A few nostalgic and, occasionally, humorous views of things I did as a Marine. And before you ask, no, I did not include any combat stories.
Some years ago I wrote a series of stories for my kids so they could understand that their old man was not a hero, just a human. I’ve included, below, a few of the anecdotes that show my sillier side.
It’s amazing how just a few months can change your attitude and actions. Summer, 1964, I’m living my normal lifestyle, just having graduated high school and I and my friends spent most of the summer at the beach. I was a surfer in those days and we nearly lived at four or five different beaches. I don’t know why, but when the surf wasn’t up we could always find waves at San Onofre. The problem was that it was located on the Marine base. Civilians weren’t allowed to surf there and when we did the nasty old Marines would seize our boards, take them to the gate, and make us swim or walk to the gate to retrieve them.
Summer, 1965, I’ve finished boot camp, had my leave, and there are three weeks before ITR (Infantry Training Regiment) starts and they put me on mess duty. I’m assigned to the laundry room and don’t have all that much to do so I take a part-time job at the club. (I’m only making $93 a month in those days and, at the club, I get two or three dollars an hour and all the cokes I can drink.) The club has two locations, one in the main San Onofre camp and the other at the beach. Suddenly I find I’m one of those nasty old Marines working at the club in San Onofre and one of my duties is to … yep, seize the surfboards of all the civilians who try to surf on OUR beach. Did my past experiences make me more lenient? Hell no, I was one of the hardest-asses in the place and was quite proud that I seized more surfboards than anyone else in the club.
Our rear-area compound was surrounded by a wall about a foot thick and fifteen feet high. Eighty to a hundred meters long and about sixty meters wide, the inside was lined with single- and two-story buildings using the outer wall as part of their structure. We were told it was an old French villa built in the early twentieth century. Our mess hall was one of those inner buildings. About fifty feet long and thirty feet wide with an adjoining building at one end we used as a galley. The only reason I mention the mess hall is that Ho Chi Minh, in early 1966, supposedly boasted he would eat his new year’s feast in our mess hall. He didn’t do it, but did he really say that? Don’t know. That’s just what Hanoi Hannah said.
Around the outside of the wall were a number of smaller buildings used for various purposes. One of them was our barber shop. About twenty feet long and fifteen feet wide there were three chairs; one for officers and two for enlisted with two Vietnamese girls working there. Most barbers were women and, strangely, they earned more than the local prostitutes. Haircuts cost $1 and we always tipped the girls an extra $4 or $5. Why? Because after the haircut, they gave you a massage. Get your mind out of the gutter — you leaned forward in the chair and they massaged your neck, shoulders, and back. By the time you walked out you were limp. My problem was that they wanted to use a straight razor for all the trimming. None of the modern three- and four-blade razors can come close to matching the closeness of a properly-honed straight razor. My problem was having a young Vietnamese girl holding a razor to my throat. I always made them use a safety razor on me.
In that same compound/unit/timeframe I met Cpl. Dave Sherrod. He was our assistant radio chief and he showed me the human side of the war. A devout Catholic, he had been put in contact with a priest who ran an orphanage on the outskirts of Da Nang, about ten miles from our compound. One morning I was on my way to the PX and Dave gave me some money asking me to buy a carton of cigarettes. “You want to do something nice?” Yeah, sure.
“Buy an extra carton of cigarettes and I’ll show you something really cool this afternoon.” Okay, young, horny, single Marine, I immediately think about the fact that I can get oral satisfaction for just two cigarettes and trying to figure out what I can get for a whole carton is just overwhelming. That afternoon he takes me to the orphanage where the priest is overjoyed at receiving two cartons of cigarettes.
On the way back I ask Dave about it and he explains, “The Father can sell those two cartons of cigarettes on the black market and get enough to feed those kids for three or four weeks.” With my trips in and out of the bush I was only able to visit the orphanage one more time. When I told my parents about it, they sent me a box with a bunch of my old toys. They weren’t broken, just well-used, but you would have thought it was Christmas for those kids.
You frequently see pictures of American servicemen giving candy or toys to children in foreign countries. You also occasionally hear pundits saying we’re only doing it to show we have more than they do. If you ever run into someone who says that, tell them, for me, to stick it in their ear. We do it because these kids have not yet been taught to hate us and they respond with love. Enough preaching, I’m making myself sick.
