M Y O B

My letter of September 27th, 1968 continued:

Since the border is officially closed, there isn’t much for the customs people there to do, & they had to spend nearly 1/2 hr looking for the tax stamps (about 3¢US) required on the paper-work for the motor! But, at length, I proceeded. From Aranya Pradet to the intersection with Hiway 33, there is no pavement, & what with recent rains, the road was pretty bad in spots—slippery and muddy. When I got to pavement (about 60 km) the machine was covered with red laterite mud; but I ran into another storm almost at once which washed the worst of that off very quickly. I sat this one [storm] out [in a bus shelter] with a family whose son spoke  fair English, & so passed a pleasant half hour or so. Pressing on, dodging a couple more storms, I reached Chachoengsao just at dusk, and checked into a brand-new hotel, where I had a very comfortable room for US$1.75. Not much edible food, though (had a bowl of Chok, the Thai version of Chinese Soup; it has every imaginable [& some unimaginable] thing in it) but it is not bad. The next AM Ieft about 7:30 & was just nicely under way, with nice warm sun & cool breeze, when I had the first flat tire of the trip. The stem pulled out of the “chambre d’air”—inner tube—and it went flat instantly. That took about 3/4 hr to fix by the road-side (I had a spare tube), & I then proceeded as before.

Flat Tire

BACKSTORY: Chachoengsao was a very frontier-ish sort of place. I met up with a group of pretty rough-looking guys who wanted me to take them to a movie: having nothing else to do, I did. The “theater” was a tent with some old wooden bleachers; the projector was an old 16mm, and the movie was an ancient US “western”. The boys—six of them with me—obligingly sat up on the rear-most seat, where it quickly became apparent some of them at least were horny: lots of clutching at their own crotches, a universal signal! With some trepidation I groped the boy nearest to me and found him hard. One thing led to another, as the old saying goes: in the end, we all jacked off together and left quite a mess behind. They all wanted to come to my hotel, but this I felt unwise, so when the movie was over I sent them on their way. It was cheap fun: the cost for the seven of us to watch the movie was less than a dollar!

The Thai’s drive on the left—which is a bit harrowing in itself, as I’m unfamiliar with that approach of course. They also drive like madmen, just as the Cambodians, but of course traffic is much heavier. One reaches the outskirts of Bangkok about 40 km out, and from there on traffic gets very heavy. I arrived about noon, wandered around till I found a reasonable hotel, took a nice lunch & flaked out for the afternoon!

I’ve decided to proceed to Singapore. This will take me down the Kra Isthmus, along the west coast of Malaysia, through Penang to Kuala Lumpur & eventually to Singapore. Depending on how my money lasts, I might go from there to Darwin, Australia, & by train from there to Melbourne (friends there, C&E people), but that is speculation. Accordingly, I put the Honda into the Agency Shop today for a check-up & engine overhaul: it has 7000 miles that I know of on it, maybe more, and this is the first place I’ve hit with a Honda-accredited repair team. Although the machine has run well, I want it to be in first-class shape for the next leg of the journey: it is 1000 miles, just to the Thai border, almost as far as Kuala Lumpur, and about half that to S-pore! So I shall have a week or two here in BK—about all I want, I think—it has all the modern conveniences, and all the modern ills, such as smog!

BACKSTORY: When I departed VN, my vague plan was to go north from Bangkok, across Burma, and across India. My brother, Todd, had done this ten years earlier, traveling by air and train, and had found Burma particularly agreeable. However, ten years later, Burma was (then as now) firmly closed. Southward lay Singapore…

Am having photos developed & printed; they should be ready (if the camera worked) to enclose with this letter in a few days.

BK has marvelous old (French) street-cars! Not many, but they must constitute some of the oldest rolling-stock in the world apart from the cable-cars in San Francisco!!

More later,

Bruce

BACKSTORY: Fond of streetcars anywhere, I rode the old cars in BK several times. The tracks ran along the sides of the streets, a few feet from the edge of the sidewalk: people parked their cars right on the tracks, which brought the old trams to a halt with much clanging and shouting. We often had to wait for some time before parked cars were moved. It was apparent these trams served only a few folks and were utterly out-of-place in Bangkok, trying its best to modernize. Little did I know!

The letter was continued on the 29th:

Why-why-why? do tourists insist on traveling with little children? I’ve met a number of travelers  poking around with under-2 year-olds with them. Not to mention the expense, there is an awful burden on themselves and others, and all it does for the child is to enable him to say in the future, “I was in wherever when I was a year and a half old and I don’t remember anything about it.”

I watched, fascinated sort of by the contrast, as a Dutch couple eating in a nearby restaurant spent all their attention on their little boy, harnessed into a chair; special food, heated in the kitchen just for them, special spoon, etc., etc., etc. (And mama & papa had to order for themselves something not on the menu).  Two tables away was a Thai family, with a littler little boy, who sat unassisted & fed himself from portions of the same food his parents were eating. No fuss.

Children grow up rapidly in the orient and they learn much more in the process—at least as much about living—than american children. Parents start their children walking as soon as they are weaned or before; toilet training the same time: I can’t see that either hurts the kids any. It is frequently astonishing to see the things small children do here—even hard work—without complaint.

Caught a small cold (air-conditioning territory again!) so have been rather sluggish. Besides, the Moto being in the shop means walking, which is OK except that BK is a big place. Took in Dusit Zoo (nearby) today; quite a good zoo, & very popular (on Sunday) place to go. Tomorrow I have to go to the airport, pick up and re-pack my bag there are and ship it on—I think now I’ll just send it on to Robb, since I can’t imagine having any use for the stuff in it for quite a while.

BACKSTORY: There really was a time when one could pack a suitcase and send it anywhere in the world as “unaccompanied baggage”. This was very handy, and you could arrange to have your baggage at your destination even before you got there! In my case, I had sent a bag from Vietnam to Bangkok, thinking at the time I might settle in, or get work in, Bangkok. I quickly decided this was not to be, so shipped the bag on home via by Brother, Robb. Getting the bag out of customs at the airport involved a little money under the table, of course, but I had become so used to this in VN that I thought nothing of it.

Bangkok is expensive. I want to take one of the bus tours in the next day or two, & then press on fairly soon. One sees in Bangkok a preview of what Saigon will be like ten years from now, and frankly it isn’t all that pretty. Grinding poverty in the very shadow of splendor; gawdawful traffic, & smog at times; very little of Thai culture—and much of the bastardized american-thai substitute.

The Thais do have what must be the most lavishly decorated trucks and busses, though. Most start life as a Mercedes or Toyota 1½ or 2½ T chassis. The bodies (except cab) seem to be built locally, mostly out of wood, all carefully finished and polished. The whole is decorated with vast amounts of chrome trim, with hammered designs, and (fake) rivet-heads running in rows everywhere; also popular are painted scenes in little chrome frames tacked on here and there. To all this is added rows of colored lights all over the place, so at night it all looks like a moving giant Xmas tree. (And I do mean Xmas!)

Curiously, one’s surroundings change quickly after crossing into Thailand. Of course, this is emphasized by the border being closed, hence the Thai and Khmer cultures do not mix. Thai homes are built of wood, on or very near, the ground & not raised up 10-12 feet as are Khmer homes. Bangkok is largely built of wood, & there are large fires at times (I see the remains of one in some shops just down the street from this hotel). One leaves French behind quite rapidly, too, at the border; not nearly as many people speak English as the booklets say, though. Street signs are frequently nonexistent &  it is a hard city to get around in. The layout is odd, & compounded by one-way streets, traffic-circles & such. Driving on the left still seems odd—I suppose it will for quite a while—but I’ll have that from here on, so I’d better catch on. Making a right turn against oncoming traffic becomes precisely the problem that making a left is in the states.

Enclosed photos better than I’d expected!

Much love to all,

Bruce

Buddhist Temple, 1968

Buddhist temples like this are everywhere in Thailand. This was one of the first I encountered, so I snapped a photo because the weather was fine. Of Bangkok itself, I got no pictures: the reason will become apparent in future letters.

Stay tuned!

November 1, 2009

The hiatus in posting was occasioned by a drive to Pennsylvania and back, by way of Denver, where a dear friend lives. He accompanied me to PA and back as far as Denver.

It was a quick trip, driving a lot of miles:

Trip Miles

That entry for Denver to Barstow is correct: I miscalculated the distance, and planned to stay in Las Vegas to shorten the day. However, I got off the freeway there, could not find a hotel, and could not get back on the freeway due to massive reconstruction. I finally said, “To heck with it”, and drove on to Barstow as planned. It was a long day!

Otherwise, the trip went fairly well, despite some bad weather and in spite of my taking a rented car rather than my own old Chrysler. About all I can say for the modern Chrysler “Town & Country” is that it went father on a gallon of gas than my old car.

Trip Gas Costs and Miles Per Gallon

One thing I found noticeable and annoying: since we ate in restaurants, we were subjected to numerous disgusting children, better known as rug-rats. With few exceptions, they were ill-mannered and loud, and their parents did nothing to induce better behavior.  For the life of me, I can’t figure out why americans are so afraid of gay people: at the rate mid-westerners reproduce, it can’t be they fear depopulation! Could it be that deep in their hearts, they’re worried that some of their own precious little brats will grow up to be gay?

I did have some time to complete a new story: Life After Charlie turns the Nature-Boy trilogy into a tetralogy, so read the Nature-Boy triplet first, then Life After Charlie. They are all on Nifty, and formatted pdf files are available if you drop me a line at [email protected] .

Once I get used to the changed time and catch up on a flood of emails, I will continue the narrative of my trip: Thailand turned out to be very different from Cambodia. I expect it still is.

Everything up to this point had gone too smoothly! I felt it wise to arrive at the airport well before departure time. Just after lunchtime, I rode to Tan Son Nhut and stopped outside the compound. There, I drained what little fuel remained in the tank, then walked the bike into the passenger terminal. I was able to take one picture as the Air VN chaps assisted me:

Tan Son Nhut Compound

beyond this point all photos were forbidden.

Getting out of Vietnam in those days was complicated by the currency restrictions. After relinquishing the bike, and presenting my ticket

Air Vietnam Ticket

everything was in order. The bike disappeared, my luggage as well. The next step was to convert money. Whatever MPCs and Dongs I had I turned in for US Green: not a lot, less than a hundred dollars as I recall. Henceforth I expected to rely on travelers checks.

