The "Sand Pit" - Cam Ranh Bay

Cam Ranh Bay, "The Sand Pit" was a major US naval base and airfield during the war in Vietnam.  It is regarded as the finest deepwater shelter in Southeast Asia.  Over the years, it has been occupied by the French, the United States, North Viet Nam, Russia and then again Viet Nam.  Currently it supposedly serves as a ship repair facility available to foreign warships and is supported by Russian consultants.

Cam Ranh Base - 1970

During the war, one of the base's major functions was to serve as an Army convalescent center where wounded US soldiers could be treated, recuperate, then returned to duty.  It was also a drug abuse treatment center. Heroin addiction was an epidemic and many addicts were evacuated to the United States for more intense treatment. The preferred method for transportation was Aeromedical Air Evacuation "air evac", a function performed by the Unites States Air Force. 

The base was known for sand; lots of shifting sand that required boardwalks to help troops move among buildings.  The area also featured large rats, snakes, palm and banana trees, Vietnamese thatched huts and, the occasional sapper. 

In 1971, my former Air Force Medical Service Corps colleague and pal, Tom McDougall was a First Lieutenant stationed at Clark Air Force Base in the Philippines.  While there Tom pulled a six week assignment at the Sand Pit to set up an air evac detachment. The purpose, to ship heroin addicts home as patients.  This is Tom's story:

"Drugs were a huge problem in Viet Nam.  We didn't even mess around with those smoking pot, just the ones who were hooked on heroin. This situation set the stage for my arrival at Cam Ranh Bay, which was a large sand dune in the South China Sea abutting the mainland. The base was the size of a small city and handled a lot of cargo and supplies. 

When I got there, I met up with 2 enlisted guys and we comprised the air evac detachment. The motor pool gave us a crappy old pickup truck we had to push start to get going each morning. I negotiated with the transportation guy and had a quart of brandy and two cases of San Miguel bottles delivered on one of my incoming air evac planes (you could only get canned beer in country). I traded this for a relatively new 6 passenger pick up. We were in the process of "Vietnamization" at the time which meant the Vietnamese received all the new trucks arriving, so the transportation guy broke some major rules to imbibe of the "supplies" I offered. 

Patients would be rehabilitated for about 2 weeks at an Army hospital and then delivered to our Aeromedical Staging Facility located at the Air Force hospital.  It was a large quonset hut surrounded by barbed wire fences and staffed with security police as well as medical personnel.  We would receive about 70 patients a day (do the math for a year and you can see we had a serious heroin problem) and they would immediately be strip searched and finger waved.  The med techs drew straws every day to see who had the honor of serving as "Goldfinger." 

Heroin caps

We also drug tested them about 2 hours after arrival. One or two always failed and were shipped back. They were kept in locked wards at the Army hospital, but would obtain caps of heroin from the Vietnamese hospital workers who would trade them for money or a watch. We could not figure out how they were smuggling the heroin into our Aeromedical Staging Facility until one enterprising med tech noticed most of the smugglers were black.  When we started combing out their hair we found out that was where they were hiding it.

There was an auxiliary Army Officer's Club about 5 miles away that was run by an Army Sergeant who wanted to be a restaurateur when he got home so the place looked like an Italian restaurant.  My two guys and I would change into civilian clothes so they could get in (they were enlisted) and go there for dinner every night.  We would skip lunch and order 2 dinners apiece.  You could get a filet mignon, salad, and a baked potato for $2.50, or a lobster tail instead of the filet.  We usually drank about 4 or more bottles of Rose Mateus or other Portuguese wine that the club manager managed to keep in stock.  I think the wine was $2 a bottle.  I may be the only guy sent to Viet Nam who gained weight while he was there.  

One night coming home from dinner we stopped and picked up 3 filthy grunts who had just come out of the bush.  They wanted to go to the NCO club on base, but we were stopped at the main gate by the security police.  They informed me that the base commander did not allow any Army enlisted guys on base after dark because they had torn up the club a few times.  I made him tell our passengers.  I could not believe that the base CO was such an asshole.  No wonder a lot of those grunts turned to dope.  

