Back to Nam. Visit the Vietnam Tour Information Page. Courtesy Fernando De Pierris.
"The Task Force reaches the summit where a 2 June 1969 survivor finds that nothing has changed."
Read: The Last Recon Platoon
McDaniel journeys to Vietnam, honors Medal of Honor reciepeint.
By Rudy Purificato, Air Force Research Laboratory
Special Edition | |
| S. C. Jones | Of these good men |
| Fernando De Pierris | Ron's Resurrection |
| S. C. Jones | I know a man |
The 1999 Banshee Vietnam Journal | |
Photos by S.C.Jones | 1999 Vietnam Crew |
Randy Kunkleman | Vietnam 1999 |
Fernando De Pierris | Trip Report (in progress) |
Plans are well underway for a tour of Vietnam. Group rates are available. We have no affiliation with this or any other travel bureau. If you are interested in this trip, Contact: Fernando De Pierris at fernando_de_pierris@fmso.navy.mil
I am trying to arrange a tour of Vietnam for May-Jun 1999. Per person costs should include air fare from LA to Nam and return, air fare from Saigon to Da Nang and from Hue to Saigon. Those who desire to stick around the III Corps can save the in-country air fare.
Regards to all, Fernando
Subject: Danang trip
Fernando,
My name is Mike Meyer, i am a Vietnam Veteran and have traveled to Vietnam five times in the last two years on medical support with the General Hospital in Danang. I strongly recommend you stay at the Furama Hotel, it is right on China Beach and is by far the best place to stay. It is fantastic. Also, check with the tour guides in Hoi An for a head guide who was a Boy Scout leader before 75', he will take very good care of your group, I suggest if you can to take along some Boy Scout stuff as gifts, this guy is terrific.
Good Luck, let me know if you need anything.
Mike Meyer At uplift@kc.net
56th recovery 70-71 Long Thanh North Doorgunner/CE
Kansas City, Kansas
President UPLIFT International Inc.
My goal is as follows: a tour of Vietnam, economic (hovering at around $2,500 per person) 10 days give or take, allowing maximum leeway to vets to visit their old hounds. Hence no serious committments as to specific tours until we know who is coming. For example, III corps vets have no interest in Chu Lain or Tam Ky, and vice versa. The following itinerary submitted by Mr. Duong gives a pretty good idea of cost. His proposed tour INCLUDES air fare from Saigon to Da Nang, and air fare from Hue back to Saigon. I submit that his plan is very reasonable. If you add $900 for the roundtrip ticket from LA to Saigon, we are well within the price-goal set, there remaining only the RT fare to get to LA. We are in the ball park.
The dates are locked: we should be at Tam Ky airstrip on 2 June 99 at 12:30. Doc's widow, Cindy, her sister Kandy. Doc Jr. and another person are planning on coming - quite an event that we are not going to forget for a while and I think it will be good for all of us. I will also be looking for sponsors and see if we can get some assistance.
Send E-Mail to: Fernando De Pierris.
Check it out, the new Vietnam Tour Web Site with additional facts, detailed itinary and find out who Fernando De Pierris really is!
THE LEGEND OF FIDDLERS' GREEN |
Half way down the trail to Hell, Marching past straight through to Hell, Though some go curving down the trail, And so when man and horse go down, |
Date: Wednesday, November 04, 1998 1:09 PM
CAV
An old grunt dies and goes to Heaven. At the pearly gates he meetsSaintPeter. "Hey, Glad to see you made it, we need Grunts up here and you deserve to be here." The grunt smiles and is about to step into heaven, he turns and asks "St.Pete, You don't have any CAV up here do you? They picked on me my whole career. Throwing MRE's and coke cans at me as they rode by, I hate CAV!" "NO WAY!" says Saint Peter "There is no CAV here. They stay down at Fiddlers Green."
So the grunt steps into heaven again and sees a cloud with a gun tube sticking out of it. All hell breaking loose, loud music, girls screaming, bottles breaking. " Hey that's CAV, you lied to me!" "No, no, no, that's the Mech Infantry." "OK", so he goes to step in again .
Hears the same ruckus from another cloud and sees a bigger gun tube "That's CAV!!!!" he screams hysterically. "Calm down that's artillery, they bailed you out when you were introuble." "Ya, dem guys are OK." So the grunt takes another step.
A Cobra comes screaming around a corner, the gunner hunched over his sights firing rockets and Hellfires everywhere. The pilot has a Stetson and a bottle of Jack Daniels in one hand and a blonde on the other. Crossed sabers are painted on the side of the chopper. "THAT'S THE CAV!" screams the Grunt. "NAW' says Saint Peter "that's GOD, He just thinks he's CAV!"
