I remember we had no military styled maps of the island. The military uses a style of map called MGRS–Military Grid Reference System. It is a system of putting boxes overlayed onto a map in 1000 meters by 1000 meters. Everyone could know what piece of land you were talking about by using it. We went in with Xeroxed copies of a tourist map and drew in the grid lines from the one map we did find. It was not a time of precision weapons in 1983 and that was probably a good thing. No one knew where other units were with any great accuracy. I still have my map. I’ve inked out lines of where I best remember my Platoon going–on foot. We didn’t have vehicles unless you counted our LPCs–Light Personnel Carriers; also known as boots.

I don’t remember really being scared, but I didn’t shit for five days, so I might have been inside. I knew I was trained and I was surrounded by 7000 guys, the average age of 22, all wanting to kill something just to know what it felt like.

Our first encounter with fire was just a lone gunman. I never saw him but the bullets he fired skipped of the road about 30 feet from me. The guys spread instantly to the sides of the road. Some fired back at whatever was in front of them but most held back. We got him. A M47 Dragon gunner shot the tiny shed he holed up in with his anti tank missile. We found a shoe. It still had the foot in it

Everywhere we went we found the debris of a poorly equipped and trained enemy. BTR60 personnel carriers burned out, lying on their side, people hanging out of them. One night we heard rustling in the wooded area by us. A soldier fired his LAW rocket (light anti-tank weapon–a 66mm rocket powered explosive dart, sort of like the Russian RPG). The next morning we found a cow with the LAW sticking out of its side. The rocket hadn’t gone far enough to arm. The cow was killed by a rocket propelled spear.

Another night we heard movement in the valley below us. I was called up to try and get mortar fire. I was denied. I then asked for artillery illumination and again was denied. See, after the illumination chute is blown out the base of the shell, that same shell loses its ballistic stability. There is no way to know where it will land. We were concerned about collateral damage. Like we might knock down a thatch hut. So SFC K., “The Greek” orders the Platoon’s M203 gunners to all fire illumination rounds. These are just 40mm flares, probably burn for 40 seconds, fire from the barrel under selected M16 rifles. It is a heavy bastard and the poor sop has to carry his basic rifle load of ammo plus a selection of grenades.

We hear “poonk” four times as each squad’s M203 gunner fired. One at a time we see a flare light up. One, two, three, BOOM! One guy had just fired the HE round he had loaded. The next morning, another cow was found in the valley, shredded by shrapnel.