Chapter 15: The Dong Ha Bridge[1]

The intensity of the battle took its toll on Captain Ripley’s battalion but also on the civilian population. The situation he faced as he gazed at the 60-ton bridge he was ordered to destroy was best described by eyewitnesses as “chaotic.” South Vietnamese jammed the roads in a frantic attempt to escape the wrath of the Communist NVA who intentionally targeted those very roads to kill civilians. Many fell dead and wounded from enemy fire that came from an aggressor intent on spreading panic. Mothers clutching crying babies staggered down the road in zombie-like fashion, followed by shell-shocked children. Thousands of South Vietnamese Marines, seeing the futility of resistance, threw down their arms, removed their military insignias and joined the amorphous mass.

As the North Vietnamese continued pounding the South into submission with seemingly unlimited artillery, it became clear that they were dead set on crossing the bridge. The only thing standing in their way at this point was a brave, but battered, Vietnamese Marine battalion and one lethal U.S. Marine armed with the know-how to become their worst nightmare.

Colonel Turley recalled visiting John Ripley on the evening of April 1. As they sat in a makeshift bunker, shells were landing all around them. Their brief conversation was constantly interrupted by incoming rounds which forced them to take cover. In spite of the intensity of the situation and the daunting task that lay ahead of him, Colonel Turley was amazed at how calm John Ripley was.

Blowing the bridge would not be easy, but his training with the Army Rangers, Navy Underwater Demolition team and Royal Marine Special Boat Service (SBS) made him more than qualified to do the job. Shortly before he arrived at the structure aboard an M-48 tank driven by Major Jim Smock, a South Vietnamese Marine Sergeant fired upon and disabled one of the T-54 tanks on the North Side of the River. This stopped the whole column, purchasing John Ripley precious time to do his work.

Both he and Major Smock dismounted their tank under the cover of an old bunker. They were then forced to run across an open space under heavy artillery and small arms fire before arriving at the juncture of the bridge and the approach ramp. Awaiting their arrival were five Vietnamese army engineers hiding beneath the foot of the bridge, frightened to death by the intense incoming fire. Although they had carried over 500 lbs of TNT and the necessary C-4 explosives under the bridge, they flatly refused to assist in its destruction. Eventually, all five faded away, leaving Ripley and Smock completely alone.

Reliving His Adventuresome Childhood

After surveying the structure, Captain Ripley realized that to bring it down he would have to place the TNT in a staggered alignment between the six gigantic girders. This would require numerous trips into the underbelly of the bridge, each time pushing wooden crates of TNT between the girders and carrying two 40-lb satchel charges over his shoulders. It also meant he would have to go deep into the bridge super structure to accomplish this task which would bring him closer to enemy fire on the opposite bank.

The scenario before him was hauntingly similar to the Battle of Cloyd’s Mountain he knew by heart as a boy. The big difference here was that he was practically alone in the undertaking. Everything depended on him and he did not waste a minute in accomplishing the task. Comparisons to his youth did not end with the history of Radford, but also included one of his favorite boyhood stunts.

To get the TNT into the bridge he had to hand-walk into the structure, a feat that was reminiscent of his “Huckleberry Finn” days in Radford. Once again, like he did as a boy under the trestle over the New River, he would walk arm over arm under the bridge, clutching the I-Beam girders. Although, this time he would not have enthusiastic nephews egging him on, but angry North Vietnamese trying to kill him.

“Commence Firing Immediately and Don’t Stop”

What complicated matters was the chain link “sapper” fence strategically placed at the abutment in order to prevent sabotage to the under section of the bridge. On top of the fence was razor sharp concertina wire. Captain Ripley had to crawl over the top of the concertina, and let Smock hand him the explosives. This meant passing through the wire which shredded his uniform and tore into his flesh. The subsequent loss of blood only increased his fatigue.

His first trip out was a good indication of what the whole ordeal would entail. Grasping the bottom flanges of the I-Beam, he began hand walking. Arriving at the designated spot for the placement of the first satchel charges, he laboriously swung his body back and forth to catapult himself up in-between the girders. The effort sapped his low supply of energy as he dangled precariously above the water 30 feet below. After several attempts, he was finally able to lodge his heels in the I-Beams and work his way into the steel where he placed the explosives. He then crawled back to the bank still inside the flanges of the I-Beams where Major Smock passed him a crate of dynamite, requiring an equally grueling trip back to the same spot, dragging the 180-lb load. Each time he swung back down out of the steel, Communist NVA on the opposite bank fired at him causing rounds to ricochet all around.

