Last Wednesday night BRAVO! was screened to an enthusiastic crowd at the Meridian Library District, Meridian, Idaho.
As the event began a brisk wind snapped the American flag on its pole outside the library building. Warm gusts sluiced across the surface of the parking lot, tumbling orange, gold and russet leaves that announced the abrupt arrival of autumn.
The weather hinted at what winter will deliver here in Idaho between now and April, but the mood of those folks gathered inside the library was one of much anticipation for the screening of the film.

BRAVO! was well received by the audience and we wish to thank all the folks who attended. Many thanks, too, to the Meridian Library District and to Mr. Greg Likens of the library who put the event together.

Ken Rodgers introduces BRAVO! to the Meridian, Idaho attendees.
© Betty Rodgers 2014

This time of the year brings Halloween and Thanksgiving and sandwiched in between that, the Marine Corps’ 239th Birthday on November 10, 2014, and on the day following we honor America’s warriors with Veterans Day. The Marine Corps has a new commandant, General Joseph Dunford (you can find out more about Commandant Dunford at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_F._Dunford,_Jr.) who will soon deliver his first annual Marine Corps birthday message to Marines of all eras. In tune with the season of military memory and honors, it seems to be the season of film screenings for BRAVO!.

Commandant of the Marine Corps, General Joseph Dunford
Photo courtesy of Department of Defense

Besides the just-completed event in Meridian, BRAVO! will be shown as follows:

On November 1, 2014, at 10:00 AM at the Veterans Association of North County, 1617 Mission Avenue, Oceanside, California. Donations will be accepted at the door to benefit the Association’s building fund. You can find out more about the Veterans Association of North County at http://www.vancnorthcounty.org/. Doors open at 9:00 AM. Reservations are requested for this screening. Please RSVP by emailing Vanc.events@gmail.com or calling 208-340-8889.

The San Diego Union-Tribune wrote a fine article earlier this week about the screening in Oceanside. You can read the article at http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2014/oct/20/bravo-uncommonvalor-vietnam-siege–khe-sanh-rodger/.

At 5:30 PM on November 11, 2014, BRAVO! will be screened at the Meadowwood Technology Campus, E. Mission Avenue in Liberty Lake, Washington as part of a ceremony honoring Bravo Navy Corpsman Greg Vercruysse who was killed in action when Bravo Company 1/26 was ambushed off of Hill 881 South on June 7, 1967. You can find out more about Greg at http://www.vvmf.org/Wall-of-Faces/53621/GREGORY-P-VERCRUYSSE. More details about the Liberty Lake screening can be found at http://www.llfhcc.org/index.php.

Gregory Vercrussye
Photo courtesy of Vietnam Veterans Memorial

On November 15, 2015, BRAVO! will be screened at American Legion Post 291, Newport Beach, CA, 215 15th Street, Newport Beach, CA. Screening begins at 10:00 AM on November 15, 2014. Proceeds go to benefit the Fisher House of Southern California. You can find out about American Legion Post 291 at their website: http://www.al291.com/.

The Fisher House of Southern California is a non-profit organization that offers shelter and support to military families in times of medical crisis. You can find out more about The Fisher House of Southern California at http://www.fisherhousesocal.org/html5/AboutUs/Home.html.

Please attend one of these events in your area and please be sure invite your friends.

If you would like to host a screening of BRAVO! in your town this winter or spring, please contact us immediately.

DVDs of BRAVO! are available. For more information, go to https://bravotheproject.com/buy-the-dvd/.

BRAVO! has a page on Facebook. Please “like” us and “share” the page at https://www.facebook.com/Bravotheproject/. It’s another way to stay up on our news and help us reach more people.

Last week we wrote about the month of October around the Khe Sanh Combat Base. One of the main themes of the blog was that the most difficult thing to deal with was the weather. We don’t think that was the case in the rest of Vietnam. Operations were conducted from north to south searching for both North Vietnamese and Vietcong combat units. Thousands of men and women died on both sides, the troops led by the forces of the United States and those fighting for the overthrow of the South Vietnamese government. The fighting was brutal and the body counts high.