When I checked into the American embassy in Paris we had a cook named Ben. Only about 5′3” and might have weighed 130, he was Algerian. Swarthy complexion with short, black, slicked-back hair, his nickname was Snake. I understood that it had something to do with his expertise with the ladies, but we only knew that he could really cook. Every Marine house had some locals to take care of the more mundane tasks and in Paris Ben was responsible for cooking and keeping the kitchen clean. That became a problem because we had Marines working many different shifts. We had four or six Marines getting off at 2000, another six getting off at 2400, some at 0400; pretty much all around the clock somebody was getting off duty, getting ready to go on duty, or getting back from partying and wanting something to eat.
Ben was hired to cook three meals a day and keep the kitchen clean and too often he would come in around 0500 and find a mess. The guys who got off at 2000, 2200, 2400, and 0400 would have been in there making sandwiches, cooking something; and everyone left a mess. When Ben got fed up and quit, the Marine in charge of the kitchen had a brilliant idea. One of our Marines, Skip Mahaffee, was a trained Marine Corps cook. Instead of paying hard dollars for a cook, why not just use our own resources? He approached the OIC who agreed and Skip was relieved from most of his watch-standing duties and assigned as our cook. It really wasn’t a bad idea. When you consider he had all of Les Halles upon which to draw for fresh food, he did a really good job.
The next problem? Skip liked to drink. One morning I’m the SOG (Sergeant of the Guard) and I go around to make sure my relief is alive and awake. Around 0700 a few of us wander into the kitchen to get breakfast. We went in, picked up a plate or bowl, then helped ourselves to the food as there was no real serving line. Dan Hammond is ahead of me in line and Skip has fixed SOS (S**t On a Shingle). Supposed to be creamed chipped beef on toast, the Marine Corps usually just used ground beef. That’s what Skip had done that morning. There was a five-gallon pot on the stove with the SOS simmering. Skip was slumped down in the corner of the kitchen and, because he was breathing, we pretty much ignored him. Well, all the beef always sinks to the bottom of the pot so Dan grabbed a big ladle and started stirring it. I grabbed a couple plates, put two slices of toast on each, and handed one to Dan.
“Uh, guys?” Skip had finally moved! “Uh, I think I got sick.”
Dan and I looked around the kitchen and, not seeing any puke anywhere, said, “Yeah, so?”
About the time Skip said, “I just can’t remember where I got sick,” Dan scooped up a beer bottle from the bottom of the pot. Dan and I looked at each other, both thinking, yeah, well, we know where you got sick. Neither of us had the nerve to stir that pot more and we didn’t let any of the other Marines try eating it.
Ben was back the following day with a bunch of new rules. The main one was that Ben would put out some rations for off-duty guards and NOBODY was allowed in the kitchen from that day forth. (Except for party nights when we took girls back there … uh, forget that one.)
Then there’s my felony. Even as I write this I hope there’s a statute of limitations on federal felonies. We have a new comm officer check into Marine Air Group 12 where there’s a Master Sergeant (Comm Chief), Gunnery Sergeant (Tech Chief), two Staff Sergeants (Radio and Wire Chiefs), and two sergeants (John and me as assistant radio and wire chiefs). All of us were combat veterans and we were not overly impressed when this butter bar (second lieutenant) walked in with a single ribbon and a rifle marksman badge on his chest. Of the six of us, five had expert badges and two of us had expert pistol badges as well. John had the fewest ribbons (5) so, again, we’re not impressed with the newbie.
He was there a week or so when we took him out into town for a welcome aboard party. By now we know he’s single so we all kick in $5 and get one of the bar girls at our regular place to be “especially nice” to him. The next morning Fergie (the tech chief) asks, “Sir, what happened last night? We lost you.”
“Oh, gunny, it was great, that one girl took me back to her place for the night. I think she’s in love with me!”
We’re all trying to keep our faces straight as Fergie said, “Sir! You didn’t take Miko home, did you?” He nodded and Fergie said, “Oh, lieutenant, don’t you know who she is? That girl is the mistress of the commanding general.”
None of us saw that coming but we all played along and within minutes the newbie was worried about what he had done and, no, we never did tell him.
A couple months later we were sent back into Vietnam. Once there the lieutenant complained because he could never get a jeep. Our motor pool was really weak and we were often on a waiting list to get an admin vehicle. Naturally, we had all our radio jeeps, but we couldn’t use them for admin runs. So … John and I had an idea.
Any time you drove a vehicle you had to have a trip ticket and, if you were going off base, you had to have a pass. Also, if you were out after dark, it took another pass for that. Careful thought, a little forgery, and a few dry runs to the nearby Army base set it up. One night four of us drove to Long Binh Army Base, went to the Staff NCO club we had scouted, and stole a jeep. We took it to a dark part of the base and repainted it with Marine Corps tactical markings, then drove it back to our base.
