Leo Hinterlong is shown on the far right (just behind my left shoulder). This shot was taken on 17 March 1966 near Hiep Hoa Village, Duc Hoa District, Hau Nghia Province near the end of Operation "Honolulu". Sp/4 Hinterlong participated in the capture of the VC shown. The VC was in a tunnel located in a hamlet near Hiep Hoa. He was driven out by a combination of smoke and riot agent.
I'm laughing because when he ran out of the tunnel entrance, he was completely terrorized and kept yelling, "Finis, Viet Cong! Finis, Viet Cong!" When we asked him where his weapon was, he said, "I lost it." In the picture, an RVN National Policeman is asking him many of the same questions the 2nd Platoon asked immediately after his capture. Now, after he decided that we weren't going to kill him, he is telling the policeman, "What weapon? I'm just a simple farmer."
Sp/4 Hinterlong died in the explosion of Track 23 in the Fil Hol Plantation on 21 July 1966.
Ted Jagosz