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It's November 13, 2011, and the car shakes as the wind whips
across the road. November has settled into Indiana with the
sniffles, sneezing leaves from trees onto the highway and the
passing cars.
The northwest area of Plei Me in the Central
Highlands of South Vietnam is a day ahead, so it is November 14
there. I don't know if it's windy, but I bet it is quieter than it
once was.
Forty-six years ago, the Central Highlands of
Vietnam was under siege. Air artillery, aerial rockets and air
strikes shuddered the earth. At 10:48 A.M., 7th Cavalry Regiment
Commander Hal Moore had been the first man out of the lead chopper.
He literally hit the ground running, firing his M16 rifle. His
mission: find and kill the enemy. When the 7th Cavalry Regiment
landed in the area, John Herron's Bravo Company was kept near the
landing zone (LZ X Ray). Alpha Company was ordered past a creek bed.
In the ensuing moments, three platoons patrolled the jungle. One
platoon was surrounded and pinned down, cut off from the rest of the
troops.
My car zooms past stores and restaurants, flags
whipping against their poles. Whenever I see a flag flying, I see
the faces of men and women etched across the red, white and blue
stripes, and Medals of Honor holding each star. Jack Zalen was one
of my Vietnam veteran friends. He was killed this year while riding
his motorcycle. Forty-six years ago, he had been one of the men in
the platoon that found itself cut off.
Moore and his troops
had no idea what they would go up against. 450 of our guys were soon
to be pitted against 2,000 of theirs. Not one man under Moore's
command nor Moore himself, realized that he had landed in the pages
of history: the first major battle of the Vietnam War, the Ia Drang
Valley battle.
Getting out of the car in this wind is a
chore. If you don't hang onto something, you may end up in Kansas,
Dorothy. This kind of wind in Indiana always blows up a wicked
storm. It's supposed to arrive tomorrow, our November 14, Vietnam's
November 15.
On November 15, 1965, after a day of attacks,
reinforcements from the 1st Cavalry Division began to arrive. The
battle was raging so fiercely that the 2nd Battalion of the 5th
Company had to land at another spot and then move to LZ X-Ray. My
brother had arrived with A Company, 1st of the 5th. Efforts
continued for the rescue of the cut off platoon. When finally
successful, of the twenty-nine men, nine were killed in action and
thirteen were wounded.
It took Jack Zalen decades to be able
to talk about what the horrors of the night were like for the cut
off platoon.
I managed to work my way into Applebee's to meet
my friend for lunch. She and I like the restaurant because it's
convenient to both of us, and because veterans are provided meals at
no cost on Veterans Day. We talked about the rain and storms coming,
and then how it was supposed to clear and be sunny on Tuesday,
November 15
In Ia Drang, November 16 dawned. By mid morning
the battle was over, for all practical purposes and LZ X-Ray
secured. The 2nd of the 7th Cav. and the 1st of the 5th Cav were
ordered to stay at X-Ray in order to avoid the appearance of a
retreat. The remaining battalions were ordered to march to Landing
Zone Albany. Unknown to our troops, the enemy were all around,
searching for wounded Americans in the tall grass to kill them. The
enemy struck at different spots in the marching column of troops. In
the first few minutes, seventy men from Charlie and Alpha were
killed. Near LZ X-Ray, my brother lay on a field, bleeding profusely
from a mortar attack. Four of his men who carried him in his poncho,
a medic who plugged up his bleeding holes, a Medal of Honor
recipient pilot who flew in under heavy enemy fire, and several
nurses and doctors in MASH units, took turns saving his life.
It would take three more days for the battle to end and our men
to be gone from the Valley. In the fighting at LZ Albany, 155 men
were killed and 124 were wounded. In an odd quirk of fate, on
November 24, a passing H-13 scout helicopter was flagged down by the
lone remaining American, Toby Braveboy. On November 25 back in Iowa,
we were sitting down to Thanksgiving turkey, still unaware that my
brother was fighting for his life.
Now here it is, November
13 again. I'm starting Thanksgiving early this year, with a family
dinner tomorrow at a friend's whose daughter is visiting from New
York. It will have all the delicious aromas and taste of the
Thanksgiving feast, and I will be thankful again for my brother and
my Ia Drang survivor friends, and their having another kind of
November than the terrible one of 1965 in the Ia Drang Valley of
Vietnam.
By Karen St. John
Reprinted from Veterans Today
Copyright 2011
About Author: Karen St. John was
born in Iowa. She taught several years before relocating to Indiana
in 1991 where she worked for the State of Indiana until 2005. She
was awarded the Sagamore of the Wabash in 1997, the State's highest
honor for public service. St. John's work has been published
in national magazines and state newspapers. She writes of people she
meets and personal experiences, but her primary focus is veterans
and bringing their concerns and critical issues into mainstream
America. St. John has dedicated a web site for veterans called
Veterans Issues. Additional writings by Ms. St. John can at
found at St. John Journals.
Email
Karen St. John
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