FRIENDLY FIRE

By George O’Kelly

One of Murphy's Laws regarding military matters is:  "Friendly fire...isn't!"

February 1970. We were on patrol around the village of Nam O, north of DaNang. The terrain consists of lots of little islands and rice paddies, as well as streams and villages. The villages were on the larger islands. The area was connected by rice paddy dikes, which served as a "highway" for friend and foe alike.

Our patrol had stopped for a lovely noontime meal of C-rations and water. We then saddled up and proceeded from the little island we were on towards the next one, several hundred meters away.  

As we neared the next little island, automatic rifle fire met us. I could see the leaves on one of the trees jumping from the bullets passing through. Then, a grenade went off just to our front. It landed in a stream and the water erupted like a geyser. My Marines quickly brought their M-16s to bear and began seeking the shelter of the paddy dike. It was fight time!

Then, before we could do any harm, we saw two locals in black "pajama" type garb. Were they VC? (After all the VC did wear such cool clothing.) They saw us and, of all things, waved! I mean they waved in greeting to us. What the #*!@!!!

Well, it turned out they were what was called Popular Force troops, which was the Viet Nam equivalent to a National Guard force. Translation:  They may have been PFs in the daytime and VC at night. But, without proof, you really couldn’t kill 'em.

So, we had experienced the so-called friendly fire version of war. Murphy was right....friendly fire isn't friendly. Thank goodness no casualties from that episode. The two forces went their separate ways without further incident.

George O'Kelley
LtCol, USMCR, ret.