Top left and bottom right. South Korean soldiers for the ROK "Tiger Division" load onto American helicopters to do a "sweep" near Phu Cat Air Base, Vietnam. Tiger Division soldiers augmented 12th Tactical Fighter Wing security policemen in providing air base ground defense. Duty in the war zone by Dominick Cardonita AIA/PA Kelly Air Force Base, Texas

By then, the war in Southeast Asia had gone on for years. Americans wanted out of the war and there were demonstrations against the war, the administration and anything else that was considered "establishment."

I was assigned to the 12th Tactical Fighter Wing at Phu Cat Air Base in Binh Dinh Province as chief of Combat News. If you look at a map of Vietnam, go halfway up the coast to Qui Nhon, then go west 20 miles or so and there it is.

The 12th TFW had recently been activated there, having moved up from Cam Ranh Bay. It included a couple of F-4 Phantom fighter squadrons, an AC-19 "Shadow" gunship squadron, 0-2 equipped Herb and Tum FACs (Forward Air Controllers who supported American and Korean forces respectively), a Tactical Electronic Warfare Squadron flying EC-47s (same as what's on display in front of the AIA headquarters building) and the 537th Tactical Airlift Squadron (better known as "Pig & Chickens" airlines).

While I got the opportunity to fly aboard many of the wing's aircraft, it was the 537th that I recall most vividly. They flew the C-7 "Caribou," a twin engine propeller aircraft that the Air Force got from the Army.

The 537th TAS was responsible for taking supplies to American fire bases and to American Special Forces serving with Montaignard (Vietnamese Highland People) in Civilian Irregular Defense Force camps in very remote areas of South Vietnam. The C-7 was well-suited for the job, as it could take off and land on short runways, and dirt strips; places where other aircraft couldn't go.

Cargo from a C-7 Caribou is off-loaded at a remote Civilian Irregular Defense Force camp somewhere in South Vietnam. The aircraft and crew in this 1970 photo were assigned to the 537th Tactical Airlift Squadron at Phu Cat Air Base.

A technique used to off-load supplies was called "speed off-load." The supplies were loaded on skids and tied down to the rollers inside the cargo bay of the aircraft. Upon landing and reaching the offload area, the crew would untie the cargo, back up, hit the brakes and the supplies would come flying out the back end.

The crews would fly numerous sorties each day. They'd fly from Phu Cat, over the mountains, to the staging area at Pleiku Air Base, which by this time had been turned over to the VNAF, and then back and forth to the camps.

Day in, day out, each day every day, the C-7s took food, ammunition and more into the camps. Sometimes, as the "grunts" told us, we'd be the only Americans they'd see for weeks.

Christmas 1970 is a day I'll never forget. This was the day the 537th people painted the nose of a C-7 to look like Santa Claus for a special "SantaBou" mission.

In addition to normal supplies, the aircraft was loaded with all kinds of "goodies" for the Vietnamese children in the camps and some liquid goodies for the Americans. One of the aircrew dressed as Santa Claus and was absolutely mobbed everywhere we went.

We got to spend a little time at the Ben Het special forces camp in the tri-corner area of Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia. After the "goodies" had been divvied out, a Special Forces sergeant gave us a tour of their living area. "Living" was a generous description for a bunch of mud huts clustered up against a hillside. In front of the sergeant's hut was an 81mm mortar. I asked about it and he pointed to a howitzer on a nearby hill. "The mortar," he said, "is trained on the howitzer. The last attack we had, Charlie took the hill. He's not getting the howitzer." It was a cold, matter-of-fact statement, that made me, for one, glad that we had people dedicated enough to endure those kind of living conditions and, at the same time, madder than hell over the antics of the anti-war protesters back in the "world." It's hard to believe that's almost 30 years ago.

Tech. Sgt. Dominick Cardonita makes friends with a Vietnamese child during a visit to a Vietnamese village in 1970. The visit was part of a Medical Civic Actions program whereby American medical personnel would visit villages to provide inoculations and other help to the villagers.

I hope that sergeant made it home safely. Every time I see the Vietnam War Memorial, I think of him and the countless others I met there. Time has erased names, but faces remain. They were young and did their jobs and God and their families can be proud of them all.

May Spokesman On-Line