Abstract:
Men at sea in a difficult and unpopular war: this was the fall of 1967 and Vietnam was on the way to becoming an American nightmare. Yet each man had to find his own way to cope with the exhaustion, boredom and ultimately combat with a resourceful and persistent enemy. ENS Patrick Dillan, USN was assigned to USS LARTER (DD 766). Only 26 he was a bit of a rebel on what was supposed to be a 6 month Westpac deployment: dealing with normal evolutions, port calls and combat while he wrestled with his own and his ship mate’s emotions.