LEATHERNECKM31

A small man... a very small man

McCain spokesman Admiral Leighton Smith didn't waste time over the weekend; he fired a broadside.

When that slimy little weasel Wesley Clark who carries water for Obama--The Messiah--dismissed John McCain's military service with, “Well, I don’t think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be president”--Smith hit back.

"If Barack Obama wants to question John McCain's service to his country, he should have the guts to do it himself and not hide behind his campaign surrogates," Smith said.

Quite true, but he didn't go far enough.

BTW..., that's L'il Wesley on the cover of the gay rights magazine "The Advocate" when he was debasing himself for any kind of support during his pathetic run for the dem presidential nomination. 

If this puke has the stones to dismiss McCain's torture over five years as a POW under some of the worst conditions possible, let us take a look behind his glossy 8x10.

Probably from his earliest days at West Point, Clark was recognized as a potential "water walker"... military slang for a hot shot destined for at least one star.   

That means before he was old enough to vote, he was a politician; class valedictorian ('66) and of course, the obligatory Rhodes Scholarship followed.

He chose armor as a career field; and as Vietnam heated up and his fellow West Pointers were sweating their asses off in triple canopy jungle, L'il Wes was in Oxford's PPE Program... studying Philosophy, Politics an Economics and the local "birds" as the Brit slang had it back in the Sixties.   

All that, combined with armor training (he also worked in a Ranger tab) ... delayed his Vietnam for three years... until 1969. By that time John McCain already had 25 combat missions and two years in the infamous Hanoi Hilton.

And there L'il Wes became what was know in those days as a "ticket puncher", a junior officer who polished up his resume by adding the Vietnam Service and Campaign ribbons. Failing to get a "combat" assignment in those days was a serious detriment for a career officer.

Captain Clark finally arrived in-country on 21 May 1969 and was promptly assigned--this highly trained armor officer--to the rear as a staff officer, collecting data and helping in operations planning.

For his work inside the wire he was awarded his first Bronze Star.

After six months in an air conditioned office and the "O" club... this highly trained staff wienie and tanker was given command of A Company, 1st Battalion, 16th Infantry of the 1st Infantry Division.

See how four stars are eventually gathered? Yeah, it's a thirty-year plan--kinda like Bill and Hillary Clinton's.

January of '70, as the war is grinding to its inevitable whimpering conclusion, finds Capt. Clark on patrol with his troops.

As Clark tells it in his 2007 autobiography, A Time to Lead ...

... but as I turned, I sensed that I had dropped my rifle and suddenly became aware of a loud buzzing noise. I was confused. I never dropped my rifle. Not ever. Cardinal sin! And the buzzing must be hornets. Had I hit a nest? As I turned back to get my rifle, I saw something small and white on the back of my right hand, and glimpsed a dark stain on my jungle fatigue trousers right below the right knee. It was like my brain had been bypassed.

"I've been shot!" I shouted, still in the act of reaching down for my rifle.

I'm sure his seasoned troops were glad he finally figured it out and alerted them to the firefight which was already in progress.

Apparently, despite being stitched with four AK rounds, Clark finally had to be knocked from his feet by a real grunt as he continued to walk around looking for his rifle. To his credit, Clark praised the man who saved his life.

Despite wounds to his right shoulder, right hand, right hip, and right leg, Clark writes, "... a few heartbeats later, my training came flooding back and my responsibilities as company commander took over.

"'Get the machine gun up! Set up a base of fire!' I had to shout the commands, and of course that attracted more enemy fire." (Poor deluded FNG... he actually thought his yelling rose above the sounds of the firefight, and the gooks were trying to pinpoint him as a result.)  

..... you can draw your own conclusions, but the combat vets among you are arching both eyebrows right now.

My corporal chevrons say that if he did say this, some grizzled 19-year-old fighter yelled, "somebody shut that son of a bitch up." 

I can grantee you... the kid manning the M60 didn't need some rear-echelon staff puke, armor officer who just joined the company yelling commands out of his brand new "Basic Infantry Officer Training Manual." 

I served under this exact nightmare... a ticket-punching armor captain with no "bush" rifle company experience. His incompetance is directly responsible for the death of one of my friends and for my eight months in the hospital. 