The last step was emigration, where I presented my passport and ticket, which the Officer examined closely. He then said, “You can’t go.”

“Why not?”

“Your ticket is to Phnom Penh, but the Exit Visa reads to USA.”

I knew there was no arguing, so simply retrieved my documents, stepped back, and joined the throng in the waiting room. When I got near the main entrance, I stepped out and hailed a taxi. I waved a $20 US under the driver’s nose and said, “get me to Immigration!”

Mind you, had I been stopped for any reason, having a wad of Green on me would have been difficult to explain and would likely have landed me in jail!

There followed a wild ride across Saigon: the taxi driver wanted that 20 bucks, but when we got to Immigration I held the money and told him to wait. I knew he would!

Inside, I found a fellow at a long counter who asked what assistance I needed. Fortunately, he spoke english, so I was able to show the documents and explain the problem. He rummaged around under the counter, pulled up a carton full of papers, and pawed through them: before long, he came up with the form I had prepared long-hand for PA&E; attached to it was the typed form some harried secretary at PA&E had copied. My long-hand version showed Cambodia, but the typed version showed USA. Since I was probably the only american who had ever left VN to go to Cambodia (virtually all US employees went back to the US) it was an easy mistake for her to make.

Examining the papers, the fellow said, “I can see how that happened, and I can fix it.” He picked up a pen, annotated the passport with a “(1)” next to USA, and wrote above “(1) via Cambodge”. With a chop, the deed was done. I thanked him profusely. He did not ask for payment, and he got only my everlasting gratitude!

Exit Visa Saigon

(Arrows point to the critical additions.)

Needless to say, the taxi was waiting, and I got a second wild ride across Saigon, where I was able to “infiltrate” the crowd and eventually present my documents once again to the Officer. He studied them intently, but finally said, “I’ll never know how you did that, but I cannot stop you now.” He added the exit chop and waved me through into the waiting area. I had at least an hour to kill before the plane was to leave!

The bike was loaded after I got on the plane, so I did not know with certainty that it was with me until I saw it off-loaded at Pochentong. I snapped one photo from the plane, which I did not expect to come out at all. Oddly enough after all these years, I can scan that photo and just use an enhancement in the scanner to bring it out better than it actually is!

Vietnam from the Air

The white spots are clouds, but the strips in the center near the bottom are recent strafing-runs.

It isn’t far from Saigon to Phnom Penh—about 180 miles—so the flight was short. There were very few passengers aboard. I snapped a photo of the tower at Pochentong as we taxied in,

Tower at Pochentong

then dashed off the plane in time to get a shot of the guys unloading the motorcycle.

Unloading the Motorcycle

I was finally out of Vietnam! Let the adventures begin!

But first, I had to get the cycle out of Customs. I left it behind and took a bus into town: it was growing late, I was tired, and I figured I could go back the next day and retrieve the machine.

Yeah, right!

Stay tuned!

LOOKING BACK

I feel obliged to post a brief discussion about my experience in Vietnam, looking back after 41 years that have elapsed since I departed.

In many—most, in fact—ways, I had it easy. I was not in the military, I saw no combat, and I suffered no  damage. I never got further from Saigon than Long Binh, not even to Vung Tao, even then reputed to have some nice beaches. On many days in Saigon, one could easily forget there was a war going on as the local folk went about their daily business: take away the jeeps and duece-and-a-halfs, and Saigon could be pretty much like any other city in the orient at that time.

What bothered me most was how hopelessly incompetent most of the americans I worked with were! One could forgive the mil pers: they had no training in insurgency or jungle warfare, most were draftees who would much rather have been elsewhere. They were paid a pittance, considering what they had to do. Many were from the US deep south, and were basically racist pigs: their understanding of and behavior towards the Viets was appalling. None spoke, or even tried to speak, Vietnamese; they were frustrated when Viets did not speak english; and they generally referred to them as “gooks” and other disgusting epithets. The women and girls were fair game for rape and worse, and the goal of most enlisted men was to climb high enough in the army to get out of the EM barracks and into a shack job.

But the civilian crew with whom I had the most contact (being one myself) were just as bad: in many ways, they were worse, because supposedly they  ere “professionals”, there to do a job, and handsomely paid for it. The few I met who actually tried to get something done were snowed under with regulations and paperwork. But most of the civilians I met were dead-beats uninterested in work, more interested in a cushy shack-up and fat salary to augment their retirement pay (usually from the military).

For the guys who actually fought on the ground, I had and still have the greatest admiration. Their job was not easy, and was made far worse by the stupidity of the generals in charge, most of them comfortably ensconced with a local female who waited on them hand and foot. The “grunts”—ill-trained, ill-prepared and often just plain ill—were just cannon-fodder. On unfamiliar soil, unable to know what was going on right under their noses (because none spoke the language), they were up against a force which knew the territory, spoke the language and could not readily be identified as friend or foe. It was one fucked-up mess, and I met almost no one in country who was not willing to admit, with a little “lubrication”, the whole exercise was an abysmal failure.

Of the Viets, on the other hand, I had the highest admiration. To me, trying my best to behave like a guest in the country (which I was) the Viets I met were unfailingly polite, helpful when needed, charming and often very nice to look at. Using the most basic elements of “being nice”, I found, would get me anything I wanted. Most often, a simple smile was all it took, and (as will be seen shortly) I a few situations developed where the typical “ugly american” approach would have gotten me nowhere. The Viets worked hard, put up with our presences generally with a stoicism that amazed me. Somehow, using back-street machine-shops, they kept the taxis and cyclos and motorcycles—at least 3 million of them—running. in my book, the Vietnamese populace deserved far better  treatment, both from their own government and from ours, than they got.

What saddens me most now is that we ought to have learned something from our collective experience in Vietnam, but subsequent history proves we did not. Since 1975 there has come the first Gulf War, which may well stand in history as our last “successful” campaign. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were ginned-up by a fake warrior who had never seen actual combat, who had the brains of an idiot, and whose second-in-command was a conscienceless manipulator. Whether we get ourselves out of these countries intact remains to be seen.

LOOKING AHEAD

The appearance of this blog will change slightly: armed with a camera, I set out from Saigon to see more of Southeast Asia by motorcycle, and arrived nine weeks and 5003 miles later in Singapore—beyond which one does not go far on a motorcycle, unless it has pontoons! On a world map, it looks quite insignificant: basically, I drove around the gulf of Tonkin. I had a grand time!

I did keep a diary, at least as far as Penang. But I used my diary to prepare some long letters which have survived. I’ll use a combination of these sources, along with my fertile memory, to let you in on some of the events along the way. The pictures will trigger many memories for me to share with you.

However, getting OUT of Vietnam turned out to be more difficult than planned: I’ll describe that in the next page.

In the meantime, here’s my visa for Cambodia. Presumably all systems were “go”.  I hadn’t reckoned on PA&E’s penchant for screwing up!

Cambodia Entry visa

The saga continues next page.

Estimates at the time suggested there were at least 3 million Honda 50cc motorbikes in Saigon when I was there. They were small, reliable, and good in the basically flat city. It was not unusual to see a family of five riding on one together: Daddy driving, two tykes parked on the gas tank, Mama riding side-saddle behind Daddy with an infant in her arms. Accidents were surprisingly few: everyone drove defensively, and it was a great place for me to hone my MC driving skills. There were hundreds of little repair shops all over town where a machine that refused to run could be diagnosed and fixed. There were also numerous shops selling accessories and parts. In the photo below of Dai Lo Le-Loy, the double-row of parked motorcycles in the foreground was typical. There are too many to count. There was no licensing system: some folks put numbers on their bikes just to distinguish them from the literally hundreds of identical ones. I’d have to say, the Japanese did very well during the war in Vietnam!

The building opposite the Rex is the Caravelle Hotel

___________________________

Friday, Apres-midi, 10 May 1968

Dear everyone~

Got to work uneventfully yesterday, and Long Binh was quiet all day. Many Vietnamese workers affected by curfews unable to get to work, so things were dull at the post. I’m now involved in compiling procurement lists for the projected lab, which is purely make-work, inasmuch as no one knows whether there will BE a new lab or not; but I have to do something to pass the time.

I bought a Honda [Motorcycle] from a fellow at LB who is leaving, and brought it into Saigon on the back of a pick-up last night. The driver dropped me and the bike at the intersection of Bien Hoa Xa Lo and Chi Lang, and I motored into Saigon proper from there. It (the Honda) is really a marvelous invention, just the ticket for getting ’round in a city like this, although in heavy traffic it’s a bit hair-raising at times. I don’t really expect to use it much, except as a passenger behind my Number One Vietnamese friend, who is much more familiar with operating one of these gadgets than I!

Just as I pulled into the alley beside my building, there were several very loud explosions not far away: I have never learned whether they were VC rockets, or whether they were our own, but in any event “an enemy of unknown size and force” had been spotted along the point where Precinct 4 borders Precinct 2 (mine), and helicopter gun-ships were giving them a bad time. This continued sporadically until about 2100hrs, when the enemy “broke contact”, meaning they slipped off their uniforms and became civilians again! The remainder of the night was quiet, except I understand TSN AFB got hit again.

And, I had a group of visitors during the night, for when I got upstairs to my apartment I found Number One friend had custody for the night of six charming children whose mama-san had had to go to My Tho for a couple of days. So we all shared the place: these kids live about a block from the bridge in Cho Lon where there has been heavy fighting with VC, and of course with the curfew on, had no place to go. They were lucky at that: there was a group of about fifty refugees sleeping under a marquee on Le-Loi opposite my building all night.

So, Tino, Mercy, Daravith, Lucia, Rico and Bariyano, all of whom speak Vietnamese, Cambodian, some French and some English, and of course Nguyen and myself had a pleasant evening learning about each other; (I taught them how to count from 1 to 10 in German!). About 2100, when the noise of battle died down somewhat, all six of them stretched out on the floor on a large bath-towel, tossed a sheet over themselves, and weren’t heard from again until 0700 this AM!

At one point during the evening, I brought out my photo album and was showing them my papa-san, brothers, niece, nephews, etc. I sure had to laugh when we got to Jeffrey: one of the kids pointed to him and said, with, I understand, absolute accuracy, “beaucoup kilo”! The oldest of these kids was, as best I can gather, about twelve, and could not have weighed in at more than 50 lbs (but this is not abnormal—people are just small over here!)