Seeing the intensity of the fire and the possibility that his efforts would be in vain, he radioed for immediate naval gunfire to be placed on the bridge and surrounding enemy position from Captain William Thearle aboard the USS Buchanan now situated off the coast in the Gulf of Tonkin. Those monitoring the radio calls knew that the situation was desperate. Captain Ripley was actually calling for Buchanan’s 5.54-inch guns to fire almost directly on top of his own position. Captain Thearle initially refused this “danger close” mission until he reviewed his tactical maps, since he recognized how close the rounds could come to Americans in the area. John Ripley’s response to the delay showed clearly that the fulfillment of the mission was primary, even if it meant his own destruction.

“Commence firing immediately,” he said, “and don’t stop.”

The physical effort and mental concentration required in this effort took such a toll that at one point Captain Ripley passed out under the bridge while straddled between two I-Beams. He was jolted to consciousness once again by a 100mm tank round from the disabled T-54 main battle tank, that slammed into the side of bridge, sending shock waves through his body. The vibrations almost knocked him into the river.

(To purchase your copy of An American Knight, Click HERE.)

Chapter 16: “Jesus, Mary, get me there!”

Before the completion of the first part of his mission, Captain Ripley had made a dozen trips between the abutment and the underbelly of the bridge. It is one thing for a soldier in the heat of battle to look death in the face and accomplish his mission, what Captain Ripley did was much more. Considering the continual enemy fire, each trip into the bridge was a conscious decision to sacrifice his life. Yet, each time Major Smock squeezed another crate of dynamite through the wire, Ripley pushed his tired body back out into the line of fire and faced death once more in spite of the extreme level of physical exhaustion he was now experiencing.

At one point, he remembered it was Easter Sunday which provoked thoughts of family back home and his children opening their Easter baskets.  He denied himself even this comfort since the precise demolition work he was doing demanded total concentration. He could not allow thoughts from home to stir his emotions.

Putting the explosives in place was merely the first part of his heroic undertaking. Now, he would have to go back to set the detonators. Although he would have preferred electrical blasting caps and wire to do the job, none were in sight. He was thus forced to use the old-fashioned percussion caps and primer cord, but here also he ran into an obstacle. The crimpers used to connect percussion caps to primer cord were also missing. Undeterred, he fell back on the field expediency he learned in Army Ranger School. In such circumstances, they were trained to crimp the detonators with their teeth. What stuck out in his mind at that point, however, were the consequences of a wrong move. This was graphically exemplified by a Ranger instructor illustrating what a blasting cap was capable of doing to a softball. As he crimped the detonators with his teeth, he suppressed the horrifying thought that one wrong move would be sufficient to blow his head off.

Divine Intervention

After successfully crimping a sufficient number of caps, he now had to make another trip out into the bridge to set the detonators and time fuse into the plastic explosive. Once he reappeared, the North Vietnamese began firing with even greater intensity than before. Hundreds of rounds whizzed by his body. However, he reached the explosives and lit the end of the time fuse, the length of which he calculated would give him about thirty minutes.

It had taken him over three grueling hours to prepare the bridge for detonation and at this point, he felt his strength fading and feared he might pass out again.

“The only way I was going to be able to do this,” he said, “was simply to ask God to come along with me.”[2] Marines are able to make it through physically demanding exercises with the use of rhythmic chants. He decided to use his own improvised Catholic version and began a continual prayer of: “Jesus, Mary, get me there!” He said it so loudly that Major Smock, waiting for him on the bank, began repeating the same prayer, perhaps without realizing what it meant.[3]

After making what he thought was his last trip, the exhausted Marine was greeted by a smiling Major Smock. “Look what I found,” he said. Captain Ripley almost fainted upon seeing a box clearly labeled “electrical detonators.” It was at this point that the value of the second effort, another of his life lessons, came flooding back.

“You can prepare very well and yet you can fail,” he said years later. “It is the second effort… that’s what wins.” Most men would have called it a day, but he had always been taught to rig a backup charge in case the blasting caps did not work. A return trip would be very different since he now had not only enemy fire to contend with, but also the nagging thought of how much time remained of the 30-minute fuse he had lit. These were the thoughts that ran through his mind as he pulled himself upwards, went through the concertina wire once again and was greeted by a hail of arms fire from his angry opponents on the opposite bank.

