Snoopy, the dog in Charles Schultz’s popular Peanuts comic strip, regularly fights imaginary battles with the Red Baron and just as regularly loses the fight. For the artillerymen at LZ Snoopy in the spring of 1969, however, there was nothing at all imaginary about the Red Baron. He was only too real, in the form of the VC guerrillas and NVA soldiers in the area. And for the artillerymen, losing was not an option.

The early part of May 1969 was a period of relative calm in the southern portion of I Corps. For the men of the U.S. Army 23rd Infantry (Americal) Division’s Bravo Battery, 1st Battalion, 82nd Artillery, and Company C, 39th Engineer Battalion, it was a time to continue building fortifications and bunkers on the hill known as LZ Snoopy. I was a member of Bravo Battery’s fire direction center (FDC) at the time.

Originally an engineer LZ, Snoopy was located approximately 10 miles south of the city of Quang Ngai. It was situated on a hill overlooking some abandoned rice fields and Highway 1, the major north-south road that ran through I Corps and paralleled the South China Sea coast.

As part of the pacification effort, American engineers were rebuilding many of the bridges and roadways that had been destroyed by VC and NVA forces operating in the area. The engineers were increasingly harassed that spring by the VC, who would set up roadblocks and collect ‘taxes’ from the local population at night. The VC also mined the roads at night and occasionally set up ambushes for minesweeping units. Every morning the engineers had to sweep Highway 1 for mines and booby traps. To provide protection and fire support for the engineers, Bravo Battery was moved south from LZ Gator, near Chu Lai, to LZ Snoopy.

The engineers were not very receptive to the ‘redlegs’ (a term dating back to the American Civil War, when artillerymen wore a red stripe down their trouser legs, like the yellow stripe worn by the cavalry) after the first fire mission, which knocked down the engineers’ motor pool tent and made it necessary to reinforce buildings and bunkers to withstand the concussion from the battery’s four 155mm howitzers.

The firepower of those howitzers also started to draw the enemy’s attention, and soon LZ Snoopy was subjected to periodic mortar fire. The outdoor movie theater the engineers had constructed had to be closed down. Relations between the engineers and the artillerymen were further strained when, due to incoming mortar fire, the engineers had to close down their mess hall and eat C rations while the Bravo Battery cooks continued to feed the redlegs hot food.

In April 1969 the engineers moved most of their unit to another LZ just north of Snoopy, leaving a platoon of engineers to support the artillerymen. When the engineers departed, Bravo Battery moved to the higher of the two hills that constituted the LZ. That hill had been occupied by an ARVN artillery unit, which had laid a minefield of plastic explosives around the hillside. The engineers ran one of their heavy bulldozers over the minefield in an attempt to clear it, but the steepness of the hillside made it impossible to eliminate all the mines. It was decided to leave the minefield intact and construct a new set of bunkers and sandbag fortifications inside the ring of mines.

During that April, the artillerymen were busy working to build new living quarters and gun pits inside the LZ’s perimeter. The hill was so rocky and hard that all the gun pits had to be built above ground, using sandbags and 55-gallon drums filled with sand. These parapets circled each of the four howitzers and contained two bunkers, one filled with gunpowder and the other with projectiles.

The howitzers all sat on their spin jacks in the center of each gun pit. During a fire mission, the crews could change the direction of their gun by picking up the trails and moving the gun on its jack until it was aimed in the proper direction. Near each gun pit the crews built their living quarters, which consisted of 10-by-10 buildings covered with sandbags and reinforced by mounds of dirt piled up around the sides. In front of each doorway stood a blast wall of sandbags that protected the door from direct hits by mortars and rockets.

New fighting bunkers were built on the LZ’s perimeter. Some of the bunkers were designed to be manned and equipped with M-60 machine guns, Claymore mines and hand grenades, while others were intended to be used as fighting positions–to be manned only in case of attack.

The weather was hot, and the constant work of building up the LZ, coupled with the fire missions at night, gave the artillerymen little time to rest. With most of the engineers gone, the men of Bravo Battery had to provide their own perimeter security for the first time. Everyone in the battery–including cooks; communications and motorpool personnel; men in the FDC, which functioned as the command and control center of the artillery group; and the gun crews–had to stand bunker guard duty. By May, most of the work had been done and the battery resumed a more normal routine. The men provided artillery support for the engineers and other friendly forces during the day and at night fired H&I (harassment and interdiction) missions in an effort to stop enemy soldiers from moving about freely.

On May 11, breezes from the South China Sea swept inland, resulting in a break in the hot weather at Snoopy. A cool night meant the gun crews would be able to get a good rest after their night firing missions. As the evening settled in, the FDC ran communications checks with the manned bunkers. Every half-hour the communications section phoned each bunker, which in turn gave the ‘all green’ code, meaning that everything was quiet.

Just after 2 a.m. the bunkers reported ‘all green.’ But they were all wrong. Two sappers had penetrated the perimeter without being seen and had occupied one of the unmanned fighting positions. Using a captured U.S. Army field phone, they tapped into the bunker communications line and listened to see if the rest of their unit’s soldiers creeping up the hillsides of LZ Snoopy had been spotted. After hearing the ‘all green,’ the two NVA signaled their comrades to launch the attack. At 2:17 the peaceful night erupted in a series of explosions as NVA sappers stormed the top of the hill, setting off satchel charges and hand grenades under cover of fire from 82mm mortars. Before the battery could respond, the LZ was overrun by a medium-size force of NVA and VC sappers.

The sappers were highly trained to penetrate defensive positions. They wore shorts and covered their bodies with a dark, greaselike substance to help them slide through strands of barbed wire. The sappers could rapidly go through many strands of wire in a matter of seconds. Their technique was to sneak up on a position and quickly overrun it before the defenders could react.

