5 24 1541 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/cdf1ab4ca2e9169931e39b1c3eef8237.mp4 654d3f05c4e3e47b8451d711830eaa7f https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/d0e62bbd9b451f652400723c17917635.pdf e300edc26d03bcb85dfacc98f26cd4e7 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Carol Sutton Interview Length: (20.23) Interviewed by Dr. James Smither Transcribed by Chloe Dingens Interviewer: This interview is a joint production of WKTV voices, the Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project, and the Silversides Museum in Muskegon, Michigan. We are in fact at the Silversides Museum in Muskegon and we're talking first with Carole Sutton of Muskegon. So, Carol, begin with some background on yourself and to begin with where and when were you born. I was born in Davis, West Virginia in February 23, 1940. Interviewer: Okay and did you grow up there, or did you move around? (1.02) I grew up there until I was 18, then I went to the University and then transferred there to Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing in Cleveland, Ohio. Interviewer: Okay, so let's back up a little bit, what was your family doing for a living when you were growing up? My dad originally worked in the mines and then he became an engineer on the railroad and we had a garage and my brother-in-law ran that when my father was away. �Interviewer: Okay and so with that, that helped you be able to finish stay in high school and then go on to college? As they could afford to do that. Right. Interviewer: Alright and then what did you study in college? Well I started out with basic courses towards my medical degree, and then I decided maybe I don't want to do that, maybe I'll just be a nurse. Interviewer: Okay so you were thinking about being a doctor? Right and then I decided maybe math and chemistry were not my forte alright so.. Interviewer: So, did you then basically do pre-nursing or? Yes. Interviewer: Okay but you did not get it, you weren't yet a nurse at the point when you finished there? No. �Interviewer: Okay and so when did you leave college? (2.13) I graduated in 1963 okay and then I took a trip with some friends to Europe and- and then we drove down and flew to North Africa and traveled around through the Middle East. Interviewer: Okay. And after that I joined the Air Force. Interviewer: Alright so, I mean how did you wind up making that extended tour? Well a friend of mine had a father that was in the Air Force in Tripoli, North Africa and so we decided we want to go on a trip. So, we started saving our money and every time I wanted to spend more money my friend would say, “remember we're going on a trip.” So, it was a fantastic trip. We took a freighter to Europe and all young people were on it and a young captain and it was a great experience. Interviewer: Alright now was it just a group of- of women traveling together or did you have some men? No there were I think a couple people were men and one was going back home to Holland and another to Germany, but I think there were more women. �Interviewer: Okay but there was a whole group of you? Yes, well the freighter only holds 12, so we had 11. Someone canceled at the last minute. Interviewer: Okay how long did the trip on the freighter take? (3.34) Oh, gee it's been so long ago it was probably nine days or something. Interviewer: Okay they do have decent weather or? Oh, they said it was the nicest crossing that they’d had, and I thought well I wonder about that, because you're still like this when you see the sky on one side and then the other. Interviewer: Alright and so what countries did you visit? We went all through Europe, like we ended in Belgium and then we went to Germany, and France, and Belgium, Italy, and then we turned the car in and then flew to North Africa where my friend's parents were and stayed there while right on the Mediterranean enjoying the water. And then we went to Egypt, and Lebanon, Greece... it's so hard to remember when all of a sudden, I start to think about it. �Interviewer: Oh yeah, and I guess at that point the dollar was pretty strong. (4.32) Oh, it was very strong. Interviewer: So, you could afford to do that kind of thing, you go a decade later it would have been a little bit trickier. Of course, salaries were less too. Interviewer: Yeah. Alright so you kind of had your- your World Tour adventure and then you came back and then nursing school was the next stop? No, I'd already finished school. Interviewer: Okay. …and then I went to the Air Force, but we went to basic training in Montgomery, Alabama which was a farce at that time for officers. They wanted us to at least be able to go through the parade and the captain would say, “come on ladies we have to do this.” I mean it was so lax and fun. 5.16 �Interviewer: Just to clarify, did you get through nursing training at West Virginia or was that at? Well I did two years pre-West Virginia and three at Cleveland Ohio. Interviewer: Right right, okay and then so you do that then you take your trip. Right. Interviewer: Okay how did you wind up joining the Air Force? Well I planned to join the Navy and two of my friends decided, one to get married another to go to Texas. So, I thought “hmm okay.” I just called up the Air Force recruiter, he came right over. That's how it started. Interviewer: Okay, and so then when do you actually arrive in Montgomery for your... It was May sixty-five. Interviewer: Sixty-five. Yeah. Interviewer: Okay and is this Maxwell Air Force Base or? �Yes. Interviewer: Okay alright and the group that you're training with were they all women? They- that was their class that had the most women of any of them, lucky for us there were two men. And they had like psychologists and most of them were nurses. I can't remember what the other one did but... (6.25) Interviewer: Okay and then just to clarify you're going in basically as an officer? Right second lieutenant to start with. Interviewer: Because nurses are all officers. Did they explain to you why you got to come in as an officer? No, I just seemed to know that you know, from being around a lot of people in the military. Interviewer: Okay now that the basic training that you got, what did that actually consist of? Well we did a camp out and went out in the swamps and found, what would you call it? Like you'd find a little wooden things that would tell you where to go next, or I'm not �trying to think what, not ingredients what you call it, coordinates or something. And that was… and we didn't do too much. Met in the mornings and went over things all together. And the campout was fun though. Interviewer: Alright I mean did they try to- try to train you how to march or anything like that? Just that part so that we could at least be in the parade at the end of the… the experience. (7.37) Interviewer: Okay, now sometimes for the men, at least for the enlisted men there's a lot of attention to kind of the spit-and-polish. And how to wear the uniform and how to clean things. Did you get some of that? None of that. Interviewer: Okay, they had just given up or weren’t trying? I think at that time you know you're gonna be a nurse, and they didn't really think about you're going out like to Vietnam like some of them went. Interviewer: Yeah and of course in 65 it wasn't yet clear how much of that there was going to be, because it's only beginning to escalate at that point. Alright now when you went there while you �were training there did you consider the possibility that you might go overseas, or do you want to go overseas? Well I didn't really think about it at that time. Interviewer: Okay, alright so once you've finished the basic training where do they send you? To Wilford Hall, Lackland Air Force Base. Interviewer: Okay Lackland is a big base in San Antonio. Right, where they train. Interviewer: Okay and then when you- what kind of reception do you get when you arrive there? Well I was pretty nervous, but everybody was, you know, we already knew where we were going to be in Wilford Hall, but it was just like anything else it's a little nerve-wracking to start with until you adjust and kind of get your feet on the ground there. (8.51) Interviewer: Okay did they do anything to orient you or help you get acquainted with the place or do they just, just you know… �As far as I remember they orient you to where different areas are because it's a big area. Interviewer: Okay, now describe the facility itself, what was Wilford like? how big was it? what was there? It was pretty big, I can't remember now what all was there, but I know I got assigned to OB and gynecology. So, I spent most of my time there. Interviewer: Okay and assumedly a lot of the patients were the wives of the men based there? Right right right. Okay and what kind of living accommodations did you have? (9.33) Oh, I lived in an apartment with two other girls. Interviewer: Okay so you've got to be off the base? Right. Interviewer: Okay and did you have a car? �Yes. Interviewer: Okay and what was the daily routine like? Well as far as my work? Interviewer: Yep. Well I started out being on days, just for a while to get oriented like. As being a nurse I never drew blood before, so they sent me right to the lab to draw blood and my first patient was a doctor and I missed on the first time. But after that then I didn't go there anymore because we would draw the patient's blood just like their him hemoglobin hematocrit would be drawn and sent down to the lab. Interviewer: Okay and so then normally once you're-you’re in there what are you doing day-today? Well just taking care of the patients, you know. Interviewer: So essentially the same kinds of things nurses- That you do in a regular hospital, yes. �Interviewer: Okay now were there things about that job that made a different from being in a civilian hospital? I think pretty much the same at that time, because now they do so much more than we did back then. Interviewer: Okay and you said you worked days to begin with? Yeah and then I was on evenings and nights depending on what your schedule was. (11.02) Interviewer: Okay and how long would the shifts be? Back then it was only eight hours. Interviewer: alright and then was it five days a week or six? We had every third weekend off. So, it varied during the week. Interviewer: alright and what was what- what was the atmosphere like there, just in terms of being a young woman living in a place like this. I mean how did people treat you or… �I don't think they treated me any different than most people do. I get along pretty well as most people anyway. But I remember back then we had one nurse that was talking about, she was so sad she couldn't go march with Martin Luther King back then. Interviewer: Now was this facility, was this integrated? Did you have black nurses there? Oh yeah, she was a black nurse. Interviewer: okay and with their a fair number of black personnel on the base? Oh yes. Interviewer: Okay now this is still Texas in 1965-66. Right yes. Interviewer: When you go off the base were you aware at all of racial tensions or things like that? No. (12.13) �Interviewer: Okay so it just wasn't... and by then I guess you don't have segregated drinking fountains or anything like that? No, but one of the girls from the South certainly let us know how our northerners did not know about being in the South. Interviewer: Well what kind- were their customs or things that you weren't aware of? I mean aside from the race issue that… No. