Dear Colonel Dabney,

Just a note to say I enjoyed your article in the latest Gazette.  It brought back some memories, however fuzzy.  Anyway, I dug through a few drawers and finally found my flight log book for the 1968 period in hopes that the entries would further jog my recollection.  I've enclosed a copy of the page covering my January 1968 flights in the UH-34D for HMM-362.

With the help of the log book, my memory of the first days of the Tet offensive is as follows.  The ammo dump at Khe Sanh was hit sometime on 21 January.  The squadron was ordered to send a section of 34s to provide whatever support that might be required (you can see from my log book, I had been to Khe Sanh for a couple of periods earlier in January as an aircraft commander on one of the twenty six "working birds").  When the section approached Quang Tri, we were redirected to land and hold for the night (again if memory serves me right, the rounds from the dump were still cooking off and it was decided the danger of that situation out-weighed the benefit of whatever support we could offer that night).

We took off for Khe Sanh early on the morning of 22 January into some low hanging ground clutter that extended all the way to Khe Sanh.  We managed to arrive over the base by use of TACAN distance and bearing and were talked down by the folks in the expeditionary tower.  The rest of the day is pretty much of a blur now, but I do recall one of our first missions was to resupply 881S and pick up some WIAs.  I was the first in the zone and during the drop and load we received mortar fire, one round landing long and one short.  My wing man, Capt. Russell "Russ" Hohman, was second into the zone and by that time the NVA had their dope right.  Your article picks up from there.  One other note, of the five crew members in Russ' helo, only the corpsman was wounded (in the leg).  Tragically, as you relate, the WIAs and some of their mates didn't fare as well.

I will echo your observation that that the Purple Foxes did a hell of a job in keeping you guys resupplied for the remainder of the siege.  Although we hated to lose "our job", the 46s were much better equipped to perform that mission.

A couple of months later I happened to fly into Khe Sanh to pick up some NVA POWs and could hardly believe what I saw.  The terrain had been rearranged almost beyond recognition - looked like a moonscape - and the ground was almost covered with parachutes, remnants of over two months of air-ops.  Managed to dig up these pictures as well.  Thought you might like them.

SF

Glenn W. Russell, Jr.

PS Congratulations on your belated recognition