Five Years to Freedom: The True Story of a Vietnam POW - Softcover

Rowe, James N.

 
9780345314604: Five Years to Freedom: The True Story of a Vietnam POW
Softcover
ISBN 10: 0345314603 ISBN 13: 9780345314604
Verlag: Presidio Press, 1984

Inhaltsangabe

When Green Beret Lieutenant James N. Rowe was captured in 1963 in Vietnam, his life became more than a matter of staying alive.

In a Vietcong POW camp, Rowe endured beri-beri, dysentery, and tropical fungus diseases. He suffered grueling psychological and physical torment. He experienced the loneliness and frustration of watching his friends die. And he struggled every day to maintain faith in himself as a soldier and in his country as it appeared to be turning against him.

His survival is testimony to the disciplined human spirit.
His story is gripping.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

James N. Rowe was an officer in the Green Berets and was part of the small advisory force sent to assist the South Vietnamese in 1962. Captured by the Viet Cong in 1963 and marked for execution, Rowe succeeded in escaping after five years of captivity. After the war, Rowe was assigned to the Philippines to train the army to fight communist guerillas. On April 21, 1989, Rowe was assassinated by communist insurgents in a suburb of Manila. He is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.

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When Green Beret Lieutenant James N. Rowe was captured in 1963 in Vietnam, his life became more than a matter of staying alive.
In a Vietcong POW camp, Rowe endured beri-beri, dysentery, and tropical fungus diseases. He suffered grueling psychological and physical torment. He experienced the loneliness and frustration of watching his friends die. And he struggled every day to maintain faith in himself as a soldier and in his country as it appeared to be turning against him.
His survival is testimony to the disciplined human spirit.
His story is gripping.

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1

Two hui—helicopters pushed northward, two thousand feet above the swamp and rice paddy domain of the Mekong Delta’s Vietcong legions, their blades beating a steady rhythm against the air. One of them, the unarmed “slick,� carried Capt. Humbert “Rock� Versace, intelligence adviser with the Military Assistance and Advisory Group at Camau. The other chopper, flying slightly to their right front, was an armed helicopter, its landing skids heavy with rocket tubes and machine guns. Their destination was a small Special Forces camp twenty-six kilometers north of the provincial capital and in the center of a Vietcong-controlled zone.

Rocky was a trimly built, twenty-six-year-old West Point graduate who had volunteered for a six-month extension after completing one year as an adviser. His slightly outthrust jaw and penetrating eyes were indications of his personality, but his close-cut, black-flecked, steel-gray hair looked as if it belonged on someone much older.

He had recently been assigned as MAAG intelligence adviser in Camau and had witnessed some hard combat as the Vietnamese units his detachment was advising stood toe to toe with the best the Vietcong had to offer. The battles were typical of that period: Vietcong nighttime assaults; chance daylight encounters with an elusive enemy and the seeming impossibility of pinning him down; bloody ambushes; lack of adequate air support and artillery even though our pilots were flying the wings off of the available T-28’s, the frustration that went with the “old war� before the arrival of jets, artillery support, and American Combat units. This was the war known to the American advisers, to the isolated U.S. Special Forces detachments in their efforts to combat the Vietcong in their own territory. This was Vietnam, 1963.

Small groups of huts, clustered along canal banks bordered by coconut palms and banana trees, passed below the open doors of the choppers. The countryside was deceptively peaceful. To shatter the illusion all one had to do was drop down into range of the weapons which were, no doubt, pointed skyward at that very moment, hidden by the foliage of the trees. Farmers worked thigh-deep in water, tending their rice paddies, their conical hats reflecting the sunlight. Water buffalo wallowed in the mud, oblivious to all around them. A graceful “spirit bird� hung motionless in the sky, “suspended high in a rising air thermal,� its lonely world undisturbed by the passing helicopters.

