Dances with bullets

 My friend Leo V. said he and his wife were leaving a movie theater in 1990 after watching Dances with Wolves when he heard another movie-goer comment on one of the early scenes, when Kevin Costner’s character rides across the Confederate front with his arms outstretched in a “Shoot me” position. The other movie-goer said to someone, “That couldn’t happen. Somebody could not ride that far with that many people shooting at him and not be hit.”

Au contraire, Leo thought, but decided not to correct the man.

Leo had, in 1966, seen a fellow 101st Airborne soldier perform a similar act, but, perhaps more implausible.

Leo’s infantry platoon was on an operation in South Vietnam’s Central Highlands one morning when a Viet Cong machine crew opened fire, pinning all the Americans behind rice paddy dikes.

“We could not move,” Leo told me. “Every time somebody raised his head, he got shot.”

The VC machine gun crew kept the platoon pinned down for what seemed like hours, Leo said.

“It was hot,” he said. “We all were running out of water.”

After a time, one of the platoon’s M-60 machine gunners said, “I’ve had enough of this shit.”

The gunner stood up and, holding his machine gun waist high, started firing and walking toward the VC machine gun.

“They couldn’t hit him,” Leo said. “They had hit everybody who moved behind the rice paddy, but here’s this one man walking toward them, and they can’t hit him.”

Others in the platoon peeked over the rice paddy, expecting their gunner friend to get shot at any second. When that did not happen, the others began firing their M-16s toward the VC.

The gunner, yelling as he climbed the low hill, walked straight to the VC trench and shot everyone in it, Leo said.

So can a man on a horse ride across an enemy’s front and not get hit? History says yes.