The Dumbest Thing I Ever Did

The Dumbest Thing I Ever Did

John Cleveland, Lieutenant, US Army, 173^rd Airborne Brigade,

Binh Dinh Province, Vietnam, July 1970

Many years after the Vietnam War I was working in a hospital. I had a close group of friends, and we would sit at a table and have lunch together every day, tell stories, laugh and joke, and share our experiences on life. One day one of the guys said “OK, let’s go around the table, what was the dumbest thing you ever did, let’s see who wins?” It instantly hit me, what my dumbest thing was, and I hadn’t quite thought about it that way until this moment. It happened on a day in Vietnam. I let everyone tell their stories and then I began mine.

We were on a routine patrol. We went to another one of our units to coordinate some activities planned for the platoon. When I completed that work, we headed back to our own platoon base camp. Since this was just a routine run, we only had a squad, about nine men. We were on a trail that meandered through various villages, following a stream, that found its way between two large hills. I remember thinking how beautiful this place was if it were not for the war. Growing up in Philly I had never been anywhere tropical until my assignment to Vietnam. This place had the greenest greens I ever saw, palm trees, beautiful bright colored flowers everywhere, and lush green shade trees. It was mid-afternoon on a sunny, hot and humid, very typical Nam day. The trail reached a clearing with shade trees right between the two large hills. We were moving slowly enjoying the shade and the little bit of coolness it provided. The air was still and walking under these trees it was very quiet. Suddenly there was this very loud bang like a KRAK!!! right above my head. I felt the compression and impact from a bullet that splintered a tree branch about a foot above my head. I had been shot at many times before on my tour in Nam, but I never had a bullet come that close. And it made me mad, crazy mad. Normally in a combat firefight my first instinct was to hit the ground and get to cover. That’s just what you did in combat, and I had always done that before, but not this day. The bullet being that close, I flew into a rage and began charging up the hill towards where it came from. When you are shot at, you have a pretty good idea where the bullet is coming from, and I knew instinctively where the enemy was. They were at the top of that hill and their ass was mine. I charged up the hill as fast as I could, cursing, screaming, shooting. I must have been quite a sight because whoever fired that bullet was not hanging around to deal with me. They ran without firing another shot.

I got about three quarters of the way up the slope of the hill when the yells of my men behind me started to register. Rage does that to you. A single-minded focus on the target of your rage blocks out everything else, all sound, all feeling, all common sense.  My men were calling out “Lieutenant, Lieutenant” and trying to catch up to me. In my anger I had gotten way out in front of them. These guys were very protective of me, always had my back, and never let me be first in line or first to be shot at in any combat situation. As they caught up to me the reality of what I had just done, sunk in. Charging headlong up that hill, yelling and screaming I was a perfect target. If I hadn’t scared the shit out of the enemy, I would have been an easy kill. Many soldiers have died charging up hills like this with no regard for taking cover, just focused on getting to the top.

We reached the hilltop, swept the area, and the enemy was gone. Just gone. I was hyped but as my adrenaline slowed, I gradually came to my senses. I noticed my platoon sergeant coming up to me laughing. He said, “Lieutenant, you are one crazy motherfucker.” I had to agree with him, that was crazy stupid. The attack was a single shot from a semi-automatic SKS carbine that an enemy marksman would have used. He was clearly targeting me. Although I hid my rank well, you could tell where officers were in a squad of men because they would be standing next to the RTO’s, radiotelephone operators who had these big radio backpacks on their backs. His shot from the hilltop was damn good, but thank God, not good enough. I made a mental note, your anger will get you killed, never let it get out of control like that again. So yeah, that was the Dumbest Thing I Ever Did, but I recognize it was also probably the bravest.

Getting back to the hospital and our lunch table discussion. When I finished my story, the group was kind of in awe at what they just heard and all agreed, I won. I had the best dumbest thing I ever did story.