FOREWORD

This oral history transcript has been produced from an interview with
Colonel (Retired) Douglas Campbell, conducted by LTC (Retired) Brent
Bankus, as part of the Academic Year 2013 US Army War College/US Army
Military History Institutes Vietnam Company Commander Interview Program.
Users of this transcript should note that the original verbatim
transcription of the recorded interview has been edited to improve
coherence, continuity, and accuracy of factual data. No statement of opinion
or interpretation has been changed other than as cited above. The views
expressed in the final transcript are solely those of the interviewee and
interviewer. The US Army War College/US Army Military History Institute
assumes no responsibility for the opinions expressed, or for the general
historical accuracy of the contents of this transcript.
This transcript may be read, quoted, and cited in accordance with
common scholarly practices and the restrictions imposed by both the
interviewee and interviewer. It may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, by
any means whatsoever, without first obtaining the written permission of the
Director, US Army Military History Institute, 950 Soldiers Drive, Carlisle,
Pennsylvania 17013.

DOUGLAS (DOUG) B. CAMPBELL

PROF AD
DOR: 2 FEB 1997

Professor Douglas B. Campbell is a native of New Jersey. He graduated from Rutgers

University, New Brunswick, New Jersey in 1965 with a Bachelor of Science degree in
Agriculture. He also holds a Masters of Public Administration from Shippensburg University,
Shippensburg, Pennsylvania.
He was commissioned into the Army in 1965 and retired from the Army in 1993 as a Colonel
after 28 years of service. His command assignments include Tank Platoon Leader and
Company Commander, 8th Infantry Division, Germany; Cavalry Troop Advisor, ARVN and
Troop Commander, 11th ACR, Vietnam; Cavalry Squadron Commander, 24th Infantry
Division; Commander Warrior Preparation Center, Germany. Key staff positions include
Instructor USA Infantry School, Fort Benning, Georgia; Operations Officer, 11th ACR,
Germany; Special Assistant, Chief of Policy, SHAPE; Battalion Executive Officer and
Brigade Operations Officer, 5th Infantry Division, Fort Polk, Louisiana; Staff Officer, War
Plans division, HQDA, Pentagon, Washington, DC; Senior Live Fire Observer/Controller,
National Training Center, Fort Irwin, California.
After arriving at the Army War College in July 1990, he served as the Director, Army
Planning, Department of Military Strategy, Planning and Operations. He has served in his
present position as Director of the Center for Strategic Leadership since 1993.
Professor Campbell's professional military education includes the Armor Officer Basic and
Advanced Courses, Army Command and General Staff College in 1980; the U.S. Army War
College in 1987; and selection for the Army's Advanced Management Program with
attendance at Stanford University.
His military awards and decorations include the Legion of Merit with four Oak Leaf Clusters,
the Bronze Star with Oak Leaf Cluster, the Meritorious Service Medal with three Oak Leaf
Clusters, the Joint Service Commendation Medal, the Army Commendation Medal, the
Parachutists Badge, and the Army Staff Badge.

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Interview with Colonel Douglas B. Campbell, USA Retired

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Foreword
Bio of Colonel Douglas B. Campbell, USA Retired

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Tape 1, Side 1
Introduction and Vietnam Assignments
Most Significant Personnel Problems
Utilization of Officers and NCOs
Training
Unit Morale
TO&E
Unit Communication in Combat
Environmental Impact on People and Equipment
Types of Missions
Re-supply and Maintenance
Unit Recovery Assets

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2
3
4
5
6
8
9
11
13
14

Tape 1, Side 2
Night Vision Equipment
Night Operations
Living Conditions
The Most Difficult Aspect of Troop Command
Typical Day
Command Philosophy
Advice
Closing Thought

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16
17
18
21
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22
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Appendix A Access Agreement

Colonel Douglas B. Campbell, USA Retired

Appendix B Bio
Brent Bankus

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U.S. Army Military History Institute

VIETNAM COMPANY COMMANDER INTERVIEW PROGRAM
INTERVIEWER: Brent Bankus
INTERVIEWEE: Colonel (Retired) Douglas B. Campbell

[Start C-351, Tape 1, Side 1]

INTERVIEWER: My name is Brent Bankus. Im the Chief, Oral History Branch in
the Military History Institute [MHI]. Im here in Collins Hall interviewing Colonel (Ret.)
Douglas Campbell, Director for the Center of Strategic Leadership and
Development. Today Im conducting a Vietnam Company Commander Interview,
which is a topical program sponsored by MHI and sir, Id like to thank you for your
participation in our program. We really appreciate you passing on the knowledge
that you have from serving. Sir, could you give us a little bit of background on what
organizations you served with in the Republic of Vietnam?

COL CAMPBELL: I had three separate organizations, three separate assignments

in Vietnam. The first one was from July of 1968 to about January of 1969 I was the
II Corps liaison officer down at MACV [Military Assistance Command, Vietnam] East
down in Saigon.

INTERVIEWER: That would be the III Corps area?

