The Iron Triangle: A Novel of the Vietnam War by Douglas L. Edwards

Author:Douglas L. Edwards
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 2019-01-29T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 15 The Mystery of the Missing Arm

A small, rough wooden table and chair had been brought from one of the hooches for Major Grayson to use. He sat, strategically placed, where he could observe the evacuation and relocation. He stared at his map spread across the tabletop. From time to time, he would smooth the wrinkled surface of the map and then go back to just staring.

Behind him sprawled his radio operators: one was reading a comic book, while the two others tortured a huge, hard-shell beetle. They took turns slicing at it with a knife, seeing how close they could get without cutting it.

“Shit, man! Look what you did now. You chopped off a leg.”

“Big fucking deal. He’s got like twenty others.”

The Major turned and stared at the two boys. “Would you morons kindly hold it down and quit fucking with that bug?”

As the Major turned back to the table, the smaller of the RTOs mimicked him, mouthing his words. The other raised his leg and brought his boot heel down onto the beetle with a sickening crunch. He then pushed the small carcass away with his foot.

The Major sighed as he heard them snickering behind him. He seldom used profanity in front of the troops, but he was so tired and disgusted with the day’s events, he couldn’t help himself.

“Ten dead,” he said, staring at the map as his hands smoothed back the curled edges.

“Ten dead, and not a damn thing to show for it.”

The bodies of the dead and the wounded were brought back to Cu Chi less than an hour ago, and already he had received orders to abandon the village and proceed ‘with all due haste’ toward another objective: a pacified, secured village approximately ten miles away.

The Major pinched the bridge of his nose and rubbed his eyes. The men were in no condition to march ten miles, or more than sixteen klicks. It would take two days to cover that distance. He checked his watch: two-thirty. If they left within the hour, maybe they could cover five klicks. He traced his finger over the map. Five klicks would leave them in the jungle searching for a clearing. Too late for resupply, too late for hot food, too late to dig in and prepare a proper defensive perimeter.

The Major leaned back and heard the chair crack ominously under him. He leaned his head back and rolled his shoulders. “What the hell were they thinking back at headquarters? We should stay here for the night and send out patrols to see what lies ahead.” For no reason at all, he thought of those signs you see in shopping malls with a bright arrow pointing to a spot: ‘You are here.’ “We’re in the middle of nothing and going nowhere fast.”

A noise made him look up. The villagers were being herded across the square toward the waiting Chinooks, the big, monstrous double-rotor cargo helicopters capable of carrying fifty men or more. These people had probably never been in a car, and now they were being flown to God knows where to start life all over.

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