Metta for the Battalion Commander

Loving-Kindness over the Rice Paddies

Marty growls as he squats among green rows of rice shoots shimmering in the Mekong morning, repeats his guttural oath:

“I’d shoot that bastard out of the sky if I could get away with it!”

The sun over Long An province has yet to peak at noon. The humidity defies any whisper of relief from a breeze. Marty’s fatigue shirt is splashed with white stains of dried sweat. His pants are soaked from the overnight rain as he pulled his guard shift on an ambush patrol. This is the land where you awake shivering, then become sweat-soaked an hour later. He’s 19, a year out of high school. But 19 is old enough to hump the squad’s M-60 in and out of rice paddies, through nipa palm thickets dense as a fence.

“You’re not shooting that chopper down, trooper, that pilot done nothin’ to you,” Anstett countered next to him.

“No but the CO giving us orders sitting next to him is sending us on a death mission. That tree line’s HOT!”

Marty and Anstett are head down, burrowed behind an earthen dike holding acres of monsoon rainfall that nurture the rice bowl of Asia. The paddy dike shields their Third Platoon, Company A from the unseen sniper somewhere in the tree line. One sniper with one AK-47 cracking fear to the ears of four dozen infantry grunts.

Another command arrived over the radio from the LOACH spotter helicopter parked overhead, its pilot cautiously elevated beyond range of the hidden threat bringing the operation to a halt. The voice transmitted to the ground was that of Colonel Mettle, the battalion commanding officer. This CO was audibly frustrated that a single little man in pajamas was defying orders from the US Army.

THUD- the impact of a fired shot buries into the soil near Marty’s head, launches pebbles of dirt onto his face. He adjusts the steel pot worn with grateful reluctance as the top of the helmet drills into his skull. He growls again as his fingers slide over the ammo belt of 30-caliber machine gun rounds as if it were a rosary, in prayer he repeats his mantra,

“I swear I’ll shoot him down with this 60, I will!”

Others in the squad pray, too. They petition to heaven that the CO would reverse his order, retreat from the mission to overrun the tree line, to destroy the Viet Cong lair. Suddenly another voice cracks on-air over the static,

”FIRE MISSION, TAKE COVER, REMAIN IN PLACE.”

The guidance from the map coordinates by the staff sergeant in charge was relayed by the CO to the Navy, deadly accurate. A pair of F-4 Phantom fighters from a flight deck floating east in the South China Sea roar over and drop their payload. Incendiary bombs, one hundred pounds each, delivering hell by white phosphorus. Affectionally dubbed “willy-peter” by thankful GIs, a nasty product sold to the Pentagon by Monsanto to reduce foliage to ash, as witnessed, melting skin at 5000-degrees. Pity the sniper caught in the bullseye of an F-4 top gun.

BREAK OVER, SADDLE UP

Marty’s squad includes the platoon leader, usually a lieutenant, but after their last firefight, now a seasoned staff sergeant, Lebec. Behind him, his RTO, the radio operator, his antenna a prominent target. Pelletier carries this burden, a Staten Island kid who cried when Mickey Mantle announced his retirement. Marty walks point, not that he likes this position. It wasn’t an order, at least not spoken. It was duty. He’s good at it, very good. And he cares. He looks out for his men. The point man pays attention. He listens. He sees what others miss, such as booby traps, hazards along a trail where grenades are triggered by trip wires stretched across the path. Marty sees them.

Third Platoon split, with two squads entering the woods along the Tan An River, an area known as The Testicles. On the topo map two bends along the stream oddly appear as a descended nut sack. These rivers served as floating highways for North Vietnamese supplies destined for local Viet Cong guerilla bands. Duc, a repatriated “tiger scout,” typically walked point for this column. He was maybe 15 when conscripted by local Cong. He surrendered when GIs discovered him guarding an arms cache, agreed to switch sides. To date, he showed no reason for us to doubt his loyalty and he served as a helpful interpreter. Duc had guided troopers through perilous paths without incident until now.

Some booby traps are grenades rigged to be detonated by trip wire or by the pressure of a footstep. The injury could result in loss of a foot, a leg, a life. Their point is to slow down any intrusion to enemy presence. The very placement of these obstacles indicates there’s something to hide. Marty’s platoon has been sent to find it.

Marty’s squads stood by as Duc’s disappeared into the overstory, one by one, five meters apart. The rule was to not bunch up. If a trap exploded, fewer men would be hit… “One round will get y’all.” The last man to enter was still in sight when the air was interrupted by a blast and the shower of dirt passing through leaves on its return to earth. Duc’s luck expired. He was alive but wounded enough to require a dust-off. Sgt. Lebec took the handset from Pelletier and called in for a medevac, a Huey helicopter outfitted with a Red Cross banner, the same model used to transport troops to battle. Barring excessive casualties of other units in the area, Duc will be in the air in less than an hour.

