Death in the Jungle Gary Smith (mobi reader txt) 📖

playing hide-and-seek. Up until that day, it always had been just a game; never again would it be just a game. Never again.

It became difficult to see in the dark, especially when the moon vanished behind the clouds. I had to rely on my ears. I listened hard. To hear things at any distance, I had to block out the hum of mosquitos circling my head. It was their supper time, but my tenderloins and hindquarters were underwater.

The buzzing became hypnotic when I allowed myself to relax too much. It reminded me of the purring of a rotating fan that I had liked to sleep to when I was a kid. I had to watch it to avoid dozing off. The mission had begun almost twenty hours before, and my head and eyes felt it.

I decided to close my eyes and trust my ears. My hearing was acute, and besides, I was a light sleeper. I was sure I’d be alert with any unusual noise.

Some time later, I woke up. At least I thought I had been asleep. Really, it was hard to say. I sensed that I had slipped over the edge between waking and sleeping, but I was not sure. Nothing seemed to have changed. It was still dark and the mosquitos were with me. I saw very little, and there were no distant sounds. The only difference I noted was the smell.

I smelled the jungle then, really for the first time. It was the odor of decomposing nipa palm. The smell of wet and rot. An Oriental smell like I’d not smelled before. It had probably been there all along, but I’d missed it. I hadn’t concentrated on it. But then it filled my nostrils and registered in my brain. The smell of Vietnam.

I looked in Bucklew’s direction, but I saw only black. Tugging once on the suspension line, I received no response. That meant he was asleep, or dead. I pulled again. The second time, he pulled back, once. I’m okay—you’re okay. Then we were alone with ourselves, again.

The night passed. Nothing happened. No sampans, no VC. Not even a croc, thank God.

The sun was sneaking up to peek at us, so we had to get on the move. Our extraction point was eight hundred meters and a couple hours south. At Lieutenant Meston’s signal, I climbed to my feet. Water rushed out of my clothing as I pulled Sweet Lips from the branches. She felt funny in my hands and I wasn’t sure why. Slipping her under my right arm, I rubbed my hands together. My skin felt like the exterior of a shriveled prune.

Bucklew motioned for me to roll up the suspension line. I did and shoved it in a pants pocket. A minute later, the platoon was ready to go.

Back on point, I was wet and cold in the cool morning air as I guided the platoon south toward the Quan Quang Xuyen. The sun was still struggling to climb over the horizon, but its quest had lit up the land. Ahead of me, some nipa palm trees looked black against the brightening sky.

Looking back down, I watched the water and protruding brush before and to the sides of me. Many nasty things could await me—booby traps, crocs, and snakes to name three. And then there were the NVA, gooks.

Fortunately, we made it all the way to the extraction point with nothing more to show than a souvenir skull and five million mosquito-inflicted puncture wounds for the seven of us. Four and a half million of them belonged to BT2 McCollum, our grenadier, who hadn’t worn his long johns. His facial expressions as we awaited the LCPL were a sight to behold, and his incessant scratching of his thighs told the whole story. He’d been had, royally.

Twenty minutes later, though, we were all on board the Navy boat and were headed back to the barracks at Nha Be Naval Base. I glanced from one SEAL to another, all seated and chattering; strict noise discipline was off. Each guy was wet and dirty, caked with mud. Filthy as they were, they were downright ugly, but it was a good-looking ugly to me. They were the bravest and toughest men in the world. They were my teammates, my buddies, my brothers. I would fight to the death for any one of them.

Personally, I was feeling really good, almost euphoric. I couldn’t wait to grab a shower, clean my gear, oil Sweet Lips, eat some vittles, and hit the rack. The thought of it all made me smile.

Mission One was a complete success. Seven men out, seven came back, all alive and well. Only McCollum would argue the point. Scratch, scratch.

CHAPTER TWO

Mission Five

“That is at bottom the only courage demanded of us: to have courage for the most strange, the most singular and the most inexplicable that we may encounter.”

Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

DATE: 3, 4 September 1967

TIME: 030315H to 041030H

COORDINATES: YS143736

UNITS INVOLVED: Foxtrot, 1st Squad, MST-3

TASK: Line reconnaissance and river ambush

METHOD OF INSERTION: LCM-6 (Mighty Moe)

METHOD OF EXTRACTION: LCM-6

TERRAIN: Mangrove swamp

MOON: None

WEATHER: Cloudy

SEAL TEAM PERSONNEL:

Lt. Meston, Patrol Leader/Rifleman, M-16

RM2 Smith, Ass’t Patrol Leader/Point, shotgun

MM2 Funkhouser, Automatic Weapons, M-60

BT2 McCollum, Grenadier, M-79

ADJ3 Bucklew, Radioman/Rifleman, CAR-15

ENS Khan (LDNN SEAL), Rifleman, M-16

AZIMUTHS: 000 degrees

ESCAPE: 000 degrees CODE WORDS: Challenge and Reply—Two numbers total 10

There I was, back on point with Sweet Lips. I was moving through the mud of a mangrove swamp on my fifth mission. In the previous two weeks I’d been point man on three other missions; all had been uneventful. I wasn’t complaining. I was glad we’d had the good fortune to get a few placid missions under our belts; we had needed to get our feet wet, which we’d done in every sense of the phrase.

Mr. Meston liked me on point. He’d noticed my country-boy instincts and knew my Texas upbringing, so he’d put his faith in me. I’d reciprocated that trust. Since the first couple of missions, Mr. Meston