Black soldiers thought to be killed in action mysteriously reappear in Cu Chi, Vietnam. A curious war correspondent uncovers an illegal army mission gone awry.
When a reporter for the Washington Post sees a group of wounded, half-starved, black troops disembark from a helicopter in Cu Chi during the height of the Vietnam War, he senses a story, but receives no cooperation from the army or the soldiers.
The men, mostly noncombat soldiers, are the remnant of a squad sent on an illegal mission to Cambodia as punishment for their participation in a race riot at Cu Chi base camp. Led by a battle-fatigued sergeant, they fall under enemy fire. Their leader inexplicably disappears, leaving the ill-prepared soldiers to fight the jungle and enemy on their own.
Although forced to confront the shock of combat and a deteriorating family life, the reporter pursues the story hoping to uncover the truth about what happened to those soldiers in the jungle.
An intriguing glimpse into the Vietnam War, A Long Way Back is a tense journey merging the lives of the soldiers and the reporter as they struggle to overcome their fear and face the battles they must fight to survive.
Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
The two words swept through the mess hall like a northeastern wind blowing across Southeast Asia: “They’re here!”
It was mid-afternoon, July 1, 1969, in Cu Chi, Vietnam, and the sun was unrelenting. The swirl of dust from the Chinook helicopter created a surreal red and brown mist that coated sweating bodies like a new skin.
As Anthony Andrews gathered with the hushed crowd to watch seven weary-looking soldiers disembark and collect their gear, his eyes narrowed. All seven were black.
But what Anthony noticed more than their color, the torn and ripped uniforms, or the grime covering every inch of their bodies was their eyes: fluttering, darting, haunted. Most of the men looked thin and undernourished. One walked with a limp, one was carried in a poncho, and another, who helped carry the soldier in the poncho, cursed under his breath.
Anthony pulled out his Yashica camera and took pictures.
“Where are they coming from?” he asked a private first class who stood next to him, mesmerized, his hands poised as if to clap and his eyes tearing.
“Somewhere around War Zone C.”
Anthony, unsure where War Zone C was, looked at the soldier whose eyes remained fixated on the men. “What happened there?”
The private never took his eyes off the men as he replied in the softest of voices, “From what I hear, hell happened there.”
A military police jeep came to carry the two wounded soldiers. The others, with no one giving a command, gathered themselves, straightened, moved their obviously bone-tired, filthy bodies into formation, and began to march into camp when three more jeeps with MPs came and picked them up, too.
“The 25th Infantry Division in Cu Chi provides the reactionary units combating the Viet Cong insurgency,” Anthony had read in a briefing manual when he first arrived.
Those men must have returned from one of those missions, Anthony thought as he turned to locate Major Leonard Rainey Bertram, headquarter battalion’s executive officer. As a black reporter assigned to write about the black soldier in Vietnam, he was sure there had to be a story behind the return of those seven men. It was certainly the type the Washington Post was looking for, and without a doubt, something Anthony wanted to be the first to tell.
Major Bertram, Anthony’s liaison, was standing beside his desk when Anthony found him. Anthony found it odd that in the few days he’d been in Cu Chi, he’d never seen Bertram sit at the desk.
Cu Chi was Bertram’s second tour, having commanded a rifle company in the 25th in 1966. At six feet, two inches, the major was a few inches taller than Anthony. With a square jaw that appeared to be permanently clenched, he projected a commanding presence. But as Anthony approached, he watched Bertram’s eyes widen as he ducked at the sound of a mortar falling some half-mile away before regaining his composure to greet Anthony.
Anthony ignored Bertram’s reaction and his reddened face as he shook the major’s hand. “Major. The men who just arrived? Who are they? Where did they come from?”
Bertram glanced down then beyond Anthony. “I’m not sure. We just received word of their return. I’ll let you know more when I find out.”
“I’d appreciate it, because I’d like to interview them.”
Bertram nodded as if he had anticipated the request. “I do know they will have to be debriefed before they can talk.”
“How long will that take?” Anthony asked.
Bertram shrugged. “Who knows? Could be days, could be weeks.”
Anthony looked at the major a few seconds, head tilted to the side. “Really, Major? Is that standard procedure?” Anthony asked, then hesitated. Although this was the first time he’d been denied immediate access to any soldier, he didn’t want to anger his primary source after only a few days in country. Yet, he had a job to do.
“It is in this case.” The major pulled papers from a pile on his desk and bent over to sign them.
Anthony straightened up. “Okay.” He pulled out a pad, his pen poised to write. “Can I at least get their names?”
“Not yet.”
Anthony looked up quizzically, then turned to leave. “Major?” Anthony said as he stopped at the Quonset hut door.
“Yes?”
“The sooner the better for me, okay?”
Bertram nodded.
Anthony wondered if the reason the major never looked him in the eye during their conversation was because of Bertram’s embarrassment from his reaction to the mortar round—or because he knew more than he was telling.
It became clear after a week had passed, it was the latter. Anthony never got the interview, nor did any of the other correspondents, including the Army’s Stars and Stripes reporter. And he still had no names.
Upset and curious at being closed out, Anthony tried to piece the men’s story together from whispers and mutters in the mess hall and barracks.
“Only ones left…”
“Two weeks in the field…”
“Ambush…”
“Lost…”
“Reported MIA…”
“Reported KIA…”
But no one would talk to him directly.
