Death Valley_ The Summer Offensive, I Corps, August 1969 - Keith Nolan [8]
On one hand, appropriate action was taken regarding specific charges made by the black Marines, and on the other, Kummerow handed out reductions in rank and fines to some of those involved. He discussed the case with General Simpson and Colonel Codispoti, and they agreed “… it was a tough problem and one for which there were no easy solutions. After the company went back to the field, Codispoti recommended no disciplinary action. I think he feared a reaction that would engender a situation worse than that which occurred, and wanted to cool it. I felt I had to do what I did to maintain the status of discipline in the battalion. There were many other Marines, white and black, who didn’t relish the hardships and dangers of patrol, and I didn’t want to invite anyone else to seek an easy out.”
Kummerow saw no other such incidents.
Mostly the men simply did their jobs. “Like going to work in the morning” is how Cpl Lee Dill put it. He was a tank commander with B Company, 1st Tank Battalion, and he spent the summer of 69 escorting supply convoys and minesweeps on the road between An Hoa and Liberty Bridge. He didn’t have much time to worry about anything but doing it right. When they burned down the road, which impregnated everything and everyone with red clay dust, Dill threw power to the black Marines and peace signs to the white Marines.
They had good team spirit and what problems occurred were usually the kind that seem funny later. Like the time in August of 69 when they were supposed to sweep to Liberty Bridge. Dill’s tank, Naturally Stoned, and another tank, Funky Ride, rolled to the An Hoa gate to pick up their infantry support and the minesweep team. They were late and, instead of the team, a staff sergeant showed up drunk and mumbling that “fuck it, we don’t need no support!” He climbed into the lead tank and ordered them to hit the road. Dill reluctantly followed in the second tank. They hauled ass as the sergeant did three-sixties in his turret. Over the radio, his crew sounded mortified. Off the road were some figures who turned out to be Marines but who, in the distance, looked like ARVN. The sergeant suddenly opened fire in their direction with his cupola-mounted .50-caliber machine gun. Dill gulped. Oh shit. He toyed with the idea of shooting the crazy man, but dismissed it. They finally reached the Phu Lac 6 compound, but old sarge didn’t even slow down. A truck was headed in their direction on the camp road and they passed just as the sergeant rotated his turret again, broadsiding the truck windshield with his 90mm gun tube. They parked on the perimeter and the battalion commander came on the radio, wanting to know what the hell was going on. Dill told him the truth, nervous about being involved with the colonel, even more concerned about the sergeant leering at him, drunk and pissed, his hand resting on his holster. Dill had a .45 on his hip too, and he was thinking, oh man, I ain’t believin’ this! Thankfully, though, sarge only stumbled back to his tank and fell asleep.
The next day he was busted and sent to the rear.
But no one was immune to the real war. One morning the supply convoy brought in new treads to the An Hoa tank park. The men stripped to the waist and spent the day sweating the treads into place with the same care and concern, Dill thought, of pit crews working on Indy cars. They took a break to cook steaks and drink warm Pepsis, and Dill talked with a tank driver named Schreckengost. He started walking away, had gone ten steps, when the air began screaming and he bounded for his tank. The Marine lying across the driver’s hatch was clutching at his bloody legs, and the tarp over the .50-cal. ammo in the gypsy rack was on fire. Goldstein put the fire out as Dill scrambled into his turret, screaming for a corpsman. In seconds, the 122mm rockets had stopped falling. That’s when they found Schreckengost, sprawled unconscious right where Dill had been talking with him; he