Matterhorn: a novel of the Vietnam War Page 41

  One plan was scratched. A second was proposed, and then a third. It grew darker. They huddled over the map with their red-lens flashlights. Every plan had a flaw. After three hours of debate they finally realized that there was no perfect plan. Somebody was going to get killed.

  Mellas sat down with his head in his hands, rubbing his eyes, wishing fervently that Hawke was still with them. He now regretted telling Blakely that Hawke wanted out of the bush and that the battalion might lose him if Blakely didn’t act fast—this was a big part of the reason why Hawke wasn’t with them. It was all absurd, without reason or meaning. People who didn’t even know each other were going to kill each other over a hill none of them cared about. The wind picked up slightly, bringing the smell of the jungle with it. Mellas shivered. He couldn’t figure out why they didn’t just quit. Yet they wouldn’t.

  They finally decided to move Fracasso’s First Platoon and Kendall’s Third Platoon up a long finger that led south from the main ridgeline, starting just east of Helicopter Hill. When they reached the main east-west ridgeline, First Platoon would attack westward and hit Helicopter Hill from the east. They would be supported by Kendall’s platoon, which would also act as the reserve. Kendall would set up on a little hump just behind First Platoon’s line of departure, from where they could fire over First Platoon’s heads. Goodwin’s Second Platoon would simultaneously move up a narrower finger that paralleled the one the main body would take and was just to the west of it. Instead of joining the main ridgeline, however, the narrower finger led directly into the south side of Helicopter Hill. The Air Force’s defoliation had not been as successful on that finger, so there was good cover almost to the top. Goodwin was to get on line, draping his platoon across the top of the finger and down both sides, if possible without being detected, and attack from the south when Fitch felt the enemy was fully engaged with First Platoon on the east side. In this way Second Platoon would be concealed longer and, once released, would be exposed to fire from Matterhorn itself, which was directly to the finger’s west, for the shortest possible time. Approaching in the dark would eliminate fire on Goodwin’s platoon from Matterhorn before the assault, but only if they weren’t detected. In fact, a large part of the plan depended on Goodwin’s getting into position undetected. When daylight broke and the assault began, Goodwin’s platoon would quickly be mingled with NVA troops on Helicopter Hill, and the NVA on Matterhorn would probably have to hold their fire.

  Of course the main issue was the defenders of Helicopter Hill itself. Still, Fitch hoped the dead branches of the defoliated jungle just below the hill might give some concealment and cover if they could attack during the poor light of early morning. That meant everything had to go at dawn, and, he hoped, with the clouds low to the ground. On the other hand, if clouds were close to the ground, there was no hope for air support.

  “Fucking brilliant,” Mellas said. “It took us three fucking hours to figure out we’ll just charge the motherfuckers.” It was almost with relief that he threw himself into planning the mechanics of departure lines, timing, air coordination, and smoke and hand signals.

  They filed out into the blackness of the jungle at 0100, emerging an hour later into the high grass on the valley’s floor. Low clouds, drizzle, and darkness hid Matterhorn and the ridgeline completely. Mellas felt as if his map and the dim red spot of his flashlight were the only reality in a darkness that oppressed not only sight but the mind as well.

  They reached the point where Goodwin’s platoon was to veer off to the west to begin moving up its assigned finger. Everyone quietly dropped his pack. This was so everyone could save energy on the climb, free themselves for instant and fast movement when the action started, and avoid unnecessary noise. They took only water—canteens topped to prevent the sound of water sloshing—and two cans of food, carefully wrapped in socks to avoid the sound of cans clinking together. Ammunition was carefully placed in cloth pockets. Faces were smeared with clay and dirt.

  Even unburdened of their packs, they moved very slowly. The tiniest sounds rang out like bells. Unseen branches slapped at their eyes. The cold fog enveloped them. The kids cursed beneath their breath as they groped for the ground in front of them. They silently cleared limbs from their faces, biting back the need to vent their anger at the pain. They crawled over downed trees, squeezed through thick brambles. Moving quietly in the dark takes a great deal of time. Too much time. Dawn was breaking.

