 This is Think Tech Hawaii, Community Matters Here. This is a half-hour program that explores the Hawaiian connection with the Vietnam War. I'm your host, Vic Kraft. Paul Seabury and Angelo Codavilla wrote in their book War Ends and Means, A Blood Appraisal of War. One of the more telling passages from their book goes like this, quote, a belligerent with small regard for human life is far less sensitive to taking casualties than one accustomed to cherish life highly, a factor that surely must enter into strategic calculations. The American practice of body-counting enemy casualties in the Vietnam War was mindless, innocently assuming that these deaths had a bearing on North Vietnamese capabilities and willpower. The weight of burdens up to some unknowable point is relative, nor will it do to try to calculate the economic costs of each side's losses or efforts. Not only do people put different values on things, but more important, military goods are valuable not for the material and labor that go into them, but for the strategic gains that can be got out of using them. No one in wartime has ever been struck by a piece of gross national plodding, end quote. Our guest today led a double life with violence. He is Larry Johnson who experienced combat with F-Trupp 17th Cavalry 196 Infantry Brigades of the American Division. On his return from combat, he ended up training others who would eventually end up in Vietnam. After his time in the US Army, Larry found a career in law enforcement and retired from the Clay County Missouri Sheriff's Office. Larry now resides in Wai Nai and participates in veterans activities. Aloha. Hello. Welcome Larry. Thank you very much for the invitation. My pleasure. We got a lot of pictures to go through and you sent me a lot of stuff and I was really interested in the stories that you had that goes along with them. I'm going to take a look at the first one here and if you can explain what's going on here. That was my bunk at one point in time before it all disappeared there, but I had just arrived in country not very long before that and was sitting down just relaxing. Which didn't happen too often, did it? No. My machine gun 50 caliber is sitting up on top and the 2x6s there would protect us from rockets or mortars if they happen to come in and hit the ceiling. Well, let's explain what it was that you were doing in Vietnam and go to the second one there and see what it was. These are what are known as APCs or armored personnel carriers and I believe you are probably one of the track on the far left and that's you up in the couple off. That's me kind of semi standing up there on the top of the track. I guess this brings to mind some of the arguments that were made during the Vietnam War that we were going after the enemy like a business of instead of using a fly slaughter we were using steam rollers to go after the fly. How effective were these things? They were pretty effective. We carried or transported infantry people on top occasionally and although they were not really good in rice paddy water and mud and foliage as you go to the forest part there that you could see, they did a good job. They carried a lot of ammo and they managed to get us from one place to the other pretty much safely. I know that you were telling me, you go to the next one in order there, you didn't really carry any troops inside the vehicles but this was your view of the world from a couple on the top of the track vehicle but as you were telling me when you took what's called a rocket propelled grenade or an RPG sometimes the sides of the vehicle didn't exactly absorb. They were not necessarily steel on the sides and if an RPG did hit a side panel as it melted its way through it showered the inside with molten metal and was quite a hazardous position to be in. For instance my particular location there on top I sat on a 2x6 so in the event we hit a mine that the force inside would throw me up and away from the track. There was an M79 grenade launcher there and my 50 was there and that was that was my home pretty much. Yeah and I recall you saying that you didn't really carry troops on the inside of those things because they were kind of hazardous to the health of the people inside them and I believe at one time that's how you got wounded. I got wounded from an RPG that happened to break apart on its way in it hit a rice paddy dyke and a portion of it come off and then the rest of it came up and that was how I got wounded. Had a multitude of shrapnel that eventually was taken down. Yeah I know I still carry the blue marks. It was not a pretty sight. Yeah it can be. As far as going out on missions in these things I mean did you have this feeling of invincibility or? There were times that you felt too safe and that pretty much was taken away as soon as they would ambush us or something like that but you also felt that you had some protection against small arms fire and that you could put back a whole lot more firepower than they were showing at us. But there were times that you felt like we can go through anything. A lot of trees a lot of bushes a lot. The only thing we couldn't go through real easily was bamboo because bamboo would bend over and then want to push us back or a tree on the other hand would break if it wasn't very big. I know we're going to be coming up on one of the pictures in here where you have a line of vehicles getting ready to go into the jungle and it was the track vehicles on mass and I know that