Marine returns to Vietnam village

By STEVE KADEL Western News Reporter

Bill Lafrance of Libby recently traveled halfway around the world to shake hands with a man who once tried to kill him.

The former Marine sergeant returned to a village where he was shot during the Vietnam War.

Lafrance didn't go back to heal emotional wounds as many U.S. soldiers have done. Instead, he wanted to see what had happened to the villagers and local Viet Cong forces.

"I was aggressive during the war but I loved the people and I had great respect for my adversary," Lafrance said. "It was important to go there to shake their hand."

Bill's wife, Nora, her brother and his wife accompanied him on the Feb. 2-21 trip.

They flew into Hanoi and then south to Hue, from where they drove 13 kilometers to the village of Thuy Phu. That's where Lafrance was shot in the chest during a bloody 1967 battle. The bullet is still lodged in his back.

Lafrance was a counter insurgency adviser in Vietnam from 1965 to 1967. He returned in November 1968 after rehabilitation and served until July 1969.

His job was to help a small team of Marines stop Viet Cong raids on villages by becoming friends with the local chief and residents. That helped Lafrance obtain information that he used to plan ambushes, thwarting raids by the Viet Cong to kill residents and confiscate weapons.

Sometimes villagers could communicate only by drawing a picture of the kind of weapons Viet Cong soldiers were transporting.

"If it was mortar, that meant a large group," Lafrance said. "Then Uncle Bill was off and running."

It was the first time the U.S. military used such an approach, he said. It produced such good results that 6,000 troops later were assigned to similar squads throughout South Vietnam.

After killing the top communist cadre officer in Loc Son village, Lafrance and his unit were transferred to Thuy Phu because U.S. resistance there was weak. Lafrance had already earned a reputation among the Viet Cong and quickly became the target of assassination efforts in Thuy Phu.

Lafrance's top objective was to kill the village's Viet Cong leader, Nghia Trong. Nghia's men set an ambush for Lafrance's team at a village bridge one night, not realizing the Americans had already crossed the bridge and were circling back on the communists.

Lafrance tracked the Viet Cong's movements by listening to the barking of village dogs. Suddenly, he sensed movement a few feet away and saw a helmet covered by grass.

He fired directly at the man's face, killing him instantly, "and then all hell broke loose," Lafrance said.

He didn't know it then, but a Viet Cong soldier named Nguyen Pho was part of that fight. Nguyen saw Lafrance being rescued by American soldiers and taken to a helicopter.

During last month's visit to the village, Lafrance shot video footage of the village. It was calm and sunny that day, with a woman washing clothes in the river. The tape shows a bridge just a few yards from where Lafrance was hit and went down.

Lafrance intends to share the tape with some of the others from his unit with whom he's stayed in contact. As he panned across the peaceful village scene, he said, "Welcome home, guys."

A translator with Lafrance questioned locals to see if any were in the village during the late '60s. It wasn't long until she found Nguyen.

Lafrance was incredulous.

"He remembers everything about me," Lafrance said on the videotape. "He remembers the night I was shot because he was with them, he was on the patrol that shot me. This is unreal."

At that point, Lafrance gave the camera to his wife and talked with Nguyen through the translator. The conversation went on for several minutes with excited exclamations on both sides.

Nguyen initially showed wariness but no animosity toward the American. He invited Lafrance to his house for tea and the two former combatants walked away arm in arm.

Nora continued to record the scene at Nguyen's house. The Vietnamese man seemed to be relaxing more and more, and beers that Lafrance bought were opened. Other people soon arrived, crowding inside and peering in through the doorway for a glimpse of "Mr. Bill."

"It spread like wildfire through the village," Lafrance said.

One of those who came was the widow of Lafrance's top prey, the Viet Cong military boss Nghia Trong. After Lafrance was shot, the Viet Cong believed he was dead and they were rid of a major obstacle to their local war plans.

But Lafrance returned to the village for one day before leaving Vietnam for convalescence in the U.S., just long enough to prove the assumption wrong. He went to the Nghias' home, where the woman was alone, and put a gun to her head.

"I told her I would come back someday and kill her husband," Lafrance said.

Now an old woman, she is shown on the videotape entering the house boldly, without hesitation.

"The last time I saw you, Mrs. Nghia, you were young and beautiful," Lafrance told her through the translator.

Then he kissed her cheek.

"This lady's husband is who the Marine Corps wanted me to assassinate," Lafrance said on the tape for his buddies.

The translator confirmed that Mrs. Nghia remembered Lafrance's visit to her house 38 years earlier.

"Please tell her I am sorry," Lafrance told the translator. "The general made me go to her house. And tell her that I had great respect for her husband as a soldier."

Lafrance's unit didn't kill her husband, as it turned out, but the cadre leader was killed in 1970 by U.S. special forces.

Meanwhile, talk continued with voices rising in exuberance. A man told Lafrance many Vietnamese had been crippled in the war, and asked what the American felt about that. Lafrance replied that they and their families should be compensated monetarily by the U.S. government.

Lafrance unfolded a map of the region marked with 17 dots from a red pen - all sites of battles. The map still bore stains where Lafrance's blood had dripped after he was shot.

The Vietnamese bent closer and inspected the map closely, talking quickly among themselves.

Eventually, Mrs. Nghia invited the Americans to her house for more socializing. However, things weren't going as well outside, where Nora Lafrance's brother, Butch, was being accosted by an angry former Viet Cong. Butch was starting to follow the man around the corner of the house when Lafrance intervened.

He said firmly, "I think we better go before the party kills us." The Americans hopped into the van that brought them from Hue and sped off.

Before leaving Hue, Lafrance's former enemy surfaced once more near the visitors' hotel. He wanted to exchange addresses, and Lafrance promised to write and send photos of their get-together a day earlier.

Lafrance believes that was when a communist television crew surreptitiously photographed him for a news segment. When he and Nora later checked out of the hotel, a clerk told them she had seen him on TV. And several times on the street, he said, they'd overheard Vietnamese whispering "Bill" among themselves.

It was a curious and somewhat unnerving twist to the visit. Lafrance had invited others who served under him in the old days to come along on the visit, but they declined, saying they feared violence.

Lafrance said the trip was the most satisfying thing he's ever done. He appreciated the chance to let those whom he fought know he admired their courage.

"I have nothing but honor and respect for them," he said.