Everyone left about 0800 to see if they can get home. I decided to stay here myself—work is so unrewarding that ANY excuse will do. The morning I spent cleaning up the Honda (Model 50CL) and making a few adjustments on it.

Friday again, 2000h

Having nothing else to do, I had planned to sit down and try to evoke the mood of this place again, but I had no more than typed the time and date when I noticed the arrival of several truckloads of police in front of the block across the street. The group of about a hundred was pretty evenly divided between ARVN and Saigon Security Police, and there were a few american advisors on hand. They proceeded to make a thorough and systematic search of the entire block, and in the end took away about two score civilians, mostly women: I assume they were prostitutes, not VC. Apparently this was just a random search, not done because of any intelligence that VC were there, but just as part of routine. I expect sometime they will search this block similarly.

So it is now 2130 hours, and quiet again, except that every half hour or so our jets are bombing an area about a mile and a half from here, which makes a hell of a racket just when everything gets nice and quiet. The area is in precinct 4, across the Saigon Canal from Precinct 2, the principal downtown section where I live.

Except for these loud blasts, and occasional bursts of mini-gun fire, about all that is to be heard is the too-loud sound-track of the cinema atop the Rex BOQ, and the quiet swish of tires on moist pavement as a security vehicle cruises by: it rained hard for an hour this afternoon about 5, creating the temporary flooding that lasts such a remarkably short time, and rained again about 7:30, very hard, but for only about 5 minutes! A brief electrical display accompanied that rapidly passing storm.

On the street itself, one sees an occasional wandering child: there are countless homeless and parent-less children who somehow manage to  survive (the mild climate is a blessing!) from hand to mouth, who sleep in the doorways at night and do goodness knows what during the day. Many beg, but many also earn a sort of existence shining shoes and doing odd jobs that come along, such as washing motorbikes and cars, repairing flat tires, selling coke-bottles full of gas to hapless passers by who didn’t make it to the gas-station, and so forth. There are, too, a few wandering cats and dogs, and the sharp-eyed will detect an occasional large rat poking around here and there.

This is the closest thing to the eve of the Paris talks, and there’s been a lot of speculation to the effect that a major push on the palace, or on the American Embassy, may be attempted. The latter is much more heavily guarded now, you may be sure, than it was when the VC succeeded in gaining temporary entrance to it during Tet! The palace is similarly guarded, though of course both buildings are vulnerable to rockets and mortars, assuming the VC can manage to launch any without being detected in the process: there are numerous spotter planes quietly circling about overhead, usually without marker lights: these are either very small piper-cub-like gadgets that can fly slowly and quietly, or ti ti helicopters that can do likewise. They can spot the flash of a rocket launch even in an area well lit with flares, and direct a strike at the spot within minutes. Flares light the entire city perimeter at night, assisting this surveillance work, and casting, an eery glow over everything from this vantage point.

Close to 2200 now, no more paper, and bedtime. I’ll add to this later and mail it Sunday, I expect.

Except that like almost ALL the others in Vietnam mine was red, this is the closest photo I could find of a Honda 50CL like the one I bought there.

this is the closest photo I could find of a Honda 50CL like the one I bought

__________________________

Sunday, 12 May 1968

Dear everyone~

Things are quieting down somewhat, though whether the current offensive is over or just awaiting reinforcements no one knows. The only really annoying thing about this situation is being right in the middle of it and knowing so little about what is going on! The single most worthless institution over here that I’ve found is the Armed Forces Vietnam Network—AFVN: two nights ago, I had just turned the volume up to hear above the din of a nearly battle that “quiet has returned to Saigon”.

I mentioned a while back C A [redacted], the gent I got to know on the trip over and with whom I was billeted through the Tet carryings-on. He’s stationed at Qui Nhon, and I repeat below a couple of excerpts from his latest letter to me, dated 29 April:

“An Khe is like Dodge City. A chap named [redacted], youngish, got drunk in a civilian club at An Khe and had a fight with the Asst Installation Manager, who beat him up. He went to the Manager’s quarters, and the manager beat him up some more. Next day, he was in the Area office with one arm in a cast, a black eye, and various abrasions and contusions. After the fight, he went and got a shot-gun to take after the Asst Manager, who in turn got his M-16. Fortunately, there was no further action.

“Civilians in the Qui Nhon area are being armed. That includes TCNs as well as U S civilians. Everyone gets either a .45 automatic or an M-14. Most are taking the M-14, for one of two reasons: 1, they already have a pistol or 2, they couldn’t hit a building or those inside it with a pistol. Jim [Redacted] and I shudder at the possible consequences. Qui Nhon is like Tombstone, Arizona, last century. Some of the military are worried, too: what if a Korean killed a Philipino, or vice versa, in a Qui Nhon bar, with an issued weapon?

“I don’t know if I wrote you what happened here on 30 Jan. On 29 Jan, the night before our three U S civilians employees of PA&E were killed on the main street in downtown Qui Nhon on their way to work, the following entry was made in the (PA&E) duty officer’s log book:

‘9:00 PM – City of Qui Nhon blacked out under Martial Law. Police say heavy VC infiltration and possible insurrection.’

That was 29 Jan, the night before the men were killed. Nothing at all was broadcast over AF Radio, QN. Next morning, our civilians had no way of knowing anything was amiss. There was gun-fire in downtown QN, but they had been hearing giant firecrackers for a week and thought it was just more celebration of Tet. The three were on their way to work and followed the same route they’d taken for more than a year. They were completely unaware anything was wrong: there is no warning system here for people not on a military base.”

The situation described above is little different in Saigon. For myself, I always look out on the street before going abroad to see if other americans are moving about, and then go directly to the Rex for b’fast, in the course of which all sorts of gossip, most of it unreliable, can be heard. Any serious hazards are usually posted on the daily bulletin board in the lobby. As for the radio, as a warning device it is useless, and except for one or two “entertainment” programs, it is equally useless: I like Joe Allison’s Country music program at 5 AM, and Sunday nites they have tapes of the Mormon Tabernacle Program. Otherwise, I listen mostly to Tokyo and Malaysia.

My “family” did not return Friday night, but Number One friend showed up Saturday and explained that all was well: mama-san had gotten back from My Tho (the highway was temporarily blocked); she sent word she was grateful for my hospitality to her children, who, as I said before, were a lot of fun and who showed their own appreciation before leaving by cleaning the apartment thoroughly AND doing up some laundry for me!

The name situation here is confusing. Just about everybody’s family name is Nguyen—it is as common as Smith in the US, Yi in Korea, or Yung in China. There is usually a Van or Thi next, which is meaningless except the Van is for men and the Thi is for women, and then the given or first name i. e., Tai or Hung or the like. However, in addressing another person, where we generally use the family name except in cases of familiarity, the Vietnamese do it the other way around, using the given name virtually all the time. Hence Ong ( = mister, pronounced approximately “aum”) Tai, or Ong Hung (the correct pronunciation for Hung is not renderable in english, but is approximately “howng”). For people of importance, “Thuong” is used in place of Ong, and it means approximately “Sir”, but still is coupled with the given name.

The universal greeting is “Chao” (Chow), coupled with any one of a large number of definitives, such as Ong (cf. above), Co (young woman), Ba (older or married woman), Em (children), Anh (brother) and so forth and so on. Learning all of them gets to be a problem at times, and to use the wrong one is quite embarrassing to the person addressed. Boys are ti ti (i.e., small or young) until they are 16 (the definitive is Cao, pronounced Gow), and are men thereafter (Ong again!). Girls are ti ti until they are 18 or married, whichever transpires first, and thereafter are addressed as Ba: it is not easy to tell if a girl less than 18 is married or not, so one can easily use the wrong form of address, to which the girls are particularly sensitive! (It is very desirable to be in a position to be addressed as Ba, for some reason).

My friend, Ong Hung, is outside polishing up the Honda: later we will go to the PX on it, since the military buses have not resumed their routes. I think we will both go to the Rex cook-out for steaks tonight, and then all too soon the brief Sunday respite will be over and another dull week will commence. Although hired as a chemist, I haven’t run a single test of any kind yet! Cest la Vie. . .

Love to all~
Bruce

After three and a half months in Vietnam, I had accomplished absolutely nothing I could point to and say, “I did that”!

I was not alone! I recall a chap at LB who was supposed to be in charge of creating water points for the Army. It seems that somewhere up-country someone at a  U S base had found a well: they asked PA&E to secure and install a pump so water from the well could be used. To determine what size of pump was required, we had to know at a minimum how deep the well was, and where the water-level was. In its simplest form, this means tying a stone to a length of rope and dropping it down until it stopped. Pulling the rope back up would reveal the depth, and the amount of wet rope would reveal the water level. Since our man had no means of getting up-country, he sent requests through “channels” to have the measurements made. He had a file a few inches thick of the various orders working their way up the chain of command and back again, yet no one had actually issued the order to measure the well! Meanwhile the brass were bitching about not having any water…

Now, 40 years later, I wonder if things in Iraq are as fucked-up as they were in Vietnam. I’m quite sure the answer is yes.

More letters to come!

August 9, 2009

By the time the next letter was written, I had managed to go out and procure a typewriter. This is facilitating transcribing my letters now, using OCR software. Most of the copies Dad kept were carbon-copies, though, so the images aren’t all that sharp; OCR is not perfect anyway, so some fairly heavy editing still is required. But it IS faster than key-entry.

The borrowed typewriter with its Vietnamese keyboard was difficult to use because the letters had been rearranged in accordance with their frequency of use, so frequently-used english letters were in the wrong place. There were also a number of letters which occur in Vietnamese, but not in english. (The Vietnamese language is akin to chinese, and for the most part is incomprehensible to westerners: the typical characters were replaced with a romanized alphabet  by Missionaries a long time ago).

Saturday, 9 Mar 68

Dear Everyone,

As you will have guessed by the time you begin to read this, I have now gotten a typewriter! This one has a standard keyboard! After trying out the hazards of a Vietnamese typewriter,  I couldn’t hack it, and decided to get one of my own. As you can see, I’m not altogether used to it. It’s an Ollivetti “Dora”, a small light portable, with an assortment of features, including halfline spacing, along with an arrangement coupled with the spacebar that allows one to type in an extra letter in case of an error; i. e., god and good here occupy the same space.

