Tony Morton’s experience in Vietnam: Real bullets, real war, real bad
Editor’s note: This is the eighth in a series of Vietnam War stories shared by Manatee County residents in conjunction with the PBS documentary “The Vietnam War” by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick.
You learned really quick that everything in Vietnam was real.
Real bullets.
Real people shooting at you.
Real people dying, says Tony Morton, now 66. He went to Vietnam as an 18-year-old machine gunner in 1969.
Morton and seven of his buddies joined the Army right out of high school in Akron, Ohio.
“Out of the eight, seven of us went to Fort Polk, La., for light weapons infantry training, and five of us went to Vietnam together. After we got to Vietnam, they sent us to different units,” Morton said.
“Some things stick in your mind. I remember landing at Cam Ranh Bay, the way the heat hit me, and the smell. They burned human waste in diesel fuel. I had tears in my eyes and I thought, ‘I’m not going to make it out of here,’ ” he said.
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Morton was assigned to a rifle platoon in the 7th Squadron of the 17th Cavalry Regiment, part of the 1st Aviation Brigade near Pleiku.
“We would do some patrolling ahead of the battalions. We had Loaches (light observation helicopters) that would go out. If they found something, we would be inserted to check it out. We would be sent in to recover downed pilots or their bodies,” he said.
“One of the first guys I met was the company clerk. He was a great guy who made me feel at home. He had a pretty safe job working in the orderly room. He volunteered to fly scout in a Loach. Then one day one of our Loaches went down. We flew out there, and with the Cobra (gunships) circling overheard, found that two of our Loaches had collided and caught fire,” he said.
The bodies, including Morton’s friend, the orderly room clerk, were so badly burned they were unrecognizable.
“He had it made – he was the company clerk,” Morton said. “When you’re an 11B (infantryman) or an observer in a scout helicopter, you know there is danger. But here was a guy who had a relatively safe job, and he wanted to go to the front lines.”
You accept responsibility, depend on guys, trust guys. It was a life and death thing.
Tony Morton
On April 14, 1970, Morton’s platoon was inserted into the area near Dak Seang, South Vietnam, after a battalion of North Vietnamese Army regulars shot down an American helicopter.
Morton’s platoon was supposed to recover the two downed American aviators, the pilot, Captain Robinson, and the observer, Sgt. Tate.
“There were so many enemy soldiers on the hill that we couldn’t get in there. We watched the Air Force come in and make bombing runs. It was unbelievable how all the trees on the hill just disappeared,” he said.
“I was on the point squad on the first ship. We got off and went to our defensive position. The second ship came in, got shot up very badly and did not land. Then the third and fourth ships came in. We got our stuff together, and down the hill we went to the helicopter that had been shot down. Captain Robinson’s body was in the Loach, which the NVA had badly booby-trapped,” he said.
“We got Captain Robinson’s body out of the Loach, put him in a body bag, and then we started back up the hill to where we came in. I’m carrying the M60 machine gun, when an NVA 30 mm machine gun in a fortified position begins ripping off rounds. One of our Cobras came in firing rockets and machine gun. The pickup zone is on fire. I remember the old man (the company commander) saying you have to get through to the other side of the fire,” Morton said.
The platoon moved through the fire and found itself almost on top of the enemy’s 30 mm machine gun.
“At the pickup zone which was now ablaze, Pfc. Morton placed covering fire while elements of his platoon neutralized an enemy anti-aircraft position, killing three enemy soldiers, and capturing a .30 caliber machinegun,” said the citation which accompanied the award of the Bronze Star Medal for Valor to Morton.
Later, Morton learned that the missing scout, Sgt. Bates, had been captured by the NVA, and spent several years as a prisoner of war.
Morton and his unit were working out of Ban Me Thuot during the American incursion into Cambodia between April and July of 1970, when the National Guard opened fire on student protesters at Kent State University.
“I couldn’t understand what was going on. Kent State is like 20 minutes from my home town. I was upset with the students for protesting. We worked the Cambodian border the majority of the time I was in Vietnam. At night the North Vietnamese Army would shoot 122 mm rockets into our base -- three or four of them -- and then run back across the border. This happened all the time. We were getting hit with rockets and couldn’t do anything about it,” he said.
“But then I didn’t understand why the National Guard would fire into a crowd of students. It didn’t make any sense to me until I got back home,” he said.
While Morton knew he could die at any time, he believes his closest brush with death was when his platoon was being picked up at a landing zone.
“The ship started to take off, rolled – and I fell out. I’m looking up and I see the helicopter coming down like it was in slow motion. I thought, ‘Wow, I’m going to die,’ ” he said.
The ship landed on top of Morton, who was laying between rows in a sweet potato field.
After a few days in the hospital where he was treated for cuts on his leg, he was sent back to his unit with a cane while he recovered from his injuries.
Thinking back on his days in Vietnam, Morton says that after a mission, black troops and white troops might go their own ways.
But when they were in the field, they had a powerful bond.
“You had to do your job, and they had to do their job to survive. The trust factor was unbelievable,” he said. “You accept responsibility, depend on guys, trust guys. It was a life and death thing.
“When I joined the Army, I was an 18-year-old kid from the projects who had never traveled, and never had a car in the family. When I got to Vietnam, my eyes went ‘whoa.’ I went from being a kid to a man in a short period of time.”
In spite of all that Vietnam vets risked in the war, he says, “This country was not in love with us when we came home.”
He applauds the respect that has been shown to war veterans since the first Gulf War.
“It gives me a good feeling in my heart that the country is finally recognizing the sacrifices made by the soldiers and their families,” he said.
Dave Dailey, adjutant of the Braden River VFW Post, says it’s a wonder that veterans like Morton who were exposed to such horrendous experiences were able to adjust and move on with their lives.
“That’s very dark,” Dailey said of Morton’s time in Vietnam.
Morton would eventually serve 32 years in the Army before retiring as a sergeant major.
Today, Morton has a litany of health issues and is haunted by nightmares from his combat experience in Vietnam.
A neighbor once asked him if he’d like to return to revisit Vietnam.
“I did — two nights ago,” Morton responded.
James A. Jones Jr.: 941-745-7053, @jajones1
This story was originally published September 23, 2017 at 4:04 PM with the headline "Tony Morton’s experience in Vietnam: Real bullets, real war, real bad."