COL CAMPBELL: It was in III Corps but it was in the Capital Military District. So I
was in Saigon. Then from January of 1969 to July of 1969 I was a troop advisor to
the troop in the 3rd ARVN [Army Republic of Vietnam] Armored Cavalry out of
Pleiku, II Corps Pleiku, Kontum, Dak Tho, Ben Het area.

INTERVIEWER: Just a little bit about that sir, did they operate, the South
Vietnamese Cavalry, operate like ours? Did they have similar missions?

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COL CAMPBELL: Yes, very similar missions, very similar organizations, they were
all ACAVs [Armored Cavalry Assault Vehicle]. They didnt have any other armored
vehicles within their organization. They had the 81mm mortar variant versus 4.2
mortar variant that we had in US cavalry units and they were all M113 base rather
than anything else.
INTERVIEWER: I was surprised they didnt have any light armor because they had,
if memory serves, like M41 Walker Bulldogs and those kinds of tanks.
COL CAMPBELL: The Squadron had a tank troop with M-41s, but they didnt
integrate them into the Cavalry troops. They had three regular reconnaissance
troops and then the tank troop. So it was sort of a mix between being like a US
Armored Cavalry Regiment with the three cavalry troops and a tank company. The
squadron didnt have a howitzer battery associated with it. And then from August of
1969 until February/March of 1970 I was the troop commander for K Troop of the
11th U.S. Cavalry.

INTERVIEWER: Sir during your tour there principally as the troop commander of K
Troop 3rd Squadron 11th Cavalry. What do you consider were your most significant
people problems?

COL CAMPBELL: Mid grade and senior grade noncommissioned officers. By that
point in the war the Army, based upon assignment policies, in Campbells opinion,
they essentially destroyed the noncommissioned officer corps, because my
experience is we kept sending them back again and again and again to Vietnam and
they were carrying a fairly significant and heavy load. Most of them were just getting
out so we were doing all sorts of things to create noncommissioned officers. We
had the shake and bake program which Im sure youre familiar with. It produced
some very good leaders. The only trouble is it was like having a second lieutenant
as a platoon leader and a second lieutenant as a platoon sergeant because they had
the exact same experience. You didnt get that leavening and the wizening effect of

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the senior platoon sergeant that you would have with a second lieutenant on that
platoon level so that is where the biggest problem was.

INTERVIEWER: Sir, how did you utilize your officers and senior NCOs
[noncommissioned officers] in your organization?
COL CAMPBELL: I look at that question and Im not quite sure where youre
headed. Again, we spent essentially all our time in the field. I think of six months
that I was commanding K Troop we were back from the field in a secure base area
for three or four days where we did a maintenance stand down. Essentially were
out in the field, so the troop exec officer and the troop mess sergeant, who by the
way was one of the strongest NCOs in the organization, ran the rear and everybody
else stayed out forward and so the organization functioned the way the organization
TO&E [table of organization and equipment] was supposed to function. So the
platoons operated with the regular TO&E [Table of Organization and Equipment] for
platoons. We had a first sergeant who had been an advisor to the Idaho National
Guard for the last five or six years before coming in as a first sergeant and left
something to be desired as far as the first sergeant was concerned. Then we had a
small cadre of folks who ran the CP [command post] but besides that everybody
performed the functions that they were supposed to perform in the TO&E.

INTERVIEWER: So essentially what youre saying is that because you had

inexperience in the ranks you really didnt have an opportunity to train these folks
before they went out to the sticks, true statement?

COL CAMPBELL: Well I took command in the sticks, turned over command in the
sticks and so we never did do formal organized training. I never thought it an issue.
Now it was interesting because we would do training when we had the opportunity,
but it was normally at the vehicle level. So it was like Table 8 kind of stuff for ACAVs
or for a Sheridan crew. Wed occasionally do that because your question has
caused me to liken it to essentially whats going on probably in Afghanistan and Iraq.

U.S. Army Military History Institute

I mean youve got this daily grind that youre going through so were either doing
search and destroy, busting our way through jungles to where we think theres
probably enemy concentrations or were doing highway security or something like
that, but essentially were kind of on a daily basis doing missions and so it would be
hard to break away to do anything bigger than that. We would occasionally set up,
especially if we were doing highway security, wed set up on the highway and then
do Table 8 kind of stuff for both Sheridan and ACAVs.

INTERVIEWER: So you did the best you could with what you had and because of
the OPTEMPO [Operations Tempo] being in the field all the time it was pretty much
catch as catch can as far as training would go then.
COL CAMPBELL: Yes, and again the perception, Im sure from senior leaders is
that since youre engaged in combat operations you remain trained and are trained
up. Im not sure, one of my funniest experiences from that because I was following
down an ACAV that was going down the lane and because again were constantly
getting replacements in so to get this brand new Private E Deuce who is in the crew
training and his vehicle commander tells him to get a grenade and throw it
overboard, so he pulls the pin on a grenade and it goes overboard. Its not good
with about five feet off the side of the vehicle and theyre running down and so when
it goes off were all ducking down inside because it goes off right next to our track
about five feet away. So yes it was an interesting period. As I said perception was
that we were training to the mission.

INTERVIEWER: Sir what was the morale like in your unit?

