South Viet Nam: Bad Day in the Delta

When American helicopter crewmen in South Viet Nam begin a mission over Communist territory, they never fail to take foot-square chunks of thick steel plate. As seat pads, the pieces of steel are not much comfort. But as protection from Red bullets, they often mean the difference between life and intestine-ripping death. “Pucker up, and pray,” is the cry over the intercoms as the brave men who fly the choppers into the Mekong Delta head off toward the land of vertical gunfire.

Last week, neither steel plates nor prayers helped the hapless men who died in the biggest helicopter airlift of the Viet Nam war. Wave after wave of choppers—27 in all—droned onto an island in the mouth of the Mekong River 60 miles south of Saigon and disgorged 1,500 South Vietnamese marines, paratroopers and rangers. Simultaneously, in from the South China Sea swarmed an armada of junks and landing barges with another 1,000 men. On hand to observe the most ambitious strike against the Viet Cong in weeks were top brass, led by General Paul D. Harkins, commander of U.S. military forces in South Viet Nam, and Vietnamese Chief of Staff Major General Le Van Kim.

The objective was to destroy a guerrilla training camp and supply depot on the island, which was defended by a battalion of Viet Cong troops. As orange tracer bullets streaked into the sky from Communist foxholes, a turbine-powered, UH-1A (“Huey”) support helicopter, laden with rockets, fluttered down to “zap” the enemy. Suddenly the Huey was hit, and exploded in a ball of flame; the four Americans aboard, and their Vietnamese crewman, never had a chance. As the battle blazed, the desperate Viet Cong poured murderous fire into the other whirlybirds. Fourteen more were hit but limped back to Saigon. On the second day another Huey, zeroing in on a Communist beach emplacement, lost its rear rotor to an enemy bullet, fell like a stone into the sea.