before you were born

The_Traveler · May 3, 2007

this was taken in 1967 with Pentax Spotmatic and tri-x, developed in whatever was in the brown bottle. I have no idea what the shutter speed or aperture was.

I was out in my jeep doing MedCap on civilians when I inadvertently (believe me) ended up in the very middle of a helicopter assault and a fierce firefight. Only dared to take this one and then hid my head until tanks and more troops came up and the area was secured.

Negative long gone, just this one battered print remains.

mpython77 · May 3, 2007

d***, what a time to have a camera. Awesome picture my friend. :thumbup:

snownow · May 3, 2007

WOW, great shot. Glad you kept your head down.

The_Traveler · May 3, 2007

If you look at it, the technical values aren't much at all and composition isn't maximum but what it does have is immediacy and reality - (completely by accident). A viewer just knows that life is happening big time right in front of the camera.

I was lucky to be there with a camera.

Garrentee · May 3, 2007

amazing!!!

what a great capture!! I cant even imagine what you guys went through over there!

thanks for going and protecting this country!

garrentee

The_Traveler · May 3, 2007

Garrentee said:
I cant even imagine what you guys went through over there!

thanks for going and protecting this country!

garrentee

I had it easy, believe me.
It was the grunts that suffered.

and I didn't go to protect the country. I went because politicians made me; pols who weren't afraid of a little blood and guts - as long as it wasn't their own. I spent 24 years in the service - retiring as a full colonel. Whatever failings the individual soldiers have, they are willing to put their lives at risk in the line of duty for the concept of love of country. For whatever virtues a politician has, he or she won't risk their career for anything.

To paraphrase Wm Buckley, I would rather be governed by 500 people chosen at random from the telephone book than the 500 people in Congress who have, in general, sold their honor to get where they are.

lasershot · May 3, 2007

lol, the title had me thinking something for a minute...

Great pic though, I just appericate it so much when pictures like those are shared...

newrmdmike · May 3, 2007

this is one for the history books! its awesome

schumionbike · May 3, 2007

Hey The Traveler, very nice shot, I didn't know you were that old! lol.

My father flew that chopper, the UH-1 Huey, for 5 years (1970-1975) during the war in Vietnam. Logged in a total of 4600 hours. Serve 7 years in POW camps after the war for that. Thanks for sharing the picture.

The_Traveler · May 3, 2007

Gunship platoon of 118th AHC/145 Combat Avn Bn
Rocket tubes on side of UH-1 Huey
scanned from 40 yr old slide.

Gunner fires M60 machine gun from door, hulls and links ar on the floor of cabin.(M60s leaning on rocket tubes)

The_Traveler · May 3, 2007

Reloading the 'Blooper' or 'Pooper'; it fired 40 mm explosive rounds.

The actual instruments of destruction are strangely interesting perhaps because of their intricate lethality and their foreigness to most people.

myopia · May 3, 2007

incred

The_Traveler · May 3, 2007

Since some are interested, here are two more

Checking rockets from storage tubes

Paddies behind compound. (picture below text)

For any of you who are interested in history this was the American Club compound where [SIZE=-1]John Paul Vann lived. He was the protagonist in a famous non-fiction book about the Vietnam War called 'The Bright and SHining Lie" by Neil Sheehan. I never knew who the mysterious man was who lived in a guarded villa across the street until years later when I read the book.

The entire compound was about the size of a football field and was under siege for 3 days during the Tet offensive in 1968 until we were literally rescued by the cavalry - a platoon of tanks from the 11th Armored Cavalry rolled through our gates on the morning of the 3d day to my and others everlasting relief. Altho the VC were never serious about overrunning us, they threw the odd grenade at the walls and shot at anyone at the walls.

Their main attack was at the air base where over 500 VC were killed in a running battle over 3 days. They came close to reaching two big AF bunkers wher 500 unarmed airman were sitting out the attack and were only driven off when the attack on the helicopter airstrip was foiled and the gunships actualy got into the air. The pilots had been lifted [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]by helicopter [/SIZE][SIZE=-1]off of the American Club compound where we lived - we tore down some fences to make an impromptu pad just big enough for a Huey to get in. That left a skeleton crew of non-combatant officers, including me, and some enlisted men in charge of defense.

Lucky for us, the difficulty of approaching across the paddies and the presence of helicopters from nearby Bien Hoa air base (3 km) prevented any serious attack on our compound after the first day although it was a scary, surreal experience.

I went back to see the place in 1998 and it is entirely gone, although Cong Ly Street, the street that ran down the center of the compound[/SIZE], still exists. War is interesting in retrospect but nasty, ugly, bloody things when they are happening.