captured weapons

[Mithrandir]

here are a few pictures of some of the type of weapons we captured....

these are from a little "Museum" set up at camp eagle to show what the 101st had been encountering ...

enjoy...

[Mithrandir]

and one more

[Marlin T]

Thanks for posting these pics.

[new sks 2005]

any of you vets bringback any sks? how many hoops did you go thru to get it home?

[southernshooter]

Thats sum pretty harsh weapons

[Sarge]

I brought 2 SKSs and a Browning Hi Power home with me and sent another SKS home with a buddy. I took a russian Makerov pistol with me on R & R to Hawaii and gave it to my wife to take home, along with a WW 2 German Mauser I bought while there.
Paper work for the bring backs didn't amount to anything. I just took the weapons to the MPs somewhere, don't remember where, and filled out the war trophy papers. They gave me one copy which I had with the weapons when I left. About 2 months after I got home I got the SVN papers authorizing me to take the weapons out of the country.
Still have 1 of the SKSs and both pistols. I've also added an AK and another SKS and pistol to the collection, with trophy papers.
Here is a photo of the pistols/papers in a VN display I set up at conventions and other places.
Sarge

[AL MOUNT]

Originally Posted by new sks 2005

any of you vets bringback any sks? ?

Not me......the hospital in Yokohama kinda frowned on that......

But does a GSW from an AK count.......


Actually, this little flesh wound in my front thigh (Feb. 21st of 68) only kept me off the line for a mere 30 days....

Then right back to my unit to try to stop some more of em.....

Succeeded in Aug. with shrapnel to the ankle....and hello Jay pan....

[Sarge]

You went to the wrong horsepital! I took the above listed weapons thru Camp Drake, by way of Yakoto Air Base - where ever the hell that was/is?
I was sorta/more or less ambulatory - so long as I didn't have to go far or fast.
No hassel from the hospital people or the hair farce. They just put them in safe keeping till I got on a C141 med-evac 10 days later back to the states.
When I got to Fitzsimons Army Hospital in Colorado they gave them back to me and I had the wife come get them.

[AL MOUNT]

Originally Posted by Sarge

5th SFG(A)281st AHC B55 Mike Force

Durn..... ...you "Snake eaters"..... ....always did get special treatment..... ...



Fer you non-military types.... .....SFG stand for "Special Forces Group"

Sarge here, was either a Green Beret or attached to them flying birds .....get it.....

I can kid him till the cows come home.....

But if you ain't a Veteran.....

You better not.....



Happy Memorial Day Sarge.....

[Sarge]

Hey, why wuz U in die 501st instead O die 506th?
Oh, I dun thunk we wuz juust gett'n comp-ensated fur all de SH- we got to du, sides BBQ snake is Gud!
Actually I flew door gunner with the 281st as a "Moon lite'n" job. My first assignment in country should have gone to a 2nd or 3rd tour guy. I had lots of free time so flew every other day for 7 weeks. Finally got myself xfer'd to the Mike Force and began beating the bushes.
Another perk of SF & MACV was that we got to bring three(3) war trophy firearms home where everyone else could only bring one(1). You'll notice that I took full advantage of the opportunity!!! No idea why we were so lucky, but as they say - "Never look a gift horse in the mouth!!!"

[citydesk175]

www.geocities.com/citydesk175/
check the gallery for 2 pages of pics at the 199th LIB captured weapons museum in 1970

BTW I mentioned this museum to the asst curator at the Army Ordnance museum and he asked where the weapons went. I told him my best guess was that they were blown up by our EOD people when the Brigade pulled out.

He became very exercised and shouted "That was our heritage!!"
I was speechless

Regards
Citydesk175

[MJ1]

2/6/68

Rifle traced back to the 1st Cav

[Riverrat1969]

Check out my photo album. There are three photos of Chicom weapons fresh out of weapons caches.....actually, fresh Vietnamese graves....still has the dirt on them.