  An explosion ahead of the main body sent everyone down to his stomach. A long wailing scream hung in the air. Samms, directly behind Mellas, rose to his feet and whispered, “Shut the fucker up, somebody. Shut that son of a bitch up.” First and Third Platoon had lost the advantage of surprise.

  The scream stopped abruptly.

  The stillness of the jungle after that anguished sound was like ether-laden cotton, numbing, oppressive, dangerous. Everyone wondered what had happened to cause such pain, and how it had ended.

  It had been ended when Jancowitz shut his eyes and jammed his fist into the hole left by the blown-away lower jaw of the kid who had been on point. The shrapnel from the DH-10 directional mine had taken out his eyes and lower jaw but had left his vocal cords intact. One foot had been ripped off as well.

  Jancowitz pulled his bloody hand from the mess around the kid’s throat. A piece of jawbone with two teeth in it caught on the opal ring Susi had bought for him. Fredrickson rushed up and pinched the spurting carotid artery with one hand while he fumbled to stuff a thick bandage pad against the stump of the lower leg.

  Jancowitz touched Fredrickson on the shoulder and shook it gently. “Let him die, Doc,” he said.

  Fredrickson hesitated, then let go of the artery. The blood oozed out quickly, no longer spurting.

  “Who was it?” Fredrickson asked quietly, blood smeared on his face. The face before him was unrecognizable.

  “Broyer.”

  Fracasso, who had been anxiously watching Fredrickson’s efforts, backed away involuntarily, bumping into Hamilton. “Excuse me,” Fracasso mumbled.

  They wrapped Broyer’s body in his poncho and put his black plastic glasses in the pocket of his utility jacket. They then rolled the poncho’s edges for hand grips. Fredrickson put the medevac number in his notebook along with the cause of death.

  Fracasso put Jacobs’s squad on point. They continued moving awkwardly forward to get into position for the assault, knowing there would be no surprise in their favor. Their main hope now shifted to Goodwin, if only he could work his way up undetected.

  The fog swirled around them. The fear of mines dogged every step. Broyer’s body slowed them considerably.

  Big John Six was frantic.

  “It’s damn near oh eight thirty. They were supposed to be at their FLD three hours ago. I knew I should have shit-canned that goddamned Fitch.”

  Hawke listened, knowing that Fitch would have been extremely fortunate to make the FLD—the final line of departure—on time. He was more worried about the weather than Fitch’s failure to kick off on schedule. Air support, holding in tight circles within easy striking distance of the target, had to have clear weather and had to strike before running short of fuel.

  Captain Bainford threw his pencil across the bunker and leaned back in his chair to look at Simpson and Blakely. He’d had four F-4 Phantoms waiting above the clouds, but they had gone bingo fuel and had to return to base. He cursed about Fitch’s inability to stick to a schedule. One of the radio operators picked up Bainford’s pencil.

  “What about the Navy?” Simpson asked.

  Bainford sighed. “I’ll try, sir. But they got to be able to see what they’re bombing, just like everyone else.” Bainford went back to the radio, trying to drum up another flight to wait above the towering clouds that hid the western mountains.

  At that moment Goodwin was quietly spreading his platoon out in a long frontal line, preparing to move from the cover of the trees up the defoliated slopes of Helicopter Hill. He keyed the handset to signal his arrival. Fitch checked his watch. The company had been moving
nearly eight hours without rest or food. Fitch could only guess how far away he was from his own final line of departure.

  Robertson emerged from behind a thick cover of bush and caught movement in a tree from the corner of his eye. An NVA soldier was taking a piss, holding on to a branch and making patterns on the ground below him with his urine. Robertson said, “Oh, shit,” and fell backward, firing his M-16. At the same time, a second NVA soldier in the tree let loose with a long burst from his AK-47. The one who had been taking a piss jumped to the ground, running hard. His friend toppled over backward with Robertson’s bullets running up the inside of his body.

