Why We Served

By Phil Keith

“Hell, why not? If I don’t sign up, some other poor bastard will have to go in my place.”

That’s what “Robin” Henderson said to his friends when they chided him about actually volunteering to serve in Vietnam. As it turned out, there were more than a few who felt the same way.

One late September morning in 2009, I was sitting with my morning coffee and New York Times, wondering what my next writing project should be. As I absently scanned the headlines, my brain was harking back to a lunch meeting two days before with good friend and accomplished author Tom Clavin. My ears were still ringing from the challenge he had laid before me: “Enough with the fiction! You should really tackle a powerful non-fiction topic. I bet you’d be good at it.” I had authored two fictional novels that had done pretty well, but somehow Tom could tell, even if I couldn’t, that I was not satisfied with where my writing career was going.

At that moment, my eyes fell on a page-one story that seemed to have been sent my way by Providence. The Times piece, written by James Dao, focused on a group of Vietnam Vets who were going to the White House to receive a Presidential Unit Citation for something they had done in Vietnam almost 40 years ago. How could that be? I tore through the copy and by the time I reached the last lines, I knew my next book project had just fallen into my lap: This was a true story, it contained all the right elements, and as a Vietnam Vet myself, I could relate to the men and the material with ease.

One of the many aspects of their tales I found so compelling is how they ended up in the middle of the jungle in Vietnam in the first place. Here is how it all unfolded:

March 26th, 1970, a small troop from the 11th Armored, found themselves way out in the” boonies,” close to the Cambodian border, dug into a NDP (Night Defensive Position). About noon on the 26th, they heard an unnerving radio call: An infantry company from the 2nd Battalion, 8th Cavalry, about one-hundred men, had accidentally wandered into a North Vietnamese Army supply base populated by an entire NVA battalion dug into heavily fortified bunkers. The small band of GI’s were outnumbered 6-7-8 to one, no one really knew, and became immediately surrounded. If they couldn’t find a way out—or get some help—they were doomed to die or be carted off to hellish POW camps across the border.

As I began to gather the data necessary to pull the book together, I sent out a short questionnaire to all the men that I could find who were still around and willing to talk (and not all were—some memories were just too painful). I innocently asked a basic question meant to serve as background: “How did you get into the Army?” I was curious to see how the men involved had ended up where they were at that time. I suspected that most of them were drafted. I was surprised by what I found.

There were, of course, a number of men who were Regular Army—“lifers” as we called them—but they consisted of less than ten percent of the total. There were another handful who were on second tours and not Regular Army. The rest of the men who were present for duty during these fateful days were almost evenly divided between those who had been drafted and those who had enlisted voluntarily. Calling some of the enlistees “volunteers” was probably a bit of a stretch, though, since many of them either knew they were about to be drafted or had received their draft notices. To avoid getting stuck with assignments that would simply be thrust upon them—most likely the ubiquitous rifleman designation and probably orders to Vietnam—these men went down to their local recruiting offices to “sign up,” hoping for something other than the front line infantry, maybe even the “gold standard” of postings in those days: orders to a unit in Germany.

They were men like “Point Man” Dave Nicholson, from Charlie Company. He was a true rarity in the ranks. He had just finished his bachelor’s degree from Middlebury College when his draft notice arrived. Many of his friends urged him to turn and sprint to the Canadian border. As a native Vermonter, it wasn’t far away. He made the argument—and many of his peers thought him somewhat addled—that the draft seemed to be falling disproportionally on the poor and certain minorities. “I wanted to show people that middle class white boys could stand up and be counted, too,” Nicholson said.

A case of childhood amblyopia, which Nicholson had mostly overcome, got him detailed to Army Finance Clerk training. He would carry a ledger instead of an M-16. That didn’t sit well with Nicholson and he began to lobby for a rifleman’s MOS. It took several months, and a personal trek to the Pentagon, where he found a sympathetic Sergeant, before he was reclassified. With barely enough time remaining in his two-year obligation, he was finally issued orders to Vietnam.

SP 4 Nicholson was assigned to Charlie 2/8, Lonely Platoon, with which he served mostly as a point man. This was a hazardous duty—almost everyone else shunned—but, for reasons he still wrestles with, Nicholson preferred it. He fought hard and did well—until a mortar round nearly killed him March 20, 1970. The wounds he received landed him in a field hospital in Cam Rahn Bay, where he received several blood transfusions as part of his treatment.

At the end of his obligated service, Nicholson got out, went back to Vermont, finished law school and became a successful litigator. Unbeknownst to him, the demons of Vietnam were lurking in his system: one of the blood transfusions he received was contaminated with hepatitis “C.” In his early 50’s, Nicholson became gravely ill and developed liver cancer. Nicholson survived a liver transplant and, now retired, and on 100% VA disability, still considers his choice to lobby for a rifleman’s MOS, and to serve “on point” the right choices.

Rick Hokenson, second from the right, and others with which he served in Vietnam.

Rick Hokenson, also from Charlie 2/8, was attending junior college in Minnesota when his draft notice arrived. Like Nicholson, he embraced it. Hokenson had grown up around guns, was an avid hunter and an expert marksman. He volunteered to be a sniper during basic training—and because of his skill with a rifle, his wish was granted. At the end of his training, Hokenson was given a choice: Vietnam or Korea. Having grown up learning to survive winters in Minnesota, he wanted someplace warm; so, Vietnam it would be. “Besides,” he later said, “the 1st cavalry had the coolest shoulder patches.”

Ken “Mississippi” Woodward, Tay Ninh, March 8, 1970.

