T. Harry Williams Center for Oral
History Collection
ABSTRACT
INTERVIEWEE NAME: Jimmy D. Coins #
4700.0943
IDENTIFICATION: Vietnam veteran
INTERVIEWER: Bailey Vinson
PROJECT: Americans in Vietnam
DATES: 5/8/77
FOCUS DATES: June 12, 1968-June 12, 1974,
Jan. 1969-Dec. 1971
ABSTRACT:
T 1379
Family life in Seminary, Mississippi; education; drafted, chose
Air Force because it seemed easiest; training in Amarillo, Texas;
tech school at Chenault? Air Base; jungle survival school at
Clark Air Base; US military propaganda about war was bullshit;
landed at Tan Son Nhut Air Base at Saigon; arrived during Tet of
1968; served with 834th Air Division, communication
electronics branch, at Cam Ranh Bay; worked 12 hours per day;
meals; ammo dumps blown up at Danang and Cam Ranh Bay; huge C130
bombs; fighting, racial hostility; machine gun fire between
blacks and whites; black soldier shot and killed mess sergeant
when he told them to check arms before entering mess hall;
fragging was common; Vietnamese women who cleaned their barracks;
Saigon was like Old West; Cam Ranh was a closed base; about 15
prostitutes lived in barracks with men; drugs easy to get;
swimming in South China Sea; worked long days, not much to do in
free time; movies, drugs, alcohol, and prostitutes for
recreation; Viet Cong overrunning bases; learned a little
Vietnamese; most older Vietnamese spoke French; black market; men
who traded truck for warrant officers' helicopter; low opinion of
Vietnamese; wide gap in culture and lifestyle between US and
Vietnam; only way to have stopped war was to kill all the
Vietnamese; war changed him; seeing someone killed by rocket
right in front of him; couldn't sleep for six months after
returning to US; MPC, Vietnamese money, US currency, and the
black market; black market trade in goods such as combat boots
and poncho liners; popularity of Salem cigarettes among
Vietnamese; army not allowed to have liquor, so traded with them;
swiping fruit, vegetables and steaks off aircraft; got caught by
air policeman with two cases of stolen steaks, bribed him with
one case; grilling steaks outside his hutch on Herky Hill; Coins
charged with stealing travelers' checks; not much to spend money
on; Coins had bought stolen travelers check from bank; suspects
bank teller stole checks, pocketed his money; could only get
Black Label beer, which made people angry; graft and corruption
was game to keep people occupied; turning in missed meal slips
for money; illegal trades of jeeps and gasoline.
TAPES: 1
TOTAL PLAYING TIME:
# PAGES TRANSCRIPT: 17
RESTRICTIONS: none