Badger's Burrow

AUTHOR

Prologue

August 1975 - Somewhere in the Wilderness of Northwest Laos

Drenched and chilled to the bone, the going grew more difficult with each step. Fatigue invaded every fiber of their bodies, causing muscles to cramp, hearts to race and each step to seem like carrying twice their own weight. Stumbling, crawling, forging ahead, collapsing and then more stumbling and crawling. It was endless like being lost in a void, a maze, and not knowing the exit. Steep, rugged, jungle-covered mountainous terrain made matters worse. Towering ledges separated one ravine after another, and slippery rocks bruised, punctured and tore the skin making gashes and scrapes.

Blood-sucking leeches clung to soft skin burying their heads until they grew full and large. The men forged on because surrendering to the elements or their pursuers was not an option no matter how terrible the ordeal or hopeless the situation. Gary wondered how much more of this torture his wards could withstand in their diminished physical state. It was the second day and he was surprised they had managed to this point.

CHAPTER 1

Biloxi, Mississippi 1964, Eleven Years Earlier

Three airmen stood in front of a tavern several blocks off Division Street in a shabby seedy area of town under the flickering, partially burned out Jack of Clubs blue and red neon sign. A small black and white notice on the lower right corner of a smoky, dirty window warned, No Coloreds Allowed.

Jimmy laughed and shook his head at the crazy act of defiance Gary had just suggested. Biloxi, like all of Mississippi and most of the South, was thoroughly racially segregated. Open resistance was foolish. They won’t put up with my black ass in there, he said matter-of-factly and to no one in particular. They’re gonna tell us to get out, and if we don’t, they’ll try to throw us out, and if that doesn’t work, they’ll call the fucking cops, and we will end up in jail. We’re nuts to even try this.

I don’t give a rat’s ass. I say we go in and have a beer or two. If they don't serve you Jimmy, I will buy two beers and give you one of mine. Gary looked from Rick to Jimmy. Come on, this is America, they can’t pull this shit and get away with it. Jimmy has just as much right to enter this dive as we do. When Gary set his mind to something, he left little doubt he was bent on doing what he said.

Jimmy sighed. Okay, okay, what the hell, let me go first. He opened the door and entered with Gary and Rick in tow. This ought to be interesting, he said with a fair share of apprehension.

The dark dingy inside smelled of disinfectant. A long wooden bar dominated the right side of the narrow room with several barstools occupied by scruffy hard looking locals. A pool table stood in the back illuminated by a low hanging green shaded overhead light. A large rough looking man was bent forward lining up a shot, while another stood by chalking the tip of the pool cue and studying the table. The mournful sound of Hank Williams’ Your Cheating Heart flowed from the jukebox. The bartender spotted Jimmy and walked over to the portion of the bar closest to the three airmen. Hey boy, get the hell out of here. Can’t you read the sign? No coloreds.

He’s with us, said Gary. He and Rick pushed their way in front of Jimmy.

Oh shit, goddamned Yankees. We don’t want you in here either, not with him anyway, drawled the bartender, nodding at Jimmy. Now get your trouble making asses da hell outta here.

We’re not going anywhere until we have a beer, our friend here included, Gary glanced toward Jimmy. He barely got the words out of his mouth before a large man on the nearest bar stool retrieved a large black revolver from his belt and pointed it at Gary’s face. You boys looking for trouble? Y’all know there’s no niggers allowed in here. Two other barstools quickly emptied and the two men in the back laid their pool cues on the table and joined in. Five nasty looking locals surrounded the three airmen.

Gary studied the revolver then switched his gaze to the man holding it. This is none of your damned business so unless you plan on using that cannon sit back down and stay out of this. He turned and glared at the other four men. That goes for the rest of you assholes as well. Jimmy and Rick suddenly realized Gary had just pushed matters beyond avoiding a fight.

