Before I landed at Chu Lai, July 1965 with 1st 155 Guns (SP), I inverted two magazines tightly wrapped with electrician’s tape and came ashore with confidence that my added firepower would rue the day, easily neutralizing envisioned nasty, fire breathing indigenous heathens with my superior military creativity. Another time I returned incoming small arms fire. Excited to bag my first trophy, my rifle jammed after the second round. I flipped magazines. Another three rounds fired. Jammed! Nonetheless I confidently persevered even with the additional weight of two loaded magazines in the tedious heat of a long patrol. I pondered the value of my experiment, unwrapped, thoroughly cleaned the magazines and repositioned them, rewrapped and reloaded with fresh ammo. Nothing! Silent, ominous pictures in my brain finally assured me of my folly. I buried my superlative, yet ill conceived invention, offered a few words of wisdom and with appropriate ceremony included my red cape, mask and tights. I resorted to standard mags the remainder of my tour. Too bad. I was never able to justify “my imagined lethality” with 40 continuous and glorious rounds fired down range.
But I’m convinced the laughter of my enemy, much older now but with long memories that still ring throughout the provenance with stories of that “Boocoo Dinky Dow”. Subsequently I carried a Grease Gun on future excursions into the jungle; a much wiser Marine. Somewhere I heard the raspy voice of my DI: “Son, if the Corps wanted you to have a double mag he would have issued you one!”
1st. Guns (SP) 3rd. 8″ Howitzer (SP)
1965-1966
For all who are curious about survival, its guilty consequence and PTSD, my novel “The Price for Glory” a story of Destiny’s mystics and mysteries will be published in August.
Great minds unsuccessfully co-exist with heavy artillery.
I’m glad to hear you’ve written a book about your time in the service. Those memories will be treasured by future generations. I think there have been more books written about Vietnam than any other subject. My personal book is titled To Hear Silence. I was a radio operator on a forward observer team. I was with C/1/13 from the time we first formed up at Camp Horno in CA until we left Khe Sanh in Oct ’67. Our unit was attached to the 3/26.
Semper Fi bro
I assume you are talking about the M-14. I made 3-packs for my M-16 and they worked great. (two magazines facing up with another between them facing down).
It was just a matter of flipping or rotating the magazines as they emptied. W
with the M-16 on auto, you could put 60 rounds down range in less than a minute.
Myself and another Marine used the 3 packs to great advantage the night we were hit on Hill #826 at Hai Van after dropping a pair of frags on Charlie. Charlie made it through the perimeter but not at our position. Cpl Bill Reed, Nam 68-69.