Posted by Jackson Reimund on Sunday, January 25, 2004 at 9:37PM :
In Reply to: Re: Another Photo posted by Russ Roth on Sunday, January 25, 2004 at 5:59PM :
Hello Russ,
Sounds like one lucky RTO. Most of the Forward Observers never made it back. The price on our heads was pretty high. FO’s went on mission with any combat unit that was lucky enough to get an FO team assigned to them and when that mission was over we were on to another unit and mission. I was in the field with so many outfits I can’t remember them all. This was during the “search and destroy era” 1965-67. I never came out of the bush which was good for me as we never lost our edge. I credit that and a lot of luck for making it out. Most unit losses were during the later “pacification and Vietnamization” era. During the earlier “search and destroy” era we were all out after them and had the momentum and the advantage was with us but during the latter fire base “pacification” era the momentum was lost and they came after us. We made the same mistake the French did back in the fifties trying to hold down the fort. Can’t win a war doing things the way the French do.
Trying to find this guy would be a “lucky shot” with out more to go on. The 1st Field Force web sight would be a good place to start with as just about every combat unit in II Core the Central Highlands came under the operational control of IFFV. This web page lists all of the artillery units that were there and some have web pages that could be useful. Many have membership lists. What ever unit he was with was probably under the 1st Field Forces. Binh Dinh province on March 17, 1968 would put it in the “Fire Base or pacification era” which might help you as most American units were based together at fire bases. Locate artillery units that would be based where you were and odds are he would be from one of them. Prior to that artillery gun battery’s such as mine “Air Assault” never stopped moving and fighting so we never had a base.
Start here.
1st FFV
http://www.ichiban1.org/html/iffv_history.htm
Another great link.
1/69
http://www.rjsmith.com/my_unit.html
Yours.
1/50
http://www.ichiban1.org/
Just keep working the links on these pages.
Welcome home, Jackson
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