Foreword
This story is about a time in the history of the US Army at the winding down of the war in Vietnam. While parts of the story are based in fact and the names of the towns and cities are correct, all the names of the people involved have been changed to protect the identity of the innocent or guilty as the case may be.
The US Army then was significantly different than it is today, and I have described things as I saw them happen during my tour in South Korea in the US Army. Those readers who served in South Korea during that time will understand. For those who didn't have that experience, please do not think this story is in any way descriptive of or intended to mock the current soldiers who defend our country today. I currently know and have known many of these men and women, and I have the highest respect for their voluntary commitment to service.
South Korea has changed significantly as well, and while I am certain some of the events I describe still occur, even at that time most South Korean people were not really all that different from people in the US. No matter their station in life, they worked hard and lived their lives as best they could given the political and economic conditions of the time. This story only reflects what I experienced and should not be interpreted as being disrespectful to the people of South Korea then or today.
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Standing in the line of other guys wearing only my jockey shorts wasn't something I'd planned or wanted to do, but like all the other guys there, I didn't have a choice. The letter I'd gotten from the local draft board instructed me, Eric Winslow, to be at a local restaurant at ten the night before to travel to Chicago for a US Army induction physical. It didn't matter that I'd finished two years of junior college and was working to get enough money to get into school for a bachelors degree. The draft was down to my lottery number so I had to go.
At about eleven, they called our names and loaded us on a bus to the train station in Mattoon. After spending all night on that train, I got off at the station in Chicago and stood in line with the rest of the guys. The sergeant there told us to get on another bus when he called out our names.
That bus took us to the induction center where we took a bunch of tests and then stripped down to our underwear. Each of us got a folder of papers to carry, and then they started us through the maze of doctors and medics who poked us, prodded us, took our blood, and checked our eyesight and hearing. At the end, we put our clothes back on and waited for the results.
An hour later, I was standing in a formation and swearing to defend my country against all enemies, foreign and domestic. I had time for one phone call home to tell Mom and Dad the Army was keeping me, then it was another bus to O'Hare and a plane to Ft. Dix, New Jersey.
Ft. Dix didn't seem too bad for the first two days. We were in a holding barracks until there were enough of us to form a Basic Training company. The sergeants were pretty laid back, and we had a little spare time. We got our uniform issue and then changed and packed our civilian clothes in a box to send home. On the third day it was back on a bus for the trip to the barracks that would be our home for the next eight weeks.
My world got turned upside down once they'd separated us into batteries and assigned us a bunk, locker, and footlocker. The drill sergeants seemed to not know how to speak in anything less than a scream, and nothing was ever done fast enough or right enough. It seemed as if we raced through and to everything. I couldn't figure out what all the rush was about since we'd be marched to someplace and then wait for an hour before doing what we came there to do.
I did have somewhat of an advantage, well, more than one really. I'd worked most summers while in high school so I was used to people telling me what to do and I'd seen guys who couldn't handle that work a day or two and then get fired. I'd also spent two years in junior college. I learned fast that it didn't matter if I liked the subject matter, if I didn't do my homework and study, I'd flunk out. I was also twenty one by then, so I'd grown up quite a bit. The result was I figured out Basic Training pretty fast.
The Army didn't fire you if you didn't take orders; the drill sergeants just made sure you went through seventeen kinds of hell until you learned to do what they said. The penalty for failing basic training was to repeat it and after two days, I was sure I didn't want to do that.
It all boiled down to this. Don't do anything unless you're told to do it, and do everything you're told to do when you're told to do it. The younger guys didn't catch on quite so fast. There were a couple who never did. They do something like light a cigarette before the drill sergeant said it was break time, and end up low-crawling up and down the parade ground while the rest of us rested. Talking in ranks or saying "OK" instead of Yes, Drill Sergeant" usually meant twenty pushups. Taking a drink from your canteen on a march before it was authorized meant running around and around the formation of marching trainees. I escaped almost all of that by letting the Army dictate every thing I did and when I did it.
Basic training was interesting most of the time, almost as interesting as watching the younger guys screw up and pay the penalty. I learned a lot of stuff I didn't know about weapons and how the Army is supposed to work. I'd been in the marching band in high school, so drill was easy and sometimes even fun.
The physical part of basic wasn't fun. After spending a lot of time sitting at a desk in class or doing homework, I was pretty out of shape. The daily runs, PT, and endless marches to classrooms and the ranges caused a few pains at first. By the end of basic, I'd gained ten pounds of muscle and was in the best shape of my life.
