Robert Nardiello
1st LT.US ARMY
1st Logistical Command
Da Nang, Vietnam 1968-1974
1st LT.US ARMY
1st Logistical Command
Da Nang, Vietnam 1968-1974
Bob Nardiello was born in Waterbury, CT in 1946. He came from a Military family with 3 uncles, a grandfather and 4 cousins who served in the armed forces. That, and the small stipend to help pay for college, helped him make his decision to join the ROTC in 1964 when he entered the University of Connecticut. In 1966 he enlisted and upon graduation in May of 1968 he was commissioned a 2nd Lieutenant. Although he didn’t learn of exactly where he would be sent or what he would be doing until graduation, Bob knew he would eventually be going to active duty in Vietnam. I asked what he was thinking during that time leading up to graduation. “It was a fact of life and you had to deal with it.”
Bob headed off to Ft. Devens for basic camp in the summer of his junior year and since he graduated in the top 10% of his class, he got his requested assignment with the Ordnance Corps. This unit handled ammunition and ordnance and in addition, handled maintenance activities of all kinds. Bob shipped off to the Redstone Arsenal in Alabama for 10 weeks of training and from there was sent to Ft. Bragg where he became a Platoon leader for a Nuclear Weapons Company. In August of 1969 Bob learned he was headed for Vietnam. I asked what he thought when he received his orders. “It was inevitable.” Bob boarded a United Airlines flight to Cam Rahn Bay and from there he took a C130 to Da Nang. I asked what his first thoughts were when he got off the plane. “It was hot! Really hot,….and humid!” His first night in Da Nang he slept in a lean-to and he got 92 mosquito bites.
Bob was assigned to the Chief Engineer at the Headquarters Unit but after several weeks was eventually transferred to a unit that was responsible for off-loading equipment brought from the US by the Navy, inspecting, repairing and making the heavy equipment operational and field ready. Da Nang is located in the northernmost part of South Vietnam. The region was known as I-Corp. (i.e. first military region). “The base was safe but outside of that, it was the wild, wild, west.” Between August 10th and December 25th his base came under nightly rocket attacks 60 times. Then he stopped counting.
I asked Bob if he worried much. “When you were a new guy you worried a lot because you had no context for daily events.” He recalled one of his first nights in Da Nang. Sometime in the middle of the night the Viet Cong began rocketing the base and his 16’x32’ hooch where he and his buddy lived. They both woke up, sprang from their bed, dove out the door, down a wooden ramp and into a foxhole they had dug. His buddy landed on top of him and when the rocketing stopped, he asked Bob if he was ok. It was pitch black with little to no visibility. Bob felt something wet and sticky rolling down his chest and he thought he had been hit by one of the rockets although he didn’t feel like he was hit. It was definitely blood, but it wasn’t going to be a purple heart. Bob figured out that when he slid down the wooden ramp, that was newly constructed, he had slid across an exposed nail and suffered a deep cut. Now he had some context.
I asked Bob about his most vivid memories of his time in Vietnam.
Bob spent exactly 365 days in Vietnam and remembers being called a two-digit midget when he was under 100 days. He was officially discharged in 1974. Bob returned to the US and attended Michigan State to get his MBA to go along with his undergraduate engineer degree. Bob had always wanted to learn to fly and eventually he earned his commercial pilot’s license.
He spent 9 years at The Stanley Works in New Britain, CT and rose to the level of plant manager. He then went to Lyman Products as the VP of Operations. During this period, he had the opportunity to fill in and do some part time flying as a charter pilot and corporate pilot. He eventually knew that was what he wanted to do full time and made a career change. I asked why he decided to make the change. “Well, I’m a big proponent of making the most amount of money with the least amount of effort. Not the most money and not the least effort. At the intersection of the two.”
I asked if he would recommend joining the military. “If you don’t have a defined career path, I would encourage you to join the Military. It gives you discipline and teaches you leadership skills.” “The goals of the military are such that they are achievable, so you can feel good about yourself and learn along the way.”
