A state of disobedience

Field Mess, 4^th Battalion, 101^st Aviation Regiment

Officers could not speak ill of the President of the United States. Noncoms and enlisted men could not insult officers but could say whatever they wanted about the President; no rule against it. At least there was no legal and official rule against it. The political officers—the troops had already taken to calling them "Zampolits"—might have different ideas.

Thus it was that, surrounded by officers and flight warrants of the battalion, one lone, slightly chubby first sergeant by the name of Henry looked around, saw no Zampolits, then stood upon a folding mess table and announced, "Be proud, gentlemen, be proud. That sound you hear over toward the PZ? Why that's our own brave boys carrying the 'elite of the nation'—Rottenmuncher's Own, the arrogant cocksuckers—into battle. What an awesome and welcome mission. What a garland for our proud unit's history. Can't you just imagine it, imagine how you're all going to feel when we get that campaign streamer that says 'Western Currency Facility' to put on our standard right next to Ia Drang and Al Nasriyeh?

"Oh, yes . . . something for each of us to tell our children and our grandchildren. 'Why yes, Johnny, I was there pulling pitch . . . or turning a wrench . . . or running tests of the electronics when the Rottenmuncher hammered the last shackle on the United States. Yep . . . that was me, your old grandpappy, helping make the world unsafe for democracy."

Most present in the tent laughed; First Sergeant Henry was one of those characters a lucky unit has; treasured because of—not in spite of—his humor and cynicism.

One warrant pilot did not laugh. Chewing and swallowing his bite of "undifferentiated meat with differentiated sauce" quickly, this warrant officer, CWO2 Harrington, asked, "And what the hell are we supposed to do, Top? We get our orders. We follow them."

Henry's lip curled in a sneer, not at the warrant so much as at the world. "Do, sir? Why I didn't say we should 'do' anything. Why that would be mutiny, sir, and I would, of course, never counsel mutiny. Why I would not even suggest to you gentlemen—oh, and ladies—that you remember your oaths to the country, because if I did then—who knows?—you might mutiny on your own.

"No sir, not me, never. No mutiny from this end.

"I might, though, ask the chaplain—oh, and you, too, sir," Henry indicated with a finger the battalion's JAG officer, "if it would be mutiny to ask God to help those men in the WCF that are going to be fighting there soon for our freedom."

Henry looked around for the unit chaplain. Finding him, and catching the chaplain's eye, the first sergeant shouted, "Hey 'Chap,' can we make this a prayer breakfast?"

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