Dad told me a story several times over the years about a night in Vietnam. It was really stuck in his head since he was almost killed and was wounded during the same attack. Dad was in an artillery unit that would set up on hills with temporary fire bases. One night the base was almost overrun. While on the sand bagged perimeter firing at a human wave like assault of NVA he saw the M2, .50 caliber machine gun start enfilade firing on the advancing line. In the light of the flare he said he saw one of the NVA soldiers literally cut in half right above the waistline while running and the legs continued on a few steps without the upper body. A 50 round entering above the hip from the side crossed to the other side, cutting him right in twain.

Later during a lull he said he saw a NVA sapper trying to turn a caymore mine around to face back towards their perimeter. A flare went off and Dad spotted him, he hit the clacker and set the mine off right as the NVA had it in both hands held about a foot from his face.

After the battle he walked out to the same spot and behind that guy was a slight depression and another sapper was in that depression that must have been peaking out over it when he set off the mine since top of his skull was gone from just above the eyebrows. He said it looked like scrambled eggs with ketchup inside.