Chapter 6

I never met anyone quite like the General.

He was not what you would say “old”. Then again, he was not a young man. He was extremely tall. I think it was his sense of height that impressed me the most. The locals must be overwhelmed with his very size. Next thing that was so noticeable was the guns. He wore 2 silver plated .45s sitting high under his armpits in custom made holsters, not the useless holsters they issue in an armory. He wore the most opaque shades I have ever seen, except maybe in a commercial back stateside.

The single star said it all.

I wanted to jump to my feet and salute because of my Army years of training. But Marines don’t do that kind of shit indoors. It was just one of the nuances of differences between soldiers and Marines.

The two dark figures that shadowed him were almost invisible, they perched on the back of your mind like ghosts in a mist. They looked to me like a pair of heavily-armed “Yards” from the back country. They were the head hunting kind of indigenous tribesmen.

About a half dozen assorted nasty characters stayed with the vehicles on the street. It was almost certain enemy eyes were watching. You could take it to the bank that enemy eyes watched every move by every round eye in country.

Tran got the picture real good and I saw him scooting off home for safer surroundings.

“Well, son, you been doing some good work for me. You ever hear tell of the CAP?”

I vaguely had heard of a loose organization of Marines, Corpsmen, and ARVN who had sustained horrific casualties in the recent TET offensive. They were the first line of friendly forces spread into the smallest of villages in miniscule numbers. Usually only a dozen Marines and 20 – 30 ARVN comprised a single self-sustaining unit. Almost all the units were over-run in the first 24 hours of the offensive and only about half of the Marines made it back to centralized Group camps. I don’t have the figures, and it has been 43 years, but it seems like about 1,800 KIA or MIA just in a 14 day time span. Most of the ARVN just melted away. Pretty much didn’t have much choice considering the overwhelming odds against them.

Despite the losses, the program was a great success in retrospect. Close to 300 units spread all across I Corps area of operation. I didn’t know most of that in the restaurant that evening, so I honestly answered,

“Not very much, Sir.”

“I want you to take Tran with you. That was him I saw outside, right?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“I want you both to go over to the CAP (Combined Action Program) Headquarters down there by China Beach and start up a language program for the CAP Marines. Can you do that as a special favor for me, son?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“You keep an eye on Tran, Hear? He has got an awful lot of strange friends in strange places.”

“Yes, Sir.”

I already knew that about Tran, but I figured his value to me was well worth the trade-off of the risk.

“I want you to keep an eye out for leaks, you get me?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“We got us some rats in the barn, Sergeant, rats in the barn. You find them, I’ll tend to them.”

“Yes, Sir. Aye, Aye, Sir.”

“I think you got a promotion waiting for you up in the G-2. But, I would suggest staying away from that place. Out of sight, out of mind, you catch my drift?”

“Yes, Sir”

That was the first and last time I saw the General. Some State Department turd got him transferred to Japan after being pressured by a South Vietnamese counterpart. I figured the General was a mite bit too effective for their liking.

I hitched a ride to the junction close to Tran’s neighborhood and walked to the house. I was recognizable now and no alarms were set off. Blending in even in uniform was a difficult thing to do. I kept my conversation with the General on the QT and acted real surprised a couple of days later when Tran excitedly told me we had both been reassigned to a camp in China Beach. The orders read “assigned for duty with Combined Action Group 2, CAP Headquarters, China Beach, RVN.”