Dan Ragen
Anheuser-Busch Companies, Inc.
Phone: 314-865-9871 FAX: 314-865-9231
Thursday, November 18, 1999 12:05 PM
Across the street from the main gate was a small strip mall catering to the soldiers. I got my first credit card at a store called the Brick. I am not sure if it was there, or at another store, but they would allow you to "pawn" your jump boots. I paid $70 or $80 for my special "jump" boots (as if I would really wear them to jump in), and I could get $20 until payday.
This was frowned upon, and so occasionally they would have a special inspection just before pay day to catch those foolish enough to do this. The credit card was a way around this.
William D. Livingston, Captain (retired)
D, 1/4 Cavalry, 1st Infantry Division, 1966-7
B, 2/17 Cavalry, 101st Abn., 1969-1970
The history of B, 2/17 as shown on the home page puzzles me a tad. It says, if I remember correctly, the troop went air Cav with CH-34s in 1958 (*). But in late 1968 the air cav element, at first known as F Troop, 15th Cavalry & some weeks or months later redesignated as B Packet, 101st Abn formed at Ft. Hood, Texas to replace the then ground cav Troop B, 2/17, 101st which began the process of turning over its ground cav vehicles to the ARVNs. In February,1969 B Packet was redesignated as Troop B, 2/17. In March it, with OH-6s, UH-1s & Cobras went to 'Nam. At the time, I led the scout platoon. We flew our aircraft from Hood to California, where they were put aboard a ship for transport to Da Nang. The troops went over by chartered airliner. I carried my personal S&W .38 on board with me, as probably did several of the offcers. I was movement officer for the troop, in theory responsible for the move. Once in Da Nang, I (a veteran of a previous tour in 'Nam with D, 1/4 Cav, 1st Infantry) hopped in a jeep with my driver And just the two of us buzzed up Highway One to Camp Eagle to verify the place was ready to receive the troop.
I remained with the troop until 22 January, 1970, the day I was WIA out in the Au Shau Valley.
My puzzlement relates to if the troop went air cav in '58, when did it go back to being ground cav? There seems to be a bit of a gap in the troop's history.
I simply want to help to keep the record straight. But perhaps because before I became a soldier, I was a school teacher I can at times be rigidly dogmatic. Or perhaps it is but what my parish priest said of me once, "You come from smalltown Kansas, therefore you call a spade, a spade." Folks from our culture, rural and smalltown America, have small truck with word games. To us something is or something is not.
Should anyone be writing a definitive history of Troop B, 2/17 I have as source material copies of most, if not all of my orders from my assignment to Troop F, 15th Cavalry (which became B Packet, which became Troop B) through my assignment as X.O. of Troop B, 2/17, 101st Abn.
In addition, this very day I finally made contact via the internet, with the Troop C.O. of B, 2/17, then Major David Larcomb, the very guy who was overhead in a Slick when I went down in my OH-6 (although I was troop X.O. and had less than two months to go on my second tour, I could not resist flying Loaches on scout missions, I liked flying little buggers so much and frankly, I liked scouting, because I was good at it). But my fixation with Loaches cost me my Army career and very nearly my life.
Ha. Bring on the next challenger, would you.
Dave
* [Webmaster Note] This refers to the statement "when B Troop first went Air ASSAULT (Air Mobile) using H-34's" on the home page, refer to Troop B (RECON) circa 1958. Can anyone fill in the gap?
And in response to the Entry in Dan Hilliard's Diary of a Scout Pilot, "22 Jan: Livingston and Shelters shot down East of Aloui - Shelters OK. Livingston seriously injured."
Shelters apparently was getting ready to throw a red smoke when the fight got hot & he, in the excitement, forgot to throw it out of the aircraft; they kept him in hospital for some days, until he stopped pissing red smoke. According to guys who wrote me, Shelters, a slick pilot, was flying with me because I was showing him how Scout pilots worked, him thinking of transferring to the Scouts; immediately after getting out of hospital, he went back to slicks. I do not blame him, scouting was indeed terribly dangerous. Although it was a type of flying that could be addictive: when I was hit, I was the troop X.O. with less than 60 days to go on my second tour (my entire first tour had been with Scouts and for the first third or so of my second tour I led a Scout platoon). Addictive, you see.
My name is Jim Matthews and I am currently serving as president of the B Troop 2/17th Cav Asso.
Some of the officers of the Association have spent many hours at the National Archives researching the history of B Troop as well as receiving information from the current squadron historian. We are aware of when B Troop was deployed to Vietnam, but are not totally familiar with what the troop was like and how it operated. Anyone with information is encouraged share it with us.