The big man smirked and stepped in close to pistol whip Gary. Jimmy reached over and twisted the gun from his hand and threw it hard at the mirror behind the bar loudly shattering it. Long slivers of glass cascaded to the floor. Several bottles of cheap whiskey and some glasses also toppled and smashed. The bartender looked on in horrified disbelief, the locals waded in, and a brawl broke out.

Jimmy grabbed the nearest man by his hair and slammed his head viciously against the hard, mahogany bar causing a large bloody gash on the man’s forehead. He went down like a rock. Next, in one fluid motion, he picked up a bar stool and went after the two pool players beating on Gary. Jimmy took them both out, striking them repeatedly with the barstool. He helped Gary rise and they both rushed to Rick’s aid. Two men had him pinned in a corner by the door, working him over. Seconds later the policed arrived. They happened to be only a block away when the bartender called for help.

The two cops broke up the fight. Jimmy didn’t have a scratch. Gary had some cuts and scratches and Rick a split lip, and several nasty looking black and blue spots. The locals were in far worse shape. One needed to be revived, and the others were doubled up on the floor groaning. One of the cops helped them up.

The bartender was irate and fuming. These three goddamned Yankee bastards barged in here just looking for trouble and that one, he said pointing to Gary, demanded to be served including the nigger. I asked them to leave, but they were bent on trouble. Look what the nigger did to the mirror. He also smashed several bottles of good booze and a bunch of glasses.

After the bartender finished spewing his angry version of the incident, the police arrested the three airmen, handcuffed and marched them out the door to the police cruiser, and called for another squad car to carry the wounded locals to the hospital for treatment. The bartender followed them out the door. You boys are going to regret this. I’m lodging a complaint to your commander and you will pay for every goddamned cent of the repairs, he yelled, shaking his fist.

The white portion of the Biloxi jail was a rundown dump of a facility with several holding cells. The black section was considerably worse. It consisted of only one large holding cell with a filthy plugged up toilet and a rusted water spigot sticking out of the wall, no chairs, no beds. Fortunately, Jimmy had the entire cell to himself because no other blacks had been arrested yet that night.

Such was not the case with Rick and Gary. All three holding cells were full of detainees, most of them combative and drunk. As soon as the police placed Rick and Gary in one of the cells, the inmates determined that they were airmen and started pushing them around. Gary warned them to stop; but as soon as he spoke, his Yankee origin became obvious. The pushing turned to fisticuffs with Gary and Rick getting the bad end of it. Fortunately, several police officers heard the commotion and broke it up. Although Rick and Gary sported additional cuts and bruises, they had dished out enough pain that once the police departed their attackers left them alone.

The three airmen spent a long, uncomfortable night in the Biloxi jail. The First Sergeant fetched them later the next day and took them directly to the commander who was not happy. He glared at them as they stood at attention in front of his desk and read off the list of charges; destruction of property, instigating a fight, public misconduct, conduct unbecoming of an airman, and so on. Once he finished the list of infractions, he leaned forward in his chair. Furthermore, two of the men you beat up are in the hospital, and the other three are in almost as bad a shape. You three men caused way too much trouble and I will not tolerate any further misconduct or any other bad reflection on the United States Air Force and most importantly this Squadron. I am tempted to Courts Martial the three of you; however, the First Sergeant convinced me to go light this time. Nevertheless, if you morons so much as litter, I will throw the damned book at you.

For punishment, the commander restricted them to the base for 30 days. He directed that they perform a considerable amount of extra details and docked their wages to help pay for the damage to the bar and for the medical bills of their victims. However, the incident bonded the three airmen even closer, as shared adversity often does.

The friendship began several months earlier when Rick and Gary, who did not know each other at the time, separately came to Jimmy’s aid. They were sitting in the bus station waiting to catch the city bus back to the base when Jimmy walked in followed by four local hoods who were harassing him. Jimmy told the biggest one to go to hell and all four attacked him. It was plain to see Jimmy was an airman so both Rick and Gary jumped to his defense. Several minutes later two bus drivers and a ticket agent broke up the fight and chased Jimmy’s attackers out of the station.