After setting the electrical detonators, he returned to Major Smock, alive but completely exhausted, before mechanically falling to the ground.

Defending the Innocent

After catching his breath, he was back on his feet. With a roll of detonating wire slung over his shoulder, he and Major Smock made their way back to the bunker where they searched for a way to trigger the explosion since they had no blasting box. Some distance away they found an old burned-out jeep with a battery that appeared to be in good condition. In haste he applied the electrical wire to the battery terminals. Nothing happened! He then switched the wires, expecting any minute to see the bridge go up in smoke. Still nothing, nothing but the terrible thought of failure and a paralyzing fatigue.

As he was waiting for the bridge to explode, he noticed two figures walking down the road towards him. As they got closer, he could make out the desperate scene of a mother who had lost her left foot and was hobbling along on a makeshift splint. She held a baby in her arms and some steps behind was her daughter, a terrified little girl, barely able to keep up. The scene caused Captain Ripley a movement of compassion and fear. Although he was unable to blow the bridge with the electrical rigging, the time fuse was still burning. If the bridge blew, the little girl would certainly not survive the impact.

The man who had singlehandedly faced an opposing army during his trips out into the bridge, the Marine who in a moment of desperation called down naval gunfire on top of himself in an attitude of supreme self-sacrifice, would not sit by and allow an innocent child to perish if he could help it. His spirit of chivalry would not allow it.

Forgetting everything else, he bolted in her direction and scooped her up with one arm while still running. When they had almost reached her mother, the two were lifted off the ground by the explosion of the bridge and thrown through the air before landing on top of a heap of dead bodies on the roadside. The girl landed on top of him, dazed but alive. As John Ripley looked in the direction of the explosion, all he remembered was seeing massive chunks of concrete and steel spiraling through the air. After coming to her senses, the little girl jumped up and ran off. Seeing her moments later wandering aimlessly along the road, he picked her up again and took her to the nearest house for safety where she was eventually reunited with her mother.

“The Bridge Is Down”

He then found his radioman and called Lieutenant Colonel Turley. Without the slightest bit of bravado, he succinctly announced, “Sir, the bridge is down.” It was Easter Sunday and the entire South Vietnamese Army, after being beaten down for days, had received their own type of resurrection. While they gave shouts of joy, however, Captain Ripley knew that the battle was not over.  A column of NVA tanks and a hornets’ nest of angry North Vietnamese wanting revenge were just north of the Cua Viet River. However, the USS Buchanan was just off the coast, ready to send more naval gunfire their way.

Here was Captain Ripley’s chance. It was payback time for the North Vietnamese who had wreaked such havoc upon his men and the defenseless South Vietnamese populace. He was just about to call in the big guns again, when he stopped. He remembered the little girl once more and feared for her safety. To destroy enemy tanks that were now log jammed along Highway 1 just north of the river would be an easy task for the Buchanan, but he did not want to risk injuring the little girl in the process. He ran back to the place he had left her and saw two figures walking up the road. It was the injured woman and her daughter. With her safely out of the way, he called for artillery fire which decimated many of the enemy tanks.

Colonel Turley could not have been more surprised at the successful completion of a mission he was certain would end in Ripley’s death. In a later report on the Easter Offensive, he summarized John Ripley’s actions in the following way:

Captain Ripley’s success against impossible odds in actually destroying the bridge was an epic struggle in itself. And in a climate of seemingly national policy failure on the Vietnam War, Captain Ripley’s destruction of the Dong Ha Bridge and halting the NVA’s primary attacking forces was immediately recognized at the National Command Authority (NCA) and Defense Department levels as the single historic event which brought the advancing NVA’s multi-division [assault] to a halt on the North side of the Cua Viet River. One man’s persistence to complete his mission, his leadership under the most stressful combat conditions and his raw courage made the difference in the hundreds of smaller battles that took place that day. Captain Ripley’s indomitable spirit, conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life was far above [what we commonly consider] ‘beyond the call of duty,’ as his actions helped turn the tide of the Easter Offensive 1972. Within hours, his singular destruction of the Dong Ha Bridge was hailed by the U.S. newspaper and television crews on the scene and dispatched back to the United States. Captain Ripley justifiably received international recognition of his heroic act.[4]

Patrick Mooney was a personal friend of Colonel Ripley and now works at the Marine Corps Museum in Quantico, Virginia which John Ripley was instrumental in establishing. He qualified the destruction of the Dong Ha Bridge as an act of heroism on par with the greatest acts of valor in American history.

