Early in the Vietnam War Pentagon officials believed Vietnam was no place for Armor. Dense jungle, rice paddies, rough terrain, and monsoon rains would preclude off-road mobility of heavy armor. Confined to the roadways, they would be easy targets, and that the Vietnam War could only be fought and won by Infantrymen on the ground. They were wrong.
Nearly all of the 150 photographs in this book were made from slides. That is why they are so clear and with such true color. Most of them look as though they were taken yesterday.
I arrived in Vietnam in the summer of 1968 with an Agfa 35mm camera that I had purchased while stationed in Germany. The camera only lasted about one week in Vietnam because it was the Monsoon season in the Central Highlands, and rust from the rain and high humidity ruined it. Since the unit I was in never went into the 4th Infantry Division basecamp, Camp Enari, in Pleiku where the PX was, I did not have the opportunity to buy another one. I spent the first half of my Vietnam tour of duty without a camera to document the extraordinary events, places, and people I encountered. Then, early in 1969, I went on R&R, and while in basecamp on my way to Hong Kong, I bought an Olympus 35mm camera at the PX. So, it was only during the last half of my tour, the first half of 1969, that I took all of the photos that I have now.
Al Hogue, who was in the same mechanized infantry scout squad as me, also took many pictures. Using his Canon Electra 35mm camera, his pictures were all shot during the last half of 1969. The majority of the pictures in this Vietnam pictorial were made by Al. Al has a good eye for photography and a talent for capturing a moment in time and creating pictures that say a lot.
Our pictures bring back memories from more than fifty years ago and they mean a lot to us. We like to show them to our friends and family and other Veterans and tell them the stories associated with each one. Since most of the guys who served in Vietnam did not have cameras and therefore have no pictures, we decided to combine our photos to share with them and anyone else that might be interested in that extraordinary period of U.S. military history.
