What did tankers have on their web gear during the Vietnam War? What was the weirdest thing you saw?

What did tankers have on their web gear during the Vietnam War? What was the weirdest thing you saw?

Tankers never wore web gear or individual load carrying equipment like the infantry.

 It would be caught up like crazy on the inside protrusions of a tank plus we didn’t need it.

 Unlike the infantryman who had to carry everything on his person, we had a tank to carry ours either inside or outside on the bustle behind the turret or strapped on to the turret including coolers of beer.

 Oh yeah, we were lucky that way. A roof over our head and armored walls around us.

We were lucky we had armor between us and the enemy whereas the infantryman had just his shirt material. I had nothing but admiration for the grunt who fought with us in Vietnam.

We did wear web belts at times. I had Colt 1911 .45 pistol in a shoulder holster.. still have the holster but not the gun.

 I didn’t see a tanker have anything weird. We mostly wore t shirts or no shirts, flak vests at times and fatigue trousers.

The only thing I remember was that our gunner Reb would the roll the legs of his trousers up into shorts during maintenance at base. 

That looked funny. A lieutenant once stopped and stared at him and scoffed, “Pride of the US Army.”

Reb gave him a shy Tennessee smile and said, “Thank you sir, I appreciate that.” The lieutenant stared at him for a few seconds then walked away shaking his head.

Weirdest thing about tankers is the names of their tanks and symbols they painted on the tanks. We in the 11th ACR often worked with infantry. 

One tank I saw had ‘Stay Close to Mama’ printed on the rear. Actually, the last place a grunt wanted to be.

As a tank driver, I had TAXI stencilled in yellow on the front of my CVC helmet.

Below a Marine tank crew in Vietnam. Notice the name of the tank on the barrel of the 90mm gun and Goofy painted on the cover of the Xenon searchlight. Yes, tankers had a sense of humor.

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