Clark's narrative goes on... starring himself in the title role of his very own Audie Murphy fantasy... ordering his machine gun team around, taking full command while flat on his back and calling in artillery fire into "thick jungle".

Uh huh. The man watched too many WWII movies.

He claims to have actually yelled: "'Machine gun, shift fire to the left. You men on the right, on your feet, move forward and get them!'  This was my command, and I was in battle. The don't-want-to-be-here feeling was gone. I knew we could do this!"

Well now.. that's telling, a commanding officer admits he didn't want to be there...; he didn't have to admit that to his troops... I assure you they already knew.

That apparently was L'il Wes' most important, or more likely, his entire combat experience. Getting shot and causing his men to risk their lives to protect an inept newbie.     

Looks like the man never fired a shot in anger.

For this he was awarded the Silver Star.

Resume complete with a combat tour of less than a month, he went home for medical treatment... and the rest of his water-walking.

Today his MySpace page lists every last medal, ribbon, badge, tab and do-dad he has, including his Commander of the Legion of Honor... the same one the French awarded comedian Jerry Lewis.

Ninety percent of his awards are the result of the higher and higher rank he achieved.

Captain McCain lists only... Purple Heart, Bronze Star, Silver Star and Distinguished Flying Cross.  Just the ones that matter.

McCain's service to this country had been attacked seven or eight times now by the Magic Negro's hatchetmen including Tom Harkin and George McGovern. 

So, next time L'il Wes/Obama shoots his/their mouth off about McCain's military experience... consider the source. 

THIS JUST IN:  Maverick has just fired back... clicked here.

The tree of liberty must be occasionally watered with the blood of patriots and tyrants.

Had a couple of questions about "Molon Labe" in yesterday's posts on the Heller decision.

One of the great time-honored mottos... Molon Labe is a classical expression of defiance roughly corresponding to the modern equivalent of "over my dead body", but far more clever and bellicose.

Essentially, it is the response of Spartan King Leonidas to the ultimate rag head genocidal maniac Xerxes at Thermopylae (480 BC). Xerxes offered to spare the lives of his out-numbered Spartans and his few thousand other warriors if they would only surrender and lay down their weapons.

"Come and take them", was Leonidas' riposte.

The "300" could fight like demons and they were damned handy with the turn of a phrase as well.

Thermopylae and the Spartans are also remembered for the battle élan vibrantly displayed in Leonidas' lieutenant Dieneke's retort to the same Persians who taunted the 300 with, "Our arrows will blot out the sun."

"Then we shall fight in the shade," he said.

ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ is also on the emblem of the Greek First Army Corps and the motto of United States Special Operations Command Central.

And a slight variation formed the sentiment of Texas' first battle flag. On October 2, 1835, when Mexican tyrant Santa Anna tried to disarm the Texans at Gonzales, they responded by flying this flag.

All this is what the framers had firmly in heart and mind when they wrote the Second Amendment, and placed it right after the First.

Shooting your mouth off isn't much of a right unless you'll defend it with a weapon and your life.

R.I.P.... Ma Deuce

This'll bring a tear to the eye of any current or past member of the military... the venerable M2 .50 cal machine gun, the legendary " Ma Deuce" is facing retirement.

The the lightweight, 50-pound XM307 developed by General Dynamics, will take over from the 84-pound war horse (128 pounds with its tripod) and be phased in during FY '08.

Because of the weight reduction, there's even speculation it could also replace the trusted M-60 7.62 machine-gun. This also has important ramifications for armor as well as aircraft and naval vessel use.

Plus, the new kid on the block has some tricks up its sleeve... it will fire an array of high-explosive 25mm rounds; think Ma Deuce Meets Blooper Man.

More war porn here.

... predictable

House Speaker SanFranGramNan Pelosi says that despite the Supreme Court decision to strike down its gun ban, the District of Columbia will still be able to regulate firearms.

"I think it still allows the District of Columbia to come forward with a law that’s less pervasive," Pelosi said at her weekly briefing Thursday. "I think the court left a lot of room to run in terms of concealed weapons and guns near schools."

Idiot...

Scalia specifically addressed that in his opinion; Heller had nothing to do with gun-free school zones.

This is what happens when Californians are allowed to vote.

I don't have kids in college, so in the wide world of protecting my own ass.... if you want to send you kid to college and get back a brain-washed feminist Commie in four years for $180,000 who could be shot to death in a classroom... knock yo'sef out.

