DEATH IN A SMALL PLACE
Virtually all of the 1st Cavalry infantry units that
fought in Operation Crazy Horse were ferried into and out of the battle zone
through a place called Landing Zone (LZ) Hereford. This was a small one-or two-ship LZ located in a
saddle on a ridgeline overlooking Happy Valley. The rugged ridgelines
to the east and west of the valley were dense jungle, and good landing zones
were scarce. LZ Hereford, on the eastern side of the valley, was the
only piece of open terrain leading into that enemy-infested sector of the Crazy
Horse area of operations. Thus, this small piece of terrain took on
great tactical importance to both sides. During the course of the operation,
a goal of the 1st Cav was to keep this crucial LZ secure. The North Vietnamese
constantly lurked in this area looking to ambush an American unit if they could
achieve tactical surprise and superiority. Having been pounded by suppressing
artillery and gunship fire every time a cavalry unit assaulted into Hereford,
the LZ was a scarred, devastated wreck of a landscape.
Enemy laying in wait
On May 21, 1966, the mortar platoon of Charlie Company,
1st Battalion (Airborne), 12th Cavalry was located on LZ Hereford. Charlie Company had executed
a combat assault into LZ Hereford several days before. After several
days of “humping the boonies” as the cavalrymen described the
search and destroy missions that made up their daily routine, Charlie Company
returned to LZ Hereford. The company’s three rifle platoons would
begin a westward sweep from Hereford down to the valley floor looking for NVA
infantrymen who might be in that area. The mortar platoon would stay
at Hereford, fire its remaining rounds in support of the company’s advance,
and then would be extracted by helicopter to the battalion command post in
the valley.
LZ Hereford was a tricky piece of terrain to defend. It was located
on a saddle which is a military terrain feature characterized by a low-lying
area surrounded on two sides by higher ground, in this case, two prominent
hills. The key to defending a saddle is to secure the higher ground above
the saddle. Otherwise, an enemy force could achieve significant tactical
superiority by seizing the high ground, enabling devastating fire to be brought
against the soldiers below. Unfortunately with only 22 cavalrymen, the
mortar platoon did not have enough strength to man its mortars and simultaneously
hold the high ground above Hereford. On May 21, this courageous but undermanned
band would pay a severe price for its inability to secure these hills.
"After our march to relieve B Company 2/8 and A company of the 1/12th
on May 16 and 17 we spent the next several days sweeping along the hill tops
around LZ Hereford," recalls Sp4 Bill Martin, C company commander Donald
Warren's radio telephone operator. "At one point engineers were lowered
into our position from a CH47 Chinook. We assisted them in blowing down
trees and building a makeshift wood landing platform which the engineers named
LZ Milton. On May 21, 1996 elements of the 1/5 Cav were brought in to replace
us and we began to retrace our path back to LZ Hereford. When we arrived at
Hereford, we left our mortar platoon on the LZ to fire support for the rifle
platoons as we began our sweep down to the valley floor. Our point man had
just reached the valley floor as the mortar platoon completed their fire mission
and were preparing to pack up and be air lifted to join us at the base of the
mountain. Then all hell broke loose on Hereford as hundreds of North Vietnamese
soldiers attacked the twenty-two man mortar platoon. We reversed our line of
march and with all possible speed and started our climb back up the mountain
to the LZ. Capt. Warren was in constant contact with our mortar platoon and
an observation aircraft that was circling the LZ. The pilot reported swarms
of attacking enemy soldiers intermingled with our mortar platoon and couldn't
fire on the position without killing the defenders. We stayed in contact with
the mortar platoon until they were no longer transmitting".
