Written by Steve Liewer - UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER - March 1, 2008
SCRIPPS RANCH – Skimming above the treetops of Vietnam's central highlands in an OH-6A helicopter, Army Spc. 5 John Fogle warily eyed the jungle below.
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| K.C. ALFRED / Union-Tribune |
| John Fogle received the Air Medal for laying down suppressive fire when his crew flew over an enemy encampment during the Vietnam War. The photo next to the medal shows Fogle in 1967. |
As the chopper passed over a little canyon southwest of Hue on that steamy July day in 1969, Fogle, the crew chief and door gunner, spotted a soldier at the edge of an enemy camp. He swung out the window on his seat harness while squeezing the trigger of his machine gun straight downward.
Then pain like a hot poker shot through his right leg and, seconds later, his right elbow as three bullets pierced his flesh. Blood spurted into his eyes from a severed artery in his thigh, but he still managed to shift the gun to his left hand and kept firing while the helicopter veered away.
“I had so much blood in my face, I couldn't see,” said Fogle, now 61, as he relaxed at his home in Scripps Ranch. “I was just saying my prayers, trying not to go into shock.”
The next day, the other two men aboard his helicopter visited him in the hospital. The pilot, Lt. Alan Szpila, said Fogle's suppressive fire surely saved the crew's lives. He pledged to nominate Fogle for a valor award.
Somehow, that never happened.
But nearly four decades later, Fogle is wearing the Air Medal that family and friends have long told him he deserves. The medal, the second-highest...
