9th Medical Battalion

 Whether it's an upset stomach or a serious bullet wound, doctors and medics of the 9th Medical Battalion stand ready to meet all emergencies for Old Reliable soldiers.
   Within minutes after a soldier is wounded in action, he is rushed for treatment to a base camp or hospital. Besides treating the wounded, battalion doctors see more than 5,600 other patients each month.
    Constituted July 8, 1918, as the 9th Sanitary Train, the unit has had a long and illustrious career with the 9th Division. It was active in both World Wars and the Korean conflict before being inactivated Jan. 31, 1962 at Fort Carson, Colo. Four years later it was reactivated.
    For World War II services, the battalion earned the Meritorious Unit Commendation streamer, embroidered EUROPEAN THEATER, and was cited in the Order of the Day of the Belgian Army for action at the Meuse River and in the Ardennes.

The impressive aspects of medical operations in support of combat units in Vietnam were the versatility of the, classic system and the far-reaching modifications of the system, that evolved from the Vietnamese experience.

Doctrine prescribed the structure and type of medical support for combat units sent to Vietnam. A medical battalion of four companies, each with three platoons, supported each division. A single medical company supported each separate brigade. The medical platoon of three sections supported units of infantry and tank battalions or armored cavalry squadrons. Under the fluid conditions of warfare in Vietnam, the employment and deployment of combat units determined the utilization of their supporting medical units, and no two medical battalions were used alike. The action accounts that follow are representative of these varied usages.

Mobile Riverine Force

The Mobile Riverine Force, created in 1967, was composed of the 2d Brigade, 9th Infantry Division, and two Navy river assault squadrons of 50 boats each. The force, designed to deny the extensive river and canal complex of the Mekong Delta to the enemy, was wholly independent of fixed support bases and operated entirely afloat. Company D, 9th Medical Battalion, supported the Mobile Riverine Force in a highly unorthodox manner. Shortly after Company D arrived at the Dong Tam base in early 1968, it established a medical, facility in a converted armored troop carrier to provide more effective medical support for riverine operations. Later this facility, the only Army medical facility in Vietnam based in a Navy ship, was moved to a barracks ship, the U.S.S. Colleton. After the arrival of Company A, 9th Medical Battalion, at Dong Tam in August 1968, Company D established a 37-bed facility for medical cases aboard the U.S.S. Nueces, thus freeing the unit on the Colleton for care of surgical patients. When the U.S.S.Mercer replaced the Colleton a few months later, the medical and surgical units were united aboard the Nueces. The rear section of the aid station of Company D was maintained in these ships at the base anchorage.

On tactical operations, Navy armored troop carriers, preceded by minesweeping craft and escorted by armored boats, transported the soldiers along the vast network of waterways in the Delta. The units debarked upon reaching the area of operations or upon contact with the enemy.

Small, specially designed craft with an aid station aboard, called aid boats, accompanied the troop boats into combat. A physician, attached to Company D during these riverine operations, went forward on an aid boat with the combat units. The aid boats functioned at night when most combat in the Delta took place. Casualties were, evacuated to the ship-based rear aid station at the base anchorage by aid boats, or by helicopters permanently assigned to the Mobile Riverine Force, at first by the Army and later by the Navy.

The primary medical problem in riverine operations was "immersion foot," which was minimized by alternating units in combat every 2 or 3 days. While the fresh troops sustained, the attack, those units relieved were allowed to "dry out" and refit.

Riverine operations brought extensive modifications in the use of personnel and equipment as well as in the structure of Company D. Ground ambulances and tents were eliminated. The aid station, as noted, was split into two sections. One section remained aboard the vessel at the rear anchorage; the other accompanied the combat units.

The two sections of the aid station were often separated for days. The section accompanying the, combat units was split even further when

two or three missions were, conducted simultaneously in different areas. Since the physician attached to the company was almost always forward with the combat elements, the medical operations assistant, a Medical Service Corps officer, usually supervised the rear section at the base anchorage. This officer and the senior enlisted medical aidmen he supervised had considerably greater responsibility for the treatment and evacuation of patients than was customary. Casualties requiring more extensive care than could be provided in the rear section were evacuated by helicopter to a hospital. Helicopters as well as shuttle craft were used to supply the aid boats from the ship-based rear section. The rear section itself was supplied from shore.

Tan An Army Airfield was a short distance west of the village of Tan An and National Route QL-4. The airfield was constructed early in 1967 to support 3rd Brigade participation in operation Enterprise. Company C - 15th Engineer Battalion and Company D - 86th Engineer Battalion transformed a straight stretch of Communal Route 223 into an asphalt, 2,500x50-foot, fixed-wing runway. The displaced road was rerouted south of the airfield. The installation included a heliport with 28 pads, a MEDIVAC pad, and a Chinook pad. Company C -  9th Medical Battalion operated a 40-bed hospital staffed by 5 doctors and a dentist. The hospital functioned as a clearing station between Tan An and Dong Tam/Long Binh.

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