This Day in History: Brian Thacker's bravery in Vietnam

On this day in 1971, a hero engages in an action that would earn him the Medal of Honor. Brian M. Thacker’s bravery came in Vietnam—a place that he admittedly didn’t really want to be.

“If you thought going to first grade is scary,” he later said, “it’s all those feelings multiplied. Because this is a different kind of first grade.”

Maybe it seemed like things were looking up at first? First Lt. Thacker was given command of a 6-man observation team atop a hilltop known as Fire Base 6. They were supporting South Vietnamese artillery units there.

“Being put in command of the observation team was every lieutenant’s dream come true,” he later said. “You talk about a dream assignment.”

The dream didn’t last long. Instead, on the morning of March 31, all hell broke loose.

“A numerically superior North Vietnamese Army force,” Thacker’s Medal citation describes, “launched a well-planned dawn attack on the small, isolated, hilltop fire base. Employing rockets, grenades, flamethrowers, and automatic weapons, the enemy forces penetrated the perimeter defenses and engaged the defenders in hand-to-hand combat.”

“[T]he South Vietnamese just fell back and reformed the perimeter where we were,” Thacker explained.  “And the little oval that we called a fire base just kept shrinking and shrinking and shrinking through the day.”

Soon, two resupply helicopters were shot down, and their crews joined Thacker’s men.  It was becoming apparent that the Vietnamese would soon take the fire base. “All we were fighting for at that time,” Thacker concluded, “was to buy time to make sure that we could make the ARVN artillery inoperable and destroy the powder. And then hopefully figure out a way that we could be extracted.”

Suddenly, there was a lull in the attack. It had become too quiet. Air crews overhead must have been horrified when they saw what was coming: The enemy was gathering, preparing to strike again.

Thacker knew his men had to get out—immediately. He ordered them out, but he stayed behind, single-handedly covering the retreat. When the enemy got close, he called artillery in on his own position, giving his men just a few extra minutes.

Would you believe he managed to escape the fire he’d called in on himself? He started down the trail, but he couldn’t find his men. “Somewhere on that trail, a little hair on the back of my head said, ‘It’s time to leave the trail,’” Thacker later said, “and that’s what I did. I understood that I wouldn’t be extracted.”

He’d stumbled into a bamboo thicket, which is where he stayed for 8 days. He was as motionless as he knew how to be. He could hear—and even smell—the enemy nearby; even the smallest bit of noise would give him away.

He emerged only when he could hear that friendly forces had re-taken the fire base. He later estimated that he lost 25 to 30 pounds over the course of those 8 days.

Slowly, painfully, he crawled back. He was so dehydrated when he finally found help that he had to be given water slowly, half a canteen capful at a time, once every 15 to 30 minutes.

He spent weeks in the hospital, recovering. When he learned that he was to receive a Medal of Honor, he didn’t think he deserved it. “My first thoughts were, ‘I don’t want this,’” he later said, “but you can’t say no. And then I asked myself, ‘why me?’”

In the years since, he often notes that the Medal is “not a ‘me’ award, it’s an ‘us’ award.” He speaks of the three men who were killed at the fire base that day. “My job is to continue their legacy,” he concludes.

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Primary Sources:

• Brian Thacker: Dear Young American, “You have to keep going” (Medal of Honor Society interview)

• David Vergun, Nation Marks 50th Anniversary of End of Vietnam War (Dept. of Defense; May 11, 2023)

• Frederick N. Rasmussen, War Memories Remain for Medal of Honor Winner (Baltimore Sun; Nov. 8, 2003) (p. D2)

• Joe Costanzo, Utah Winner of Medal Says He Just Did His Job (Deseret News; Mar.19, 1990)

• Lee Benson, Weber State honors Utah’s only living Medal of Honor recipient (Deseret News; Nov. 10, 2019)

• Master Sgt. Kendra M Owenby, Medal of Honor recipients fly to east TN schools for visit (Air National Guard; Sept. 26, 2014)

• Medal of Honor citation (Brian M. Thacker; Vietnam)

• Medal of Honor oral history (Brian M. Thacker; Vietnam)

• Medal of Honor Recipient Reflects on the Meaning Behind the Historic Medal (PR Newswire; Sept. 18, 2013)

• Peter Schworm & Sarah Roberts, City Salutes Nation’s Highest Honor (Boston Globe; Sept. 17, 2015) (p. B2)

• T.S. Jarmusz, Ghost on the mountain (U.S. Dept. of Veterans Affairs; Feb. 28, 2020)

• VA Hospital Aide Holds the Medal of Honor (Press-Telegram; Nov. 29, 1976) (p. A-15)