Chapter 8

While talking to Bill Jones, Jerry remembered his conversation with the Special Forces Sergeant Major, in Nha Trang.

“Mister Jones, what about those MACV people? They talked to me first,” Jerry said.

Jones shrugged nonchalantly. “No problem, we all work for the same folks, I’ll let them know you are joining us. Now you need to go pack your things, and say goodbye to your buddies; because you should be getting orders the day after tomorrow, and fly out the next day. I’ll have someone here alert your unit,” Jones said.

Jerry was skeptical about getting anything done that quick. He knew the Brigade Personnel Section moved with glacial slowness. But surprisingly, that’s the way it went, and on Friday morning Jerry was on a C-130 headed south to Saigon. He was excited about visiting the large city but nervous about starting something new, especially since Bill hadn’t really told him anything about the assignment. But the opportunity to make a better life for his mother and sisters overruled any doubts he had.

Jerry was receiving regular letters from his mother that included notes from his sisters. His mother said they were doing fine on the money he was sending home and Ida Flood confirmed that they seemed to be doing okay. The fact that his family was making it, was good; but the prospect of them having a little more than enough, was wonderful.

The C-130 landed at Tan Son Nhut Air Force Base. He didn’t know it at the time, but Tan Son Nhut would be his base of operations for the remainder of his time in Vietnam. A jeep picked up Jerry and Bill Jones at the apron of the runway and drove them to a complex of nondescript buildings behind two large hangers. The buildings were inside an eight-foot chain link fence topped with razor wire. In front of the fence was a triple stack of concertina wire. The entry gate was manned by armed Vietnamese guards.

Jerry thought it strange that there were no signs or identifying markings other than a number painted on the left of the entry of each building. Jones took Jerry to building four where they passed through another check point just inside the door. He stopped at the check point and signed them in and then turned to speak to Jerry.

“Welcome to Project Kappa, this is the admin center. We are loosely affiliated with MACV-SOG, you could say we are in the same church but different pews. That’s how we got your name. You are now assigned to Headquarters Company, Services Battalion, Military Assistance Command Vietnam, but you are on detached duty to Joint Task Force 17. Your mailing address will be, Headquarters, MACV, JTF 17. No need to memorize that, it will be in your in processing paperwork. We are a joint task force because we have people from all services, some folks from civilian agencies and servicemen from three foreign countries. Did you get all that?”

Jerry nodded, “Got it,” he said.

So began Jerry’s life attached to the Central Intelligence Agency. He had to admit that, so far, he was impressed. He had what he considered deluxe accommodations because he had his own room in the NCO billets. There was an indoor bathroom and shower down the hall. The chow was most excellent with sit down meals in an Air Force dining facility.

After a day of in processing, Bill Jones caught up with him at the mess hall.

“I figured you’d be here, I know you field soldiers hate to miss a hot meal,” he said with a laugh.

Jerry finished masticating the chewy piece of mystery meat in brown gravy before replying. “I’m a growing boy,” he said.

Jones was a very affable man. He had a good sense of humor and treated everyone equally well. Jerry liked him but was leery of the way Jones parsed out information. Jerry had been there two days and around Jones for five, yet he still didn’t know what his job was going to be. So he brought it up with Bill.

“Exactly what will I be doing here?” he asked.

“Well, that’s not for sure yet,” said the ever-evasive Jones, “it depends on the school you start Monday. We are going to send you a few miles up the road to the First Infantry Division base camp at Di An. You’ll take an advanced marksmanship course there.”

Jerry perked up at the mention of more marksmanship training, because shooting was by far his favorite military activity.

“That would be great Mist ... I mean Bill. What kind of weapons are we talking? I familiarized with a lot of different ones at Recondo.”

“We have a new version of the M-14 we’d like you to try out. Its designation is the XM-21. We are sending you up there with six of them, you pick the one you want and give the rest to the course instructors. You’ll also have three cases of some kind of fancy bullets for the rifles. You keep what you need and pass on the rest with the extra rifles. How does that sound? “ Jones replied.

That sounded like a good deal to Jerry.

Of course, as was usual with Bill Jones he’d given Jerry only half the story. Sunday Jerry climbed into the cab of a deuce and a half filled with supplies bound for Di An and the First ID base camp. Mixed in with the number 10 cans of vegetables and cases of C Rations was a lot of six XM-21 rifles with 3x9 Redfield scopes and 3000 rounds of 7.62x51mm, M118, match grade ammo.

Upon arriving at Di An he had to wait while other supplies were unloaded before he could get directions to the First Division S-3 Operations Center. Jerry was told to report to the S-3 Training NCO wearing his uniform with the 173^rd shoulder patch. If asked he was to reference his old unit. Jones had also provided him with a cover story for arriving with the rifles and ammo.

Jerry was very surprised that the training involved much more than just shooting the XM-21. And boy-o-boy did he like that rifle. With his excellent eyesight Jerry was hitting targets out to 500 meters with just the iron sights. With the scope he was consistently getting bullseyes at half a mile.

