Into Cambodia - Keith Nolan [21]
Each firebase of the week was christened with choking black dust as the helicopters landed, each broiled under hundred-degree temperatures, and each was soon littered with hundreds of empty artillery cannisters.
The bottom line of all this to the individual infantryman operating around these firebases was that he humped, and humped, and humped.1 The grunts were mostly young and mostly draftees, but due to good leadership and the fast pace of action, morale in the 1st Cavalry Division was usually a bit higher than the hard physical conditions would have seemed to dictate. The 1st Cav shoulder patch was nicknamed the Horse-blanket because of its oversized shape; in the subdued colors of black and olive drab, and as rumpled and threadbare as the shoulder sleeve to which it was sewn, the Horseblanket was always a comforting sight. It let you know you were with the pros. An English journalist who accompanied a 1st Cav company in 1970 wrote:“As they crept through the bamboo-thicketed hills, they have the same air of acquired profession-alism as drafted GIs of past wars. They look the same, even smell the same: a drab green centipede of men in soiled fatigues with the same boyman faces under the bobbing steel helmet brims.”
The infantry did not travel as lightly, nor were they used as aggressively as their forerunners in the hot war. As a West Point lieutenant who served as an artillery forward observer with an infantry company commented,“while the men were able to move through the bush pretty well, they were not very aggressive in seeking action.”The two-star general who commanded the division as of July 1970 commented frankly on the attitude at ground zero:
With respect to fighting spirit, I would be the last to say that the average infantry soldier in the 1st Cav is eager for a fight and each of us, regardless of his professional outlook, knows why. That soldier knows that our nation is divided over this war. He knows that we are rapidly withdrawing ground combat forces and he and all the others here do not want to be the last man killed or wounded in Vietnam. On the other hand, he knows and accepts his job. When he finds the enemy (and he does), he acquits himself well. In short, as an individual he would prefer another occupation; but the team response, of which he is a part, is great–and, really now, isn't that the way it has always been?
For the grunts of the 2d of the 8th Cavalry, there was another reason for caution: a healthy fear of their foe. As far as the GIs were concerned, the forests of War Zone C were the private property of the 95C NVA Regiment, and the grunts regarded those skinny brown rice-eaters in Ninety-five Charlie as, man for man, tough little bastards. They were regulars with khaki and olive-drab fatigues, equipped with web gear and backpacks that some GIs considered more utilitarian than their own U.S.-issue equipment, and armed with B40 rocket-propelled grenade launchers and AK47 automatic rifles that many GIs considered superior to their weapons.
And these North Vietnamese knew how to fight Americans. By the early afternoon of 7 March 1970, after medevacking