Jim Crigler - Mission of Honor: A moral compass for a moral dilemma

MISSION OF HONOR

A moral compass for a moral dilemma

This book is dedicated to the Gold Star Families
of the Vietnam War as well as the men that
served in that conflict; but especially to
1LT Thomas Francis Shaw who showed me the
right path to take in a perilous world.

MISSION OF HONOR

A moral compass for a moral dilemma

First published in 2017 by
Panoma Press Ltd
48 St Vincent Drive, St Albans, Herts, AL1 5SJ UK
www.panomapress.com

Cover design by Michael Inns
Artwork by Karen Gladwell

eISBN 978-1-784522-92-6

The rights of Jim Crigler to be identified as the author of this work have been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced in any material form (including photocopying or storing in any medium by electronic means and whether or not transiently or incidentally to some other use of this publication) without the written permission of the copyright holder except in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. Applications for the copyright holders written permission to reproduce any part of this publication should be addressed to the publishers.

This book is available online and in all good bookstores.

Copyright 2017 Jim Crigler

This book is the story of so many young pilots of that time. It took me back to those days over 40 years ago. We lived day to day in Vietnam, not knowing if we would see the next sunrise or sunset. It was a constant that we all just lived with, and like any combat veterans we continue to live it to some degree every day of our lives.

I first met Jim Crigler at Fort Wolters, Texas in the fall of 1970. We were Warrant Officer Candidates in 1st WOC or the Big Red One. After primary training it was on to Fort Rucker, Alabama for instrument training and transition into the Icon of the Vietnam War, the UH-1 Huey. We lived through the grueling inspections and verbal abuse designed to separate the strong from the weak. It was like forging steel.

Jim and I were both honored and burdened with the mission of burial escort duty. It changed our lives forever. Seeing and feeling the grief of those special families up close was gut wrenching and it is still part of us both to this day. But it was our honored duty.

The loss of our comrades in arms is ever present in our souls. Their faces will never age as we have done in these 40+ years. These men were our friends, people we ate and drank and laughed and cried with. They were in most cases men that we only knew for a few months or maybe a year. But these were men whom we would die for and they for us. Even today those that survived the war are still the men that we yearn to be around.

All of the men that we flew with in Vietnam took great pride in our accomplishments. For most of us the tempering in fire in both flight school and combat has helped us excel in our lives. But when our time comes and we head to the great hangar in the sky Im certain that we will be welcomed by and know the faces that will greet us.

Dennis L. Faucher D.D.S.

Ex CW2 Pilot 129th Assault Helicopter Co

Memories dont last forever. After 45 years even the best of memories will dim. In my case to help me remember so far in the past I researched much of my personal correspondence, reviewed all of my personal Vietnam photo collection, tracked down and interviewed most of the pilots, crew chiefs, and gunners that I flew with and did my best to give as accurate a depiction of what happened as possible. If nothing else, its damned close. But if I did make a mistake please, let me acknowledge in advance that mistakes, like the ones I made in life that I talk about in this book, make good and entertaining stories and often, as is the case in this book, have a lesson to be learned from them.

Also of special note, though I talk mostly about the helicopter pilots in this book, the real heroes of our helicopter crews in Vietnam were the two men in the back of the bird. The crew chiefs and gunners were the men that did all the work and protected us pilots with their brash antics and skillful use of the M60 machine guns. And they did it all while we pilots did our best to learn how to fly in those combat situations. The men in the back of the bird are my true heroes.

Lastly, I have purposely left out or changed a few names where I thought that the statute of limitations on embarrassment had not run out. In the case of my two girlfriends, both of their names have been changed to protect their anonymity and privacy. But the remainder of this book is exactly as I remember it happening.

My Army dog tag and dog tag from American Huey 369.

There have been many books written about the Vietnam War. I did not set out to write one of them. For me the war was well behind in my lifes rear-view mirror and I had been looking forward in life for many years. But over those years the war kept creeping up on me like a mosquito that keeps buzzing around your ear. It wont go away until its satisfied with blood or you kill it. For over 40 years I let that mosquito buzz in my head. My life was impacted in so many ways by Vietnam. I focused intently on anything other than that war. Ive had trouble in positions that I worked in with authority figures and people that did crazy and stupid acts. I worked beyond extremely hard at every endeavor, whether it was work or play. 80 hour work weeks were the norm for me for many, many years. I even left the corporate world and started my own company because of this mosquito. But always my war would return.

Then a few years ago several of my grandsons asked if I would write some stories or perhaps a book from my time in Vietnam. They had read some books on that war and discovered that helicopter pilots were key players in every battle. And that was my job. In Vietnam I was a warrant officer helicopter UH-1 Huey pilot. I agreed to try. For six months I would periodically sit down at my computer and try to hammer out my thoughts on the year that I had spent in Vietnam. But only a few stories came to my mind, the rest was blocked out by a brain that had shoved those nasty memories so far in the back of my mind that all I had was a blank slate. Many people that I spoke to on book writing advised me to just start writing. They said it would all come to me. But it did not come to me. I needed to remember what had happened and put it together so that it made sense to me. My mind was still a blank.

Then one December day in 2010, I called up my 82 year old mother to see if she had kept any of my correspondence with her from my time in Vietnam. Indeed she had kept every letter. Some weeks later in January I received an envelope with 12 or 14 letters that I had written and sent to her from Vietnam. They were in a small stack with a piece of yarn tied around them in a bow for keepsake. My mom had obviously kept these letters safe as a memento for over forty years. All of them except one said Free where a stamp should have been. I went through the envelopes and organized them by postmark from September 1971 until September 1972 - the time of my tour in Vietnam. But there was one letter left. It was dated December 5th 1972, several months after I came back from Vietnam. Tomorrow morning I will start this journey by reading my words from so long ago.