I Volunteer For Duty in Vietnam

And the Army Oders me to Germany

War Stories
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
#8/No Trip to 'Nam

Listen, I gotta be honest: I NEVER was in the war - at least the one we fought in Southeast Asia. The closest I got to Vietnam was the U.S. Air Force Base near Manila in the the Philippines. That was aboard a big air ambulance, to pick up burn victims from the war zone and fly them to Brooke General Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas. No, I never made it to 'Nam. I was sitting across the German-Czechborder from the Soviet Army, when Moscow stormed into Prague in May, 1968. But here too: not a shot was fired, although shots were exchanged - the drinking kind of shots. I'll provide more about these two episodes a bit later.

First, you deserve to know why I did NOT wind up facing hostile fire. I doubt there's anyone who can explain the military method of making decisions. It is more than mysterious. Confusing doesn't seem to fit, as the process has worked for two centuries. If there are rules to how things are decided, it was NOT in any manual I read - and I tried to read them all.

Let's cut to the chase. Two weeks before I finished medic training, my class of 400 soon-to-be medics was marched into a hot auditorium at Fort Sam Houston, Texas. It was early April, and the temperature was well above 80-degrees at 700 hours in the morning. Once seated, we were left a half hour to "work up a sweat" before someone screamed: "Ahh-ten-hutt!"

As we jumped to our feet and snapped to attention, as trained to do, Colonel Pixley marched smartly across the stage. He came to a stop as if marching in a line with ten others, and performed that cute little toe-behind-heel 90-degree turn to face the podium, and 400-soaking wet GI's. The commander of the U.S. Army Medical Training Center marched forward and snapped his heels to a stop at a regulation coded distance from the podium. He let us stare at him for thirty seconds, as if we might not recognize him through our salt water dripping eyes. Who did NOT know Colonel Pixley? Did anyone else ride around the base while standing up on the back of a jeep wearing a chrome helmet with that little whip tucked under his arm?

FINALLY, he yelled, "AT EASE! SIT DOWN GENTLEMEN!" I wonder if the Colonel ever talked in a whisper? Probably not. I wonder if he was always kicked out of libraries when he was a young officer? In case you're wondering, Pixley is NOT a made up name - at least not made up by ME.

After giving us precisely 2-seconds to get comfortable, the Colonel began his speech. We expected a machine-gun like delivery, a speech given to hundreds of other medic classes before we arrived in the "melting room."There was no need for him to rehearse it, the words are the same he delivered each week without change since the start of America's involvement in the Vietnam conflict. We got what we expected:

"Gentlemen, this is where you volunteer for your area of service. It does NOT mean you will go there, but you can volunteer for ANY part of the world you want to go to. Now, for you young PATRIOTIC Americans who want to go to Vietnam... come up and sign your cards, and you'll have the rest of the day off. You can spend it at the Enlisted Men's club and DRINK all day. You can go into downtown San Antonio and get a new girl friend. I don't care what you do. For everyone else, we have a lovely day planned. You will hear speeches, see movies, and get all kinds of other informative messages about the mission of the U-S Army Medical Service Corps, of which you WILL become a member TWO weeks from TODAY."

It's amazing. This MAN is incredible. The Colonel got through all that in a clearly understood manner, on one breath, in just 21-seconds! His message was clear, but for anyone needing a translation: "Go to 'Nam? Party now. Hawaii? Europe? Any place OTHER than Southeast Asia? Prepare to face torture."

I looked around the auditorium, I was the only one not mesmerized. Everyone else had a glassy stare - not willing to give up dreams of getting stationed in Southern California or Florida or Texas. I woke up both guys on either side of me, "Look, we're ALL going to the big swamp anyway. So let's just sign the damn cards and go get blitzed now." They shrugged their shoulders as I rose. As I started down the aisle, the two also got up and began to follow me.

Then from the other side of the auditorium, a guy we all knew as a "gung ho lunatic" began running toward the podium screaming, "I wanna kill Charlie!!!" How'd this guy ever wind up in medic training? He's crazy. I slowed down to make sure he was gone by the time I arrived to sign up for duty in hell. The four of us signed our cards and were nearly out the door when something resembling a revival meeting crossed with a pep session got started. Have fun guys. Out the door, the four of us went in different directions. I later found out the other 396-trainees were finally freed about 1900 hours, barely able to walk from dehydration and stinking to high heaven but confident they would serve in a place where they would not die.

Ten days later the orders came down from military personnel. In a shock to everyone, there were 396-medics assigned to duty in the Republic of Vietnam. Just four were ordered to duty in Europe. Explain to me the Army logic that ONLY the four who volunteered for the war zone were getting shipped to Europe.

Three of us were thrilled. Private Gung Ho was outraged, his goal to mutilate and murder Asians wearing black pajamas had taken a bad twist. He wanted the Army equivalent of the F-B-I to launch an immediate investigation of the practices of the personnel branch. We turned down his offer to join his request for an inquiry and begged him to wait until we were on the plane to Frankfurt, Germany. When he refused, we considered stuffing him in a duffel bag and sending him to Saigon, or better yet - Hanoi.

One sad footnote to this war story: Half the guys who graduated with me and went to war came home in boxes. It seems the enemy made radio operators and medics their primary targets, AHEAD of the officers.


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