(To purchase your copy of An American Knight, Click HERE.)

[2] TFP lectures.

[3] John Grider Miller, The Bridge at Dong Ha (Annapolis, Md.: United States Naval Institute Press, 1989) p. 126.

[4] Excerpt from Colonel Turley’s official account of John Ripley’s actions at the Dong Ha Bridge.

Paul Bruno Interview with Author Norman Fulkerson

Interview with Sandy Lawrence of Perceptive Marketing

CLICK HERE

Media Release

Contact:  Norman Fulkerson

1358 Jefferson Rd.

Spring Grove, PA.

17362

717-887-6270

Norman Fulkerson, Pennsylvania author, receives prestigious award from Military Writers Society of America

Spring Grove, PA., August 15, 2010 – Norman Fulkerson of Spring Grove, PA, has received the Military Writers Society of America (MWSA) Gold Medal for 2010 for his book An American Knight, The Life of Colonel John Ripley USMC. MWSA recognizes its members and their creative works at an Awards Banquet during their annual Conference.

Norman Fulkerson’s title, took top honors for a biography. “Seldom does a book’s story live up to its potential;” said MWSA Founder Bill McDonald,  “’An American Knight’ was much more than just a true tale about an American hero. This book delivers the riveting life experiences of a real hero without any worry about being politically correct in today’s world.”

MWSA President Joyce Faulkner, said, “Among the benefits for Norman Fulkerson and other award nominees there will be appearances on various Internet blogs and radio talk shows, features on MWSA’s website and in our monthly Dispatches magazine, and interviews on radio and public-access TV during our conference in Pittsburgh.”

Norman Fulkerson

A native of Red Hill, Kentucky, Norman Fulkerson is a 25-year veteran of the American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property (TFP). He is a contributing editor to the TFP’s Crusade Magazine with a current circulation of 130,000.  In his “Only in America” column, he describes the little-known cultural richness of the United States. He has also written for the illustrious fifty-year-old Brazilian periodical Catolicismo, the Australian magazine Quest and the Polish periodical Polonia Christiana. His first book An American Knight: The Life of Colonel John Ripley was the fruit of his enthusiasm for heroism, as seen in American servicemen, which he currently documents on his blog Modern American Heroes [ModernAmericanHeroes.wordpress.com]. He now resides at the TFP headquarters in Spring Grove, Penn.

All awards recipients will be honored at the MWSA’s conference, Thursday, Sept. 30 – Sunday, Oct. 3, at Pittsburgh’s Wyndham University Plaza. The Conference will include a special ceremony at the Dawn’s Early Light Flag Retirement Plaza in Pittsburgh’s South Park, special interest luncheons around the city, a play featuring the works of MWSA authors at the Kelly-Strayhorn Theater, Oral History Day, Workshops, Book signings, and the awards banquet. Many of the events are open to the public. Joseph Beth’s Book seller is the official MWSA Pittsburgh Conference bookstore.

Fulkerson is among more than 900 authors, poets and artists who comprise Military Writers Society of America. Most MWSA members are active duty military, retirees or military veterans. Others, like Fulkerson, are life-long civilians who’ve chosen to focus on military and/or historical themes with their writings or art.

Norman Fulkerson’s website is www.AmericanKnight.org, his blog is http://modernamericanheroes.wordpress.com.

MWSA  http://militarywriters.com/

Contact: Joyce Faulkner, MWSA president, Bridgeville, PA (412) 496-5034.

###

Fulkerson’s book recognized

By Suzi Bartholomy, Messenger-Inquirer

Last October, when Owensboro Catholic High School graduate Norman Fulkerson talked about the release of “An American Knight,” he said writing it was like running a marathon.

He recently won a gold medal for his run of words and will be presented his prize at the Military Writers Society of America conference Sept. 30-Oct. 3 in Pittsburgh. MWSA is an association of more than 800 authors, poets, and artists whose common bond is the military.

