but this time they can't...