Boots on the Ground: The history of Project Delta

by Carpenter, Stephen

  “After we had been set up at the FOB for a week or so, an artillery unit moved in at the end of the runway and set up to support us. They hired locals to fill and stack sandbags for their firing positions and bunkers and let the locals, especially the kids, wander around their area freely. The kids sold cold drinks and fruit and of course scoped everything. We warned them about security but they ignored us and during a mid-operation stand down they got probed and lost a couple of people. I stayed behind at the FOB during the short stand down and we got probed twice and mortared once, not much, just harassment. However we did take one casualty, a 2LT who was a liaison from the Division we were working for. He had a Thompson and thought he was John Wayne. During the probe, he jumped out of his hole and was running parallel to the wire firing his Thompson into the jungle like an idiot. A mortar round came in and he received one shrapnel wound to the abdomen. He was in a panic, and as we had no way to know if there was any internal damage we medevaced him out. Bill Pomeroy also received a shrapnel wound to the head manning his defensive position.”66

  “While at Dong Xoai the recon guys found a trail system near the border with bamboo trails and overhead concealment. They also found a big cache of bicycles which were brought out by CH -47 sling load, about 60–80 were brought in. I remember that none of them were equipped with brakes and had the handle bars extended on the left side with a large stick to help steer while carrying a load. The medics kept one and took it back to Nha Trang to ride around the Delta compound, but Crash Whalen made us get rid of it after a few spills because we could only stop it by dragging our feet.”66

  D.J. Taylor recalls a particularly memorable post mission debriefing from one of the larger than life characters that populated Project Delta: “As with most men with the nick-name ‘Tiny,’ Laurence ‘Tiny’ Young was a large, powerful man, but with an even larger heart and limitless compassion for others. It was always entertaining just to be around Tiny, as there was never a dull moment. If something wasn’t happening, he’d make something happen.

  “However, with Tiny, there was a time and place for everything. When it was time to have fun, Tiny would lead the pack, but when it came time to work, he was, in my opinion, one of the best Recon Team Leaders we had in the Recon Section during my two year tour with Project Delta.

  “I don’t think Tiny was afraid of anything. He especially wasn’t afraid of trying new reconnaissance techniques as soon as they were suggested, so we Recon Team Leaders were always anxious to learn how these techniques had worked in actual application and would debrief Tiny as soon as he returned from a recon mission. Learning how, and if, these new and innovative techniques actually worked was extremely crucial to our survival, so we Recon Team Leaders hung on every word Tiny said in our impromptu debriefings.

  “For some reason, I remember one of Tiny’s post-mission debriefings in minute detail and here it is: I hope you all learn something from it. I know I did.

  “It was in December 1968 during the Dong Xoai deployment. Tiny had taken a recon team into an AO near the Song Be River, and on the morning of the third day the FOB received a call from Tiny for an emergency extraction. Tiny reported that his LLDB counterpart had been badly wounded, was unconscious, and needed medevac along with an emergency extraction for his recon team.

  “We, in the Recon Section, anxiously awaited Tiny’s return so we could pick his brain for his lessons learned during his latest recon mission. As soon as the S-2 completed their formal debriefing of his team, several of us approached Tiny with questions about what had happened as he departed the TOC, but, for the first time since I knew him, he didn’t want to talk about it and evaded our questions.

  “Of course, Tiny’s evasiveness peaked my curiosity and I planned to use my favorite elicitation technique (Budweiser) on him that evening in the Beer Tent. I was right; it was a four Budweiser secret, and at Budweiser number five the story unfolded.

  “I hope you can remember how animated Tiny could get at the five Budweiser level, so picture him again seated at a table in the Beer Tent with a beer can in his hand, waving both hands and relating this story:

  ‘Our infiltration LZ was a small clearing in the jungle near the Song Be, and we got in by ladder at last light without a problem. For the next two days, we patrolled our AO and found nothing but God damned leeches. There were so many leeches in that AO that no self respecting VC would have anything to do with such a place, so we moved away from the river toward higher and dryer ground to escape the leeches.’

  “Tiny was into his sixth beer by now and really getting into it, as he continued. ‘At last light of the second day, I found an RON position on the top of a steep hill that was some distance from the river, dry, and therefore leech-free. It was a perfect RON position but for one thing; a troop of rock apes had also claimed it for an RON position. But, what the heck? Those apes would stay in the trees, I’d stay on the ground, and I wasn’t going to be run out of such a fine RON as that one was by a bunch of apes, so we settled in for a peaceful night’s sleep.’

