Veterans Day: Michael Ellegood

U. S. Army - Captain (later Lt. Col)

June 21, 1961 – Oct. 1988

I was an Army officer, a Captain. I had led troops as a Company Commander for over five years and followed the canon: “Officers eat last” - which meant, “take care of your troops.” In Vietnam, I was not to lead troops. Because of my engineering degrees, I was tapped at Brigade Headquarters to be the staff officer responsible for the road construction program in the Central Highlands.

QL1, the coast road, was by far the most important road in the country. It was the only north – south road linking Vietnam’s cities. It also crossed some bad country with pockets of VC sympathizers; ambushes and mines were a constant. But what we found was, when we reconstructed a road to US road standards with 12-foot paved lanes, the area got safer. “Charlie,” the Viet Cong, could no longer dig through the asphalt to mine and, almost overnight, the entrepreneurial Vietnamese established shops along the road. And they did not want “Charlie” to mess with their enterprise.

North of the Port of Quy Nhon, QL1 passed through a very bad area. This area near the town of Bong Son has been notorious throughout history as being very hostile towards outsiders - with almost daily road mines and ambushes. Its reconstruction was a priority to transport supplies from the Port of Quy Nhon and to pacify the area.

On one of my trips to oversee the construction, I joined with the unit constructing the project and the Operations Officer on a road reconnaissance. It was a beautiful April morning and we hopped into his Jeep to follow the morning mine sweep team. The team was to check for mines and to declare the road safe and open to traffic. There was the sweep team of two men, our Jeep, a truck with armed GI security, followed by a bus full of civilians and other local transport.

We entered the hamlet of Phu My. The town was deserted, no farmers, no children playing in the dirt, nothing. We halted for the mine sweep team. I looked to my left and there was a railroad berm and a small trestle ahead about a hundred yards away. The hackles on my neck raised. I turned to my counterpart and asked about the village, he explained that this was “normal.” I was not reassured and gripped my weapon a little tighter and looked for places to find cover. Suddenly one of the two men manning the mine detector yelled “I got something!”. He leaned over and suddenly there was a huge explosion! I saw the lower torso of the soldier in the air; ultimately landing in the rice paddy behind me. Our GI’s started shooting towards the railroad trestle.

It was over and a GI lost his life, another seriously wounded.

In the debrief with the Battalion Commander and the Operations Officer, I learned that this was not the first time that this had happened, at that same location, they even used the same pothole to place the mine!

Too often we officers failed our men, we abrogated our responsibilities as leaders. The tip off was the deserted village, no village was ever deserted unless something bad was about to happen. If this had happened before, we should have anticipated it and dealt with it before this incident. The GI operating the mine detector bent over the mine, why? He forgot his training! The leadership could have halted the convoy and sent a patrol up the railroad track as flank security.

Too often we allowed our soldiers to forget their training; we allowed them to get sloppy. Too often we officers forgot what it meant to be a leader, we forgot basic tactics.

I am proud of my service in Vietnam; I am proud of the work that we, the engineers, did over there; I am proud to be part of a fraternity of men and women who went and served in an unpopular war. We did our job; we did it well and returned and went on with our lives. But I am forever saddened by the senseless loss of life, when we, the leaders, could have prevented it.


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