A review of Fulkerson’s book by MWSA is at http://militarywriters.com/bookstore_titles.html. The reviewer wrote: “Seldom does a book’s story live up to its potential; ‘An American Knight’ was much more than just a true tale about an American hero. This book delivers the riveting life experiences of a real hero without any worry about being politically correct in today’s world.”

“This is a way of getting the book noticed,” Fulkerson said of his membership in MWSA. He said he was a little concerned that the ultraconservative views of the book’s hero, Col. John W. Ripley, would be a negative with the society’s founder and critic, Bill McDonald.

McDonald wrote: “I did not agree with all of what John stood for with regards to his social beliefs but I have to admire his ability to cut through all the superfluous and get right to the point regardless of what the results would be to his career. He was someone that we veterans could admire. He was always true to his self and to his personal beliefs what more can we ask of anyone.”

Fulkerson’s book is available at Barnes & Noble and Amazon websites where 30 readers have left comments on “An American Knight.”

Fulkerson is a contributing editor for American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Prop Crusade Magazine with a circulation of 130,000.

Publisher’s Log

by Armond Noble

Over the years I’ve mentioned many books in this column. I’ve never used that book reviewer’s cliché: “If you only read one book this year, make it this one,” but now, for the first time, I will.

“An American Knight — The Life of Colonel John W. Ripley, USMC” by Norman J. Fulkerson (ISBN 9781877905414) is far beyond just a description of the heroic acts of Col. Ripley, it goes into the personal philosophy and moral fiber of this man.

In July 2006, the Naval Academy Prep School honored him by naming its new dormitory “Ripley Hall.” Earning a Navy Cross for his actions in 1972, during his first (1967) tour in Vietnam (as a Company Commander) he received the Bronze Star (Valor), Silver Star and Purple Heart. There were many who said he should have received the Medal of Honor during each of his tours.

Ripley went through the U.S. Army’s Airborne and Ranger schools and trained with the U.S. Navy’s frogmen, and also trained with the British Royal Commandos and went through the Royal Marine Mountain and Arctic Warfare courses.

Today there is a diorama at the U.S. Naval Academy depicting Ripley’s actions on Easter Sunday 1972, at Dong Ha, and every plebe is required to read about Ripley’s gallantry.

In 1990, at the age of 51, Ripley was CO of the of the Navy Marine ROTC unit at the Virginia Military Institute. He tried to pull strings to get sent to Iraq (even offering to pay his own way), but he was turned down.

There are those who believe the reason Ripley (35 years in the USMC) didn’t reach higher rank was his outspokenness on certain hot political issues in front of Congress and elsewhere. He was not PC!

We’ll leave all that for you to enjoy reading when you get the book.

Ripley was best known for his three-hour ordeal of placing explosives on the bridge at Dong Ha. The destruction of the bridge bottled up 200 Russian tanks — one of the main factors that stopped the 1972 invasion of South Vietnam. It wasn’t until 1975, when the U.S. stopped all supplies to the South (including medical) that the North finally won.

On that bridge, Ripley was the target of small-arms fire and a tank-fired round hit just a few feet from him, but, as stated earlier, this book is much more than just his combat. It shows how he had to make a massive effort to get his grades up to be able to go to the Academy. The book touches upon his personal moral code. To say the book was inspirational would be an apt description.

Many years ago I attended a Naval Institute event in Monterey, CA. A man in civilian clothes walked in; I didn’t know who it was, but there was just something about him. I said to myself, “That is somebody!” I later learned that it was John Ripley.

History repeats and repeats and repeats. From the book “An American Knight” was this, given as a background to Vietnam, “In China a civil war broke out between the communists and the government of China under Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, who had been our staunch ally against the Japanese. Under the guise of unity, the United States insisted that the communists be brought into the government. When Chiang refused, George C. Marshall, initially ambassador to China, then Secretary of State, cut off all aid to him despite the fact that the communists were being amply supplied by the Russians. As a result, the communists took over all of China.”

And that’s how we ended up with the Korean War. Speaking of which, if you were in Korea, 1950-53, drop me a card or letter. It will go into a drawing (held 45 days after the first entry is received) for the four-DVD (313 minutes) series, “KOREA-The Forgotten War.”

Next month I’ll mention my experiences at Cam Lo and Chu Lai.