  “Well, it was sometime around midnight, and I was sound asleep when something woke me up. What awoke me was a tugging on my rifle. My rifle was dummy-corded to me by team SOP, and my rifle was at the end of the dummy-cord. I reached out to grab my rifle, but all I grabbed was a handful of hairy animal; it was one of the rock apes that had come down out of the trees to try and take my rifle. As soon as I grabbed him, it let go of my rifle and fled back into the trees, but I expected it, or one of the other apes, to return, so I got ready for it, and I didn’t have long to wait.’

  ‘A couple of minutes later, I felt a tugging on my shirt-sleeve and I gave that rock ape my best rifle butt-stroke to the head. That ended our problems with the rock-apes, and we heard nothing more from them for the rest of the night.’

  “Tiny was silent for a moment, finished off his sixth Budweiser, and I thought for a second that the impromptu debriefing had ended, but then he continued. ‘The next morning, I did a first light head-count and discovered that my LLDB counterpart was missing. His rucksack was there, but he and his rifle were missing. For a moment I thought he’d pulled a dumb-assed stunt like going to shit and not telling anyone, so we waited a few minutes for him to return before we commenced to search for him.’

  ‘We found my LLDB counterpart lying unconscious at the bottom of the hill. I knew then it hadn’t been a rock ape tugging on my sleeve the night before; it had been my LLDB counterpart trying to awake me to tell me he’d heard something. Jeeze! I hope he’s going to be OK.’

  “I never heard anything about the LLDB’s recovery, but I too hope he was all right after receiving what had to be the mother of all rifle-butt strokes to the head.

  “And, as for lessons learned from Tiny’s patrol, there was one that stuck with me for the rest of my life and kept me from making several serious mistakes in the years to come. That bit of hard-won knowledge that Tiny managed to pass to us in the Beer Tent that night was this: No matter what the circumstances, you should never, ever, ever, ever go to bed with a rock ape.”80

  Ted Aslund and Bob Fegan were inserted on a recon mission at Dong Xoai and found themselves in the middle of a large enemy force with nowhere to go. They called for gunship support and an extraction. The 281st Wolfpack arrived on the scene and began to lay down a field of fire. From the air they could see the enemy locations and knew that the team was about to be overrun. They advised the team to put themselves in a box and began to make strafing runs that laid continuous fire about three feet over the teams’ heads. Aslund and Fegan kept their cool until the gunships directed them through an area cleared by their fire to an LZ. Upon returning to the FOB they were humbled to see that every single recon man had arrived at the air strip and loaded their gear and weapons on helicopters to effect a rescue in the event the 281st had failed. This was just one example of the many times the same scenario was repeated throughout the life of Delta. The loyalty and dedication these men had towards each other was absolute.101r />
  On an excursion into a village, Ted Aslund encountered a group of Montagnards with a spider monkey they were planning to eat. Ted asked if he could buy the monkey and was surprised when the Yards generously gave him to him. Ted named the monkey Oscar and took him back to the FOB. It didn’t take long to learn that not only was Oscar intelligent, he was also meaner than a snake. He ran off more than a few laundry girls by repeatedly jumping on them and pulling their hair and he was not the least bit reluctant to bite anyone he deemed an outsider. Still, he got along fine with just about everybody in the recon section.

  The recon men decided that if Oscar was to be a member of the team he should at least be airborne. They set about to “qualify” him for his jump wings by designing a parachute for him and tossing him from a helicopter. Oscar completed several jumps and except for some undisciplined releases of fecal matter, a weakness common in the species, he seemed to like it. As a sign of complete acceptance Oscar was allowed his own bar tab at the Delta Hilton when the troops were on stand down. Oscar would spend every evening in the company of his recon buddies drinking Salty Dogs until he could no longer navigate and then Ted would see that he retired to Ted’s room in the barracks for a good night’s rest.

