A good nights rest might do wonders for Maos health, he pointed out, in which case he, for one, wouldnt mind revisiting her in the morning. Unlike their civilian counterparts, Vorst said, the law officers (the term by which military judges were known) and members of the court (as jurors were known) had a sympathetic understanding of the pressures a combat man faced in risking his life daily; military jurists didnt expect foot soldiers to be on their best behavior in a war zone. When he spoke, however, it was about his friendship with the Marine. Far from where the daily, relentless fighting was going on, he pointed out, Radcliff was probably less disposed to take gratuitous violence in stride; besides, there were infinitely more people at the division base, and that gave him a better chance of finding the effective ally he needed. Asked whether Meserve might not have been searching the hootches of Maos hamlet for the strictly military purpose of finding strange faces, he answered, I wouldnt say this, sir. Where we were, it was a time and place for thousands of men to play for keeps, and that certainly included Meserve and the others in the patrol, because if they wanted to eliminate Sven as a potential witness they had the M-16s to do it with., Eriksson finished telling his story to the chaplain toward midnight, whereupon Kirk pressed him closely, as Vorst had done earlier, to determine whether he was certain in his mind that he was prepared to endure not just the cross-examinations but the risks attendant upon appearing as a government witness in open court. The incident on Hill 192 refers to the kidnap, gang rape, and murder of Phan Thi Mao, a young Vietnamese woman on November 19, 1966 by an American squad during the Vietnam War. Whatever the answers, Captain Vorst saw to it that Eriksson left his command early the following morning, sending the enlisted man seventy miles away to Camp Radcliff, the 1st Cavalry (Airmobile) Division base, near the small city of An Khe. His manner became momentarily subdued when Meserve waved him in as the third man, but Clark was his jaunty self again when he returned. But they werent as sure about it as the guys in the platoon had been, he said. The patrol and Mao shared the hootch that night, the girl spending it in a corner by herself. He was 34 years old. By the time he concluded his last appearance on the stand, he had been accused of lying, of cowardice, and even of Maos murder. INCIDENT ON HILL 192 (from my war diary) Manuel received a sentence of fifteen years, his punishment for rape. Did you fire your weapon? Cross-examining, the prosecutor asked, When you say he didnt have a sense of humor, you mean he wasnt a jokester, running around making or seeing the funny side of everything?. 971 Words4 Pages. A: I dont think Im braver than Eriksson. He and his wife, Kirsten, have a neat, modest apartment of three rooms, its walls decorated with paintings by Mrs. Eriksson, a Sunday artist, who was present while we talked; she is twenty-three and is employed as a receptionist in an insurance office. Related period. He remembers that he talked with one of them while they were both shaving, and that in shooting the breeze with another he led the conversation around to Greenacre when the man mentioned that Arizona was where he dreamed of spending his first post-war vacation. The two Diazes laughed, either out of embarrassment, Eriksson conjectures, or because they thought Meserve was joking, in view of his remark about the morale of the squadan old gag in the platoon. carefully explained that to me, informing me of my legal rights, one of which was to shut up. When the interrogation was over, he was asked to lead a search party to the spot on Hill 192 where he had claimed that Maos body could be found. 1/4 Fifty-four years ago today four US army soldiers murdered Phan Thi Mao, whom they had kidnapped and gang-raped in what is now called the incident on hill 192. en.wikipedia.org. You Are Here: ross dress for less throw blankets apprentissage des lettres de l'alphabet incident on hill 192 where are they now. It repeated itself in waves, broken only, Eriksson assumed, by Maos need to summon fresh breath. email: dr.diipk@gmail.comtwitter.com/diipkfacebook.com/diipkhttps://literarism.blogspot.comTelegram Grouphttps://t.me/KashyapDeepak#diipk #KashyapDeepak Accordingly, at nine the group struck out for the cliff. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy and Cookie Statement and Your California Privacy Rights. Meserve at once radioed the platoon command, reaching Lieutenant Reilly, to whom he suggested that the V.C. Film rights were bought by David Susskind who was to produce the film for Warner Bros. Pete Hamill wrote a script and Jack Clayton was to direct. As Rafe recounted it, Meserve saw her and said, There she goes. Clark said, Why, that bitch, I stabbed her more than twice. Meserve told us all to shoot her before she could get away. In due course, they came upon Mao, her remains a rigid crescent settled grotesquely in a half nest of soil and rocks and matted foliage. The gunships were now unmistakably in the area, their motors sending up a storm of noise as the machines hovered low and their crews searched out the enemy. But the assertion was a hard one to prove, for Rafe was on hand to testify that Eriksson was so situated in that feverish moment that Mao wasnt even in his line of