Having run nearly out of money, this morning I went out to CMO and arranged an advance on my salary of $250.00. That much, at least is safe from the Infernal Revenooers. Of this, I spent $75.00 on the typewriter, and $50.00 on a very nice all-band portable radio. In both cases, the prices are about half US., and I think very reasonable. I bought both on the “local economy”—our PX purchases are limited to $10.00 items max.

So you can all heave a small sigh of relief: the folks won’t have to Xerox my letters and remail them and Rob & Todd won’t be several days behind on my letters.

There’s really not too much to report. I haven’t had any letters for several days—heaven knows this is not unusual—so don’t have any answers to send along. Life is settling down into something of a routine, involving a very early (for me) arising around 6 AM and a quick cup of coffee, sometimes, and taking a cyclo at 7 over Phan-than-Gian St. to Hai-ba-trung Street, where I wait for the bus which goes to Long Binh. The trip out Hiway 1 usually turns out to be the most interesting thing all day! Then, at 5, we leave LB and reverse the process. When I get here, I must first, of course, take a bath (shower) to remove the layers of LB dust and grime. Then it’s dinner (usually here, because of the curfew), and usually a bull-session with someone, or a relaxing interlude alone on the verandah. Then, to bed fairly early, ready for the next day. It all goes quite quickly.

I just discovered that I goofed and didn’t put a sheet of paper between two carbons on this sheet, so somebody will have to get a Xerox of the first page, at least! Toi rat tiek (I’m very sorry).

You may not believe this—knowing my finickiness about eating—but I’ve actually had a number of Vietnamese meals since I got here, and have enjoyed them immensely. One of the local specialties is a sort of meat roll, made up of a very thin rice-flour tortilla, with heaven-knows-what inside. I’m told it is is best not to ask what the filling is, so I haven’t done so! There’s also a very good chinese soup that is made here, lots of noodles and things, with some meat and a few shrimps added for good measure. And last night, several of us ordered chicken curry, which turned out to be very good (quite mild on the curry) and very filling, what with both potatoes and rice included! Alas, I have not lost so much as a kilo, and won’t, If I keep eating like that!

We understand, unofficially, that the curfew is going to be lowered to 9 PM next Monday, which will enable us to get out a bit more in the evening and get some other meals. I don’t remember whether or not I mentioned that the hotel has lowered its prices materially or not—I’m now paying 500$ [dong] for a single room, per day, rather than the 600$ for a double paid previously. This is a shade over $4.20 per day ($130 per month), which is hard to beat in Saigon, considering the fact that it includes maid service, and considering the fact that the facilities are so good. Hence, I’m staying put for a while, as I mentioned before.

There are indications of some action at Long Binh. 24 hour power is presently being installed (it has been in the works for quite a long time and is just now being accomplished, despite the fact that 24 hr hi-tension lines go right past our compound). I have submitted the listings of the equipment items I must have, and there are indications they might actually be obtained. Meanwhile, not much is doing, and I double up with the operations department from time to time when they are short-staffed (which is always). I have in mind a good training program for the Vietnamese, to be implemented as soon as the lab is functioning. This is a big thing with the Govt and the army now, and so it will win a lot of points if I can bring it off. But it’s a long ways off, unless I miss my guess about how fast the army can move on a project such as mine.

The electricity here tonight is currently (you’ll pardon the pun) going through a series of gyrations, so I think I’ll go play with the radio a while, and finish this up tomorrow.

Sunday AM

How curious! Most of the programs on the radio are in foreign languages. However, Radio Hanoi spews forth a constant stream of messages to “American Service Men fighting the unholy war in Vietnam”, and Radio Peking spews forth a constant barage of quotations from Chairman Mao Tse Tung. In both cases, the female voices used almost exclusively have a familiar ring and resemble closely the voice of Radio Moscow.

Hanoi repeats endlessly all the UPI and other descriptions of the draft-dodgers, burners, etc all over the world. Some of it is undoubtedly true, some of it embellished, and some false. The same thing happens here: at one point last night, I had Hanoi on the radio, while a plane was flying by overhead sending propaganda messages down via sound-powered microphone! And, when Hanoi broadcasts messages (allegedly in the voices of) from the group of US boys who recently defected in Japan, one has to realise that Radio Sgn is simultaneously broadcasting statements by captured or defected VC. One only wishes that the entire war could be waged thus, through words, instead of the way it is: the outcome is likely to be the same, either way.

Today’s Saigon paper carries an excellent (if heavily censored) article criticizing the American way of making war in this country. There’s a lot of truth in what is said. In essence, it points out how unprepared for fighting a defensive war our machine is. The other article enclosed is for information—although you may find it a bit alarming, it is not sent with that in mind. This only Premiere Ky’s view, and may not be correct. In any event, our security (as americans) is not any less than before, and most of us with sense enuf to stay out of trouble have quite successfully avoided it.

I’m going to set out now for the PX: there are a few items I want to pick up, and the concierge wants a few rolls of film. I will continue (finish) this letter later.

Later

That was a waste of time! I wanted some chewing-gum and a fly-swatter, and they had neither. Despite scads of color film, they had no B&W that Sao wanted. The place was swamped, and the air-conditioning was off, so it was sweltering as well. I stayed long enuf to get a spare set of batteries for the radio, then came right back, after stopping at the snack-bar for what (for want of an appropriate name) was called a milkshake. In a few minutes I shall go up and have a sandwich of some sort. Sometime this afternoon an aquaintance here is supposed to take me along on a short visit with a VN family with whom he’s been acquainted for some years. One of the daughters teaches for VAA., so I should get some information about that, and of course it will be a chance to meet some nice people.

So, for the moment I will close. Please supply the missing page 1 for Todd, and send this on to him: full copies went to Folks and Rob directly.

Love to all
Bruce

Street stall in Saigon, 1968

Clowning around at a street stall: I’m offering the photographer a pair of dark glasses.Most of what’s on the table came more-or-less directly from the PX: much of it is Military Issue. Directly behind me is a cyclo, probably the one I rode in to reach this spot, and it is likely the photograph was taken by the driver. I’m sorry the photo is light-struck—thems the breaks! I was most likely actually shopping for temporary replacements for glasses I had dropped and broken: see below.

14 March 1968

Dear Everyone~

I’m going to start this letter tonight, and probably finish it tomorrow. I got a long letter from Todd a couple of days ago, and Dad’s letter of 5-6 March at the same time.

Before I forget (which I have in several previous letters), I recall your mentioning your foster-child’s name in one early letter: apparently, that one got lost in the shuffle between hotels, because I have reread everything I have and can’t locate the reference. Please repeat, with all available information. Have you had any word from him since the Tet offensive? There might be something I could do. . .

The radio has turned out to be a very wise investment. I’m still locating stations and the times they broadcast useful info (that rules out most of Peking’s programs!), and more particularly, music. Oddly, some of the best music is coming from what appears to be either India or Pakistan—and the reception is pretty good in the evening. V 0 A and A F R T S, sharing the Manilla transmitter, get out much more comprehensive world news than does heavily censored AFVN.

The curfews have been extended from the former hours of 0700 to 1900, to 0600 to 2000 hrs. This enables us to put in an actual 8½ hour day. Leaving the hotel at 6:30 and returning about 18:00 makes it a long day, though. The other two hours are consumed, of course, by the bus-ride. These still are the most interesting parts of the day. The bus route I now take, which picks me up and drops me just a block away from the door, goes all over robinhood’s barn in the process (specifically, through the sections of town known as Go Vap, Gia Dinh, and Bay Hien, if you have gotten a map…), so there is always a lot to see.

Traffic on Hiway 1 is pretty much back to normal—it staggers the mind. The average is 21 dead each week in accidents. It is the sort of traffic that would bring an average US freeway to a stand-still, yet somehow it moves at breakneck speeds in spite of all but the worst pileups. There aren’t many bicycles (because of the distance and a few long hills), but POV (power operated vehicles) of every other description are found by the thousands, and it all ranges on up to the largest US Army equipment. Yesterday there were five more-or-less wrecked vehicles noticed on the way in; today, one accident involving two people on a motorbike that was a bit grisly (though they weren’t killed).

No word yet, of course, from the IRS. I’ve followed up my original letter with three other reminders of my desire for action on their part, and threatening a couple of other moves I’ve been told of if they don’t get off the pot: we’ll see if anything comes of it. Actually, if they don’t move right away, I intend to drop the matter, and let the sum they have earn 6% for ME until such time as I feel like coming back in person to claim it. That will in a small way offset the loss all that money I had to pay them represents. Once I get a paycheck here and get my bank-account back in operation, having over 300 bucks “on deposit” with IRS won’t make any real difference.

A couple of weeks ago, I dropped my dark glasses and broke the right lens into two pieces. I immediately ordered a new one from SF, and epoxyed the broken one back together as a stop-gap. The new lens came today. But YESTERDAY, I dropped them again and shattered both lenses. So now, I’m short the left one! I’ve ordered that one, and when it comes, I will begin carrying the case. . .

Unexpectedly, we had an inspection by a US Army Team today. I gave them the whole ugly story of what the lab amounts to, and what my problems are. However, in the exit report, nothing whatever was said about it. Apparently Dandy Dan Smythe talked them into dropping it until the next inspection, on the premise that something will have happened by then. I think it’s unlikely that anything will, but in fairness to him, I have to admit that I had only yesterday turned in my “program” to him, and there has been no time for him to act upon it. The ball is in his hands now. It seems likely he will be leaving around 22 April: in that case, Long Binh will see a celebration that ought to make Tet look puny. But the liklihood is that Smythe will leave the lab as a thorn for his successor to grapple with. Meanwihile, I may volunteer to operate a water point or some such thing, as we are desperately short at the moment in that department, and it should at least give me something more to do than I can accomplish under the present setup. The wheels of the US Army grind exceeding slow!

0530 arrives early tomorrow—so it’s beddy-byes now until tomorrow, when perhaps I shall have heard from someone, and can add answers to anything I receive.

15 March 1968

No letters today, but lots of action at Long Binh: Dandy Dan went on a rampage of personnel “actions” (i. e., position shifts) as a result of the inspection yesterday. Looks like I’ll have a new boss, for the second time in less than a month! It really makes no difference to me—nothing is happening anyhow. He may have a near mutiny on his hands tomorrow, since no one thinks for a moment that his actions have improved anything. God—what a stupendous mess he has made of things!