I was part of B Packet 2/17th Cav that formed in Ft Hood, TX in 1968. We trained there for appx 8 months and deployed to Vietnam with A Troop and C Troop, to complete the transition of the 2/17th from ground cav to air cav. We arrived in country in March of '69 and became operational by April.
From what we were able to find out, it was in late ' 68 or early ' 69, B Troop was inactivated. Most of the personnel were infused into other units within the 101st, but very few stayed in the newly formed unit. What is suprising is that most of the ' 68 troopers that we have contacted were unaware the the unit was never deactivated as they had assumed.
Most of the newly arriving "Banshees" were aware that we had some big shoes to fill and traditions to uphold, but many of the people to follow in ' 70- ' 71- ' 72, may not be aware that there was a transition of B Troop from ground to air cav in 1969 since they were assigned to the unit a year after the transition.
Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1998
There are some questions and misconceptions about the history of B Troop (17th Cav and 2/17th Cav) that I hope to clear up just with a summary, since I have not had the time to read all of the documented history that has been sent to me. Sometime in the near future I hope to have an article about the history of our unit for the web site that will be compiled from the historical documents that were sent to me from Ft. Cambell, newspaper articles, and personal input from some of the earlier members.
So for now, in hopes of clearing up some misunderstandings, here goes:
B Troop 17th Cavalry (airborne recon) was part of the 101st Abn Division at Ft. Campbell, KY in 1956-57-58 and although all members were primarily airborne infantry, they did have several fixed wing aircraft for observation/recon purposes and I believe, I was told 10 Ch-34 Choctaw that were for the exclusive use of the 17th Cav. So in fact, if this is true, the 101st was one of the first divisions to experiment with the airmobility concept. According to several of the "originals" that attended the reunion, they were crewchiefs, etc, but first of all they were airborne infantry. This is documented with the newspaper article that was copied and given to our archives. Although they were recognized as the 17th Cav, they came under the division Command and Control element and did not wear the 17th Cavalry Crest. (One of their extra details was division honor guard).
Somewhere in the early sixties, the 17th Cavalry was expanded into several squadrons. To our knowledge, HHT, A Troop and B Troop 2/17th Cavalry remained assigned to the 101st Airborne Division. (There was no C & D Troop at this time). They were all still airborne infantry and according to some of the people who served during this era, they had jeeps and helicopters while they were still stationed at Ft Campbell, up until they were deployed to Vietnam. A Troop went first in 1967 and B Troop went when the rest of the division deployed in 1968. According to these B Troopers, the aircraft that they had at Ft Campbell, stayed behind and were supposed to be shipped over later, but that never happened. Some where along the line someone deciede that they didn't need them. After they arrived in Vietnam, they still had the jeeps, but were assigned APCs, which neither were of too much use, since they were given missions where they could not take jeeps, let alone APCs.
Toward the end of 1968, the 2/17th Cav was more or less at a standdown. Most of the remaining personnel were reassigned to other units within the division, in fact, some of the people that I talked to thought the 2/17th Cavalry was disbanded all together and were surprised to learn that the 2/17th continued to serve in 69-70-71-72. During this period in 1968, the 101st began its' transition to becoming airmobile.
During the summer of 1968, excess personnel that were left over from D/1/1 that formed in Ft Hood, TX, began forming another unit first designated F Troop 15th Cav, and later B Packet 2/17th Cav. Since there can not be two units is the Army with the same unit designation, we did not become B Troop 2/17th Cav until the unit that was serving in Vietnam , was deactivated or at complete stand down, whatever the terminology. The personnel that served with B/2/17 that came over from Ft. Campbell in 1968, never knew of the existence of B Packet 2/17th, who we were or where we came from. Upon the arrival of A, B & C Troops in March of 1969 , completed the transition of 2/17th Cav from airborne to air cavalry.
As of today, there are three active squadrons in the 17th Cavalry. The 1/17th is with the 82nd Airborne Div., the 2/17th is still with the 101st Airborne Div and the 3/17th is with the 10th Mountain Div.
I hope this clears up some misconceptions that anyone may have.
In 1968, the 333rd was a seperate unit that was detached to B Troop 2/17th Cavalry. We had our own C.O. with a senior maintenance officer usually a warrant and maintenance sergeant, ususlly an E-7 or above. It was basically an oversized platoon that was responsible for the heavy, front line aircraft repairs that the maintenance platoon could not handle. It also included the aircraft repair specialists such as electricians, hydraulics, engin mechanics, avionics, etc. The C.O. of B Troop was the ultimate commander of both units.