  The radios crackled to life.

  “We’re committed,” Fitch said. “End radio silence. Over.”

  The company surged forward, still in single file, behind Fracasso, who emerged from the shelter of the jungle onto the defoliated crest of the main ridgeline and went running across, down the north side, spreading the platoon in a single line behind him as he went. He stopped, setting them in place, and then returned to the center, moving in a crouch behind them as they lay looking intently at their objective.

  Helicopter Hill’s bald outline wavered in the gray fog. It had changed considerably, having been made into an auxiliary LZ by the artillery battery, the trees blasted clear for forty or fifty meters from the crest, and all the remaining trees and brush killed by defoliating chemicals. The NVA had also built bunkers that were plainly visible near the top of the hill, which was about 100 meters above the ridge on which Fracasso was crouched. The ridge sloped gradually upward from him toward the west. About 300 meters from where he was, it merged into Helicopter Hill, which rose abruptly and steeply from the ridge, like a large knuckle. From the map, and from interviewing everyone he could, Fracasso knew that the much larger bulk of Matterhorn stood behind Helicopter Hill, about 600 meters to its west, hidden from his view. Matterhorn’s summit, with its flattened LZ and abandoned artillery positions, was about 200 meters higher than Helicopter Hill. That was within rifle range and Fracasso didn’t like it. For now, however, he had other things to worry about.

  Kendall and Samms set Third Platoon into position, packing everyone on the small hump behind First Platoon in tiers, thankful they had gone into the hot zone first the day before yet feeling guilty and anxious for the Marines of First Platoon, who lay silently on the ground in front of them. Mellas joined Fitch and the command post group on the top of the little hump.

  Bass and Fracasso moved from kid to kid patting rumps or legs, checking equipment, going over the smoke and hand signals for the twentieth time, comforting them with the thought of jets standing by even though everyone knew the clouds would keep the jets away. Maybe the skipper won’t send us in without air, they thought. That hope died when Fitch picked up the hook. “OK, Bravo One. Pop smoke when you want fire. Good luck. Over.”

  “Aye, aye, Skipper,” Fracasso answered. Everyone lay staring ahead at the dead shrubs and defoliated trees on the hill. Fracasso looked down the line to where Bass was crouched with Skosh. Bass was looking at him, waiting for the signal to go. Fracasso crossed himself. Then he stood up and waved his arm forward toward the hill. Bass imitated his signal for those who couldn’t see Fracasso. Every Marine rose to his feet, switched off his safety, and walked forward. There would be no running. To reach the summit of the hill in a state of exhaustion would mean almost certain death. They walked, waiting for the enemy to open fire.

  Mellas, watching First Platoon’s backs, kept asking in a whisper, “Why? Why? Why?” At the same time, immense excitement gripped him. He turned to Fitch. “You don’t need me here. I’m going with First Platoon.” And not knowing why himself, he ran to catch up with the slowly moving platoon.

  Running to rejoin them, he felt overwhelming joy. It was as if he were coming home from a lashing winter storm to the warmth of his living room. The sky seemed brilliantly blue and clear, although he knew it was overcast. If he didn’t move his legs faster, his heart would outpace his feet and burst. His heart, his whole body, was overflowing with an emotion that he could only describe as love.

  He came up beside Bass, panting from the run, and settled in on the southern downhill side of the ridge, a few meters to Bass’s right. Bass had placed himself between Jacobs’s squad, on his left, and Jancowitz’s squad, which held the middle position of the line and was draped over the ridge. Fracasso had given Jancowitz the middle position because of the skill and experience it would take to keep the squad from splitting in half if gravity and fear pulled people in its middle downhill from the ridgeline. Fracasso had placed himself just off the ridgeline on the northern side. There he could see where Jancowitz’s right flank met Connolly’s squad, which held the far right of the line, and endeavor to keep the two squads from splitting apart. At the same time he could pop up over the top of the ridge and see where Jacobs’s squad was, although he was relying heavily on Bass to keep them formed up with the rest of the line.

