In John Laurence's "The Cat from Hué" (New York: PublicAffairs, 2002), the author first mentions 23-year-old Joseph Galloway of UPI in a chapter titled, "October 25, 1965." The place was the Plei Me Special Forces Camp in Pleiku Province, which had been attacked on the evening of October 19. Special Forces Major Charlie Beckwith had arrived with his reaction force on Friday morning, October 22. Laurence, a CBS News correspondent who had been in Vietnam for almost two months on his first assignment, Galloway, and a number of other journalists had come to cover the siege of Plei Me. Laurence recalls Major Beckwith's hearty welcome to the reporters:

" 'Now that you're here you better get one thing straight,' . . . 'Every damn one of you is gonna help defend this camp.' . . . 'I'll use anybody I can get, God damn reporters or not.' "

By Wednesday, October 27, the siege of the camp was over. A battalion from the 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile) arrived later that morning. Major Beckwith and his men left, as did Laurence and most of the journalists. But Joe Galloway would stay with the story, following it to LZ X-Ray, 14 miles from Plei Me, on the evening of Sunday, November 14, 1965. The rest of the story is history. . . .

Joe Galloway passed away on August 18, 2021, at age 79. In his remembrance of the journalist friend and colleague he had met at the besieged Plei Me camp almost 56 years before, John Laurence wrote:

"Joe and I met in 1965 at a besieged US Special Forces camp in Viet Nam. He took his turn on one of the corners manning a .50 caliber machine-gun through one of the nights because the SF guys were exhausted and Charlie Beckwith, the major in charge, insisted that reporters pitch in to save the camp from being overrun."

"In private, drink in hand, Joe was loud, funny, and an accomplished story-teller. He kept his Texas accent throughout his life. He also kept his dedication to honest reporting about the Viet Nam War. Dear Joe, we will miss you. We will miss you in many ways, not least for your sense of right and wrong."

In this video of Joe's talk at the Vietnam War Conference at VMI ([ Ссылка ]), hosted by Dan Moore and myself on April 16, 2016, Joe shares many of his experiences from over 50 years as a war correspondent, including his meeting with Major Beckwith at Plei Me.

Dear Joe, we will miss you.

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