The Kid That Became A Guy Part IV: Vietnam
My first impression of Vietnam was: Why the fuck would anybody want to live here? Before I got a hundred feet across the tarmac at Tan Son Nhut, I was soaked. The air was so thick you could feel it. I got billeted for the night and the next morning got airlifted to the base at My Tho. At first things were pretty basic, we stopped and searched boats in the river. They were mostly little more than big canoes or dugouts and I'd stand with the .50's and keep watch while the guys on the PBR searched for weapons. Sometimes we'd take some fire from the shore when we were patrolling and I'd jump on the .50's and light up the jungle. It was pretty much the same every day.
About three months into my tour something happened. I got called back to Saigon and some government guys wanted to talk to me. They start out with the whole patriot thing...you want to save American lives right? Your country needs you. They said they had this special program they wanted someone like me for. I had scored high in marksmanship. This was before they had the scout/sniper school so they wanted guys with high marks for shooting. They also told me they knew my Social Security number was a phoney and they could send me home, or to prison. But they didn't want to do that, they wanted to give me an opportunity to serve my country. I figured it out much later- if something happened to me, there was nobody to come looking or put up a fuss about me being missing. I was a perfect patsy.
They said that to do the stuff they wanted, I couldn't be in the service. My military records would be destroyed but I'd still get paid in cash. I don't mind telling you, this shit was getting weird. The head government guy looked like some kind of geek or something. He had those old time glasses with the see-through frames and weird eyes. He was one scary looking motherfucker, just the way he looked at you. I could have kicked his ass easy, but there was something in those eyes that turned my blood to ice. The other guys looked like military types or jocks or something like that- they had crewcuts and short sleeved white shirts with ties. One looked like a football player, he was big. I figured he was the muscle. The other guy just sat there and didn't say a word, he just wrote stuff down.
The guy with the glasses was nice, pleasant, like he wanted to be friends. He smiled and talked nice, but there was something really creepy about him. I only saw him one other time, at a restaurant where we met and I started to like him better. The big guy was supposed to be the guy I would deal with and get paid from. Then they brought a Vietnamese guy in named Hue Pham. He was a Lt. in the Army of Vietnam and he was going to be my partner. He knew the country and naturally the language, being from there, so he was my guide and spotter.
Hue Pham spoke pretty good English, he had been to college for a while in America and came back to fight the Commies. His family had been killed he said, they were from up North some place. So we took off on a chopper for Pleiku. There was a base there so Americans didn't look so out of place. I wore tiger stripes like the South Vietnam Army but no insignias or anything like that. The soldiers looked kinda funny at me but didn't ask too many questions because I was supposed to be some kind of "spook." Mostly they just left us alone, it was me and Hue Pham. I had an M-14 set up with a B&L 10x scope. Hue Pham carried an AK. Up to this point I had never really shot anybody that I knew of. I had sprayed the jungle with the .50's but I don't know if I ever hit anybody or not.
My job in Vietnam was to find people and shoot them from far away. Actually, Hue Pham found them and I shot them. They were enemies of the Vietnamese and us too, I guess. The first time I looked through that scope and saw a man, I thought it might bother me or something, but I just squeezed off a round and watched through the scope as he went down. I don't know why but I just kept looking and Hue Pham had to grab me by the back of my shirt to pull me up and run to the extract point. I once saw something in a movie or TV or somewhere where they asked a sniper what he felt when he shot somebody. "A little recoil," he said. That was about it. Well, that's about all I can say about that except I could have stayed home and made a lot more money for doing the same thing.
Next: Haight Ashbury and my life as a hippie
https://steemit.com/story/@richq11/the-kid-that-became-a-guy-an-autobiography-of-sorts-part-i
https://steemit.com/story/@richq11/the-kid-that-became-a-guy-part-ii-uncle-arthur-and-back-to-boston
https://steemit.com/story/@richq11/the-kid-that-became-a-guy-part-iii-sonny-patty-and-uncle-sam
Most Sincerely,
-Jim
I can send you my email on steem.chat and from there my address. In return I'd like to send you a copy of my book.
aye aye - is steem chat safe from the scum/tangos who might do harm? I can do it another way to make your (OUR) info secure and mine... whatever Sir -whatever you want!
And my agenda - as is yours
Yes, it's just an exchange of emails, so it's private enough.
AOK I will mke a steem chat register - HAVE A GREAT DAY..will advise..Bravo Zulu
....And Joy!
https://steemit.com/blog/@bluelazer/old-man-and-guitars -
By the way- did you find all the links to the whole story here?
Maybe you had gotten more richer staying home hustling on cars ;)
Quite a story @richq11
I wanted a home... and I wanted to serve my country. I figured I could do both at the same time!
I had missed these when they first came out.; timing on my feed probably. I went back and read it all. Great story telling. Sounds like some Chinese cursed your parents. "May your children live in interesting times"
I am curious to whether you support the death penalty for pedos...might be a good post of it's own.
I have one suggestion for this series; add links back to the earlier parts of the series so the reader can read them of a piece.
I do favor the death penalty for pedos...a very, very painful death. Probably a bad idea for me to be investigating Pizzagate- difficult to keep an open mind, except I don't think it's about pedophilia. I would provide links if I knew how.
I agree with you on the death penalty.
As long as you question your motives and decsions in investigating, and know to keep an open mind, you should be OK. In fact, you may tend to bend over backwards to avoid being too harsh
To make a link:
start by opening a bracket
[
then put in the name of the link (or any other description you want to use!)
then close the bracket
]
then open parenthesis
(
then put in link location - copy and paste from address bar
then close parenthesis
)
should look like this
[name of link](link address)
you can even leave out the title and just copy/paste the address if you like, and Steemit will create the link, so it would look like this
https://steemit.com/story/@richq11/the-kid-that-became-a-guy-part-iv-vietnam#@richq11/re-stevescoins-re-richq11-the-kid-that-became-a-guy-part-iv-vietnam-20161215t175901322z
(copied and pasted from address bar)
I can't believe it... I did it!!!
[replying to your last]
I was talking about the links, but I don't seeing anything wrong with killing in itself.
It is the context in which a killing takes place that makes it moral or not.
On top of that, some men, about 3%, are natural killers. Most men have to be socialized into killing under specific circumstances. Doesn't make the 3% bad, but there is a prejudice against them from the naturally squeamish
See Grossman, On Killing
And there is a dopamine rush on learning skills and other accomplishments; that's why it feels good.
Maybe it aint normal, but there is no point in making your own life a copy cat of the normal fuckedup human's either ;>
Whoops lol! Well nobody has ever accused me of being normal. I owe learning about the links to you, I'd never have even thought to try.
dopamine rush from successfully employing a new skill!
oohrah!
The weird part was ENJOYING a new skill...I kind of liked it. Not really killing but a sense of being good at something. I guess that's probably not normal.
Great story Rich.
I love the start. I feel that way about Qatar in the summer. It's a freaking desert but its so humid because its a penninsula.
Thanks so much! My grandson Cordell is in Qatar now.
Oh that's cool, I don't know him though.
I didn't know you're there. I'll find out where he is
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