Before long the three men became close friends. This was particularly odd for Jimmy. He was a loner, a tough kid from Chicago and did not easily make friends. Gary and Rick changed all that. Soon they were doing most everything together, from eating meals at the dining hall to attending movies at the base theater and having a few drinks at the Airmen’s Club on Saturday nights. They jokingly referred to themselves as the Three Amigos.

After the incident at the Jack of Clubs the Three Amigos funneled their energy into doing well in class. Air traffic control school was not by any means easy and the washout rate was much higher than most Air Force schools. They were all in the same class block, so it made sense to pool their energies into group study. The Amigos often remained up until late at night studying and quizzing each other. As a result, by the time they graduated they had improved to the point of being in the top ten percent of the school with Jimmy achieving the highest grade of the three. This reflected well on their squadron which pleased their previously irate commander considerably.

Before graduation they filled out their dream sheets on where they wished to be assigned after tech school, Rick and Jimmy requested Aviano Air Base in Italy. Several instructors told them it was one of the best assignments in the Air Force. They were also convinced if the women in Italy looked even remotely like Sophia Loren that was where they wanted to be. Gary requested Combat Control School, the Air Force version of Army Special Forces.

Rick and Jimmy thought he was crazy and tried to dissuade him to no avail. Who’s going to get us into trouble if you’re not with us and instead somewhere out in the jungle eating snakes, teased Rick.

When the assignments finally came out, the Air Force ordered each of the Amigos to a different location. Rick to an air traffic control radar unit at Kingsley Field, Oregon, Jimmy to the control tower at Yokota AB in Japan, and Gary to Combat Control School.

The Air Force directed all graduates to report to their new duty station 30 days after tech school graduation. Most airmen welcomed the free time after the rigors of basic training and tech school and eagerly looked forward to returning home for several weeks of leave before reporting for duty at their new assignment. Not Jimmy. He had nowhere to spend his leave because his only living relative, Aunt Clara, had passed away when Jimmy was at bootcamp. Jimmy became withdrawn and it took a while for his two friends to learn why.

Rick called home and asked permission to bring Jimmy with him on leave. He explained Jimmy’s problem and that he had nowhere to go, and of course, Grandma and Grandpa Jennings approved. So, Rick and Jimmy said an emotional goodbye to Gary and traveled to Ripon, Wisconsin. Jimmy was a big hit with Rick’s family and friends. Grandma Jennings fussed over him as though he were her own grandson. A tight-knit and loving family like the Jennings clan was foreign to Jimmy and the experience touched him deeply.

Saying goodbye this time to Rick and the Jennings family was again difficult for Jimmy who never had good friends until he met Rick and Gary. After a month at the Jennings home, Jimmy and Rick parted ways for their new duty stations.

Gary qualified as a combat controller but in late 1965 injured his back on a parachute jump into northern Laos on a classified mission. The injury was enough to disqualify him from future jumps, so the Air Force assigned him to regular air traffic control duties and shipped him to Clark Air Base in the Philippines. Rick spent 18 months at Kingsley Field, Oregon and in 1966 the Air Force also assigned him to Clark AB.

Although Rick and Gary were reunited, they had lost contact with Jimmy about two years after his assignment to Yokota Air Base. Their letters came back marked return to sender, and when Rick finally managed to get a call through to the Yokota Control Tower, they informed him that Jimmy had gotten into trouble and was no longer assigned there. They had no idea of his whereabouts.

CHAPTER 2

Eastern Laos – the Early ‘60s

Lae Phankham, his father Vang, two younger brothers and his aunt lived on a farm located close to the Laos and North Vietnam border. His mother died years earlier from a cobra bite while working in her garden. The farm consisted of a small main house made of reeds and bamboo with a thatched roof and built up off the ground several feet to protect against the flooding monsoon rains. A shed built of the same material and used to store the harvest stood nearby. Like most farms in the area, it had been in the family for generations and the main crop was rice. They felt blessed and content.

