Tales From the Cut: True Stories About the U.S. Army's Combat Land Clearing Engineers in Vietnam

During the Vietnam war, the U.S. Army's Corps of Engineers was tasked with removing heavy jungle cover along roadways that were being used by the Viet Cong and NVAs to attack passing convoys in South Vietnam. A unique tractor was developed to cut down and eliminate certain areas of the jungle-called the "Rome Plow" crawler tractor-and it emerged to spawn a new movement in South Vietnam called "Land Clearing."

Some of the gritty "land clearers," as they were called, all of whom experienced h...