The weather has grown steadily warmer since my arrival, and now ranges from 35 to 40 C, depending on whether or not one has any shade. It is surprisingly dry, but this will change when the monsoons hit in mid-May.

The news today is all about [Senator Joseph] McCarthy’s performance in New Hamp, and the probability of Bobby throwing his hat in at last. This, I fear, could possibly throw a lot of weight to Nixon which would be pretty bad. It is amazing, how much control Moscow has over the next US election: they could assure Johnson’s win by getting Ho Chi Minh to the bargaining table (which they could assure by a simple withdrawal of support), or they might well assure Johnson’s defeat by a reverse process. One has to give Moscow a lot of credit for playing it cool: they’ve created chaos all over the world without ever having fielded a man.

There is a lot of talk in the news also about the gold problem. Whenever I hear of this, I think of HMT’s [Henry Moore Teller, first Senator from Colorado] predictions, way back in 1896: it looks as if he may yet prove to have been a true prophet. And while Johnson talks out of one side of his mouth about the dollar drain, and its impact on the “chronic unemployment problem”, out of the other he continues a policy of pouring millions down endless ratholes here. There are, for instance, about 5000 “third country nationals” here, nearly all Korean and Phillipinos. Their base pay hovers around 500 US dollars, plus living allowance of $175. With the kind of overtime nearly all of them show (whether actually worked or not), few of them send home (their home) less than $1000 each month. Virtually all that money goes out of the US. Its purchasing power in Korea is such as to make equivalent millionaires out of most of these people.

Now, the rationale for their existance here (besides the nonsense about being part of the Free World Forces), is that they are performing essential services that the Vietnamese can’t do. Vietnamese are not allowed to operate any water points, nor any generators on military bases, because no one can be sure they aren’t VC, and won’t either a) sabatoge their installation at a critical moment or b) disappear if they come under attack by VC.

If one accepts these criteria (and a whole lot of sensible arguments could be lodged against doing so), the question is, why not replace those 5000 people with American “hardcore unemployed”, thereby keeping most of their pay in the US, and employing them, and teaching them a trade as well? A policy like this could reduce the dollar outflow by at least $100 Million each month (taking into account PX privileges and other benefits extended to TCNS). At any rate, I am in complete agreement with—is it [Senator] Mills?—whoever it is that is kaboshing Johnson’s continuous pleas for a tax hike, and insisting on cuts in spending instead. A time has come—long past, in fact,—when our policies of backing the dollar with production and lavish giveaways have got to be drastically cut back: the shakiness of gold on the world market attests, I think, to worldwide doubts that we will take anything more than a cursory look at the policies that have nearly ruined us before we plunge on towards what seems to be our ultimate goal—WWIII—which will be the only way we can create enough demand for our excess output.

Bedtime has rolled around once again, so on that cheery note I will close and get these into the mail tomorrow: with luck you’ll get them (your) Monday next.

Love to all~
Bruce

How about that last line: “. . . our ultimate goal—WWIII—which will be the only way we can create enough demand for our excess output.” Fortunately, I’ve lived long enough to see that prediction go down the drain, but it has meant that our “excess production” has been shipped off to China, our production capacity along with it. When WWIII does come we could well end up having to buy our warships from China, in order to have ships with which to fight—China!  Oh, my!

Anyway, by this time we were able to get around well enough that some documents were issued: most of these were delayed by the Offensive and curfews. Here is my SOOM card:

SOOM Card

This got me into any open Officers’ Mess in the country. The food in most of the BOQs was quite good: food in the messes on LB Post varied greatly from terrific to gawd-awful!

Here’s my Identity card:

My Identity Card

Except for the few items typed in, I have NO idea what most of it says!
More in the days ahead: stay tuned!

BEFORE I CONTINUE:

REGARDING XE, NEE BLACKWATER

I’ve mentioned elsewhere in this blog that PA&E might be considered a progenitor of the likes of Blackwater. It begins to look as if Blackwater was worse—a great deal worse—than PA&E was, or even thought it might have been.

Don’t get me wrong: an open-ended “cost + 10″ contract was  an invitation to steal, and many in the company DID. It was a situation rife for manipulation, and the firm abounded with manipulators. In my experience, for that company in that time, one could re-write the old adage: ”there’s a fresh apple in any barrel of rotten ones”: I did in fact meet and work with a few Americans over there who knew their stuff, were willing  to work hard, and who earned their keep. Most of those I met were a motley collection of drunks, lounge-lizards and misfits. On the other hand, I was never close to any of the top brass in PA&E: I expect there was a lot of hanky-panky going on I never saw.

But it begins to look as if Blackwater in Iraq has taken the “cost + 10″ concept to new depths. Allegations by two former employees, in sworn affidavits, accuse the company’s former CEO, Erik Prince, of arranging prostitutes (including children), deliberate murder, gun-running, cover-ups, lying and other horrors. Prince appears to be badly misnamed and up to his ears in complicity, and comes across as a far-right wing-nut out to kill as many “rag-heads” as he could. The Company has been denied permission to continue in Iraq, although it is pretty clear some of its operatives are still there.

I wonder how long it will be before some real charges are brought against this malevolent “sumbitch”, Prince. Sadly, Blackwater (now re-named Xe) remains is Iraq, and no doubt has its eyes on Afghanistan.

There’s more information here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackwater_Worldwide

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/US/08/07/iraq.blackwater.xe/

and many other places on the web.

SPEAKING OF IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN. . .

Here is my next letter from Vietnam, written 41 years ago. I was struck, transcribing it, that it could be re-written today substituting “Iraq” for Vietnam, and it would be as true now as it was then.

AM – Monday, 26 February 1968

Dear Everyone~

The Long Binh bus failed to appear this morning, so after waiting until nearly 9 [since first-light, around 5], I walked back to the Loc Bldg and am writing this letter. I’ve been here just one month tomorrow, and can certainly claim no great accomplishment as yet. That’s the rule here, though, not the exception.

With painful slowness, Saigon is returning to something of a pre-Tet normalcy. Final figures on PA&E’s losses amounted to only 7 dead Americans, 8 Koreans and a few Vietnamese. Earlier reports of as many as 20-30 Americans killed resulted from interruptions of communications—a number of people were unable to report in any way, and were listed as MIA for a while. Open-market food & other prices have suddenly dropped back to something near 15-20% above pre-Tet, rather than the 100-200% that prevailed a couple of days ago. The dusk-to-dawn curfew affects only the bars, for the most part, and allows most other businesses to carry on pretty much as before.

The complexity of the American position here is beginning to come to the surface. President Johnson cannot be blamed rightfully for getting us involved; depending on one’s individual view, he may or may not be correct in his handling of affairs here. But on one point at least he can be strongly and rightfully criticized: for not telling us at home what’s going on. The “credibility gap” is wider than most people imagine. [I had received clippings from the States].

And regardless of who is to blame for it, Vietnam at the present time represents a colossal failure for America. We have not “won the hearts and minds” of the people here—our heavy-handed civilian population—the ugly Americans—have assured that. Neither have we succeeded in arousing any significant degree of nationalism—certainly nothing to compare with NVN & the VC. We have not brought a strong or popular central government, and needless to say we have not won the war by any means. But what are some of the reasons for these failures?

For one thing, we are still a “military assistance command”, largely devoted to providing support, materiel and training for ARVN. Remember, though, that it’s been 15 years or more (since Korea) that the commanders here saw any actual combat—and most of them did just that—they SAW it; they watched it, but didn’t participate in it. Even those combat veterans from Korea here now saw action in very different terrain, in very different circumstances, and, most significantly, in an offensive war (I use the term in its tactical sense!).

Vietnam represents the first time we’ve been on the defensive, and our military machinery is just not geared for it. It is demoralizing to the troops, particularly, to know where the enemy is and what he’s doing and how to stop him, but have to wait for the enemy to “make contact” before anything can be done. With some exceptions, any offensive against the VC must be cleared with VN authorities before it can proceed—and by the time clearance is obtained (and often it is denied) the VC have vanished—usually leaving behind some destructive memento for any unwary person to fall into.

The news today says that U Thant assures Pres. J. that if we stop bombing in the North (one of the areas where we have a fairly free hand), Hanoi will begin to negotiate in “a few days”. Johnson has replied—with some logic one has to admit, if not actual justification—that he must have first some assurance the NV will not use the “few days” to re-trench. Communist treachery is well known; North Vietnamese treachery is equally documented (if you want to distinguish between the two), most recently by the Tet debacle amidst their own truce declaration. Under these circumstances, both sides feel obliged to carry on “business as usual” until some other approach can be found.

There is a lot of sentiment here that our best approach at this point should be to seize the offensive and obliterate NVN, even if this requires the use of “Nukes”. Our reluctance to do this is frequently interpreted here as a) weakness b) softness on Communism c) actual collaboration with the communists (to prolong the war & boost our economy) and, least often, d) fear that such an action would lead directly to armed conflict with Russia or (worse) China. Thus, we are damned if we do and damned of we don’t, a dilemma we have somehow got ourselves into and from which extrication seems very remote.

Further complicating matters is the fact that the government we have pretty much single-handedly created, now that it is created, wants to govern in its own way (not necessarily an unreasonable desire, it seems to me)—and most particularly wants no truck with a coalition type set up with anybody (such as the NLF, or—God Forbid—with the NVN government).

Our Ambassador, Mr. Bunker, is one of the most thoroughly disliked Americans over here. The press gives lavish coverage to the afternoon Teas he has with the ladies, and otherwise ignores his presence whenever possible. His credentials as a statesman are questionable at best (he’s a good businessman, has made a fortune, etc; but he’s not here on “business” of that sort). Westmoreland is well enough liked, but his hands are so well tied that he’s not as effective as he should be.

The USAID program, which administers the various “pacification” attempts, is a colossal failure on every count. Not to mention the internal boon-doggling that amounts to millions of dollars, their usual approach has been to build schools, precinct stations and hospitals in the small towns—on a give-away basis; these structures have cost millions, and for a few hundred dollars worth of dynamite the VC have systematically destroyed them, or frightened the residents out of using them. The point that seems to be beyond anyone’s real appreciation is that in the provinces, political allegiance goes automatically to whoever provides the greatest protection against getting killed or losing one’s crops. Politics is a concept beyond the grasp of most of the provincial bourgeoisie, whose only desire is to be left alone to live their lives unmolested. It is essentially a feudal system in which the town Chief settles all disputes, collects taxes, and gives some measure of protection. If he is supported by the VC, we wipe out the whole town with the argument (albeit a non-sequitur) that they’re all VC. Admittedly, the VC do the same exact thing if the town Chief goes along with us. But the failure to protect the lives and property of millions of South Vietnamese during this last offensive has been a bitter pill for a lot of people to swallow, and is resulting in a lot of shifting allegiances. The final outcome, of course, has yet to happen.

