Fort Bragg to Hue: A Paratrooper with the 82nd and 173rd Airborne in Vietnam, 1968-1970

In February 1968, the U.S. Army’s 82nd Airborne Division was understrength, with only enough paratroopers to deploy a single brigade. The 3rd Brigade got the order to reinforce American units fighting the North Vietnamese Army around Hue and joined the battle, later receiving a Valorous Unit Award for their actions.

James Dorn led a rifle platoon with the 3rd at Hue and with the 173rd Airborne Brigade in the rice paddies west of Saigon. His frank and detailed memoir recounts their diverse combat missions, the commonplace inhumanity of war and the day-to-day life of infantrymen in the field.