Mon, March 17th 1966
Military life is nothing if not repetitive. Like all days, today began with a trip to the latrine. As I sat in quiet contemplation of life, a tremendous blast blew me through the door and onto the dusty ground outside.
Stunned, I lay on the floor with my trousers around my ankles for several seconds. Sirens screamed a red alert—incoming rounds. Realizing that only my pride had been injured, I staggered to my feet and moved towards the explosion site.
As I neared the blackened, smoking crater, warm liquid fell from the sky. Sticky red blood ran down my head and across my shoulders and arms, coating me. There was no pain, and it slowly dawned on me that body parts were raining down from the sky.
Gagging, I fell to my knees, overcome by the gruesome reality. At the edge of the crater, a torso heaved one last, reflex-driven sigh. To my right, a man screamed incoherently, his burnt face a mangled mask.
As I knelt with my stomach heaving, I could only listen as the feet of braver men than I pounded past, rushing to assist their fallen comrades.
Later, someone took pity on me and led me to a shower, the first of several I took that day. Though, try as I might, I couldn’t wash the memories away. They will forever stain my soul.
That evening, a standard telegram was sent out to devastated parents and spouses with the dreaded introduction; “We regret to inform you that your son, (name of deceased), was killed in combat operations in the Republic of Vietnam in the service of his country...”
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“Peters, put that fucking pencil down and start marching.”
I stopped writing my diary entry and looked up. The others had already finished their rations and stood waiting impatiently. Trying to ignore their glares, I quickly tucked the tattered notepad away. The other grunts regularly reminded me I was just the latest in a long line of boots. Marines fresh out of bootcamp generally didn’t last long, and bookworms like myself were especially rare and endangered creatures. This reinforced the popular opinion that I didn’t have the right stuff to be a Marine.
As I got to my feet, the sarge nodded and strode out. Sergeant Jones was a man of few words, but what commands he uttered, his men obeyed immediately and without question. This wasn’t down to any threatened consequences. It wasn’t just that he was the ranking officer. It was simply that the man had completed two tours and knew how to survive in this hellhole. Everyone wanted to live, and that meant listening to the sarge.
The cloying heat of the jungle wrapped around us and sweat flooded down my forehead. As usual, my glasses—the compulsory military issue ones—steamed up, and I absentmindedly wiped them for the hundredth time that morning. Not only were they next to useless in the field but they were so ugly they’d been nicknamed ‘Birth Control Goggles’ because no woman would look at you twice if you wore them.
The squad marched in silence without the sing-alongs that you see in war movies. The sergeant didn’t stand for unnecessary noise on patrol. I’d heard mess hall tales of inexperienced officers leading their men in chants to keep morale high. Those were the squads that didn’t come back. In real life, noise advertised your presence to the enemy. As sarge put it, “Camaraderie doesn’t matter to dead men.”
“Fuck, it’s hot,” Schmidt growled. His clean-shaven head lacked the ability to soak up sweat and the salty water was running into his eyes, which wasn’t improving his mood.
“I miss Maine, it’s never this hot in Maine,” Hodges agreed. The country boy never missed the chance to mention his home state. As he indicated several times a day, it was apparently, ‘God’s own country.’ I had my doubts. The rolling acres of nothing he described didn’t sound particularly enticing to me.
“SITFU,” Sarge grunted, his gravel-like voice laden with quiet authority. I was still learning the slang of the Marines who practically had their own language. This one I knew—like most Marine slang—it wasn’t for use in polite company, ‘Suck it the fuck up.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
The fireteam fell back into respectful silence, and the only noise now was from our heavy boots sloshing through the mud as we moved forward in sync. I was relieved, although they were right, it was bloody hot, now wasn’t the time for chat and debate. The Vietcong were out there somewhere, waiting patiently for a chance to ‘off’ an American. A sniffle escaped as I considered the likelihood of me surviving this tour. Hodges threw a glare in my direction, and Sarge slowed his pace, falling back and marching alongside me.
A short, squat man with greying hair, Sarge was a career soldier. He walked silently beside me for a minute before speaking slowly and deliberately. “You gonna hold it together, kid?”