What is the way out of this quick-sand? If we summarily withdraw, mutual assistance pacts all over the world will be torn up by the hundreds, and a global re-allignment of allegiances would result—almost certainly to Russia and China’s benefit. If we bring Hanoi to the conference table, the result  almost certainly will be another “Pueblo crisis” off the waters of North Vietnam fifteen years from now. If we obliterate NVN (especially if we use Nukes) can we ever again call ourselves the world’s peacemakers?

I still am inclined to feel that the honorable way out is through the Geneva Convention of 1954, to which we have never paid more than lip-service, but which still contains a workable formula for the reunification of Vietnam. Ho Chi Minh would be elected—and not very long later he would die, as he soon must in any event, for he is both old and unwell. The crux of this is still the question of whether Ho’s power stems from fervent nationalism of fervent communism; it is hard to imagine VC suicide-squads being ready to die a certain, violent death for the sake of a concept such as communism—a concept both “foreign” in the sense of being alien—and foreign in the sense that it goes against established traditions. But suicide-squads willing to die for their country? What is so strange in this? We ourselves have used this gambit from 1776 on, and technological superiority is all that has made it a successful gambit in the past. Our refusal to recognize our own Nationalism for what it is blinds us to the possibility that others may feel as fervently—and as righteously—about their country as we do about ours. It is sheer stupidity to become involved against nationalistic trends—ask any Frenchman (or, for that matter, Englishman) and  he will have to agree, if only because he has been forced to in recent years.The sun is about to set on the U.S. empire, too, and it is high time we realized it.

That’s how it looks after a month here—it will be interesting to see if the next months change this view in any significant way.

The weather continues perfect as far as I am concerned—warm, sunny, consistent from day to day, and thoroughly enjoyable. Haven’t had even the suggestion of a cold since I got here!

Cheers—
Bruce

A typical street scene in 1968 Saigon

Note the relative size of the Army tractor and the little Peugeot taxi! This is probably Tu Do Street, which was one-way, but the bicyclist is going in the wrong direction, and risks being wiped out by a deuce-and-a half at any moment. I did not carry a camera with me most of the time in Vietnam: there were still folks there who objected to having their photo taken, and one risked a confrontation over a random snap-shot. I did have a camera though: a Kodak Instamatic, and I used it much more when I departed Vietnam on my motor-cycle trip.

The Kodad Instamatic

The camera was later stolen in Bangkok, but I managed to get it back! Unfortunately, rather than have films developed  along the way, I accumulated the rolls and had them all done when I got back to the states. This led to some film deterioration (that will be seen here in future images), but for the most part I got decent pictures of my adventures.

Stay tuned for more letters, and remember you can discuss these adventures with me at [email protected]

Continuing with Vietnam and the Tet Offensive, still not quite over.

Monday, 19 February- 1968

Dear Everyone –

Went to work as usual this AM. The first news I got was that yesterday (Sunday) my immediate spvsr (Chief of Operations) had decided to transfer. Since the Post Installation Mgr & he didn’t get along well anyhow, this was OK with the former. It was also OK with me, since Mr. [redacted] was not a very dynamic sort of person & it was obvious to me that he and I were going to clash before long. A new CO was on hand by noon—the fastest work I’ve seen accomplished here yet!—and I think he will be a much more successful person. The Post Installation Mgr? Well, he made a big thing of telling me, when I first met him, that he had been a PIM longer than anyone in VN—which I took immediately to mean either a) he was such a fine PIM that he couldn’t be replaced or b) he was such a bad one that he’d never managed to get himself promoted. The latter assessment of the situation begins to show itself as the more likely one, now. He’s handled his personnel in this crisis very poorly, we feel. He’d better show some real management ability to me soon, or we are going to clash!!

Enclosed copy of today’s Sgn DN [Daily News] is interesting both for its content and its omissions, which are due to government censorship. You can see what we’re up against in the way of news!!

Enclosed also is a very poor little map, showing more or less, central Saigon. I’ve appended my location and a very few details. I’ve seen so little of it, really, that I can’t mark very many places.

Map of Downtown Saigon, 1968

Your worries about my food are needless. I thought I’d lost some weight during “the siege”, but—alas—I haven’t lost a single kilo!

The “siege”—third stage—continues, though with less intensity locally. There was an incident yesterday morning on the Long Binh – Bien Hoa hiway, which closed it temporarily. I didn’t go to work anyway, so wasn’t involved, and it was all cleaned up by morning. Tonight as we drove in about 5:30 helicopter gunships were working over another portion of Go-vap, an outlying section of Sgn which, like Cho-lon, has seen some pretty intense fighting. Tan Son Nhut is being mortared pretty regularly, and I’m not sure what this has done for the tenuous commercial flights recently reinstated.

As you can see, the direct route from Saigon Port to Long Binh & Bien Hoa is directly up the main street of Sgn! New Port, more directly accessible to LB-BH, was severely damaged by VC raids, hence a lot of freight, vehicles and so forth are being moved each day right through down-town Saigon. Needless to say, the sight is appalling, and traffic is snarled up maddeningly as a result. Tu Do Street is hardly 3 US-car-widths wide, and there is always a double line of small cars parked at the curb on each side. 7 days a week, tons of cargo move right up the main street, around the cathedral, and on to Bien Hoa or Long Binh. Quite a sight, as I said!

One of the more delightful things about which I’ve said very little so far is the gekkos—small lizards that live everywhere and—happily—eat bugs by the millions. They’re everywhere, though they hide out during the heat of the day. But at night they come out and gather around the lights.The silly rascals can crawl—run, actually—along any surface, straight up, or upside-down on the ceiling, with perfect ease. They have about 270 deg of vision, and any bug that lands anywhere near them is doomed to be a a gekko’s dinner. They look something like Chameleons, but are a uniform color. Occasionally they make a sort of chirping sound amazingly like that silly noise I [used to] make, but usually are silent—and very diligent in their duty.

Bugs aren’t much of a problem here. Mosquitos are the worst offenders, but if one keeps a sufficient stiff breeze in the room by means of a fan (usually a ceiling fan) they aren’t very bothersome. I got badly bitten one night when the electricity was off, but the bites were only unsightly, not painful. Roaches are to be found occasionally—frequently in dumpy places like the Tourist Hotel, and more frequently still in shanties, I’m sure—and they are usually real big ones. Despite their harmless nature, they are still ugly and one of the few beasts to whom I take a real dislike! But I’ve only seen a couple so far, which is good, and I understand it’s pretty easy to keep them out of one’s quarters if a determined effort is made.

Love to all—

Bruce

Statue of a Soldier, Saigon 1968

This hideous statue of a VN soldier stood in the middle of Le Loi Boulevard between Nguyen Hue and Tu Do Streets. His gun was aimed directly at the National Assembly building, at the photographer’s back. The Rex BOQ (formerly Hotel) is to the right.

2 February 1968

Dear Everyone~

Today is Washington’s Birthday (here), and although I guess I could have gone to Long Binh as usual and sat on my hands at double-time, I elected to stay home & look for an apartment. Spent most of the day at it, without finding anything. So I’ve decided to take a single room here at the Loc Building, 318 Phan-thanh-Gian. (In Vietnamese that comes out approximately “fantanyan”). It’s a comfortable place, clean, well kept, and secure. About a 20 minute walk to downtown, or a 20p – 10 min cab ride. I’ll take most of my meals out, though there is a restaurant here, of sorts.

I found out why I’ve been having GI [gastrointestinal] trouble— found three daphnia (a small water-flea typical of polluted water) in a bottle of Bireley’s orange drink here the other day! Although it is supposedly “pasteurized”, it’s probably done in bulk, before going into the bottles. At any rate, I’m off Bireley’s. Cokes are bottled at the same plant—so I guess they’re out, too. I’m beginning to see why “33″ is so popular—nothing could possibly live in that “pickling bath”—but I’ll drink water only before I’d take that stuff again!

The formula for US Army iced tea is as follows: fill one bucket (preferably with lots of rust) with water. Add a tablespoon of Clorox to sterilize. Add ice to chill. Serve. One tea-bag may be added for color if desired.

There are so many marvelous little changes here that few people bother to observe, but which contribute to what little charm the place has left. For one thing, everything is scaled down in size to fit the population’s general smallness. (cf. previous letters) Elevators, for instance, are tiny. The one in the Rex [BOQ, formerly hotel] was rated by Otis [India] for 8 persons. 8 americans got in it one night, and it plunged all the way to the basement. (The Rex has no basement). So now it is posted for 4 persons (or, as some pfc, no doubt, added, “2 Officers”). Chairs and tables in restaurants tend to be miniscule, as do seats on busses. The long Binh bus (a Mercedes) seats 80 Vietnamese comfortably—about half that number of americans, UNcomfortably. I practically have to crawl in and out of it—a good case of “Flebus” would help immeasurably!

Oddly, the beds here in this hotel, though slightly narrower than US standard, are longer—and quite comfortable for me. The bathroom fixtures, on the other hand, are sort of “sports-car” equipment, and one has to assume some unaccustomed positions to use them. And since Vietnamese are almost totally devoid of body-hair, they put very fine screens in the floor-drains, which plug up immediately when I take a shower!

Under separate cover, I’m sending a bundle of newspapers that I gathered up, mostly, after others were through with them. You may be the only house in town with the Saigon Post in the stack with the New York Times! But since you are still plagued by the SF strike, I thought you could use some news!!

I’ve decided to get an 8 mm movie camera. Bell & Howell has a very nice one that’s virtually automatic and not too expensive. Hence, you should look around for one of those small 8 mm viewer contraptions. It will be month or so before I get it, but it will enable us to share a few experiences, visually at least.

You’ve probably figured out by now that when you get to Hawaii for  your long-awaited trip, you’ll be about 1/3rd of the way to Bangkok—why not plan to fly over for a week—with luck & plenty of advance notice, I could probably get there at the same time. On the other hand, you could doubtless get an entrance visa to Vietnam itself if you should feel compelled (!!) to view Saigon University. I pass it every day—it’s out of town a ways on Hiway 1—right smack-dab in the middle of Charlie territory. Several large buildings are completed, but idle . . .

