The Storm

Chapter Twenty

Deployment

G unny began filling me in about their assignments, their missions: "It was 1965 and we were a part of an elite force in Vietnam called The Dirty Thirty . Soon after our training in Coronado Island in San Diego we were ordered to search out and assassinate high rankin' Vietcong officers and officials, as well as Chinese operatives that were in the country as advisers. We were a black-ops group composed mainly of Navy Seals and received our orders via sat-com (satellite communications) with coded messages of who, what, when, and where. Our job was to exterminate with extreme prejudice and re-group for our next mission. It was left up to us to plan and execute according to whatever we felt as necessary to complete our mission with effectiveness and efficiency." "Our track record was 100%: 64 missions 64 dead. We did not include collateral damage, which was just part of the job. It was not like today, where our troop movements and actions are held under close media scrutiny. Hell, there was no media. We were deep-cover, black-ops, special operations ghosts. We got done what was asked of us. Failure was never an option. On a few occasions we would receive intel from deep undercover operatives that were embedded deep within the Vietcong leadership. We were to protect those assets by makin' it our number one priority to keep their identity secret. Only

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