European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - November 08, 1993, Darmstadt, Hesse Cen. William Westmoreland army chief of staff and hero of ditties. On the morning the Ocean Pearl entered the Saigon River the ship s. Newspaper carried an item about a 1 3 foot Long Python slithering into a Turbine at Plesku s hydroelectric Plant and plunging the Central Highlands capital into darkness. Americans come Back for a variety of reasons for catharsis a personal Healing of War s recurring psychic wounds out of curiosity for what has become of their old Hooch or Jungle outpost a haunting nostalgia for Mist shrouded mountains and Rice paddies that once were a matter of life and death. Maybe just to put the pieces together suggested or. Paul Burns of Austin Texas who in 1965 roamed the Countryside with medical teams treating the civilian population. We tried very hard to do the right thing and yet it All fell most like Highway Engineer Gray had a lingering affection for the people they were just wonderful and War does t seem to have made them bitter or less a number of returnees dined out at some of the pricey private restaurants that have opened since 1986, when Vietnam began moving toward a free Market Economy. Most recommended were be Mekong with its authentic French cuisine beef not water Buffa Loand la Bibliog Cheque de Madame Dai which a charmingly snobbish attorney who Jat in the South vietnamese Assembly and is no longer allowed to practice operates in her Law Library to maintain this Bourgeois those who remembered wartime s 10 . Curfew rejoiced at How late the City swung. Near Midnight a Cycle Convoy from the ship converged on the superstar discotheque. The disc jockey played some tapes by Elvis Phuong the Saigon Rock Star of two decades ago who mimicked a mean hound dog. On Long Days at sea Between ports the americans gathered in the top deck bar or around the Pool to Swap mostly modest reminiscences and laugh Over old Barracks room ballads that they could t quite recall in full. Parodies like you re a sup general Dap to make old Westy testy. And Jingle Bells mortar shells . In the grass to Chi Minn can take this War and shove it. Right about Here memory failed them. Tuesday Hack to Danang americans destinations Are not on tourist map by Hugh a. Mulligan the associated Pressa americans returning to Vietnam often pursue an itinerary of strange sunding places not found on tourist maps the Rock pile hamburger Hill Apache country Dogpatch the. Iron Triangle. Finding old battlefields and fire bases requires patience ingenuity hours of Bone jarring travel Over cratered roads waiting for ferries to Cross Rivers and an interpreter old enough to remember the War. Vietnam is a Young country. More than half its 67 million population was bom after the 1968 tet offensive. is available. Gen. Phan to Quang who was head Honcho moving supplies Down the to Chi Minn Trail and a Van la the North s former . Ambassador have formed veterans tourism service to escort american Vietnam vets to Khe Sanh the a Shau and la Drang valleys and other ctr meat zones travel is hard class says guide Tran Quoc Cong. Sometimes you sleep on the floor of Trie province guest House. You better bring plenty of insect he quoted a Price of less than $100 for a three Day tour out of Danang. Cong recently led two american amputees Back to Khe Sanh. One had lost a leg the other an Arm in the 75 Day siege that left each Side with the War s highest casualties. They were surprised at the hordes of scrap Hunters combing the Bleak plateau for Shell casings and Armor fragments. Vietnam leads the world in exporting scrap metals mostly to Japan. This is now our most dangerous occupation Cong says. Live rounds have killed nearly 5,000 people since peace came. Sometimes a water Buffalo or a cow is blown to girl guides barely in their teens and speaking bizarre English show the Way to the top of Marble Mountain where a Viet Cong Field Hospital shared a Cave with an artillery unit that shelled the huge Marine facility at Danang. Totally awesome they Tell you. Some areas remain off limits like Dak Pek and Dak Sut the special forces Camps that perched on. The spine of the mountains bordering Laos. The Hill tribes Are still unsettled explains Bruno via lard who books Battlefield Tours from Saigon. They have not smoke rises from . Jet area at Bien Hoa air base during fighting in 1965. At left the rusted Shell of a . Tank sits off the Side of Highway one near Hue. Accepted the authority of the Hanoi government like other commercial ships the Ocean Pearl was not allowed to enter Cam Ranh Bay the deep water port built by the americans that became a soviet naval base after Saigon fell to the communists. The russians Are packing up to go Home a vietnamese Pilot told the Bridge officers but they Are in no hurry to face the russian Winter. They have vietnamese girlfriends so All of a sudden there Are big problems with their equipment the most visited War site is the Tunnel Complex at Cuchi Vietnam s rival to Rome s catacombs. The tunnels dug by guerrillas beneath the Headquarters of the . 25th div have been enlarged As a brochure explains to accommodate american some of the biggest bases built to protect Saigon Are hardest to find As this reporter Learned on a two Day search with a rental car and an interpreter. The rubber Plantation at Lai Khe. Where the . 1 St inf div dug in against the Viet Cong was operating again but 28 years later there was Only faint evidence of the great american troop buildup. A faded Green jeep pulling two cows in a tiny trailer and a Petroleum tank truck that still bore the 3rd brigade s unit designation moved past some quonset huts camouflaged with laundry and disappeared Down the Dusty Road to Ben cat. This was Charlie country in the old Days the Gateway to deadly War zones c and d. A Plantation Foreman was pleased to inform our interpreter that the huge electric generators left by the big Reo one still work very Good thank at nearby i an a new Gilt and Green Pagoda partially obscured the Entrance to the old division Headquarters and refugee houses built from helicopter revetments covered the Parade ground. The once Busy fighter base at Bien Hoa now was a training Field for vietnamese air Force Crews. No one seemed to know what became of sprawling Field forces ii Headquarters at Long Binh. With its big pm and Bowling alleys. The Access Road had been stripped of its Concrete base by local builders. Finally a wrinkled old lady in a conical hat Selling Beer and soda beside a pothole deep enough to Swallow a jeep pointed the Way. Russians gone now she told the interpreter. A baby faced guard leaning on an ak-47 Rifle in the sentry Tower denied us admission but welcomed photos of his scrawny chickens pecking at the grass Over growing the rotary driveway that once led up to it. Cen. Frederick c. Weyand s War room. He had no idea what happened to the Bowling alleys or whether the russians Ever used them. In fact he no idea what a Bowling Alley was. America of he allowed accepting a cigarette then upgraded us to Numbat one when told to keep the pack. Thi stars and Stripe monday. November 8, 1993