I’d marginally planned (or hoped) to spend Christmas in Australia. On talking to an Aussie this morning, though, it seems that December & January are holiday months there, and prices skyrocket. So I’ll probably plan that for next February or so. Any leave I take before then will be to HK or BK, I suspect.

My new immediate spvsr at Long Binh is a much better man than his predecessor and think there is a much better chance, with his help, I can get a program started. It’s obvious that I’m going to have a brief personality-clash with the [Post] Installation Manager—but I think I can handle it in such a way that it won’t happen more than once. Among the milder remarks by others that I’ve heard about him are the following choice items:

“There is nothing like a good Post Installation Manager, and Mr. Smythe is nothing like a good  Post Installation Manager!”

“Mr.  Smythe suffers from delusions of adequacy”

“In a recent popularity poll, Mr. Smythe came in just slightly above Ho Chi Minh!”

The rest of the comments don’t bear repeating. All I can say from my own personal experience is that so far, he has yet to show me any indication of real management ability. We shall see!! He makes a big thing about the fact he’s been a PIM longer than anyone here (which he likes to intimate is because he’s such a good one). The fact is, he’s been demoted twice, and is so genuinely disliked by so many people that it’s all he can do to remain a PIM. He broadcasts his insecurity every time he opens his mouth. Cèst la viê!!

The chap I’ve been billeted with here was supposed to go to his assignment in Qui Nhon, today, but it’s a 50-50 chance that the transportation  actually works out and he gets there. I’ve been fortunate to learn a great deal from him, and he was always in good humor and pleasant, with  a great sense of camaraderie, and a long collection of amusing anecdotes.

Time to go to bed soon. There’s an unusually pretty sunset right now. One doesn’t see them too often. Morning half-light here lasts only about 15 minutes, and against the lightening sky the clouds (usually present) are a curious black color. The length of days doesn’t vary much here, and the sun rises and sets quickly. Sunsets are brief and usually not spectacular, twilight is short, and darkness overtakes the city almost suddenly. Against the present reddish clouds, there is already a flare aloft to light the way for some sort of action, or to allow surveillance against infiltration or strikes…

Last night around midnight there was a good deal of action due North. At least 3 Charlie emplacements were lobbing mortars and rockets in all directions, and despite heavy “FWF” attack, were still lobbing them out at a great rate when I crawled into bed at midnight. The action was, as best I could judge by timing the flashes & sounds, about 15 miles away.

On that delightful note, I’ll close. As Walter Cronkite would say, “that’s how it is…”

Love to all~

Bruce

My narrative will continue as soon as I can find time to transcribe more letters.

July 27, 2009
Before I continue my saga, there’s a couple of things to mention:

NATURE BOY

The response to this latest of my stories has been quite phenomenal: many have written to me about it, and all have urged me to continue it. So, I am doing so. It will be a while before it is ready to put up on Nifty, so keep your eyes open there.

BACK TO MY LETTERS FROM VIETNAM

Saturday, 10 February 68

Dear Folks,

Things are slowly (very slowly) getting back to normal. The general feeling is that another VC attack may come at any time, but so far it’s fairly quiet, and normal routines are being re-established. I’ve managed to get out to Long Binh twice this week, and tomorrow I and several others are moving out of this flea-bag flop-house to the Loc Building, where we were originally billeted and from which we were so summarily “evacuated” because of the stupidity of a minority of our group. Now that the group has been dispersed somewhat on assignments, we’re free to go where we choose. The Loc Building is as secure as any place in town—more-so in some ways. Until the curfews are entirely lifted and a normal way of life results, I expect I’ll stay at the Loc Building. My address, of course, for mailing purposes remains the same and will for some while.

I’ve even driven out to Long Binh twice in the vehicle assigned to me. I had the foresight before I left to pay $3.00 for an international drivers’ license, which many people do not have here. Driving is pretty hectic, what with the incredible traffic load, which is still not back to its usual levels because of curfews. Then, too, there are numerous ARVN & white mice check-points. Of course, if one is courteous and uses the usual hand signals, there’s no problem. The guys who drive here and get into trouble are inevitably the ones who drive as if they owned the place, which (naturally enough) displeases the Vietnamese. I’ve had no difficulty so far. The most important rule, of course, is to abandon any hope of getting anywhere by a specific time—one has to move at the traffic’s pace, whether that be dead stand-still (as it frequently is) or a snail’s-pace crawl, as is more usual. In town, it’s rare to get the truck into third gear!

I’ve only spent a couple of days at Long Binh, so haven’t been fully able to psych out  the situation. Everything has been so discombobulated by the VC attacks that normal routines (which are nearly always chaotic anyhow) still haven’t been pieced back together. Communication is a great problem, and there are still people unaccounted for. Because of the curfews, very few Vietnamese are available to work, so the lower echelon assistants just aren’t there. Curfews are being extended & ended & lifted in various precincts from time to time, but as there are still parts of town (notably Cho-lon & the Phu Tho rare-track) that are hot-beds of VC activity, the populace has to be restricted in its mobility The clippings enclosed will give you some idea of present situations here.

So—that’s the way it is. I hope all my letters have gotten through OK. The PT&T cable office is still not yet open to the public, & by now you should have had word from me, so I won’t cable.

Incidentally, the emergency connection to get through to me is through the LA office of PA&E. The telephone is [expunged] collect. Ask for [expunged]; he can radio messages; explain my location is Long Binh Post, and you could reach me within 12 hours, I suspect. Alas, under current circumstances I can’t work it the other way ’round!!

Love to all–
Bruce

Letters down to every-other-day now, signifying things were calming down.

Monday, 12 February 68

Dear folks –

By now I hope you’ve had all my letters, and know I am OK. I was on the “missing” list for 3 days as it turned out, simply because no one had checked me in at the CMO—I’d transferred by then to LB. But that’s how it is here—utter chaos—and I’m not sure but what that’s how it will be all the time.

Got your February 4th letter today—it went to Saigon first, then to Long Binh, so took a little extra time. [Family trivia deleted. The letter included a $10 bill, illegal in Vietnam].

Already got a swell birthday present as previously mentioned. It may be a while before I find anything costing $10 that I’d want to buy here; but I’ve had so little chance to see shops and so forth open, I don’t have too clear an idea of what’s available.

A new group of PA&E recruits arrived today, and a few are billeted here at the Loc Building. From what they tell me, the radio/press/TV coverage of the Saigon situation was greatly exaggerated. Make no mistake: there was a lot of bitter fighting here, a great many people killed & wounded, and some areas largely destroyed. But don’t believe 600,000 homeless and that sort of bilge. This morning I saw a group of about 50 AP news photos, mostly taken in Cho-lon. where the worst of the fighting took place. Not very pretty. But a realistic figure on the people displaced in Saigon would be no more than 5-8000; the refugees into the city from much harder hit (but smaller) cities stands around 30,000. Not that these figures aren’t bad enough, but nothing like the reports apparently circulating in the U.S.

Then too, most of the “homeless”, by any human standard, were “homeless” to begin with. The standard of living for at least 2.5 million people here is such as to make the worst of Harlem or Watts seem palatial. It is a wonder that any of the people in these areas survive—and of course, many don’t, even in “normal” times.

The American presence here is creating a fairly large upper class—land owners who lease various properties (such as this hotel) & buildings to the U.S. This situation accentuates the lack of any sizable middle class: Vietnamese tend to be either wealthy or very poor. The leading businesses, for the most part, are owned by Chinese, who have managed to move into the vacuum left by the French. Where the French moved in, created an economy and skimmed the cream off the top, we move in and simply destroy whatever economy is in place and substitute inflation—which makes the poor poorer.

(Later) Three of us just went next door to the Korean Officers Club & had a Korean dinner. Surprisingly good, which is quite a compliment, coming from a steak and potatoes fan like myself. Also, at Long BInh today I got the first decent meal I’ve had out there: it even included an unlimited supply of “filled milk”—reconstituted milk—which is the first I’ve had since leaving LA, and the only thing I’ve really missed since I left.

I’ve sort of become the unofficial chauffeur for the group of us who live more-or-less down town & work at Long Binh. This means driving the “turnpike” (the only 4-lane road in all Vietnam {except possibly the Ho Chi Minh Trail, which is mostly in Laos anyhow}), a distance of 20 miles or so. During these times when traffic is relatively light, it takes a half-hour; but when things get really moving again it will be more like an hour or more. But by then the buses (which are leased from Vietnamese firms and hence aren’t operating because of the curfews) will be running, & I can sleep the whole time as I understand most people do! The road is relatively safe—you can’t plant mines in a paved highway—and is only occasionally (and very temporally) cut by the VC.

It passes the outskirts of Bien Hoa (pronounced Bin Wa) where there was some bitter fighting over control of the highway, and a good many buildings were destroyed.

You can’t afford to go on Xeroxing my letters forever – but as soon as I get my first pay-check I’ll get a typewriter, which will enable me to carbon-copy everything to the family. I appreciate your doing it as long as necessary.

That’s about all for now. Unless the VC kick up more ruckus (some feel they are going to, some don’t), we should soon be settling down to a steady routine—about all that will mean is fewer letters, since there won’t be so much to wrote about!!

Love to all-
Bruce

The driving mentioned in the letter above was all done on my International Drivers License. Later on, I got the local license shown above. Wonderfully impressive, with all those stamps and chops. Yet, no one ever asked to see it during the entire time I was in Vietnam!

Valentine’s Day. 14 February 68

Dear Folks –

Managed to get some larger paper—makes for shorter letters and more economical use of your Xerox facilities!  I’m wondering a bit about whether you ever got the long letter No. 2 that I finally managed to send out unexpectedly when we were confined here. The envelope was poorly sealed; I hope you didn’t get it empty! If you did, a carbon copy went to friends in SF and I expect I could get them to Xerox it & send it on if necessary. [It wasn’t necessary—BB]

Life is slowly returning to normal. The Vietnamese are still, for the most part, under curfew from 7:00 am to 2:00 pm daily—5:30 in a couple of precincts only, so that not too many are able to work, especially those who ride out to Long Binh or other spots outside Saigon proper. Each day, though, sees new streets opened to traffic and other signs of a semblance of normalcy.