Lae, the eldest at 16, had a kind face and a gaze that fell on you gently. His smile was broad and sincere. Hard work on the farm made his slim body muscular. He was a handsome boy. Someday when his father grew old and tired, he would inherit the farm.

Vang wanted his oldest son to become educated and used some of his meager savings to enroll him in a nearby mission school run by the French. For Lae it became a door that opened to a new world. Seeing how quickly Lae learned and the excitement he found in books, the French missionaries loaned him one book after another, and Lae devoured them. After a while, it became clear Lae was an exceptionally gifted young man. This prompted the missionaries to use their influence to get him accepted at a French Catholic boy’s school in Luang Prabang some 80 kilometers away.

At first, Vang objected mightily. He needed help at the farm during harvest and what would happen to his plan to eventually give the farm to Lae should he pursue another life? But Vang, after all, loved his son dearly and ultimately gave his blessing after relentless pleading from Lae.

Lae attended the school for the next two years achieving excellent grades and gaining the admiration of the nuns and priests. After two years, he graduated at the top of his class with grades so good he secured a full scholarship to the University in Vientiane. He resided at the government-sponsored men’s dormitory with other young men of lesser means.

Some of the vocal older boys in higher classes made the university a hotbed for political drama and radical ideas. Mostly they railed against the government and the monarchy. They expressed opinions that Lae had never thought of in his young and simple life; the rights of ordinary people, help for the poor, and redistributing some of the wealth from the rich to the less fortunate. These things stirred a fire in the students and Lae, the poor farmer’s son, was no exception.

A popular upperclassman named Somkhith Noi, known as Som, was the most vocal. Som’s intense look made it seem, as though his message was so serious, the end of the world would happen the next minute unless someone acted quickly to make it a better place. However, he was a friendly person and made a special point of welcoming Lae. He respected the fact a farmer’s son had made it all the way to the university.

Most evenings over tea in the canteen Som stood and addressed all who would listen. He spoke about the plight of the poor and disadvantaged, that the rich owned ninety percent of the country’s wealth and refused to share it. He said their previous French masters used the wealthy to exploit the country. Now, he said, the Americans had replaced the French, and although they were not so interested in plundering the wealth, they were interested in making sure Laos did not fall to the communists. Therefore, they supported any group in Laos that shared their view. He said the American CIA now asserted much influence with the government and turned a blind eye when millions of American aid dollars went to the pockets of rich and corrupt politicians.

Lae always listened to all this with interest. Som’s articulate lectures and his influence on many of the students fascinated him. However, as a first year student Lae did not want to do anything that might shed a poor light on himself. So, he remained silent and devoted himself to his studies. Later in the evening though, when he was alone in bed with his own thoughts, he would ponder the points Som made. These things made sense even to a farmer’s son.

Som recognized this and made sure not to push too hard. Someday, Lae would be ready to assist the cause. Som was a devout communist and an agent of the Pathet Lao, always looking to recruit new blood, and Lae seemed an ideal candidate, intelligent and naïve.

CHAPTER 3

Angeles City, Pampanga, Philippines 1967

Baby glanced at Rick Jennings and smiled as she smoothly poured the cold San Miguel, guiding the amber stream so it touched the far inside of the glass. She always finished with just the right amount of suds on the top. Rick looked on and smiled back. Just looking at Baby made him smile. Pappy Reese, the expat owner of Pappy’s, employed Baby and several other young girls to help with the bartending and to flirt with the customers. They remained behind the bar and off limits for anything beyond flirting and talking. Still virgins, in their late teens and pretty, Pappy called them his Cherry girls. Baby was the prettiest, small and shapely, with long hair tied in a ponytail, a smile that teased, and inviting eyes. Baby knew how to use those eyes to flirt.