At this point it's hard top believe that one of the the simplest declarations ever committed to paper was ever  debatable in the first place:

The original and copies of the Amendment distributed to the state, and then ratified by them, had different capitalization and punctuation:

“	A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. Wish I owned a DC gun shop. Fight on.

More from Scalia:  “it is not the role of this Court to pronounce the Second Amendment extinct.”

"We find they guarantee the individual right to possess and carry weaons in case of confrontation” — in other words, for self-defense. “The inherent right of self-defense has been central to the Second Amendment right,” it added.

The individual right interpretation, the Court said, ”is strongly confirmed by the historical background of the Second Amendment,” going back to 17th Century England, as well as by gun rights laws in the states before and immediately after the Amendment was put into the U.S. Constitution.

What Congress did in drafting the Amendment, the Court said, was “to codify a pre-existing right, rather than to fashion a new one.”

........ Scalia said nothing in the ruling should "cast doubt on long-standing prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons or the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings."

Of course "gun free zones" were not taken up by the Court in Heller... but it does set a foundation for legal challenges to laws that restrict your right o self-defense with a firearm. Ask 30+ people at VaTech... oops, sorry--they all died inside their little Utopian gun-free zone.

not even `close to 7-2; 5-4 as usual

... the Second Amendment has been affired as an individual right by the narrowest of margins, 5-4.

Let that sink in.... just one vote--and your right to possess, own a firearm and most importantly to use it to protect your family, would have likely been lost.

Look for this to be spun by the leftist drive by media as a "victory" because "they" were almost able to destroy gun rights.

Second Amendment unchained... it ain't about hunting

Justice Antonin Scalia is the expected author the majority opinion on the Supreme Court's ground-breaking decision in District of Columbia v. Heller which should be released in hours.

Early betting has the decision a surprising 6-3 and even as high as 7-2 and will strike down D.C.'s decades-long gun-ban as unconstitutional.

While certainly welcome and long overdue, the decision will simply affirm the Constitutional right of bearing arms as an individual right -- finally putting to rest the ridiculous "militia/national guard" argument.

However... like all constitutional rights... this ruling is very important but doesn't mean that the Second Amendment is now without restriction. The background checks, registration and even more Draconian laws which have been allowed to take root since 1968's Gun Control Act will remain in force.

Expect Sara Brady and her Traveling Husband Act to be outraged that DC can now protect themselves from murderous thugs because the corrupt and incompetent district government cannot.

Similar bans such as the one in Chicago (Take that, Messiah) will fall across the country, but the gun-grabbing socialists will fight back.

Now if Wayne"The Sellout" LaPierre and his asinine NRA will get out of the way, real gun rights advocates can start cranking on other restrictive and unconstitutional laws that remain.

These are just a few of the lowlights of the Act which shows how far we've allowed the Second Amendment to be dismantled:

Major Provisions:

• Prohibits the mail-order sales of all firearms and ammunition.

• Prohibits the interstate sale of firearms.
  A handgun purchaser may only buy a gun in the state in which he/she resides; however, long gun sales to individuals in contiguous state that did not violate either state law, were allowed. (Today, long guns may be purchased from gun dealers in any state, regardless of purchaser's state of residence).

• Prohibits the importation of non-sporting weapons.
  The importation of "Saturday Night Special" handguns and some semiautomatic assault rifles (the 43 weapons covered in the 1989 Bush Administration ban) as well as two military shotguns have been barred under this section of the law.

• Prohibits importation of weapons covered in the National Firearms Act and extends NFA restrictions to machine gun frames and receivers and conversion kits (i.e., parts to make machine guns).

• Prohibits importation of foreign-made military surplus firearms.

• Prohibited the sale and manufacture of new fully automatic civilian machine guns (effectively freezing the number of them in circulation).
  This provision was adamantly opposed by the NRA. In fact, some of its most radical members did not want the McClure/Volkmer bill to pass if it contained this provision.

  Immediately following the enactment of this law, the NRA announced that "its highest priority" in the next Congress would be to repeal the ban on machine guns. To date they have not introduced legislation to do this.

I'll post again as soon as the decision is announced.

Will Americans actually vote for this come November?