After passing all the tests, I graduated and got my first stripe. The next afternoon, we all sat in the day room while the senior drill sergeant gave us our next duty assignments.
I kept hearing a name and then "Eleven Bravo", the Military Occupation Specialty for infantry. A few of the guys drew artillery, armor or communications. Those guys knew they were probably headed for Vietnam, and they sat around with blank looks on their faces. I couldn't blame them. I was just hoping I wouldn't join them.
I held my breath when the Drill Sergeant called my name. Then he said, "Sixteen Hotel, Operations and Intelligence". I had no idea what that was, but at least I probably wouldn't be carrying a pack and a rifle through the jungle. As it turned out, six of us drew the same MOS. The next day, we were on a flight to Ft. Bliss, Texas.
The difference between Ft. Bliss and Ft. Dix was night and day. The drill sergeants were insistent about keeping the barracks clean, proper dress, and military courtesy, but otherwise were pretty good guys. We still did PT, but not until we were worn out like in Basic. Most of the time was spent in training, though the drill sergeants confided that 16H was an obsolete MOS and we'd probably be reassigned when we got our next orders.
They were right, except we didn't go anywhere. I had spent eight weeks learning how to use radios and field phones, how to read aerial photographs, and how to write backwards on a big plexiglass map. That's what an Operations and Intelligence Specialist was supposed to do. I then got orders for a school in air defense artillery, still at Ft. Bliss. After another eight weeks, I could operate a radar console and direct fire control missions. I'd also learned about a great bar in Juarez, Mexico and Oso Negro vodka. Sometimes that part of my education hurt a lot the next morning.
It was a little disappointing that my next orders didn't say Florida or Hawaii or Okinawa like our instructors said they might. Mine said I was to report to the 8th Army Replacement Center at Camp Humphries in South Korea. On the day of my flight, I said good by to Mom and Dad and flew to Chicago and then to Ft. Lewis, Washington. Two days later I was on another flight to Incheon, South Korea.
Like everything the US Army did, I got to Camp Humphries and then waited. In my training duty, I had something to do. At Camp Humphries, there was nothing to do except eat and sleep and the club for enlisted men. I spent my nights there sucking down a few beers with a couple of my buddies from Ft. Bliss and enjoying the entertainment.
The entertainment was a whole bunch of young Korean women of a very agreeable nature. They'd sit down beside you, say "me takusan horny. You want short time", and then they'd massage your cock for a while before telling you the price. Apparently that was pretty much the extent of their English. If you said anything, they'd just nod and massage your cock some more.
It was the damnedest thing I'd ever had done to me. I mean, in junior college, if you dated one girl several times, most would let you go further. They'd jack you off if you returned the favor. A few would let you go all the way as long as you had a rubber. I dated a lot of girls back home, but not once did any of them grab my cock through my pants and start jacking it. It just seemed really strange and all but one or two of us just enjoyed our beer and watched each other wince when the jacking got a little to vigorous.
We didn't take the girls up on their offer of a "short time" because as soon as we'd arrived at Camp Humphries, we'd all been put in a room and listened to the ravages VD would wreak on us if we screwed what they called "business girls". According to the doctor, the strains of VD in Korea were becoming resistant to penicillin, and it took stronger drugs to cure it.
There were also barracks rumors of a secret venereal disease called "the black clap". It was supposedly incurable. If you caught it, the Army would send you to a secret remote island colony and tell your family you'd either been blown to tiny little pieces by a bomb or died of some super-contagious disease, and send home an empty, sealed coffin for them to bury. You'd stay on that island until you did die so you couldn't infect anybody else.
We listened to the doctor talk about VD and most of us believed what he said. I don't think any of us really believed the black clap really existed.
A week after landing at Incheon, I took a bus to the Battalion Headquarters of 1st Battalion (HAWK), 2nd ADA, 38th ARTY near Seoul. That trip at least broke up the monotony. The Army bus was the only powered vehicle on the highway as big as an interstate in the US. I saw a guy walking down that highway and sweeping the shoulder with a broom. The real highlight of the trip was a guy on the same highway on a bicycle with a hog strapped on a rack on the back. I later learned the farmers would get the hog drunk on rice wine so they'd lay still and then tie them on the back of the bicycle. The guy was just taking his hog to a market to sell.
I spent the night at Battalion Headquarters, and the next day a clerk looked at my personnel file and grinned.
"You can type, can't you?"