Legacy of a modern knight

By Debbie Thurman, DAILY COURIER

Saturday, April 3, 2010

This week Christians observed the Passion of Christ, the suffering servant but also the King of kings. Were he still among us, one warrior-servant whose deeply abiding faith and military prowess helped shape him into a legend — a latter-day knight — would be solemnly worshipping. He also likely would be recalling another Easter Sunday 38 years ago at almost precisely this time of year in a quaint but war-ravaged South Vietnamese village called Dong Ha.

In 1972, Marine Capt. John Ripley was in South Vietnam for the third time as one of the last American military advisers. His first two combat tours were as a rifle company commander. He was already the stuff of legend.

Ripley’s duty now was to shadow his South Vietnamese Marine brothers, enduring hardship and risking death with them as they bravely stood against communist forces approaching from the north. The Easter Offensive became their shared fate.

As Easter dawned on April 2 that year, Ripley, Major Le Ba Binh and the roughly 200 men of the elite 3rd Vietnamese Marine Corps Battalion had a clear imperative: “Hold and die” defending the southern banks of the Cua Viet River. But first they had to blow up a superstructure bridge that had been built five years earlier by U.S. Navy Sea Bees for American forces. Two North Vietnamese Army (NVA) divisions — 20,000-30,000 men, reinforced by some 200 Soviet tanks — were moving south toward Dong Ha. They had to be prevented from crossing the near-indestructible bridge, the only place to move their heavy armament.

Ripley knew the odds of survival were ludicrous. Ripley would later say he was forced to “stop being cluttered by the feeling that (he was going to survive).”

The amazing story of an already exhausted Ripley’s miraculous hand-walk underneath the Dong Ha bridge, expertly planting charges amid a continual hail of NVA small arms and artillery fire, and his rhythmic prayer-chant of “Jesus, Mary, get me there!” has been retold many times. It resurged in the wake of this hero’s untimely death in late October 2008.

Nowhere are this and other Ripley stories — for instance, his equally miraculous liver transplant, allowing him to cheat death for another decade — told with more poignance than in Norman Fulkerson’s recent book, “An American Knight: The Life of Colonel John W. Ripley, USMC.” Fulkerson and Ripley shared a staunch Catholic faith, a deep respect for tradition and loyalty and a love of history.

“An American Knight” revisits Ripley’s upbringing in mostly Protestant Radford, Va., and traces his life’s arc through his U.S. Naval Academy days and amazing Marine Corps career, anchored by his devotion to his beloved wife, Moline (she passed away last year), and their four children, two of whom also served as Marine officers.

There are two kinds of freedom in this world. The first is bought with the blood of selfless warriors who have stood against tyranny and evil in every age. The other freedom finds its sublime expression in the sacrificial atonement of the One who was fully God and fully man. His blood also flowed freely, but his death was short-lived. And thereon hangs the redemption of mankind.

The Marine Corps places God before country, as it should. Ripley was God’s man, above all.

God before country

By Debbie Thurman

Sunday April 4, 2010

The holiest day for all of Christendom is here. We celebrate the Passion of Christ, the suffering servant, but also King of kings and Lord of lords.

Were he still among us, one warrior-servant whose deeply abiding faith and military prowess helped shape him into a legend — a latter-day knight — would be solemnly worshiping. He also likely would be recalling another Easter Sunday, 38 years ago at almost precisely this time of year, in a quaint but war-ravaged South Vietnamese village called Dong Ha.

In 1972, Marine then-Capt. John Ripley was in South Vietnam for the third time as one of the last American military advisers. His first two combat tours were as a rifle company commander. He was already the stuff of legend.

Ripley’s duty this time was to shadow his South Vietnamese Marine brothers, enduring hardship and risking death with them as they bravely stood against Communist forces approaching from the north. The Easter Offensive became their shared fate.

As Easter dawned on April 2 that year, Ripley, Maj. Le Ba Binh and the roughly 200 men of the elite 3rd Vietnamese Marine Corps Battalion had a clear imperative: “Hold and die” defending the southern banks of the Cua Viet River. But first, they had to blow a superstructure bridge that had been built five years earlier by U.S. Navy Seabees for American forces. Two North Vietnamese Army divisions — 20,000 to 30,000 men, reinforced by some 200 Soviet tanks — were moving south toward Dong Ha. They had to be prevented from crossing the near-indestructible bridge, the only place to move their heavy armament.