Bob headed off to Ft. Devens for basic camp in the summer of his junior year and since he graduated in the top 10% of his class, he got his requested assignment with the Ordnance Corps. This unit handled ammunition and ordnance and in addition, handled maintenance activities of all kinds. Bob shipped off to the Redstone Arsenal in Alabama for 10 weeks of training and from there was sent to Ft. Bragg where he became a Platoon leader for a Nuclear Weapons Company. In August of 1969 Bob learned he was headed for Vietnam. I asked what he thought when he received his orders. “It was inevitable.” Bob boarded a United Airlines flight to Cam Rahn Bay and from there he took a C130 to Da Nang. I asked what his first thoughts were when he got off the plane. “It was hot! Really hot,….and humid!” His first night in Da Nang he slept in a lean-to and he got 92 mosquito bites.
Bob was assigned to the Chief Engineer at the Headquarters Unit but after several weeks was eventually transferred to a unit that was responsible for off-loading equipment brought from the US by the Navy, inspecting, repairing and making the heavy equipment operational and field ready. Da Nang is located in the northernmost part of South Vietnam. The region was known as I-Corp. (i.e. first military region). “The base was safe but outside of that, it was the wild, wild, west.” Between August 10th and December 25th his base came under nightly rocket attacks 60 times. Then he stopped counting.
I asked Bob if he worried much. “When you were a new guy you worried a lot because you had no context for daily events.” He recalled one of his first nights in Da Nang. Sometime in the middle of the night the Viet Cong began rocketing the base and his 16’x32’ hooch where he and his buddy lived. They both woke up, sprang from their bed, dove out the door, down a wooden ramp and into a foxhole they had dug. His buddy landed on top of him and when the rocketing stopped, he asked Bob if he was ok. It was pitch black with little to no visibility. Bob felt something wet and sticky rolling down his chest and he thought he had been hit by one of the rockets although he didn’t feel like he was hit. It was definitely blood, but it wasn’t going to be a purple heart. Bob figured out that when he slid down the wooden ramp, that was newly constructed, he had slid across an exposed nail and suffered a deep cut. Now he had some context.
I asked Bob about his most vivid memories of his time in Vietnam.
- Bob said he had very little interaction with the LN’s (Local Nationals). The villages were off limits and the only time they left the base was to go to the dock to pick up equipment or deliver equipment. They only drove on paved roads to avoid mines and they only had day missions because the surrounding geography was the “wild, wild, west” and was “too hot” for night activity. They also “strongly encouraged” curb side pickup rather than delivery. “Everyone wanted equipment right away. We gave them a choice. We could deliver it in a week, or they could pick it up tomorrow. There’s politics in everything.”
- He was “astounded at how little you really knew about what was going on in the war.”
- He was also amazed at the cost to support the military operations. Even simple things such as air freight, which was much more expensive than standard delivery and the cost of parachute flairs. “In those days flairs cost $12 each. Any time someone was on night patrol and thought they saw something; they would light off multiple flairs to light up the surrounding area. The cost of those flairs today would be about $100 each to add some context.”
- “The distinctive odor of US facilities that you won’t experience anywhere else in humanity.” This was created by the methods used to dispose of human waste.
- The soldiers didn’t focus on the protesting back in the US. “We were too busy to think about that.” When he returned home, he didn’t have any problems with the college protests. “We were graduate students. Most of the protesting was from the undergraduates. You just stayed out of those areas.”
- “It was a tumultuous and historic period.”
Bob spent exactly 365 days in Vietnam and remembers being called a two-digit midget when he was under 100 days. He was officially discharged in 1974. Bob returned to the US and attended Michigan State to get his MBA to go along with his undergraduate engineer degree. Bob had always wanted to learn to fly and eventually he earned his commercial pilot’s license.
He spent 9 years at The Stanley Works in New Britain, CT and rose to the level of plant manager. He then went to Lyman Products as the VP of Operations. During this period, he had the opportunity to fill in and do some part time flying as a charter pilot and corporate pilot. He eventually knew that was what he wanted to do full time and made a career change. I asked why he decided to make the change. “Well, I’m a big proponent of making the most amount of money with the least amount of effort. Not the most money and not the least effort. At the intersection of the two.”
I asked if he would recommend joining the military. “If you don’t have a defined career path, I would encourage you to join the Military. It gives you discipline and teaches you leadership skills.” “The goals of the military are such that they are achievable, so you can feel good about yourself and learn along the way.”