As night ushered in a hushed silence over Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, Petty Officer David Larsen sat nervously in a patrol boat as it cautiously made its way through the dense jungle along the perilous upper Saigon River. It was August 2, 1969, and the 21yearold gunner’s mate was part of a team with a vital yet risky mission: to set up a twoboat waterborne guard post on the murky river and intercept hostile river traffic.

Also on board was a sixman ambush team charged with protecting the pair of patrol vessels from any landbased threats. As the fiberglass boats reached their position, they cut their engines and quietly glided toward the riverbank, where Larsen watched the six soldiers leap onto the shore and quickly disappear into the darkness of the trees, unsure what lurked among them.

Waiting with anxious anticipation, Larsen wiped beads of sweat from his brow. The tension was made even more unbearable by the suffocating humidity. Suddenly, the silence was shattered by a staccato volley of machine gun fire, swiftly followed by the thunderous boom of rockets exploding. Larsen had a bad feeling about this one. Moments later, his fears were confirmed when a distorted, panicstricken voice came blaring over the radio: the ambush team had been seriously outnumbered and desperately needed help. The patrol crews were under strict orders to stay on their boats come what may, but he wasn’t about to let his buddies bite the dust on the jungle floor…



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