My Tour of Duty, Interview & 'Soundtrack'

This is from Quicksilver's first album....but still part of my Tour 'Soundtrack'

Quicksilver Messenger Service - Gold and Silver

Aye, thats the 'Prick' I carried, 30 lbs with battery, and I almost always had an extra battery as well, so your talking 35 lbs added to your combat load.
Depending on usage, a battery would last 3-4 days in the field before quality degraded to questionable status. We rarely let them get that bad, as the last thing we wanted in the bush, was to be out of commo. Because of this extra weight, I was not required to carry 60 mm mortar rounds as most of the grunts did. I did carry a several blocks of C-4, some Det chord and blasting caps, as I frequently had to go engineer and build LZs. When I ran out of demo, I would resupply via the other Grunts who were carrying extra C-4. I was armed with a 45 cal pistol (which was stolen one day while in rear) and carried a box of 50 rounds of ammo. I wore a shoulder holster as I found the belt holster got caught up in jungle brush too much.

As for the cassette player, it was a commercial type typical of the day, fairly compact (boom boxes hadnt been conceived yet, not that you'd want to carry one in the bush) it required 4 'D' batteries (not easy to find in the bush) to run and could burn through them in a day, my depleted batteries could run it for several days.

Queston:

 
Our AO was in the highlands bordering Laos & North Vietnam, it was called 'Leatherneck Corner'. Therefore the horizontal distance covered might be less than a mile (~1500m). However, the nature of the terrain was mountainous and it would take us the entire day to reach the next peak. I guess you'd say we used the tactics that the Brits learned in Afghanistan. 'crowning the peaks'. We rarely stayed down low in the drainages, as we did not wish to allow the NVA to have a height advantage on us, for obvious tactical reasons. Therefore, while I cannot give you how far we humped, we generally humped until just before dusk.


I never heard them play this long version on AFVN...
Eric Burdin & the Animals, Sky Pilot

ERIC BURDON & THE ANIMALS- "SKY PILOT" (LONG VERSION)

Questions:



Our AO was generally north of Khe Sanh and west of Con Thien. We participated in only one lowland operation (sweep) for a few days, during my tour. As can be seen from the maps below, while not very tall mountains, the range was quite extensive. Since our OBJ was to interdict troop and supply movement south along the Ho Chi Minh Trail, we rarely stayed in one place for more than a night. My only set piece engagement, took place when we had gone in to re-activate FB Argonne, which sat astride a section of the trail adjacent to the border with Laos. It was during this time that I made my one and only visit to the country of Laos. Where we found a muddy trail about 5 yards across (5m) just covered with what looked like fresh tennis shoe footprints, and none of us were wearing tennis shoes. Needless to say, since we were a small patrol (~15 men) we got out of Dodge quick. (to the Euros who may not know the slang, to get out of Dodge is the same as to get out of hell. It comes from the wild west when the sheriff told you to get out of Dodge (the town) by sunrise.



click on pic to enlarge

"I ain't no millionaires son...No!"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcpXpQx9aLM

This Lady blew me out of the Filmore a time or two...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JjD4eWEUgMM

The Rolling Stones, 'Satisfaction'

The Rolling Stones Satisfaction (rare)

Oliver, 'Good Morning Starshine'

Good Morning Starshine - Apollo 11 Moon Mission

The Apollo 11 flight took place during my ToD, so it is fitting that I found this music with this clip as they both fit within the theme.
It would be another 7-8 months before I saw the actual footage of the moon landing.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=loyRYFUYg9g

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9l59IPomH7Q

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JGbokn4r38o