Nam Sense by Jr. Arthur Wiknik

Burke and gestured, “He’s the one who’s lucky.”
    “Really? Perhaps I should include assault with your Article 15. Or maybe charge you with aiding the enemy.”
    “Aiding the enemy?” I asked confused. “What are you talking about?”
    “Right now, that axe is of more use to the NVA than to us. When you cool off, go back down and find it.”
    “Yes, sir,” I mumbled in return.
    Now there was an inspiring example of our priorities. If I had wanted to, I could have killed a man, but the Captain was more concerned about a lost axe. Considering how I felt about Burke, I almost had to agree with Hartwell’s wisdom.
    Sergeant Burke never spoke to me again. We spent a year in the same company and I only saw him at a distance. I think he was now genuinely afraid that I was crazy enough to kill him.
    Our stay at Firebase Airborne was a welcome change from the humping we did around Phong Dien. There was, however, no escape from the typical Army bullshit duties. We were required to perform police calls, latrine duty, and submit to bunker inspections. Our days were spent filling sandbags, pushing the edge of the jungle back, or going out on short patrols. There was little free time. Perhaps the activities were the Army’s way of keeping us from thinking about home.
    Daytime on the firebase was physically exhausting, and the nights were mentally demanding. The most likely time for an enemy attack was from midnight to dawn, so we rarely got sufficient sleep because Captain Hartwell often put us on 100% alert for up to four hours at a time. When we were allowed to sleep, the artillery battery seemed to have a fire mission at the same time. Rounds might be launched for only one minute, or the mission could drag on for an hour. More often than not, the guns were aimed over our shallow bunker, so every cannon blast shook us from our sleep.
    The biggest disadvantage of being on a firebase was that we were sitting ducks for the enemy. Although we weren’t directly attacked while I was there, we did get mortared one night. The NVA walked four rounds across the base scoring a direct hit on one of the bunkers, killing three GIs as they slept in a fighting position on the bunker roof. The trio never knew what hit them. The next morning their mangled bodies were found strewn over the sandbagged walls like rag dolls. It was a grim and depressing sight.
    We didn’t have any body bags, so we loosely wrapped the dead in ponchos. After the bodies were placed on the chopper pad for extraction, I was drawn to the spot where they lay. Their feet were grotesquely tilted in the same direction and the uncovered legs each had an identification tag tied to the right boot. I didn’t recognize their names and I couldn’t see their faces, which was just as well.
    Though the mortar attack deaths were shocking, their impact soon faded as the routine firebase activities resumed. However, Specialist Harrison, the GI who claimed he smelled the VC girl we killed at Phong Dien, went off the deep end. He was mentally unstable and we had not realized it. We watched in amusement as he loaded himself with ammunition and declared, “I’m gonna get me some NVA. Don’t you see them watching us from the tree line?”
    “Sure Harrison,” Freddie Shaw laughed, “they’re making faces at us!”
    “Take no prisoners!” shouted Stan Alcon. We all laughed. Five seconds later we had stopped laughing and were staring dumbfounded as Harrison leaped over the concertina wire and dashed into the jungle. Once out of sight, he hollered “Geronimo!” then sprayed the jungle with a full magazine burst of M-16 fire, finishing the barrage with several grenades. Two squads scrambled to retrieve Harrison in case the NVA really were out there. When we found him, Harrison complained that the Gooks ran away when they saw him coming. Harrison was clearly a risk to the firebase as well as to himself. The safest thing to do was send him to the rear for psychiatric evaluation