VIETNAM HORRORS RECOUNTED: "Under the flare light, we survey the camp. A 100-yard arc of trench from the south gate to the western point of the fence is a long and narrow tomb for grotesquely maimed men--arms and legs sheared off, necks without heads, open abdomens revealing coiled intestines.".

• Author: Rose, Jerry A.
• Position: THE WORLD YESTERDAY - Excerpt

WE ARE UP in the Highlands, though the surrounding area is relatively flat--we are on a plateau. It looks like a native village with nine neat longhouses of newly woven straw, but it really is a military training center, encircled by 900 yards of barbed-wire fence, 15 feet wide, with a trench running parallel to the length. The camp even has electricity, supplied by a hefty 10-kilowatt generator.

We are standing in the middle of the camp and I cannot help noticing the odd assortment of "uniforms" surrounding us. The U.S. Special Forces soldiers are in their usual Army-olive fatigues and green berets, but most of the Jarai "soldiers" are nearly naked, wearing only loin cloths--many of them with guns strapped over their shoulders.

On New Year's Eve, the American troops at Camp Plei Mrong drink small cups of champagne that Capt. Grace brought back on his last reconnaissance flight. The Strike Force is ready to go on patrol. Capt. Grace chooses the Special Forces men: my good friend Tony Duarte; Lou Woelfel, a 32-year-old sergeant who came "once upon a time from Brooklyn"; Sgt. George Hoagland III, 27, of Phoenix, Ariz.; and himself. The five American soldiers will be going out on patrol with about a dozen or so of the Jarai troops.

"Sure am disappointed I'm not going," says young Pvt. Mike Boyd, one of those left behind.

I had planned to go out with them on this patrol. That is why I am here--to follow the troops when they actually are on a mission-but Capt. Grace shakes his head; he cannot permit me to go along with the patrol. I clench my fists from disappointment and frustration. Duarte brings it up and tries to argue my case. "He's a good guy," he says, "and what he writes is important for the folks back home to read."

"I'm really sorry, but there's no extra space on the 'copters," Capt. Grace says.

Duarte looks over at me and shrugs. "Damn it," he says under his breath.

At supper, meals always are the same--cabbage salad, tough buffalo meat, greasy potatoes, and canned milk. Talk naturally turns to the imminent patrol. Some of the talk is light, but some is edged with a faint note of tension.

"If there are 3,000 Viet Cong across that river," Sgt. Woelfel says, "and they decide to attack the patrol, then it would be another

Dunkirk." Dunkirk, of course, was the famous Allied defeat and evacuation at the beginning of World War II. It is a grim reminder of the seriousness of our current war.

"Except without boats to get out," notes Capt. Grace wryly.

Lt. Leary will be in charge of both the American and Jarai troops that are left behind in the camp. With one cheek bulging with a wad of chewing tobacco, he comments, "Wouldn't it be funny if we got hacked instead of you guys?"

On New Year's Day, we all get up in the dawn grayness. The morning air is cool and moist. I cannot say I am hung over from my tiny paper cup of champagne last night, but my disappointment hangs over me like a gray fog. I wanted to follow the soldiers on patrol--to see and hear what they confront, how they deal with this strange, amorphous guerrilla war--but I am not. Instead, I am plonked back in the base camp, fortified with a wire fence. What is the point of my being here?

Capt. Grace and the other Americans that are going on the patrol are readying...