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In the early morning
hours, 1st platoon was inserted into a LZ to look for NVA that our
recon had spotted moving through the area. I remember the LZ was an
open field right next to a large wooded forest. We quickly exited
the choppers and my squad took the point. I took point myself and we
moved out. I can't remember who our LT was at that time. It may have
been LT Rees but I am just not sure. Anyway, I was given the order
to move out and given a direction to move.
Moving through the forest was relatively easy. I remember the forest
was flat, which made for an easy walk. We would move a ways then
stop and listen. Everything was very quiet. As we moved along I
began to notice a tree here and there that was cut down with what
appeared to have been cut with a saw. The cut was very smooth. I
asked one of my guys if they had ever seen anything like that and he
said no. I had never seen anything like this either and it was some
what puzzling. I called back for LT to come up and take a look. He
couldn't explain it either. We discussed this for a few more
minutes, when all of a sudden it hit both of us like a tone of
bricks, "Bunkers". The gooks had cut down the trees to build
bunkers. We passed the word back for everyone to stay alert. He told
me to move out but be very careful.
We moved deeper into the forest still noticing trees missing with
nothing but stumps left. Then all of a sudden I spotted a bunker. I
was no more than a few feet from the sucker. If someone had been
home I would not be here today. We immediately took cover. LT came
up and then we began to see more bunkers. They were so well
camouflaged that we had walked right into the middle of an NVA
bunker complex. It was frightening experience.
LT spread the rest of the platoon out and took my squad to
investigate the complex. It was completely empty. He moved up the
rest of the platoon and we began to search the bunkers. They were
very well built and it was my first chance to take a look at one.
The hole was about 4 ft. wide, 6 ft. long and about 4 ft. deep.
There were sleeping compartments cut into the back walls. The
overhead cover was also very well built. There was a layer of logs
then mud and then another layer of logs. The complex was located
next to a small stream. There was also thatched hooch about the size
of a small bedroom. Scattered around the complex were discarded
pieces of equipment. There were also bloody bandages scattered
around.
We had just missed what had to have been at least a company of NVA
if not more, because there were about 20 or 30 bunkers in this
complex. I know this was good thing for us because we had just
walked right into the middle of this bunker complex and not a one of
us had seen the first bunker until we were standing right smack in
the middle of the thing. |
