Cooking with C-4

[QRQ 30]

Like I say, I am a slow reader. I just got to the part in "Secret Commando" about sleeping on the side of a ridge under a fallen tree. This is eerie since it is so similar to my last post in the "Briefback" section.

Plaster mentions using C-4 for heating rations. We used to do that and several personnel were medevaced with serious symptoms. A few from the field which jeopardized the rest of the team and their dustoff crews. C-4 is highly toxic, especially if ingested. This can come about because a small piece flakes off into the drink or food. The fumes are also toxic, causing severe headaches. The practice was stopped and strictly forbidden by the CO of FOB-2 and I think it even went up as far as Col Warren in Danang. This was before Plaster's time and I don't deny that the practice may have resumed secretly.

Not only is C-4 toxic bur it emits a pungent odor. When a man, or animal becomes sensory deprived he compensates. In the jungle we were vision impaired and therefore the senses of smell and hearing sharpened. This was one of the advantages of having the Yards along. They could hear and smell people long before we. Those of you who are hunters are aware of scent discipline. C-4 was a strict no-no, as well as freshly laundered clothes. That is why the teams looked as scruffy prior to insertion as after. (refer to pictures of my team in the FOB-3 section). IF we smoked it was "Yard" tobacco not American. Etc, Etc.

Not necessarily the only method, but often our choppers used a "leap frog" method of insertion. They flew in trail and the lead chopper would drop and wait for the others to pass then resume flight at the end of the cue. Someone watching would have no idea when a ship had set down and off loaded troops unless he were on or very near the LZ.

Again accept Plaster's book as a very good and realistic read, not as history.