“Sorry, Mr. Andrews—orders.”
“It’s classified, Mr. Andrews.”
“Word from the top,” one sergeant related in a whisper, “is anyone caught giving out information on those men will face an immediate court martial.”
“Can they do that?” Anthony asked.
The sergeant shrugged. “Who wants to be the first to find out?”
Professional Reviews
Vietnam Veterans of America
J. Everett Prewitt was drafted into the Army, completed Officer Candidate School, and served in a supply battalion in Vietnam from 1968-69. He’s the author of the novel, Snake Walkers (2005).
The Introduction to his fine novel, A Long Way Back (CreateSpace, 388 pp. $16.99, paper; $6.99, Kindle), Prewitt sums up what takes place between the covers: “Anthony Andrews, a reporter for the Washington Post, watches as a group of bedraggled black soldiers believed to be missing or killed in action mysteriously reappear in Cu Chi, Vietnam, in 1969. Andrews uncovers an Army conspiracy to conceal a story of soldiers ill-prepared for battle, yet sent on an illegal mission and not expected to return.”
The author thanks the late Vietnam War correspondent Wallace Terry (the author of Bloods) for the help he provided. This novel takes an important place on the small shelf of African-American Vietnam War novels.
When Andrews arrives in Saigon on June 25, 1969, he’s assaulted by the sewer smell and the blast furnace heat, the first two things mentioned in most Vietnam War memoirs and novels. He’s there to write for the Post about the positive experiences of black troops. Experiences like that are thin on the ground at that time and place.
The men sent off to Cambodia on an illegal mission are clerks, cooks, truck drivers, and other support troops. There is one warrior in their midst, a sergeant who tries his hardest to give them a crash course in how to survive against the enemy. These rear echelon soldiers were sent on a mission they were told would take three days. They were in the field for eleven days.
The section of the book that deals with their attempts to become field soldiers is very strong and hit home with me, a Vietnam veteran who is glad he was never sent away from his typewriter at USARV Headquarters and into Cambodia.
The book contains some of the usual stuff of in-country Vietnam War novels: returning soldiers being called baby killers and being spat upon; cold ham and lima beans C-rations; Vietnam being a stink hole of a country. But this book avoids going overboard with such images.
These black soldiers acquit themselves pretty well in Cambodia. It turns out that they were sent there with a one-way ticket because they were considered troublemakers. In part, this novel reads like an homage to Going After Cacciato, as the men wander in Cambodia encountering troubles they are ill prepared for.
—J. Everett Prewitt
At some point, one of them thinks, “And with all the firepower in America’s possession, we can’t defeat a small, backward country like Vietnam? Was it some Supreme Being’s way of telling us we shouldn’t be there?” Good question.
The seven black soldiers who make it back alive are given other-than-honorable discharges and sent home in disgrace. They try to settle into life in the United States and forget about their Cambodian adventure. Andrews, being an intrepid reporter, does not allow this to happen. He keeps pestering away, trying to get to the bottom of what was done to these men.
I won’t give away the ending, but I will say that the book is well worth reading, as these African American soldiers get treated better than most did in real life.
The author’s website is http://eprewitt.com
—David Willson
Kirkus Reviews
Prewitt’s (Snake Walkers, 2005) mystery confronts the wages of both war and racial conflict.
Anthony Andrews, a black reporter for the Washington Post in 1969, is tasked with finding positive depictions of the black soldier’s experience in Vietnam, what his editor calls “hero stories.” Andrews is embedded in an active, combat-ready unit and given an eye-opening taste of the horrors of war. He sees seven black soldiers return from some nebulous mission shrouded in mystery. Andrews learns that those seven—originally 15—are returning from a harrowing experience no one seems anxious to discuss. He also discovers that their alleged mission was more like penance for what may have been a riot, uprising, or some kind of brawling melee that involved more than 40 black soldiers angry at their white superiors for mistreatment. After two months investigating the story and hitting a dead end, Andrews returns stateside, haunted by the trauma of his violent experience. Andrews’ angry and disillusioned wife eventually leaves him, and his once-peaceful life starts to unravel. He finally receives an unsolicited phone call that potentially promises to move him closer to the truth about his stonewalled case. This is a nuanced exploration of the racial tensions that express themselves within the pressurized context of war. Prewitt does a fine job allowing those tensions to reveal themselves through the characters rather than through authorial proselytizing. Some of the plot development, though, seems needlessly compressed and, as a result, melodramatic. Andrews is quick to fall apart after his first frightening experience in Vietnam, just as his wife is inexplicably ready to leave him with their young child after a few weeks of arguments over domestic banalities. Also, some narrative anomalies are more distracting than gripping: one soldier, nicknamed Professor, aids his comrades with his psychic abilities. As a whole, however, this is an intelligently crafted tale, brimming with both suspense and social commentary.
Set in 2022, new novel features a successful Baltimore attorney who attempts a run at the state senatorial seat. But she is suddenly faced with obstacles she didn’t know existed and decisions she never dreamed she would have to make…
In this fourth and final installment the intrepid crew is taken to the limits of their endurance as they brave a subterranean world filled with dangers and bizarre wonders. When Thurid’s warriors are defeated the crew frees the Grettig family from ca
