2V  GHOSTS

During the June 16, 1969, attack, one of my men on the Reaction Team fired a lucky shot which detonated the satchel charges on the back of a Viet Cong Sapper. My man was injured from the concussion, but miraculously he received no serious injuries. I was the first one to reconnoiter the blast area, but I could not find any Viet Cong bodies; instead, the adjacent boulders were covered in blood and bits of human flesh. The charges had detonated between two large boulders, which had the effect of redirecting the forces from the explosion back towards the men and obliviated their bodies. Only the bottom of one sneaker was found, along with five toes still under the toe part. We also found one Ho Chi Minh sandal with three toes. The AK-47 rifle that one of the sappers was carrying was bent in half and unusable. If I had not seen it for myself, I never would have believed what had happened to those two Sappers.
The Viet Cong Sappers by 1969 were under the direct control of the 429th Sapper Group which was part of the North Vietnamese Army. Only the bravest and most determined soldiers were picked for the sapper missions. When these warriors would attack one of our camps, they usually wore only a loin cloth. They would cover their bodies with grease then apply charcoal to make themselves almost invisible during the night. Most of their missions were suicidal and during the Nui Ba Den attack I did everything I could think of to drive them out of our perimeter or kill them before they realized that my Reaction Team was hunting them down.