by Larry Bond
Na San had played a critical role in Vietnam’s liberation from the French. Attacked by Giap during the campaign that led to the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, it was ultimately held by the French after considerable bloodshed. But the French misinterpreted their victory there, and made the grave mistake of using the Na San victory as a model for their defense of Dien Bien Phu. It was an error on par with the Germans’ decision to take and then hold Stalingrad, with similar results.
Jing Yo had considered the Na San and Dien Bien Phu battles carefully. His unit’s job—much more critical than at Lai Chau—was to seize the control tower at the Na San airport, and use it to direct the large assault group into the base. The defenses ringing the airport, while not extensive, would now be on high alert. Jing Yo had to bypass them, sneak into the tower, then hold on while all hell broke lose.
The easiest way to do this would have been to get onto the airport grounds before the invasion was launched; the team would have then had an easy time overcoming the guards and getting into the tower. And indeed this had been the original plan. But the assignment of the other tasks had made this impossible, and so Jing Yo had adapted.
Shortly after the battle for Lai Chau ended, a small helicopter skimmed in over the tree-lined streets, heading for a spot on the road just north of the bridge Jing Yo and his men had managed to hold. The helicopter was a warhorse from another era—a Bell Huey UH-1, the same type that the American army had used to great effect farther south some fifty years before.
This particular chopper had not seen action in the Vietnam-American war, and until roughly six months earlier it had been rusting forgotten in a boneyard in the Philippines. The men who had renovated it had found its Lycoming engine dilapidated beyond repair, and had replaced the power plant with a Harbin design nearly twice as powerful, though it had a considerable distance to go before it could prove itself as dependable as the venerable Lycoming. They had also chipped away all of the rust, replaced the rodent-chewed wires with new ones, and given the pilots an avionics system that would have seemed like something out of Star Trek to the helicopter’s early crews.
Most important, they had dressed the helicopter in the dull gray camouflaged tones favored by the transport division of the Vietnamese air force, topping the image off with a yellow star in a red circle and bar field used by the Vietnamese air force. The helicopter looked exactly like the two old Hueys still used by the Vietnamese air force in the area to the south.
After picking up Jing Yo and his squad, the helicopter flew south to the Ta Sua Nature Preserve, settling down in an isolated clearing several kilometers from the nearest road. The idea was that Jing Yo and his men would get some rest while the main assault elements got closer to the objective.
But sleep didn’t come easy to the young lieutenant. The attack on the scientists’ camp and the ferocious battle at Lai Chau had unsettled his internal balance. He knew from experience that he could restore it only through meditation, and so, after urging his men to rest, he walked a short distance up a nearby hill and began to meditate. Legs folded, he began to breathe slowly and deeply, pushing up from his diaphragm. His mind hesitated, still filled with distractions. Jing Yo concentrated on the muscles in his stomach, pushing his mind into the tendons as he had been taught at age sixteen. Then he lifted his hands to the sides of his body, moving them upward in a circular motion.
Ego was a stubborn master. His mind remained distracted. Images of the battle passed back and forth in his head. The sensations of doubt, of weakness, of dishonor, drifted through his consciousness.
He and his men had done well; their objectives had been met. Yet the ego would not be satisfied. The ego wished perfection, wanted glory and accolades so overwhelming that no mortal man could hope to enjoy them.
Ego had always been his problem, from the very moment the monks took him in. “Stubbornness,” his first mentor called it.
Stubbornness.
But the universe was around him, and so long as he could breathe, he could find balance. So long as he could feel the muscles in his chest expand and contract, the toxins infecting his mind would drift back into the void.
Jing Yo lost track of time.
That was the first sign. He felt the warm breeze tickling his tongue; that was the second.
And then there were no signs, no thoughts, only breathing, and finally, balance.
The wind blew lightly through the trees to the east, rustling through the branches like whispers drifting down a hallway. Jing Yo let the wind push into his lungs, its energy rekindling his.
Gradually, he became aware of another presence nearby, watching him through the long blades of grass on the slope from the wooded area. The rising sun made it hard for him to see, the sharp rays blurring and glaring as they struck the green slope.
It was black, dark, moving toward him slowly.
Striped orange. A tiger.
Jing Yo could feel each shift of the animal’s weight against the ground, the slow dance toward him.
Jing Yo rose from where he was sitting. He had faced the tiger many times in his training. It was the spirit of his fears—the enemy within.
As a young trainee, Jing Yo had been exhorted to face the tiger as the dragon—to assume the power of water, endlessly mutable, energy ready to be channeled at a moment’s notice.
The tiger saw him and stopped.
“What are my fears today?” Jing Yo said to it. “Failure. Disgrace. Ego fears—fears of the temporary. I am of the eternal. I am the dragon. You are only a creature of the earthly moment.”
