LTC Herbert Assumes Command of 2/503d

   BONG SON- Lieutenant Colonel Anthony B. Herbert assumed command of the 2nd Battalion, 503d Infantry during recent ceremonies at LZ English.
   Colonel Herbert takes over from LTC John W. Nicholson, who commanded the Battalion since August. Prior to his new assignment, Colonel Herbert served as the Brigade's Inspector General (IG). He came to Vietnam in August.
   Born in Herminie, Pa., Colonel Herbert joined the Army in 1947 and went on to distinguish himself heroically in the Korean War as a Master Sergeant, where he was wounded four times, he came out of the war as the U.S. Army's most decorated enlisted man. In addition to the Purple Heart with 3 Oak Leaf clusters, Colonel Herbert has been decorated with the Silver Star, two Oak Leaf clusters, the Bronze Star with V, Soldier's Medal, Army Commendation Medal with 2 Oak Leaf clusters and and he is the only non-Turk in the world to receive the coveted Turkish Ozanu. He has also earned the Combat Infantryman's Badge, Master Parachutist Badge, Jump Wings from the German and British Armies, Pathfinder's Badge and Ranger Tab.
   Commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant in 1957, Colonel Herbert's colorful career has taken him to Japan,. Korea, Alaska, Iceland, the Azores, Canada, Saudi Arabia, 51 African Nations and across Europe. He is a qualified interpreter in Portuguese. After graduating from the University of Pittsburgh in 1956, the 38-year old Lieutenant Colonel went on to earn a Masters Degree and PHD from the University of Georgia in Psychology."

A commondreams article claims he lives in Colorado.

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I was an avid read of ‘About Face’ when it first came out back in the late 80's and I was a 40 year old junior at Montana State University in Bozeman.

I had recently read Neal Shehan’s bio of Col. J.P. Vann and I was intrigued by the parallels between his career, your career, and the author of a book I had read in the early ‘70s, LTC. Anthony Herbert’s ‘The Making of a Soldier.’

I’ve read the excerpts of your latest, which prompted me to re-read the ‘Hardcore’ Chapter in A. F. There is a particular correlation to your description of the hard luck 4/39 vs the Division and Brigade headquarters of the 9^th Div in 1969, and Herbert’s description, based on his initial assessment as the Brigade I.G,. of the 173d Abn Bde. base camp and ‘forward position’ of An Khe and Camp English, in 1968, and the combat battalions.

Herbert, like you, was a poor kid who enlisted as a private just after WWII, fought in Korea, was a  highly decorated enlisted combat infantryman, went to college, got a commision, was in the Ranger program, commanded a battalion in Vietnam, and was forced out of the service when he embarrassed the high command, in his case when he made charges of atrocities he witnessed in the 173d's AO.

Herbert was later largely discredited by CBS News when 60 minutes found discrepancies in his charges against his ‘Ira Hunt’ and the actual record.

My questions about this are:

Did you know or cross-paths with Herbert in your careers (Korea, Vietnam, or in between?)

If you don’t know him, what have you heard of his story? Have you read his book? If yes, do you find him credible?

He seems to hit on a lot of the same gripes you do: the inefficiency of fighting a battalion from a chopper, interference from airborne higher command, command emphasis on the body count, trying to fight a guerrilla war with conventional tactics (not ‘out-G-ing the G’ – he doesn’t use your term, but he talks about the same thing), the need to change tactics and patterns frequently the keep the enemy guessing, and of course his biggest red-flag item: the value in the capture of live prisoners as intelligence assets, as opposed to dead body count.

Here is an excerpt about his first impressions of the 173d, from pgs 127-128 of '...Soldier'. As I said above, I find the comparison to your Hardcore chapter very interesting.

"Within a few weeks, I realized that the desk sergeant had been worth listening to. He had it pegged. Pound for pound, the Brigade was garbage. Discipline was lax, the troops were slovenly, disrespectful, and sluggish, mentally as well as physically. It was obvious that in An Khe at least they were no match for either the Viet Cong, or the North Vietnamese regulars. As the sergeant had said, they prefered pot, two to one. But marijuana was only an expression of a deeper, more serious failure. At An Khe, the troops wore what they damn well wanted to wear, including beads and bracelets. They capped their teeth with different colors – red, blue, and gold – and they called the hierarchy "motherfuckers’ and printed "Fuck the Green Machine" on their jackets and hats. Some of them wore earrings, a few sported noserings, and the battle flag of the Confederacy flew from many of the bunkers. The sergeant was right about nobody giving a damn, too. Almost every one looked the other way.

An Khe was a staff-and headquarters post, crammed with chair-borne-commando types. In any other war, it would have been ridiculous, but not in Vietnam. Every careerist who could wheedle his way over was there, drawing combat pay, while the citizens back home were getting the bill. The troops knew best what to call it: a humbug!

