My War - Installment 35

"Sure thing sweetie."

She started massaging my toes and feet with baby oil, then slowly and tenderly worked her way up my legs kneading my knotted leg muscles into relaxation. I thought to myself, "that for the couple of dollars that it was costing me, I could handle this as a daily ritual. Maybe I could move to Japan when I got out of the service." As I lay there naked, I thought about my R&R, "which would be coming up before too long. Where should I go, Japan, Hong Kong, Bangkok, or Australia to visit relatives in Sidney." I was drawn to thoughts about Japan or Bangkok; it would be one of those two, definitely!

The massage was intoxicating. At that particular moment anybody at all could have come through our small curtained room without my noticing anything but the dancing fingers of my masseuse.

"Hey'a Di wee youa loll ovel ona back, yes?"

"Oh yes "These chicks probably didn't know what they were saying. I could probably have asked her anything and she would just say yes.

I rolled over onto my back trying to not act very embarrassed, she again started at my toes and feet and moved upward. She stopped as she approached my groin and then went to the top of my head and worked downward to each hand and finger and then to my neck and chest and then south again.

I started day dreaming about R&R again, commonly referred to as Rest and Relaxation or Rape and Ruin, and where I would go, what I would do, who I might go with, when sh... she suddenly grasp my penis with a baby oiled hand.

I met Jack in the street in front of the massage parlor. We picked up the few personal items that we had seen at local vendors, and then went to the rendezvous point and waited for Ramirez, while having a coke.

Jack had come down with the clap from his massage parlor visit. I didn't indulge a smart move on my part. While remembering Jack's past agony and trips to the infirmary for his drips he abruptly bolted off his bunk, startling me, and darted for the door.

"Forty," he yelled and was gone.

OPs meeting was totally unenlightening that evening. Just more of the same was in store working west of Granite Rock. The only interesting part of the meeting was when Jack jumped up and ran out yelling Forty-three, to a resounding round of applause from all present.

We spent the remainder of the evening at the Scout tent joking around and playing cards. The shock and horror of Bird had been pushed into the recesses of our minds. The rotting bodies near Bird's old location were the only tangible reminders. Through the dim light and pipe smoke laughter and smiles were shared, friendships were made stronger. I felt part of it all, not just because I could keep my pipe lit by now, but because I actually fit in. We meshed with one another like a smoothly operating gearbox. We all did our jobs and did them well. We relied on one another and knew without a doubt that there was not another Scout that would not willingly risk his life for another Scout or G.I. That's why Scouts had to be tried by fire before they became Scouts, nothing less would do.

I went to sleep that night knowing that I had found my niche in life, the place where I really fit in, where I was appreciated by the others that I worked with. It was a terrific feeling of...I slept content.

DOWN, BUT NOT OUT....I THOUGHT
I had finished my morning rounds and was sitting enjoying coffee in Buzz's Mess tent before breakfast was ready. I was already done with my preflight, just killing time while waiting to eat. I would be flying on Ken this day, he and I would be alternating with the team of Smitty and Jack. We would be working with a friendly ground unit out of Granite Rock. They had been out on a search and destroy mission, working the mountains to the south west of Granite Rock's CP (Command Post), near where I had wiped out the abandon NVA compound.

We finished our first light and then flew a few other short missions before refueling in preparation to relieve Smitty and Jack. We were overlapping our reconnaissance to provide continuous support to the ground unit. Some NVA had been spotted in the region in the preceding few days and we wanted to keep up our surveillance pressure, hoping to make contact and start another battle.

Ken and I were moving in to replace Smitty and Jack, when Jack called over FM radio.

"One-six - one-eight."

"Roger, one-eight - go."

"We saw a beautiful tiger down there, don't let 'em get ya."

"Roger, one-eight. I copy, any other news."

"None yet good luck See you guys later One-eight - out.

"Roger one-eight. One-six over and out."

We took over the recon, first moving in and hovering over the ground unit, identifying ourselves. Ken took off toward the lower slopes of the mountains, while I worked the upper ridges and northern slopes of the upper half of the mountain.

I had been doing reconnaissance on top of most the mountain ridge for thirty-five to forty minutes. GW and I had had perhaps scanned an area some one half to one kilometers away from the ground unit, flying west along the top ridge. Then I began banking, starting a 180 degree turn, moving down the face of the mountain. This maneuver would cause us to move toward our men again. I had finished my turn when unexpectedly, from my left rear, we started receiving automatic weapons fire. The engine had been hit and was, obviously, severely damaged. Oil pressure had quickly dropped to nothing and the engine temperature immediately started to rise. I pressed my intercom button and began speaking loudly, but clearly and calmly I spoke to GW, in the right seat.

"Well GW. It looks like we'll have to put her into the jungle today."

GW had been with me when we had gone down before, but not into the jungle. To my utter surprise GW went berserk. I could hear him yelling even though he had not pressed his intercom button. I had received some small pieces of shrapnel in my side. The way GW was acting, he must have believed that me to be seriously wounded; and about to buy the farm. If that were the case he'd be minced meat anyway and have to bend over and kiss his ass good bye.

GW suddenly lurched over toward me and tried to grab the controls from me, for some damn dumb reason. I had to physically force him away from the controls, while talking to him over the intercom, assuring him that I was OK, that he needed to let me do the flying. And that his actions could hamper me from doing any emergency procedures.

"Hey." I yelled, at the top of my lungs, to get his attention, to try and break his hysteria. "Get hold of yourself GW old boy. I have enough to do without your going bonkers on me and my having to fight with you."

