The detailed history of the Marine helicopter pilot has never been written in such a hard , cold -steel factual way as this great book reveals. The author, Marion Sturkey, has produced a very exciting chronological documentary using no pseudonyms, only the true names, of pilots and aircrewmen who flew and died in I Corps. His Dedication page, to 28 Marines from HMM-265 who " made the Supreme Sacrifice in the noble cause of freedon during the course of the Vietnam War", punctuates the fact that real people fight wars, not statistics.
The Prologue very squarely sets thestage for the book by looking at a small part of the history of Vietnam which is germane to understanding a small bit of the Oriental mind as it pertains to "the war" and the "coming of the United States, as leader of the free world." The U.S. Marines arrived in 1962 to help the South Vietnamese, a country already used to warfare for at least 2000 years. How bizarre to begin the whole affair on Palm Sunday, 1962. Beginning with the very early troop deployment , Code named Operation Shu-Fly, the Marines actually started in the Mekong region with H-34,s before landing in mass at Danang on March 8, 1965. Funny how PBS documentaries seem to leave this fact out.
Following the Prologue, Marion Sturkey doesa masterful job through some 10 chapters telling the actual story of Marine Aviation starting from Marble Mountain, July 14, 1966 through The Seige at Khe Sanh. Day by day , hour by hour, you will be stunned by the details contained in Chapters titled: Mutter Ridge, The New Year, The Longest Night, The Hill Fights and They Bought the Farm. You will be held captured by stirring detail, taken from hundreds of abstracts from After-action-Reports, Aircraft Accident Reports, squadron Unit Diaries and Flight Schedules, Casualty Cards, and Command Chronologies. Bonnie-Sue.... is no "from memory" biography.
Closing out the book , the author submits a Requiem: (Webster-- A Mass for the repose of a departed soul or souls....in honor of the dead!) Punctuating the details of the pull-out, overthrow and die-down of the War ,Marion Sturkey quotes many prophetic words by people known and unknown to show just how "history" will remember the whole affair. There is no crying or remorse, only a factual hard hitting and truthful approach to reality. To quote the author, " Surviving Marine Corps helicopter pilots and aircrewmen remember the horror and hardships, the fear and fatique, the stench and carnage. Yet, they also recall the camaraderie, the love and brotherhood, the passion, the incommunicable experience of Marines at war. THEY FOUGHT AND FLEW HAND-IN-HAND WITH DEATH, BUT THEY WERE NEVER MORE ALIVE. THEIR SURVIVAL BECAME THEIR VICTORY!"
Any helicopter pilot who is serious about knowing exactly what happened will want to have and read this book. If you rely on accounts, such as the many PBS mini-series, solely for your facts, you have not heard the real truth. To help quickly find facts and names, "Bonnie Sue.." contains a complete Master Index with 419 names(real people) and a Bibliography of 169 listings. If the author Marion F. Sturkey didn't apply for and receive a PhD for his fine research and writing, he should have. As far as receiving one from the School of Hard Knocks, I would give him a PhD, for sure. Read it and you will no doubt agree. And, in this case, PhD actually stands for "Plenty of Heroic Detail"!
Tom Payne
Bandit32
118th AHC
66-67 END