The 333rd shared the same hootches, mess, and details as B Troop. Our work or maintenance area was located in the tent that was on top of the conexes at the end of the road. As you walked down the center walk between the officers hootches, going toward the low side, you came to aircraft parts supply. If you continued in the same direction and went down over the hill you came to a huge maintenance tent that had a psp floor, this was the 333rd work area.
Each Troop except HHT & D, had a T.C. Detachment. Those troops did not have the aircraft that would require the need for a T.C. Detachment. The 333rd originally had Major Tallgreen and the C.O. in Texas and when we first arrived in Vietnam. When he left, Cpt Jach Pugh took over and he was later replaced by Lt. Steve Thomas. As you can see the rank slowly reduced as time went on.
After a short visit to the 2/17th in April, we learned that there are no T.C. Detachments assigned to any troop. In fact, the ' 69 B Troop and the 333rd together had approx 200 officers and enlisted men assigned to it's roster. Now the troop has 14 Officers and 11 EM. The 2/17th now has an E Troop, which does the maintenance for the whole squadron.
Jim Matthews
In the current film, Titanic, the character Rose is shown giving the finger to Jack (another character). Many people who have seen the film, question whether "giving the finger" was done around the time of the Titanic disaster, or was it a more recent gesture invented by some defiant seventh-grader.
The gesture has it roots in warfare in general and with enlisted troops specifically.
Before the Battle of Agincourt in 1415, the French, anticipating victory over the English, proposed to cut off the middle finger of all captured enlisted English soldiers. Without the middle finger it would be impossible to draw the renowned English longbow and therefore be incapable of fighting in the future.
This famous weapon was made of the native English Yew tree, and the act of drawing the longbow was known as "plucking the yew" (or "pluck yew").
Much to the bewilderment of the French, the English won a major upset and began mocking the French by waving their middle fingers at the defeated French,saying, "See, we can still pluck yew! PLUCK YEW!"
Over the years some 'folk etymologies' have grown up around this symbolic gesture. Since 'pluck yew' is rather difficult to say (like "pleasant mother pheasant plucker", which is who you had to go to for the feathers used on the arrows for the longbow), the difficult consonant cluster at the beginning has gradually changed to a labiodental fricative 'F',and thus the words often used in conjunction with the one-finger-salute are mistakenly thought to have something to do with an intimate encounter. It is also because of the pheasant feathers on the arrows that the symbolic gesture is known as "giving the bird".
Enlisted troops, regardless of origin, have always been and continue to be an amazing bunch.
LAST COBRA FLIGHT IN HAWAII AND THE ACTIVE ARMY
SCHOFIELD BARRACKS, Hawaii - The last flight by AH-1F Cobra attack helicopters by an active duty Army unit will be Monday from 2:30 to 3:30 p.m.
This final mission by crews assigned to the 1st Battalion, 25th Aviation Regiment (Attack), 25th Infantry Division (Light), will begin and end at a unit ceremony at Wheeler Army Airfield, pass over the USS Missouri and the USS Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbor, the Leeward coast and Kole Kole Pass. Unit members begin turn-in of their aircraft the following day to prepare for the battalion's draw of new OH-58D Kiowa Warrior helicopters. First developed in 1965 and fielded in 1967, the Cobra was the U.S. Army's first attack helicopter designed for that mission, and has deployed for nearly every U.S. combat operation from Vietnam to today. The Cobra was the first U.S. military helicopter specifically designed for ground attack, and is equipped with armament that includes a 20-millimeter cannon, tube-launched, optically tracked, wire-guided (TOW) missiles, and 2.75-inch rockets. Its two-soldier crew consists of a pilot and co-pilot/gunner. The Tropic Lightning Division's remaining Cobras will be replaced by OH-58D Kiowa Warriors, aircraft equipped with improved optical sights, a laser designator, Hellfire missiles, a .50-caliber machine gun and 2.75-inch rockets. 1st Battalion will field Kiowa Warriors on the Mainland and return to Oahu in May 2000.
The formation Monday will consist of eight Cobras, four Kiowas, and one UH-1H Iroquois ("Huey").
Major Edward S. Loomis, Media Relations Officer, 25th ID & U.S. Army Hawaii Telephone 808-655-8729, Fax 808-655-9290
Date: Thu, 17 Jun 1999 12:29:40 GMT
If your in Santa Rosa, California some day you might visit the Pacific Coast Air Museum. If you get the chance stop by and say hello to old #66-16779. She may have carried some of you in the Lamar Plain Operation. Looks like she was out of it for a few days on June 1st with a rotor strike at Camp Eagle, so she wouldn't have been on Hill 376 that following day.
Read about it at the PACIFIC COAST AIR MUSEUM