Since the 1960s I've said that "Americans always get the president they deserve."

Yes, we got a Carter, but we finally saw our heinous mistake which we erased with two Reagan terms; eventually we get it right.

As we approach November, I would be more confident if McCain seemed capable of running as an antidote to Obama.  

Nonetheless, I cannot imagine sensible adults--while we are in the midst of The Long War and in dire need of government reform top to bottom--voting for "change and hope."

If the majority do, then we'll deserve such a calamity and we'll be hoping we have some change left after taxes.

Should our country lose its way as occasionally happens, here are worse and worst-case scenarios should we be further overthrown by socialists and communists at the ballot box.

"Free Universal/National Health Care"

The old joke is "... if you think the government can do it better--look at the post office."

That stopped being funny when the postal service went "postal".

Hillary (who?), Pelosi, and name-any-black-congresswoman routinely threaten nationalizing oil companies and wage class warfare against the "rich"; you ever been hired by a "poor" person?

Well, here's a case of what "national health care" does in the UK where people routinely die from being denied life-saving treatment that would be available to even the indigent here in the U.S. 

Regimental Sergeant Maj. Tul Bahadur Pun, the 87-year-old WWII Victoria Cross Recipient was terrified and berated yesterday by a National Health Service bureaucrat who denied him care and medication for a critical heart condition. 

An NHS horses ass went further, claiming the heroic Gurkha owed the government thousands of pounds for previous treatment. They demanded his passport, and accused him of "misleading" them over his immigration status. He was escorted from the hospital.

(This just in: The wheelchair-bound SgtMaj. Pun has just returned his VC and all his other medals to 10 Downing Street in protest over being refused medical treatment and to support the rights of more than 2,000 fellow Gurkha soldiers to stay in Britain.

(I'll write more on this outrage tomorrow).

It gets worse...  one of only 11 living Victoria Cross Recipients, Pun was refused entrance to the UK by British officials in Nepal three years ago who claimed he "doesn't have strong enough ties with the UK" to allow him to to settle there.

And Princess Di did?

The decision was overturned in 2007, due to the "exceptional" nature of the case.

One last irony... the West Middlesex Hospital in London which denied him treatment yesterday is the same hospital that saved the war hero's life last August - since then he has been kept alive by heart drugs through the NHS.

Just like a "free lunch", national health care isn't either.

"Justice" favors the criminal over the victim... even if they're eight years old. 

WASHINGTON — Sentencing someone to death for brutally raping a child is unconstitutional, The Supreme Court ruled today in the usual 5-4 liberal victory. 

Imbecile Justice Kennedy for the majority wrote, “The death penalty is not a proportional punishment for the rape of a child.”  I don't need to list the four other usual suspects.

Kennedy wrote that a Louisiana law violates the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment, which draws it meaning from “the evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society.”

“When the law punishes by death, it risks its own sudden descent into brutality, transgressing the constitutional commitment to decency and restraint,” Justice Kennedy wrote.

No... Mr. Justice, your decision is a descent into brutality against the innocent.

He droned on, "sentencing someone to death for raping a child could have terrible, unintended consequences, given the years that typically go by between a crime and the execution of the defendant."

Look jackass, don't blame the child because your "legal" system can't execute someone with two years.

Justice Alito in dissent, wrote that the majority ruled out executing someone for raping a child “no matter how young the child, no matter how many times the child is raped, no matter how many children the perpetrator rapes, no matter how sadistic the crime, no matter how much physical or psychological trauma is inflicted, and no matter how heinous the perpetrator’s prior criminal record may be.”

Of Obama is elected in November.. we will suffer such judicial outrages for generations to come; Obama would appoint as many as three leftist justices--significantly younger than those presently befouling the Court.

Green is the new Red

You want change...? How about an Environment Czar and thousands of new laws that will drive you mad and become the biggest redistribution of wealth this country has ever seen.

Can't happen, you think?

While we are in the middle of a war, and virtually every element of our society needs to make some hard decisions for our national security and economic survival...

... the democrat party--Congressional do nothings for two years now--are spending time deciding on balloons, fanny packs and what color food your should eat.

Denver's Democratic mayor, John Hickenlooper (not kidding), challenged his party and his city to "make this (Democrat Party convention) the greenest convention in the history of the planet."

