(Tan Son Nhut, Vietnam. This twelve year old ARVN Airborne trooper with M-79 grenade launcher accompanied the Airborne Task Force Unit on a sweep through the devastated area surrounding the French National Cemetery on Plantation Road after a day long battle there. The young soldier has been “adopted” by the Airborne Division. Photo US Army Signal Corps.)

“I hated program and budget,” declared Mac firmly. “It was dry and complex and the meetings were mind-numbing.”

“We share that experience, Admiral,” I said taking a sip of wine. “The longest three and a half years of my life were spent in charge of the same organization you led. I got out of there just before we were supposed to submit the 2003 President’s Budget, which immediately became irrelevant when 9/11 happened.”

I looked toward the end of the bar where it appeared Lauren was in the process of quitting, if I read the body language properly. That would mark a new record- she did not even make the end of Happy Hour.

Elisabeth-with-an-S came by on the way to getting Old Jim another Budweiser and I asked what was going on.

She flipped a lock of chestnut hair over her ear and shook her ponytail. “Eight-month-old baby at home,” she said. “The idea of double shifts isn’t appealing.”

“Sorry to hear that. She seemed nice.” I wondered about the story behind it all- single mother?  Broken relationship? Elisabeth has survived these periodic tectonic shifts in the bar personnel line-up, and is hanging on until a real job that can harness her formidable talents in public health policy.

We all have stories at the Willow Bar, fueled by excellent Happy Hour prices and a certain incurable optimism that the bottom of the next glass will provide the answer to life’s persistent questions.

“I hated the budget, too.” I said mildly. “But it turned out to be the best thing that ever happened to me. Jake was my Detailer, and he warned me that insisting on going to the Industrial College instead of the Chief of Naval Operations Intelligence Plot was going to mean I had to go to a Joint billet on graduation, and it would finish me in the Navy.”

Mac nodded. “I managed to stay clear of the Joint World and DIA right up until I was selected for Flag at PACFLT. I went from the junior Assistant Chief of Staff when I arrived to being the senior one.”

“I remember being a Commander ACOS at THIRD Fleet,” I said with a scowl. “All the other ones were Captains and it sucked.”

“The Intelligence Division enjoyed being senior to Ops,” said Mac. “It was a good time, and the best tour I had.”

I thought about what was going on when Mac left the Pacific for the last time. “The War was going pretty well at the time, wasn’t it?”

“Oh, yes. I left in 1967. General Westmoreland was giving glowing accounts of our progress against the VC. The Light at the End of the Tunnel was still gleaming. The troop build-up seemed to be working, the White House was optimistic, President Johnson said he was trying to win the war as fast as he could in every way he knew how. The word on the waterfront was that if we allowed South Vietnam to fall, we would be fighting in Hawaii in 1968.”

“I guess it was just as crazy overseas as it was back home,” I said. “I just was reliving the madness that happened in Detroit that year.”

Mac nodded and took a sip of his Virgin Mary. “The War had our complete attention, but remember, the Six Day War happened in the Middle East in June of 1967. It was the height of the Cold War and Brinksmanship was the way things worked.”

“So they ordered you to be Plans and Programs at DIA? That seems sort of strange.”

“Well, I had to go Joint, since that is where the Flag authorization was. VADM Rufe Taylor wanted me  be the Current Intelligence Officer at DIA, but General Carroll wasn’t having any of that. He gave all the decent jobs to the Air Force.”

“Carroll was the first Director of DIA, right? Didn’t he serve, like, forever?”

“Oh yes. He was there almost seven years. He was an odd duck. In addition to being fiercely parochial to his Service, he was not very communicative to his Staff. He would go to the US Intelligence Board meetings by himself and never say what went on unless he was tagged with an action by the Director of Central Intelligence.”

“Who was that then?” I asked. “Was it still Dick Helms?”

“Yes. He was a real old hand- he came up through the OSS, the first director to have done so, and the first career civilian to be DCI. He had good credentials about the war. He engineered the coup that overthrew President Diem.” Mac smiled thinly.

“That would seem to have mixed results,” I said.

“You are looking at it in the rear-view,” said Mac. “Back then, he was a guy who knew everybody that counted. One thing he hated was his community role as the DCI. His view was to keep his oversight staff as small as possible and concentrate on being the Director of CIA.”

“But he still chaired the USIB, didn’t he?”

“Yes. Some things he could not duck. So when General Carroll came back from the meeting at Langley and called me down to the office, he told me he had a job for me.”

“Was that right after the Pueblo was captured?”

“Yes, within the week. You have to imagine what was going on. We had finished our work on our part of the President’s budget submission, which was going to be rolled out at the end of January. It was controversial, since Johnson was gong to ask for $26 billion to continue the war and increase in taxes to do it. Mr. Bush never had the inclination to do that for Iraq.”

“That was our slack time in the Program,” I said. After we got the Congressional Budget Justification Books done for the coming fiscal year and would get ready for all those stupid Questions For The Record from the Committees on the Hill.”

“There wasn’t any slack time in January of 1968,” declared Mac. “I was itching to get my teeth into something real. The North Koreans launched their attack on the Blue House in Seoul right before the Pueblo business started. The Ship was never informed.”

“They still talked about that when I was assigned to USFK,” I said. “Special Unit 124 of the North Korean Army infiltrated the ROK through the 2nd ID sector of the DMZ and tried to attack the presidential residence and kill Park Chung-hee.”

“And three days later the North captured the Pueblo and her crew.”

“God, that must have been strange. It was weird enough watching network news back in Grabbingham while I was going to high school. We all assumed we would be headed for Vietnam in the draft when we graduated, but then it seemed like there might be war with Korea.”

“Only for a minute,” said Mac softly. “The day after President Johnson made his budget speech the North Vietnamese launched the Tet offensive.”

“Crap,” I said. “That is when everything changed.”

“Yep. A massive defeat for the Viet Cong, and a massive victory for the North Vietnamese in the New York Times.”

“What a month that must have been.”

“Yes. General Carroll looked at me in his office and said DCI Helms wants to know what the hell the North Koreans got along with the Pueblo and her crew.”

“Damn.”

“You can say that again,” Mac said, and finished his Virgin Mary.

(USS Pueblo crew in captivity. Photo courtesy DPRK.)

Copyright 2011 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com