COL CAMPBELL: My initial comments on that, my initial thought was well that was
pretty good although there clearly were problems and it depended on where we
were. So if we were back close to civilianization there were a lot more problems.
Alcohol and drugs became a bigger problem because we were in that period of time
when the drugs were slowly becoming more and more prevalent throughout the

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Army and we were also seeing a general increase in racial problems. So out in the
woods far away from civilianization, everything was good and as we got closer to
bases or the civilian population it became more and more difficult because there
were more distractions for the Soldiers.

INTERVIEWER: Great segue into the next question, what was the entertainment
like? Im kind of leaning towards the Bob Hope kind of thing.

COL CAMPBELL: I found that part funny because except for the three or four days
where somebody set up 8mm projector or something like that there was zero
entertainment. I recall one time where we got to nominate two or three Soldiers to
send them back to some kind of USO show, but zero in entertainment except for the
daily ration of two beers a night and stuff like that. But again, it was different from an
infantry outfit. Were getting resupplied by Chinook twice a day because if the
Chinook didnt come in twice a day with parts and fuel and stuff like that we sort of
ground to a halt so in addition to parts and fuel we were getting hot meals.
Breakfast would be breakfast to order eggs and bacon and all the rest of that and
then there would be a hot evening meal because they would marmite the hot meals
out with the evening Chinook. So our Soldiers were not having the same kind of
difficulty or the same kind of incredibly hard life that infantry guys would have and
when we worked with infantry we were doing some big operation close to War Zone
C because supposedly Intel indicated that the North Vietnamese were going to come
across in great waves to try to break up some South Vietnamese operations. So we
worked with some American infantry and the first thing we did was set the link up
with them because there was a whole bunch of fighting going on around there. After
we linked up with them we just sat all day because they were getting resupplied and
this single Huey would come in and carry water to them and combat rations,
ammunition and other stuff they had requested. And that single Huey working for
most of the day accomplished what one of our morning or one of our afternoons
resupply runs would have accomplished.

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INTERVIEWER: Sir in regards to your TO&E was that adequate? If not, how did
you organize for operations?

COL CAMPBELL: I thought the TO&E worked very well. We had the resources that
we need. Some of the equipment could have been clearly better but I thought they
gave us what we needed. And I thought the ACAV was a great vehicle. We had
certainly matured the 113 were talking about diesel 113s as opposed to gasoline.
The ARVN [Army of the Republic of Vietnam] was running gas which was really
dangerous animals.

INTERVIEWER: So that was an A2 by that time?

COL CAMPBELL: That was an A2 by that time and so they did fine. ACAVs again
by that time wed also added belly armor to them so there could be a little bit of the
psychological issues associated with running over mines.

INTERVIEWER: How about the Sheridans?

COL CAMPBELL: The Sheridan was a very interesting animal. I love the track and
suspension system on the Sheridans.

INTERVIEWER: Christy suspension system?

COL CAMPBELL: Yes. We would not throw track. I had those guys down waddys
where the two tracks were at 45 degree angles going down the side of the wall to the
waddy and just staying on there without any problems at all, where 113s would have
thrown track a long time ago. So I think in six months we threw the track on only
one Sheridan. Now once you threw track on a Sheridan there was no chance of
walking it back on, you just broke track and put it back in and you didnt walk or do
anything else like that. But the turret, the electrical turret was difficult. And then
other components would constantly break because they were aluminum pieces,

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aluminum parts and aluminum frames and housings and stuff would crack based
upon the pressure. We were breaking jungle on a daily basis so were putting a lot
of pressure on the systems. The 152mm gun on the Sheridan almost universally
was shooting nails. Occasionally we would shoot high explosive rounds which
were useful for opening up bunkers and making a way through jungle.
INTERVIEWER: Sir just from my own interest you didnt see any tank on tank did
you?

COL CAMPBELL: Nope never.

INTERVIEWER: Just for the bunkers and so on?

COL CAMPBELL: I never saw them (NVA/VC) use anything bigger than RPGs and
occasionally recoilless rifle.

INTERVIEWER: You know your combat service support, what kind of internal
communication did your troop use during fire missions?

COL CAMPBELL: I found that an interesting question. The way I normally operated
was we would set up an NDP [night defensive position] and in that NDP would be
the headquarters, the maintenance elements and thered always be one platoon left
behind so that it would pull maintenance. So a platoon would be out two days, and
back a day conducting maintenance and with the two platoons that were out and
wed always work two platoons together in the column I would be in either the left
or right column and the fire support officer would be in the exact same position in the
other column so wed be right next to each other. So if we ever got into a fire fight
wed just come together. He would operate on both the troop net and his fire
support net because again we had the Howitzer Battery that belonged to the
squadron, and at that point in time all the mortars were stripped out of the Cavalry
troops and the squadron had a mortar battery so that we had six 155 Howitzers and

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nine 4.2 inch mortars operating as two separate organizations which were always
kept in a proximity to each other so that they could support each other, if the
Howitzer battery came under attack that the mortar battery would provide fire for it
and vice versa. So if youre in the fan of both of those organizations then you
significantly increased fire support capability. So if we had a request for fire support
coming in from platoons over the troop net or if I wanted fire support, we were close
enough to just yell across to each other.
INTERVIEWER: Well thats exactly the point sir that you had the latitude as troop
commander to organize and have out in an SOP [standard operating procedure] how
you were going to act if you had actions on contact and I just described a very
efficient way to make sure that you didnt lose troops.

