Another War, Another Peace

by Ronald J. Glasser

  “There was something in one of the knapsacks,” David said. “Felt like a grenade.”

  “Yeah,” Tom said. “Well, one thing’s for sure. They ain’t refugees. Come on. Let’s get back to the jeep.”

  They crawled back off the slope together, and when they were clear of the rise, stood up.

  “NVA?” David asked.

  “In civilian clothes? Not likely.”

  “North Vietnamese cadre then,” David said, “sent down to work with the VC.”

  “If they were cadre, they wouldn’t be movin’ during the day, not by themselves anyway. They’d be movin’ with VC who’d be showin’ ’em the way. They wouldn’t want to be on their own this far south.”

  “Then who are they?”

  “Don’t know.”

  David couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d seen them before. “I guess we’d better tell Thorpe,” he said.

  “You sure?” Tom asked. “What are you gonna tell him? This is still an officially secure area, and there ain’t been no trouble for months. Lifers don’t like being told secure areas ain’t secure. Besides, if they are NVA, where are their weapons? We ain’t the only troops movin’ around out on these flats. We got choppers flyin’ over this area all the time and there’s a lot of ARVNs around. If them gooks do have their weapons in those knapsacks, they wouldn’t stand a chance. You saw what happened back there. If we’d been an ARVN unit, they’d be dead now. NVA are too professional for that. I’ll tell you this much,” Tom said, “it don’t make sense.”

  David shook his head. “I can’t help feeling I’ve seen them before.” But he didn’t say it very loudly.

  David didn’t tell anyone what had happened. Tom was right; there was nothing to tell. The first question was bound to be “Are you sure?” You needed facts whether it was medicine or the Army. Besides, why jeopardize the med caps. No sense making trouble where there might not be any.

  After dinner David took his usual evening walk, but the feeling he’d had on the hill kept intruding. He could not shake the sense that he had seen those Vietnamese before. He stopped at the helipad, and as he turned to leave he found himself staring at the communications building diagonally across from him. He quickly turned and looked back at the pad. There was a sudden flash of recognition. “Of course,” he said and hurried up the path.

  Tom was in the barracks. “Come outside,” David said. They walked until they were well clear of the building. “Those weren’t regular NVA today,” David said. “They were assault troops, shock troops, whatever you want to call them. I told you this afternoon there was something familiar about them. It’s been bothering me ever since. Then a few minutes ago out at the helipad, I figured it out. It was the look on their faces. It was the same look as those assault troops from the 25th, the ones you thought you knew. They moved the same way, too. Those were hard-core soldiers we saw today. They didn’t expect us, but they didn’t do anything stupid either, and they weren’t afraid. They saw the antenna and they stood still. No one panicked. I think there’s more of them, too. Remember the cloth on the rock, those footprints along the creek bed the other day, and the shirt in the hamper? You were right. Weapons or not, there’s something going on around here.”

  “All right,” Tom said without hesitation. “We’ve got a day before we got to go out again. Let me think about it. I’ll see you tomorrow after breakfast.”

  David knew he was right, but he still didn’t quite believe that he and Tom had discovered something a whole army had missed. The chopper pilot he’d given the morphine to had said there was nothing going on around the 40th, and nothing had been reported.

  Tom came to the dispensary a little before ten. “No one here?”

  “No, just me.”

