Combat Swimmer by Robert A. Gormly

Author:Robert A. Gormly
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2010-07-21T04:00:00+00:00

15

ANOTHER CLOSE CALL: NUI COTO

On July 23, I loaded the platoon into Huey slicks and headed for Chau Doc. A week earlier, I’d flown there to meet the U.S. adviser to the Provincial Reconnaissance Unit, a Special Forces sergeant by the name of Drew Dix. Drew, about to be awarded the Medal of Honor for his heroism during the Tet Offensive and given a field promotion to second lieutenant, was one of the coolest operators I ever worked with.

His role as PRU “adviser” was actually CIA cover. All the Army commands he worked with were told he was an Army major seconded to the Agency. Six feet two inches tall and a lean 175 pounds, with light brown hair and intense eyes, he not only looked and acted the part, he was a better officer than any major I’d ever seen. It amused me that, while Drew accepted the idea he was going to get the MOH (I don’t think he really liked it—he just accepted it) he was very apprehensive about being promoted to lieutenant. He wasn’t sure he could be a leader in the “regular” Army.

At the time he commanded a force of over a hundred former Vietcong and Vietnamese mercenaries, conducting operations throughout the province for the CIA.

Drew met us at the helo pad and told me he was going to put us up at the villa, where he lived, because it was the only place he felt security was sufficient. He had a guard force composed of Nungs, Vietnamese of Chinese descent and very loyal to whoever employed them. After settling us in, he gave us an intelligence briefing on the activities around the Seven Mountains, which rise out of the Mekong Delta near the Cambodian border. He had been to one of them, Nui Coto, two weeks earlier as part of a combined operation that had met with little success. The U.S. Army colonel commanding the operation proclaimed the area free of Vietcong, but Drew suspected otherwise. He figured we could have all the trouble we wanted—and probably a hell of a lot more success—if we went back to the very same area. He had good intelligence through his PRUs that there was a huge weapons-and-ammo cache in a cave at the western base of Nui Coto, and he had a guide who could lead us there. I said we’d do it.

We needed a few days to clear the operation. Drew had to convince the corps commander that there was still a good target; I’d have no problem clearing the operation through the Navy side, except for the fact that Nui Coto was not near any water and the staff pukes at CTF-116 might get heartburn over that. I knew CTF-116 captain (later rear admiral) Art Price wouldn’t have a problem with SEALs attacking the enemy inland, because he was an aggressive commander who liked our previous results. But, if I didn’t make an issue of it, I could save him from having to go

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