Valor in Combat

By Kelly Black

Bittersweet.

The Bronze Star, the Navy Commendation, two Purple Hearts: the medals are bittersweet to Bob Moxley.

In six months of intensive fighting in the jungles of Vietnam, Moxley earned numerous medals for valor in combat.

“I look at all those medals and all I see is death and pain,” said Moxley.

Christmas morning 1968 eighteen year old Moxley landed near the demilitarized zone in Vietnam. He was assigned to the 1st Battalion 9th Marines, nicknamed, “The Walking Dead.”

A man leaving said to him, “You’re a dead man. Nobody makes it out of there.”

The Walking Dead had a 72 percent casualty rate.

“I was just a kid,” said Moxley.

A recent graduate of Tigard High School in Portland, Ore. Moxley had planned to enroll in Oregon State University’s forestry program. Instead he was conscripted for boot camp in San Diego and after just eight weeks of training sent to Da Nang, Vietnam.

“They called us shake and bake, because they had to have warm bodies in Vietnam,” said Moxley.

Moxley was sent up into the highlands to fight the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) where the triple canopy was so thick the squad had to hack through it with machetes. In the heat and humidity Moxley trekked mountainsides with over 100 pounds on his back: six canteens of water, a M-16 rifle, 20 magazines, 200 extra rounds of ammunition, 100 rounds of ammunition for the machine gun, one mortar round, C-4 explosives for the engineers, a Claymore mine, a LAWS rocket, six hand grenades, a five day supply of sea rations in cans, a flak jacket with fiberglass panels for body armor, a body bag that served as a poncho and a heavy helmet.

He was shot for the first time two days after his 19th birthday.

In February 1969, Operation Dewey Canyon in A Shau Valley on the Lao Ocean border saw thousands of NVA troops heavily fortified with tanks, mortar teams and artillery rockets.

Helicopters were coming in with five guys hanging from a rope. The squad leader said to Moxley, “Those are dead bodies coming in from A Shau Valley and we’re going there tomorrow.”

On February 26, 1969 the fighting started at 9:00 a.m. A machine gun bunker part way up the hill had the whole platoon pinned down. Lieutenant Simms said to Moxley, “Take your team and take the hill.”

To avoid being easy targets for enemy machine guns, the men would stagger running. When the squad leader called a man’s name; he would get up, run forward and drop down.

Lieutenant Simms and two others were killed right off. A rocket-propelled grenade came at Moxley who dove in a log deck. A bullet round blew out his eardrum and another caught him in the head and blew him backwards. Dazed Moxley tried to wipe the sweat from his eyes and got blood. His helmet had a gapping hole.

“I’ve been shot in the head,” Moxley realized.

Moxley thought he was dying and decided to charge the NVA machine gun bunker with his M-16.

The NVA also thought Moxley was dead. He caught them by surprise, rushed the hill and before they could reposition the machine gun at him, threw a grenade into the bunker.

The bunker was part way up Hill 1044.

Hill 1044 is known as one of the largest supply depots of weapons and ammunitions captured during the war.

“I was the first one on it,” said Moxley. He got to the other side of the bunker and lay down, bleeding profusely.

Moxley was awarded a Bronze Star with combat V for taking out the NVA machine gun bunker and saving numerous American lives.

His commander told him, “We counted 34 dead and you got most of them.”

Later while Moxley was waiting for a medevac chopper, Captain Riley asked the group of wounded if anyone could fight one more night. Numbers were very low due to casualties. Moxley knew the NVA would try to take back the hill. Concerned that his comrades would be overrun, he volunteered to stay.

Riley put his arm around Moxley and said, “Damn, you are one hell of a marine. I love you.”

Moxley was good at making decisions during combat. He was quickly put in charge of first a team of three and then a squad of 15 men.

“I accepted I would never make it home,” said Moxley. “I would take a bullet for any of them. They knew that.”

Moxley remembers being out in the jungle with no food, no supplies and no bullets. They would dig roots from the ground to eat and squeeze water from banana tree bark. At night bugs veraciously attacked but they could not slap them for fear of alerting the nearby NVA.

In April, Moxley was sent back to Hill 1044 for Operation Apache Snow. On May 6, 1969 Moxley lost a very good friend and displayed valor in combat that earned him the Navy Commendation.

Under heavy fire, Moxley’s good friend Bill Prose had thrown his helmet over a grenade lobbed into his foxhole. When the grenade detonated it blew Prose’s face, shoulder and leg off. Another man, Private Turner, lost his foot. Their team leader froze.

