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Were the Bad Guys Stealing
Us Blind From Our Own Hooches?
By Charles Adams

You guys ought to know that you could never leave anything visible in your bunker or hooch. There were some that just could not keep their hands off the other guys stuff! Or, on the other hand, it might not have been a fellow GI. Read on.

I feel a new story coming on.

It was July, 1971 at FSB Charlie 1 just after we (Charlie Battery) had moved from Alpha 4. Also, it was just after the 5th Mech left and stood down. The ARVN's were brought in to C-1 to provide perimeter protection. It was in the middle of the night. Gun 4 had a fire mission. The guys and me of Gun 2, who were off and sound asleep, were all awakened by some guys hollowing and yelling in the bunker next to us. [Note: Gun 2's crew bunker was on the very end near our Gun- "SOUNDS OF SILENCE".] The bunker was, I believe, Gun 3's bunker (a ruff and rowdy bunch of guys! (Ha Ha!) Well, we heard all this commotion going on next door so we all, thinking the worst - that we were getting hit, piled out of the bunker "LOADED FOR BEAR AND ARMED TO THE TEETH!" When we got outside "locking and loading" our rifles, we found the crew of Gun 3 whipping the s__t out of this little guy who was in an ARVN uniform.

After everyone calmed down, and the little guy was pretty much whipped, the officers and NCO's arrived and started to pull the "Gun Bunnies" off the guy. What a sight! This little guy's uniform was really ripped up. It appeared that this "ARVN" had slipped through our wire and entered our compound. [Note: at this time C-1 had two wire perimeters, one was the outside wire perimeter that the ARVN's guarded, and then the second wire separated us and the ARVNs.] Anyway, It was determined that this guy had been slipping into our AO at night for the past week and moving through the bunkers and stepping over sleeping GIs. It was also found that while he was in the bunkers, if he found something that he liked, he would take it! I remember during this period some members of the battery had reported things missing from their bunks. We didn't know who was getting it. The "ARVN" was found to be taking food and other stuff. It was reported that he stepped on a crew member's face as he was moving through Gun 3's bunker. He was found to have food from State-side packages and C's in his pockets. I don't remember the "Gun Bunny's" name who was stepped on, but I do remember he was real p____d off. When the fight started, the GI didn't know what he had when he grabbed the guy, but the fight was on! As the ARVN tried to escape, the fight escalated until all of the Gun 3 crew became involved. Soon the fight was brought outside the bunker in moonlight where one could at least see who in the hell he was hitting! At this point in time all the 8/4 guys came-a-running. When the officers got one of the ARVN officers on the scene, who could translate, it was found that the "ARVN" was not an ARVN, but one of the "other" guys!

The next morning at chow the word was that the ARVN's had taken the guy out on the bunker line and shot him!

Chas Adams, C-8/4