Joy in Seattle

It rained on their parade, but for the 814 men of the 9th Division's 3rd Battalion, 60th Infantry, it was Christmas, Thanksgiving and the Fourth of July combined. Each man had served at least ten months in Viet Nam, and theirs was the first unit to be shipped home since President Nixon's June 8 announcement at Midway that 25,000 U.S. troops would be withdrawn this summer. Last week they flew in nine C-141 StarLifter transports to McChord Air Force Base in Washington. As bystanders clapped and called out "Thank you! Thank you!" they paraded proudly through downtown Seattle, their jungle green battledress stained dark by a pelting rainstorm. Said one exuberant captain: "We would have marched in snow."

Flags waved, ticker tape showered down on the troopers, and pretty girls pressed red roses into the men's hands. At the end of the parade route, near the Seattle Public Library, a group of antiwar protesters made V signs of peace and chanted: "Bring 'em all back!" For some of the soldiers, it was the first face-to-face contact with peace demonstrators. "It really made the men mad," said Sergeant Rick Spellman. "You read about it, but you have no idea of what it's really like until you see it."

Plastic Leis. Just before leaving Viet Nam, the 3rd Battalion stood through an elaborate three-hour send-off ceremony on the baking tarmac at Saigon's Tan Son Nhut airbase. A gaggle of aodai-clad Vietnamese girls pranced out to drape them with plastic leis and give each of the departing troops the country's yellow and red flag with a two-foot pedestal. Defense Minister Nguyen Van Vy spoke his gratitude at length--in Vietnamese, later translated. The U.S. commander, General Creighton Abrams, offered his congratulations: "You have fought well under some of the most arduous and unusual combat conditions ever experienced by American soldiers. You are a credit to your generation."

In a whir of flapping helicopter blades, South Viet Nam's President Nguyen Van Thieu arrived at the last minute to add his own farewells. "The fact that the South Vietnamese army can now start to replace U.S. troops constitutes both your success and our success," said Thieu in English. "I convey to you all the heartfelt gratitude of the free Vietnamese." Then, at last, the battalion wheeled to the left and marched across the runway to board the waiting airplanes. Said a Bravo Company platoon sergeant: "I don't think anybody is going to believe it until they get back. You ain't never lucky until you leave this place."

The first detachments of Marines also got lucky last week. In the midst of a drenching typhoon, 200 men of the 9th Marine Regiment arrived at a staging area in Quang Tri, just south of the Demilitarized Zone, en route to Danang and Hawaii. On the way they stopped to pass out candy and toys to village children; one baffled Vietnamese boy got a pair of ice skates. A battalion of the 9th Marines is also scheduled to sail this week from Danang for redeployment in Okinawa.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.