COL CAMPBELL: As I said we would normally break jungle in a double column

which meant both platoon leaders needed to make sure they knew where each other
were as opposed to the second platoon just sort of following. So on contact the
platoon on the right would break right and the one on the left would break left and so
wed have two platoons so you got to about 22 to 25 vehicles online and you clearly
would be exceeding and turning the flanks of any enemy position that you ran into
and so put that much fire power online normally destroyed any kind of enemy
ambush or anything else that we would run into. Then as I said both the fire support
officer and myself were generally in the middle of being able to control the fire
support requested.

INTERVIEWER: Sir being it was in Southeast Asia Vietnam was there any kind of
impact from the temperature, humidity and all those kinds of things, on equipment,
or people? I mean you had to get used to it I would imagine.

COL CAMPBELL: I guess from the human being point of view the issue of the
temperature and the humidity and the rain depending upon what part of the season
you were in became difficult. Keeping the troops in flak jackets became difficult. I

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always look at the operations ongoing now where they are wearing a much heavier
armored plate than we were using. Infantry never wore anything as an example and
we tried to keep all our Soldiers in flak jackets all the time because as theyre sitting
as opposed to walking makes a big difference. It did offer a level of protection I
recall where we were doing one search and destroy in a sort of a semi built up area,
a lot of rice patties around and we were out crossing and one of my platoon leaders
directed his guys through a cut in a gulley that had been bulldozed in there by some
Americans previously and I was commenting to him I said, You know if we run into
a mine anyplace today youve just picked the place where the mine is likely to be.
And he drove through it and I drove through it. The Sheridan behind us drove
through it and as the Sheridan behind us drove through it he exploded the mine. I
had a brand new guy from the CP who was with us because again the way we
operated meant that my crew and my artillery officers were out every day as
opposed to two of every three days like line platoon soldiers. So I would rotate
soldiers in from the CP in other places to man the ACAV guns and on this occasion
he wound up with about a 4 or 5 inch piece of shrapnel that went into his back from
the 105 or 155 shell that was part of the mine. He survived fine because he was
wearing that flak jacket. The flak jacket absorbed most of what he had. He had a
penetration of about an inch or so into his back and as opposed to all the way
through. So keeping the troops in flak jackets was important to do that but again it
just drove us crazy. On equipment, overheating was an issue. Number one, we
were operating at high external temperatures; number two, were busting jungle and
the biggest problem was keeping the engines cool because although both the
Sheridan and the 113s are water cooled soon all the air intake would fill with leaves
and other stuff and so we would have to stop and clean out to let the crews do that
so that they wouldnt be overheating. Probably the third interesting part would be
radios. By afternoon the fan on a radio would never stop going whether or not you
were transmitting or not; the fan would never stop running. It just ran constantly.

INTERVIEWER: Do you have AN/VRC 12, Vehicular Radio , and the AN/PRC 77,
man portable radio and the rest of that?

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COL CAMPBELL: Yes the AN/VRC-12 series in the vehicles and the PRC radios for
dismounted work. On all variants of the radio the fans would never stop going. After
that the biggest problem was the encryption gear because back then the encryption
gear was this big humongous thing and whether or not that worked was always
problematic again based upon the heat. When I would go into the squadron
headquarters they would have fans blowing out, regular commercial fans blowing
trying to keep that stuff cool.

INTERVIEWER: Did you find anything else that was peculiar to Vietnam?

COL CAMPBELL: The thing that strikes most is fire ants. The platoon leaders
would constantly rotate the lead track so as to change the lead guy breaking jungle.
When they hit a tree with a fire ant hive in it you would have to laugh but it isnt funny
at all for the kids involved. The drivers would pop out of their hatch or the TC [Tank
Commander] would pop out of the hatch and hed come screaming back throwing
clothes around and everybody else would be up there with spray cans of bug spray
trying to kill the ants that were just chewing the soldiers apart.

INTERVIEWER: Sir what missions did you carry out? Were they mostly search and
destroy or screen, guard and cover?

COL CAMPBELL: We did search and destroy and guard and cover doing road
security is really a cover mission. When things were critical we got pulled back to
road security. Wed operate on a series of old fire bases and convoys would come
in and out of it, but it was probably 65 or 70 percent of our effort would be search
and destroy and 30 or 35 percent would be road security because again unless you
had a specific objective road security was an incredible waste of the resources.

INTERVIEWER: Now you operated west of southern II Corps/northern III Corps,

Saigon and west of the Cambodian border, correct?

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COL CAMPBELL: We would work north of Saigon almost exclusively north of

Saigon all the way up to the Cambodian border from An Loc/Loc Ninh west to Tai
Ninh War Zone C area up to the Cambodian border. That is the picture thats
downstairs. The picture thats downstairs, is a bunker complex somewhere around
the Cambodian border. Im not sure exactly where. It was somewhere around the
Cambodian border.