It was a daunting mission, and one that only a man like Ripley, who had trained with the world’s most elite forces, could possibly pull off. He knew the odds of survival were ludicrous. Ripley would later say he was forced to “stop being cluttered by the feeling that [he was going to survive].”

The amazing story of an already exhausted Ripley’s miraculous hand-walk underneath the Dong Ha bridge, expertly planting charges amid a continual hail of NVA small arms and artillery fire, and his rhythmic prayer-chant of “Jesus, Mary, get me there!” has been retold many times. It resurged in the wake of this hero’s untimely death in late October 2008.

Nowhere are this and other Ripley stories — for instance, his equally miraculous liver transplant, allowing him to cheat death for another decade — told with more poignancy than in Norman Fulkerson’s recent book “An American Knight: The Life of Colonel John W. Ripley, USMC.” Fulkerson and Ripley shared a staunch Catholic faith, a deep respect for tradition and loyalty and a love of history.

“An American Knight” revisits Ripley’s Catholic upbringing in mostly Protestant Radford and traces his life’s arc through his U.S. Naval Academy days and amazing Marine Corps career, anchored by his devotion to his beloved wife, Moline (she passed away last year), and their four children, two of whom also served as Marine officers. The entire book is a sublime read.

I wish John Ripley could have known during his life how God amazingly touched mine years after our brief sojourn together in the 2nd Marine Division, or how both he and the Christ we both worshiped inspired me to take unpopular stands in a politically correct world run amuck.

There are two kinds of freedom in this world. The first is bought with the blood of selfless warriors who have stood against tyranny and evil in every age. The other freedom finds its sublime expression in the sacrificial atonement of the one who was fully God and fully man. His blood also flowed freely, but his death was short-lived. And thereon hangs the redemption of mankind.

Those who bear our savior’s name know it is he who commissions the modern warrior to carry into battle his sword of truth that pierces “as far as the division of soul and spirit” (Hebrews 4:12 ). The Marine Corps places God before country, as it should. Ripley was God’s man, above all.

Kudos to Fulkerson for giving the world this wonderful book. My copy bears Ripley’s famous, dual-meaning injunction in the author’s kind inscription to me: “Press the attack!”

I will. Semper Fi, Colonel.

Thurman, a Marine veteran, is a writer living in Monroe

Not in the Pentagon Closet

by: Brett Decker

May 21, 2010

Listening to the liberal media, it’s easy to think that all America’s gener- als and admirals want to torpedo the ban on open homosexuals serving in the military. At times, there is a revolving door on the Pentagon’s closet, with some of the brass putting fingers in the air to test which way the winds are blowing.

While politicized officers might try to curry favor with the Obama administration and congressional Democrats by assuming the liberal position in favor of ending the so-called “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, 1,164 flag and general officers have signed a petition informing President Obama that, “Our past experience as military leaders leads us to be greatly concerned about the impact of repeal [of the law] on morale, discipline, unit cohesion and overall military readiness.”

The extraordinary open letter by so many respected military leaders, which has been shepherded by the Center for Military Readiness, isn’t surprising to most Americans, who know those serving in uniform are among the most forthright in America, a few media darlings aside. However, in our morally confused age, officers who defend traditional values tend to be the ones kept in the Pentagon closet rather than those with less normal views. Despite this political pressure, most warriors espouse a very conservative ideology. One of them speaks to us from the grave.

The late Col. John W. Ripley is a Marine Corps legend for his many heroic stands in combat, in congressional hearings and in life. In “An American Knight,” first-time author Norman J. Fulkerson does a masterful job recounting not only what this great man did, but why he did it and how he became who he was. In short, with a few exceptions aside, great men aren’t born – they are formed. John Ripley benefited from the example of a strict family upbringing and the influence of an ascendant American culture that was unabashed in its encouragement of the eternal verities of God, family and country. In the Ripley household, religion wasn’t only for women and wimps, and the whole family knelt to pray the Rosary together every day.

It was this faith that would fortify the tough Marine during his toughest trials. His most celebrated feat was on Easter Sunday 1972 in Vietnam, where he singlehandedly blew up the Dong Ha bridge to halt a communist advance along the main transportation artery into South Vietnam. For more than three hours, he climbed the superstructure of the bridge, swinging from steel girders like monkey bars to place explosives and detonators under the main supports. He scaled the bridge over a dozen times, taking heavy fire the whole time, to accomplish the mission and thwart the enemy.

