Donald Duncan

Heading up operations of a new, very hush-hush project called Delta — a name that lives to this day — I had to pour over MACV intelligence reports almost daily; both those based on information collected by us and those based on two other similar operations. I was absolutely astounded. It was bullshit. Pure fabrication. Routine fabrication. An example? OK I think a “typical” mission into Tay Ninh province to check out reported VC movement in and around a Michelin rubber plantation makes the point.

We went in at night and reached the plantation perimeter mid-morning where we found well-prepared trenchworks, complete with mortars, machine guns, ammo — but no people!

Feeling as naked as jaybirds, we stood up, took deep breaths, deployed across the opening, stepped across the trenches and proceeded through the rubber trees toward the center of the plantation. Just short of the center we were stopped by the sound of voices. Sgt. Minh and I crept forward and involuntarily stepped back in shock. There was at least a battalion of VC grouped around three individuals, one of whom was talking loudly — a troop “educa-tion/orientation” session (we called it TI&E). I radioed to have our VN Airborne troops drop in at three designated sites outside the perimeter, then sat back and waited. The next goddamn thing we knew the whole world exploded on us, and for 12 straight hours the area was under constant air bombardment — with us there! What went wrong? Where were the troops? We had Viet Cong running blindly past us, over us and/or trying to bury themselves next to us in the dark

Miraculously we survived to get to an LZ the next day and as miraculously our VN chopper again got us out amidst .50 caliber fire; we were back at Ton Son Nut. There we were handed a report — already released to the press — telling how many KIAs there were (in the hundreds). I challenged the report inasmuch as we were the only people on the ground and we didn’t have a clue how many had been killed. We were too busy scrambling to get our asses to a pick-up point, and there were too many live bodies in the area to be walking around counting dead ones. What I got in response was a bunch of prop-wash about grids and tons of bombs per grid factored by numbers of people in each grid equals x-number of KIAs. When I pointed out that ten of us moved from one grid to another and were not killed, it was ignored — and no apology for overriding our orders, for not informing us or for “dropping,” knowing we were in one of those grids.

From that day I grabbed and analyzed every report I could get my hands on having anything to do with intelligence and policy. It was obvious we had no policy and intelligence was whatever MACV said it was. We had reports of”… and four VC water buffalo killed,” and marines shooting at “VC sounds” and reporting KIA. Instead of cleaning up corruption in the country, we became the biggest contributors to it. We supported the worst elements in the country. We had nothing to win. The whole thing was a lie.

I signed on for a second hitch in Vietnam, but I couldn’t bring the same enthusiasm to it.

Oh, I was being offered things — a direct commission to captain, a Silver Star and Legion of Merit … All heady stuff for a career soldier. But the idealism and purpose of my being a “Green Beret” and being in Vietnam was confuted at every turn.  The administration and the Generals were deceiving the American people and betraying its troops.  After 10 1/2 years in the U.S. Army, in the summer of ’65, I quietly put in my papers for discharge.  Once back in the land of the Big PX I was determined to get out the word.