Through the Valley. William Reeder
to fall, and I shook uncontrollably with cold and fatigue. I found a bush up against a small tree and worked myself under its cover. I collapsed on the ground and fell asleep instantly.
An AC-130 Spectre gunship had been shooting for much of the time I’d been traveling, along with frequent strikes by jet fighter aircraft. Spectre departed and the fighter air strikes slowed. I slept soundly for the first moments.
Armageddon wrenched me awake. I raised just my head. I felt the first distant rumble of bombs. Oh shit! B-52 strike!! Terror gripped me. The thundering came toward me, louder and louder. The ground trembled. The earth shook. Hundreds of bombs fell almost on top of me. Then it stopped. Silence.
Pieces of debris crashed close by. Floating residue of the earth-churning explosions drifted down around me. My nostrils filled with the acrid smell of explosive. I trembled again. How many times that day? I laid my head back down on the dirt and fell back asleep thinking, Whatever is going to happen will happen. May live. May die. No sense in worrying about it.
Other B-52 strikes intruded into my uneasy dream state as the night went on, none as close as that first. I rested fitfully. At dawn, a flight of jets struck a target close enough to instantly snap me from slumber. I jerked awake, but lay still. I thought through the sequence of events that had brought me to this place and point in time. I was a mess. My face was covered with crusted blood. I could feel some pretty good lacerations, particularly one on my hairline above my right eye. I hurt all over, especially my back. I was stiff and had trouble getting my arms and legs moving again. After some effort, I rolled onto my front. I struggled onto my hands and knees, then back up on my feet. My back screamed as I stood. I was bent over like a very old man. On my left forearm, a squiggling worm-like thing was standing on its head, a leech. I grabbed it and tore it away. I discovered another on my arm, one on my neck. I ripped them off.
I thought about finding a better place nearby and hunkering down for the day. One tenet of my evasion training was to travel only at night. I decided to accept whatever increased risk there might be traveling during the day. It would be too hard to do what I’d done the night before. I checked my compass and headed southeast, continuing toward Kontum or Plei Mrong, forty miles away.
Before long, I came to a stream. I dropped slowly and carefully to my knees, cupped my hands, and raised water to my lips. I was really thirsty. I’d had nothing but a cup of coffee since the night before I’d been shot down. I guzzled the water. The taste of cordite didn’t deter me from quenching my thirst. Afterward, I wondered if it was poisonous. I came upon the B-52 strike. I dragged myself through and around craters and shattered trees for half a mile before I was back in the jungle again.
Later that morning, I came to a trail that was running southeast. Another principle of my evasion training was stay off trails. Exhausted and in pain, I took the trail anyway, rationalizing that I would remain alert and take cover if I heard or sensed anything. Besides, I’ve got a lot of distance between Ben Het and me by now. Shouldn’t be any NVA this far out.
The trail was easier going. I felt optimistic. Keep moving southeast. Get around or over Rocket Ridge. Get near Kontum and find friendlies. Plei Mrong is good. That’ll work. This is gonna be OK.
A large grassy area opened to my right. The trail was still in the trees, but I could look out onto the open field. I heard the sound of a light airplane. I stepped into the field and looked up. A VNAF O-1 Bird Dog spotter plane was approaching the field. Thank God. I pulled out my pen flares. I mounted one onto the launcher as quickly as I could. The plane was heading past the edge of the field. I pulled back the spring-loaded firing mechanism and let it go. The flare shot into the air and burst into a bright red cluster. I held my breath, hoped, waited. Nothing. The plane kept flying. No wing-rocking, nothing. He hadn’t seen it. I turned back to the trail, my head not as high as before.
Small arms fire erupted from across the field. Voices shouted in Vietnamese as eight or ten uniformed NVA soldiers came running across the field. The Bird Dog had not seen my flare, but they had. They rushed, hot after me. My hands patted my hips and survival vest. Oh, crap. For the first time since being shot down, I realized I had no weapon.
I had been issued a .38-caliber revolver, the same weapon I’d had on my first tour. When I was shot down then, I’d drawn my pistol, looked at the stream of rifle and machine-gun fire coming from my pursuers, and reholstered it immediately. I would not die hopelessly in another Custer’s Last Stand. Instead, my wingman covered my forty-five-minute run through the jungle to a helicopter rescue, a dash that earned me the nickname of Lightfoot. A .38 wasn’t worth a shit. I had wangled a CAR-15 automatic carbine from one of my special ops friends, which I carried instead. The CAR-15, with my two bandoliers of ammunition, was still behind my seat in the Cobra. I hadn’t thought about it as I’d struggled to get out of the burning aircraft. There hadn’t been time to get it even if I had.
I shuffled down the trail as quickly as I could. After a curve, I dropped and rolled under a patch of thick bushes to my left and lay there as quietly as I could. I was breathing heavily. I was sure I’d soon be dead or captured.
The enemy soldiers came down the trail at a fast run, yelling among themselves, probably shouting commands to me as well. I knew about five words of Vietnamese, so I had no idea what they said. I held my breath when they ran past me. The noise died down, I took several deep breaths. They ran on down the trail. I had made it. There was still hope.
I was cocksure. If anyone could survive this, it was me. I had been a Boy Scout. Though I was one of the troublemakers in my troop, I’d learned a lot. I’d backpacked sixty-five miles through the mountains in five days and practiced survival skills.
My troubled youth got me suspended from school a number of times, but it also taught me lessons. I learned to street fight, take care of myself. I had boxed, played football, and run track. I majored in forestry, worked cattle ranches, rode broncs in small rodeos, fought forest fires, worked construction, and was an electrical lineman for Southern California Edison.
Survival, escape, and evasion training were part of officer candidate school as well as flight school. Navy jungle survival school in the Philippines gave me additional training. Being shot down and evading capture on my first tour made me about as ready as anyone could be for what I now faced. I only needed some luck and, I damn well knew, a little help from something beyond myself.
I remembered a little ditty my mother had taught me. “The Lord helps those who help themselves.” I knew I could depend on its absolute truth to help get me through this. The Lord helps those who help themselves. God, I’ll do that. Do all I can. Muster every bit of what’s inside me. I’ll do my part. I’ll do all I can to help myself. So please, please do yours. I need your help! I said it to myself again, drawing comfort and strength. The Lord helps those who help themselves. I would repeat it often, as I set my mind to doing all I must to survive.
I crawled out from the bushes and left the trail, back into the tangled jungle toward high ground to the south. There I turned to my southeasterly course again. I would get up out of the valley and work across the hills. Never again would I risk using a trail.
Thirst took hold of me. Every painful step toward the hills made me thirstier. You’d think there would be an abundance of water in the jungle. Not so. I hadn’t crossed another stream since that morning. My mouth was dry as dust. I tried to cup rain in my hands during a shower. That rendered only a few drops. I came upon some plants with large, horizontally lying leaves with small amounts of rainwater puddled on each. I drank eagerly, moving from leaf to leaf. I got no more than a couple spoonfuls of water for my effort.
I found myself in an astonishing place. I stood under high, dense jungle canopy as in a large, dimly lit room, quiet, serene save for the sounds of the jungle. The air was filled with bird songs. Another strange yodel-pitched sound was almost like some creature singing out, “Fuck you. Fuck you.” It was the exotic call of a Tokay lizard.
The tops of the largest trees formed layers of canopy like a protective ceiling, a hundred or even two hundred feet above. Smaller trees and a variety of bushes and other shrubs spread across the decomposing duff of the forest floor. Thick vines hung from the dome.
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