The airstrip at Khe Sanh.
Photo courtesy of David Douglas Duncan

But not at Khe Sanh. For a time and place that saw the savage springtime battles centered around the hills, 861, 881 South and 881 North, the battle action was strangely non-existent in October 1967. Compared to the conflagration of the Siege and associated fights, October 1967 at Khe Sanh was almost Paradise. Leeches, patrols, rain and mist, work parties, slick red mud and too much water were all, in the big picture, little to nothing.

According to Reverend Ray Stubbe’s Battalion of Kings, the men killed in action at the Khe Sanh TAOR in October 1967 were as follows (if you are interested in knowing more about these men, please check out the links to the virtual wall following each name):

On October 13, 1967, Marine Corporal Melvin Sink (http://www.virtualwall.org/ds/SinkMF01a.htm) was killed by friendly fire while leading an ambush off Hill 881-South.

On October 15, 1967, Army Sgt. Charles Baney (http://www.virtualwall.org/db/BaneyCL01a.htm), and crewmembers Airman 1st Class Lawrence Berneski (http://www.virtualwall.org/db/BerneskiLA01a.htm), Captain Erle Bjorke (http://www.virtualwall.org/db/BjorkeEL01a.htm), 1st Lieutenant James Hottenroth (http://www.virtualwall.org/dh/HottenrothJR01a.htm), Tech Sergeant Edward Mosley (http://www.virtualwall.org/dm/MosleyEx01a.htm) and Airman 2nd Class John Snyder (http://www.virtualwall.org/ds/SnyderJH01a.htm) were killed when the C-130 they were either inspectors on or crewing, crashed and burned at the east end of the Khe Sanh airstrip.

On October 30, 1967, Captain James Bennett (http://www.virtualwall.org/db/BennettJH01a.htm) died from injuries sustained in the crash of an Air Force O1-E spotter at the Khe Sanh air strip.

Even when the war was quiet, in terms of combat, the dangers of operating in bad weather, in tough terrain, in the light and in the night was dangerous and took the lives of good men and women such as those represented herein…

We look forward to the upcoming screening at the Meridian Library in Meridian, Idaho, at 6:30 PM this evening, October 22.

Also on tap is a screening in Oceanside, CA, 10:00 AM on November 1 at the Veterans Association of North County, 1617 N Mission, Oceanside, CA. Donations go to renovate the VANC Resource Center. Seating is limited. Please RSVP to Vanc.events@gmail.com.

Oceanside Screening Info

Later in November, a screening will be held at American Legion Post 291, Newport Beach, CA, 215 15th Street, Newport Beach. Screening begins at 10:00 AM on November 15, 2014. Proceeds go to benefit the Fisher House of Southern California.

Please join us for one of these events and please invite your friends.

If you would like to host a screening of BRAVO! in your town this winter or spring, please contact us immediately.

DVDs of BRAVO! are available. For more information, go to https://bravotheproject.com/buy-the-dvd/.

BRAVO! has a page on Facebook. Please “like” us and “share” the page at https://www.facebook.com/Bravotheproject/. It’s another way to stay up on our news and help us reach more people.

April is the cruelest month . . .

–T. S. Eliot

But October 1967 was pretty cruel for the men of Bravo Company. Or so we thought. It rained. Everything was soaked. We ran patrols in red mud and slick jungle grass. We went on LPs when you couldn’t see three feet in front of you. The same with ambushes. It was a time when everything dripped and leaked and water ran down the trenches like creeks in a flood. Your feet were soaked and wrinkled and if you were lucky you got foot rot and went on light duty. It seemed like everybody was on light duty. For those of us who weren’t, the workload was cruel. Working out in the downpour for the battalion pogues, working on our own trenches, our own bunkers, our own fighting positions. Going on patrols. Running ambushes in the black of night. Listening posts, too. Falling asleep on our feet while standing watch and tumbling into the muddy red water that flowed around our knees.