The animal moved its head, warning him to retreat. But that was just a tactic—show the slightest weakness, give even an inch to fear, and it would overwhelm you.
Jing Yo spread his fingers and pulled back his arms. His muscles flexed, then stiffened, ready for the attack.
Confronting the tiger did not guarantee victory. But it was nonetheless the necessary course.
“Ha-ah!” said Jing Yo, moving his right foot forward as he brought his arms up into attack position.
The tiger growled. Its shoulders pushed back, gathering strength for a pounce.
“Ha-ah!” said Jing Yo again.
The tiger growled, lower this time, then leaned to its left. In an instant, all of its weight shifted—and it slunk backward through the grass, retreating.
Fear could be controlled; that was the lesson today. It was a lesson he had learned many years before, and had relearned many times since. It was a lesson he would learn many times in the years to come.
A voice shook Jing Yo from his meditation.
“Incredible—you scared the damn tiger away!”
Jing Yo turned to find Sergeant Wu squatting on the ground, a few feet away. Wu rose slowly, trembling.
“I thought one of us—I thought one of us was going to be its breakfast,” said Wu. “You stared him down. I can’t believe it.”
“Why are you without your weapon?”
“I came looking for you,” said the sergeant. “Colonel Sun wants to talk to you.”
“Check on the sentries,” said Jing Yo, walking back up the hill. “Make sure they are aware there is a tiger in the jungle.”
“Of course.”
One of the helicopter’s crewmen was waiting with the chopper’s secure radio. Jing Yo took the handset and held it to his ear.
“What are you doing, Lieutenant?” snapped Colonel Sun. “Sleeping?”
“Meditating.”
“Do your meditation later. The attack time is moved up. The tower must be taken within the hour.”
“Yes, Colonel.”
“Don’t fail in this, Lieutenant.”
You are a fearful man, thought Jing Yo as he handed the handset back.
~ * ~
The men were groggy but did not complain when Jing Yo woke them. They donned their fake Vietnamese uniforms and filed toward the helicopter at a deliberate pace; no one ran, and no one lagged behind. They were veterans now, Jing Yo thought; they were just
beginning to understand who they were.
It took three battles to test a man. His action in the first could not be counted for anything. War was too confusing to be sorted into categories the first time it was experienced; keeping your balance amid the blows was impossible until you understood where those blows might come from, let alone how much they hurt.
The second battle was almost always a reaction to the first. A man who had frozen might do the opposite, making a grave mistake. A person who had acted like a hero might be filled with the dread he had ignored during his first battle and be overwhelmed. There was no predicting.
So the third battle was the real test. By the third battle, the sound of gunfire, the rumble of the earth as a bomb went off—neither of these things was new. The soldier had survived two encounters, as a hero or a coward, or more likely as something in between. Stripped of his illusions, a man would face himself.
Jing Yo’s third battle had come long ago. So had Wu’s—a good sergeant, competent and loyal, in his way, Jing Yo decided. For most of the rest of the squad, this would be only the second.
Much room for error.
“We are being queried by their air traffic controller,” said the pilot five minutes after they were airborne.
“Very good.” Jing Yo turned to his men. “Be ready.”
They were quiet. He couldn’t read their faces in the shadow-laced interior, but he didn’t have to; he knew their expressions would mix fear, anticipation, and even joy. He gripped the hand strap on the metal framework between the cockpit and crew compartment and began breathing slowly, pushing his ribs against the armored vest, easing it outward and then pulling it inward. The pit of his stomach was empty.
“They’ve accepted us,” said the pilot. “Three minutes to the airport.”
Jing Yo looked over and caught Sergeant Wu’s eye. He nodded.
“Prepare!” yelled the sergeant.
The commandos rose as one from the benches. Weapons were readied, belts cinched.
Jing Yo saw the airport runway through the window as they began to bank into a landing pattern. A pair of MiGs—probably inoperable, according to the premission briefing—were parked in a tarmac apron area at the far end. A civilian aircraft was on the opposite taxiway, waiting to take off.
There was a helicopter nearby. And a second one.
Were they being sucked into a trap?
Two helicopters? There was generally only one—it was a bit of deception they were counting on.
Did the Vietnamese know they were imposters?
Jing Yo twisted around and leaned into the space between the two pilots.
“There are two helicopters at the airport,” he said. “Did they ask questions?”
“No,” said the copilot. He was a Vietnamese language specialist, chosen specifically because he sounded like a native.
Or had he been chosen because he was someone’s nephew? In China, one could never be absolutely sure, and Jing Yo’s Vietnamese wasn’t sufficient for him to judge the man’s abilities.
“Lieutenant, we are almost over the runway,” said the pilot.