You not drink much tonight Ricky? Baby always called him Ricky, even though he had told her numerous times his name was Rick. Eventually, he gave up correcting her.

I never drink much. His grin widened. Pappy always had those girls pushing the beer. I don’t like to get drunk.

You won’t get drunk if you drink a couple more, she patted his forearm, her eyes inviting, and yet not too inviting. You been a butterfly tonight? You got lots of girlfriends?

Not me, I am studying to be a priest.

Oh, Ricky it’s not good to joke about that. She shook her finger at him. Anyway, you very handsome. You must have girlfriends.

Oh okay, I’m handsome and you’re pretty so let’s get married. We’ll have beautiful kids.

No! You’re just a poor airman! No money! I want a rich man. You know one? Bring me an officer, maybe your commander.

My commander is married.

I don’t mind, she giggled then left to serve a couple of guys at the other end of the bar.

You’re the butterfly, he chuckled to himself as he turned on his bar stool to watch the dance floor on the other side of the club where Pappy’s ladies of the night entertained their chosen targets, young airmen and NCOs. Several couples clung to each other dancing to the jukebox music of Patsy Cline’s Crazy. The rest sat locked in conversation next to a wall displaying an enormous painting of General MacArthur wading ashore at Leyte.

Rick usually spent a couple of evenings a week at Pappy’s, but always sat by the bar and never interacted with the women out on the floor. He believed Pappy ran a clean establishment, free of VD, still why take the chance? Instead, he joked around and talked with Pappy and the Cherry girls. The girls grew to like him and kidded around with him and he appreciated it. Sometimes they offered to share their food, encouraging him to taste the local delicacies. Most of the time he politely declined.

He liked Pappy too and spent time talking with him from across the bar. Pappy came ashore at Leyte with MacArthur. Later, he married a local woman and never left. However, tonight Pappy was not there, and the Cherry girls remained busy at the other end of the bar flirting with customers. So, after several minutes he finished his beer and decided to call it a night. It was getting close to curfew anyway. He left a couple of pesos on the bar, slid down off the bar stool and waved and winked at Baby as he exited the club onto MacArthur Highway.

CHAPTER 4

MacArthur Highway shot several miles straight as an arrow through the heart of Angeles City. Bumper-to-bumper traffic consisting mostly of brightly colored and ornamented customized enlarged jeep taxies called jeepneys, jockeyed continuously for position, making the going slow. Several hundred bars and night clubs, ranging from large ornate establishments like Pauline’s and the Esquire to smaller bars like Pappy’s, dominated each side of the street, packed together with souvenir shops, eating establishments, and hotels sprinkled here and there wedged snugly between. Live bands played in the larger venues, so a chaotic raucous mixture of music assaulted the ears as traffic crawled along passing the clubs. Most of the establishments provided female companionship for a price, usually well within reach of even low-ranking airmen who packed these clubs nightly, getting drunk and taking advantage of the cheap sex.

Occasional gun fights erupted on MacArthur Highway between the police and gangsters and between political rivals with their small private armies. Just a few days earlier communist Huk gunmen shot up several night clubs that refused to pay protection. It was a place where many Filipino men walked around packing heat and establishments posted signs requiring firearms to be checked at the entrance. Much of Angeles City was rough, lawless, corrupt, and violent like Old Dodge City Kansas, the San Francisco Barbary Coast, and Marshal Wyatt Earp’s Tombstone Arizona all rolled into one.

As Rick neared the edge of the street, a jeepney pulled up in front of him. He jumped in and directed the driver to take him to the Clark AB main gate. As they edged their way into the traffic flow, the driver glanced his way. Joe you want a woman, cheap, good time, all night, only 20 Pesos. Many Filipinos still referred to American military men as Joe. It was a holdover from the war. He grinned and tossed a lit cigarette butt into a puddle as Jennings settled in the front seat