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By Root 865 0

He looked down to where two of the mech boys had dug their foxhole between his tank and their track. They were up to their necks in muddy water, one of them curled up with his poncho liner trying to sleep, the other on guard, staring vacantly into the black. Later, someone spotted movement and put up a flare. A machine gun opened fire and Flowers snapped awake again as the burst was answered by a probing party of NVA who were moving in the spots of vegetation around them. Against his own orders, Flowers had removed his grimy trousers and jungle boots, so he ended up scrambling into his cupola and pulling on his .50-cal in his drawers. Glowing green tracers arched back at them. Out of the shadows he caught a sudden glimpse of a little guy in black pajamas who ran like mad from one clump of trees to another as Flowers's .50-cal and a dozen M 16s danced tracers all around him. The man disappeared behind a piece of cover. Flowers was amazed that the man had made it, but heartened too because if that guy could survive that kind of fire, he figured so could he if it ever came to that.

* * *

Of the huge amounts of 155mm howitzer ammunition that had been prepositioned at FSB South II, only half had been fired in the morning's preparatory barrage. The other half had gone unused when the border proved less warlike than had been expected. Rather than destroying it in place, it was slingloaded beneath Chinooks for the trip back to An Loc. By the time the back-hauling was complete, Major Driskill, XO, 3-11 ACR, and Captain Speedy, CO, K/3-11 ACR, were more than a little concerned about the dusk haze falling across their laager. The remainder of the squadron had advanced so far into Cambodia that they could no longer establish radio contact with them. Speedy's map indicated numerous footpaths in the tree-clumped savannah of the border: It would not take NVA runners long to pass the word of their isolation, and all it would take to wreak considerable havoc would be a few foot soldiers with rocket-propelled grenades and mines.

To top it off, their movement would be slow and channelized on the main trail into Cambodia. The maintenance and supply vehicles of the squadron trains elements had already been left with Driskill and Speedy, and Lieutenant Colonel Griffin had helicoptered back briefly during the afternoon to point out on their map where the broken-down vehicles of the 2d and 3d Squadrons had been gathered. K Troop would have to tow them.

Driskill and Speedy were beginning to collapse their perimeter in on itself, and to move the lead elements out, when a squad of NVA toting RPGs and AK47s walked down a footpath right into one of K Troop's Sheridans. Presumably, the NVA were coming in to ambush the departing column or to scavenge the empty laager, but what they had not counted on were the Sheridans that Speedy had deployed around the perimeter. They sat in the high brush and elephant grass, engines off until they were ordered to roll back, and the NVA on the trail were abruptly reduced to bloody rags when a cannister round suddenly roared from a 152mm main gun.

Speedy, on his Ml 13 ACAV beside which was the M577 ACAV that he used as an operations center, got a call from the excited platoon leader, who wanted to check the bodies.

No. There was no time to linger.

Moving down the trail in the dark, one of the ACAVs rolled over a mine. No one was seriously injured, but the track was a combat loss. Speedy radioed Driskill and received permission to blow the vehicle in place. Under the illumination provided by their 4.2-inch mortar tracks, C4 plastic explosive was placed around the diesel fuel tanks.

As they got moving again, Speedy knew more trouble lay ahead, and although he kept it to himself, he had some lingering doubts about how well they would come through: He thought K Troop was stale. Speedy himself was on his second tour with the Blackhorse, having joined them two months before in the rubber plantations of Lai Khe and Loc Ninh, where it seemed the relatively quiet days had dulled them. The troops had seen too few of the