John Spranza manning 81mm mortar
John Spranza is one of the few survivors of Charlie
Company still alive to tell the tale of that horrific day. The mortar platoon was so few in
number that it was unable to mount a traditional perimeter defense around the
LZ. As many of the platoon’s troopers were needed to fire their
mortar, only a few soldiers were available to provide security. Sergeant
Robert L. Kirby, the platoon leader, organized a u-shaped defense leaving a
portion of the mortar platoon position completely undefended. Around noon,
Specialist John Spranza was talking on the platoon radio. He was communicating
with the Charlie Company rifle platoons, helping adjust the mortar platoon’s
fire in support of the company’s advance down the ridgeline toward the
valley floor. Spranza recalls Charles Stuckey and Paul Harrison located in
a nearby defensive position, suddenly opening fire with their M16s. “I
thought they had gone crazy,” Spranza remembers. “I couldn’t
immediately imagine what they were firing at or why.” But just
as Harrison and Stuckey opened fire, the LZ was raked by AK-47 rounds fired
by hundreds of North Vietnamese infantrymen charging toward Hereford from the
high ground above the landing zone. Interspersed with this automatic
weapons fire was a barrage of rocket-propelled grenades arcing down toward
the American positions.
NVA rockets raked the LZ
Spranza rolled back into his foxhole and tried to reach
for his radio that was the platoon’s only communication with the rest of Charlie Company
and any hope for reinforcement. Without help, the mortar platoon would
be destroyed by the overwhelming firepower of the North Vietnamese human wave
attack. “I had the long whip antenna on my radio and the gooks apparently
saw it and were aiming RPGs right at me,” recalls Spranza. He shot
three North Vietnamese who were heading straight for his position but was wounded
himself. “I was able to raise the company on the radio and told
them we needed gun ships and artillery.”
John Spranza radios for help
Realizing that its mortar platoon was under heavy attack,
Charlie Company reversed its path and started moving as fast as possible
back toward the LZ to help the beleaguered platoon. Unfortunately, the terrain, elephant
grass, and “wait-a-minute” vines made movement very slow. At
the same time, the battalion headquarters located in the valley below ordered
A Company, 2nd Battalion (Airborne), 8th Cavalry, in reserve at the headquarters,
to load on a section of Eagle Flight choppers and make an emergency combat
assault into Hereford to rescue the mortar platoon. Once again the mortar
platoon had no luck at all. As soon as the first lift of A Company boarded
the Eagle Flight Hueys, a heavy fog rolled over Hereford making an immediate
combat assault impossible.
The few remaining Americans who had not been killed
in the initial North Vietnamese onslaught realized they were fighting for
their lives and that the difficult terrain and the fog precluded any hope
of assistance. Although seriously
wounded, Specialist Spranza was able to crawl to a small rocky area that several
survivors were using as a defensive position. Being unable to carry his
radio with him, Spranza found a hand grenade and threw it back at the radio
hoping to destroy it before the enemy could capture it. Thinking he would
not survive much longer, he hid his classified radio codebook in his pants,
hoping the North Vietnamese wouldn’t look there if they searched his
body. Sergeant Kirby, the platoon leader, had also made it to this improvised
position, where these last few cavalrymen would make their final stand. Now
out of ammunition, they grabbed for some AK-47s dropped by dead and wounded
enemy. Kirby found several hand grenades that he threw at the North Vietnamese
skirmishers now charging out of the elephant grass on the slopes of the LZ. When
one NVA charged its position, Kirby shot him in the face with a flare pistol.
Attacking enemy soldiers
Joining the mortar platoon that morning arriving on
a resupply helicopter was 31-year-old Sam Castan, a journalist for Look magazine. He was working
on an article for Look but was having trouble finding a combat situation to
photograph. Every time he went to a battle site, the fighting stopped. He
referred to himself as the luckiest guy in Vietnam. But that day, his
luck would run out. After surviving the initial North Vietnamese fire,
he tried to escape by running down the side of the ridgeline to safety. He
ran right into an advancing group of enemy where he was shot in the head and
killed.