The 173d was the largest brigade in Vietnam, with over 10,000 men attached to it. It was, according to the manual, a combat brigade with absolutely no dead weight. But it was a humbug. There were five so-called combat battalions in the Brigade, and not one of them had more that 6000 physically present for duty. Out of a total of 10,000 men, then there were no more than 3,000 at the battalion level, which means that some 7,000 people were assigned to support roles: steakhouses, pizza huts, clubs, headquarters, the General’s mess, artillery, engineers, etc. Even among the approximately 3,000 at the combat battalion level, not all were out looking with their rifles. Some were, of course, but the battalions had their "rear areas" just like the Brigade, with their own steakhouses, their own cubs. Each battalion was composed of five, one of them a makeshift outfit responsible for heavy weapons – which left four companies for walking. No company in any battalion in the Brigade had more than seventy- five men physically present and ready to go. Thus, each battalion fielded about 300 combat troopers, except that each battalion assigned one company guard its base of operations each day. That left a maximum of 225 available for the field, or 1,125 on a Brigade basis. And that would have been on a good day with everybody out and everybody with a rifle – but everybody didn’t carry a rifle. Some toted radios, some stayed back and typed, some worked in company supply, some were "fireflies," the daily helicopter resupply lifts, and some just plain screwed off. So on an average day, the 173d Airborne Brigade could field approximately 800 men – if all its battalions were out. In the year I was in the Brigade, all the battalions were never out simultaneously.

We fielded less than 800 of 10,000 troops, in the Brigade. On a countrywide basis, it meant that out of the 500,000 men we had there at the peak of our involvement, less than 50,000 were engaged in the business of fighting n the field – and that figure applies only if all the other outfits were doing as well as the 173d. As General Westmoreland liked to say, the 173d was the cream of the crop.

It wasn’t that our kids didn’t fight well in the field. It was just so damned few of them ever got there. We had a 500,000-man Army fielding less than any one infantry division did in World War II or Korea. On paper, we were hell on wheels. The reports had a column for it: In The Field – and on paper it was 98 per cent or more every day. I’ve filled in those reports myself and they look truly magnificent. All the guys at the Steakhouse: In the Field; all the guys at the clubs: In the Field; the general’s orderlies: In the Field; the life guards at the Esther Williams’ pool: In the Field. Stunning , absolutely stunning – and from time to time I found myself inclined to go along with it. It was so mesmerizing that when I later took over a battalion myself, I had to add another column to my reporting procedure just to keep things straight. "Ass In the Grass," I called the new column. It was no joke. It was necessary."

Thomas Pike

I was an avid read of ‘About Face’ when it first came out back in the late 80's and I was a 40 year old junior at Montana State University in Bozeman.

I had recently read Neal Shehan’s bio of Col. J.P. Vann and I was intrigued by the parallels between his career, your career, and the author of a book I had read in the early ‘70s, LTC. Anthony Herbert’s ‘The Making of a Soldier.’

I’ve read the excerpts of your latest, which prompted me to re-read the ‘Hardcore’ Chapter in A. F. There is a particular correlation to your description of the hard luck 4/39 vs the Division and Brigade headquarters of the 9^th Div in 1969, and Herbert’s description, based on his initial assessment as the Brigade I.G,. of the 173d Abn Bde. base camp and ‘forward position’ of An Khe and Camp English, in 1968, and the combat battalions.

Herbert, like you, was a poor kid who enlisted as a private just after WWII, fought in Korea, was a  highly decorated enlisted combat infantryman, went to college, got a commision, was in the Ranger program, commanded a battalion in Vietnam, and was forced out of the service when he embarrassed the high command, in his case when he made charges of atrocities he witnessed in the 173d's AO.

Herbert was later largely discredited by CBS News when 60 minutes found discrepancies in his charges against his ‘Ira Hunt’ and the actual record.

My questions about this are:

Did you know or cross-paths with Herbert in your careers (Korea, Vietnam, or in between?)

If you don’t know him, what have you heard of his story? Have you read his book? If yes, do you find him credible?

He seems to hit on a lot of the same gripes you do: the inefficiency of fighting a battalion from a chopper, interference from airborne higher command, command emphasis on the body count, trying to fight a guerrilla war with conventional tactics (not ‘out-G-ing the G’ – he doesn’t use your term, but he talks about the same thing), the need to change tactics and patterns frequently the keep the enemy guessing, and of course his biggest red-flag item: the value in the capture of live prisoners as intelligence assets, as opposed to dead body count.

Here is an excerpt about his first impressions of the 173d, from pgs 127-128 of '...Soldier'. As I said above, I find the comparison to your Hardcore chapter very interesting.

"Within a few weeks, I realized that the desk sergeant had been worth listening to. He had it pegged. Pound for pound, the Brigade was garbage. Discipline was lax, the troops were slovenly, disrespectful, and sluggish, mentally as well as physically. It was obvious that in An Khe at least they were no match for either the Viet Cong, or the North Vietnamese regulars. As the sergeant had said, they prefered pot, two to one. But marijuana was only an expression of a deeper, more serious failure. At An Khe, the troops wore what they damn well wanted to wear, including beads and bracelets. They capped their teeth with different colors – red, blue, and gold – and they called the hierarchy "motherfuckers’ and printed "Fuck the Green Machine" on their jackets and hats. Some of them wore earrings, a few sported noserings, and the battle flag of the Confederacy flew from many of the bunkers. The sergeant was right about nobody giving a damn, too. Almost every one looked the other way.

An Khe was a staff-and headquarters post, crammed with chair-borne-commando types. In any other war, it would have been ridiculous, but not in Vietnam. Every careerist who could wheedle his way over was there, drawing combat pay, while the citizens back home were getting the bill. The troops knew best what to call it: a humbug!

The 173d was the largest brigade in Vietnam, with over 10,000 men attached to it. It was, according to the manual, a comb