we're going to see a picture of a Sheridan in here. Which one do we have next here coming up? There we go. That was a rather long day. That's napalm going off or having been dropped. The depressions in the soil are actually I'm going to say like tire marks for a track and as you can tell we were further up and we had to back up because we were taking a lot of fire and we called for air support and napalm happened to be one of the things they dropped other than explosives and they dropped a lot of napalm. Which is now outlawed. Which is no longer used. Yes. At one point I know that of course I was in a unit that used to drop that stuff on bad guys and I can recall we would run out of it and the ability to make napalm basically is I shouldn't give away trade secrets here but detergent and gasoline and we would be actually filling the stuff. It would dry up and we would use it to heat up sea rations and we'd come out of the canisters that we had on the aircraft and we'd just kind of ooze out and just break off a piece and light it up and heat up our sea. We've done that with C4. Yes. But yes you get into these firefights and saying you would go out on patrols I would assume. We would go out for sometimes just a few days. Other times we'd go out for a week or two maybe three. We'd get resupplied out in the field in Framonition and if we happened to have injured people they'd medevac people in or medevac them out. I got medevac'd out but the helicopter that I was medevac'd out on was actually a gunship because they put me next to the door gunner and the other people on the floor and we flew out of there. I mentioned in a program earlier that with Alan Ho the dust ops which were the medevac helicopters which had nice great big white squares with red crosses in them actually became targets as opposed to being observed as far as the Geneva Convention and I know that they were carrying M60s on the side for protection. I got to see the helicopter that flew me out a few days later and it had a number of holes in the back section of it that I really never recalled being had. I couldn't see anyway they had my eyes all covered up and with bandage and a number of different bandages all over me but when I got to see the helicopter I went who flew in on that? When they told me I did I went ooh we really shouldn't have made it back. I'm thankful that there wasn't a whole lot that was possibly vital to the flight of the aircraft. There's a lot of things they can hit in the tail section and that was where most of the rounds were at but I never remembered it being hit or didn't remember hearing it. Can we see the next slide please? Ah, again you guys are out looks like not just APCs but you also have a Sheridan or two there. We have a couple Sheridans there a number of APCs we were out on a mission at that particular time and we were being resupplied. The individual there in the picture isn't me it's a friend by the name of Eddie Craig who just a few days after that picture was shot and killed. He'd been over to talk to me and was heading back toward his Sheridan and he was also from Kansas one of three of us and both of the other ones were killed I was the only one in that unit from Kansas that managed to make it back but it's rather dry there a little bit of mud where he's at from the but the rice paddies there would look dry until you rode through them and then the water would start coming to the surface. But he was a very good commander and many many times I said cover me and because I'd be out on foot and I never had to watch my back when I knew he was there. If I can you know how how was he killed and you said he was actually killed by a friendly fire. Yeah we had told the other APC that we were where we were at and not to be shooting our direction and although they stayed away from us for a while when it did come in my driver Ron Russell said get down we're taking fire and I got down and Eddie got hit in the side of the head had I not got down he wouldn't have been hit from the direction that the rounds were coming in we tried to do something with it and at the time friendly fire wasn't a real main topic it wasn't something that they followed up on a lot no publicity like there is now something like that would happen again. It's rather tragic that those kinds of things happen in combat and I know a lot of steps have been taken both in training and with the technology that we have being able to make sure that we don't hit the friendlies. Quite a bit so. I laughed about it with Eddie on the first time he was shot because he was shot with an M16 the first time when he was on foot and got shot at and somebody got a little carried away and had shot him in the shoulder. Oh jeez. It wasn't a severe injury I mean he was out for a couple of weeks and came back and eventually friendly fire got him again. I'll tell you what we'll talk a little bit more about this but first let's take a break. Von Lee think Tech Hawaii is Volunteer Chief Operating Officer and occasional host and this is Minky. For the first time think Tech Hawaii is participating in an online web-based fundraising campaign to raise $40,000. Your thanks Think Tech will run only during the month of November and you can help. Please donate what you can so Think Tech Hawaii can continue to raise public awareness and promote civic engagement through free programming. I've already made my donation and look forward to yours. 