Peter Paden was aboard a helicopter hovering by way of a gap within the clouds. Because it dropped the rear ramp on a hilltop beneath hearth, he reached for a wounded Marine’s hand.
The Marine had stepped on a landmine. Paden’s crew from A Firm, 159th Assault Help Helicopter Battalion, name signal Pachyderm, took the mission to extract the wounded Marine.
“He slips from my hand and falls on the bottom,” Paden stated. “He will get again up, I pull him up. I keep in mind that as a result of I felt so unhealthy I dropped him two ft off the bottom.”
The Marine thanked Paden, who provided the wounded Jarhead a cigarette.
It was one mission amongst a whole lot. Over a single 12-month tour, Paden logged 1,800 flight hours as a door gunner, crew chief and flight engineer on one in all Vietnam’s most indispensable and weak plane, the CH-47, also referred to as the Chinook.
Becoming a member of the Army
Paden was born Sept. 25, 1949, in Norristown, Pennsylvania, and grew up in Cherry Hill, New Jersey. His dad and mom divorced, and by his teenage years he was skipping faculty and working out of possibilities.
“My mom was uninterested in coping with me and my rebelling,” Paden stated. “She gave me the selection to affix the army or transfer out of the home.”
He tried the Marines first. They turned him down. The Army took him in January 1967.
Army service ran deep within the household, his father was a World Warfare II veteran, an aunt served as a Navy nurse throughout the identical battle, and an uncle labored on helicopters throughout Korea.
Paden was inducted at Newark, New Jersey, sworn in at Philadelphia, despatched to Fort Dix, then bused to Fort Benning, Georgia, for primary coaching and superior particular person coaching. His preliminary project to infantry airborne fell by way of attributable to a foul again. His testing confirmed aptitude for aviation, and the Army despatched him to Fort Rucker, Alabama, for helicopter upkeep coaching. He lastly earned his highschool diploma throughout this coaching.
He was then despatched to Fort Sill, Oklahoma, which had no aviation property, so the Army put him in a motor pool as a elements clerk. After 13 months of frustration, he instructed a chaplain that if the Army couldn’t put him in a job they skilled him for, he was contemplating going AWOL.
The chaplain obtained him right into a small aviation detachment with no helicopters, 5 males and an empty hangar. Then they have been assigned a Huey gunship and a CH-34 the crew rigged as a second gunship. Their job was flying demonstrations on the firing vary for visiting dignitaries.
Quickly sufficient, Paden acquired standalone orders for Vietnam as an 11B infantryman headed to the first Cavalry Division.
Arriving in Nation
Paden arrived in Vietnam in early April 1968 to seek out the unit he was supposed to affix had been decimated. With nowhere to place him, the Army assigned him to help a wounded soldier ending his tour as a lifeguard on the seaside at Cam Ranh Bay.
“I am saying, if that is what Vietnam is like, this may not be too unhealthy,” Paden stated.
He was finally shuffled to Cu Chi, then Da Nang, the place he crammed sandbags till a sergeant requested if anybody was certified on computerized weapons. With expertise in aviation and with computerized weapons, Paden was despatched to his new unit.
The unit was the 2 hundredth Assault Help Helicopter Firm, a part of the first Aviation Brigade, establishing at Phu Bai airfield south of Hue. They have been constructing from scratch with tents going up and Seabees setting up Quonset huts. The 2 hundredth would later be redesignated A Firm, 159th Assault Help Helicopter Battalion, the “Pachyderms,” and hooked up to the one hundred and first Airborne Division. The corporate operated 16 CH-47 Chinooks, every with a crew of 5 together with two pilots, a door gunner, a crew chief and a flight engineer.
Paden began as a gunner.
“Simply Shoot a Lot”
The veteran gunner who skilled him stored the directions easy.
“He instructed me, ‘I do not want you to be correct. I do not care if you’re. Whenever you shoot, simply shoot so much,'” Paden stated.
A Chinook coming right into a touchdown zone was not delicate, it got here in low and sluggish, saying itself with the thump of tandem rotors lengthy earlier than it was seen. The door gunner’s job was to put down sufficient suppressive hearth to maintain enemy heads down throughout method and touchdown. Earlier than each mission, crews checked with floor models for patrol areas and the place hearth was coming from.