INTERVIEWER: Just for my own interest was that a lot of what you ran into bunkers
that you had to clear?

COL CAMPBELL: We were constantly searching for the enemy and if we found
bunker complexes in areas where we assigned to search that was a good thing.
The enemy would have to be in camp where there was a source of water and
therefore the squadron staff would be sending us to areas along streams and along
areas that were where water was there so that we could likely find the enemy. The
only trouble is of course is that that meant we were going to areas which were the
most inhospitable to armored vehicles so we had this constant tension. One of the
assigned mission areas was an AOR [area of responsibility] that was about a
thousand yards on either side of a waterway that went for about 10 kilometers and
that was where I was supposed to patrol and we spent the entire day pulling stuff out
of the mud. That was the whole dichotomy between what was logical to find the
enemy and where we could actually go.

INTERVIEWER: Did you find that the enemy would -- knowing they were getting a
good feel for what you were out there doing set you up for a bush whack?
COL CAMPBELL: Initially yes, but the problem for them, I dont know if I can
describe it right, the problem for them was the firepower differential between what
we could bring to bear and what they could bring to bear was just so enormous. It
wasnt a fair fight. I mean you roll the platoons online. The platoon has about ten

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vehicles. In those ten vehicles are 30 machine guns, plus three 152s so it is nothing
like what happens if they ambush an infantry platoon. I mean the firepower ratio
was just so enormous. The standard SOP for the wing gunners, the .30 caliber
gunners was the first burst was 100 rounds. Do not stop pulling the trigger until 100
rounds have gone down range and the .50 cal guys are, first burst is 50 rounds. So
the initial firefight is just an overwhelming amount of ammunition coming out. I was
in one firefight, heavy jungle to start with and when we finished it was like
somebodys front lawn. Everything had been cut, from six inch trees down. Just cut
because of the enormous amount of firepower that youve got when you start
shooting all those machine guns and then shooting nails. It just wipes away
everything.

INTERVIEWER: In the area of supply and maintenance did you have any difficulty
with repair parts? You discussed this a little bit before but if theres anything that
stands out in your mind.

COL CAMPBELL: I thought the supply of repair parts was good. Some vehicles
were perennially difficult to keep going like 548s. We had a 548 to replace the
trucks because we certainly couldnt get trucks into the jungle and for some reason
or other they had taken a perfect good M113 and adapted it into an M548 and ruined
it. Besides that, repair parts were adequate, the supply time was okay as I said the
normal Chinook missions would involve repair parts in the morning, anything else
that we would need during the day especially for the platoon that would stay in back
and pull maintenance during the day would be available. When the platoons would
come back in the evening we would order repair parts and the evening Chinook
would bring fuel and water. We would get 500 gallons of fuel and 500 gallons of
water and then hot chow and then the stuff for breakfast in the morning and anything
else that we had established a need for during the day. Again the XO [executive
officer] and the mess sergeant who were running the rear would do a great job of
assembling those packages and hauling them out to the LZ [Landing Zone] at Quan
Loi and sending them out to us.

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INTERVIEWER: Now did you have the recovery asset 578s, 88s with you or did you
have to call back and get them?

COL CAMPBELL: We had a 578 and our maintenance operation traveled with us,
we also had a great maintenance NCO and crew with us. They did not go out and
do missions but they would be the combat trains that were with us in whatever NDP
(night defensive position) that we would set up. So we would normally set up a
position. Wed stay in that position somewhere between 48 and 72 hours depending
upon how things felt and then wed pick up and move that position someplace else
and stay 48 to 72 hours. The field trains, the headquarters CP, cooks would stay in
that position together with a platoon that would be there all the time and then the
other platoons would be out and then every third day a platoon would stay in.
Based upon this schedule the troops had a incredibly high motivation to maintain
their vehicles and they keep them operational.

[End C-351, Tape 1, Side 1]

[Start C-351, Tape 1, Side 2]

INTERVIEWER: Sir youre talking a little bit about the maintenance. Did you have
many problems with the 578? Because as a battalion maintenance officer myself I
found that youd have to circle X that thing because theres a spade on the front of it
and the hydraulic hoses were hanging out there in the jungle or underbrush could
catch on that a lot.
COL CAMPBELL: No I dont recall the issue and again it wasnt leading anything so
its pretty well broken down by the time it was coming down a trail. Most of the issue
of the 578 was using it as a wrecker as opposed to a recovery vehicle. Almost all
our recovery was self recovery and I never recall pulling the 578 out of the defensive
position to come out to the field.

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INTERVIEWER: I was going to say 113s and Sheridans both, its not like youre
trying to pull out an M60. You could pretty much do it on your own and even if you
needed the 578 you could get out there real quick and get back.
COL CAMPBELL: I dont ever remember pulling it out of the defensive position or
the maintenance effort.

INTERVIEWER: I see. Sir with regards I know we talked about the TO&E and what
came to mind was did you folks have any access to night vision goggles and did you
go after them? Did you request them?

COL CAMPBELL: Night vision equipment was sort of just at the cusp of coming in.
Sheridans came in with night vision i.e. IR [Infrared] sights and we were working IR
and we were seeing some weapons sights, either IR or night vision stuff, but it was
really big and really clumsy and wasnt really a key piece of what we did and how we
did it.