U.S. civilians are also under strict curfew from 7 pm to 8:00 am. This means we don’t get to long Binh until 9 (instead of 7:30), and when we leave at 5, we don’t get to Saigon until 6 pm, which leaves no time for eating. Here at the Loc building we’re lucky, inasmuch as there’s a restaurant of sorts on the premises, and the Korean Club next door which serves good food (we ate there again tonight) How soon the curfew is lifted is anybody’s guess, but barring another siege by the VC, my own guess is Monday.

I’ve sort of become the unofficial chauffeur (it’s official now—I got a military license today!) for the group of us who live near or in Saigon.

The buses leave only from Tan Son Nhut, and there’s no very practical way to get out there by the time appointed for it to leave. So every day I drive this bucking bronco of a Dodge 2-seater pickup out the Bien Hoa “Hiway” to Long Binh. It’s quite an experience, for traffic rules (if any) are only rarely observed by anyone, never enforced, apparently, and there are long convoys of heavy trucks, tanks and all that to thread one’s self in and out of! We picked up assorted people after working at LBI today en-route, and ended up with 15! Needless to say, many rode in the back—not a pleasant place to ride I guess; but it beats walking!

I used to have an occasional twinge of conscience when I worked only 7 hours per day at [former employer] but got paid for 8; I accomplished all the tasks I set for myself in that length of time, and everyone prospered, so nothing was ever said about it. But over here, the scale is something else again!! (Of course, nothing has been really “normal” since I got here.) I’ve put in, (exclusive of driving time which is some benefit I suppose) perhaps 20 actual hours of useful work since I arrived—and of that 20, about 18 has been filling out forms. If we never win this war, we ought to be able to bury the whole country in paper and start over! I even had an attack of “Federal Form-itis” last night: I was dreaming I was typing out a form justifying a personal visit to the loo!—and about the time I ripped it out of the typewriter as being just too ridiculous for words, I woke up! [and went to the bathroom—BB]

The army procurement system, after which PA&E is patterned of course, is too incredible; to imagine spending a lifetime in the system as a supply officer or some such would seem unbearable. And I’ve only just started. Compounded by the general ineptitude of the people using & running the procurement system, it is a marvel that anyone ever gets anything. Some way to run a war! And side-by-side with the shortage of staple items, like food, one has a glut of useless items, like staples!! The lab is equipped, for example, with literally hundreds of petri dishes (of an obsolete style) but lacks an analytical balance, the cornerstone of any quantitative lab operation. Oddly enough, two balances (not very clearly identified, but apparently good ones) are in the original “Schedule B” of items issued to PA&E under the contract, but no one has actually ever requisitioned either of them. That’s how it goes. I figure it’s optimistic to shoot for making the lab operational (for chemical analyses) by June 30. Through normal state-side channels, I could be in gear and going in two weeks!

Elsewise there’s not much to report. Haven’t had any chance, of course, to look for quarters—or much else. Having mailed myself a big box of sundry items (soap, etc.) which I finally picked up at Long Binh, and having a good supply of clothes along, I’m better off than many who got caught up in this mess. Will have to order a pair of shoes soon to be mailed down, but for the moment there’s no great rush.

Love to all—and please don’t worry about me. I’m pretty safe (as much as anyone here) and not given to looking for trouble, as I see many idiots doing. They find it. The self-appointed “protector” of our group (described in earlier letters) was sent home (thank goodness)!!

Love to all~
Bruce

I was beginning to get my feet on the ground and learn my way around Saigon. I learned so much from CA, and remember particularly one event. He said he’d take me as his guest to the Five-Os BOQ for a nice dinner: he still had his SOOM [Saigon Open Officers Mess] card that would get us in. By this time there was a fair amount of traffic on Phan-thanh-Gian street, and we decided to take a taxi. At the street, there were several other “round-eyes” (as we were often) called seeking a cyclo or taxi: they stood, waving their thumbs in the air as traffic ignored them. CA simply extended his arm out from his body and gave a little  motion with his hand: six taxis immediately screeched to a halt! We stepped into one of them and were off, leaving the other guys wondering how we’d managed. The secret, of course, was to keep my eyes open and observe how CA had indicated he wanted a taxi (which was, of course, the way the Vietnamese did it as well) and thereafter use the correct action. It worked every time.

In 1968, Saigon Taxis were little Renaults left by the French, and they were usually pretty well worn out. They dated from the 1950s, and were painted in blue and yellow. It was not unusual to look through holes in the floor-boards at the street passing below, but they usually got where they were going.  Maintaining these relics was a local industry: the French refused to provide spare parts, so if one wandered a bit off the beaten track in Saigon, one could find tiny machine-shops manufacturing parts for those taxis.

Similarly, Saigon (and I suppose the whole country) was  a gold-mine of old motorcycles:

I snapped this venerable BMW single parked at a curb one day, and saw it driven around town often. Early Indians could be found, and I even saw an Ariel Square-4 once!

However, the ubiquitous cycle by 1968 was the Honda 55, of which there were an estimated 3 million in Saigon at the time. I’ll have more to say about these later.

MY LIFE IN VIETNAM

I begin here a long series of pages relating events in my life while in VietNam. I wrote many letters which were circulated among family and friends, and which my Dad saved: I still have them.

Because I was writing to many people (Dad copied and re-mailed many letters to a distribution list I supplied), there is little of the gay side of those times included. That aspect has been covered in a couple of my stories (on Nifty), but will be included where appropriate in the pages which follow.

I consider myself reasonably articulate and observant: yet, prior to arriving in VietNam, I’d have been hard-pressed to take a stand on the war there. It was something that was, for those not directly involved, pretty much in the background. President Johnson’s “guns and butter” philosophy was designed to keep the war in the background: the kind of war-time sacrifices (rationing, “War stamps” and all that sort of thing I grew up with during WW II) were not imposed, so it was easy for Americans to ignore the Vietnam War. As I would soon discover, it was not so easy for the Vietnamese to ignore.

War Savings Stamp

What  I think is significant, (and clearly revealed in my letters), is how quickly I perceived what a colossal mistake the whole war was! Now, what particularly appalls me is that we clearly learned nothing from the experience, for we continue to this day to wage war where we should be waging peace.

For any of my readers unfamiliar with the Tet Offensive of 1968, I recommend reading the WikiPedia synopsis before going on with my narrative and letters. As far as I know, these letters will be the first on the net from a civilian who was there, at least for a while.

27 January, 1968

Dear ones all –

We made it, but it was a long haul. The group, 16 in number, embarked LA about 8PM on the 25th, and 21 hours later touched down at Ton Son Nhut Air Base, Saigon, VN. It was, of course, dark all the way to Guam (we stopped at Honolulu and Wake) but there the sun caught up with us and we were able to witness a beautiful tropical sunrise at about 7:30 local time. From Guam we flew directly to Saigon, by-passing (but flying directly over) Manila. The actual flying time was about 17 hours; the distance 8920 miles (according to PanAm charts). Although tourist class and filled every inch of the way, the flight wasn’t too bad—just long. Somewhere along the way I made an estimate of my total flying miles and was disappointed to find it’s only about 40,000 miles.

Pan Am Ticket Stub

Our arrival at Ton Son Nhut was about 10:00 am local time, and after the usual clumsy customs and immigration clearance, we were transported to PA&E HQ (nearby) for a quick briefing and a little paperwork. Then on into Saigon proper for billeting at Loc Building, 318 Phan-thanh-Gian; this is a hotel, and quite a good one by local standards; H & C running water, good food & reasonable rates. Quite modern and up to date, though architecturally unlike anything we know in the states. Naturally!

Reason For Voiding Will Be Explained Later

It is Saturday here, the first day of Tet, the celebration of the New [lunar] Year (of the monkey). We’re told the streets of Saigon are not the place to be the next 5 days, so haven’t seen much so far. I’ll have plenty of time to get familiar with it all, apparently.

My only observation so far is that the US “Military Presence” is all-pervading and EVERYWHERE!! Since there is active fighting within 50 miles of Saigon, it’s a pretty tightly controlled place. Ton Son Nhut Airbase (Airport, really, but converted to a base) is a veritable beehive of aircraft operations, visited not only by half a dozen international carriers, but by hundreds of Military aircraft as well.

Our briefing was exactly that—brief—and not too instructive. However, it does appear I am the first “chemist” to arrive here under PA&E contract, and it appears I’ll be based at Long BInh. This is the largest [US]army installation in VN, situated about 12 miles out of Saigon. Reportedly, it is one of the safest places to be in all VN, and of course is handy to Saigon. All this will become clearer as full briefing gets under way Monday. (Tet notwithstanding, PA&E works on!)

The weather—right now—is terrific. About 75, and not overpoweringly humid. January is, of course, Saigon’s best month, and it will get steadily hotter until late in May when monsoons arrive. But for the moment weather is great and a welcome change from the cold dampness of SF. (If I had elected to fly down Thursday from SF, I’d have gotten fogged in and barely made it, as one of our group found out).

The time change is catching up with me; so, though it is early here, I’ve got to hit the sack for a while. Please find an old shoebox or equivalent to toss the various items included [with this letter] into—I’m an inveterate saver of such reminders of various adventures; also circulate this letter to family and somebody retain it later on.

Whatever else, don’t worry! Though there’s plenty of trouble to be gotten into here, one has to seek it out—it rarely works the other way. I’m not here looking for it, so the law of averages works in my favor!

Love to all from (of all places!) Saigon, VN
Bruce

Here endeth the first letter, of many yet to come!

PARENTHETICAL INFORMATION

An odd fact was that for a number of years, Saigon was the only place outside the northern hemisphere where my two brothers and I had all been at one time or another. My oldest brother passed through in 1958, and my older brother visited Saigon on business while I was there. I met him at Ton Son Nhut as I would at any other airport. But the building he stayed in took a rocket hit that night and he was “urged to depart”, which he did! When older bro finally went to Europe, Saigon lost this distinction.

INITIAL IMPRESSION

Within just a few hours of arrival in VietNam, I realized I was going to like it! Everywhere I turned there were scantily-clad youngsters, most often bare-legged.  As a confirmed chicken-queen, I thought I’d found heaven!

Wrong kind!

Unfortunately, I had only a cheap little Instamatic camera, so I got far too few photos of much of anything in Vietnam. It would be some time before any of us got away from the Loc Building, because of the Tet madness, about which more later!

My second letter from VietNam will appear soon.