“Proceed as planned,” said Jing Yo. He reached into his pocket for his earplugs, slipping them into his ears as he joined his men.
The helicopter skimmed forward, exactly as it would do if landing on an ordinary flight. It then began to veer to the left, toward the designated parking area near the civilian terminal. At the last second, the pilot flexed his control, jolting the chopper upward. They flew another three hundred meters, hopping over the terminal building, past the security gate, and right next to the small parking area flanking the tower.
When they’d rehearsed the landing, the lot had always been filled with cars. Today it was empty. That allowed the helicopter pilot to put down closer to the tower than planned, shaving precious seconds off the timetable. But as he hit the pavement, Jing Yo realized the lack of cars might mean there were no workers—it might really be the trap he feared.
Too late.
“Go! Go! Go!” shouted Sergeant Wu.
One team raced for the building; a second, headed by Wu, ran to the auxiliary shack next door, taking out the phone lines that connected the base with the outside world. When that was accomplished, the second team would split up, half providing security at the base of the tower and the other half circling around the far side of the runway, aiming to take out two antiaircraft guns there.
The point man for the tower group, Private Han, and Corporal Chen were already at the tower door. They had it open—no locks, no need for explosives.
It must be a trap.
“Move! Move!” shouted Jing Yo, the last one out of the chopper.
The helicopter was already up. If it was a trap, they were doomed.
The smell of burning metal hit Jing Yo’s nose as he pushed into the building. He hadn’t heard any gunfire yet, but he could smell that too as he started up the metal steps that led to the control area. The building, opened only within the past year, was basically a staircase topped by a large glass-enclosed room where the flight controllers worked. There were no security checks at each landing, just more steps.
Jing Yo slung his feet on the metal treads, jogging upward. He kept his head up, eyes darting. There were shouts above, but still he hadn’t heard gunfire.
The earplugs were good, but not that good.
Have I gone deaf? he asked himself. Did someone throw one of the loud grenades, a flash-bang, to get into the control room?
No—he heard the voices around him, barely muffled by the plugs. And he heard his own steps, the slight rasp on the metal.
The steps came up into the middle of the control room. Jing Yo saw the rail as he approached and put out his arm. Accelerating, he leapt upward, vaulting over the pipe and landing only a few feet from the console area.
Three men lay on the floor, blood pooling around their heads. All Vietnamese. One of their pistols lay on the floor; the others hadn’t managed to unholster their weapons.
“The tower is ours,” said Corporal Chen.
Jing Yo scanned the consoles quickly. They seemed to be working.
“Geijui, get to the radio,” Jing Yo told the corporal who had been trained as an air controller. He was to use the Vietnamese circuits to broadcast to the incoming flights.
A body lay in front of the console where Geijui was to work. He hesitated, his face pale.
“Bring the bodies downstairs,” Jing Yo told Chen. “Put them below the steps. Quickly. Then make sure there are no charges set anywhere inside.”
As the squad got to work, there was an explosion outside. Jing Yo pushed up on the console and craned his neck to see if it had been the auxiliary shed, but all he could see was the shack’s black sloped roof.
Sergeant Wu ran up the stairs a few moments later.
“Pin and Fushan are at the door,” said Wu. “The rest of the team is going for the antiair gun at the southeast.”
“Good,” said Jing Yo.
“Now comes the fun part,” added Wu.
Jing Yo picked up a pair of binoculars from the shelf below the window and began scanning the airstrip. The Vietnamese unit responsible for providing security to the base had not yet reacted; no troops were pouring from the barracks, no messengers running frantically from the headquarters building.
Jing Yo pulled out his radio and sent the prearranged signal that the tower had been taken: “The ostrich has been beheaded.”
Before he could return the radio to its pocket in his vest, a cloud of black smoke appeared beyond the runway. The bombardment had begun.
“Direct the fire,” Wu told Chen, handing over the radio. “Tell them they have a good hit.”
Jing Yo went to the door at the side of the room, which opened onto a metal catwalk that surrounded the tower. Privates Ai Gua and Han were already there, lining up their rocket-grenade launchers on the mobile antiaircraft emplacements at the northern side of the field.
The flak guns were four-barreled ZSU-23
cannons mounted on tank chassis. Though old, they were devastating weapons against slow-moving aircraft, helicopters especially.
The back of Ai Gua’s launcher flared as his grenade shot out. A second later, white smoke enveloped the farthest truck. Han fired next, scoring a direct hit on the gun next to the one Ai had hit.
The other antiair unit began firing at the tower a few seconds later. The barrage was thick but at first missed the tower completely, shooting wildly high and well off to the side. The swarm of bullets moved toward them slowly, slamming into the tower almost directly below where Jing Yo was standing before moving across.