INTERVIEWER: Well then did you conduct a lot of night ops or not?

COL CAMPBELL: We did. We would send some dismounted patrols out from
where we were. So wed put out dismounted listening posts from where we would
be both the troop NDP and the platoon NDPs. Two platoons and the HQ element
would be wed be out all day, they would come back to the troop position in the late
afternoon, you would do maintenance, you would feed, you would do whatever
resupply was necessary to do and then two platoons would go out to platoon
positions, far enough out so theyre outside the direct fire weapons range so you
wouldnt be shooting each other, but theyd be out in two different directions so that if
somebody wants to attack the troop NDP theyve got to deal with the fact that there
are now three locations that they have to fight so it made the entire equation much
more difficult for the North Vietnamese or Viet Cong as they were trying to do

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reconnaissance of and what they wanted to attack, based on that we didnt do get a
lot on night attacks against our positions. One of the platoons that went out for the
night was the one that spent the day conducting maintenance. Both those platoons
would come back in after stand-to and eat breakfast and then go out on patrol. We
would occasionally do night thunder runs to keep roads closed to the enemy. We
would just drive down the roads with no lights on at all ready to engage forces if we
found anybody on the road and things of that sort, people laying mines. Most of that
effort was on small trails not big roads.

INTERVIEWER: Sir NDP what does that stand for?

COL CAMPBELL: Night Defensive Position.

INTERVIEWER: Sir you talked a little bit about it before but what were the general
conditions like for your living conditions?

COL CAMPBELL: Well again in the field all of the Soldiers would have cots so
theyre either sleeping alongside their vehicle on a cot or inside the vehicle or on top
of the vehicle with a cot and sleeping bag or whatever it is depending upon the
temperatures. The days were warm but the nights were reasonably cool so that
caused them to go into sleeping bags. I would sleep on a cot inside the tent
extension of the 577, so that I would be always available to immediately go into the
577 in case something took place that required my attention. It was considerably
better than an infantry outfit but we never saw clean sheets or beds for the entire
period.
INTERVIEWER: That brings up a good point because we havent covered anything
on the 577 command vehicle. Were there any issues with that communication wise
or anything with those?

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COL CAMPBELL: No, I thought the 577 was a very good vehicle again, they did a
good job of the 113 conversion compared to the 548s.
INTERVIEWER: Im sorry what is a 548?

COL CAMPBELL: The 548 was like a track originally designed for artillery outfit to
haul ammunition.

INTERVIEWER: Oh, okay a track?

COL CAMPBELL: Its a 113 that you cut, right behind the drivers position you cut it
off and do a flatbed so in size its about a 2.5 ton truck. But its a 113 track vehicle
with a cabin up front with glass windows and stuff like that. I think we immediately
took the glass windows out of them because of the danger of broken glass and
reflections inside the vehicle. With the dust it was impossible to see through the
glass.
INTERVIEWER: I dont believe Ive ever seen one. That was the reason I asked.

COL CAMPBELL: Oh, ok. So the 577 worked fine but again the 577 is moving
every two or three days. The principal problems were generators because youre
working a 4.2 KW generator. For some reason the Army had a difficult time getting
good generators. I dont know why, they were also very noisy. The only other issue
wound up being communications because traditionally we were really far from
squadron HQ, and again its one of the hallmarks of the Cav units spread out all over
the place. So wed traditionally have to put up multiple AN 292s to be able to
communicate on all the different radio networks that we would have to work.
Sometimes going back to the artillery fire support stuff sometimes wed have to do
relays to get what we would need in fire support because of the distance that we
were covering and the difficulty to get through jungle.

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INTERVIEWER: Sir what would be the most difficult aspect to command that you
encounter when you were K Troop commander?
COL CAMPBELL: Probably again Soldier behavior problems as I said were starting
to see the issues of drugs and we were starting to see the issues of racial problems
and as we got close to civilization; do road security stuff then you have the local
Vietnamese people selling stuff to Soldiers so that opened up the potential for drugs.
Tactically probably the most difficult problem winds up being land navigation, where
are you, how do you get where you want to go.

INTERVIEWER: I was going to say were the maps fairly good or not?

COL CAMPBELL: I thought the maps were fine. Probably my biggest problem with
the platoon leaders is the question of who thinks theyre in the right place and who
isnt in the right place.

INTERVIEWER: Sir since you had more experience say then at being in country as
it were when you had your platoon leaders how did you reconcile that? Was there
anything you did especially with them or just say hey look, time to get with it? How
did you find being in country for a while to read a map?

