With Veterans Day on the horizon, it was only appropriate that Nick Nerio, commander of American Legion Post 360, shared his experience in Vietnam with the Women’s Club of Lake Arrowhead.
He was drafted into the Army in 1966, Nerio told the women at their Oct. 16 meeting, and he served until the end of 1968. “I was 20 when I was called to serve,” he said. “After my training, I was given orders to report to Vietnam.”
Nerio was assigned to the operations company in the 1st Cav Division. He was stationed in the jungle, staying in tents on the perimeter with their helicopters in the middle.
It was his second week “in country,” he said, late at night. The Vietcong attacked. “I woke to machine gun fire and rolled out of my cot onto the ground with my M16 rifle. The Vietcong has destroyed all of the helicopters. My tent had hundreds of holes in it and there were several large craters next to the tent.”
A second event that made an impression on him took place in February 1968. During the Tet offensive, the North Vietnamese army invaded South Vietnam. “All the major roads were closed due to the fighting. I flew out of Da Nang Bay over the coast. I heard an explosion – the helicopter pitched to the left and crashed into the sea and sank.”
As Nerio realized he had survived the crash, he dove into the Red China sea. A small Navy boat spotted him after an hour. He made it to Camp Evans, north of Hue. There he saw North Vietnamese soldiers blindfolded, lying on the ground. When he was working on a Jeep the next day, he smelled death – there were body bags with dead American soldiers.
A third event of note took place in May 1968, an event that almost caused the 1st Cav to be sent back to the U.S. The North Vietnamese Army and the Vietcong fired rockets at the ammo dump, trying to destroy it. They finally did. “I was in the operations bunker,” Nerio said, “below ground. It was well fortified but it collapsed. We were in darkness.” Two large explosions caused Nerio to black out. His battalion was completely gone.
The last event he shared with the women had the most impact on him. It was October 1968 at Camp Evans. “One of the greatest fears in Vietnam was to die when you were close to going home,” he said. “I heard an explosion and saw a large black column of smoke. I saw an aircraft crash to the ground. There was white paper floating in the air – they were letters meant for families back home.” An aircraft and a helicopter had crashed into each other; there were no survivors. Twenty-four soldiers on the plane were rotating back home.
“I became overly anxious, hypervigilant. I had less than two weeks to go but realized I might not make it. It wasn’t until my plane landed in Southern California and I walked into the door of my mother’s house and was finally home that I was able to take a deep breath,” Nerio said.
“So many soldiers came home physically scarred, many more scarred mentally. I realized I was no longer the innocent soldier I had been. I realized life was precious – you can lose it in a second.
“We as a community are important,” Nerio said. “Each one of us is unique, necessary. Each has a purpose. Each is loved.”
“You are the measure of a man,” Jeri Simpson, president of the Women’s Club told Nerio. She presented him with a check for $500 for a flag for the Veterans Day observance and said the club had already sent a check for $740.94 to print the booklets for the event.
Blue Star Moms
Alma Diaz (left) and Vicki Garner were all smiles after receiving a donation from Jeri Simpson of the Women’s Club of Lake Arrowhead.
The Women’s Club also heard from Vicki Garner and Alma Diaz of the Rim Blue Star Moms. Diaz gave the women a history of how the Blue Star Moms got started. The first meeting, she said, took place on Feb. 1, 1942, with 358 mothers in attendance.
Garner, who serves as the group’s president, said that first her daughter and then her son joined the Navy. “A friend told me I belonged to a group of Moms with children in the military.” She joined the Rim Blue Star Moms.
“I feel close to these ladies,” Garner said. “We are there for each other.”
Garner and Diaz told the women about the Hometown Heroes banners they put up from Crestline to Running Springs.
Simpson presented the Blue Star Moms with a check for $500 for them to put toward the banners.
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