** I read through this quarterly report, interesting information. They do not however list any problems on 21 Nov or list 297 anywhere. I found one section that mentioned a non-recoverable helicopter accident. Did they report crashes in the ORLL ? They list several mechanical malfunctions ...... **

Mark, it should have been there because it was obviously a Major Incident. Shootdown, mechanical failure, unexplained pilot error, lightning strike, whatever, and it is not. It's called "Operational Report Lessons Learned" for a reason.

The whole sytem was a damned mess by then. We're talking about the peak of US forces, late 68, early 69. It was a zoo, and a sloppy damned mess as far as records and details. No excuse.

Need to keep in mind, tho, that everything went up the line, just like it flows down the line. The 52d Battalion ORLL that we have (by the way, holy cow, I can't believe we have that much all of a sudden, after so long) I am certain was composed from information received from Company-level ORLLs. Wouldn't surprise me at all if 119th Company ORLLs were incomplete... people turned over so fast you cannot believe it. It's also a graphic lesson that you simply cannot believe everything you read. Huge errors and omissions everywhere.

The GOOD news is, if this ORLL has all of a sudden surfaced, that means other official records have NOT been lost as we (ok, I) feared. Also all government documents and reports are usually designed to overlap and confirm one another, more good news.

This Texas Tech project is wonderful, and we just need to keep an eye on things and stay in touch; I have hope now that we actually will find the records we all want.

Hang in there. We've all got enough to get mad about without this. I am very hopeful that good stuff is about to surface.

We're sneaking up on this, Mark, I think. Damn, I hope I'm right.

Bob