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"I inflated my Mae West and released my rubber dinghy about 25 ft. from the water. As my feet touched the water, I dumped one side of the parachute. My head barely went under the water. Surfacing, I found my dinghy only three strokes away. Ten seconds after touching down I was in the dinghy. Fifty seconds later I had ripped open my survival kit, set the squawk-radio beam going, activated my 11-h.p. radio and called Thunderbird Two. The first thing I asked him was whether he had sunk that gunboat. He said he had cut it in two with his 20-mm. cannon. Then I asked if Old Dumbo [a rescue seaplane] was coming, and he said right away. The Dumbo landed a few minutes later and picked me up."
He summed up the experience: "I simply did as I had been taught to do."
Was he afraid? Not so that you could notice it. "Fear," says Risner, "is a luxury one can't afford." Anyhow, he has faith. "I believe in God. I'm already at peace with myself. If death comes, I only hope that it comes quickly and that I won't be sorry."
It is unlikely he has any sorrow about how he has lived his life. For Robbie Risner considers himself "the luckiest man in the world to be doing what I'm doing."
Like almost every other American combatant in Viet Nam, Risner feels strongly that most American citizens fail to understand the nature of the war — and the extent of the U.S. effort. He would be the first to agree with Admiral Moorer's statement that "this war is being fought by a very few dedicated, hard-working people in a peace time atmosphere." On the ground, at sea and in the air, those dedicated people daily risk the ultimate sacrifice (see casualty box, p. 25). In the experiences and attitudes of a few can be told the story of most.
The Adviser
MAJOR LANE ROGERS, 36, a lean, dry-humored U.S. Marine Corps regular, has been in Viet Nam for 10½ months as adviser to a Vietnamese marine batallion. He has no command capacity whatever. All he can do os offer suggestions when and if they are solicited by his Vietnamese "counterpart." To perform effectively, the adviser must earn the trust and friendship of his Vietnamese opposite number— a process that often takes weeks, and sometimes is never achieved. Whenever an American adviser tries to force his views on a Vietnamese commander, he is in for trouble. Thus one overzealous adviser was told by a Vietnamese commander who never spoke to him thereafter, "Just remember, you are an adviser—and nothing else."
On his first operation, in the Mekong Delta, Major Rogers rolled out of hammock at 3:30 a.m., marched all day under a brain-beating sun, through paddyfields and up to his armpits in irrigation ditches, ready to give instant advice. The Vietnamese commander barely spoke to him. That night, after washing out his muddy clothes in a canal, Rogers sat patiently waiting to be consulted — but neither offering advice nor being invited to give it.