The times began between 4 and 4:30 a.m. Missions acquired the night time earlier than went on the board, sorties have been assigned to helicopters, and crews flew all day. However the schedule was fluid as new missions came visiting the radio continually.
Paden carried his M79 grenade launcher with high-explosive, white phosphorus and buckshot rounds. He was a door gunner for less than three or 4 weeks earlier than transferring to crew chief, then flight engineer inside months, a quick development pushed by the tempo at which the battle consumed males.
As flight engineer, he ran the again of the plane. He supervised the crew chief and door gunner, managed all inner hundreds, coordinated with upkeep crews and had ultimate say on whether or not the Chinook picked up a load or not.
“I had no drawback telling pilots what to do or what to not do,” Paden stated. “I used to be extra aware of who the nice pilots have been and who the unhealthy ones have been.”
The A Shau Valley and the one hundred and first Airborne
For essentially the most of his tour, Paden’s firm supported the one hundred and first Airborne. The work centered on the A Shau Valley, a jungle hall working parallel to the Laotian border that served as a significant artery for North Vietnamese males and provides flowing south alongside the Ho Chi Minh Path.
The one hundred and first’s doctrine was constructed round momentary hearth help bases, establishing one to cowl one other, then leapfrogging ahead as wanted. Paden’s Chinooks have been the spine, hauling howitzers and ammunition into hilltop positions unreachable every other manner.
Flying between these bases was harmful even with out enemy contact. Artillery batteries ran fixed hearth missions, and crews needed to navigate corridors between lively gun-target traces.
“It’s totally hazardous simply from your personal property,” Paden stated. “You need to ensure you do not fly into areas they’re doing hearth missions at.”
The enemy added one other layer. The NVA had anti-aircraft weapons dug into the mountains flanking the valley. At one level, the Chinook crews took hearth each time they flew by way of. Airstrikes by no means stopped it. Reconnaissance groups later found why.
“The NVA had dug tunnels and put a gun on a railroad monitor,” Paden stated. “After they heard us coming, they might pull it out and shoot. Then when quick movers got here in, they might transfer it again in.”
When the rounds have been massive sufficient, .50-caliber or equal, the crews may see the tracers and shoot again. Smaller rounds have been worse.
“You might hear it. You’ll be able to hear the rounds hitting the aspect of the plane,” Paden stated.
Paden’s Chinook took hits on a number of events however by no means misplaced a vital system within the air. The CH-47 was constructed with twin hydraulic programs, shedding one didn’t imply shedding the plane. A spherical by way of a rotor blade was one other story.
On one mission, injury pressured the crew to place the Chinook down in hostile territory and watch for a restore group whereas infantry secured a fringe round them.
The Risks of Fight
Paden’s first direct encounter with dying got here early. His crew was flying ammunition resupply when a name came visiting the radio that an infantry unit had captured a NVA anti-aircraft gun and wanted it extracted. Paden’s Chinook diverted.
The timber had been blown to create a clearing, however a sniper was ready.
“The pilot took a spherical to the top,” Paden stated. The pilot slumped onto the controls and practically drove the plane into the tree line. The co-pilot seized the stick and flew to the hospital at Phu Bai. The person didn’t survive.
The captured gun nonetheless wanted to come back out. On a subsequent mission, Paden’s crew volunteered to return in with an additional crew member mounted on the rear ramp with an M60.
“When flying again in, we acquired hearth from the rear. He took out the man in a tree,” Paden stated. Although he was uncertain if it was the identical soldier that had killed the pilot.
He didn’t dwell on it. “I had a job to do. That is the best way I checked out it.”
The Pachyderms Go North
In January 1969, Paden’s firm was among the many first Army Chinook crews despatched north to help the third Marine Division and the ninth Marine Regiment. The Marines have been getting ready what would grow to be Operation Dewey Canyon, the final main Marine Corps offensive of the battle, a 56-day sweep of the Da Krong and A Shau valleys close to the Laotian border.
The reception from the Marines was hostile.