One by one, with Marty in the lead, a dozen men enter along a path towards the river. Duc’s squads will stay in place to interdict any fleeing bad guys. Not even twenty meters in he spots the first trip wire. There’s something in these woods that one side does not want found. Our side does. This is why the CO was so relentless in his orders.

As procedure, when he identifies a booby trap, the point man calls out and reminds the squad of the drill. Step over the trip wire, point it out to the man following, and repeat until the platoon passes. It will be neutralized later on the way out. Marty proceeded deeper into the forest, followed by Lebec and Pelletier and the squad. A clearing, 25-30 feet wide and deep. Slowly crossing, eyes everywhere, searching where another path continues… a sudden FLASH before the explosion Marty never heard. He took one step, as if to run. The next step was in the air, three feet above the ground. He fell, tried to get back up, failed. This was a different type of booby trap, a buried explosive that propelled him upward. Without a trip wire, it was detonated in one of two ways. Either by the pressure of a footstep, or, commanded in person by an unseen foe awaiting the most effective time to strike. The answer to which type was never revealed to Marty. There were more pressing matters.

“Everyone down! Lookout for trip wires! Watch for movement!” Warning others was instinctive for Marty, to protect them. But now it’s time to protect Marty. The impact blasted off his boot and ripped his pant leg. His right leg below the knee is bloody split bone. Oakwood, the platoon medic was at his side before the smoke lifted. Lebec radios the CO in the overhead chopper to call in another medevac. Oakwood will later recall that he saw jagged points of Marty’s tibia where it snapped mid-calf. Admitting his touch violated the sterile procedure he was taught in training, he pushed the two pieces of limb back together, assuming nothing to lose. Infection has already begun marching in this case of open wounds in tropical jungles. And also assuming Marty’s pain required intervention, the medic jabbed a morphine syrette into the right bicep of the injured. In order to inform providers of the next stop for treatment, the spent morphine vessel was pinned to his shirt.

WHO BY FIRE

There is a cleansing. Physical pain is a highly subjective experience. It ranges along a spectrum from a minor itch to breathless blackout. At extreme intensity it can be hallucinatory. Marty is consumed by the fire that is his right leg. Assured he still possesses all his body parts, he searches for a status report. Was anyone else hurt? Look out for booby traps. Please be careful, everyone…“PLEASE BE CAREFUL!” He remembered the first trip wire they crossed. He knew they would return to that path to carry him to the dust-off.

“Lebec, that trip wire, that grenade, take it out so nobody gets hurt.”

“Got it, dude.” Lebec is a capable man.

Four men fashion a stretcher with a poncho and their M-16s and lift me above the path out of the woods, to await the medevac landing on the rice paddies. I’m pleading with every troop to be careful. I have a newly-discovered passion, I want no one to feel this fire. I want peace, peace for all. I’m an apostle for peace. Peace for my squad, my platoon, all of Company A. I’m talking in tongues.

“Peace for everyone!”

“Peace for the CO?” Anstett pipes up.

“YES! Peace for CO son-of-a-bitch. I want no one to feel pain like this, EVER!”

We hear the slicing of chopper blades nearing. Lebec opens the smoke grenade- PURPLE- to mark the landing. They load me in onto the floor of the chopper, secure with safety straps. The pilot greets me,

”You’ve got a passenger,” and I see another next to me on the floor, it’s Duc! His medevac had only been in the air for a few minutes when the pilot was ordered to return for me. His eyes greeted mine, painlessly stoic. He was missing an arm.

“I love you Duc, I want peace for you.”

Duc repeated, “Peace,” with a beatific smile.

METTA

In Buddhist practice there is a prayer, a mindful meditation, Metta, defined in the Pali language as loving-kindness. One application is to visualize a loved one, even oneself, and silently wish, “May you be happy, may you be healthy, may you be safe, may you not suffer.” You may continue to extend this focus of compassion beyond those you love. Your boss, your rude neighbor with the barking dog, even those you have come to dislike. Upon this practice, you’ll soon find how you will be the first to benefit.

The Huey lifts Marty and Duc above the sniper fire and buried explosives and hidden destruction. Marty’s leg remains a burning pit of pain. He turns again to Duc, whose gaze is a meditation on impermanence. The possession of one arm beats having no arms.

Their chopper rises to a position at 300-feet above ground. Before it sets the flight path to the Army Third Field Hospital in Saigon, the pilot pauses. Marty at the spotter, sees they’re at the same altitude. He makes eye contact with the CO, Colonel Mettle. They’re only 30-meters apart. Marty no longer wants to shoot him out of the sky.

“May you not suffer. May you have peace,” he blessed.

Their eyes meet. Mettle salutes. Marty smiles.