• The convention has hired a "'Director of Greening', longtime environmental activist Andrea Robinson."
• biodegradable convention balloons have been buried in a steaming compost heap to make sure they are as advertised.

An "Official Carbon Adviser" was hired to measure the greenhouse-gas emissions of every placard, every plane trip, every appetizer prepared and every coffee cup tossed. The Democrats hope to pay penance for those emissions by investing in renewable energy projects.

• 900 volunteers at "waste-disposal stations" ("trash cans" to us Texas) to make sure every scrap reaches the proper bin; something in the wrong container... the dumb-asses in organic, cotton, green shirts must paw through every bag and save the planet.
• No fried food. Each meal will include "at least three of the following colors: red, green, yellow, blue/purple, and white."... something about nutritious food being more "vibrant" ????

And the fanny packs? Green enforcers say they will be made in the USA of undyed, organic fabric; a union shop will print the logo, but if the ink is petroleum based they'll go with an embroidered logo, using biodegradable thread.

Yeah, all this is fun to ridicule, but this is exactly what democrats do while "Rome is burning"... balloons and carrot sticks.

And should democrats control all branches of government in '09... you will see mentally-deranged measures such as these become law.

It won't be so funny then, will it?

Read on.

Spoils of War

Spring, 1969--Just weeks before departing for Vietnam, I was walking through LAX and passed a Marine in dress greens--obviously just back from the war--with an a Chi-Com SKS rifle at sling arms.

There was an official-looking tag wired to the front sight. Some civilians noticed; most did not. After all... a military man with a weapon?

The Marine was participating in a time-honored ritual of war--bringing home a  trophy after surviving combat with his nation's enemies. The tradition began when a pre-history combatant picked up an enemy clansman's pointed stick on the battlefield.

The airport Marine wasn't an uncommon sight in those days, back before the socialists established near total ownership of the United States.

I couldn't wait to bring back my own.

Once in the bush, I learned that the chances of me getting an enemy firearm home through the Marine Crops/MACV web of regulations and rear echelon theft were remote.

You were to turn in your war trophy which (they promised) would be registered to you and sent to division where (they promised) it would be held for you until you picked it up on the way home. Un-huh.

If you really wanted a war trophy the best chance was with a Chinese Type-54 or the Soviet TT33 Tokarev 7.62 pistol, or more commonly, the nifty 9mm Makarov (right); field strip it and mail the individual parts back home to Mom over time. Your odds were much better.

Most of those weapons today hang on the den walls of retired officers whose tours in Vietnam involved water sanitation, accounting, warehousing and you get the idea. They had a much better chance of working the system from their desks.

As bad as that was compared to Korea and WWII... read on:

Dateline Camp Pendleton:

OCEANSIDE, Calif. — It might not get you into as much trouble, but that little Tabasco bottle filled with Iraqi sand is as illegal as a fully automatic AK47. (Editor: "Little" here means about a quarter of a teaspoon.)

Both items violate federal rules for bringing stuff back from the war zone. Sure, the feds don’t routinely raid houses in the middle of the night looking for tiny bottles of dirt, but U.S. Customs officials are serious about keeping foreign soil from leaving foreign soil, fearful that bugs and germs could be spread from overseas.

Riiight... bugs and germs.

Our returning servicemen--instead of being welcomed as returning war heroes--are often investigated, arrest and jailed for bringing home their trophies.

According to a lengthy story in Marine Times,  the Corps' standing order on “Control and Registration of War Trophies and War Trophy Firearms” — MCO 5800.6A — dates back to 1969 (see?), when the rules began to tighten as Vietnam began winding down.

Dirt and rocks are prohibited, as are artwork and rugs taken from a house. Some knives and bayonets are allowed, but not all. Some captured weapons are allowed but must be rendered unserviceable in accordance with federal firearms laws. ("Unserviceable" means essentially destroying a working firearm by drilling out the chamber).

Retired Col. Gary Wilson had to get approval to bring home two fragments from a rocket that exploded in a 2005 roadside bomb, wounding him and others, and damaging his vehicle.

The paperwork drill “wasn’t so bad,” Wilson said. “I had to take it down to the [staff judge advocate] and I had to get the CO to sign it.” The shrapnel now sits in a closet in his California house.

