Commanding Patton’s Personal Tanks

And thus were born Safety Officers

SGT Philip Roncari - Lots of different reactions to armor back then. Yes, we were noisy so everyone could hear us coming. In my unit, we usually tried to move fast enough to cut down on that time for anyone to get ready for us. As for scaring the bejesus out of anyone, I recall our tank company being sent to rescue an infantry unit that was pinned down by the NVA. (I also recall being annoyed to be driving past 1ID's own tank battalion to get there.) One small problem was that the unit was a few klicks the other side of the Song Be river. The Song Be bridge was, at best, a one lane road for a tank, and the VC had recently blown out some of the supports for the bridge. The engineers were surveying the bridge, trying to decide whether to try to repair it or to finish dropping the main span and replace it. No one was sure if the main span would hold a truck or a bus.... until we took our tanks across the twisted bridge doing about 15-20 MPH. A few of the engineers who had been working on the bridge had tried to wave us to stop, then dove from the bridge into the river when it was obvious that we weren't stopping.

MSG Thomas Currie
Always appreciated you Armor guys,as I had mentioned our unit didn’t get to work all that much with APCs and M48s,couple of times at most and surely liked the heavier weapon systems that was available when things got all wonky,having the twin 40 mm Duster gun platform and the Quad 50 gun trucks on the perimeter of our artillery fire bases gave we poor grunts all lot of extra security up in the Central Highlands, Welcome Home Brother, Phil.

SGT Philip Roncari - I never worked with 4ID, we were in different parts of the country. We worked mostly around 1ID, 25ID and occasionally 1CD.

Each Infantry division generally had one tank battalion (M48A3 tanks) and one divisional Cavalry Squadron (M113's and either M48A3 tanks before 1969, or M551 Sheridans after 1969). My casual observation in III Corps mid-1968 to mid-1969 was that the Infantry Division tank battalions tended to guard the perimeter of the division base camp while the divisional cavalry squadrons actually got out in the jungle.

I was with 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment which was a regimental cavalry unit with a very different TO&E from the divisional cavalry squadrons. A divisional cavalry squadron had their tanks and M113s mixed down to the platoon level (each platoon had 3 tanks or Sheridans together with about 8 M113s). As a Cavalry Regiment each of our three squadrons had three cavalry troops (with the usual mix of M113s and either tanks or Sheridans) plus one tank company (17 M48A3 tanks), and one artillery battery of M109 155mm self-propelled howitzers. That concentration of mobility and firepower encouraged some very aggressive employment.

MSG Thomas Currie
Well,that brings up the question,where did those “Duster” and quad 50s come from? I remember clearly that they were implaced on several artillery fire bases,we used to fill in on perimeter security on our breaks from the boonies,doesn’t seem like your TO&E carried these weapon platforms,have to admit ,the amount of fire put out during a “Mad Minute “ was indeed impressive,Be Well Brother.