Indeed there was not any way we could load you to definitely pallet straight back on the the latest lighthearted truck, therefore as the an excellent Samaritans we had been, we piled as much times while we you certainly will into all of our V-100-a whole lot that individuals could not change the latest turret. Needless to say, there have been certain disappointed MPs you to evening and you will numerous terrible headaches a day later.
To the men who served on a V-100 for a year, the vehicle became more than just a machine. It became your life, your friend and your protector. All but two of our V-100s were named after comic book heroes. These included “Captain America Upper Austria whore house,” “Thor,” “Big Ben,” “Flash,” “Spider – man,” “Barbarian,” “Atom,” “Daredevil” and “Iron Man.” The other two were named “Road Hog” and “The Lemon.” Each of the V-100s had a painting of the character or the name across the front, life-sized and in coloric book superheroes painted on the front of the V-100s made for an interesting article in The brand new Roundup, our local GI newspaper. The April 1970 article was headlined, “66th MP Co. Super Heroes to Combat VC Wrong Doers.”
Periodically we’d the moments, like the date whenever we was basically escorting a good convoy within the An enthusiastic Khe Pass and one of one’s autos destroyed a complete pallet away from beer
David A great. Swisher stays in Marshall, Unwell. The guy received the fresh new Armed forces Commendation Medal that have V Device getting their procedures during the ambush during the An enthusiastic Khe Solution in the April 1970. For further studying, see: Cadillac Gage V-100 Commando 1960-71, by the Richard Lathrop and you may Jim Laurier; and you will Combat Police: U.S. Army Military Police in Vietnam, of the Rick Young.
A lot of our very own issues came into QL-19, but I felt warmer thereon highway than simply on QL-1, simply because they there had been a whole lot more convoys on QL-19 which better likelihood of backup. My personal baptism away from flames arrived into bush from the hairpin bend throughout the An Khe Pass. The V-100 had currently come through brand new hairpin and you may is oriented down the newest violation, in the event that westbound convoy was strike. The words “Get in touch with! Get in touch with! Contact!” appeared along the radio internet once i was operating, thus i turned the newest V-100 as much as and on course back-up the citation. Once we have got to the latest hairpin, We watched particular Korean soldiers pinned off. One of them had his arm stuck-up floating around pointing towards the south section of the hairpin turn. I removed the latest V-100 between your Koreans plus the status he was directing so you can, therefore we could let them have a bit more cover and have build relationships our very own firepower.
My V-100 is escorting a beneficial convoy off Tuy Hoa 1 day whenever there was lots of design run the street, leading to some an accordion impact
Things on running brand new courses daily is actually you never understood what unusual material was going to happen second. When the side of convoy avoided, the trunk tightened up. Then your front side would begin again, additionally the convoy dispersed up until the butt you may initiate. Because of that, We advised the V-100 rider Reno Catalano to get in the center of the new street therefore we helps to keep most other automobile out of our convoy until we got outside of the build area. While we always let shorter car feel free to violation the brand new convoy vehicles, since there was really framework I wanted to store brand new convoy clear of others site visitors.
On one convoy so you can Da Nang, a autos hit an effective Lambretta loaded with Vietnamese. It actually was some in pretty bad shape. Brand new Lambretta ran off of the path and off an enthusiastic embankment. By the point i got an excellent dustoff indeed there and you will had something cleaned upwards sometime, there are a myriad of black colored pajama-clad people with weapons standing to talking and you can yelling. From the difficult, a misunderstanding could easily have developed, before you to happened i got of here and you may right back to your convoy.
