From Michael Kellermeyer, HHC 1/35^th Inf. (Forward Observer, 4.2" Mortar Platoon), Jan 1965 to Dec 1966

The following is a recollection of the events that took place on May 11 and 12, 1966 in the Central Highlands of Vietnam. The author admits to reliance on memories of events that occurred more than 35 years ago and may be in error as far as chronological chain. Anytime the phrase "I learned later" appears, it is because I did not personally witness an event and learned of it through "scuttlebutt" or other sources, which I will name as memory allows. I would be grateful if the piece is edited before publication to remove any outright contradictions of fact or material that might prove to be embarrassing to anyone who might read this.

Approaching my nineteenth birthday, I found myself carrying a radio for a Forward Observer for the 4.2 inch Mortar platoon. His name was Kreil and he was from Wisconsin or Minnesota or some other upper Midwest state. We were both attached to Charlie Company, 1^st Battalion, 35^th Infantry which was conducting "search and destroy" missions somewhere in, or near, the Ia Drang Valley. We had been happily finding very little in the way of enemy activity in the area in which we were operating for the previous week or so and were content to patrol and search under these conditions interminably. Of course, this was not to be the case.

During a patrol on the May 10, the headquarters element was called together and told to be ready for immediate extraction by helicopter. At the same time we were told that Bravo Company was heavily engaged with an enemy force. The transport Huey’s arrived soon thereafter and we scrambled onto them, knowing that we were going into a fight somewhere.

We flew into Duc Co, a Special Forces CIDG camp somewhere west of Pleiku and near the Cambodian border. On the ground was an assembly of helicopters such I had not yet seen during my tour of duty in country. I didn’t count them but there must have been almost a hundred "choppers" sitting in a huge field adjacent to the SF camp. Some had their rotors spinning, some did not. There were transports, gunships and light observation helicopters (loaches).

Charlie Company was formed up into "sticks" or seven man groups and assigned to waiting helicopters. The one on which I was placed was not on and it felt peculiar to be sitting in a Huey, in full battle dress, which was not even turned on. While we waited I tuned my AN/PRC25 backpack radio onto Bravo Company’s command frequency. There was much anxious chatter and the sounds of small arms and explosions could be heard in the background. I let anyone who wanted to listen do so in turn and then tuned the radio to Alpha Company’s frequency only to discover that Alpha had already joined the fight. Again, there was a charge of anxiety in the transmissions and the sound of many weapons in the background. We began to wonder aloud why we were just sitting there in that field. We wanted to go in and help our Battalion.

Eventually, the knots of pilots surrounding the field broke up and, at a trot, they made their way to the ships. We watched our pilots strap in and prepare for flight with a little anxiety of our own.

Once airborne, I was awed by the sight of so many helicopters filling the sky all around me. They flew in formations of from three to six ships and the formations were in every direction I looked. Far below us Huey Gun ships (hogs) weaved just above the triple canopied jungle. In every ship I could see groups of soldiers in full combat gear, their weapons at the ready and their legs dangling from the cargo holds in anticipation of a quick exit. In the distance I saw plumes of thick gray and black smoke rising from the earth. I knew that was our destination, Landing Zone Ten Alpha. We were ten minutes out.

As we approached the battle I could see the orange flashes of explosions occurring in the forest surrounding the LZ. It seemed mostly on the south and west perimeters. We watched as several A1E Skyraider propeller driven attack planes swooped low over the wood line and dropped tumbling canisters of napalm, which boiled explosively through the forest.

Someone nudged me and pointed. Far below and to our left a Huey Hog was making a run on an enemy position. But something was wrong. Enemy ground fire had evidently caught right side rocket pods on fire and the crew chief, a very tiny figure from our viewpoint, was leaning out of the burning chopper with an even tinier fire extinguisher trying to put out the rapidly growing blaze. We watched in horror as the alloyed metals in the skin of the chopper itself became engulfed in flame. It was almost comical to watch that hapless crew chief and his valiant but futile effort to extinguish that blazing inferno with his completely ineffectual little fire extinguisher. The blazing helicopter continued to lose altitude and flared for a landing in Ten Alpha. We watched as three crewmembers raced from the brightly burning ship. One hesitated and returned to the ship. Apparently one of the pilot’s doors was jammed. The heroic crewmember was able to free the jam and soon we saw all four crew members scrambling for safety.

We were on final approach, just meters above the barren treetops on the east end of the LZ. Hearts in our throats, we could feel the occasional "tug" of a bullet hitting the aircraft. The explosions on the ground were audible as well as the staccato rhythm of various automatic weapons. We edged closer to the doors to make a hasty exit when, all of a sudden, the pilots poured on the coal streaking across the LZ at sixty feet and climbing. The concern was the violently burning gunship in the LZ. Her fuel tanks had not yet exploded and no one wanted to risk more choppers on the ground in close proximity. We circled and approached twice more, each time feeling "hits" on our birds. The third time we came in hot and low, the helicopters hovering three feet off the ground for the few seconds that it took to disgorge the passengers, then dropped their noses and took off like bats out of hell.

I found myself lying in muck about twenty meters from the burning chopper. The M-60 machine guns abandoned by the burning chopper’s door gunners were so hot that rounds were being "cooked" off, and I could see tracers hitting the ground and bouncing over my head. I had to wait a few moments for all the helicopters to clear the LZ before I could retreat from the burning one.