“Once we first went up there, they handled us like crap,” Paden stated. “They known as us doggies. They would not allow us to use their mess corridor or bathe amenities.”
The Pachyderms operated out of Touchdown Zone Vandegrift, the staging base for the ninth Marines. They slept of their plane. They flew the identical missions as with the one hundred and first, ammunition, resupply, artillery displacement, troop lifts, however found the Marines had a wholly totally different method to fireside help base operations.
Marine aviation was smaller and lacked the heavy-lift capability the Army introduced. Marine bases have been extra everlasting because the Marines went out to seek for the enemy. The department was simply now adopting the extra cellular method to fight operations in Vietnam.
“The Marines not often did that,” Paden stated. “They have been beginning to comply with Army coverage to arrange self-supporting hearth help bases, which they by no means did earlier than. They did not have sufficient heavy-lift capability to help the mission.”
Coordination issues went past ways. Paden recalled flying a Marine ahead observer onto the USS New Jersey as a result of floor crews couldn’t talk hearth missions to the battleship’s gun crews.
“The primary month was a cluster,” Paden stated. “After that, everybody began getting on the identical web page.”
The turning level was less complicated than doctrine. The Pachyderms flew missions Marine helicopter crews have been unable to.
“We by no means refused to do a mission,” Paden stated.
Marine helicopters, together with the Huey and Sikorsky, struggled at occasions attributable to climate or inexperienced crews. Paden’s chinook was in a position to conduct operations Marine choppers couldn’t. Solely after Paden left months later did Marine Corps aviation broaden to incorporate bigger and extra highly effective transport craft.
“I picked up wounded the place Marines would not go as a result of they stated they could not get in,” Paden stated.
Attitudes finally modified. The Marines got here to respect and appreciated the Army chinook crews, even giving them tents and a barracks. When casualties got here aboard, the crew provided water, C-rations, cigarettes and beer from the igloo cooler they flew with. When the wounded couldn’t transfer, the crew made them as comfy as doable on the cargo ground.
Not each load was wounded. Some have been physique luggage.
“The worst factor was selecting up simply luggage,” Paden stated. “It sort of makes you conscious of what can occur there.”
Throughout the Border
The hilltop medevac by way of the clouds was not the one time Paden’s service with the Marines practically killed him.
On one insertion, his crew was dropping a Marine squad onto a hearth help base beneath mortar hearth. A Marine struggled to dump tools and Paden jumped in to assist. The Marine stepped on Paden’s communications twine, severing his connection to the cockpit. He circled to see his Chinook lifting off with out him as mortar rounds hit throughout the touchdown zone.
The pilots didn’t notice he was gone till they have been airborne. They circled till the shelling stopped and got here again.
On one other mission, Paden’s crew refueled from a Marine gas level with contaminated JP-4. Whereas draining the unhealthy gas from the Chinook’s three tanks, a valve caught open and jet gas soaked his flight swimsuit. JP-4 burns on contact with pores and skin.
The ache finally turned insufferable mid-flight and Paden requested the pilot to land on a small island in the course of a river so he may strip off his garments to leap in.
A Marine additionally stole his M79 grenade launcher after his crew inserted a patrol, later triggering a CID investigation that delayed Paden’s departure from Vietnam. The weapon had earned its preserve.
Throughout one sizzling touchdown zone insertion, his door gunner’s M60 jammed and Paden grabbed the grenade launcher and eradicated the risk himself.
“I cherished that weapon,” he stated.
Because the battle progressed, the Pachyderms’ missions expanded. They flew flare drops at night time. They dropped napalm from the cargo ramp, 55-gallon drums in cargo nets, launched over targets that fixed-wing plane couldn’t attain.
The infantry known as corrections as thermite grenades have been dropped to ignite the gas on affect. In addition they dropped Agent Orange and tear fuel utilizing rack programs loaded with barrels, pushing every part out the again.
“I am nonetheless in touch with guys I served with, eight of us that get collectively,” Paden stated. “Out of them, possibly one would not have most cancers.”
The Pachyderms additionally flew throughout the Laotian border in help of Operation Dewey Canyon, missions that have been categorized for many years. Crews have been forbidden from chatting with journalists beneath risk of court-martial.