For the bulk of folks here in the States who don’t know combat, these words call up images that intimate cruel notions.
During October 1967 the company conducted operations on Route Nine. In the drizzly fog. We ran patrols out to the east and to the north. We endured the blast of a typhoon. Then with a gaggle of new men and a new company commander, we humped up to Hill 881. It didn’t rain that day as we struggled up the east side among the remnants of blasted trees and thickets of bamboo.

The mist smothers Khe Sanh.
Photo by David Douglas Duncan

After that, for the most part, the sky intermittently drenched us, then spit on us almost every day, and most nights the dark was invaded by heavy mists. We were sniped at from a ridge to the east. And we patrolled that ridge and sought the enemy. On the days when the sun graced us with its warmth, farther west into Laos, we sat in our fighting holes and watched the North Vietnamese move their war goods. We watched the B-52s pound the ridges and the highways of Laos, the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

But if my memory is correct, those sunny interludes were sparse. For I remember rain.

Rain sluiced off the lips of our helmets. It drizzled off our helmets’ back ends and down our necks. The rain alternated between warm and chill. It got in our beans and franks, it ruined our Lucky Strikes and Old Golds. The sulfur heads of our matches dissolved when we tried to strike them. Inside our boots our feet became harbors for leeches. We cleaned our weapons every evening but the next morning I often had to kick my M-16 bolt open. Rust had seized its innards.

A trench line on Hill 881 South.
Photo courtesy of marines.org

Down to the east, on the flats of Vietnam, men were dying at places like Gio Linh and Con Thien. But we were soaked and wrinkled like prunes and we thought life was tough. October blew a cruel breath. Or so we thought.

But that was before January 21, 1968, before the beginning of the Siege, when life grew very cruel.

We look forward to upcoming screenings at the Meridian Library in Meridian, Idaho, at 6:30 PM on October 22; Oceanside, CA, on November 1; and Newport Beach, CA, on November 15, 2014. Please join us and invite your friends.

If you would like to host a screening of BRAVO! in your town this winter or spring, please contact us immediately.
DVDs of BRAVO! are available. For more information, go to https://bravotheproject.com/buy-the-dvd/.

BRAVO! has a page on Facebook. Please “like” us and “share” the page at https://www.facebook.com/Bravotheproject/. It’s another way to stay up on our news and help us reach more people.

One of the more gratifying experiences we’ve enjoyed with our BRAVO! encounters is the recognition that is coming to so many of the men who served with Bravo Company, 1/26, during the outfit’s time in Vietnam. On September 28, 2014, Vincent Mottola was honored in his hometown of Medford, Massachusetts.

Unlike a lot of other wars in which United States armed forces have been involved, the honors and remembrances due the men and women who served in Vietnam have been slow to come.

Regardless of how one feels about the morality or efficacy of our efforts in that war, the men and women who fought and died there, not to mention those who have returned, were not responsible for our government’s choice of wars. They were called to serve and they did, some giving the ultimate sacrifice for, in most cases, something they thought was worth doing.

Honoring Vincent Mottola. Photo Courtesy of Marie Chalmers

So we are very happy to crow about the honors that are coming now to the men of Bravo who gave up their youth, their naiveté, and in many cases their lives for something they thought was of value.

Below are some photos taken and sent to us by Vincent Mottola’s cousin, the vibrant Boston native, Marie Chalmers. These photos are of the ceremony conducted in Medford, Massachusetts, where Vinnie Mottola was memorialized by having a street corner named in his honor.

Vinnie is one of the veterans to whom BRAVO! is dedicated, thanks to the generosity of the Mottola family. He was killed in action at Khe Sanh Combat Base on February 23, 1968. You can find out more about Vinnie here.

Below are some photos of the event in Medford. Photos courtesy of Marie Chalmers.

This first photo is of the street sign for the newly named corner.

Vincent A Mottola Square

The second photo in this three-photo series is of Medford Mayor Michael McGlynn and the Marine Corps color guard.

The last is a photo of Vincent Mottola’s family who joined together at the naming of Vincent A Mottola Square.

Ooorah and Semper Fidelis, Vincent Mottola!