The next morning we presented the lieutenant with his “own” jeep. He actually drove it around for about two weeks before the comm chief convinced him we’d be in a world of hurt if anyone found out about it. So, I drove it down to Saigon one afternoon with John following me. I parked it and walked away trying to look as if I was shopping. Around a corner, I got into the jeep with John, and we went back to the base. Our thinking was that the Viet Cong or a black marketeer (most likely) would steal it and we’d be clear. We had washed off any fingerprints and I had worn gloves when I parked it. Well, I guess it worked, I haven’t been charged with theft.
Oh, to the Army SNCO who had his jeep stolen that night while he was drinking, I’m sorry. I hope you didn’t get into too much trouble.
Plovdiv was a resort community about sixty or seventy miles from Sofia. The communist party heavies all had dachas there and nearly all the embassies also had villas there for their staff. I was at the American villa twice for parties and once at the British villa. The British villa was in the mountains outside of Plovdiv and was a two-story all wood building. Built along the lines of a Swiss chalet it was spacious and very nice. My girlfriend, one of the British secretaries, invited me one afternoon for a little party with several others.
I had duty the following day at noon, but there was a bus station about fifteen minutes down the road where I could catch a bus at 0800 and be back in Sofia in plenty of time. We partied the afternoon and evening away and I was up by 0600 the following morning. I walked down to the village and the bus station. Along the way I ran into a Bulgarian soldier who had been hurt in a training exercise and was on his way back to his unit. It stretched my Bulgarian a bit but he also spoke German so we managed a comfortable conversation all the way into town. That’s where it got weird.
When we first arrived in Bulgaria the embassy took my passport, sent it to the Bulgarian Foreign Ministry along with a couple pictures of me. The Bulgars made up a diplomatic pass for me that was nothing more than a little folding leather case about two by three inches. Inside there was a piece of paper glued in that had my picture and ID info. Name, height, weight, birth date, eye and hair color, and a notation that I was with the American embassy — all in Bulgarian, of course. They kept my passport until I left and traded in the ID card.
So, we get to the village, the soldier’s bus comes first and he leaves. I’m standing there when two very heavy-looking dudes come up and ask for my ID. At that time the Bulgarians were the most backward Soviet satellite and also followed the Soviet party line the closest. They also provided the heavies that performed all the “wet” work for the KGB. In those days of the Cold War the KGB and CIA had an understanding that they wouldn’t kill each other’s operatives. So the KGB had the Bulgarians do all their assassinations for them. That way the KGB could never be accused of killing anyone. Also the Bulgarians were known throughout the world’s spooks as some of the best assassins. I have heard stories that the Greeks, the Mossad, and even our own CIA hired them occasionally.
These two guys could very easily have been such agents. Short, thick, and all muscle under their ill-fitting East German suits. One of them took my ID and walked away while the other led me into a little office just off the village square. The interrogation really stretched my Bulgarian because neither of them spoke English or German (or pretended not to).
They really didn’t do anything. Kept me there about an hour then the first one walked out again, came back in, handed me my ID, and they let me go. Darn! I missed my bus; there was only one in the morning and one in the afternoon; my friends from the British embassy would already be on their way home; and I was left with no way back other than shank’s mare. So I started hoofing it.
No, we didn’t have cell phones, and the Bulgarians didn’t have pay phones except in the bigger cities. So I had a fifty-mile walk ahead of me. Hopefully my NCOIC would catch on that something was wrong and send out some scouts. No such luck. About two hours into my walk I stopped in a little lakeside cafe to have a beer and happened to run into one of the British attachés. We had a drink and I related what had happened and then he asked to see my ID. I handed it to him and, without looking at it, he opened it and turned it for me to see. The paper ID inside had been ripped out! Evidently this sort of thing had happened before because he knew exactly what to look for. The bad thing about that was that, had I been stopped by the police or militia, without a diplomatic ID I could have been thrown into jail for however long they wanted. I feel quite certain the Bulgars would have just said they never heard of me and I would never have been seen again. The Brit then gave me a ride back to the embassy.
George, whom I was supposed to relieve, was mad until I told him what had happened. I reported it to the NCOIC, then dressed, and stood post. When I got off I had to make a complete report to him and the political attaché. The following day another political type flew in from Frankfort, took my statement, and then left. The next day I had a new ID card and within a couple weeks I was given a letter of apology from the Bulgarian Foreign Ministry. Another thing that I have somewhere in the garage that I hope to find one day.
Now, besides my kids, the whole world can see what an idiot I can be at times.
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