Once the choppers were clear I began to make my way across the LZ toward the sound of the fighting. The LZ was a virtual swamp. I hunkered low because there was much small arms fire from the east and occasionally a spray of water erupted where a bullet hit. It was very tough going, my boots were sucked in by the mud over my ankles and it required quite an effort to pull each step free. Ahead of me was a hole from which two guys were looking out and I scrambled into the position with them. I was immediately immersed in muddy water to my waist. I didn’t recognize either guy. They must have been from either Bravo or Alpha Company. I thought they might have been part of the downed chopper crew but they had rifles and were wearing steel pots, not flight helmets. I still don’t know what they were doing in that hole in the middle of the LZ.

I knew I had to rejoin Charlie Company so I left the hole and half ran, half crawled to the tree line beyond which all the heavy fighting was taking place. I saw a stack of crates and hunkered behind them to catch my breath and prepare to enter the fighting. I glanced over my shoulder at the burning helicopter. Inexplicably, it still had not blown, even though it was thoroughly embroiled in flames. I turned my head and the stenciling on the side of the crates caught my attention. Grenades. I knew I couldn’t stay here so I moved into the tree line looking for someone familiar. I wasn’t twenty feet from the grenade cache when the downed helicopter finally blew. It exploded in a tremendous ball of fire that rose hundreds of feet in the air.

Someone came running by yelling that Charlie Company was to assemble on the opposite side of the LZ. Soon droves of infantry began making their way across the open LZ, slogging through the mud as quickly as they could. Sniper bullets whined through the air as we went. Near the opposite wood line the new battalion commander was directing traffic, inserting units where he wanted them inside the tree line. I thought it remarkable that he would expose himself to enemy sniper fire in such a manner. We went into the tree line and found abandoned enemy fortifications, which we occupied facing outward against a possible attack. We were shifted right and left a few times to ensure maximum perimeter coverage. During this time an occasional sniper bullet would come snapping through the tree branches reminding us that the area was extremely dangerous.

On the other side of the LZ, perhaps three hundred meters distant, the battle still raged. Artillery and aircraft continued to bombard suspected enemy positions and through the sound of explosions we could hear great volumes of automatic weapons fire, both U.S. and North Vietnamese. It seemed only a matter of time before we were involved on this side of the LZ. It was getting toward dusk and we had to hurriedly prepare our positions to withstand any assaults that might be made by the enemy during the coming darkness. The rifle squads worked out their intricate networks of fields of fire and communications were established among the line of positions.

When darkness fell, the sounds of the battle across the LZ died down except for the occasional staccato bark of an enemy AK-47 or the heavier ripping sound of a friendly M-60 machine gun’s reply. We heard voices calling out but at that distance we couldn’t tell what was being yelled or who was doing the yelling.

The entire night was a series of ghostly shadows cast by overhead flares and bursts of automatic weapons fire where NVA troops were probing the perimeter. No enemy activity took place on our side of the LZ that I can remember.

When dawn broke the battle seemed to be over. On the far side of the LZ Alpha and Bravo companies were running sweeps outside the perimeter to ascertain enemy intentions and casualties.

My FO and I were assigned to a five man squad that was going to patrol out to the opposite side of the LZ. We thought seven guys was a bit few in light of the obvious numerical strength of the NVA on the previous day but orders were orders so off we trudged, cautious and alert. About two hundred meters north of the LZ the forest gave way to an large field of elephant grass about as high as our eyes. We began moving through the field to enter more forest on the other side. About fifty meters into the grass we encountered a huge swath of trampled grass. It measured about ten meters wide and wound away around the woods that surrounded Ten Alpha. The grass had been trampled by a large number of NVA troops moving through the area in great haste. The grass had been only recently trampled, perhaps during the night but we couldn’t tell if it was a retreat from the battle or reinforcements arriving.

We continued our designated patrol route without further incident until we had nearly arrived back at the LZ. As we entered the woods that surrounded the north side of Ten Alpha, we paused in a thicket in order to communicate with the perimeter that we were about to return through our lines. One of the rifleman spotted movement to our left and we hunkered down into the thicket to observe. Walking toward our concealed position was a solitary NVA soldier, AK-47 at the ready. Although he was exhibiting stealth in his movements, his concentration was obviously on the activities taking place several hundred meters away within the LZ. (Helicopters were coming and going) We watched to see if he was the scout for a larger force but saw no other movement in the forest. He crept to within five meters of our position when several riflemen in the squad opened fire, killing him instantly. We hastily called in our location and situation lest the perimeter force get trigger happy and begin reconning by fire. No fire came our way and we made our way back into Ten Alpha. That concludes my eyewitness account of the battle.

The Rumor Mill

The following is what I heard about the battle:

A company of the 14^th Infantry walked into the LZ prior to the battle and saw nothing. They were then extracted by helicopter prior to B Co., 1/35^th’s arrival.

Only one chopper was able to initially land B company troops within the LZ, the remainder being driven off by at least five enemy anti-aircraft guns.

The seven soldiers of B company stranded on the ground valiantly knocked out enough of the anti-aircraft positions to allow further insertions of troops.

The errant napalm bomb dropped by the A1E Skyraider killed or wounded over 40 B Company troops, mostly the headquarters element. This was obviously exaggerated.

When Alpha company arrived to reinforce a beleaguered Bravo company, the enemy was getting an upper hand until Alpha’s company commander, Captain "Mad" Anthony Bisantz stood in front of his troops, cigar clenched in his mouth and blazing M-16s in either hand, rallied and inspired his men to counter attack effectively. In a recent email conversation with Captain Bisantz, he pooh-poohed the incident and gave credit to his NCOs and "fine’ troops. I don’t care what he says, I LIKE to think of him standing defiantly in the face of the enemy, guns blazing from the hips, cigar stub clenched tightly in his teeth. (I do too - Ed)

The sweeps along the south perimeter of Ten Alpha conducted on May 12^th produced an enemy body count nearing 600.