vision. But Rafe stayed, and again the moan and the sobbing, slightly diminished, rose from the hootch. It was still dark in the area, and no civilians attempted to stop us. Leaving the mother behind, the patrol resumed its march, prodding Mao to match its stride. Gervase was found guilty on the count of premeditated murder. They were alone this time, Eriksson told me, and when Eriksson inquired what progress there had been in the murder case, the Captain seemed not to hear but posed a series of questions. Clark at once greeted it with enthusiasm. We couldnt have gone very far, I realized, but it was going to be dark soon and we might find a hideout somewhere in the brush. His reaction interested me, Eriksson said. But, as Eriksson pointed out, he could not give me many such first-hand accounts of V.C. Panting, she finally reached the soldiers, indicating to them that the scarf was Maos and that she would like her daughter to have it; the womans cheeks were wet and her manner was imploring. Besides, what if the four were court-martialled and found guilty? Having appeared as a witness before four tribunals in Vietnam, Eriksson told me, he had had his fill of the judicial processof the dogged grillings by lawyers and the repeated strictures of judges insisting on precise answers to questions that were often vague. or did he just refuse at all times? However, a board of review in Washington, made up of three senior officers, had noticed the C.I.D.s oversight, and it had resulted in a second chance for Manuel. Flying back to Carson, I thought to myself, So Manuels out. When I got up to the girl, I saw that her head was partially blown away, he testified. . At the time, Eriksson told me, he had no idea that the Captain had chewed them out. In the late spring, for instance, he learned that a change of sentence might be in the making for Clark, whose lawyer, it appeared, had asked the jurors who convicted him to approve a petition urging clemency; all but two of them had agreed, and Eriksson was given to understand that this augured an almost certain reduction in sentence. The two other G.I.s in the combat team were a year younger than Eriksson, who was then twenty-two. To counter any such strategy, the prosecutor wanted to have on hand a statement attesting to his chief witnesss mental stability. The idea that came most easily to his mind was to continue in police work, in which he had been engaged since his days at Camp Radcliff, but on applying to the State Highway Patrol for a post as motorcycle cop he discovered that this was impracticable. The only thing you could count on out there was that the unexpected would happen. Usually, Eriksson said, it took time for the unexpected to develop, but nowmore than half a day before the patrol was to leave platoon headquartersit happened with stunning abruptness. She kept looking at me, as though she was trying to guess what my game could be. Eriksson himself helped Manuels case by testifying briefly as a defense witness, corroborating the fact that Manuel had refused to obey Meserves order to kill Mao. Unless Eriksson went along with the others, Meserve warned, he would run the risk of being reported a friendly casualty. Clark seconded this vociferously, and both Diazes concentrated puzzled stares on the difficult member of the patrol. Navigation - The Judge Advocate General's Legal Center & School In the Army, he had discovered, that kind of action depended entirely on the discretion of ones superiorunless it was possible to figure out some way of bypassing him. The climb took longer than it had the day before, the mens pace slowed by the packs they bore. I didnt know then that they were four hundred metres away, at the top of Hill 192, or that it would be a whole hour before they returned. As in all armies, he believed, it pervaded every facet of military life, embracing officers and enlisted men, volunteers and draftees, and, for that matter, men with college degrees, like Vorst and Reilly, and men with meagre educations, like Meserve and him. munitions cache on Hill 192. No such dismay was expressed. Meserve and the others returned an hour later, toward noon, and had a hearty snack, eating it outdoors, near the entrance to the hut. In the hootch, Eriksson recalled, Mao, now relieved of Manuels pack, watched him and Rafe heave out junk for a while, and then, unasked, the girl lent the G.I.s a hand. He didnt laugh and joke as much as the other guys did; he was much quieter, the sergeant said. Necessarily, he said, he was in a position to speak only of the behavior of American soldiers, since they were the people he fought and lived with. Additional pictures were taken a week later, when Eriksson led a second pilgrimage to Hill 192. As a result, Eriksson spent the next two days surreptitiously doing a kind of security check on Greenacres character. But. The two have no children. This meant going to platoon headquartersthe home of four squads, and only a few minutes walk from company headquarters, where there were officers who outranked Reilly, the platoons lone lieutenant. Meserve said nothing to Rafe; nor did he say anything to any of the others when, as the mission unfolded, they committed similar derelictions. Before long, Eriksson told me, his sleuthing established that Greenacre was well thought of, and one evening, after the carpenters had finished eating, he invited Greenacre to take