Night tiger

Two or three months into my Viet Nam tour the intelligence people were predicting another all out offensive similar to the Tet offensive.  I got ordered to take two dusters (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M42_Duster) down  the road leading to Khe Sahn and help some Marines guard a bridge. I was apprehensive to say the least. 

Dusters were designed to be antiaircraft weapons. The  gunners were in a steel turret standing up to load the guns. At first blush they look somewhat like a tank but if you look closely you’ll see no completely protective armor. We were good for shooting at targets up in the hills, but the guns wouldn’t depress much lower than level to the ground so you’d shoot over the head of  troops sneaking up on you. They were used in the Korean war and were pretty much obsolete by 1968. Parts were hard to find and at one time fully 50% of our vehicles would not run so they were parked in bunkers used as perimeter security. Being asked to go to war with shit equipment is one of the reasons I came to oppose the war. But I digress. On to the bridge story.

I joined up with the marine squad leader who was in charge of the infantry group at the bridge. We exchanged radio call signs, verified call signs for artillery support, discussed possible scenarios etc. while having our chat I noticed he was unscrewing the detonator on a hand grenade! Jesus, what kind of jarhead nonsense is this? He then put a match to the explosives inside the grenade and used the fire to warm his C-rations. You learn something new everyday.

We settled in for the night not knowing if we’d see the dawn or not. The marines were used to this scenario, but us army “doggies”, as they called us, were not.  We spent our nights at Camp Carrol, snug in our mosquito screened beds. (See photo)Darkness descended like a cloud of black ink. Looking for attackers was like looking for a black cat in a coal mine one hundred feet underground at midnite. I didn’t dare turn on a flashlight because that would be the best thing for a sniper to aim at. I fleetingly considered the possibility of having the artillery support shoot up a flare so we could see. Those things do an amazing job of lighting up a battlefield, but then I reasoned if I cant see, neither can the enemy. Your ears get very sensitive in a situation like this, but I heard nothing, then I saw a North Vietnamese soldier! No, wait he’s gone. WTF, I can’t see my hand in front of my face, how can I see soldiers 40 yards away? There’s another one! Hmm. No, wait. Am I imagining things? Yes, you scaredy cat dumbass, you are imagining things. Whew! My pucker factor was in the red zone all night. We finally made it to sunup and there had been no attack. Big sigh,

Then a shout rang out. Lieutenant! Come over here and look at this! Right next to a sandbagged barrier, manned all night by some infantry, were huge tiger tracks! The tracks went all the way across the bridge past the sandbagged barrier on the other side. Nobody saw or heard a thing. Whoa dude! Spooky.

I guess we were lucky. By dint of being the ranking army officer at Camp Carrol, I got invited to dine with the Marine officers that were hosting a visiting Marine general. At that dinner they recounted a story from the night before. The Marines had set up an ambush that netted no enemy. At daylight they were leaving but one guy was missing.  They went looking for him and found his eviscerated body surrounded by tiger tracks.  Nobody heard a thing. A couple of weeks later a tiger was shot and loaded in a utility trailer behind a jeep. I saw the photos, and that monster completely filled the trailer w paws hanging over the side rails. War is hell, but you don’t think it will be like this.