Secret Weapon


by Richard "Berk" Bergquist


I don't recall which ville it was we were strolling through on this particular day...but it was one of our regular villages....it was midday and hot....and in this ville Charlie was always around to try and take a few of us out....so, I remember we were paying particular attention to keeping our separation as we walked along the trail...I was humping the 60 at sling position ...ready for action. A blue that ran the distance of the ville was to our left. Charlie opened fire on us from across the water...several ak's were yakking and before I could figure out if it was safe to crawl closer and try to fix a target I heard this god awful scream...then I saw one of the guys to my front run right at the enemy fire, while the fire-fight was in full blast....screaming bloody murder with no weapon in his hand and tearing at his jungle shirt, he jumped right into the water. Instantly the ak's stopped. We were all shocked at this maniac behavior of one of our guys....man this guy was really pissed off I thought....he appeared to want to take the VC on all by himself.

We later learned that this grunt took cover right in a bush full of fire-ants...this explained instantly his moment of valor! I don't recall the grunts name.......but I remember we always encouraged this guy to simply scream and run at the enemy the next time we were ambushed....he could be our secret weapon...he failed to see the humor...of course... but it is a story I love to tell the kids. Bye the way, if your reading this and you were that grunt, let us know...that was really a great move!

Richard "Berk" Bergquist