Free fire zone

An abandoned village sat in a large clearing northeast of Blackhorse base camp. The village consisted of half a dozen concrete block buildings with red tile roofs and a small Catholic Church building, also with red tile roof. The village was in a free-fire zone. That meant the area was so infested with Viet Cong that everyone had been suspect and relocated to a village under government control. Free fire zone also meant anyone could fire into the area at any time, no reason or approval required.

The village became a favored place to test helicopter machine guns and rockets following aircraft overhaul as well as evaluating new gunship pilots, and for registering artillery pieces.

One day in spring 1967, the gunship team leader in whose platoon I flew that day decided to test his two ships’ door guns and side mounted flex guns, six M-60 machine guns on each helicopter.

I learned that day: it is fun as hell, rolling into a number of concrete block buildings and firing a machine gun; and, roof tiles shatter when hit by 7.62mm slugs.