Moxley heard his friend screaming for help, as did the enemy. Moxley tried to get to the foxhole. Flares lit up the night sky, Moxley saw three NVA soldiers staring down at him. He dove and rolled; one of their bullets took three of his fingernails off.

At the foxhole Moxley started shooting enemy fighters up in the trees. He got tourniquets on the legs of Turner and Prose. He carried Prose to the medic only to be told, “You brought me a dead man.”

Later Captain Riley told Moxley he would recommend him for a medal for his courage under fire and credit him with 17 confirmed kills. Moxley did not care. He was tired of war. The enemy was close by but he took off his helmet and flak jacket, and sat on a log where Prose died.

He told Lieutenant Gene Smith, “I’m tired of war. I don’t want to kill anybody else. I don’t want to see my buddy’s die anymore.”

Years later Moxley finally accepted the Navy Commendation with valor in combat for taking control of the foxhole and rescuing Prose and Turner.

The medals are bittersweet to Moxley. Each one represents death and loss.

In fact, Moxley refused the medals for many years before allowing his sons Robert and Jason, then 14 and 12 years old, to pin them on him at the Marine Corp base in Portland, Ore. in 1988. 200 marines stood at attention.

“There is no glory in war,” said Moxley. “Nobody wins in a war. Everybody loses tremendously.”

Moxley feels angry that as an eighteen year old his country would not allow him to drink a beer or vote but deemed him mature enough to fight a war and kill people.

Most troubling to Moxley are his memories of the wounded NVA soldiers reaching out for help.

“They were just like us,” said Moxley. “They just wanted to go home as bad as we did.”

Moxley had to shoot them in the head. If they were left alive they might get a weapon and sneak up behind.

“I can still feel their hands grabbing hold of me to help them,” said Moxley. It gives him nightmares.

“I portray myself as a tough marine,” said Moxley, “but I tell you I have a heart as big as the world and it hurts knowing what I did over there.”

Moxley does not understand why smart, educated people choose war.

“There has got to be a better way to do it instead of bloodshed,” said Moxley.

Moxley lost his whole squad on June 12, 1969 during Operation Utah Mesa at Khe Sanh, one year after the big siege. At 9:00 p.m. Moxley and seven of his men were out of ammunition and on patrol. Hundreds of the NVA were close by.

The enemy was setting booby traps—an artillery round in the fork of a tree detonated with a trip wire.

When the squad tripped the wire two men, including his best friend David Palmeri, were killed instantly. It was an ambush. The enemy started shooting at them and throwing grenades. Moxley’s left leg was badly hit and he was shot in the right arm and shoulder. He used one bootlace to tourniquet his arm and the other his leg. His men were either dead or severely wounded.

“I can still hear my men crying for help,” said Moxley.

The enemy swarmed over them. Moxley was bayoneted and shot several times in the groin. He thought to himself, “Hell Mox, the war is over. They got me.”

Finally the rest of the platoon pushed off the ambush. The first helicopter took out the wounded. The second, called the dead chopper, took the dead out in body bags.

Moxley remembers the corpsman looked at him and said, “He’s dead.”

Lieutenant Smith said, “Bag him and tag him.” He was crying.

In a body bag on the dead chopper, the gunner who protects the helicopter must have sat on Moxley who squealed.

The gunner ripped the body bag open and screamed to the pilot, “We got a warm one.”

Moxley spent over one year in the hospital system getting put back together. He had malaria and dysentery. He nearly lost both his arm and leg. He left leg is partially paralyzed and parts of his knee are artificial.

From six months of intensive action Moxley would earn numerous medals including the Bronze Star, the Navy Commendation and two purple hearts.

Moxley returned to a political climate in America where veterans were stereotyped as warmongers and killers. He felt the scorn. He would tell people his leg injury was from a car accident.

In 1999 Moxley traveled to Vietnam for one month with Colonel Bulldog Smith and two other Special Forces veterans. They took 5,000 pounds of medical supplies to distribute to clinics in small villages where there had been battles during the war in the northern part of South Vietnam.

“I thought there would be so much animosity,” said Moxley.

Instead Moxley met a beautiful and proud people who night after night insisted on buying him dinner and beer.

“I was dumbfounded,” said Moxley.

Moxley had dinner at the home of a Colonel from the North Vietnamese army who fought in a battle against Moxley.

The Colonel spoke pretty good English and asked Moxley, “Why? Why did we have to kill each other?”

“I have no answers,” said Moxley.

He got down on his knees and kissed Moxley’s hands.

“There is not an hour that goes by that I don’t think about that war and the friends I lost,” said Moxley.

Moxley wants his gravestone to read: The war is finally over.