“We went in farther than the bounds,” Paden stated. He didn’t study the complete scope of what his unit had participated in till he visited the Nationwide Archives 45 years later and located the declassified orders.
Throughout his time in I Corps, Paden’s crew additionally flew civilian evacuations throughout monsoon season, transferring Vietnamese households with their chickens, pigs and no matter else they might perform of flooded villages.
In addition they steadily transported ARVN troops, whom Paden stated he didn’t belief as different models had reported troopers leaving booby-trapped grenades aboard helicopters after flights.
“The one good ARVN models have been their Airborne or Tiger models,” Paden stated. “Disciplined and able to struggle.”
Going House
After supporting the Marines, Paden and the remainder of his unit have been despatched again to the one hundred and first. Nonetheless, the hazard was nonetheless current. After one mission, because the rotor blades wound down on the bottom, the plane shook violently and a blade dropped onto the fuselage. A shock absorber piston had snapped in flight however held in place by way of momentum alone.
“If that occurred whereas flying, we might’ve gone down,” Paden stated.
On one other event, a upkeep crew put in a hydraulic actuator backward. The pilot engaged the system and the flight controls reversed. He managed to close it off earlier than the plane hit the bottom.
Paden’s flying in Vietnam led to March 1969 throughout a big airmobile operation. His Chinook crashed and he walked away with bruises. He spent his remaining weeks on the bottom ready for a flight house.
He left Vietnam in April 1969.
He flew house from San Diego with a fellow crew member, a door gunner named Mitchell, the identical man whose M60 had jammed on a sizzling LZ whereas Paden killed the risk together with his M79. On the base gate, they walked into antiwar demonstrators.
“Calling us child killers and throwing shit at us,” Paden stated.
They discovered a liquor retailer however have been unable to get flights house. The 2 ended up in Las Vegas for 2 days, having fun with the expertise after months in fight.
They finally boarded a airplane to New York full of a Jewish household getting back from a bar mitzvah, who purchased them males drinks in the course of the flight.
“They handled us like gold,” Paden stated.
In New York, the 2 parted methods. Paden returned to his household in New Jersey, however he nonetheless had a while left on his contract.
His final obligation station was Fort Eustis, Virginia, the place the Army made him a upkeep teacher on CH-47s. He separated as an E-5 in January 1970.
After the Warfare
Paden drifted after the battle working part-time however had no actual construction. He finally married his spouse, Janice, and had a daughter in addition to a son. Nonetheless, he struggled with what he had carried house from Vietnam. Paden famous the years have been robust as he struggled to deal with his experiences.
A Marine good friend, a retired first sergeant, pushed him to get assist. The VA’s medical method didn’t work. A Vet Middle in Philadelphia, constructed round group remedy with different fight veterans, did.
“That was the catalyst that obtained the ball rolling for me to get higher,” Paden stated.
He discovered a profession in injection molding manufacturing and retired as a manufacturing supervisor. He volunteered on the Vet Middle for years, serving to different veterans by way of the identical darkness.
Paden is 76 now. His granddaughters attend a Catholic faculty that holds a Veterans Day ceremony yearly. He stated it means greater than most individuals notice.
“I keep in mind the primary time somebody stated ‘thanks to your service’ to me,” Paden stated. “I did not know easy methods to react. That was eight years in the past. We got here house to not solely hatred, but it surely was like they did not care.”
When requested how he views his service in the present day, Paden was blunt.
“I did what I used to be skilled to do. I believe I saved lives,” he stated. “I believe battle is the epitome of the madness of man. I really feel as unhealthy for the Vietnamese as I do for vets combating what they went by way of. And if I needed to placed on the uniform once more in the present day, I’d.”
Paden nonetheless remembers his experiences in Vietnam as vividly as ever. As a crewmember on a CH-47 Chinook, he logged over 1,800 flight hours and took half in numerous missions starting from resupply to medical evacuations. Alongside the Huey, the Chinook stays one of the vital identifiable symbols of the Vietnam Warfare and nonetheless stays an important element of Army aviation in the present day.