  They were about 100 meters from the base of the hill when a machine gun opened up from low on the hill, lacing a long line of bullets directly down the crest of the ridge, swaying slightly to both sides of the crest. The line of Marines hesitated only for a moment, ducking more from instinct than anything else. The three squad leaders, Bass, and Fracasso immediately pushed forward to maintain the deliberate walking pace. The whole line continued forward with no one right on the ridge’s crest where the machine-gun bullets kicked up mud. The gun was well placed. It denied the easiest approach to the hill, forced the attackers onto steeper ground on the sides of the ridge, and widened the gap between them.

  Fracasso ran forward of the line, just off the north side of the ridge, where the machine-gun bullets flew over his head. Hamilton ran beside him with the heavy radio. Then Fracasso popped a red smoke grenade and Hamilton radioed for Third Platoon to open up behind them.

  The morning air was shattered by the combined fire of forty rifles and three machine guns. First Platoon surged forward, now running in short bursts of speed, the kids throwing themselves to the ground to fire upward, then moving again, ever higher. The ground on the side of the hill was churning with the bullets being poured into it by Third Platoon. The Marines of First Platoon hit the steep bank, the line of advance folding in on itself in a crescent, and moved up the slope in disciplined short bursts—a movement that had been drilled into the Marines from their first day at boot camp. Some of them were shouting to keep their spirits up; some were shouting from sheer excitement. A few fired their rifles up the slope, but most simply held their fire, knowing that the angle was poor.

  About twenty-five meters up the hillside Fracasso popped a green smoke to signal Third Platoon to stop firing. Fitch called off the fire of Third Platoon to avoid hitting his own men.

  There was a second or two of silence.

  Then Helicopter Hill exploded with the steady, ear-splitting fire of heavy machine guns and the flat clatter of the solid automatic AK-47 and semiautomatic SKS rifles of the North Vietnamese Army. Now the ground beneath First Platoon’s feet spat up dirt and mud, some of it tinted dark red.

  Mellas ran forward, throwing himself behind rocks, scrambling across exposed patches, and then lunging again for any sort of cover from the fire pouring down on them. All of his being was wound up in his pumping heart and the rapidly rising heat of the blood coursing through his brain and legs. The kids were running and dodging in groups of two and three. Fracasso was trying hard to keep the platoon together. Connolly’s squad, on the north side of the ridge, was bunched together, leaving a large gap between it and Jancowitz, who had half his squad on one side of the ridge and half on the other. Jacobs, on the south side, had his squad moving forward in rushes, two fire teams shooting while the third scrambled forward.

  The NVA, no longer pinned down by Third Platoon’s fire, maintained its own fierce fire. The world seemed to turn over as Mellas watched soft flesh run against hot metal. What, moments before, had been organized movement now disintegrated into confusion, noise, and blood. The att
ack might have looked as if it were still being directed by the leaders, but it wasn’t. It went forward because each Marine knew what to do.

  Mellas was transported outside himself, beyond himself. It was as if his mind watched everything coolly while his body raced wildly with passion and fear. He was frightened beyond any fear he had ever known. But this brilliant and intense fear, this terrible here and now, combined with the crucial significance of every movement of his body, pushed him over a barrier whose existence he had not known about until this moment. He gave himself over completely to the god of war within him.

  A burst of machine-gun bullets cracked over his head as he ran parallel to the contour of the hill to try and help get the squads back together again. He heard screams for a corpsman. He ran toward the sounds and found Doc Fredrickson already there. Two kids were down, one still breathing raggedly, the other shot through the upper teeth, a gaping exit hole in the back of his head. The two remaining fire team members were still moving upward against the fire. Mellas ran after them. He saw Jacobs crouching behind a small outcropping as he moved forward against a machine-gun emplacement.