Ahead, now visible at the intersection of two larger canals, was Versace’s destination, Tan Phu. A streamer of green smoke billowed up from the landing zone, a small rectangular area cleared for chopper landing. At Tan Phu there was only one way in or out—by chopper—and it wasn’t safe that way either. The terrain one kilometer away from camp for 360 degrees belonged to Charlie. It was an isolated fortress manned by an American Special Forces A-Detachment, their Vietnamese Special Forces (LLDB) counterpart team, and four companies—about 380 men on an average day—of the Civilian Irregular Defense Group. These were the Vietnamese and Cambodians from that area who had been recruited, equipped, and trained to resist the Vietcong in their home villages. It was a lonely spot for the Americans.

The armed Huey made its first pass over the camp, a cluster of brown thatched huts surrounded by a mud wall, narrow moat, and several distinct barbed wire barriers. Large machine-gun bunkers on the corners and scattered rifle positions along the wall marred the otherwise smooth rectangular layout of the camp’s main defense. Mortar positions within the perimeter, a watchtower, a masonry and tile dispensary, and a large concrete cube completed the major interior parts of this barrier to complete Vietcong domination of the area.

The large concrete structure was being used as an ammunition bunker now that it had been strengthened and sandbagged. It was the only survivor of a militia post that had been overrun by the VC in 1962. The last of the soldiers then manning the post had been trapped inside the building as they made a final stand. The Vietcong had jammed the muzzles of their weapons into the firing ports and riddled the inside of the building, then hurled grenades into the ports and wiped out the remaining defenders. The inside walls of the building still bore the scars of that last stand.

The choppers settled onto the sheets of perforated steel matting which prevented them from sinking over their skids in the soft muck of this delta swampland. Rocky jumped to the matting, clutching a small bag in one hand and a portable Thermofax machine under his other arm. His baseball cap was canted to one side of his head and his carbine had slipped from his shoulder to the crook of his arm.

“Welcome to the end of the world! I didn’t expect you so soon.� Ducking against the powerful downdraft of the blades and holding my beret on with one hand, I greeted him. Members of the American team took his gear as I introduced him to Al Penneult, the crew-cut, bull-necked ex-football player—our detachment commander.

Rocky’s grin was one of the nicest things about him and his greeting made it seem as if we’d known each other for years. Actually, it had been only a few weeks since I’d met him. I had been en route to Tan Phu from Saigon after picking up funds and supplies for the camp. Rocky had been just another face in the vehicle that took us from the Catinat Hotel to Tan Son Nhut Airfield and I had said no more than “Good morning� when I first saw him. It wasn’t until we found ourselves sitting side by side on the same Caribou flight to Can Tho that we began to talk and introduced ourselves. Before we landed at Can Tho, we had gone through the whole problem of exchange of vital information that existed in our operational area and had hatched a plan to establish communication between our posts. We received permission at my B-Detachment to put in voice commo between Tan Phu and Camau. It was to be strictly for exchange of information and not used as a command net. With that guidance, we went to work and in three days had installed an AN/GRC 9 radio at Tan Phu and linked the two groups of Americans, the Special Forces and MAAG. I had spent two days at Camau, coordinating the setup and requisitioning the radio which I subsequently took back to Tan Phu to be installed. Rocky had planned to come up to Tan Phu for a visit to check out what we had and coordinate further exchanges.

This visit had been prompted by a briefing we had given his senior adviser earlier the same day on the situation at Tan Phu. He had questioned whether or not Rocky had been up to coordinate yet and after my negative reply had decided to send the choppers for him. It hadn’t been more than a couple of hours after the Colonel’s departure that Rocky arrived.

Rocky, Al, and I walked through the gate into the main camp, saluting the stern-faced striker on guard as he snapped to present arms with his carbine. We passed a clothesline, sagging under the weight of dripping fatigue shirts and trousers. “Big Boy,� our Vietnamese laundryman, was attempting to dry the freshly washed uniforms before the humid rainy-season climate induced mold to form. The intervals of sunlight were short and it took no time at all for the clothes to...

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Verlag
Presidio Press
Erscheinungsdatum
1984
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0345314603
ISBN 13 
9780345314604
Einband
Taschenbuch
Anzahl der Seiten
480
Kontakt zum Hersteller
Nicht verfügbar
Verantwortliche Person
Purmerul LTD
https://strengholt.nl/en/

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