“Yes, Sarge. Sorry, Sarge.” I squeezed out, desperately trying to pull myself together. It was bad enough that I was going to die in this hellhole, I’d prefer not to disgrace myself when it happened.
If the sarge picked up on my inner turmoil, it didn’t show. He grunted, “See that you do,” and increased his pace again.
“Latrine duty for you again tonight,” Robinson, the final and most malicious member of our group, said with a smirk. I nodded sullenly but sucked it up, no point in complaining about the truth. Only the excessively stupid went into the Marines expecting kind words and a shoulder to cry on. The military way was to break you down and rebuild you in their image, encouraging conformity through intimidation and punishment.
Hodges and Schmidt’s voices drifted back to me.
“That’s what book learning does to you, makes you weak,” Hodges commented.
“Hope our next grunt has bigger balls.” Schmidt replied, “This one won’t survive the tour.”
“When he kicks the bucket, his boots are mine,” Hodges said, staking his claim early.
“Pick up the pace, Hodges,” the all-knowing Sarge grunted from the front, effectively curtailing any further chatter.
I listened to it all quietly, bristling impotently with anger. They were callous bastards, the lot of them! Don’t get me wrong. I don’t really disagree with them. They’re tough fuckers. Me, not so much. It was me who I was angry with. It had been my decision to enlist, mine, and mine alone. I’d been in college when the war had started and had signed up to impress my dead father. A decision that is just as stupid as it sounds.
The sun was starting to set, and we were heading back to the wire when Sarge stopped suddenly, holding his hand up and dropping silently to one knee. His eyes scanned the dense jungle around us, looking for evidence of the enemy. Behind him, the squad assumed similar poses. All I could hear were the croaks of the dwarf horned toads and the cicadas chirrups, but I remained rigidly in place. Sarge had stopped for a reason.
Then I heard it, the crack of a branch, somewhere to the left. Robinson heard it also, but unlike me, he reacted like a soldier. He quickly dropped to one knee, and his M16 assault rifle barked out in anger, the rest of the team immediately following suit. Firing indiscriminately, their shooting rapidly shredded the dense leaves and foliage around us.
“Cease fire!” Sarge commanded. The air was heavy around us as silence fell. This time, there were no animal noises. Everything was silent. Time slowly ticked past. Nothing moved in the undergrowth as we waited.
Robinson looked over at me, my M16 still held in numbly, shaking hands. There were no spent cases near me. I hadn’t even fired a single shot. He didn’t say a word, but his eyes judged me and found me wanting. I was a useless soldier, a dead man walking. There are always stories about what happens to people like me who are a danger to their squad. It was just a matter of time until one of my squad mates misfired and I became another ‘accident’ statistic. Part of me hoped it happened soon. I felt it would be a relief to be dead, an escape from the continual stress of waiting to find the bullet with my name on it.
“Move out,” barked Sarge.
The adrenaline was still running hot in my veins as we moved onward, our heavy boots splashing through the mud. To an observer, I would have looked the same as my squad mates. However, my nerves were alive, screaming with sensitivity, as if fire ran through them. I jumped at shadows, twitched at every sound. It was all I could do not to cry.
If the others noticed, they said nothing and just kept marching. I concentrated on the ground in front of me—intent on keeping the rhythm of my feet in time with the others. Sweat soaked through everything, running freely down my face and body. The jumpy rush of adrenaline was quickly replaced with the throbbing ache of chafing thighs.
Just when I thought my life couldn’t get any worse, the rain started. Huge droplets lashed down upon us. Sweat and rain merged on my forehead, dripping uncomfortably down my face.
“I don’t know how he’s survived this long,” Robinson commented ahead of me.
“Don’t complain about him,” Hodges said amiably, “He makes a great target for the VC to aim at. It’s always nice to have a meat shield around to take a bullet for you.”
The pair guffawed at this witticism. This time around, the sarge didn’t intervene. Perhaps, he thought I deserved the comments after my inaction earlier.
As we ground through the rest of the patrol, I silently seethed with hatred for this country. It was beautiful and exotic, but everyone and everything here seemed designed to either torment or kill me.