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Welcome back we're speaking with Larry Johnson veteran of the American Cal Division I guess it was an upper two core I core I core oh you were an I core that's right you guys were that far north just a little bit south of today oh wow okay and again if you look at the beginning of the program you'll see the map of Vietnam and understand what we're talking about I core two core three core four core Vietnam was divided into those or those regions or military regions for our benefit not necessarily for the enemies but for our benefit where was your home base by the way where the unit was actually stationed at Hawke Hill it was just a little bit south of Da Nang originally the unit was a signed to LZ Baldy which on a recent 10 hour or 10 series program LZ Baldy was pictured along with a sign that F troop carried to oh and Ken Burns documentary yeah yeah during that documentary yeah um but we were just a little bit south of Da Nang we were north of a city called Tam Ki but we went there on numerous occasions to block enemy forces that was coming in from from their west and if they were attacked well we were usually one of the first people called so you said you go out on patrols or missions that would last upwards of a week and be resupplied how far west did you guys go because you guys are pretty close to the to the sea weren't you we we went out into the sand dunes or the the sand on the ocean side and we went clear to the mountains and hep duck on the other side uh ashaw valley was also in that same area so the same amount of troops are the same type of troops were in both i core was pretty busy yeah it was i can recall you know even on christmas truce uh it wasn't so much of a truce i think we probably ran more operations off of the alert alert pad on christmas day than we did normally we were out in the field for christmas and um we couldn't shoot at them but they were sniping at us so we were limited to what kind of round we could use we were using tear gas and smoke and a few other things but we couldn't use explosive rounds back to them which on the 26th day of december proved to be the wrong thing to do that we should have been shooting at them for the last three days mm-hmm yeah you know that's uh it's it's crazy some of the things that occurred in vietnam as far as policy and uh we've had other guests on the program talking about how uh it was controlled by washington and the rules of engagement uh or necessarily dictated to us that were not the way we were trained as far as yeah we were restricted in in regards to some things that we could do in other areas icor was more of a free fire zone most of the time if you seen them you could fire yeah um we reconned by fire which they can no longer do which amounted to us firing at something to see if we get fire back to see if they return fire let's take a look at the next picture here what do we got ah rather somber moment that is a funeral it's covers nine people nine friends as a matter of fact the helmets on the left side with the speakers were all track commanders or tank commanders and the three on the right hand side those were like machine gunners on the back of my track they would wear a steel helmet um that was not a real happy occasion but that was how we held our funerals they do it a little different now but that was one of our funerals um and that's on a on a Sheridan tank it's on the front of a Sheridan tank uh there's a piece of plywood or something underneath all of it and uh I remember the funeral quite well yeah I think we all have moments like that and I know that at one point in time we were told we couldn't have any gatherings or any unit uh meetings or formal gatherings of anything larger than 25 people we made too much of a target we made a target on on Hock Hill yeah not only for that but on a couple of other funerals um they were not something you wanted to be involved in yeah but F troop during the years of 69 and 70 lost the most number of people that um were killed no during the time that they were assigned to Vietnam no can we see the next one please that's an American flag that I purchased um and we I kept it my friend in Michigan Ron Russell has it now um and I had it framed whenever we came in out of the field if we were involved in a firefight where um enemy was killed injured captured then we would hoist a flag up on our antenna just like kind of like the fishermen do when they catch a marlin or something well curiously uh looking at the flag uh when I first saw this picture I remember uh Alan Ho bringing the flag that he purchased in July and I think that's where you got that's where I got mine uh the difference between the two of them is that his I believe quite a bit bigger or at least a little bigger than than that one that one you could kind of roll up in a ball his was also uh rather I wouldn't say small but I think it's probably around the same size probably made by the same person could be made by the same person because the stars were plastic yeah so the ones on Alan or vinyl whatever and then it was some kind of vinyl or cracked so it wasn't it wasn't cloth no it was I know means I had it at a uh ceremony where a memorial was dedicated in Kansas City and there were several people that came up and said that they thought that flag had seen more combat than some of the people that were there can we go to the next one please ah that's also me a little younger of course and I weigh a lot less um the gentleman that was wearing