71st Evac Hosp-Pleiku, Vietnam - Stories

These stories are true, but the names may be
changed to protect the innocent. Besides, my memory
isn't very good any more. I haven't researched any of these for historical detail, but have lived them. Steven Streeper - Copyright, 2007

Periodically, we'd get wounded guys in who
were "blank". They'd be wearing jungle fatigues or tiger stripes, with no insignia, no nametags, no labels on their clothing, brought in by unmarked choppers...completely unmarked choppers or jeeps. They may as well have had "CIA" in four-foot-tall letters emblazoned on their transportation and wearing hot pink pantsuits. In a world of military identification, their very innocuousness made them stand out.

They were always accompanied by a "friend" who could answer questions for them, in the event they were unconscious. As part of our paperwork, we'd ask for their name, rank, serial number, unit, location when wounded, etc. To these questions, we got a lot of "John Smith's", with fake rank, unit and serial numbers. When asked where they were wounded, they'd say "in the leg", "in the arm", etc., which, though true, was not exactly what we wanted to know...we could figure that part out for ourselves, thank you very much!! "No, no, I need to know where you were when you were wounded", we'd say in frustration. "You don't need to know that, pal, just take care of my buddy and we'll leave", would be a common response. These guys were as tough as steel and packing (carrying a weapon), so we'd just patch them up and send them on their way. We figured they were on our side (and glad of it!), so we just took care of them. We even gave them the "Company" discount...

Story by Steven Streeper - Copyright, 2007

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