Ken “Mississippi” Woodward, was from tiny Quitman, Mississippi. By 1969, he had finished his first year at “Ole Miss” but he had a strong suspicion that a draft notice was in his immediate future; so, he went down to his local recruiting office and signed up. “I had been raised to say ‘Yes, sir,’ and ‘No, ma’am,’ and recite the Pledge of Allegiance with feeling, so I had no qualms about signing up. It’s what my family and my community expected of me anyway.” Woodward ended up as a radio operator in Charlie 2/8 and went through the harrowing events of March 26th, 1970, earning a Purple Heart for wounds received.

First Lieutenant Robert “Robin” Henderson (mentioned at the beginning of this piece) had graduated from the University of Oklahoma in 1968 and was attending his first year of Business School at OU when he decided to opt for OCS and the Army. His father had done the same during WW II. Henderson’s friends, like Nicholson’s, urged him to flee to Canada. March 26th, 1970, Henderson was in charge of Alpha Troop’s 3rd Platoon. It was his first real firefight and he acquitted himself well enough to earn a Silver Star. He would not be so fortunate two months later, in Cambodia, where he would be killed in action leading his platoon in an eerily similar firefight against yet another NVA bunker complex.

Pasqual “Gus” Gutierrez was one of those “urban poor minorities” that Dave Nicholson worried about. A native of East Los Angeles, Gus was trying to figure out what to do with his life in 1968 when the specter of the draft pushed him through the doors of his local recruiting office. Gus aced the aptitude tests and the Army decided to send him to “shake ‘n bake” at the NCO Academy at Ft. Knox. The Army, because of Vietnam, was losing too many sergeants and senior enlisted soldiers; so, in a move designed to replace those senior NCOs as quickly as possible, the Army sent their brightest recruits through “accelerated NCO training.” Gutierrez graduated first in his class, and, as a result, he found himself an E-6 Staff Sergeant with less than one year’s total service.

March 26th, 1970, the day of the battle and rescue operation chronicled in Blackhorse Riders, Gutierrez was the Platoon Sergeant for Alpha Troop’s 2nd Platoon, and a tank commander in charge of a powerful Sheridan tank. He, too, would fight well and win a Silver Star for his bravery. Once released from active duty, he returned to Los Angeles with a solid focus. He went back to college and became a successful architect. When he and his former men finally got to the White House almost 40 years after the fact, to receive a Presidential Unit Citation from President Obama, Gutierrez said: “When all of us who served came back from Vietnam we had to re-enter society through the back door. Now, forty years later, in a different world, there we were, walking through the front door and right into the Rose Garden of the most famous building in America. What a difference!”

Fred Harrison was a star football player in high school in Riverside, California. He was six feet, six inches and well over two hundred pounds. He was so good that the Minnesota Vikings had scouted him and were considering inviting him to one of their mini-camps. There was just one problem: the draft—and Harrison knew he had caught the eye of his local draft board, too. He volunteered for the Army and told the Vikings that he’d come see them again as soon as he finished his two-year stint.

“Big Fred” was told he’d be shipped to Germany. After basic training at Ft. Ord he found himself on a troop flight to Vietnam and soon after landed “in country,” assigned to Alpha 2/8 as a machine gunner. Alpha Company was briefly assigned to Alpha Troop: long enough, as it turned out, to ride along to the battle and rescue operation March 26th, 1970.

Harrison survived Vietnam and returned home with two Bronze Stars, two Army Commendation Medals, two Purple Hearts, five Air Medals and a Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry. He went back and knocked on the Viking’s door. Sadly, they were no longer interested. Harrison, as he put it himself, became a “Viking of the road,” and drove long haul trucks for many years. He also kicked around in heavy construction and later on became a dental technician. “Big Fred” passed away January 23rd, 2011, from systemic failures brought about by exposure to Agent Orange.

And so it went, one man after another. In all the stories I heard, the hundreds of interviews I conducted, the thousands of documents that I read, not once, from any soldier; enlistee, draftee or “lifer,” did I hear one word of ultimate regret for their service in Vietnam. I’m sure there was plenty of soldierly griping among these men as they endured the harsh conditions of their service overseas, but not as they reflected back upon those times. It was pretty remarkable, really.

I certainly know why I joined the Navy. First and foremost, I wanted a shot at finishing college before the draft caught up with me, too. Back in 1964, it was a real worry. Second: “the babes.” I had an older cousin who had already finished college, had applied for Navy OCS, gotten commissioned, and was ready to go to sea on his first assignment. He came to visit me on campus before he shipped out and as we walked through Harvard Square, I noticed that his blue uniform, gold stripe, and polished buttons were definite magnets for the “babes”—at least the ones not among the mass of the “great unwashed” hippies congregating in the pre-Starbucks coffee houses. That definitely piqued my interest; so, the next day I waltzed over to the NROTC Unit and signed up. I figured I’d serve my two years after graduation and be done with the military forever. Besides, as a Navy officer, I’d be eating off of fine china and using sterling silver utensils in some sea-going officer’s wardroom and not slogging through rice paddies in some hell-hole corner of Vietnam. It didn’t quite work out as I planned it. , but that’s another story for another day. In the end, I served 24 years, active and reserve, including three tours in Vietnam, and was nearly killed by bullets, malaria and pneumonia; and, today, collect a VA pension for Agent Orange exposure.

Like Dave Nicholson, Rick Hokenson, Ken Woodward, Robin Henderson, Gus Gutierrez, and Fred Harrison, I volunteered. Do I regret doing so? Not for an instant. I am happy with where I am in life right now, and if, those many years ago, I had jumped to the left instead of to the right, I wouldn’t be where I am today: and that would make me very sad, indeed.