John Spranza, Kirby, and a few others also tried to
crawl into the tall elephant grass to escape to safety. All of the survivors had been wounded, some
several times. Specialist Spranza had been shot five times including
taking one round in the head that knocked out most of his teeth. Sergeant
Kirby had been shot three times. Both were bleeding badly and on the
verge of unconsciousness. At this point, thinking that all the friendlies
were dead, as there was no radio contact from the mortar platoon, artillery
fire from the battery located in the valley floor began pounding the LZ. At
the same time, the NVA infantrymen were searching for any remaining Americans
in the tall elephant grass and shooting any wounded.
Sergeant Kirby, knowing that the few remaining cavalrymen
were out of ammunition and bleeding from numerous wounds, felt that their
chances of survival would be better back on the LZ. He thought the NVA would have pulled out from
the LZ due to the pounding of the American artillery. Spranza told Kirby
to save himself if he could. Spranza was so shot up that he could no
longer move. His only hope of survival was to lie down and play dead and hope
the NVA were convinced of his demise. Several times, enemy soldiers
rolled him over and searched his pockets but each time moved on thinking he
was dead. Spranza lay as still as he could feeling that he would bleed
to death in the tall elephant grass. At this point, several 1st Cav gun
ships flew by, strafing the LZ in preparation for A Company’s combat
assault into Hereford. One fired its machine guns so close to Spranza
that dirt kicked up by the impacting rounds hit him in the face.
A Co 2/8 Eagle Flight to Hereford
On the verge of unconsciousness, Specialist Spranza
had hidden his bayonet under his body and decided he would kill the next
North Vietnamese who searched him. Feeling hands probing his body, he turned and reached out with his
bayonet. He looked up into the face of a Charlie Company soldier just
arriving back at the LZ. The enemy had fled and choppers bringing A Company
into Hereford began to land. Specialist John Spranza had survived this
horrific attack but lapsed into unconsciousness. He next remembered being
on a surgery table at the field hospital at the 1st Cavalry base camp at An
Khe.
RTO Specialist 4 Jordan Brindley
(right)
Specialist Jordan Brindley, one of Captain Warren's
RTOs recalls, "The
rifle platoons of Charlie Company started down the mountain. Our weapons
platoon would remain on LZ Hereford to provide supporting fire to the company
as we moved toward the valley floor. After moving only a few hundred yards
down the mountain, through thick vegetation and undergrowth, we received
a radio message from John Spranza the mortar platoon radio operator. It
was a desperate cry for help, "They're all over us, they're killing us!" and
then his radio went dead. We could hear automatic weapons fire and RPG
rounds exploding up the mountain from our position. By that time Captain
Warren had turned the company around and headed back to LZ Hereford, we
arrived within minutes. All but five members of our weapons platoon were
killed, the sight was unbearable. Dead bodies were everywhere, weapons
and bloody equipment was strewn all over the mortar platoon position. I
found Spranza, he'd been shot a half a dozen times. He was barely conscious
and in very critical condition. We loaded John and the other survivors
on the first available "Dust Off" for medical evacuation to the rear".
Over the coming months, Spranza would be evacuated through
a series of military hospitals finally winding up at Womack Army Hospital
in Fort Bragg, North Carolina. Of
the 23 Americans who were on LZ Hereford on that fateful day of May 21, 1966,
only five survived: John Spranza, Sergeant Kirby, Specialists Isaac
Johnson and Charles Stuckey, and PFC Bob Roeder. One member of the platoon,
Sergeant Louis Buckley is still missing in action. Spranza recalls Sergeant
Buckley, wounded in the shoulder, running across the LZ to his fighting position
but never saw him again.
Field hospital at Camp Radcliff
Although the North Vietnamese may have succeeded in
overrunning and virtually destroying Charlie Company’s mortar platoon, they too paid a terrible
price for their success. More than 60 dead NVA infantrymen littered the
LZ and the area surrounding it. While they were vastly outnumbered and
outgunned, the cavalrymen on LZ Hereford were not outfought. Every American
soldier who died on that forsaken hill fought to the end and made a timeless
contribution to the heroic tradition of the 1st Cavalry Division.