I was there all of '71. Spent the first three months or so being a regular FAC for the 173rd Airborne Brigade at LZ English up at the Bong Son Pass. Ran a bunch of airstrikes, saved a bunch of grunts, and had a few other adventures. Then was "invited" to "volunteer" for something else. What? They couldn't say. Just that I'd be picked up and taken there. "There" turned out to be a tiny compound outside the civilian airport at Ban Me Thuot, 25 miles from Cambodia. After I got the real, no kidding Mission Impossible speech, I flew the next nine months doing what was essentially spy work. Got shot at. A lot. Did things I could not talk about for the next couple of decades. And came home with no new holes in me.
