I suppose everyone has a night to remember. Mine was in April 1966. It was hot, sticky, and there was a war going on around me.
For me the night started in the early evening. I was catching a short nap before I had to report to the duty office at midnight. I was sleeping in my room in the Harding Hotel in Saigon. I was wakened by a thunderous sound which I thought might be an explosion, but at some distance from the hotel. Within a minute many sirens were being sounded throughout the streets. Soon the whooshing sounds of helicopters were heard crisscrossing above the city.
After a few minutes I heard some of my friends talking loudly in the hallway outside my room. I quickly joined them and asked no one specifically, “What’s up?”
“Not sure!”
“We don’t know!”
We continued our nervous small talk, each of us stating our guess to what was happening outside. Four guys came bouncing up the stairs and joined us in the hallway.
Without waiting one of them said, “We were just walking back after having dinner at the Rex when we heard the explosion.” The Rex was a hotel in the center of Saigon with a popular terrace restaurant on top.
“But there is a lot of activity in the streets. MPs and White Mice everywhere!” added another. The “MPs” were the U.S. Army Military Police responsible for U.S. security in the city and Saigon city policemen were called “White Mice” because of their white uniforms.
The answers to our non-stated questions came fast, overlapping each other.
“They cancelled liberty. The MPs told us to get back to our hotel.”
“They told us that a hotel was blown up!”
“There were also some grenade attacks – grenades thrown into some America bars.” One of the undesired effects of the war was the proliferation of bars to serve the ever-increasing number of American servicemen.
“Could it be an all-out attack on the city?” I asked.
“Don’t think so. We didn’t hear any small arms fire.”
“Hell of a time to have the duty. I got the midnight duty,” I said.
“Looks like you’re going to have fun, Tom,” one of my friends said sardonically.
Since I knew that I could not sleep any more, I decided to get ready for my tour as duty officer. I went back to my room to shave and get into my uniform. But I did not feel safe at all. We were unarmed and our hotel did not have any security guards. In fact, we didn’t even have a telephone. We had often joked that if we came under attack, we would have to yell very loud to get help.
At the time I was twenty-six years old and a Lieutenant Junior-Grade in the Navy. My patrol squadron had a detachment flying out of Tan Son Nhut air base. The officers and enlisted men were billeted in hotels located in the city of Saigon. Along with our flight missions, we had ground duties which were required to support the six aircraft and crews stationed in Vietnam. One of these duties was standing the duty watches common to all military units.
This night I had the duty officer watch. Duty officer responsibilities included coordinating all the activities needed to keep our airplanes flying, tracking flight operations, and ensuring various reports were completed and issued on time. In Saigon the twenty-four-hour duty was shared by three of the flight crews’ officers. Since I was the junior officer in my crew, I drew the midnight to eight in the morning duty watch.
Our duty office was in a building that was once a military commissary during French colonial times. It was about a twenty-minute drive from the Harding Hotel to the office. A driver and jeep were supposed to pick me up at eleven-thirty. I was to relieve my friend and roommate, Larry, who was standing the four o’clock to midnight duty watch.
I went down to the lobby at eleven-twenty to make sure that I was there on time. The lobby was very dim with only a small lamp on the counter turned on. The air was stuffy and warm. During the evenings the air conditioning was turned off to conserve electricity.
I nodded to the young clerk behind the counter. His name tag said that his name was Trung. He was one of those Vietnamese that seemed to always be smiling.
“Jeep not here yet,” he said knowing why I was in uniform at that time of night.
“Any news on what’s happening,” I asked hoping that a citizen of Saigon might know more than I did.
He shrugged his shoulders and broadened his smile a little more. “Sorry, no. Very quiet now,” Trung said in very good English.
I decided to step outside to see if the jeep arrived. The direct path to the street from the lobby was blocked by a big generator protected by sandbags that reached the second story of the hotel. We also joked that the generator was better protected than we were. The street was brightly lighted but vacant of any vehicles. The buildings on both sides of the street were only three or four stories high and housed various shops and small hotels like the Harding.
About thirty yards down from the Harding I saw two ROKs standing guard behind some sandbags. ROKs were Republic of Korea troops. I knew that they were guarding a hotel that billeted ROK soldiers. I remember saying to myself, “Those ROKs know how to protect their own.” But it also made me feel a little safer.
I stepped back inside the lobby to continue my wait. Again I exchanged nods and smiles with Trung. Time went on and the jeep still didn’t arrive. Every few minutes I would step outside. Each time I spent a little more time outside. I even ventured into the middle of the street sometimes to see if anything was going on further away. I would go into the street only after I waved at the ROK guards to make sure that they noticed me. But each time I didn’t see anything in either direction. I also hadn’t heard any explosions or gunfire since I started my wait.
About five after midnight I was waiting in lobby when Trung said, “Sorry sir, but I have to lock up.” He was still smiling, but he did so apologetically.
I had a quick decision to make: should I wait inside or outside? I decided to wait outside. I wanted to make sure that I would not miss the jeep that was supposed to be picking me up. I also thought that I may be able to hitch a ride in other military vehicles. The old French commissary building housed many other U.S. commands, including Army and Air Force units.
“I’ll wait outside,” I told Trung. “Will you be staying in the lobby if I need to get back in?”
“Yes, just bang on door,” he answered with his biggest smile yet.