We look forward to upcoming screenings at the Meridian Library in Meridian, Idaho, on October 22; Oceanside, CA, on November 1; and Newport Beach, CA, on November 15, 2014. Please join us and invite your friends.

If you would like to host a screening of BRAVO! in your town this winter or spring, please contact us immediately.
DVDs of BRAVO! are available. For more information, go to https://bravotheproject.com/buy-the-dvd/.

BRAVO! has a page on Facebook. Please “like” us and “share” the page at https://www.facebook.com/Bravotheproject/. It’s another way to stay up on our news and help us reach more people.

Last Thursday evening, 9/25/2014, BRAVO! was screened to an enthusiastic crowd of more than one-hundred folks at the Nampa, Idaho, Elks Lodge as a fundraiser for the Wyakin Warrior Foundation.

The audience included ROTC cadets from Boise State University and Northern Nazarene University, veterans of multiple wars, long-standing friends of BRAVO!, and folks from the general public. BRAVO! Marine Ron Rees, whose interview for the film was nothing short of electrifying, traveled with his family from Cove, Oregon, to be on a Q & A panel that included Iraq War veteran George Nickel and Vietnam Vet and United States Army chopper pilot Cliff Gaston who pulled two tours in Vietnam. BRAVO! co-producer and co-director Ken Rodgers rounded out the panel.

Al Heathcock speaking to the audience.
© Mike Shipman, Blue Planet Photography 2014

The event was expertly emceed by Boise-based author Alan Heathcock, whose short story collection, VOLT, is an outstanding look at the agony and ecstasy of being human. VOLT has won many prestigious literary awards.You can find out more about Al at http://alanheathcock.com. Joining Alan on the program was Wyakin Warrior Foundation co-founder and board president Jeff Bacon. Jeff is a cartoonist whose work is published widely, and you can read more about his work at http://blogs.militarytimes.com/broadside/about/. You can also learn more about the Wyakin Warrior Foundation and their important mission at http://www.wyakin.org/.

Panel discussion following the screening of BRAVO!. Left to right: Ken Rodgers, Ron Rees, Cliff Gaston, George Nickel.
© Mike Shipman, Blue Planet Photography 2014

Events like this don’t just happen and we are very proud to shoot an energetic OORAH! to Mr. Ed Willson, the Exalted Ruler of Elks Lodge #1389, Mr. Lawrence Manning and Betty Mallorca of Hill Street Studios/Track 13, Whiskey River Bar and Restaurant, business development professional Mr. Jeff Foster, Thorne Printing and Copy Center of Nampa, and International Minute Press of Boise.

We extend special thanks to Tom Frazee and Nancy Roché of Admagination for the spectacular audio/visual set-up and to Mike and Monique Shipman of Blue Planet Photography for organizing the entire shebang. Mike Shipman is the graphic designer for BRAVO! You can find out more about Admagination at http://www.admaginationstudios.com/622013_ad/and Blue Planet Photography at https://www.blueplanetphoto.com/.

A member of the audience addressing the ROTC cadets at the screening of BRAVO!
© Mike Shipman, Blue Planet Photography, 2014

We made a lot of new friends for BRAVO! at this event, and we cherish every single new relationship as we drive onward in our quest to have every American see this film. More of the new friends we gained at the Nampa screening are the staff at Wyakin Warriors Academy headed by Roy Ledesma. Roy was instrumental in rounding up the bulk of the crowd for the screening. Thank you, Roy!

We look forward to upcoming screenings at the Meridian Library in Meridian, Idaho, on October 22; Oceanside, CA, on November 1; and Newport Beach, CA, on November 15, 2014. Please join us and invite your friends.

BRAVO! Marine Ron Rees, left, speaking to volunteer members of the Wyakin Warrior Foundation.
© Mike Shipman, Blue Planet Photography 2014

If you would like to host a screening of BRAVO! in your town this winter or spring, please contact us immediately.

DVDs of BRAVO! are available. For more information, go to https://bravotheproject.com/buy-the-dvd/.

BRAVO! has a page on Facebook. Please “like” us and “share” the page at https://www.facebook.com/Bravotheproject/. It’s another way to stay up on our news and help us reach more people.