  For the first time in weeks Tom looked ill at ease. “I’ve been thinkin’ about all this,” he said. “Somethin’ is happenin’, but I don’t know what. You get feelin’s about things over here, a kind of sixth sense, but you can lose it real quick. Maybe it’s bein’ out of the real heavy stuff. It’s the reason a lot of guys pass up their R and Rs. There were a couple weeks down in the Delta when I was attached to a company of the Riverines. One of their patrols got ambushed and all of ’em—ten or eleven—were wasted. Claymore went off. It had to have been command detonated to have gotten ’em all. I found the wire and followed it back to within twenty-five meters of a small village. At night, I went into the village with two or three of ’em. First two huts I went into standin’ up. At the third one I stopped. Can’t tell you why. All of a sudden, it was like I knew I was doing somethin’ wrong. There wasn’t much of a moon, but enough, if you looked close, to pick objects out of the shadows. I went into the third hut on my belly. Soon as I pushed open the door, the whole top half got blown away. I saw the muzzle blast and killed the gook. He must have been watching me, seen me go into the other two huts standin’ up, figured I’d do the same thing again.” Tom looked worried. “I should have been able to figure out who they were,” he said dejectedly, “but I didn’t, and I can’t figure out what shock troops would be doin’ dressin’ up like refugees, and without weapons, or weapons they couldn’t get at. It don’t make any sense. Maybe we should stop.”

  “But nothing’s happened,” David said. “They didn’t want trouble any more than we did. Listen, we’re still safer out here than anywhere else. We’ll stay out of the hills from now on, close to the 40th. Okay? Agreed?”

  “Agreed.”

  They did stay near the 40th, sometimes visiting the same village twice in a week. David simply continued to file the regular reports, writing in the names of villages they should have visited. They met no more groups of refugees, nor did they see any more footprints. Still, David was anxious. He was not as worried about himself and Tom as he was about the 40th. Tom had been sure that no one would listen and David shared his feelings, but there was the nagging thought that even if he and Tom were not personally at any greater risk than usual, the 40th might be. For days he debated whether he should tell someone.

  But who would believe that anyone was going after the 40th? For the little that he and Tom did, the 40th did even less. So David, balancing the benefits against the risks, always drifted back to keeping silent. If he and Tom had found anything more to make them suspicious, he’d have said something, but they hadn’t. And nothing happened. Yet the feeling that something was going on and that someone at the 40th should know worked on David. Finally, he decided he should at least tell Lieutenant Brown. Brown, like Thorpe, was regular Army, and David was sure he could mention it to him without arousing his suspicion, something he wasn’t so sure he’d be able to do with Thorpe. He didn’t want to jeopardize the med caps even temporarily if there was no reason.

  It was the very fact that nothing else had happened that ultimately gave him the confidence to talk to Brown. He waited till the afternoon and walked to the headquarters building. He told Brown that they’d been seeing groups of refugees on side roads and passing through some of the villages.

  “Griffen never mentioned anything like that,” Brown said.

  “Oh, he didn’t think it was worth reporting,” David answered quickly. “I guess I’m a little more nervous than he is,” he added.

  Brown grinned. “Yeah,” he said appreciatively, “he’s a cool one.”

  David told Brown about the hut; not about the grenade, only about finding the shirt with the star on it, and also the footprints that Tom had found above the village with the woman who’d wanted her tooth pulled.

  Brown took it all in. “You haven’t seen anything around here, though, have you?”

  “No … nothing.”

  “Well,” Brown said, “there’s always been some infiltration across the flats, but no one’s seen anything recently. If there were big movements, someone would have seen ’em. Don’t worry.”

  “Oh, I’m not really worried,” David said. “I just wanted to know what you thought, kind of a second opinion.”

  “Any time, Doc,”
the lieutenant said. “Any time.”

  Relieved, David walked away. Tom was right. No one did want any part of it. Either Brown didn’t think what he was told was important, or else he thought what happened away from the 40th wasn’t his responsibility. It was Tyler’s and Cramer’s views of Vietnam all wrapped up together. Everyone doing his own little part and no one watching anyone else. Crazy, David thought, but it did have the advantage of letting you do what you wanted.

  Nothing happened for the next two weeks. The flats around the 40th were clear of any movement. They didn’t even meet anyone on the roads.

  Then one morning on the edge of one of the great basins southwest of the 40th, David and Tom saw another group of refugees. They watched them through their binoculars as they moved across the flats. There were six this time.

