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absolutely necessary—standing straight up—-running in a straight line or in a pattern will get you killed and returning fire immediately helps neutralize incoming rounds. Our training had emphasized all these things but until you come under fire personally you cannot appreciate what it takes to advance towards an enemy who is firing at you—our Marines learned how to overcome the very natural tendency to hunker down when being fired upon and demonstrated time and again the courage and tenacity which defines them as United States Marines! The squad leaders of first platoon ( Cpl. Nelson, Cpl. Ingerson and Sgt. Fontaine) were experienced at maneuvering under fire—providing covering fire for each other and moving like a well oiled machine on the battlefield—we moved with arm and hand signals borne out of countless firefights and countless hours of training and even rehearsals for these moments. As we lost some of the original platoon to injuries, promotions and transfers due to ‘operation mixmaster’—we had to continue training and rehearsals to bring the new people up to speed—as time passed we did, however, see an erosion in our ‘teamwork’ because of the turnover in personnel.
‘A’ Company 1/4 operated in our new TAOR much like E Co. 2/7 when we were in Qui Nhon—the platoons had their own TAORs and our patrols operated from the platoon outposts with an occasional Company size operation or sweep. The platoon patrol routes were determined by the Battalion S-3 , S-2 in coordination with the ARVN and other friendly units engaged in the security of the Chu Lai air base and supply depot. These patrol routes were posted on the Battalion ‘sit
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