  Oscar contracted pneumonia and grew quite ill. The recon men took him to the hospital in Cam Ranh Bay and sought treatment for him. The nursing staff was immediately taken with Oscar and adopted him as their special project. Within a few days the nurses called Delta and demanded that the men come and get their fucking monkey. He had recovered fully and was terrorizing everyone in the hospital and veterinary lab. He had learned how to unlock the K-9 cages and delighted in releasing the guard and tracking dogs at all hours. He also figured out the most sterile places to relieve himself. Ted and others picked him up and Oscar quickly fell back into his old routine at “home.”

  Each room in the barracks had a ceiling fan. Partly out of curiosity and partly to amuse himself, Ted put Oscar on a fan blade and turned the fan on. Oscar seemed to enjoy the ride thoroughly but did manage to indiscriminately evacuate his bowels and coat the walls of Ted’s room. Early in 1969 it appeared that Delta was in for a long deployment and SGM Crash Whalen ordered the monkey gone. Ted took Oscar over to the Air Force compound and tried to sell him to some young fellows there. He struck a deal and traded Oscar for three poncho liners and $10. Two days later the Airmen showed up at Delta’s gate and demanded that they get their barter back and wanted to leave the monkey. Ted instructed the Nung gate guards not to let them in. The Airmen walked along the road outside the Delta compound and tossed Oscar, wrapped in another poncho liner, over the fence. Within the next day or so Nha Trang came under rocket attack in the middle of the night. As everyone rushed to man the perimeter a very excited Oscar jumped on Crash Whalen’s back, wrapped his arms around his head and defecated down his shirt collar. After the alert was lifted, Oscar left with one of the indigenous workers.101

  Dennis McVey recalls the following incident from Operation ARES at Dong Xoai: “I had to take a sick Delta member into the Third Field Hospital in Saigon. I took the 281st admin run that was going to Tan So Nhut and got the patient to the hospital. He was not sick enough for a MEDEVAC but too sick to keep at the FOB. The Recon SGM asked me to pick up some beer as the beer supply was running low, and gave me money from the beer fund to purchase some beer and sodas. I bought a pallet of beer, a half pallet of soda and paid the bill. The guy from the PX asked if I wanted some free beer and of course I said yes. He showed me some pallets of beer, some off the wall brand (Blatz something) that nobody wanted and that had been sitting around for so long that the cans were rusting and leaking, but I agreed to take some. The PX guy said to take all you want so we loaded another pallet of “free” beer on the 2 ½ ton and set off to the airfield. Well, my eyes were bigger than the cargo area of a Huey and it did not appear that two and a half pallets of drinks would fit. However the makers of Huey’s had underestimated the initiative of thirsty Delta members and the 281st aircrew. We painstakingly stacked beer and soda, with the good stuff in the middle of course, so that the “free” beer cases were hanging over the edge on the chopper by ¾ of their length. By carefully stacking we were able to weigh them down with cases stacked on cases until we got everything wedged in. I had to squeeze in with a gunner on the ride back but what the hell, we had a whole pallet of “free” beer on board. I felt good as I had made a good deal for DELTA and the guys would have plenty of beer. Well, we were a little heavy and the beer hanging over the side made the Huey a little less aerodynamic but it was flying and we were on our way home. About halfway back and flying over heavy jungle, we hit a downdraft and the chopper made a huge lurch and began shedding cases of beer like a dog shaking water off itself. I sat stunned as I watched my “good deal for free beer” cascade toward the earth. There was silence for a moment then we all burst out laughing and talking about Charlie looking up and saying “those crazy Americans are bombing us with beer”. I can only hope that the beer was so bad that it made them sick if they got any. We got back to the FOB with all of the good beer and soda and a small amount of the “free” beer which turned out to be flat as it had sat in the sun too long. I believe we finally traded what was left of the bad ‘free’ beer for some Crations with the artillery unit that set up next to us for a short time at the end of the runway so things turned out all right in the end.”

  CHAPTER XVII: ASHAU; AGAIN

  “Tet 69/Counteroffensive”, 23 February 1969 - 8 June 1969. From Tet 1969 through the month of June, the enemy again tried to sustain an offensive. His inability to do so can be largely attributed to aggressive allied ground operations. Between 23 February and 8 June 1969, a total of 70 significant named ground operations were terminated resulting in heavy enemy loss of life and materiel.