a walk with him. He hopes to open a small carpentry shop of his own in several years, but, ideally, he would like to be a farmera career that he doubts he will ever be able to afford. I simply asked, do you think a murderer should be retained in the United States Army? But the longer I was over there, the more I became convinced that it was the other way around that countedthat because we might not be around much longer, we had to take extra care how we behaved. Vorst was in the group, and Eriksson, detaching himself from his unit, went up to the Captain and told him about Mao. I called him back and commended him on the job that he did and reported it, in turn, to the company headquarters.. The C.I.D. On November 22nd, Meserve, Clark, and Manuel, weary from their five-day stint (Rafe was still hospitalized), had scarcely dropped into their foxholes back in the platoon area when they were ordered to appear at Captain Vorsts command posta hootch somewhat larger than Reillys but equally bare. Eriksson decides to do something about her death and reports it to his superiors. It was the way I felt, he said. Vorsts executive officer, by contrast, could not countenance the thought of Meserves being cashiered. Throughout, he told me, the single belief that sustained him was that in serving as the defendants principal accuser he was carrying out the resolve he had made as he trained his grenade launcher on the cave complex; namely, to let the world know of Maos fate. It was impossible for me to have any part of what I knew was about to take place. He suspects that Meserve sensed this, for before anything else happened the Sergeant confronted him, demanding to know whether he would enter the hootch when his turn came. Going about their tasks with unrelieved efficiency, the men staked out an area thirty feet square in which to conduct their operations, soon gathering a harvest of clues, among them lead fragments of spent bullets, for the ballistics and firearms men, and parts of Maos remains, for the pathologists. Arriving at the austere hootch that Reilly used as a command post, Eriksson told me, he imagined that the Lieutenant, if only conversationally, would express dismay over the murder. For protective custody, they said., From that point on, Erikssons life in the Army was radically changed. Mao was ungagged but was given no food; noticing that she was flushed and coughing slightly, Meserve handed her an aspirin. To listen to them, and to the testimony that the guys in the patrol gave, Mao was probably living happily in her hamlet. As early as the opening day of Rafes trial, which was the first one held, he realized that it was idle to consider whether the G.I.s punishment would, or could, fit the crime. Lying awake nights, listening to Asian birdsong and the squealing of monkeys in the jungle nearby, he said, he found himself constantly mulling over the phenomenon of military disciplinethe chain-of-command system. The New Yorker may earn a portion of sales from products that are purchased through our site as part of our Affiliate Partnerships with retailers. As a result, Eriksson left Colorado for Fort Leavenworth, where Manuel, serving his time in the Disciplinary Barracks, was to be retried. But caves werent all that the five men would he looking for. In a sample encomium, Lieutenant Reilly declared that the Sergeants character and reputation are the best I have seen, and [he is] one of the best combat soldiers I have known. Reilly also called him a fine soldier, and went on to say, He never failed to accomplish the mission. Eriksson was delighted with this duty, since he had had a passion for carpentry all his life. Had he taken into account the amount of suffering that Americans had already undergone in behalf of the Vietnamese? Q: How did you react to this particular ambush, Eriksson? His persistence in reporting the crime to higher authorities eventually resulted in general courts-martial against his four fellow squad mates. Even the prosecutor predicted defeat, Eriksson told me, and during a short break Eriksson heard the judge remark to the court reporter that the trial was a waste of the taxpayers money. I mean, if I let you go, do you think you can make it home? I wish Mao and I could have talked, Eriksson said, his voice tightening. Returning to the patrols briefing, Eriksson told me that Meserve was all business as he plunged into his talk. In warat least, the war we were init was nothing unusual to hear shots that were unexplained, to find a body that might or might not have been shot in combat. Out on a search-and-destroy mission the morning after leaving Meserves command, Eriksson told me, he encountered a small group of American military men reconnoitring the vicinity of the cave complex. Manuel admitted to C.I.D. Through an interpreter, Loc related that after the patrol finished with their hamlet, she and her mother had searched desperately for Mao. Id never known the Army had any such unit, Eriksson told me. He had no one to talk to over there. agents, photographers, a firearms expert, and a ballistics man. rallied to the patrols defense that idea seemed less tenable. Its obey the man over you, follow the chain of command, or into the stockade you go. Something that added to his feeling of frustration in those trying weeks was that he could not find it within himself to single out Vorst as the arch-villain, from whom