In the years after combat duty, Col. Ripley served in many roles, including stints working for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, as an instructor at the Naval Academy in Annapolis and even as president of the Southern Seminary, an all-woman’s college. As the years passed, the Marine’s Marine feared that America was endangered by another leftist threat: political correctness. During the 1990s and the first decade of the 21st century, he again answered the call, publicly arguing against admission of girls into the Virginia Military Institute and against women in combat. It was his belief that these positions were in defense of ladies and femininity, especially by trying to protect them from abuse. “If we see women as equals on the battlefield, you can be absolutely certain that the enemy does not see them as equals,” Col. Ripley said. “The minute a woman is captured, she is no longer a POW, she is a victim and an easy prey … someone upon whom they can satisfy themselves and their desires.”

Mr. Fulkerson explains that, “While Americans appreciate the warrior spirit of someone like him, we admire much more a person who is not afraid to tell the truth.” That’s why “An American Knight” is not only an interesting book for military buffs but offers inspiring reading for anyone looking for noble examples amidst modern amorality. On the night of Oct. 28, 2008, this Marine met his maker. But while Col. Ripley is dead, his legend lives on. If you listen closely to the din of contemporary political-military debates, the voice of Ripley echoes.

Brett M. Decker is editorial page editor of The Washington Times.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/may/21/not-in-the-pentagon-closet

Fulkerson profiles ‘An American Knight’

By Suzi Bartholomy, Messenger-Inquirer

Norman Fulkerson, who has been voicing his conservative opinions on the Messenger-Inquirer editorial page for 11 years, has written a book about another conservative, Col. John W. Ripley USMC. Over the years, Fulkerson has written more than 75 letters to the editor on many subjects, including family values, abortion, Bill Clinton and homosexuality.

Fulkerson met Ripley in 1993 at a luncheon sponsored by his employer, the American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property. Realizing that they were in synch on many issues, the men became friends and remained so until Ripley’s death last October.

There was much to admire about Ripley, Fulkerson said, during a recent phone interview. Ripley’s military career has been documented in other writings, Fulkerson said, but what he was most interested in was telling the other side of the war hero who in 1972 during the Easter Offensive in Dong Ha, Vietnam, blew up a bridge that “virtually halted the largest North Vietnamese offensive of the entire war.”

“An American Knight, the Life of Col. John W. Ripley USMC,” is about Ripley’s “deep Catholic faith, his love for his children and his devotion to his wife Moline,” Fulkerson said.

Fulkerson, of Utica, began writing Ripley’s biography just days after his death and completed it in June. The book will be released Oct. 28, the first anniversary of Ripley’s death.

Fulkerson, an Owensboro Catholic High School graduate, had never written a book before.

“It was like a person who had never run, running a marathon,” Fulkerson said.

When asked how he completed the book in six months, which included lengthy interviews with Ripley’s friends and family, he said he did it with divine intervention.

“I had to squeeze my brain to do this but did not have to squeeze my heart,” Fulkerson said.

Fulkerson, who is a contributing editor for the TFP’s Crusade Magazine with a circulation of 130,000, has received positive reviews of his book from retired military officers who knew Ripley.

Retired Col. Wesley Lee Fox, USMC, a Medal of Honor recipient and author, writes that he knew Ripley “like a brother for 42 years” but learned a lot more about his friend’s life from Fulkerson’s book.

“This is a must read for all desiring to be a leader, especially those desiring to lead Marines,” Fox wrote in his review.

Col. Gerald Turley USMC, Ret., who ordered Ripley to destroy the Dong Ha Bridge, said in his review of ‘An American Knight’ that Ripley truly deserves to be held up as a role model … and Norman Fulkerson’s book will help insure this.”

“An American Knight” should attract men and women to its pages, according to a release from Fulkerson’s publisher. Men will see Ripley as the ultimate warrior who was motivated through “supernatural faith, discipline and pure morals” and women will find Ripley “the kind and gallant husband,” dedicated father of deep faith, refinement and “unfailing leadership” at home and in public.

To order Ripley’s life story by Fulkerson go to www.americanknight.org.

Suzi Bartholomy, 691-7293, sbartholomy@messenger-inquirer.com.