A Rumor of War: Chapter Ten Summary & Analysis

Just as Kazmarack predicted, Caputo’s first night at headquarters is noisy. Across the road, “big guns” fire at road junctions, hilltops, and anywhere else the enemy is likely to be. Caputo spends the next day getting used to his administrative role as assistant adjutant. He looks at the “a truckload of paperwork” that has to be “inventoried and audited,” in addition to messages, directives, and regimental orders that must be filed. Later, Schwartz briefs him on additional duties that no one else wants to perform. The additional work looks like a lot but will not require more than three or four additional hours of Caputo’s time. Caputo learns that a clerk cannot do this work because regulations call for an officer to do it, and Anderson will not perform these tasks because he is a captain and does not have to do things he would rather not do.

The additional duty of casualty reporting keeps Caputo especially busy. The job gives him a lot of bad dreams and stamps out any lingering romantic ideas he has about war. He reports both enemy casualties as well as those among the marines. It is a complicated task due to the military’s elaborate procedures for everything. The KIA reports are particularly long and complicated, as these forms require additional information pertaining to burial and insurance policies. Caputo also has to use jargon to describe accidents. Some incidents, such as reporting injuries as a result of high explosives, cause semantic difficulties. When Lieutenant Colonel Meyers is blown apart by a booby-trapped 155-mm shell, Caputo describes it as a “traumatic amputation” of all limbs, including multiple lacerations to the abdomen with fragment wounds “through-and-through.” He concludes with “killed in action.”

Sometimes Caputo has to verify body counts due to the field commanders’ tendency to exaggerate the number of VC their units have killed. When possible, the bodies are brought to headquarters, and Caputo counts them. The decomposing bodies are laid out on canvas stretchers and covered with ponchos or rubber body-bags, with yellow casualty tags tied to their boots or to their shirts, in instances in which their legs are blown away. The simplest way to identify a man who still has a face is to match him against a photograph in his service record book. Otherwise, they use dental records. Caputo finds that all races of dead men look the same, like “wax dummies of themselves.” Their eyes are all “a washed-out gray” and “their mouths [are] opened wide, as if death had caught them in the middle of a scream.” Their revolting smell is also the same.

Caputo’s first day on the job as a casualty reporting officer is June 21, 1965. Early that same morning, a patrol from 2nd Battalion fights a small skirmish with the VC near Iron Bridge Ridge. Caputo’s field phone buzzes with a notification from the battalion’s adjutant reporting on four friendly casualties, one dead and three wounded. Due to all of the static on the line, the adjutant spells out the names phonetically. When the reports are called into division and filed, he goes over to operations to find out how many enemy casualties there are. Webb Harrison tells him there are four, all KIA. Caputo walks into the colonel’s tent and makes the appropriate changes on the scoreboard where Anderson keeps a tally. Lieutenant Colonel Brooks examines the figures and says that Colonel Wheeler is giving a briefing for General Thompson this afternoon and will want the latest casualty statistics.

Sometime later, a jeep drives into HQ carrying two dead VC and two civilian women who were injured in the fire-fight. The corpses are on a trailer hitched to the jeep. When the driver parks the jeep and unhitches the trailer, it tips forward, and a half-severed arm, “with a piece of bone protruding whitely through the flesh,” hangs over the side of the trailer. Caputo counts the bodies, ensuring there are four. They are so entangled that they seem indistinguishable from each other, except for the fourth, which is missing most of its limbs. Another, hit in the midsection, has the “slick, blue and greenish brown mass of his intestines bulging out of him.” Blood has pooled at the low end of the trailer.

Caputo turns away and tells the driver to remove the bodies. The driver says that he was told to leave them where they are and get back to the motor pool. Caputo tells Kazmarack to take the bodies to the cemetery for the enemy dead, but Anderson insists that they stay. He says that the colonel wants the clerks to look at them and get used to the sight of blood. Caputo despises the idea and insists on burying them, but Anderson reminds him of the colonel’s orders. So, the bodies are left lying in the sun. Then, the HQ troops are marched past the trailer to look at the dead VC. The bodies reek, releasing an odor like “cooking gas” or the hydrogen sulfide from a chemistry class. The procession ends, then Kazmarack and Corporal Stasek hitch up the trailer and drive toward the enemy cemetery, which Kazmarack describes as a “dump” for bodies.

Ten minutes later, Captain Anderson comes into the tent and says that they need the bodies back. The colonel wants to show the bodies to the general when he briefs him. Though the captain knows that the bodies are gone, he wants someone who can drive a jeep to catch up with the jeep that is taking the corpses to the cemetery. Caputo cannot believe these orders, but he follows them. When he returns to his tent, he makes up a new title for himself, writes it on a piece of cardboard, and tacks it to his desk: “2LT P.J. Caputo. Officer in Charge of the Dead.”

General Thompson arrives by helicopter with Colonel Wheeler on one side of him and Lieutenant Colonel Brooks on the other side. A couple of nervous-looking aides trail the three men. Their briefing starts and Stasek and Kazmarack return about fifteen minutes later. They both look exhausted. Stasek says that they had the bodies buried, then exhumed them. He says that the guts of one VC spilled out of him during the process, while another’s leg began to come off while Stasek pulled at him. Caputo apologizes for what they went through, but he says that they will have to bring the bodies in when the briefing is over.

When the briefing ends, General Thompson, Colonel Wheeler, and the other officers emerge from the tent. Caputo salutes them. They walk past him toward the corpses. The general glances at them, then he continues on to the LZ, where his helicopter awaits. Caputo spends the rest of the afternoon doing menial paperwork.

Caputo goes to the mess hall for dinner, where he sees Chaplain Ryerson and Milsovic. The chaplain talks to Caputo about the recent loss of another marine and asks Caputo if he thinks the boys are dying for a good reason or because “some officer wants a promotion.” He also talks about the show that the colonel put on for the general earlier that day. The chaplain persists in asking Caputo what the Americans’ purpose is in Vietnam, and Caputo throws up his hands in frustration at the question but still insists that Vietnam is not “that bad a war.” The chaplain reminds Caputo that he and the doctor think in terms of human suffering, not statistics. He mentions the twelve KIA from April in the context of “twelve wrecked homes.” Caputo loses his temper but apologizes when Milsovic intervenes. He finishes eating then goes back to his desk.

Caputo now finds it difficult to work, and the tent is stifling with heat. He knows that much of what Chaplain Ryerson said makes sense. He thinks that the general’s observation of the dead VC was disrespectful. He also thinks that many of the Marine Corps’ tactical operations seem futile and purposeless. He reflects on the chaplain’s mention of “twelve wrecked homes” and contrasts them with the simple tally marks on the colonel’s scoreboard, where that number sits in a different column from the enemy dead. Caputo thinks about Sullivan’s widow in Pennsylvania. He works for a few more hours, has a beer, then goes to bed early. He has late-duty watch that night and knows that he will not get much sleep after midnight, with the howitzers booming all night.