Howdy folks,
Completely Off-Topic. feh.
Fireworks for Christmas
It was Christmas Eve 1968. It wasn’t New Years, the normal holiday for fireworks, because the Vietnamese celebrated their New Year in February 1969. 1st Reconnaissance Battalion was stationed at Camp Reasoner, Danang, which was across the road from the Commanding General, 1st Marine Division, and next door to the 1st Marine Division band. We had our own Landing Zone (LZ#401) to take us out on patrol so we were able to be in the rear with the headquarters of the division. The camp was on the downslope of a ring of hills that included #327 Freedom Hill. This gave us a tremendous panoramic view of the rice paddies, Danang, the airbase and harbor. We watched from the slope between Alpha Company and the Mess Hall.
The fireworks at the highest were the 8” and 155mm artillery illumination rounds. These are flares on small parachutes that light up and drift slowly down. They last for a couple of minutes. Under these were the smaller artillery rounds like the 105mm howitzers.
Then came the starburst rounds. The airwing at Danang used all red and green star clusters. Then we had the various colored Pop-Ups and Pencil Flares. Among all this light show slowly drifting down were the various and sundry automatic weapons shooting tracers upward. They had replaced all the rounds with tracers. Hell, even Charlie was in on it and shooting AKs.
I’ve always thought of it as the Christmas present we gave to ourselves. It was perhaps one of the greatest uses of 6 figures worth of ordinance I’ve ever heard about.
Peace on Earth
S/Sgt R. V. Overton, Admin Chief, CoA, 1stReconBn, 1stMarDiv,
Danang, RVN March 1968-November 1969
Comments
Dan
@BenWP I've watched Apocalypse Now 4 times. Very well written in my opinion, and fully expresses the madness of that type of war. So much carryover from the cold war thinking and the battles of governments to control outcomes. Colonialism. Not much has changed. There are many choices for such depictions via movies; although one has to remain open minded, as there may always be a bias of presentation.
'Sand Pebbles' with Steve McQueen is worthy of watching for another colonialism perspective..... The Boxer Rebellion, also known as the Boxer Uprising, the Boxer Insurrection, or the Yihetuan Movement, was an anti-foreign, anti-colonial, and anti-Christian uprising in China between 1899 and 1901.
Yes, many of these movies have the human connection to establish some type of personal connection; but the ability exists to begin teaching those unaware of significant pieces of Global History and the many turning points.
Sidenote: In 1973 while traveling in Morocco, I came to know, for 2 days, a young Portuguese Marine, during a stay at a camp ground. He was 'on the run, A.W.O.L.' from the Marines. Mozambique, where he had been stationed, was part of the Empire of Portugal since about 1544. He had become sickened by the military atrocities against the population, which continued to rebel for their independence, which came forward in 1975. He was so fearful that he couldn't return to his country without being caught; although he was close, being in Morocco. I can't imagine his journey across Africa. I hope he found home again. And the same beat goes on today, eh? Can you say, 'Ukraine', etc. ?
@BenWP not sure, but apparently, this happened all over the country so it was fairly common for us.
Apocalypse Now was actually a very real depiction of one small aspect of the war. But a very small aspect. The Provisional Reconnaissance Units (PRUs) carried out this type of operations and they were the ones I heard about. We had a couple of career Marines that went from battalion recon to the PRUs. Many of the war movies are based upon a significant element of truth. Catch 22 is one of my favorites. I knew a guy that was robbing whore houses on a money conversion gambit. The Dong to $ was 7 to 1. Military Payment Certificates (MPC) was 1 to 1 with each. 'Crazy bell ringer was right. There's money to be made around here'. He'd go with $100 in dollars and swap for $400 in MPC and make a date for the following week $1000. Next week, he get's the money, pops a CS grenade, and runs to the waiting jeep. He was paying off everyone in the battalion to convert the MPC into dollars so he could mail it home. Pay was in a check or MPC and the only time you could get dollars was for R&R and going home. He was paying 20%.
@catch22 As for R&R. I went to Hong Kong on my tour and on my extension I went to Sydney, Bangkok and Taipei. Plus Okinawa 4 times coming and going. R&R was, 'who hasn't been?? 'who wants to go?'. For my free 30 day leave for extending in Vietnam, I went in Feb 1969 with Mont Tremblant as my destination and routed my flight thru Lansing, coming and going. In a 1 week period, I dropped 100 degrees in temperature. Today it would kill me.
and so it goes,
peace,
rono