Another time returning from dinner (maybe 6 bottles that night) we were taking a short cut to an AF barracks where there was a party when I hit a bunch of 50 gallon drums full of sand that blocked the road. Luckily there was not too much damage to the truck although the collision sounded like a bomb going off.  We took another road to the party and found everyone outside worrying that an attack was coming because of the loud noise.  They had closed the road earlier in the day because of supposed enemy activity.  We had a pretty good laugh over that one.

We worked 7 days a week (flight every day), but we had a little time to go to the beach and catch some sun.  You had to be careful when swimming because the crazy Army helicopter pilots would skim the deck at about 2 feet.  The first time one went over that close it scared the crap out me.  

The base was saturated with outside speakers, a system that was called "Giant Voice."  It would come on 2 or 3 times a day and announce the weather (hotter than hell) and the current security condition.  This was giving in military terms, like DEFCON 3 (safe), DEFCON 2 (suspected enemy activity), and DEFCON 1 (haul ass to the weapons storage area because we were about to be overrun). They didn't allow AF guys to carry weapons...this was another bright rule. 

The guys who spoke on Giant Voice all had great radio or possibly singing voices and sounded really smooth in their daily deliveries. One afternoon the guy said we were on DEFCON 2 and further stated they expected enemy activity that night.  The Vietnamese all left the base before 3 PM which made us even more convinced we were going to be hit. 

Each day, we needed to report to work very early because our flights usually arrived at 7 AM.  I was sitting there hung over at 6 AM, pleased that we had not been attacked the night before, when there was a huge explosion that blew out the 2 doors on the building and raised the metal shutters on all the widows. The lights went out and I found myself fighting for space under my desk with a nurse (equal opportunity in war).  

The first explosion was followed by another about a minute later. The lights were out and all the drug patients were under their beds where one asshole was doing a whistle imitating an incoming missile.  Several of his bunk mates threatened to kill him, but were too scared to move. After a couple of more explosions, good old Giant Voice came on, but he sounded like he was scared to death. He was stuttering and stammering and saying "DEFCON, uh DEFCON uh 2."  Well that was helpful since we had already figured we were under attack.  We kept waiting for the big one, but it didn't come.  

Giant Voice finally explained that an enemy sapper had blown up a good part of the ammo dump up on the hill.  After that explanation there were a lot of idiots out on roofs taking pictures of the bombs and missiles exploding.  When the missiles went they took off into the air so it was not real safe outside for a few hours.  

About 3 hours after the last of the explosions went off they opened the runway and the first plane in was a contract carrier full of newbies.  When the pilot was in final approach a missile went off from the ammo dump and came close to the airplane. The pilot pulled the stick like he was driving an F-16 and hauled the hell out of there. I am sure he exceeded all the tolerances for that airplane, but he was not waiting around.  They diverted to Saigon and came back about 3 hours later.  Everyone went down to the tarmac to greet the newbies and see if any of them had brown stains on their butts.

Later, I got on the phone to my boss in the Philippines and told him I thought I should leave on the plane coming in that day.  He said I had to wait until my permanent replacement came in about 2 weeks.  

I was a little nervous around loud noises after that and was not real pleased with our security.  We expected them to come and we couldn't stop one guy from getting to the ammo dump (gee, you think that might be a target?)

I left 2 weeks later when a beaming 2nd Lt stepped off an airplane carrying a golf bag.  That idiot's name was John Oleson and he probably has better war stories than I do.  He was famous for sitting in high stakes poker games in Saigon and cleaning out a bunch of senior officers. 

Anyway that is my short war experience.  The 20 minutes while the bombs were going off  (we did not know what it was) were terrifying.  It greatly increased my appreciation for the grunts who lived with that shit daily.

About ten years ago I ran into a guy who had been assigned to Cam Ranh when I had been there.  We were telling war stories when he mentioned it was a good thing the enemy sapper didn't get at the 15,000 pound bombs.  I was not aware there had been any at the base and he informed me that if they had blown we would not be there talking. Ignorance is bliss."

(Thanks for the story Tom.  Tom served a full career with the Air Force Medical Service Corps is now recently retired from a senior position with the University of Texas health system.  He resides somewhere on the gulf coast.  He remains busy sipping fine wine or scotch or both and smokes mighty fine stogies. If you find any mistakes in his story here or any blame to place, I made them and blame me.)