Customs agents in 2002 confiscated sheep skulls carried by some Marines at Camp Lejeune, N.C, upon their beach return from Afghanistan, according to a 2003 Pentagon news release.

The reason for such stringency here is two main reasons: 1). the fundamental mistrust and disrespect of the American serviceman...

While in-country these young men are trusted with their own rifles, pistols, C-4 plastic explosive, hand grenades, bayonets, knives, claymore mines and million-dollar weapons systems unknown to liberals.  Kids not long out of high school are routinely entrusted with the very lives of their comrades and commanding officers.

Men yet to have voted for president, direct deadly air strikes by gun-ships and jets, but cannot be trusted to bring a rusty, semi-automatic pistol back home.

... and 2). America no longer acts like a world power possessing the most powerful military in the history of the world; in the Middle East especially, the military is forced to bend over backward for Muslims--even enemy Muslims.

Gawd forbid we offend butchering ragheads and their religion by taking some of worthless sand home.

... it's unthinkable in this War on radical Islam Terror that our best and brightest who are often maimed and killed for Iraqis and Afghanis should be allowed to liberate one of Saddam's dinner plates and risk offending anyone.

Lima Site 85 -- 1968

(June 24: Editor's update/correction:) I over-reved the engines on this great story yestyerday due to my too-quick read of some newspaper stories and a congressional press release. I am sorry for any confusion.

House Bill 766 bill requesting a waiver the time limitations specified by law in order to allow the Medal of Honor to be posthumously awarded to Chief Master Seg. Richard L. Etchberger has been approved and appears to be liekly to pass the Senate as well.  

Once this waiver is approved by Congress and signed into law by the President, it will be directed to the Air Force chain-of-comand for review and approval.

Earlier news stories I quopted here yesterday claimed only passage by the Senate and the President's approval remained.  

If approved through the chain of command the process would upgrade CMSgt. Etchberger's Air Force Cross awarded in 1969 to the nation's highest award... the Medal of Honor. See citation here.

Etchberger was honored for his defense of a remote U.S. radar outpost in Laos which was highly classified and crucial to the early air campaign against the North Vietnamese.

I am particularly pleased with this news as I have followed this little-known action of US airmen "on the ground" for many years. Etchberger was like to many of our unsung military heroes who simply carry out their orders without fanfare.

"Sheep dipped"

An outstanding Staff NCO, Etchberger was first to be recommended and volunteer for a clandestine mission so secret that he actually had to resign from the Air Force and sign up as an "employee" of a civilian contractors--Lockheed, in this case. Even the volunteers' wives had to come to D.C. to sign confidentiality agreements in personal.

Volunteers for the "Lima Site 85" mission (and scores of others like it) went through a process known in the shadowy world of special operations as “sheep dipping.” They were hired by a legitimate civilian company, and go into Laos as employees. When their mission was over, they would be welcomed back into the Air Force. If they were captured or killed, their families would be covered by company or Air Force benefits.

Lima Site 85

Forty-eight such volunteers based in Thailand and when they flew to Lima Site 85 for two-week rotational tours of duty in small teams, they wore civilian clothes and carried their Lockheed ID.

The top-secret radar equipment and antennas were rigged with explosives so  they could be destroyed before the enemy could capture it. The team "Heavy Green" took over the installation and the radar bombing system went operational on Nov. 1, 1967 to support Operation Rolling Thunder--the bombing of North Vietnam.

As is so often the case in the clandestine ops of the Vietnam war, the key for Lima Site 85 operation was a force of about 1,000 indigenous troops, mostly Hmong but including some Thais. "Two hundred were tucked in close to the radar site, another 800 on the lower parts of the mountain. Two CIA paramilitary officers were stationed just south of the helipad. The approaches to the radar site were strewn with mines and concertina wire," after action reports said.

Nobody expected an enemy force to be able to scale the highest outcropping and attack. From the bottom of the mountain, rocky slopes extended about halfway up at angles of 45 to 60 degrees. The rest of the way to the top was much steeper, rising in places at 85 to 90 degrees.

They were wrong.

Final assault

On March 10 when the attack began, 19 Americans were at Lima Site 85; 16 Heavy Green personnel and three "spooks" sent from Vientiane to direct local air strikes.

