1st Cav "Help!"
We were refueling at CU Chi when the Cu Chi Tower called out for available gunships to go to the help of a 1st Cav unit in heavy contact near the Razorbacks, a string of hills northeast of Cu Chi. I went over to Hinton's ship to consult with him about offering our aid. He said I'd better get clearance from our CO before committing to the mission. I went back to my ship and tried to contact some one with authority to authorize the mission. I was unable to contact anyone while Cu Chi tower kept calling for help. I decided on my own to go. We got the coordinates, the FM ground troop's frequency, and the UHF Medivac frequency from the tower and departed to the area.
Enroute we could hear the ground troops RTO hollering for help and trying to get the Medivacs to land. The Medivacs replied the area was too "hot" for landing at their area to pick up the wounded. The troops were hunkered down in some scrub brush and small trees no higher then 15-20 feet. The wind at ground level was strong and the marking smoke just ran along at ground level making it difficult to see their position from the air.
At about 5 miles out we could see the 2 Medivac ships circling to the southwest at about 1500 feet and 2 Cobras circling to the west at about 2 thousand feet. We called the Medivacs and suggested they follow us in. The RTO called to inform us they were almost out of smokes to mark their position. I told my Crew Chief to gather up a lot of smokes and wire tie them together. I then broke procedure big time and told Hinton to go into a "bulls eye" pattern over the troops. This put me in a small circular pattern over the troops and him in a larger circle around me. This put him over the enemy half the time. Normally, we would use a "racetrack" pattern around a landing zone at 180 degrees from each other to suppress the area around the entire landing zone.
I called the Medivacs to follow us in. At tree top level I could see the RTO and told the Crew Chief to drop the wired up smokes. We almost fell through (lost lift) and I had to overstress the aircraft to pull out of it. The Medivacs were behind me and Hinton was behind them and a little higher.
One of the Medivacs came to a hover above the trees for a moment and as I recovered, flying right over the enemy, the Medivac called out he was taking fire. He banked right and scooted out of the area. We went into the bulls eye pattern and having "eyeballed" the Cav's position we used our door gunners to suppress the enemy.
The RTO called to say he couldn't find the smokes we dropped. We were so low, I looked and could see them still wired together about 30 feet from the RTO and one had gone off. The Crew Chief had wired them through the pins and one had pulled on landing on the ground. I directed the RTO to their location. All this time we could see and hear the enemy shooting at us and them.
Then there was a lull in the fighting. I dropped a smoke over the enemy and we climbed up to set up for a rocket run. At about 500 feet we set up for the run and I couldn't see the smoke I dropped because the wind kept the smoke along the ground. So down I went to mark the enemy again. Back up and I couldn't see it again. Third time down, back up and nothing. I felt I could guess, but that would be risky. I called the RTO to get low as I would shoot 1 pair of rockets and have him adjust. He agreed as the enemy had started up again once we had left tree top level. I punched off 1 pair and the RTO said I was right on and away from his people. I unloaded about 6 more pair and told Hinton to shoot up the area I had hit. We continued the runs until we were both out of rockets. The RTO was hollering "right on, right on, we can hear them screaming". The Medivacs came back in and started loading wounded. We had to leave as we were out of rockets and low on fuel. The fighting had stopped and the RTO said "come up to Tay Ninh and I'll buy you a beer". I told him "we're here for you, come down to Bien Hoa and I'll buy you a steak".
Then their "CO" showed up in his "C&C" (Command and Control) ship and he started giving me orders to sweep and fire to the north. He strongly insisted even after I informed him of our condition and fuel. He ordered us again and I told him to "go to hell" and "where were you and those 2 useless Cav Cobras, while your troops were in the fight?" We left for Cu Chi to refuel and rearm. We then returned to our original mission never having contacted anyone in our unit for authority to leave our mission.
Later on that afternoon, back at Bien Hoa, I was watching AFVN television and saw a news report of 2 unknown "Charlie Model" gunships helping out the 1st Cav near the "razorbacks" killing about 35 enemy soldiers. On my way to the officers club for dinner I was confronted by our "CO" and he asked "what happened this afternoon?" I simply told him to watch the 10 o'clock news. He must have already seen it as nothing more was ever said. No report was ever filed.
118th Assault Helicopter Company RVN '69-'70