[199er]

I brought one home in August of 1970. It came out of the huge cache near "Shakey's Hill" (hill 428) in the upper area of the 'Fishhook' in Cambodia in June 70. The huge cache provided enough SKSs for every man in the our infantry battalion plus all the 'strap hangers' that showed up to see the cache site and observe us 'humping our asses' off to extract the huge find.

No hoops to jump through as I recall. Our SKSs were back hauled to our base camp (escorted by our Bn Sgt Major) and secured for us. After returning from the Cambodian Operation we all filled out our paperwork to take them home and we tagged our SKSs. You got your SKS paperwork when you got your clearance papers and weapon upon signing out. If you were wia and medevaced out of country our XO would make arrangements for it to go with you.

I had mine for years gathering dust and a few years ago I donated it to our Brigade Association.

Our Brigade Hqs had made some sort coordination with the 93rd and 24th Evac hospitals in Long Binh that serviced our soldiers and it worked pretty well.

[Esteban]

Add this to the collection.

[rooter]

Those CHICOM (potato masher) grenades in the foreground...I had our marine EOD disarm a number of those for me on my first tour in country and brought them back stateside in '69....I donated those and all the rest of the captured items I had to the Seabee Mueseum, Port Hueneme, California. The new mesuem is going to be commissioned next year, so if any of you ever get up into Ventura County stop in and look-see....Chief

[Esteban]

Those RPG's , & Recoiless Rifles, were what we worried about. I was in a Cav. unit.

[Snakedriver]

By 1972 we were up against some of the best Russian-built equipment available. Unfortunately for the NVA, they didn't the first thing about how to deploy this fancy new equipment.

Here is some of the stuff that was knocked out at the Battle of An Loc:





This is some of our guys atop a T-54 that they killed:

[Esteban]

I was South of An Loc on Hwy 13, Thunder Road , & at that time, there wasn't any " tank to tank " fighting for us. I am sure there was plenty of Armor in Cambodia just waiting for us to leave, though.
Good pix. I have some others & some I probably shouldn't post , too.

[Snakedriver]

When they rolled out of Cambodia in the Easter 1972 attack, they brought hundreds of sophisticated Russian-built tanks, track-mounted AAA guns and armored vehicles in a never seen before Warsaw Pact style battle. Unfortunately for them, their armor frequently outran the infantry and were in the open unprotected from air attack.

Their logistics was very poor for tanks and armor as well. We saw many cases where they had 55-gal drums filled with extra fuel strapped to the rear deck of the tanks during battle. A straffing run with even a .30 cal machinegun would pierce the drums of fuel and set the whole vehicle on fire. Not good!

My unit killed dozens of them during the battle of An Loc. 3 1/2 Divisions of NVA were also decimated. Sucks to be them!

[Esteban]

They sucked anyway !
I am sure you remember this saying.

" Kill 'em all,,,, Let God sort 'em out ! "

What unit were you in ? I was in a cav unit of the First Infantry Division. Lai Khe , on #13 , was our base .

[Snakedriver]

Originally Posted by Esteban

They sucked anyway !
I am sure you remember this saying.

" Kill 'em all,,,, Let God sort 'em out ! "

What unit were you in ? I was in a cav unit of the First Infantry Division. Lai Khe , on #13 , was our base .

I was in the 1st Air Cav., callsign Blue Max. The giant 1st Infantry patch carved out in the trees SW. of An Loc was always a pleasure to see from the air as we headed north to the fight. I was in the 1st Infantry at Ft. Riley for several years after Vietnam. You know what they say, "If you're going to be one, be a Big Red One"!

Lai Khe was where we staged out of for the big fight at Loc Ninh and An Loc. Crashed into the perimeter wire in a battle damaged Cobra there on the north end of the airstrip. We almost made it back, the engine just couldn't hold on for a couple more seconds.

[Esteban]

I remember that Big Red One !!

That's me & the track I drove in the other pix.

I was in C Troop 1-4 Cav. & D Troop was our Air Cav. unit.

[Snakedriver]

Awesome pic's.!!!

Here's me with my Blue Max Cobra. We were all such handsome devils in those days weren't we?

[Esteban]

Your uniform is cleaner than mine !!