Local man writes a book of his time in Vietnam and the war with a surprising bright side

It’s hard for Bob Vilt to recall much from his time in an artillery support unit during the Vietnam War.

The 69-year-old Austin resident was diagnosed with mental illness after the war and spent some time in the psychiatric wards of Veterans Affairs hospitals, and now it’s hard for him to remember details, sometimes even names. But what sticks out in his mind are the good things about the war — if there is such a thing, he says — like a Vietnamese orphanage, where children would wash U.S. soldiers’ clothes for a small fee, and they would be glad to do it.

“The little kids were just great,” Vilt said. “That was a vital piece of being there for me. They always had a warm smile.”

Vilt — a weekly columnist for the Herald — published “You Much Crazy: One Soldier’s Story of Vietnam and Its Personal Aftermath” in May, a first-hand account of his time in Vietnam. While he said he was opposed to the war, he still has fond memories of the Vietnamese children and his comrades.

“Like most young men, I had no desire to become a soldier or be sent to Vietnam,” he said in the book. Vilt — assigned to the 105 Artillery Support Group — landed in Qui Nhon, Vietnam, in 1967 at the age of 23. He was known as Jungle Frank, a nickname coined by his close friends.

He said he never thought he would write a book — an arduous task for someone in his position — and while the entire process took five years, he’s glad he did it.

The title, he said, derives from a phrase repeated numerous times by an elderly Vietnamese man. The story goes when Vilt and three other soldiers were building a bunker, the Vietnamese man would twirl his finger around his ear and say “you beaucoup dien cai dau,” which translates to “you much crazy.” Vilt said the phrase was fitting for a story of his life.

“I thought we were probably crazy,” he said, jokingly.

Now, he spends a lot of time sitting in a chair in his backyard, and while he tries not to watch TV, he reads newspapers to stay informed.

“I’m a quiet guy, and I enjoy listening to others,” he said.

While he said it doesn’t bother him to talk about the war, much of it is hard to remember for the soldier once known as Jungle Frank. He said he’s forgetting more now, so he wanted to get his thoughts on paper.

“It’s good to have the story out there,” he said.

 

To request a copy of the book, contact Vilt at 507-433-5687 or email him at robertvilt@yahoo.com.

Excerpts from “You Much Crazy”

It wasn’t long after the mortar attack when we received the news that Hinkle had been injured. He and three other soldiers were on their way to the dump in a field ambulance when they detonated a 155mm artillery round buried in the road. It was a dud American round that failed to explode. The [Viet Cong] dug it up and buried it in the road, no doubt under the cover of darkness, then ran wire from the round into the tall grass where it was detonated — probably with batteries either discarded or stolen by Vietnamese workers who were “hired” on a daily basis. …

The following Sunday, I asked the Chaplain to say a prayer for Hinkle in his service. He did.

Hinkle lived for two weeks. …

The premonition that surfaced months earlier, that one of us wouldn’t come back alive, had proven true.

———

After being mortared a couple times, Lurch, Patrick, Ray and I decided we might be safer if we built our own hooch. The canvas of our tent was not going to do much to protect us from incoming mortars. Ray thought in terms of a bunker.

We found a location kitty-corner from the Enlisted Men’s Club and near one of the bunkers that was manned during the night. On our free time, anything that was not nailed down or under surveillance, we claimed and dragged to where we intended to build the hooch. We hired an old Vietnamese Papasan who smiled a lot. He would twirl his finger around his ear, point at us, and say “You beaucoup dien cai dau,” which we later discovered translates to “you much crazy.” It was a fabulous combination of English, French and Vietnamese.

———

Later that same day, I was transported to the Brentwood VA Hospital in Los Angeles. While leaving Riverside sitting in the back of the ambulance, I applied a breathing mask over my nose and mouth and then heard my Uncle Joel’s voice, my mother’s brother who lived in Canada who had previously passed away.

“Hi, Bobby,” he said. We chatted for a bit.

I was released in April 1970.