A Question of Luck.

A Questionof Luck

The guys called me Lucky. It was one of those ironic nicknames. Like calling a guy shorty when he's six foot six. My bad luck started with the draft lottery. My birthday was the first one drawn, so I won an all expense paid trip to exotic Viet Nam. Then I broke my leg halfway through basic and had to do the whole thing over again.

My bad luck continued when I got to 'Nam. When we opened our Rats, I invariably got Ham and Mothers. Pound cake was merely a fond dream. Nobody wanted me walking point, because when I did we always got into a firefight. No fault of mine, just bad luck. The M16 was notouiously unreliable, but mine ALWAYS jammed. Twice they gave me a different rifle, but it made no difference, If it was my rifle, it jammed.

The sergeant always inspected everyone's weapon before going out on patrol.
Mine, he fieldstripped and inspected each individual piece. He knew how well I maintained it, that's just the way it was. As he reassembled my rifle , he said,"Luck, I want you on slack today." That was a good plan. It made good use of my skills, but hopefully would not set off my bad luck. Unfortunately, it didn't work

We were about three hours into our patrol. We had gone about a klick and a half,with maybe another kilck to go. Our objective was a hilltop that G2 thought was being used as an O.P. by the NVA. We had moved out just before dawn, and by now the temperature and the humidity were both in the mid ninetys. My skin was covered with a layer of sweat that seemed to act as insulation, keeping the heat in rather than dissipating it, and sucking the energy right out of me.

That's the sort of thing you remember later, but don't really notice at the time. Your attention is all focussed outward. You see every tiny movement of a leaf, because if a leaf moves when there is no wind, your'e in trouble. You listen to the buzz of the insects and the call of the birds, because if you don't hear them, your'e in trouble. You constantly sniff the dank smell of jungle rot, because if you smell something else, garlic, cigarette smoke , stale sweat, your'e in trouble.

I was following Scooter through the brush, generally looking everywhere but at him, when I saw movement out of the corner of my eye. I turned and saw a grenade flying through the air to land just behind me. "GRENADE!", I yelled, and dove on top of it. As I did, time seemed to slow down. I lay there thinking what a dumb thing I had just done, and wondering how much it would hurt.

Then I realized time had not slowed down at all. The grenade was a dud. I looked around and saw Scooter and Rizzo looking at me. Then they realized the grenade was a dud and turned and began firing off into the bush.

I grabbed the stupid grenade and flung it off into the bush. This resulted in an explosion and a short scream. Immediately, the incoming fire started to slacken. I grabbed my rifle and ran toward the explosion.

This stupid, cowboy move is officially called Assaulting Into the Ambush. It is generally found only in training manuals and Hollywood movies. Bursting through the bush, I ran straight into an NVA who was trying to drag away his buddy.

In a situation like that, you don't think. People who stop to think don't survive. I fired, and of course, my rifle jammed. But the two rounds I got off were enough; the gook went down.

Scooter was right behind me. He pushed on, looking for more enemies. By the time I got the jam cleared, he was back. We checked out the bodies and discovered that the one I had gotten with the grenade was an officer with a map case. The Brass were pleased with that. The L.T. recommended me for a DSC, but it got downgraded to a Bronze Star. Just my luck.