Cheerful Obedience

Navigating the stormy seas of the 1960s wasn’t easy, especially if Vietnam was on your horizon.

Ignoring his 2-S selective service deferment, Conor Patrick McKall volunteers for the draft, and Uncle Sam promptly deposits him in the Big Green Machine.

Six months later McKall is walking point in jungles, rice paddies, and rubber plantations. In nine short months, he’s made an infantry squad leader responsible for a dozen other grunts. In the “boonies,” life is lived one day at a time.

Joining McKall’s squad is Jack “Red” Sheridan whose near-death encounter with a black panther presents challenges to his credibility from other members of Lima Platoon. When McKall stands with Sheridan, an unbreakable bond develops. They meet Red Cross Donut Dollies and together experience the infamous Black Virgin Mountain where the good guys control the top and the bad guys the rest.

Escaping Vietnam for a handful of days on R&R in Sydney, Conor experiences Aussie hospitality and the attention of a green-eyed beauty who offers him a chance to escape the war. Loyal to his oath and to his men, Sergeant McKall barely has time to supplant the fading scent of Chanel before he and his squad must face their determined and deadly adversaries. The arbitrary gauntlet of Vietnam offers no guarantees.

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Republic of Vietnam, June 1967

A door gunner nods to Badger as he climbs on Huey number six with his team plus McKall, Abel, and Sheridan. It is crowded. McKall and Sheridan sit with their legs hanging over, one on port side and the other on starboard. The men are loaded down with ammunition, smoke and frag grenades, Claymores, three or four canteens of water, C-rations for two days, entrenching tool, and sandbags. Shovels, axes, power saws, and five-gallon cans of gas will come out by supply slicks. These tools are necessary to accomplish digging in and constructing the BRO bunkers as quickly as the situation allows.

Word is this will be a hot LZ. Watching the terrain pass below, McKall is struck by the blend of rice paddies, rivers and streams, and jungle ranging from moderate to heavy showing multiple variations of green. God only knows what is covered up by that expansive canopy.

Open areas are interspersed throughout the terrain, and McKall is trying to figure out which ones are sufficient to allow a battalion to establish an NDP. Helps to keep one’s mind off what may be waiting at the end of this ride. In the distance the men can see the signs of battle. Smoke is rising, fueled by napalm dropped by USAF fighters, joined by gunships, as those unload on the jungle below. Artillery shells explode, sending branches and trees flying in all directions. The LZ is under motor attack. As the slicks begin the descent toward the LZ, McKall spies two medevacs ascending from the LZ returning to Lai Khe or to the nearest medical facility.

The platoons of Charlie Company have been instructed as to the locations assigned to them after touchdown. McKall’s squad is to move straight forward to the jungle line and secure the location of wounded men and the medics caring for them. McKall hollers to the others, “Exit immediately because this guy isn’t planning on parking this bird.” As the ten slicks come in for a landing the precision and timing of the skids gliding near to solid ground allows a truly short window for the enemy to unload on the slicks and their cargo. It is 1630 hours on June 17, 1967.

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