It was at Wounded Knee, huddled under a night sky lit by military flares and the searchlights of armored carriers seeking him out, that Vietnam vet Woody Kipp realized that he, as an American Indian, had become the enemy, the Viet Cong, to a country that he had defended with his life. With candor, bitter humor, and biting insight, this book tells the story of the long and tortuous trail that led Kipp from the Blackfeet Reservation of his birth to a terrible moment of reckoning on the plains of South Dakota. Kipp?s is a story of Native values and practices uneasily crossed with cowboy culture, teenage angst, and quintessentially American temptations and excesses. As a boy, Kipp was a passionate reader and basketball player, always ready to brawl and already struggling with discrimination and alcoholism in his teens. From his tour of Vietnam as a Marine to his troubled return, from his hell-raising as a violent, womanizing, hard-drinking horse breaker to his consciousness-raising as a college student and foot soldier in the American Indian Movement, Kipp?s memoir offers a unique, firsthand view of the enduring power?and the vulnerability?of Blackfeet culture, of the difficulties inherent in cross-cultural understanding, and of the urgent necessity of overcoming these difficulties if the essential heritage of Native America is to survive.

It was at Wounded Knee, huddled under a night sky lit by military flares and the searchlights of armored personnel carriers, that Vietnam vet Woody Kipp realized that he, as an American Indian, had become the enemy, the Viet Cong, to a country that he had defended at the risk of his life. With candor, bitter humor, and biting insight, this book tells the story of the long and tortuous trail that led Kipp from the Blackfeet Reservation of his birth to a terrible moment of reckoning on the plains of South Dakota. Kipp?s is a story of Native values and practices uneasily intersected by cowboy culture, teenage angst, and quintessentially American temptations and excesses. ø As a boy, Kipp was a passionate reader and basketball player, always ready to brawl and already struggling with discrimination and alcoholism in his teens. From his tour of duty in Vietnam as a Marine to his troubled return, from his hell-raising as a violent, womanizing, hard-drinking horse breaker to his consciousness-raising experiences as a college student and foot soldier in the American Indian Movement, Kipp?s memoir offers a unique, firsthand view of the enduring power?and the vulnerability?of Blackfeet culture, of the difficulties inherent in cross-cultural understanding, and of the urgent necessity of overcoming these difficulties if the essential heritage of Native America is to survive.

Holm describes how Native American motives for going to war, experiences of combat, and readjustment to civilian ways differ from those of other ethnic groups. He explores Native American traditions of warfare and the role of the warrior to explain why many young Indian men chose to fight in Vietnam. He shows how Native Americans drew on tribal customs and religion to sustain them during combat.

This work describes riverine combat during the Vietnam War, emphasizing the operations of the U.S. Navy’s River Patrol Force, which conducted Operation Game Warden; the U.S. Army-Navy Mobile Riverine Force, the formation that General William Westmoreland said “saved the Mekong Delta” during the Tet Offensive of 1968; and the Vietnam Navy. An important section details the SEALORDS combined campaign, a determined effort by U.S. Navy, South Vietnamese Navy, and allied ground forces to cut enemy supply lines from Cambodia and disrupt operations at base areas deep in the delta. The author also covers details on the combat vessels, helicopters, weapons, and equipment employed in the Mekong Delta as well as the Vietnamese combatants (on both sides) and American troops who fought to secure Vietnam’s waterways. Special features focus on the ubiquitous river patrol boats (PBRs) and the Swift boats (PCFs), river warfare training, Vice Admiral Elmo R. Zumwalt Jr., the Black Ponies aircraft squadron, and Navy SEALs. This publication may be of interest to history scholars, veterans, students in advanced placement history classes, and military enthusiasts given the continuing impact of riverine warfare on U.S. naval and military operations in the 21st century. Special Publicity Tie-In: Commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the Vietnam War (Commemoration dates: 28 May 2012 - 11 November 2025). This is the fifth book in the series, "The U.S. Navy and the Vietnam War." TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction The First Indochina War The Vietnam Navy River Force and American Advisors The U.S. Navy and the Rivers of Vietnam SEALORDS The End of the Line for U.S. and Vietnamese River Forces Sidebars: The PBR Riverine Warfare Training Battle Fleet of the Mekong Delta High Drama in the Delta Vice Admiral Elmo R. Zumwalt Jr. Black Ponies The Swift Boat Warriors with Green Faces Suggested Reading