Part 12 (1/2)
”You and your d.a.m.ned blackboard,” the President said.
His eyes flashed. ”I thought you said we were winning the war. You said that after your last trip.”
General Whisenand stood next to the mantel. ”I said we Could win, sir,”
he said gently.
The President straightened up and looked at him from under furled brows.
”Didn't you set up some operations in Laos to stop supplies coming down that G.o.dd.a.m.n Trail”.
Didn't I say go ahead on that a few months back? What came of that?
What are the figures?”
”Sir, Air Force and Navy planes have stopped about eighty percent of the daylight traffic coming through the pa.s.ses.”
”What about traffic at night?” the President asked.
”Sir, in a short time we will be implementing increased night strikes on the Trail, and soon after we will have a night fast-FAC program using F-4 fighters that will use strike planes on the supply trucks.”
”What's a FACK?”
”FAC is the term we use for a Forward Air Controller, a man airborne in an airplane who searches for targets, then calls in strike aircraft to destroy them. They fly slow or fast planes. We want to use FACs to stop the traffic at night.”
Commander, 7th Air Force, had sent Whitey a coded backchannel TWX outlining the progress of the night FAC program they both thought necessary. To his surprise he read that a Major Courtland EdM.
Bannister was to head the unit. Court Bannister, and his half -brother, Shawn, were like nephews to him because Sam Bannister was his cousin.
”Night strikes will be tricky,” Whitey continued, ”but I think we can do it.” He didn't think it wise to tell the President that the Chief of Staff of the Air Force was less than enthusiastic about the fast FAC program in the daytime, much less at night.
”Plug that Trail and I'll win the war,” the President said.
”Sir, allow us to take out all the supplies and supply s.h.i.+ps and trucks and railroads before they hit the Trail and you'll maybe win the war.”
”G.o.dd.a.m.nit, Whisenand, how many times do I have to tell you? I don't want to start World War Three. I just want to keep those commie b.a.s.t.a.r.ds out of South Vietnam. You and those generals over in that five-sided c.r.a.phouse are all alike. You don't do what I want you to do.
You never listen to me, so I have to put the screws to you.” He waved his drink, animated once more with a tangible enemy at hand.
”That Kennedy general,” LBJ said, ”that Max Taylor. He had it right.
You read his book? That Trumpet book? fie had it right. He said the Joint Chiefs of Staff belong to the administration in power and are expected to be the spokes men for the President's policies. That's what I want. I want you generals to support my policies.”
”Mister President, General Taylor, as Chairman of the JCS, refused in July 1963 to let John Paul Vann brief the JCS on how bad the situation was in South Vietnam.”
”Well, maybe Taylor was right. We don't need any negative people now, do we? Just who the h.e.l.l is John Paul Vann?”
”Sir, John Paul Vann is a former infantry officer who served in Vietnam as an advisor, then got out of the Army.
He became a civilian advisor to serve better, he believed, the Vietnamese people who sincerely wanted to fight a communist takeover.”
”Well, I just don't want any negative reporting.” The President stared into the flames.
Negative reporting, Whitey mused. No, he doesn't want any negative reporting. He really can't accept that we are having trouble over there because of the restrictions. And he ce negotiations are close at hand.
thinks the subtlest of nuances from Ho Chi Minh means pea Whitey returned his thoughts to the fireplace room.
POTUS, President of the United States, didn't seem interested in following up on who John Paul Vann was, so Whitey didn't continue.
There was a knock on the door. After the President barked an enter command, his senior military aide, an Army brigadier, walked in. He held a teletype message and looked ashen.
”What is it now? What does that say?” the President asked irritably.
”Sir,” the brigadier began. He was nervous and shaking.
”The Viet Cong have attacked in force all over Vietnam. The air base at Tan Son Nhut, MACV Headquarters, and the city of Cholon are taking heavy fire. Hue City is invaded.
And the wall of the United States Emba.s.sy in Saigon has been breached.”
1145 HOURS LOCAL, WEDNESDAY 31 JANUARY 1968.
QUANG TRI ARMY AntrxELD, NORTHERN I CORPS REPUBLIC of VIETNAM The late-morning rainsquall pelted the Quang Tri runway and the tin roof of the operations shack next to it with such ferocity that the two men inside had to stop talking rather than shout to make each other heard.
