I wanted to write a story about Rosco's distrust of all the Vietnamese. I don't recall where I heard this. I wrote it in 1st person as if it was being told to someone.
When I first got out here - right off the chopper - my CO instructed us not to trust any one not in American combat attire. He warned there were no innocent civilians out here.
About that time a little boy came out of the wooded area. He looked beaten, was bleeding and crying. His arms were behind his back.
The CO kept commanding us to shoot the boy. When no one did, he took a pistol from my belt and dropped the kid in his tracks.
It was quite bewildering, but not as shocking as the shinny metallic object that fell out of the boys hands and rolled toward us.
I barely had enough time shout "grenade" before instinctively falling to the ground and covering my ears.
Posted by Michael at September 28, 2004 07:11 PM