On Gia Long street in the seamy port of Qui Nhon, South Viet Nam's third-biggest city, two troopers from the U.S. 173rd Airborne Brigade halted their three-quarter-ton truck. Whether they stopped to shift their load, as they said, or to grab a beer or a whore, is beside the point. Within minutes, one of a legion of larcenous Vietnamese urchins surrounding the truck had made off with a fire extinguisher.
For 15 minutes, the American G.I.s drove around looking for the thief. Then they came roaring back down Gia Long street. A 15-year-old student named Nguyen...
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