Spike Team Alabama, Oct. 5th, 1968

[ABNAK]

https://www.sofmag.com/nva-general-t...alties-part-2/

I bought the book by John Stryker Meyer called "Across the Fence". About halfway through it now. I am familiar with SOG teams from other reading material like John Plaster's books. It is about MACV-SOG recon teams ("Spike Teams") running missions across the border into Laos and Cambodia.

In October of 1968 Spike Team Alabama ran a mission into Laos not far from the A Shau Valley. Unbeknown at the time they landed basically on top of an NVA division. Were looking for a regiment and found a division! It didn't go well as you might expect, 9 guys (3 Americans and 6 indigs) against a division. Something like 4 or 5 rescue aircraft were shot down and more heavily damaged, with 17 non-SOG personnel losing their lives in the process. It was so bad a "Bright Light" rescue mission was planned and then scrubbed due to the extremely heavy NVA resistance.

I am continually amazed at what those SOG guys did. Talk about "seat of your pants" missions! There were a number of teams over the years that simply "disappeared" in Laos and Cambodia. Inserted and then.....nothing, never heard from again. Ever. Scary as hell if you think about it. In 1968 alone they suffered a 100% casualty rate; every team member was either wounded (some more than once), killed, or missing. That is some no-joke shit right there for a military unit. They started recruiting from LRRP teams from regular Army units (doing similar missions but not "over the fence" and not with indigs) because the Special Forces School at Ft. Bragg wasn't able to crank out tabbed graduates fast enough to cover the casualty rates. They were able to attain a 500+:1 kill ratio, from doing it themselves or from the airstrikes supporting them.

You will be hard-pressed to find a unit in the U.S. military that suffered those levels of casualties and still killed so many enemy. Not to mention this was a sustained effort over the course of several years, not a one-time epic battle (which U.S. military history is replete with over the centuries).

[Inkslinger]

Lots of good interviews with him on Jocko Wilinks podcast. Some truly intense stuff!

[Averageman]

I just saw a story on YouTube where a Marine patrol lost a Team Leader to a Tiger.

[Black_Sheep]

I watched about half of Jocko’s interview this morning before heading out to clear snow, it was very compelling. I can’t wait to watch the rest...

[flenna]

Another excellent read on MACV-SOG is We Few by Nick Brokhausen. His first hand accounts of running operations out of CCN are riveting to say the least.

[Straight Shooter]

I read it, and I dont even feel worthy to. It almost feels...private, in some way, only for those who've "been there, & done that" kinda.
My God- THANK YOU for these men. How horrible their situations were, & that Ill never have to endure what they did.

[ABNAK]

I read it, and I dont even feel worthy to. It almost feels...private, in some way, only for those who've "been there, & done that" kinda.
My God- THANK YOU for these men. How horrible their situations were, & that Ill never have to endure what they did.

You couldn't make up some of those harrowing stories. It's seems unbelievable that they could survive against those types of odds.....of course a lot of them didn't.

Can you imagine in today's day and age entire teams of guys just disappearing, never to be heard from again? In many cases without even a trace. Makes me shudder to think how many Americans have their final resting place in those Laotian and Cambodian hills.

[Straight Shooter]

You couldn't make up some of those harrowing stories. It's seems unbelievable that they could survive against those types of odds.....of course a lot of them didn't.

Can you imagine in today's day and age entire teams of guys just disappearing, never to be heard from again? In many cases without even a trace. Makes me shudder to think how many Americans have their final resting place in those Laotian and Cambodian hills.

No, I cant imagine. And the horrors that happened to them before death...oh man. Very sad.

[ABNAK]

I think it was in Plaster's book, but one Spike Team in Laos was essentially wiped out: two of the three Americans and all the 'Yards were killed. The last American, a Spec4, watched in horror as the NVA disemboweled the Team Leader right in front of him. About that time an extraction chopper flew overhead and dropped in a Jungle Penetrator (a thing to get into and be pulled up through the trees to safety). The NVA strapped this Spec4 into the Jungle Penetrator and let him live.....so he could tell the tale and spread the word. He got back, white as a ghost, and never pulled another mission "across the fence" again.

Reminds me of the Gen. Pershing story during the Philippine Insurrection where he supposedly had a bunch of Moro's executed by bullets dipped in pig's blood and let one free to spread the word.

[Sam]

Sgt. Jerry "Mad Dog" Shriver !