In my last article gave a description of my adventuresome trip to Vietnam. Now I’ll describe how my five person civil affairs team was finally deployed to our region of Vietnam.
After several days of living in the Army’s tent city in Nha Trang my team finally received orders to report to a Military Assistance Command Vietnam (MACV) compound in a town called Tuy Hoa in Vietnam’s Phu Yen Province. After loading our two jeeps and other equipment on board a C130 cargo plane we landed at an Army improvised landing strip about two miles south of town. When we arrived at the MACV compound we were pleasantly surprised to see a well fortified and hardened facility that included concrete buildings, running water, and electricity. Following a brief meeting with the compound’s leader – an Army Lieutenant Colonel — we were shown our accommodations. To our pleasant surprise we were given the use of two rooms consisting of three beds each (one being a bunk bed). Since I’m reluctant to mention our team’s names without first obtaining permission, I’ll just refer to them as – the captain (our team leader) – the lieutenant (our security leader) – the doctor – and the sergeant. To be complete I’ll refer to our locally provided interpreter as “the interpreter” who lived in town with his family. The captain, lieutenant, and I were assigned to one of the rooms.
To help the reader understand what this MACV compound was like and what its purpose was, I’ll give this brief description. As mentioned it consisted of several hardened concrete buildings that were located adjacent to the South China Sea. A concrete fence surrounded the complex and watch towers with guards were located at each corner. 24 hour surveillance was provided by Vietnamese soldiers who reported to the compound’s U. S. Army leader. Inside the compound were sand bagged bunkers that served as defensive positions in the event of an attack. In addition to the rooms that were used for sleeping, there was a dining room, an activities room and bar, and a headquarters meeting room.
The purpose of MACV was as the title suggests – that of providing military advisors to the Vietnamese Army and other purposes like Phu Yen Province district leader advisors, Navy forward observer pilots, Navy swift boat personnel, and — in our case — a civil affairs team. In other words it served as a base camp for various military support and special operations personnel. While it provided a reasonably secure and comfortable reprieve from uncomfortable field assignments, it was empty about 30 percent empty most of the time because of the various field assignments required of the military personnel.
I should also mention that the base camp for the 101st airborne brigade was stationed nearby. And, as I’ll describe later, the brigade had a Corps of Engineers battalion — that had bulldozers and other equipment available — that I would eventually liaison with during my time in country.
If you’re interested in knowing more about Phu Yen Province, I recommend that you do an internet search. Unfortunately what you’ll find – especially from the photos — is so different from the way I remember it being in 1966 (almost 50 years ago) that it’s unrecognizable to me. Although much has changed, the people still appear to be very poor, but not as poor and destitute as I remember. Since Phu Yen is quite beautiful – with white sand beaches, scenic landscape, adequate restaurants and hotels, and great winter weather – I’m not surprised that it has become a tourist attraction and a source of jobs and modest wealth to some of its citizens. What I remember most was the huge rice patty located near Tuy Hoa. At one time – before the war – Phu Yen was the rice exporting capital of Southeast Asia. Even today Phu Yen’s rice harvest exceeds 320 thousand tons. As I’ll explain later, the rice patty became an important part of my civil affairs experience.
In 1966 Phu Yen consisted of six districts, three of which were headed by Vietnam army captains, and MACV supplied U. S. Army captains were assigned to the three coastal districts as advisors. The three inland districts – the highlands – were overseen by a special forces camp. The population in the highlands consisted of Montagnard Indians, who were quite different (more primitive) from the ethnic Vietnamese people. I’ll explain more about our civil affairs team interaction with these people later. Although the Viet Cong (VC) were capable of insurgent actions anywhere in the country – the highlands represented a particularly dangerous place to be.
That’s it for now. In my next article I’ll get into some specifics about what our civil affairs team did from day to day. I think you’ll find it to be quite interesting.
Memories of My Army and Vietnam Experiences - Part 4
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