Firsthand Accounts

Jean Ponder Allen: "I started screaming at the officers..." Mike Arias: "...we had just walked into an ambush..." Jane Brotman: "...they were beating people up..." Jack Cipperly: "...there was a lot of yelling and screaming..." Joe Costello: "We were all scared, very scared..." Keith Hackett: "It was literally a fight for your life." Diane Sikorski Kramer: "...there was a giant hole in his stomach..." Jim Rowen: "...we were trapped..." Paul Soglin: "This was not a time to negotiate." Choose a person interviewed in the film.

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			Watch video: Before (1:02) October 1967 (1:00) Aftermath (1:03) Reflections (0:50)

Clark Welch
commander

Clark Welch grew up in Durham, New Hampshire. He enrolled in the Army out of high school, after a Marine recruiter told him he was too scrawny and an air Force recruiter said he could never be a pilot since he wore glasses. Welch served in the Army Special Forces in South America, Laos and Lebanon, before going to Vietnam, where he commanded the Delta Company division of the Black Lions regiment. He survived the battle of October 17, 1967 with multiple wounds. Decades later, Welch returned to the ambush site in Vietnam, where he met the man who commanded the Viet Cong soldiers against the Black Lions.