March 13, 1968
Larry

There's really so much to say that I don't know how to begin. So I might as well go way back to my first day in Long Binh and Vietnam. That first day I was on KP. Myself and William Choi. We didn't do much in the way of work but we had a lot of fun. The next day we were again put on detail together. We stayed on it for 3 1/2 days and did about 6 hours work. We got to know each other pretty well. In fact too well.

Hawaiian by birth and blood, he left the Islands a few years ago because he wanted to farm in California. He bought a ranch and set himself up in his one love and ambition, farming.

About this time he met, or rather his brother met, a young girl at school and he brought her home where she met Choi. She liked him right off and with an impulsiveness typical of a sixteen year old immediately set out to get him. by questioning choi's brother she found out all she needed to know. He was a skillful pearl diver, could cut a deer's throat from as far away as he could throw a knife or axe, danced those Hawaiian fire dances professionally, but primarily because he was as kind and compassionate a person as could be found, with a simplicity beautiful. It's ironic but he's the last person one would expect to see a combat soldier.

Anyway, after they had met about three times, she asks him to marry her. Choi, thinking it must be a joke, agrees. So they get in his car and start driving to Las Vegas. Every now and then Choi would ask, "You want to turn around yet?" The girl would just smile and say, "No." They finally arrived and she told him he had to find a chapel, so he did. When she produced the license and her letter of parental consent, Choi suddenly realized she wasn't kidding. He kissed his bride for the first time on their wedding night.

That was well over a year ago. Since then, he sold the ranch, primarily because of the wife, and bought a house overlooking the beach and boardwalk of Santa Cruz. He had a job at some granite quarry in the Santa Cruz mountains. One night a couple months after he was married he went to meet the girl's father. The father worked at the quarry with him and had even congratulated him at the time. They were, surprisingly, very happily married and so publicly affectionate that friends sometimes had to ask if they were really married.

When my name was called for shipment, I woke Choi up to tell him I was leaving. I never expected to see him again. But ten days later there he was again, checking into Bravo Company 3/60 inf.

Before I go further I should explain the structure of the 3/60th. It's made up of four companies Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, and Echo. This forms a battalion. When I came in there were about 70 in Bravo Co. and 28 in my platoon, the 1st platoon. Theres four platoons in a company normally, I think we have three.

On the 26th of February, the 3/60th moved out on what was my fourth mission, Choi's second. It was to be an eagle flight which is dangerous but nobody seemed worried that day at all, there had been lots of them the last few missions. Bravo was to go first which is always choice and about 10 choppers came to pick us up, about 6 per helicopter (the other ten men were on sick call, R&R, etc.)

We landed about where the Xs are on the map ((see page 6 VI)), my location is circled. When we came in the door machine gunners started shooting but I didn't think anything of it, it's sop. I got off into an uncultivated paddie with tall rice shoots and moved away and got down lest I get shot by the helicopters. It wasn't till they lifted off and moved away that I could hear enemy carbines firing at us. The woodlines it seems were loaded with VC bunkers and we had landed in the middle of their crossfire. If the rice had not been tall they could have killed all of us. We tried to get organized but we didn't dare get up so we found what groups we could. Every five minutes or so someone would scream and hollor medic. Bullets cracked overhead and schrapnel (sic) fell everywhere. We tried to fire back with our thump guns, grenade launchers, one of which I carry instead of a rifle but it was damned hard to see their dug-in bunkers which are nothing more than hollow mounds, and we were pinpointing our positions so we gave it up. Some idiot lieutenant wanted us to get on line and charge the woodline at 'C' while he went to get a radio. Fortunately nobody listened. There were about 15 in our little pinned down group, several wounded, from all different platoons, we were really disorganized. We finally decided we weren't going to get into the woodline so we started moving to 'A' which, by the way, wouldn't let us in either. To make a long long story short I spent the entire day sitting in a muddy canal at B, wet to my armpits. There were about 22 of us in the canal, counting 11 wounded and one dead.There was a lot of shooting going on but we didn't know who was doing it and we didn't shoot indiscriminately for fear of hitting our own, which happens often. Echo, I guess landed across the river and secured the dike to 'A', and the VC simply left the other. As it started getting late I was watching some guys moving around at A to see if it was alright to get out of the water, we were pretty will chilled. I heard carbines fire and then the guys I'd been watching were yelling "medic." Some guys are foolish asses.

As the sun went down I got out of the canal and moved to A. There were wounded everywhere. Everybody was hit someway it seemed, including our C.O. who'd been shot in the leg.

It was dark now I was lying on the dike when my squad leader climbed up saying, "Choi's dead." Someone asked if he was sure and he said he could cross the canal and see for himself if he wanted. That was the last straw for my overworked psyche and I just lay there and cried as quietly in the dark as I could.

Finally my platoon moved across the paddie and set up along C, stepping around a couple of bodies lying in the water nobodied (sic) got to yet and clusters of abandoned equipment along the way.

I slept on the dike that night. I was soaking wet and muddy and very uncomfortable. Around 4 in the morning Charlie attacked our position at 'A' Charlies green and yellow tracers were coming my way while, I guess, our red tracers went the other probably very pretty from the air. It lasted about five minutes and a few minutes later a misplaced artillery round fell on one of our positions a little ways up the dike from me, wounding 3 in my platoon, one criticaly, I heard they doubted he'd live.

The next day we ate breakfast and waited a couple hours while abandoned equipment was cleared away. Those hours I spent mostly by myself, as did others, worried a little about McKechnie in 3rd platoon. I'd heard only 7 from 3rd would be walking out. For that matter the 1st only had 13 left out of 25-28. Nobody had much to say. They tried to be cheerful and actually one cannot lament the dead too long in war. To stay healthy one should close the mind to death as much as possible. It comes naturally, in fact.

All in all out of 60 to 65 men in Bravo Co who were in that ambush 11 died and 30-40 wounded. About 65% casualties.

That firing in the morning was one of our positions being overrun. Then Charlie turned our own machine gun on us. It seems we had a few guys sleeping on guard.

There's more I want to say but I'll mail this now and send more later. I was glad to receive your letter it was very interesting and I like especially the part about living together in the mountains. We can think about that about 17 months from the time you receive this. Not such a long time really.
Bob