  “All men again,” Tom said, putting down the binoculars. “Come on, let’s see where they’ve been.” He drove slowly to keep down the dust. “It’s early,” he said, “so they’ve had to make camp somewhere around here. I don’t think they’d be travelin’ at night, not out here. Look real funny in the middle of nothin’ to have someone find you sleeping during the day.”

  When they reached their tracks, Tom turned the jeep away from the direction the Vietnamese had taken and backtracked, following the footprints across the basin. They drove for more than an hour.

  “Over there,” Tom said finally, pointing to a hollow. “That’s where they stopped.”

  He took his rifle and they walked the last twenty yards to where he’d pointed. There wasn’t a sound; there was nothing moving for miles.

  “No fire. They’re eatin’ cold rations … see.” Tom kneeled and ran his hand gently across the ground. There were little pieces of rice mixed with the dirt. “And look here.” David kneeled next to him. There was a faint mark on the ground. David could see the crosshatching. “That’s the imprint of the butt of a Siminov attack rifle. They have a kind of serrated pattern on the shoulder stock.” He brushed aside a small mound of dirt. “Chewin’ tobacco; they ain’t even smokin’.” He stood and looked around. “See over there, that pile of rocks?” There was a small mound of rocks out in the middle of a level area a short distance from the hollow. It was in clear view of anyone coming in from the west. “This place has been used before. That’s a cairn, a trail marker. They can be used as signs, too. If the rocks on the top are knocked off, it can mean stay away; two cairns side by side can mean leave supplies here, things like that. They got to let their own people know what’s goin’ on.” Tom started checking the other directions. “Looks like they’re moving in from the west along a line directly below the 40th, most likely skirting it. I’ll tell Major Thorpe. Hell, there’s probably a pile of rocks every kilometer from here to Saigon.”

  David looked at the rocks again. “You know, Tom, if they need the cairns, then there’s got to be new groups coming through all the time. It means that they are on their own; no one from down here’s taking them through. These troops don’t know what to expect out here. They probably haven’t been this far south before, and there must be a lot of them.”

  Tom thought for a moment.

  “And there’s something else,” David said. “They’re traveling light, so they’ve got to eat as they move along, and they aren’t going into any villages. No one’s reported them taking any food. It’s all got to be set up for them. There have to be food caches out here.”

  “Meaning?” Tom said, looking at David.

  “Meaning that this is all real organized. There’s something big going on somewhere.”

  They drove out of the basin toward the 40th over a series of great parallel slabs of earth, each a kilometer or two in length. In the rainy season they would be plates of mud.

  “Over there.” Tom slowed the jeep. Far across the flats they could see figures moving, no more than reeds shimmering in the waves of heat.

  David took out the binoculars and focused on the figures. “Five more,” he said, “and all men.” He turned in his seat, giving the whole plateau a quick scan. “When we get back we’ll have Thorpe send out a chopper to check these guys out.”

  The road ran straight for a half-mile and then turned, disappearing for a short distance into one of the many depressions that crisscrossed the flats. They were halfway to the turn when a metallic sound came from the front of the jeep. A moment later, there was another sharp sound.

  “Down!” Tom yelled. He pressed his foot hard on the gas pedal and the jeep shot forward. David had to grab the door handle to keep his balance. The air was snapping around them.

  “Tom!” But even as he yelled, Tom had slammed on the brakes, throwing the jeep into a hard right-hand skid. Four Vietnamese were standing at the dip in the road.

  While the jeep was skidding, Tom slammed his foot on the gas again and, spinning the wheel, threw the jeep into a left-hand skid so that it spun around, driver’s side facing the turn. Even before the jeep came to a stop, he’d picked up the M-16 from the floorboard and in one motion pointed it down the road and emptied the clip. With the roar of the automatic, the first two Vietnamese fell over and the others leaped for the ditches. A flash of orange engulfed the road. Tom pulled out another clip, reloaded and, turning the wheel, drove straight toward the sprawled figures.

  The next instant the ground in front of them lifted into the air. The jeep careened through the dust and debris. Behind them a series of explosions went off, one after the other.

