122 mm

Jim Lovins photograph; Pleiku, Republic of Vietnam, 1971. This building housed Republic of Korea troops and was just outside Pleiku's central MACV compound. It was roughly half-way between our "home" in the hospital complex and our "office" in MACV. The damage was done by a 122 mm rocket.

Every couple weeks the VC would fire missiles at us. While the rockets certainly weren't harmless--people died in this incident--they were far more scary than they were dangerous. Typically, we'd be ducking nine rockets in a day: Three in the early morning, three more around noon, and three before supper. They'd set up the rockets on the outskirts of the city--near the whorehouses, I'm told--and retreat into the town before the Hueys could respond. The intended target was usually the local military headquarters (II Corps). Since our Commcenter was on the line defined by the launch site and the target, we had more than a few close calls. But by the second rocket in each set, we'd be in the bunker, wearing tin pots & flack jackets.