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https://web.archive.org/web/20061126140956/http://www.dienbienphu.org/english/index.htm

A volunteer hits the silk
April, 1954

Disappearing into the maw of the mountain monsoon, rising from the hills like a vertical wall, the C-47 pitches and rolls as it approaches the Ba Vi mountains west of Hanoi. It is ten o’clock at night. The twenty-two passengers are quiet, dazed, hearts rising in their throats, sitting on canvas seats, clinging to the webbing of the seats that they had grabbed hold of in the dark on take-off.

The jumpmaster yells “Let’s hear you sing” with the command voice of a professional organizer.

But sing what? The passengers have nothing in common with each other. They don’t even know each other. Three hours before, they had never even seen each other. They come from units all over Indo-china. There are legionnaires, Algerian riflemen, artillerymen, rear echelon troops, men who are AWOL from hospitals. Nothing in their regimental folklore lent itself to choral singing. And then, even if they all knew the same song, if they opened their mouths no sound would come out. The jump, looming on the horizon tonight, rid them of any desire to react.

“On your feet, ‘Paras’, it’s time to go.
On the road with cadenced step,
on your feet ‘Paras’, we’re going to make a jump
over our beloved motherland...”

The jumpmaster’s voice rising above the deep sound of the motors suddenly broke off, discouraged. If he could have seen them, staring at him with unseeing eyes, the jumpmaster never would have begun to sing.

“On your feet, ‘Paras’... “

There is hardly a single paratrooper in the plane and tonight they are going to make their first jump, over Dien Bien Phu, in the middle of a battle. They don’t regret the enthusiasm which caused them to step forward this morning in morning formation when their NCO called for volunteers. They hadn’t had time to regret it. Gathered together in a hangar they found other volunteers with drawn faces. Some affected a vaguely mocking cynicism, others a false indifference. Most, with questioning glances, tried to determine if their neighbor was as vaguely apprehensive as they were.

“What’s your name? I’m Lamarque. I’m a sergeant. I extended to come to Indo-china.”
“My name is Manke. I’m a sergeant in battalion headquarters of the 13th Half brigade of the Foreign Legion.”
“Volunteer?”
Manke smiled and shrugged his shoulders. “You could say that. I used to be in the artillery, at one time, in Russia. They asked if I knew how to serve a 105. How about you?”
Lamarque gave a forced laugh...
“You’re an artilleryman? That’s funny. So am I. But I was never in Russia. I was drafted. In France, several months ago, they asked for volunteers to go to Indo-china to replace the non-draftees in rear echelon jobs in order to free them up to fill in the combat units. Except me and paperwork, well...”

Manke said gravely “Admirable. In short, you’re a cherry, never jumped, never been in combat.”
“Tell me, what’s it like in combat?”
“Combat?” Manke hesitated.
“It’s impossible to say. It’s too difficult to explain. Nobody experiences it in the same way. It’s like a lottery and like all lotteries it’s one of the most unjust things there is. It raises more questions than it answers: Why am I afraid and the next guy isn’t? Why was he wounded and not me? Why am I still alive when a hundred times over...”
“I wonder if I’ll be afraid.”
“Afraid? Yeah, you’ll be afraid. But that’s not the real question. What you ought to wonder about is how you will handle your fear. Just remember, being afraid means being alive...
When the shells start raining down around you there is no place for enthusiasm. It will just be a struggle between you and your fear, wrapped around you like an octopus with a thousand arms. Like death, it’s a personal affair.”
“I read somewhere that the combat troop, as an individual is molded and shaped only by fear.”
Manke nodded, reached out, squeezed Lamarque’s arm in a token of friendship and said
“You don’t know. You can’t know.”
“But if you know, why are you throwing yourself into the mouth of the wolf?”
Manke laughed loudly, maybe too loudly.
“That’s what I keep asking myself, mein lieber. And I get no answer. Maybe I’m verrückt, completely crazy. I prefer to think that I wanted to be with my friends, my brothers. In Germany we call them Landsknecht. Real soldiers. My family...”

____________________

“Stand up! Hook up!”
A jump master passes by, flicking his flash-light on and off checking that the static line hooks are correctly fastened and the static lines are properly coiled on the back packs. He expresses his approval with a slap on the back and a shout of OK.
The door jumpmaster scrutinizes the darkness with his arm across the open doorway a rectangular lifeless black velvet hole.

____________________

“Two minutes” shouts the jumpmaster.

The C-47 executes a tight turn and stabilizes. It’s now on the proper approach path. Dien Bien Phu is not far away now. The pale orange lights of Dien Bien Phu visiblecloser they on the horizon resemble a distant storm. As the plane comes become more distinct and suddenly explosions of light seem to fly straight at him, from above and below. The C-47 starts to pitch and vibrate. The motors change speed.
“Flak” shouts the jumpmaster.
The flak thickens with each passing second. Tracers arrive from all directions, right, left, in front, behind.

_________

Manke steps up to the doorway and sticks his head out. The noise of the motors fills his ears and his cheeks are deformed by the wind. He pulls his head back in as soon as he spots not far ahead the distinct flash of artilleryjumpmaster fire.
Isabelle! No more than sixty seconds to go.

Manke is so absorbed by the spectacle going on below... The brings him back to reality screaming “Go”, and pushes him into the emptiness. He doesn’t know how he left the plane. Maybe he even closed his eyes... Manke looks below his feet.
He has the impression that he is plunging into hell. It is an effort to reassure himself...
If they’re fighting below at least that means I’m not in Viet territory...
His heels hit the ground. Now the noises are distant, on the other side of an embankment which stands out clearly against the luminous background of the explosions. “Where the hell am I?” A new fear which is rapidly curbed.
“Oho! A reinforcement.” The voice is friendly but slightly jeering. Manke sighs in relief. The voice spoke in French.

____________

Two hours later, guided from position to position, Manke finally arriveshis combat fatigues torn. “I landed in the at the CP. There he finds sergeant Lamarque, filthy, muddy, river. How about you?”
“I landed OK. I was lucky I guess. I landed in front of a strong point called Dominique 3. How about the others?”
“Out of the 22 on board the plane they’ve only found 17 so far. They figure the rest landed in Viet territory.”

A colonel enters the bunker. Manke knows him. It is Vadot, executive officer of Lemeunier’s 13th Half Brigade.
“I was sent as a replacement for the artillery” explains Manke after introducing himself.
“For the moment we need squad leaders more than gun layers. At dawn you’ll join Captain Philippe’s company on Huguette 4. And who is this one?”
“I’m an artilleryman.” replies Lamarque. Vadot stares at him attentively.
“Did you enlist?”
“Yes sir. Well, I’ve only got six months of service.”
“I see. You’re one of the rear echelon replacements. Why did you come here? You didn’t have to.”
Lamarque blushed. “Sir, I’m twenty years old. I don’t know anything. I wanted to come to Dien Bien Phu before it...”
He caught himself, conscious of almost saying something he shouldn’t.
Vadot finished the sentence. “Before what? Before Dien Bien Phu is screwed? Is that it?”
“Well, I mean, yes sir...”

Vadot was silent for a moment.
“Is that what they’re saying in Hanoi?”
“Not just in Hanoi. Here, sir, here’s a newspaper.”
Vadot leans over and reads: “The terrible tactical and political mistake of Dien Bien Phu.” Vadot raises his head and says
“You read that and you still came?”
“I just thought that if enough of us took up the challenge then maybe Dien Bien Phu wouldn’t be quite such a mistake.”

MY g^6 grandfather fought with Cornwallis/ remained in US,other grandparents direct from the old country, Germany. Not French.