Tanner and Hill ducked while their driver swerved the jeep and tried to keep from crashing. Someone was screaming in pain. At least it isn’t me, Tanner thought. Hill and Tanner got the men out of their jeeps. The machine guns mounted on them opened fire and began to chew up the trees. Individual American soldiers began firing their M1s in the general direction of the forest. Tanner clutched his helmet. “If the sniper has a brain, he’s far, far away by now.” A second shot and a third followed. “He doesn’t have a brain,” said Hill. “But the son of a bitch is cunning. He waited for the lead elements to go by his position before shooting. We were a little complacent and now we’re paying for it.” Two men had been shot and one looked very seriously wounded with a bullet in the abdomen. The second had a broken arm and medics were caring for both. Tanner shook his head. The one with the broken arm would be fine, but the other had his stomach ripped open. Medics were working on the gut wound, but the looks on their faces said that their efforts would be futile.
