Robert Peavey - Praying for Slack - A Marine Corps Tank Commander in Vietnam

At almost the same time, two RPG shooters jumped up out of their grass-covered holes about twenty feet away. I grabbed my M14 and took out one of the NVA. The other one came under fire by the grunts assigned to our tank. This was getting too hairy; I was way too short for this shit.

That night, we learned we would spend two more days in the field. In the darkness, Mr. Charles probed us, looking for a weak spot and trying to get us to react to his poking around. But 1/9 was too good a Marine outfit to fall for such mind games. Their automatic weapons remained quiet, as did the tanks. It would take a full ground assault before these guys would open up.

The only reaction Charlie got from within the perimeter was one single rifle shot, by a sniper specially equipped with a Starlite scope. The following morning, it was discovered that Mister Charles had turned around most of the Claymore mines that 1/9 had placed out in front of them. The NVA were hoping we would fire them off and have all the ball bearings come back our way.

The remainder of the sweep was uneventful. We were none the worse for wear, except for being tired from lack of sleep. We were reassigned back to Oceanview. The run north along the ocean, half in, half out, helped clean up the mess we had in our sprocket. Taking up our familiar position atop the sand dune, we quickly downed a meal of C rats as the sun set behind the mountains to the west.

We all felt drowsy as we started our watch routine; I had the second watch, from midnight to 2 a.m. Around 12:30 the ARVN fire base at Gio Lihn, about five miles west of us, came to life. Green and red tracers flew in both directions. The hill was under attack, and sporadic flashes of artillery silhouetted it against the dark horizon. I immediately woke up the crew to be ready in case this wasn’t an isolated incident.

I was standing in the TC’s position, with Steele next to me in his loader’s position. Suddenly we heard a buzzing noise that grew louder and louder, until finally we all ducked without knowing why. The buzz ended with a Thud! , impacting the ground right next to the tank.

“What the fuck was that?” I asked the crew over the intercom, trying to get back in my own skin. “Did anybody see where it came from?”

A few minutes later, another buzz was followed by a similar thud . This one landed a little farther away, but behind the tank, inside the compound.

I immediately contacted the CP on the radio and told them we were taking some kind of incoming fire, except their rounds appeared to be duds. Just then, another buzz grew in intensity and ended with the same Thud! —this time, only five feet from my side of the tank.

Some kind of projectile had hit the sand dune with a very sharp impact, again without exploding. Even so, this one really scared the shit out of me. “Jesus Christ!” I yelled, still on the radio. “That son of a bitch just missed me!”

Whatever they were, they sounded large, and they were getting too goddamned close and scaring the hell out of all of us. We were being shot and bracketed, the target of some weapon that gave no indication where it was located. At least its ammunition was defective—so far!

I had the driver start the tank and was prepared to move, but then I realized something didn’t add up. I had seen no muzzle flashes. We could hear the rounds coming, so they were traveling too slowly to be fired at us. That, plus the unlikelihood that all of them were duds, kept me from moving the tank from this key position.

These things kept impacting all around and inside the perimeter. Their rhythm was almost predictable. A terrifying buzzing grew in volume until it impacted the ground, solidly. It was that approaching sound that really freaked us out.

Yet another buzz was getting louder and louder. We all ducked inside the turret and immediately heard—as well as felt!—a loud clang.

“Motherfucker!” screamed the driver. “Did you hear that? We just took a hit!”

“Of fuckin’ course I fuckin’ heard it!” I yelled back. “I might be short, but I ain’t fuckin’ deaf!”

Whatever these things were, one had just made a direct hit on my tank. If this was some NVA kind of psychological warfare, it was working marvelously. Man, I thought, I’m too short for this shit!

Again, I got on the radio and explained the hit we had just taken. I had both the driver and the loader button up, but somebody had to keep a lookout. First I peeked over the very lip of the cupola, keeping the TC’s hatch down on my head with one hand. Then I decided to get out of the turret and at least investigate where the thing had hit.

From the direction of the sound, I was sure it was the tank’s right fender. The rest of the crew agreed with me, so I climbed outside. I crawled on hands and knees, feeling my way around the top of the tank, groping for the impact site to get some idea of what in hell it was—scared shitless that I would be this thing’s first victim.

We weren’t the only ones with the shit scared out of us. Down from where we sat, the grunts along the perimeter had only a hole to hide in; they were totally vulnerable to whatever these things might be.

I found a dent pushed in about a half-inch in diameter on the fender, near the driver’s position. What could have made such a pronounced dimple? I felt around in the dark to see if I could learn what it was. Jumping down off the fender, I got on my hands and knees, and groped around in the dark, but didn’t find anything odd, much less solid just sand.

I felt like a damned idiot. If it was a dud projectile, did I really want to find it? Buzz-z-z-z …

I dropped to the ground and covered my head, feeling absolutely helpless and totally vulnerable, like a deer caught in the headlights of an eighteen-wheeler.

Finally thunk! Another one impacted, just behind the tank. This was doing nothing for my short-timer’s paranoia. I had had enough of this crap. I scampered up on the tank and into the safety of the turret.

A minute went by, then buzz-z-z-z… thud! This one landed out in the wire, directly in front of us. The grunts were getting vocal about the mysterious buzz bombs.

Meanwhile, the firefight going on at Gio Lihn had died down. The sky above the base was still illuminated with the flares that hung over it.

Another minute brought another buz-z-z-z and thud! One more of those whatever-they-were landed even closer to the front of our tank. Now that I thought about it, the sounds had been evenly spaced—almost clock-like in their regularity. I looked back at Gio Lihn, where the firefight had simmered down to a few sporadic flashes. Then it suddenly dawned on me what these things were.

I told the crew. They didn’t believe the idea, so I had them all look toward Gio Lihn. “Wait for the next illumination flare to go up.”

Just as the last flare was about to burn out underneath its parachute, we saw a new one burst in the sky above it.

“Get ready,” I told the crew. “One of the buzz-bombs is about to pay us a visit.” As if on cue, the buzzing sound began its approach, terminated by a now-familiar thud! behind our tank.

My crew didn’t say a word. They wanted to confirm my hypothesis with a second example, so they waited for that far-off flare to extinguish itself. Sure enough, just before it started to fade and go out, another flare broke above it. After a few seconds went by, buzz-z-z-z… thud!

I dropped into the turret, switched on the red light, and got out my maps. Mentally, I drew a line between Oceanview and Gio Lihn, then extended it on past Gio Lihn. When I unfolded and joined the next map, my straight line continued on to Con Thien.

Over the radio, I gave the Oceanview CP my hypothesis: The ARVNs were getting their illumination from either The Washout or Con Thien. I figured that an illumination round fired from Con Thien was crossing over Gio Lihn when it released its flare, illuminating the battlefield. But the projectile itself continued on course and fell to earth at Oceanview.