Soon the outpost was surrounded by 3,000 enemy troops--five to seven battalions--firing mortars, artillery and rockets with surprising effectiveness.

Bad weather hampered US air support and the order was given to extract the Americans... it proved to be "one day too long."

Incredibly, a sapper team 33 NVA commandos scaled the sheer rock face that operational planners considered "impassable"; they had fatally underestimated the tenacity of the NVA.

They struck the heart of the installation with RPGs and Ak-47s.

The Americans executed their planned egress off the mountain under fire.

The sappers shot down the side of the mountain with automatic weapons and lobbed grenades over the slope in attempts to kill the retreating Americans.

Several US technicians on a lower ledge were killed outright. However, CMSgt. Etchberger was unhurt and, because of him, his wounded companions would live to be rescued. Etchberger kept the sappers at bay with his M-16 rifle.

At least eight Americans were still alive on the mountain. Etchberger, Capt. Stanley J.Sliz, and SSgt. John Daniel were on the ledge. Radar technician, SSgt. Jack Starling, was wounded and playing dead. SSgt. Bill Husband was on top of the mountain and the combat controller, Sgt. Roger Huffman, was near the helipad. The two CIA officers, Howard Freeman and John Spence, were south of the helipad.

Etchberger helped Daniel and Sliz prepare to be hoisted by cable to a hovering chopper, then he and Husband went up the cable last. Etchberger was no sooner inside the helicopter than ground fire burst through the floor, mortally wounding him. He died minutes later. His wife Katherine would receive his Air Force Cross in a closed ceremony in the Pentagon Jan. 15, 1969.

Of the 19 Americans on the mountain, eight had been brought out and 11 were confirmed KIA or MIA, later listed as KIA.

In the confusion of the surprise attack, the thermite explosives on the radar installation were not detonated. Later air strikes finished the job.

After the fall of Site 85 the US ceased placing radar bombing installations in Laos.

On Nov. 1 President Johnson ended the bombing of North Vietnam.

Aftermath

According to John T. Correll, retired editor in chief of Air Force Magazine, in March 2003, two former North Vietnamese commandos who took part in the attack showed the investigators three places where they had thrown Americans bodies over the cliff. The investigators threw mannequins over the edge at those points while a photographer in a helicopter videotaped their fall. That pin-pointed for the investigators, a ledge about 540 feet below.

"Mountaineer-qualified specialists (left) scaled down cliffs to the ledge, where they discovered human remains, leather boots in four different sizes, five survival vests, and other fragments of material that indicated the presence of at least four Americans. The team worked in hazardous conditions, including strong winds and falling rocks, which constrained the search.

"In December 2005, the Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office announced the identification of the remains of TSgt. Patrick L. Shannon, one of the 11 airmen at Phou Pha Thi. Further excavation of the ledges is planned, assuming the willingness of the Laotian government to approve access to the site.

"Today, commentaries on the fall of Lima Site 85 appear with some regularity in newspapers and military journals, but interpretations differ and the controversy continues.

"The losses at (Site 85) seem all the more tragic because, 20 days after the attack, the White House put an end to Rolling Thunder operations above the 20th parallel, of which the Lima Site 85 radar was a part, and the bombing of Hanoi came to a halt. The courage and sacrifice of those who died on the mountaintop stood in counterpoint to the strategic indecision and changing political winds in Washington.

May Sgt. Etchberger and his comrades rest in piece and honored glory.

The Americans at Lima Site 85 on March 11, 1968

• Rescued: Capt. Stanley J. Sliz, SSgt. John Daniel, SSgt. Bill Husband, SSgt. Jack Starling, Sgt. Roger Huffman, Howard Freeman (CIA), John Spence (CIA).

• Killed during rescue: CMSgt. Richard L. Etchberger.

• Killed in action/body not recovered: Lt. Col. Clarence F. Blanton, MSgt. James H. Calfee, TSgt. Melvin A. Holland, SSgt. Herbert A. Kirk, SSgt. Henry G. Gish, SSgt. Willis R. Hall, SSgt. James W. Davis, SSgt. David S. Price, TSgt. Donald K. Springsteadah, SSgt. Don F. Worley.

• Killed in action/body recovered: TSgt. Patrick L. Shannon.

"The highest obligation and privilege of citizenship is that of bearing arms for one's country." - General George S Patton, Jr