Opinions on War
Q: What was the attitude of the south Vietnamese soldier towards the war?
When there’s a national emergency, the heroes always volunteer first, right? And so the heroes go off to battle and so forth, and they get killed and so forth, and then fighting the French, fighting the Viet Cong, after all those years of fighting, what was left? So basically the South Vietnamese Army was tatters. And they were in the most, when I heard, when I would get the word that they were gonna, we had to have the Vietnamese embedded with us, you know to go out on operations and so forth, it was just the worst possible thing that could happen. They chattered all the time, they would smoke, they would, it’s just, you can’t do that. You can’t even wear, you don’t wear cologne, anything like that because out in the jungle you can smell cologne. You don’t do that kind of stuff, but when somebody’s smoking, or the chatter, or they light up a cigarette, they were totally undisciplined, and I had absolutely no respect for any of the Vietnamese soldiers we ever worked with. I’m not saying there weren’t some that were good, but it was a nightmare to have to work with them, and you could see why they would never be able to hold out once the Americans left.
Q: How were you able to keep your platoon motivated and focused on the task at hand?
It was like “What am I doing here? What’s the big deal about this? I don’t have my buddies here. Why are we fighting?” And so as platoon leader, this is what I said to my soldiers. I was first rifle platoon leader, then weapons platoon leader, then for the last six months I was the XO and so I had the responsibility to give the orientation to the guys, and I said, “Gentlemen, this is the reason we’re here. We are here so that Phan Thi Thu Ha and her brothers and sisters can have a good life. We’re here so Phan can write poems, he can make songs” and so forth, “so that people can have the same freedoms of expression and the good life that we have. And that’s what we’re doing here.” And for some of the guys it seemed to work, and it was very important for them because if you go over there — and the Army did a very, very poor job of trying to motivate the soldiers, I thought — so you go over there and you lose and arm or a leg or you have a scar all the way down from your dick to your throat for the rest of your life. And what was the purpose of it? What was that sacrifice? But when you’re seeking for something to hang on to, you can say, “This is my proof of my trying to make life better for other people. This is what I dedicate it to. To democracy and freedom for other people.” And some of the guys actually told me that it made all the difference in the world for when something happened like that. It certainly made a difference for me.