  The jeep bounced as it hit the first body. David lost his balance. There was a second explosion and a great wall of flame rushed past him. For an instant the air itself seemed to catch fire, and then the jeep lifted into the air and David was thrown out. All he remembered was tumbling free. There had been no time for panic. He hit something hard and then he was tumbling again, unable to catch his breath.

  It was the light that brought him back to consciousness. The sun was in the wrong place. Confused, David struggled to hang on to the fact, not to let it go. Everything was backward. The shadows were all going in the wrong direction. He knew it was important to remember why, but he couldn’t. It took some time to realize that it wasn’t the sun that was turned around but the road. David managed to get to his feet. The acrid smell of explosives stung his nose.

  For a second or two he didn’t know where he was. He stared uncomprehending at the trail of debris, the cartons and bottles strewn along the side of the road. Then he saw the skid marks. There was a sudden moment of recollection, and with it he felt the pain in his back and shoulder. He hobbled back to where the jeep had gone off the road, and followed the tire tracks till they disappeared in the rocks and hard-packed earth of the plateau. He stopped where the tire tracks ended but couldn’t see the jeep.

  It was nowhere to be seen, nor was Tom. A feeling of panic began to take hold of him. There was something he knew he should remember, something important. Fighting the panic, David quickly turned again and stared at the road as if for the first time.

  He realized the dip in the road shielded them from whoever had set up the ambush. He wiped his face and was surprised to find blood. Oddly, the sight of it suddenly calmed him. Would they come to see what had happened? How much time did he have? Startled, he suddenly remembered the Vietnamese at the turn. The gun! Of course, that was what he was trying to remember. Frantic, he looked around again. Then he saw the spare tire lying on the ground twenty yards from where he stood. Limping, he hurried over. As he neared the tire, he saw the jeep turned over in a gully. The windshield was gone and the paint on its hood was burned black.

  As David limped up to the jeep, he saw the M-16 on the ground and quickly picked it up. But the breech was jammed. While he worked at it, he saw Tom lying facedown a few yards away, ahead of the jeep. Shifting the rifle to his good arm, he scrambled over the rocky ground. Tom was breathing, but his head was cut. David reached under Tom’s shoulder.

  “It’s me … it’s okay,” David said, carefully turning him over. The cut was a gash that beg
an above his eye and continued down across the bridge of Tom’s nose. It laid open his cheek down to the bone. Blood covered his face.

  Tom struggled to sit up.

  “No … no,” David said.

  Despite the size of the wound, it was barely bleeding. David quickly felt Tom’s arms and legs. There were no fractures.

  “Stoppin’ for them gooks on the road threw off their aim,” Tom said. There was a strange, distant quality to his voice. David helped him get more comfortable. “They had us set up; must have figured we’d seen enough, but stoppin’ screwed up their timing.” He didn’t fight David anymore and let him put his head back on the ground. He coughed, and a tiny bit of reddish foam filled the corner of his mouth. David looked closer at Tom’s chest. There were two small holes in his T-shirt. The same red foam was sucked in and out of them with each breath.

  “Tom,” David said, “I think you’re hurt. I’m going to get some bandages and the canteens out of the jeep.”

  David took the surgical kit from under the dash. Then he gathered the canteens, but as he stood, he froze. Two Vietnamese were standing in the middle of the road. For a blind moment he waited for the sound of gunfire, but then he saw they had no weapons. A moment later the road was empty again. Whoever they were, they had to have seen the jeep. As he turned to go back to Tom, David realized that Tom had had his rifle pointed directly at them the whole time.

  The blood flowing from the gash on Tom’s face was just a trickle.

  David lifted Tom’s head and held the canteen to his lips. “You’ve got to drink this, Tom. It’ll help keep up your blood volume.” He managed to sound matter-of-fact. Tom took a few sips and turned his head.

  “You got hit in the chest,” David said. “I don’t know how bad, but I’m going to put a surgical pack over the wound. It’ll help you breathe.”