An overhead light bulb shone on a wall map of the entire I Corps area. A major, a tall, well-built man wearing a two-piece Army Nomex flight suit, traced the flight path from where they were at Quang Tri to the Special Forces camp at Lang Tri, 35 miles to the west. Black thread outlined Army aviator wings and a parachutist's badge on the major's left breast, and his name, Doug Clifton, on the right. He was the commanding officer of C Troop (Armored) in one of the Air Cavalry units at Quang Tri. They flew the UH- IC helicopter guns.h.i.+ps. These particular s.h.i.+ps, called the Huey Hog, mounted a variety of weaponry ranging from two 7.62mm M60 door guns to a chin turret firing 40mm grenades. Pilots loved the XM-5 system using the M75 grenade launcher that chunked 240 grenades a minute out as far as 1,500 meters.
Birds with these chin turrets were called chunkers; or thumpers because of the sound the launch charge made as it propelled the grenade from the stubby barrel. The same device, the M79 grenade launcher used by ground troops, was called the blooper for the same reason. Other versions of the Hog carried, in addition to the chin turret, combinations of 2.75inch rocket launchers, four 7.62min M60 machine guns, and/or two 5.62mm miniguns that fired 4,000 rounds per minute. A s.h.i.+p with just the 2.75-inch rockets and two miniguns was called a Frog. A Slick was the larger UH- I H that carried up to fourteen troops. The only protection for a Slick was two door gunners firing mounted M60 7.62mm machine guns. When the rain noise subsided, the major continued.
”Cougar is responsible for all ground and air a.s.sets in the Khe Sanh-Lang Tri area. His message says he backs his colonel at Khe Sanh who won't risk the two Marine rifle companies set up to relieve Lang Tri. He says there is a hundred-percent chance of an ambush on the road to Lang Tri. And he will not risk Marine helicopters because, he says, all the LZs at Lang Tri are surrounded by NVA. Understand, Colonel Lochert, we don't have command authority to launch you and your troops in Army helicopters. In other words I'm not allowed to fly you to Lang Tri.”
The man listening was Wolf Lochert. His jaw was clenched, bushy black eyebrows knotted in concentration.
”I know all that,” he growled. ”And I know Westmoreland so far, note I say 'so far,' agrees with Cougar.”
Cougar was Lieutenant General Robert Cushman, the commander of the III MAF (Marine Amphibious Force).
There had been some problems between Cushman and his theater boss, General Westmoreland. Westmoreland felt Cushman was reluctant to use the forces he had placed at his disposal, particularly the Army forces.
Westmoreland also didn't like the way Cushman was employing air power, particularly USAF' air support. He simply was not using it.
General Cushman had been fighting the concept that COMUSMACV wanted, in which Commander, 7th Air Force, would be the single manager for the use of air power in South Vietnam. Under that method Cushman would no longer have exclusive control over his Marine fighter aircraft. If Cushman had used USAF air better, and given Marine air support to the Army's 1st Cavalry Division, the problem probably would not have arisen.
Lochert continued. ”Bull Dall has been to MACV and later called Westmoreland three times with no results.”
Lochert remembered his conversation as he flew to Nha Trang earlier with Colonel Bull Dail. Wolf had told him about the attack by Huey Dan and the TV film of his killing the Vietnamese. Dail had nodded and said that war manifested itself in ways both strange and h.e.l.lish, that Wolf wasn't to worry, the Army would take care of him.
Then Dail had briefed Wolf on the situation in I Corps between the Marines and the Special Forces. Dail had become almost incoherent with anger. ”Wolf,” he had said, ”we are going to send help, I don't care what the Marines say. Get some troops and work something out at Quang Tri for transportation.” Wolf was now at Quang Tri trying to work something out.
”How about you fly us to Lang Tri or I'll break your legs,” Lieutenant Colonel Wolf Lochert said to Major Doug Clifton in a menacing voice. He was deadly serious.
”I get your point, Colonel. You're trying to protect my a.s.s if I'm hauled up on charges when we get back. All I do is plead coercion and I get off.” Clifton smiled at the fiercely scowling Wolf Lochert. ”Look, I've never met you before, but I've heard a lot about you.”