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  Nha, Maj.

  Nha Be

  Night raids

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  Ze’evi, Rehavam

  Zinni, Christina

  Zinni, Debbie

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  Zinni, Tony, Gen.

  as advisers’ utility infielder

  as aide-de-camp to two generals

  on America and the world

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  as CINC of CENTCOM putting out AOR fires

  commands 1st Marine Expeditionary Force

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  in Vietnam

  battle of the Bong Son Plain

  Binh Dinh Province (II CTZ)

  as CO of the Pacifiers

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  pacification programs

  Rung Sat (“Forest of Death”)

  thoughts on the war

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  VNMC battalion/company commanders

  VNMC night raids

  1 In 2003, during and after the U.S. invasion of Iraq, it became clear that at that time the Iraqis actually possessed few, if any, WMD. The point of all their many games during the years of inspection now seems to have been to hide their ability to restart their WMD programs.

  2 His predecessors included Army General Norman Schwarzkopf, the Coalition commander during the First Gulf War; Marine General Joe Hoar, one of Zinni’s oldest friends; and Army General Binnie Peay. He was succeeded in 2000 by Army General Tommy Franks, the CENTCOM commander for the 2001 war in Afghanistan and the 2003 war in Iraq . . . distinguished company.

  3 Large zones of northern and southern Iraq were interdicted by the UN after the First Gulf War. The Iraqi military (with some exceptions) were not allowed to fly military aircraft or drive military vehicles in these zones.

  4 A single droplet on the skin is lethal. And enough could be loaded into a missile warhead to kill most of the population of Tel Aviv.

  5 Even though the UN resolution stated that UNSCOM would have unrestricted access to any facility they needed, the Iraqis had insisted on granting air access to only a single Iraqi site, the very inconvenient base at Habbaniyah. There had been protests, but it was a battle nobody wanted to fight.

  6 The system naming military operations always uses two terms, with the first term indicating the theater. Thus, “Desert———” indicates a CENTCOM operation.

  7 The advisers were assisted by a small team of Vietnamese Marines, a “cowboy,” a radio operator, and at times a driver: The cowboy looked out for the adviser’s security and basic needs. He cooked for him and took care of laundry and sleeping arrangements. The radio operator carried the radio, which was the adviser’s link to his own headquarters. Without it, he couldn’t do the job. It was his lifeline.

  8 In every other military except ours, the green beret is a symbol of Marine commandoes. The British Royal Marines wear green berets, for instance. Only in our system does the Special Forces wear that particular headgear (though berets in other shades have spread to other branches of service). The Marine Corps doesn’t have any of that.

  9 The NVA and VC also had versions of regional and district divisions that were to some extent aligned with those of the U.S. and South Vietnam.

  10 Whenever the Marines saw a croc, they’d open up fire at them. At first, Zinni thought they were killing them because they feared them. Later, he learned the skins were worth sixty dollars in Saigon. Bagging a croc was almost as good as bagging a VC.

  11 Since the VC often popped smoke when they heard or saw helos, it was important to confirm color to ensure you didn’t land in the wrong place.

  12 The Vietcong often dug trench lines behind the hedgerows that frequently bordered trails, leaving them there as ready-made ambush spots.

  13 U.S. assets went to U.S. units as the first priority.

  14 The same was true of the enemy. Something like eighty-five percent of contacts were initiated by the VC or NVA. They always tried to fight on their own terms and to refuse battle whenever it wasn’t to their advantage to engage.

  15 Clausewitz’s term for the key capability of a combatant. Without it, he loses.

  16 The senior adviser stayed with the battalion commander, but the junior adviser had to be out in the field where the fighting was.

  17 Later, I got chewed out again for “letting him go out toward the east,” but I explained again that I’d told him not to go out that way. Nothing more came of the incident.

  18 This fine U.S. Army captain was later killed in action.

  19 The rest of the Marine battalion caught up with us later the first day.

  20 Normally, a grenade can be lobbed about forty meters. Earlier during the Vietnam War, units had been equipped with the M-79 grenade launcher, which the troops called “the Blooper,” which lobbed a grenade about 150 meters. The Super-Blooper had an even greater range and a drum full of grenades that could be cranked out in a stream. This gave units the capability of covering with bursts of grenades an area between that covered by the 60-millimeter mortar and the M-79. It jammed often and was experimental when the Pacifiers got it. The flamethrower was a multishot—four cylinders in a boxlike frame.

  21 Kit Carson Scouts were former VC who’d come over to our side. After an indoctrination program, they were assigned to units operating in areas where they had operated as VC.

  22 The enemy didn’t have a code of conduct as Americans do; there was no “name, rank, serial number” kind of thing. It was simply assumed that everything they knew was compromised. Some VC and NVA proved to be open; others were harder to crack. Though Loi gave us a lot of information, we could te
ll that he was having a hard time deciding where his actual loyalties lay; and there were times when his wavering proved to be tense-making.

  23 Any who survived were put in reeducation camps and not released for many years. When Zinni’s friend Hoa and his old battalion commander Tri were finally released, they were allowed to come to the States with their families.

  24 Zinni learned later that eighty-five American cars, mainly military police cars, were burned that night during the communist attacks on U.S. posts around Koza.

  25 Called MOSs—Military Occupation Specialties.

  26 DeCosta later took Zinni under his wing. “While you’re on this island,” he told Zinni, “you can be like all the other Marines and just go out to town and see it as one big bar. Or else you can begin to take in a whole other culture. I’d be glad to take you around and be your guide.” DeCosta took Zinni to places few other Americans ever knew—to geisha houses . . . real geisha houses, not houses of prostitution. He took him to historical sites. He introduced him to Okinawan families and his many Okinawan friends—many of them martial arts experts, who introduced Zinni to the nonphysical side to martial arts . . . its mental and “spiritual” aspects. Zinni of course found all this fascinating.

  27 Because of the post-Vietnam shortage of manpower, many units had been stood down in what was called “cadre status,” with no troops and just a few caretaker administrators to maintain unit records and equipment. As the months went by, the Marine Corps refilled their ranks.

  28 The Marine Corps had a Cold War commitment to deploy to Norway, above the Arctic Circle, in the event that the Cold War turned hot.

  29 In those days, Marine Special Operations meant something different from what it has come to mean today. These were operations in harsh environments like mountains, deserts, or the Arctic.

  30 The augmentation program made regular officers out of young reserve officers deciding to make the Marines a career. This was a very tough competition, given the few slots that were available.

  31 Interestingly, even the Army is now starting to abandon their heavy forces. Smart ordnance is making tanks obsolete.

  32 During the next years, the Marines demonstrated in several major European exercises that they could indeed successfully “mech up” and hold their own in a highly mechanized battle space.