that helmet um didn't get to keep it um I picked it up after he was shot but um I don't remember the picture being taken as the the ironic part a friend of mine recently sent it to me and uh with some comments along the way but um that was a Chinese made helmet perhaps I don't know it wasn't real it wasn't real real heavy and it was kind of like 10 well can we go to the the next photo I think after this oh this is the last one okay great which brings me to the point I mean here you are in a violent atmosphere of course and uh as you said uh in iCorg it was if you saw the bad guys you could shoot them uh you were enlisted in a way in law enforcement after your time in in vietnam after you were also in training other people uh I guess we're at Fort Leonardwood or uh well I was at Fort Knox when I was as a drill sergeant there and then when I when I came back um went into law enforcement relatively quickly um went into a reserve unit and then went right on the police department you know well the the thing that I find interesting is you and I both suffer from PTSD and uh and trying to control violence in a way and uh frustration and here you were in Vietnam surrounded by armor to some extent to some extent uh and yes you were wounded but uh you you are now in a police car rolling around and uh you're facing an unknown situation similar to what you had in Vietnam uh when you walk up to an automobile after you've pulled them over for a bust of taillight or whatever uh I'm sure we've all seen episodes of cop or cops where the the dash cans takes pictures of the officer walking up to the car and all of a sudden there's gunplay involved and the car screeches off and thankfully the law enforcement officer is wearing some sort of protection and some of those he is and in some they just he didn't make it but I mean how how it had to have affected your ability to do your job at some point in time uh walking up on a car not knowing yes um it's a a period of time that you don't really know what you're about to encounter but about 95 percent of the time those are nice people um it's husband wife family um perhaps or just some kids that really aren't out to shoot you or shoot a police officer now I'm kind of wondering if you actually know for sure at all but um most of the time that's you just stop somebody that's normal they get a traffic ticket or they had a taillight out or they weren't violent and the same thing in Vietnam not everybody you walked by into in any of the towns or the villages were violent they maybe didn't like you but they weren't intentionally ready to kill you yeah yeah no I'm just uh thinking but it it had to have affected you both uh I mean you now had a diet of this in Vietnam and you know throughout a 20 30 year career uh in law enforcement and uh it had to have impacted you in some way and uh although I've known you for several years it's uh in terms of judging people I know that uh we've we've learned certain things and how to control this control that violence and I think one of the things that you and I both benefited from is going to our vet group and participating there uh of course we had our Monday night meeting last night yes uh I think that uh we were talking about it earlier it was a good meeting and uh I highly recommend uh other veterans to get involved with any of the vet center activities uh they very beneficial there's not just meeting other veterans but there are other activities that are sponsored by the the vet center there's a lot of jokes and we have snacks available on our Monday night group it's more of a meal but we talk about anything the number of friends that I've met there that if my car broke down or I had a problem I could probably call any one of them and have some help because we're now all friends we're not just veterans that happen to be on the island yeah well there I want to thank you very much for being here today and uh we'll be talking to you some more later thank you very much a little over a week ago we observed Veterans Day in the United States Veterans Day is an outgrowth of the remembrance day which was inaugurated by King George V in 1919 this in recognition of the war dead of what was then called the Great War in some places it is known as Armistice Day and another is Poppy Day in reference to the poem in Flandersfield by the Canadian physician Lieutenant Colonel John McCray who did not survive that war I sincerely hope that while most of us got a day off from our daily grinds you took a few moments to reflect upon the sacrifices made by so many of us all journalism is not objective no matter how hard we try we all carry some amount of prejudice towards the topic however there can be alternative journalism where an issue can be discussed without rhetoric or animosity I believe this is what we have to offer here at Think Tech Hawaii this media offers an opportunity to bring more than one perspective to the community Think Tech also provides information on a host of topics that can aid in improving your life but all this costs money we speak of free speech is one of our rights in our constitution but it requires maintenance that maintenance has been measured in the lives of those who have defended it and by those who support such efforts as Think Tech Hawaii through their contributions the staff here are not volunteers and they would like to continue to pay their rent the hosts of the programs you watch are 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