Scout Sniper was the name of the course and it seemed to be made for Jerry because of his upbringing. His experience hunting with his namesake Cherokee grandfather, Jericho Hatchett, taught him the patience and field craft for the course to build on. At the end of two weeks Jerry was sneaky silent death, and he was convinced he had the finest rifle ever made.

Jerry found out what his new job was after he returned from Scout/Sniper. It was something he was eminently qualified for but maybe not emotionally mature enough to survive.

Jerry and his spotter crawled for two nights to reach a hide site that afforded them concealment and a good line of fire. Both men stoically endured the hardship and pressed on. Jerry and his spotter had been Team Mountaineer for four months now and this was their sixth mission.

His teammate quickly became the best friend he’d ever had. He was an Australian Staff Sergeant on loan from the Special Air Service (SAS) Regiment. His name was Sean McDonald. Staff Sergeant McDonald was in his early thirties and had 12 years of service. He was a jungle fighting expert who perfected his craft in Borneo during the Indonesian Confrontation and six months in the Republic of Vietnam. McDonald was also a competent sniper but did not have Jerry’s amazing 20-10 vision. He was also the team leader; he was Mountaineer 1-0 and Jerry was Mountaineer 1-1.

The hide site was on a hillside overlooking a small village. Intel sources identified the Village Elder as the Commander of the troublesome local Viet Cong cell. It was Team Mountaineer’s job to eliminate the Elder because three searches of the village failed to turn up him, any VC, or any weapons. They somehow knew when American or South Vietnamese forces were coming and disappeared.

They spent a day and night in their hide site before catching a break on day five of the mission. It was near dark, and Sean had eyes on the village through his M-49 spotter scope when he saw a man enter one of the half dozen hog pens scattered among the grass and bamboo huts. The man immediately caught Sean’s attention because of the time of day and because the village women usually fed the swine. The man waded through the muck to the middle of the pen and then reached down and pulled up a trap door buried in the mud and pig feces. He disappeared into the hole and emerged a couple of minutes later with an AK-47, NVA web gear and a couple of Chicom Type 42 grenades.

Sean elbowed Jerry and pointed down to the village. Jerry swept the area with his scope and even though it was almost dark he spotted another man exiting a hog pen armed to the teeth. Jerry raised his head from his scope and Sean whispered in his ear.

“No wonder they couldn’t find anything. We need to move back and call this in Mate, but I wish I could be here when they blow up all that pig shit.”

Scout/Sniper Team Mountaineer’s operational tempo was a mission every three weeks. Each mission lasted two to five days depending on the target. They ended up doing as much scouting as they did target elimination because more worthwhile targets sometimes popped up incidental to the mission. The mission that funny man Sean named Operation Pig Shit was a sterling example. Sent to eliminate one man they ended up causing the destruction of a major VC unit.

They operated in every area of the country, so they didn’t draw attention in any one AO (area of operations). And they were inserted into their mission areas in different ways to avoid setting a pattern. One of their favorites was to tag along with a unit in the area and stay behind when the unit withdrew. It was a very effective strategy because the bad guys came out of hiding after the American unit departed. They took out a number of North Vietnamese Advisors and Political Cadre with that technique.

Mister Jones had been truthful about him making extra money working for him. Every month Jerry received three each one-hundred-dollar, Postal Money Orders. Jones explained that they couldn’t pay him in cash because if Jerry bought that many money orders a month the mail clerk would turn his name into the CID, (Criminal Investigation Division). Soldiers who bought more than two hundred and fifty dollars in money orders were automatically flagged. Unfortunately, there were more than a few soldiers involved in the black market. And since American Currency was forbidden in Vietnam, ((MPC (Military Payment Certificates) were used instead), one of the only ways to get money out of the country was with money orders.

Jones (Sean clued him in that the name was probably an alias) was nominally Jerry and Sean’s handler, but he was not involved in any operational details. Their missions were directed and coordinated from the JTF 17 TOC (Tactical Operations Center). The TOC was an extremely secure concrete bunker in the center of the compound. When a target was designated, the TOC called them in, gave them a mission briefing, a target folder, and five days to plan. At the end of five days the team briefed back the TOC Commander. If the plan was approved, they launched. So far, every plan they presented was approved.

Jerry saw Jones a few times a month, sometimes in passing and at least once to pick up his money orders. So, Jerry was curious when Jones sent for him and Sean one day between missions. Jerry had been in country eleven months and had lost much of his naivety. Sean had helped with that by explaining how things really worked. Consequently, Jerry knew that the nature of their missions might not pass muster with some American Citizens, hence the secrecy. Jerry had a much narrower view of what he was doing. He was a soldier, they were the enemy, and Jerry didn’t see a big difference between toting an AK or coercing someone else into toting it. His conscience was clear.