AIR COMMANDO SONGS FROM THE EARLY DAYS
ON THEIR FIRST TRIP TO BIEN HOA AIR BASE, SOUTH VIETNAM IN LATE 1961 LED BY THEIR FEARLESS LEADER COLONEL BEN KING(I WOULDN'T SAY NO)
From the collection of Eugene D. Rossel
The FT-28 Song
From the collection of Eugene D. Rossel
The fighter jock were fearless when they left the old home shore
They spanned the Blue Pacific in their F-124
They thought the ride on "Shakey" wasn't very great
But they never could have made it in their TF-28
CHORUS:
We're finally all together at the station of Bien Hoa
The B-26 boys are the worst we ever saw
They never miss a briefing they've always got the word
But you can't fly any mission when you haven't got a bird
CHORUS:
We finally got a mission in this foreign distant land
The jocks made practice air strikes, while we drop bags of sand
And sometimes in the evening when we were free of cares
The Colonel gets us out of bed to drop a hundred flares
CHORUS:
You new boys do not listen, pay no heed to what we've said
Bien Hoa's a bed of roses, but we'd rather be at Stead
So hide your apprehension and conceal your many fears
Take comfort in remembering that you are volunteers
CHORUS:
The Land of the Great Monsoon
(Tune: North to Alaska)
We all left from Fort Walton in the Year of '61
Along with Col King on a flight that was no fun
We went to trash the Viet Cong in the land of the great monsoon
How did we get there? By an overloaded Goon.
CHORUS:
Your feet are getting rotten
Your names have been forgotten
The bug bites itch like a son-of-a-bitch
In the land of the great monsoon
We pulled out of Montana for the land of the midnight sun
And when we got to Whitehorse we landed all but one,
Frank overflew that Yukon town on a nite that was so black
He had to make Alaska for there was no turning back
CHORUS:
The Col bought an engine in the land of the ice and snow
The ground crew changed it quickly because we had to go
We lumbered down the Aleutian chain headed for Adak
The prop ice on the fuselage reminded us of flak
CHORUS:
We blasted off from Adak and the clouds were all around
The ice was bad the weather sad, but we were Midway bound
The west wind lashed our ancient craft and a mighty force
And Maheu and Tegge were ninety miles off course
CHORUS:
When we touched down at Midway it was dark as it could be
And it wasn't any lighter when we got up at three
We took the active runway as dawn began to break
and sixty thousand gooney birds saw us off to Wake
CHORUS:
Now Wake's a little island where Marines made history
And how our gooney's got there is still a mystery
We descended on the Colonel with grog and a two piece band
And by seven in the evening the mob was out of hand