Tripwires, Toe Poppers and Pressure Devices

[Gunz]

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[Ooh-Rah]

Thank you, @Ocoka
I look forward to reading this later.

 

[Etype]

Thanks @Ocoka - as much as things change, they stay the same.

 

[digrar]

Bloody m16 mines.
The Australian Task Force had a Commander (Brigadier Stuart Graham) who decided to put a huge minefield in the AO, running from Dat Do to the coast 11km away. It was to be surveilled by South Vietnamese troops, who did a piss poor job at best, and totally neglected the task at worst. And to be honest, it was a job that couldn't be achieved even with 100% diligence.
The VC started lifting the mines before the field had even been completed and from that point 50-80% of our casualties were traced back to mines lifted from Graham's folly.

 

[Gunz]

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[Teufel]

I hate IEDs. I was super good at finding them on the road but generally failed to do so before they went off.

 

[Gunz]

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[MikeDelta]

This concerns the actions of Combined Action Platoon 2-7-10 (10th Platoon, 7th Company, 2nd Combined Action Group), and our Counterparts from the 21st Regional Force Infantry as they related to boobytraps, SFDs or UEDs (Static Firing Device; Unspecified Explosive Device). I was a member of this team at the time these After-Action reports were written.

The enemy in my company's TAOR were prolific sappers, constantly rigging set-ups. Since we were foot-mobile every day during combat patrols and at night moving to and from ambush sites, these were ever-present stress producers. We were pretty good at finding them before they were tripped or stepped on...but the ones we missed hurt and killed Marines and RFs. Dogs helped, but dogs and handlers were in high demand and not always available.



View attachment 21969

Eddie Caiado and "Chipper"
View attachment 21972

Enemy ambushes are usually answerable. Ambushing and killing the enemy is satisfying. There is nothing answerable or satisfying about triggering rigged devices, as a number of our members here know well from their deployments in OEF/OIF. It is a frustrating and maddening experience, and a bitter one if team members are hurt or killed. There's nobody to shoot at, there's no payback.

The entries below from 30 December are good examples of the benefits reaped by maintaining good rapport with the locals. If they like you they may help you; if they hate you, they will fuck you as sure as the sun rises. Even a child could end up saving the lives of you and your teammates. There's no telling how many of us might've been KIA had we hit that 40mm or 60mm device. And the second entry is hairier still because the boy also led us to an M16 anti-personnel mine buried on a trail we used frequently.

The M16 APM is a bouncing betty. It jumps up and detonates about waist-high, spews high-velocity steel 360 degrees and has a casualty radius of 27 meters. @racing_kitty probably studied these or similar devices when she was going through her EOD courses. (We were a small autonomous unit and had to be our own EOD types.)


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Then there were the ones we didn't find. The entry below from 13 Jan was an operation in which we teamed up with a sister-unit to try and locate SFDs and tunnel complexes. This incident not only involved a detonation but had a few gunfights thrown in.

View attachment 21974

Later in my deployment I was assigned to CAP 2-7-6. The first of these two entries details a firefight on 28 March in which we ambushed an NVA element and found an M72 LAAW that had been in possession of the enemy. Rather than fire it at us, it may have been intended as a future IED.

View attachment 21977

As I've referenced in other posts, I was medevaced with 5 other Marines (half the manpower of the team) after an extended contact on 24 April 71. Our CO, Jim Ivy, quickly shifted men from other CAPs in the company to CAP 6's AO...but a few days later my teammates had another gunfight that led to a detonation and more medevacs.


View attachment 21975

Below is an example of the leaflets we'd hand out to villagers.

View attachment 21978

@Ocoka Thanks for sharing. Very cool that you saved those reports over the years.

 

[AWP]

Thanks @Ocoka - as much as things change, they stay the same.

From the video game series, Fallout, but appropriate

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[Gunz]

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[Ooh-Rah]

Bump because I re-read this thread every so often.

#respect

 

[Gunz]

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[Marine0311]

Brother this is awsome.