COL CAMPBELL: I guess I always considered myself pretty good at being able to
operate on maps and work with maps. I would take special care to plot where we
were going and things of that sort. Again as one of the reasons I established the two
platoon formation was because it required both platoon leaders to track where they
were because they may be shifted to a different place. The platoon leaders didnt
especially like that solution, nor did the soldiers, because it put both platoons at risk,
but it keeps both platoons in the action. They cant just be watching the end
connectors go by as the trail or second platoon. So that became an issue and
probably the only other time that I really got upset with a platoon leader. We were
coming back from a deep jungle penetration where we had been up against the

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Cambodian border. We are coming back down on a break (we had knocked down
the jungle to create a trail, a break) that we had just made earlier in the day and we
got to a position and the platoon leader started to turn right and I stopped him and I
said, No, the direction is left. Get the platoon going left. The next thing I saw was
of course this platoon leader talking on the radio and he was talking to his platoon
and theres a big conversation going back and forth which of course a discussion of
the platoons leadership was over what the correct direction was. At which time I
called them up and said, Stop the discussion. I want you to turn left and I want to
start moving right now. I dont care what you think, you are going left. There was
no question in my mind on the correct course but clearly my platoon leaders were
not so sure. Lacking all of the kind of capability we have now, with GPS [global
positioning satellite system] and all the other system made everything like that
harder. Fire support was hard in heavy jungle as well it was also difficult because
with a single fire support officer, giving him a break meant you were down to a
specialist or maybe a buck sergeant to handle fires. Theyre suffering the same
problem because the skill levels associated from him down to his guys is a big job
because you dont have any of the experienced non commissioned officers. The
ops guy in my 577 was an E-6 shake and bake. A good kid, great guy who made
all the right decisions but hes still a shake and bake so he comes into the Army as
an E-6 having gone through basic, gone through AIT [advanced individual training],
sent off to shake and bake school and did very well at shake and bake school. So
they made him an E-6 immediately coming into the Army so in six months he was
doing an E-7 platoon sergeants job. Those are the guys who were operating at the
platoon sergeant to the track commander positions.

INTERVIEWER: The next question is what do you spend most of your time and
effort doing in your tour as the troop commander?
COL CAMPBELL: Again Im doing daily ops and out every single day with two
platoons. I dont recall that there was any single day, maybe when we were on road
security, I might have not been out and I might have just checked on the platoons,

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but any time other than brief periods on the road security mission, I would be out
every day. So it would be breakfast, sunrise breakfast out with the platoon, the two
platoon group all day and then back in and then so it was a pretty constant
operation. The organization functioned because of key leaders knowing their jobs.
Again the second strongest noncommissioned officer we had and it was a close run
thing between him and the mess sergeant was the motor sergeant. The motor
sergeant was an E-7. So he basically was the senior guy even though the first
sergeant would be at the troop NDP. He would be the strongest guy to do make
sure that maintenance was being performed and that security was performed at the
NDP. All those things ran pretty well as far as maintenance and operations is
concerned. The only other thing that would be an issue was personnel management
business, promotions, all of the administrative kind of stuff that we would have to go
through and do.
INTERVIEWER: Sir thats pretty much a typical day what you did. What was your
greatest satisfaction/dissatisfaction with the troops command?

COL CAMPBELL: Probably watching junior leaders grow and mature because
again it was just a remarkable time because the people that youre dealing with,
mostly very junior folks taking on great responsibility. I still keep track and
correspond with the guys who were in my track and the guys who were in the
headquarters. I just saw where one of the wing gunners just recently died, Gary
Wells who lived out in California just recently passed away.

INTERVIEWER: Sir, what do you think would be your command philosophy as a

troop commander?

COL CAMPBELL: I think the philosophy is to make sure that the soldiers and
leaders understand what theyre trying to do and let them go do it. Give them as
much leeway as you can to accomplish their mission. But its difficult down at that
level where youre with them all the time not to engage them when you think theyre

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doing wrong, but you keep trying to allow them to have as much freedom to do
things on their own as you possibly can. You caused me to think of one thing so I
can go back to it. One of the other issues that we had again during that period of
time was the Soldiers question of what theyre trying to accomplish, given what was
going on state side. I can recall were in War Zone C and its in December. We had
been out there for Thanksgiving and the squadron headquarters and the Howitzer
Battery were badly handled. The squadron had a whole bunch of little fights going
on and supposedly we were close where COSVN (Central Office for South Vietnam)
Headquarters was, and they (NVA/VC) put the group together, came down a trail
and attacked the squadron HQ and the How Battery. But the point that I was aiming
at was, it is now December, the troop is back out in the same area alone and one
night a platoon leader came to me and said, You need to go talk to sergeant
whoever, because hes on top of his vehicle and hes got his rifle and he says hell
kill anybody who comes up near him. So I walked over to the vehicle, all the troops
are pretty much away from him and climbed up on the vehicle and we had this long
discussion and it was basically why am I wasting my time here given whats going on
back in the United States and this is a waste of time and a waste of effort and has no
value and all the rest of those issues. So it was also kind of a disheartening
philosophical issue that you had to deal with on the part of the Soldiers. It wasnt a
dominant philosophy for most of the time or a dominant issue most of the time but it
was something that was of concern.

INTERVIEWER: That was the 1970 time frame correct?

COL CAMPBELL: Correct.

INTERVIEWER: Sir what comments would you like to make about the senior
leadership? How that affected you and your unit. Who was the regimental
commander by that time?