  The main operations concluded during this period were:

  (1). The 3d Marine Division’s Operation KENTUCKY aimed at preventing enemy infiltration through the Demilitarized Zone in central Quang Tri Province. Throughout the early part of January 1969, Viet Cong/North Vietnamese Army forces continued to avoid major contacts with Free World Forces. Their continual movement to avoid friendly forces or to search for food and supplies contributed to a decrease in the enemy-initiated ground attacks and attacks-by-fire in Quang Tri Province.

  (2). Operation NEVADA EAGlE, initiated on 17 May 1968 in Thua Thien Province, continued in 1969 as the U.S. 101st Airborne Division continued to defeat enemy personnel, and capture rice caches, material, and installations within its large area of operations, where it undertook offensive sweeps along Route 547 and around Song Bo.

  (3). Two battalions of the 4th Marine Regiment were engaged in Operation SCOTLAND II. Initiated on 15 April 1968, this multi-battalion search and clear operation was centered in and around Khe Sanh.

  (4). The IV Corps Tactical Zone Dry Weather Campaign began on 1 December 1968 in support of the overall mission to prevent Viet Cong units from interfering with pacification efforts. This operation, “Speedy Express,” interdicted lines of enemy communication and denied him the use of base areas. In 1969 the 1st Brigade, 9th U.S. Infantry Division continued the operation in Dinh Tuong Province, using its highly successful night ambush tactics while the 2d Brigade continued its mission with the Mobile Riverine Force. Although engagements in Operation SPEEDY EXPRESS were typically small, the 9th Infantry Division fought several sizeable engagements with impressive results.

  On 23 February U.S. Navy units and installations at Da Nang, Tan An, Ben Luc, Go Dan Ha, and Tra Cu came under numerous and widespread attacks associated with a new enemy offensive, but since many units in these areas were poised to meet these attacks they caused only minimal damage. April saw the heaviest cumulative enemy activity in the barrier interdiction campaign to date.65

  During February and March, 1969, Project Delta remained in its base headquarters at Nha Trang for a much needed rest and refit. Extensive training was conducted and new members were introduced to their teams and
Delta’s methods of operation. The Project remained on alert in the event of another Tet offensive and was prepared to mobilize wherever they were needed. That someplace turned out to be the Ashau Valley and its surrounding area. From March 29th through April 25th, 1969, Project Delta was OPCON to the 101st Airborne Division from an FOB at Phu Bai. Operation Cass Park (1-69) was launched to locate NVA/VC troop concentrations in preparation for large clearing operations to be conducted by the 101st. The Ashau Valley belonged to the enemy. It provided areas where the enemy could be hidden from the air and relatively safe from air attack, plentiful water and food sources, terrain that prevented any covert operations by large forces to be launched, a well developed network of high speed trails that were not observable from the air, and imposing natural terrain barriers that prevented ease of mobility except down ridge lines and along valley floors. Landing Zones (LZs) were few and located on steep hillsides, necessitating the use of ladders or ropes for many infiltrations. The Ashau was a known major infiltration route for NVA soldiers coming from the north through Laos and was guarded vigorously from U.S. and South Vietnamese penetration.

  The NVA had long since developed its tactics and training for anti-reconnaissance forces. Because of the importance of the Ashau and A Vuong valley areas to their forces as access and egress routes the NVA had established a battalion as an anti reconnaissance force. Trained in specific tactics, the battalion was subordinate to the E-220 Transportation Regiment and employed its extensive knowledge of the trail system and lookout points to quickly observe and pinpoint team insertions. The battalion had also developed a complex system of hard wired field phones between base areas and a simpler system of communication by small arms shots, shouting, and whistling between smaller mobile units. During Operation Cass Park Project Delta launched ten Recon missions, six Roadrunner missions, four Ranger operations and four Nung BDA operations. Every single operation was compromised and teams were engaged by the enemy within 12 hours of infiltration. In the case of Recon and Roadrunner teams, the enemy watched as the teams were inserted and then quickly signaled for small squad sized units to converge on the teams and attempt to surround them. They would continue to signal as they converged and try to kill or capture the teams. That failing, the NVA would track the team to its extraction LZ and attempt to shoot down the rescue aircraft. The larger units put on the ground met with different tactics. The NVA avoided traditional infantry combat and elected to harass the Rangers and Nungs with sniper fire and small hit and run attacks. Many of the Project’s teams reported being tracked by dogs during the day and at night.82