Again I was speaking calmly, just very loudly, which at this time seemed to upset him even more for some reason, although he did move and stay away from the controls.

Every second counted. My flying instincts had taken over automatically, and I had started to initiate emergency procedures for ditching into trees, while mentally and physically wrestling with GW.

At tree top level everything happens quickly, especially when you’re getting shot down. The idea behind the emergency ditching procedure is to zero out the airspeed therefore the groundspeed and then bring the helicopter straight down into the trees with the tail in a downward attitude. Tail first if you will. These procedures is accomplished by lowering collective pitch, pulling back on the cyclic pitch to slow forward motion and then as the tops of the trees are approached to pull cyclic back more and flaring the ship. Just before entry into the foliage the pilot pulls in collective pitch so that entry is as slow as possible.

During the time I was fighting GW I should have called the ground unit that we were working with to tell them what was happening. I just didn't have time for that call with all the hysteria that GW was exhibiting, and with everything else that was going on. I did have time to maneuver close enough to the unit we were working with, that they saw us going down. We were extremely fortunate that they did see us.

At that particular point everything seemed to be moving in slow motion. The tree tops slowly came closer. GW's wild movements were drawn out and seemed to take longer to complete. The limbs of the tree tops malingered as they moved to envelop the helicopter. Then, the next thing I knew we were through the trees and had stopped on a pile of the broken down tree limbs and rubble about five feet above the ground. We had made it alive!

I felt fine, I was alive, but my vision was somewhat blurred. I needed to sit for a little while and evaluate our situation. For some reason there seemed to be no hurry since my immediate appraisal indicated, from my cursory glance, that all was well. GW leaped from his open broken door. He hit the ground running and scurried over debris, screaming...

"Let's git outa' heah foor dis hera ma'er fucka' blow up!!"

I kept calm and called to GW, having had a few more moments to look around. Tree limbs lay broken and strewn about. Pieces of broken Plexiglas filled the cockpit. I took a few more moments to further survey the situation. I realized for the first time that my left leg was missing, but I didn't think that I was bleeding or anything. What was wrong?

GW was continuing in his hysteria and wanted to leave the area as fast as possible.

I continued to keep calm and yelled to GW. "Hey GW, could you help me find my leg first."

It had even surprised me how calmly I had said that, having just realized that I could not see or feel my left leg, from the hip down. GW turned to face me, apparently terror stricken, with eyes as big as saucers. He paused and seemed to come to grips with himself. He got control and came back at my bidding.

As the minutes passed my head began to hurt and I noticed that my right arm, lower back, right leg, and neck among other things hurt. My vision was fading to almost nothing, but my left leg still did not hurt at all. I looked around some more blurry eyed. My flight helmet was not on my head it was split in half from impact with the cyclic stick, one piece lay in the cockpit, and the other half was on the ground outside my door. Those helmets were supposed to withstand the force of eight Gs (gravities) of pressure. I had a very large lump across my forehead which, to my touch, felt like the visor on a cap. My shoulder harness must not have worked. It certainly did not engage the way it was supposed to, letting my torso snap forward, causing my head to strike the cyclic.

I began to feel around for my leg, expecting to find a mangled bleeding stump, thinking that I would see the rest of my leg near by or wrapped around the engine or what ever. The quarter inch armor plate behind my back was actually, partially, bent in a curve around my back. I continued to feel around. I located my leg. It had been shoved, by a tree limb, through the metal fire wall behind me and was twisted around the motor somehow, I couldn't see it, but I could feel it with my left hand.

The bubble of the cockpit had been shattered on impact. What appeared to have happened was: that limbs had come through the bubble, hit my legs, snapped my whole body like a whip and then the fork of a limb had grabbed and driven my left leg into and through the metal firewall and into the engine compartment. I asked GW to pull away the bent armor plating. After he had done that I reached out and grabbed onto a broken limb in front of me. I pulled for all I was worth, trying to extract myself from the mangled metal. It took some time and a great deal of effort to begin to loosen my leg and body from the wreckage. My leg had been stretched out, that is the thigh, over the broken femur, like a rubber band about to break. A few more inches of forward movement probably would have torn it off completely.

I continued to yank on the limb in front of me and eventually, I literally popped loose and fell the five feet to the ground, landing on my back. The abrupt landing knocked the wind out of me, and it took a few minutes to recover.

I had flipped while falling to the ground and in my new position I was partially under the broken helicopter, gas was dripping onto my face and into my eyes further hampering my vision. My left leg was laying flat across my chest, diagonally with the toes of my jungle boot pointing toward the sky. I still had no feeling of any kind in my left leg. I lifted it and lowered it to the ground, while untwisting it.

GW aided me in crawling away from the wreckage a few yards. He was exceptionally nervous and believed the enemy would be there to get us at any moment, he was probably right.

"Let's git outa heah, Sah!"

"You go ahead GW. I just want to lay here for a few minutes before I do anything."

I believe GW disliked the idea of being alone worse than the idea of staying with me. I told him to grab our machine gun, some ammo and grenades from the helicopter so we would be able to make a stand if we had too. Just then I didn't much care what happened, I just wanted to lay still and get my eye-sight back.

"This crash just might have ruined our day GW," I commented to him.

GW became a little more composed as time passed. We waited to see who would reach us first, our men or the NVA. I was comfortably propped on a fallen tree at that time, holding my pistol at ready, just in case the enemy got to us first. We would at least go out in a blaze of glory. Forty-five minutes to an hour passed on the ground. In the distance we could hear the faint beginnings of noises; men moving in the jungle.