Once outside Trung pulled down the retractable security door made of galvanized steel. I heard him bolt the lock. I felt suddenly cut off and hoped very much that my ride would show up soon.
I walked to the middle of the street again after first waving to the ROK guards. All was quiet; I did not see any traffic in either direction. I squatted down in the doorway of the shop next to the hotel. I waited.
From time to time I would stand up to stretch. Sometimes I walked into the street just to break the monotony - always making sure that the ROK guards saw me.
Just when I was about to call it a night and go inside, a jeep drove up to the hotel and stopped. It wasn’t the squadron’s jeep; the driver was a sailor that I didn’t recognize. As soon as the jeep came to a complete halt the sailor grabbed a machine gun that was on the passenger seat and jumped out. He walked directly to the Harding Hotel and gave the security door several loud raps.
Since I was standing on the sidewalk when he pulled up, I was sure that he had seen me. I walked up to him as non-threatening as I could and said, “Good evening.”
“Good evening, sir,” he returned. Our exchange of greetings was very casual and I thought incongruent to the situation: in the middle of the night, in a foreign city that might still be under attack.
While he waited for Trung to open the door I told him that I needed a ride to the old commissary. He told me that he was conducting security checks on the hotels that billeted Navy personnel. He had several more hotels to check but would be going to the old commissary which was his duty post. I felt very relieved. Even though it was now near one o’clock, I was going to be able to assume my responsibilities as duty officer.
When we heard Trung on the inside, the sailor identified himself and Trung raised the security door. The sailor told me that he would be right back; he had to sign the security log book. He was back in less than a minute and then we both jumped in the jeep.
Before I was able to settle in, he handed me the machine gun and said, “Here hold this. But be careful! The safety is turned off. Just pull the trigger to shoot!”
I held the gun, making sure that my fingers were no where near the trigger or trigger guard. I’m not an expert on guns, but I did watch a lot of war movies – most staring John Wayne. I recognized the gun as a World War II era Thompson submachine gun. During my Navy training I fired a side arm – a revolver – five times and even hit the target sometimes. But if necessary, I thought, I could point and shoot as well as the Duke.
The sailor shifted into gear and off we went into the Saigon night. Some streets were brightly lighted, others were completely dark. The sailor drove quickly, smoothly shifting gears rounding curves.
I asked him if he knew what happen. He said he didn’t, but added that some Americans and Vietnamese were killed. “Things seemed to be quiet now,” he said. But I wished that he would have said it with move conviction.
We then exchanged introductions; I told him that I was in Patrol Squadron One. He was attached to the air wing, which was the command above my squadron – responsible for all the Navy land-based squadrons flying out of Vietnam.
Soon we stopped in front of a hotel. He said, “I’ll take that.” I handed him the gun. I guessed he knew my score in target practice! He banged on the door, entered the hotel, and returned to the jeep – all in less that two or three minutes. After he handed me the gun, we were off again.
We repeated this routine three more times. Finally we pulled through the security check point of the old commissary. The building was completely dark. I thanked the driver and quickly navigated my way to the duty office.
In the duty office the overhead lights were turned off and black ceiling to floor curtains were drawn across the windows. Only a small lamp on a desk was lighted. Larry was behind the desk and stood up when he saw me. Lying on the desk was an M-1 rifle, the standard WW II infantryman’s rifle.
“I’m sorry I’m late,” I said in greeting him. It was now almost two o’clock.
“That’s okay. I knew you would find a way to get here,” he said. He then explained why the squadron’s jeep wasn’t able to pick me up: the jeep was in Tan Son Nhut and when the attacks started it was not allowed to leave the base. I told him about my early morning ride through Saigon to get to the office.
Larry was also able to provide a little more information on the attacks: apparently a Vietnamese teenage couple rode their motor scooter right into a hotel lobby and set off a bomb killing three American servicemen, some Vietnamese hotel workers, and themselves. There were also several grenade attacks elsewhere in the city causing more American casualties.
He then updated me on the squadron’s flight activities, which were not affected by the attacks. After the quick briefing I officially assumed the responsibilities of duty officer. Larry said that he would see if he would be able to catch a ride to the Harding. I wished him luck. He left the office with both of us saying, “See you back at the hotel.”
The rest of the night was uneventful. I was properly relieved of my duty watch at eight in the morning. On my way to the hotel I picked up the Saigon Daily News, an English language newspaper.
The headlines and articles on the front page were all about the attacks on Saigon the night before. One of the articles included an interview of the American soldier who was guarding outside the hotel when the young Vietnamese couple rode their scooter into the lobby.
Like many young teenage couples in Saigon, the boy was driving with the girl sitting behind him, holding on to his waist. The girl was no more then sixteen and she was wearing a white Ao Dai. An Ao Dai is a traditional Vietnamese dress where the top is a body-hugging gown with slits on the sides that flowed over satin trousers that almost brush the ground. The American guard said then when the scooter was in the street, passing the hotel, it turned sharply crossed the sidewalk and down the walkway and exploded when it hit the door to the lobby.
The soldier explained that he was standing guard near the sidewalk and everything happen so quickly that he did not have time to react. He added that when the scooter passed him, the young girl smiled at him.
Now, more than fifty years after my memorable night, what I remember most is what I didn’t see: a young girl’s smile.