Larry Bryan, U.S. Army, My Journey to Vietnam

Where to start?  What experiences that I was exposed to influenced my life and resulted in my living in a tent in the jungles of Vietnam?  Time permits what I can share and common sense tells me that I don’t want to bore you with events of what I consider a commonplace life.  Hence, I will fast-forward through activities at East High, West Point, Airborne School and Ranger School, all of which served to make me who I am and how I navigated to my journey to Vietnam. (Right, Larry Bryan, 1960)

I’ll start my journey with my assignment to the 173rd Airborne Brigade, located on the Japanese island of Okinawa, site of the last major battle of WWII.  Here I was assigned as a forward observer to a 105mm artillery battery. Previous graduates of West Point were normally sent to a six-week basic officer course to teach new officers what they were expected to know to perform their jobs.  I was given a thick book entitled FM 6-40 that explained everything I was expected to know.  So, my classmates and I spent a lot of personal time studying and following our sergeants around.

The 173rd was the reserve force for the 7th Army, located in the Pacific and Southeast Asia.  As such, we would hold surprise periodical rallies as if we were getting a callout to be airlifted to some hot spot needing our presence.  Thus, early one morning in May, we had a callout and, rather than returning to our battery area to clean and store our equipment, we were told to prepare to embark on a landing ship transport for an indefinite period to serve as a security force for the Bien Hoa Air force Base.  I was assigned as the billeting officer responsible for assigning rooms for all the company grade officers.  My roommate and I had the best rooms on board except for the majors and colonels.  I also learned to play bridge on the five day trip.  I guess the captains needed someone to yell out for bad bidding.

We unloaded the brigade at Vung Tou, known as the Vietnam Riviera.  Not a shot was fired as we moved in ashore.  From there we moved in convoys to the Bien Hoa Air Base.  Shortly after we moved into our positions I had an occasion to be driving on the air base perimeter road.  There was a clear blue sky and I saw an O1E “Spad” flying over the end of the runway, trailing a long string of black smoke.  I could hear the engine sputtering as the pilot nosed the plane over.  I could see him jump from the plane. Then I saw the parachute fail to open and the pilot fall into a rice paddy at the end of the runway.  A bad day.  I still see that plane and wonder about the events of that day.

173rd Airborne at Bien Hoa, 1965

A typical operation in Vietnam involved loading several helicopters with soldiers at a base camp and flying them to an operation area where the soldiers are offloaded in a combat assault.  There are many opportunities for one to think about getting hurt or worse.  When this is done for the first time, many other fears surface as you pray to not screw up or fail to do your job.  For me and about fifty 18-25 year-old men that first time involved a company-sized unit being air-lifted into a landing zone and following a dry creek bed for several days to look for the enemy.  I was their forward observer for this operation.  The helicopter ride was okay, but this was only my second ride on a helicopter and the absence of seat belts was a surprise.  Fortunately, no enemy waited for us on the LZ.  We had followed the creek bed for several hours when we heard gun fire ahead.  Suddenly, everyone was firing into the brush along the creek bed.  The young soldier next to me was shooting a M78  grenade launcher firing 40mm grenades as fast as he could load them.   The grenades were hitting the brush in front of us and bouncing down at my feet.  What should I do?  Some soldiers fall on these and save persons around them and get medals of valor.  Again fortunately, the captain ordered a cease fire and I didn’t have to make that decision.  I gathered up the grenades, handed them to the soldier who had fired them and counseled him that the shells need to travel a certain distance before they arm.  As we resumed our trek down the creek bed, we passed the body of one enemy soldier.  One more story about my journey to Vietnam.