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COL CAMPBELL: Lets see, I started out with Jimmy Leach. Then it changed to
Donn Starry. That is an interesting aside, because we rarely ever saw our fellow
troop commanders, almost never. It would be very big occasion when we did,
because what would normally happen is a Loach (Hughes OH-6 Cayuse) would
come around on a daily basis and drop off orders, and if you then had any issues
you would go up on the radio and talk to the S3 (operations officer) at squadron to
sort out the issue. It would have to be something major to bring together all of the
troop commanders. When we went into the War Zone C up against the Cambodian
border they flew us into the squadron headquarters and laid out the plans to us for
the operation, what we were trying to do and the overall mission and picture. The
only other time that occurred was when they flew around and picked up all the troop
commanders and flew it back for the regimental change of command. We walked
into our rear headquarters and the mess sergeant was there and says Heres a new
set of clothes. Heres a new helmet liner, helmet, and web gear. And, This kid is
going to be your guidon bearer, just go with him, he knows what to do. So we went
out there and with just troop commanders there, no troops behind them, and that
was the change of command as Donn Starry took over from Jimmy Leach. That was
only the second time that all the troop commanders saw each other in six months.
In retrospect Im not sure that they, just like me were so busy engaged in day to day
operations, that we didnt understand the bigger picture on what we were trying to
do. Again they were all doing a good job trying to do the best they could, trying to
understand what was going on. Intelligence was problematic. I had to laugh when
one day Regiment captured a Vietnamese private soldier who told them where their
base camp was and of course he told them on a map where their base camp was.
And of course this kid has no idea what a map is. He never gets to see one and so
we were directed to go here set up a blocking position and they then sent a patrol
in, the blues were walking in with NVA soldier, to where his base camp was as laid
out on the map and pretty soon the blocking units were being moved all over the
place because now the patrol was on the other side of the creek, so we would move
the blocking position and then the patrol was back over on the other side of the
creek. We were moving all over the place because they were again trying to

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interpret intelligence. And they were trying to do a good job, trying to do a great job.
Jimmy Leach I think suffered from having to rebuild the regiment after George
Patton just ran the crap out of it and probably didnt do much maintenance on it while
he was there. We spent a lot of time doing maintenance on vehicles while I was
there, but we needed to accomplish that level to support our operations. I think that
Donn Starrys approach was somewhere in between Jimmy Leach and Patton.

INTERVIEWER: If you had the opportunity to do it over again what would you
change?
COL CAMPBELL: Im not sure at that level you can get to change very much at all
because you are given what our daily tasks were and we spent most of our time just
executing. Now knowing where the US strategy was going and what we were doing
as part of it was really not a concern. I think we should have spent more time doing
unit training because lets see three or four months after I left the regiment goes into
Cambodia. One of the things that we essentially had not done, nobody had done
because of the daily mission is be able to fight the troop as a troop because that
wasnt what we did on a regular basis so I probably would have spent more time
doing that although I am not sure I could have.
INTERVIEWER: Like you say its systemic to what kind of a mission you were
given. See again having done these interviews before, it depends on what
organization that the person had been with. Infantry is a lot slower. They move a lot
slower. Theyre able to reflect a little bit more I think but when you talk about
Cavalry and being out and doing the missions that the cavalry does and staying out
a lot, it is a little bit different story. So thats where some of these questions come
from. Sir what advice would you give any troop commander coming in that would
kind of help him on this type of a situation whether it be leadership, knowing the job?

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COL CAMPBELL: Again leaders need to be tactically and technically proficient in
terms of the elements necessary to fight their unit. Map reading is one example. I
dont know what current capabilities are.

INTERVIEWER: Because they have a GPS.

COL CAMPBELL: Yes they have a GPS and all the computer equipment .

INTERVIEWER: What happens when it breaks?

COL CAMPBELL: Well it can. That is one of the things we are asked to
understand. As we take maps off the table as paper and give you maps as
electronics and all the other electronics support equipment, how do you operate
without it working? It also means tactically and technically proficient on the
capabilities of the weapons systems and equipment. Plus how do you maintain
them in the field. And then of course it really becomes a question of people and how
do you motivate people to do the most important things that need to be done and
that you build a decent organization where the people work together to accomplish
what you want. Part of that becomes what is the bigger mission that youre trying to
do and how does what you do fit into it? It is easy to lose sight of that question.
What should you be preparing your organization to do in the future becomes another
question and what is it that they could be called upon to do versus what you are
actually doing? Its all those things, but its an incredibly complex business because
what youre trying to do is focus on what the daily mission is to keep people alive
while youre doing all the other aspects as well. Sometimes thats just all
consuming.
INTERVIEWER: Well stated. Anything else that youd like to comment on that we
havent touched on very well?

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COL CAMPBELL: I dont think so. Again, being a cav troop commander in Vietnam
was a really incredible experience. Probably the most interesting piece was the first
time in a firefight where you suddenly consider the fact that those people are actually
trying to kill you. It is a very sobering point. Once you get over that the rest of it
becomes easier to compartmentalize and understand.

INTERVIEWER: Again we want to thank you for participation in our program here.
We appreciate it.

COL CAMPBELL: Okay Brent, thank you.

[End Tape C-351, Tape 1, Side 2]

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