Into Cambodia - Keith Nolan [234]
At the northern extreme of the Blackhorse AO, the 2d Squadron, 11th Armored Cavalry, was also disentangling itself from the operation. Chinook after Chinook landed in the cache sites secured by the squadron to back-haul the captured enemy materials, while Lowboy after Lowboy performing the same task were escorted across the border. When it became apparent that the squadron had more captured supplies than truck or helicopter cargo space, materials were destroyed as they were found– and additional caches were being discovered up to the last day–including dousing sacks of rice with fuel oil and setting them and their storage hootches afire. A hundred bicycles rigged to carry supplies were run over several times by ACAVs, and CS gas grenades were thrown into tunnels and bunkers. The NVA did not harass the withdrawal of 2-11 ACR, which was begun on 26 June and completed on 28 June 1970.
Bringing up the rear of the Blackhorse withdrawal was the 3d Squadron, 11th Armored Cavalry, whose exit from Cambodia was more costly than those of her sister squadrons because Colonel Gerrity, the new regimental commander, taxed them with evacuating the AVLBs and the Bailey Bridge laid by 2-11 ACR and the 8th Engineers during the rush up Route 7 to Snoul. Where the troops had been knee deep in dust, they were now knee deep in mud. This being the case, they were mostly confined to the highway and were easily ambushed. All concerned in the Bandits–the squadron logo was Yosemite Sam–would have pre-ferred to destroy the bridges in place rather than expose their men, who had to tug the bridges from the gumbo mud of the monsoon-inundated banks. Politics, however, forbade leaving behind any equipment.
Captain Speedy of K Troop was assigned to escort the 31st Engineers to the bridge sites. They originally established an NDP near the northern-most bridge, the Bailey, to prevent the NVA from booby-trapping the structures. However, they had to abandon that position because the road between the NDP and Susan could have been easily cut, they were too isolated, and the tracks were sinking in the water and mud up to their road wheels. So, K Troop returned to the firebase, departing each morning for the day's work and returning usually before nightfall–sometimes after dark because of thrown tracks and such–taking fire each day during both trips. They suffered numerous WIA but lost no one KIA except on 23 June 1970 after they'd shut down for the night along the bulldozed berms of Susan. The first exploding mortar round caught Speedy several paces from his command ACAV, and in an instant he was inside and the crew was slamming shut the hatches. Speedy immediately contacted each of his crews over the troop net, but the operations ACAV reported that the operations sergeant–who'd been near Speedy as they had walked back from the nightly squadron briefing–was not in his track.
“Okay, I want him accounted for ASAP.”
Almost a thousand rockets, mortars, and rocket-propelled grenades whomped into the mud, while red tracers from the Sheridans and ACAVs laced the waterlogged flats in front of them to deter sappers and also streamed into the far tree lines where the muzzle flashes of automatic weapons blinked.
By the time the shelling