Sappers were usually lightly armed, relying on baskets of hand grenades, rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) and satchel charges to do as much damage as possible. Some sappers would run through a compound throwing their grenades to create confusion while others attached satchel charges to howitzers, communications bunkers and other important targets. Sapper units were among the most feared of the enemy troops in Vietnam because they could inflict heavy casualties in a matter of minutes.

The defenders made initial contact with the enemy in the sector where the engineers had their bunker. Five sappers were spotted in that area. At the same time, a number of enemy troops had worked their way through the perimeter and were moving freely through the LZ under the protection of heavy mortar fire.

One of the Bravo Battery defenders was patrolling his crew’s gun pit when the attack was launched. He had laid his M-16 against the howitzer in the middle of the pit and was walking around the perimeter. Suddenly, he heard a noise and saw a dark figure leap over the wall and enter the gun pit, no more than a couple of feet from him. Hidden in the shadow of the projo (projectile) bunker, the artilleryman could observe the sapper without being seen. With his weapon out of reach, he had only one offensive option. As the NVA sapper paused to look around, the artilleryman leapt out of the shadows, seized him by the neck and strangled him with his bare hands. No sooner had he finished off the first sapper than another sapper leapt over the wall. The artilleryman jumped the second NVA attacker and was struggling with him when another member of his crew shot the sapper dead.

The full impact of the attack was felt at 2:20, when three satchel charges exploded in one of the engineers’ bunkers. The artillerymen who were still asleep in their bunkers were rudely awakened by the explosions. Shouts and cries of ‘incoming’ reverberated through the LZ. The off-duty members of the FDC staff ran from their hooch, grabbing their rifles and steel helmets as they went, to man fighting bunkers on the western perimeter of the LZ while other men scrambled to their positions along the perimeter. Soon the explosions of Claymore mines could be heard, along with heavy machine-gun fire from the batteries’ 7.62mm and .50-caliber machine guns, as the defenders fought to prevent more enemy troops from penetrating the perimeter.

Some of the gun crews were pinned in their bunkers by sappers who stationed themselves outside the doorways and tossed hand grenades at the artillerymen whenever they tried to open the doors. Cooks, mechanics and the FDC section had to fight off the sappers and free the rest of the battery. Fierce fighting was soon breaking out all over the hill as the artillerymen and engineers struggled to regain control of the LZ from the sappers.

The NVA had captured some of the unmanned fighting bunkers and pinned down four engineers with heavy fire from their AK-47s and RPGs. Their satchel charges ignited ammunition stored in the bunker and trapped the engineers inside.

The battery medic, Pfc David Bozek, was trapped in the communications bunker. First Sergeant James Norris and 2nd Lt. Steven Rapier, the assistant executive officer, moved toward the communications bunker looking for the medic and discovered two NVA soldiers patrolling the entrance. Norris and Rapier opened fire on the sappers, pinning them down. Sergeant Norris then tossed hand grenades, killing one of them, while Lieutenant Rapier killed the other sapper with his M-16. They yelled to Bozek that the coast was clear. The three Americans then started running toward the burning engineer bunker.

All had been confusion at first. Fighting in the dark as they were, it was difficult for the Americans to get a good grasp of the situation inside the LZ. But the reali-zation soon set in that Snoopy was under heavy ground attack. NVA soldiers scampered through the battery, trying to attach satchel charges to one of the howitzers. Close-quarters fighting was the name of game that night, and for the first few minutes the sappers had the upper hand as they set up positions to trap the defenders. Explosions, incoming mortar fire and the cries of wounded troops had momentarily overwhelmed the defenders’ senses. But soon training and discipline took over. The Americans grabbed their weapons and rushed to defend the hill.

Illumination was vital to the LZ’s defense. One of the battery’s four guns was routinely kept loaded with an illumination round and pointed skyward, ready to fire in case the artillerymen needed to see their surroundings in the nighttime. But sappers had now taken control of the gun pit that had the howitzer loaded with illumination rounds. The gun crew crept toward their gun, and when they were close enough they rushed the pit. The enemy soldiers fled as a crew member reached the howitzer and fired off the first illumination round. Others followed, and soon the LZ was lit by the dim glow of flares from the howitzer.

The flares created a surreal light, and shadows appeared to be moving–shadows that might be enemy troops. At first the defenders fired at the shadows, fearful of what might lurk in the darkness. But soon their nerves settled, and they began searching for real targets. In no time, the men of Bravo Battery went from being a bunch of scared green troops to a disciplined force, bound and determined to knock the enemy off the hill.

As Bozek and Sergeants Norris and Johnson neared the burning bunker, they were joined by 1st Lt. Grady Stallings. The Americans immediately came under fire, which they returned in kind. They braved exploding hand grenades and small-arms ammunition stored inside the bunker to pull a wounded man to safety. But despite their efforts to free the remaining men, the air was soon filled with the screams of the three engineers still trapped in the blazing bunker. They perished in the inferno.

Private First Class Terrance Penick had been asleep in his bunker at 2:21 when he was awakened by someone shouting a warning that the LZ was receiving incoming fire. Seconds later a grenade went off outside his door, and Penick and Spc. 4 Robert Staples jumped up and headed for the entranceway. There, they were greeted by another grenade blast that threw Penick back into the bunker.

‘I looked to the right and saw an NVA moving around in the shadows, but somehow I managed to shoot him,’ said Penick. ‘After that, Staples and I decided to check the projo pits. As soon as we got to the first one, a grenade exploded on top of it, and we both got knocked down again.’

Penick and Staples defended themselves with hand grenades and their M-16s. They discovered a wounded cannoneer and quickly moved him to a place of safety.

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