all evil flowed. It took him a while to realize this, he said, and, curiously, he became persuaded of its prevalence as a result of thinking about Vorst s negative handling. As he went over it in his mind for the hundredth time, he began to suspect the existence of cracks in the Captains seemingly certain, untroubled faade. Commenting on this, Eriksson told me, I realized that nothing definite had happened yet, but I had the feeling it was the first sign that things were going to work out the way Captain Vorst had warned me they wouldI mean, that the sentences would get shorter and shorter, maybe even disappear.. The mother, Eriksson told me, was waving a scarf and laboriously propelling herself forward. Now, watching the chaplain depart, Eriksson decided that Greenacre was very much worth cultivating. With few exceptions, these witnesses had fought alongside the defendants, and it was a powerful camaraderie they shared, forged, as it was, in combat, where they had all saved each others lives more than once. Captain Vorst handed Meserve a piece of paper with three words printed on itKidnapping, Rape, Murder. Besides, she was in no condition to reach home or anywhere else. Things will get sorted out, he said. As the others clustered around it, Eriksson withdrew to the fringes of the circle, made uncomfortable by everyones purposeful curiosity. In our part of Minnesota, just about everyone is., It was ten at night when Eriksson sat down to talk with Kirk, and he found he was able to speak more freely than he had even to Curly Rowan. He said it was only human to make mistakes., Erikssons attempt to forget Mao proved futile, as he had really known it would. The atrocity that Eriksson had reported was too big for that. The day continued eventful. Incident on Hill 192 - Wikipedia Since the patrol would be going out again, Eriksson said, he knew he had to act fast, but that seemed no big deal. They were very definite. There Is Yet More to Casualties of War - Phoenix New Times He was uncertain how he would act with her, he said, even though, oddly, he felt he knew her well; her cries, he said, had thrown him into a turmoil he had never before experienced. I needed more of an impression of Boyd than I had, Eriksson said. Nor could the concern that the C.O. As for the defendants themselves, only Rafe showed contrition, the most striking manifestation of which was his decision to testify against Clark. the bunker in the hootch. In charge of the group were a colonel, a major, and, after they reached the airstrip, Captain Vorst himself, who maintained silence toward Eriksson. Out of the blue, without being asked, hed start defending what hed done maybe hours ago by saying that, after all, it was no worse than what Charlie was doing. From the minute I got to Radcliff, I was on the lookout for him, whoever he might turn out to be, Eriksson said. Im talking about a murder. The incident on Hill 192 refers to the kidnapping, gang rape, and murder of Phan Thi Mao, a young Vietnamese woman, on November 19, 1966 by an American squad during the Vietnam War. Incident on Hill 192 Daniel Lang Published by Secker & Warburg, London, Great Britain, 1970 Seller: Secondhand Books 'n' Things, Ross Creek, Australia Seller Rating: Contact seller Book First Edition Used - Hardcover Condition: Good 44.51 Convert currency 9.15 Shipping From Australia to United Kingdom Quantity: 1 Add to Basket Hardcover. Clark could knife the girl from the front, the Sergeant said, while he bayoneted her from behind; the body would then be tossed over a cliff from the summit of Hill 192, where the patrol had reconnoitred the previous day. Incident on Hill 192 | Historica Wiki | Fandom The enemy did the same thing, and much of the evidence for this came from the Vietnamese themselves. He has no idea to what extent that may operate, however; nor is he prepared, he said, to bank on anything so abstract. Then I thought of taking off together with her. It was a six-hour trek, over difficult terrain, and when the men finally stood just below the summit, several of them, who were unaccustomed to tramping so long, were near exhaustion. Then he proceeded to tell us that if anything happened to Eriksson, our souls would belong to him. Possibly to help them retain their souls, Vorst announced that he was breaking up the patrol. He had no idea how long this feeling would continue, but for the present, he knew, he lived with the charge daily, often wondering how Mao might have fared in a time of peace. Incident on Hill 192 ~ Murder & Rape Details with Photos | Videos All right, go ahead, Meserve said, and he instantly turned his attention to the enemy, ordering Eriksson to the lower ledge of rock while he and Manuel returned to the upper one, with Rafe to their rear. These guys right here are going to start laughing you out. Looking back, Eriksson thinks that the small band of V.C. It was certainly possible to do so, as I knew for myself from having read the court record of the trials he had brought about: seven bulky volumes in the offices of the Clerk of Courts, U.S. Army Judiciary, in Falls Church, Virginia, which included Erikssons testimony against the members of the patrol; their convictions and appeals; interminable correspondence between judges and opposing counsel; and depositions concerning the character of individual defendants.
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