climb down a Jacobâs ladder to a boat that is pitching violently in a stormy sea; for a petty officer to tell his chief that he made a mistake; for a coxswain to make her first landing; for a corpsman to stop a Marineâs arterial bleeding while enemy rounds are cracking all about; for a fireman to take the test for third class petty officer; for a gunnerâs mate to man a weapon as a replacement for her shipmate who was just killed a moment before; for a brand-new ensign to lead for the first time; for an airman to report a case of sexual harassment; for an electronics technician to climb the mast to fix a wiring problem in the TACAN antenna; for a nozzle man to lead a hose team into a compartment full of flames and smoke; for an officer to put his career on the line over a matter of conscience; for a master chief to put in his papers for retirement after thirty years of service. These are all acts of courage that occur every day in the United States Navy.
The rewards for these acts of courage vary. On rare occasions they result in the awarding of a medal such as the Bronze Star or Navy Cross. Sometimes they result in the achievement of a qualification or a promotion. Often, the only reward is in knowing, âI did the right thing.â
It is not by accident or random choice that courage is one of the three standards the Navy has chosen to live by. Honor and commitment must be teamed with courageâboth moral and physicalâif the Navy is going to carry out its many missions and overcome the myriad challenges that arise every day.
While there have been and always will be moments when courage fails, the long history of the Navy is an impressive record of Sailors having the courage to do what is right, what is needed, what makes the difference between success and failure, what ultimately decides victory over defeat.
No Exit Ramp
PBRs 105 and 99 of River Section 531 were closing rapidly on two sampans loaded down with uniformed troops in the middle of the My ThoRiver. The PBRs were running at full throttle, their American flags stretched taut, great white rooster tails following close behind.
In October 1966 it was not unusual for American Sailors to be seen on the waterways of Vietnam. The U.S. Navy had expanded its traditional large-fleet, âblue-waterâ role to take the fight to the enemy in the âbrown-waterâ world of the Mekong Delta and RSSZ. Using modified fiberglass recreational boats powered by jet pumps, many Sailors voluntarily left their jobs as yeomen, signalmen, and the like to âget up close and personalâ with the Communists, who were using the waterways to smuggle war-making contraband and to disrupt the vital flow of rice from the paddies to the marketplace along South Vietnamâs vital rivers. Small yet well-armed PBRs patrolled the jungle-lined waterways to keep them open, often boarding and inspecting junks and sampans to make sure they were legitimate commercial traffic.
On this particular day, there was no doubt that these two sampans were not commercial. Heavily armed men wearing North Vietnamese military uniforms were clearly visible in the craft. The two sampans split up; one headed for the north shore, the other toward the south. The soldiers in the sampans fired at the approaching patrol boats and were almost instantaneously answered by the staccato bark of the forward twin fifties of each PBR. The two American craft veered off after the southbound sampan. When they got close enough, they slowed down to stabilize the careening fire of their gunners, and in less than a minute they had destroyed the fleeing enemy craft. Boatswainâs Mate First Class James Elliott Williams throttled up and banked the 105 in a tight turn that caused the skidding PBR to burrow nose-down into the river before dashing out across the water in hot pursuit of the other sampan. Williams was boat captain for the 105 and patrol officer in charge of both PBRs.
A PBR under
The rewards for these acts of courage vary. On rare occasions they result in the awarding of a medal such as the Bronze Star or Navy Cross. Sometimes they result in the achievement of a qualification or a promotion. Often, the only reward is in knowing, âI did the right thing.â
It is not by accident or random choice that courage is one of the three standards the Navy has chosen to live by. Honor and commitment must be teamed with courageâboth moral and physicalâif the Navy is going to carry out its many missions and overcome the myriad challenges that arise every day.
While there have been and always will be moments when courage fails, the long history of the Navy is an impressive record of Sailors having the courage to do what is right, what is needed, what makes the difference between success and failure, what ultimately decides victory over defeat.
No Exit Ramp
PBRs 105 and 99 of River Section 531 were closing rapidly on two sampans loaded down with uniformed troops in the middle of the My ThoRiver. The PBRs were running at full throttle, their American flags stretched taut, great white rooster tails following close behind.
In October 1966 it was not unusual for American Sailors to be seen on the waterways of Vietnam. The U.S. Navy had expanded its traditional large-fleet, âblue-waterâ role to take the fight to the enemy in the âbrown-waterâ world of the Mekong Delta and RSSZ. Using modified fiberglass recreational boats powered by jet pumps, many Sailors voluntarily left their jobs as yeomen, signalmen, and the like to âget up close and personalâ with the Communists, who were using the waterways to smuggle war-making contraband and to disrupt the vital flow of rice from the paddies to the marketplace along South Vietnamâs vital rivers. Small yet well-armed PBRs patrolled the jungle-lined waterways to keep them open, often boarding and inspecting junks and sampans to make sure they were legitimate commercial traffic.
On this particular day, there was no doubt that these two sampans were not commercial. Heavily armed men wearing North Vietnamese military uniforms were clearly visible in the craft. The two sampans split up; one headed for the north shore, the other toward the south. The soldiers in the sampans fired at the approaching patrol boats and were almost instantaneously answered by the staccato bark of the forward twin fifties of each PBR. The two American craft veered off after the southbound sampan. When they got close enough, they slowed down to stabilize the careening fire of their gunners, and in less than a minute they had destroyed the fleeing enemy craft. Boatswainâs Mate First Class James Elliott Williams throttled up and banked the 105 in a tight turn that caused the skidding PBR to burrow nose-down into the river before dashing out across the water in hot pursuit of the other sampan. Williams was boat captain for the 105 and patrol officer in charge of both PBRs.
A PBR under
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