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, now when you went into the Air Force how long did you expect to stay? I was expecting to be a career woman. (12.49) Interviewer: Okay. And then I met my husband. Interviewer: Okay. �He was working, well on the labor and delivery unit and someone told him there was a tall nurse over there. So, he came over to see who it was and talked to me off and on, and then I thought, well I kind of liked him. So, I invited him over. Interviewer: What were the rules for- for fraternization? Well they were a little more strict then. And Michael had to get a, when we were going to get married, he had to get some type of release that said, like “first lieutenant Carol Anne Sutton” you know, and his name and everything. And they told him he can't go to the officer's club and he said, “oh gee maybe I won't get married then.” He got into a little trouble for that. Interviewer: But it was- it was still allowable, it wasn't totally forbidden. Yeah, right. They didn't encourage it of course. (13.49) Interviewer: Yeah well, the stereotype that you get at least for like a TV show MASH or things like this. Is it's the nurses and the doctors are carrying on and so forth and you- you wind up with an enlisted man? Yeah. �Interviewer: Now was that actually more common for if the nurses were gonna get involved they might be getting lovely enlisted rather than doctors? No, I think whatever. (14.15) Interviewer: Okay because I have had a nurse explain to me at some point that the enlisted men were more your own age and had more in common with you, and the doctors were older and too many were married. So, they shouldn't be doing anything. Right. Interviewer: Okay but this just kind of happened? Alright and then how does- so you- so when do you get married? We got married in July of 66 and then 11 months later he went to Vietnam. Interviewer: Okay and then what did you do while he was in Vietnam? Work! Interviewer: Okay, so you just stayed on? �Right. Interviewer: Alright now were you working longer than your contractual obligation? because when you signed up… Yeah, yeah you- I believe it was two years. Interviewer: Okay, so you signed up and you had to be full-time active duty for two years. Right at least. Interviewer: Okay but you wind up extending and then staying for a third because at that point you might as well? (15.12) Mm-hmm. Interviewer: Alright and then while he was in, well I guess how did you feel about him going to Vietnam? I wasn't too happy about it because of course you're newly married and all in love and excited and you worry that they're not coming back. �Interviewer: Alright and then how much communication did you have with him while he was overseas? Well letters and then we used to send tapes and one time he was teasing me about I'm talking about the rain and romantic and here he's sitting in a monsoon. Interviewer: Alright and so that basically goes on for sort of your last year? Yeah. Interviewer: And then when he comes back from the service, now what happens? Well we met in Hawaii after eight months or close to nine I think and then he came back in 68. Interviewer: Okay so he had an R&R; to go to Hawaii. Right. Interviewer: And I don't know when he came out for the R&R; was he any different than he was when he left? (16.15) �No, no at least I didn't see it Interviewer: Okay, alright and then when he does come back, then do you leave the Navy or go in reserves or what? Yes. Interviewer: Okay and then once he comes back where do you wind up living? Trying to think, was it Austin? Yes, yeah that's right yeah. Interviewer: Okay and then he stayed in the Air Force? No, he got out for I don't know if it's a year or two and then he went back in. Interviewer: Okay and then did that put you then into the life of the military wife? Before he went back in, I just worked as a nurse at the health center at University of Texas. Interviewer: Okay and then he does go back in and you just follow him around to his assignments and so forth? Right. �Interviewer: Alright when you think over the time that you spent, you know in the service are there particular incidents or people or memories that kind of stand out for you? You mean during all the times we were... Interviewer: Well actually the time you were actually on active duty first. Okay, no it was pretty standard right then you know, just doing our jobs and having fun with friends on the weekends or whenever we're off okay. Interviewer: Now you're at the base, you're at that hospital from 65 to 68 and that is a point where of course Vietnam ramps up a lot. Right. (17.48) Interviewer: Did you- did that affect the kind of business that you had at the hospital? I mean were there casualties who would come back to that facility? Well like I said I was in the OB/GYN most- all the time. �Interviewer: Yeah, I know, were you aware what was going on at all or that these people were coming in? Yeah. Interviewer: okay and did you pay any attention to things like the anti-war movement that was going on or? I really didn't pay too much attention to that. Interviewer: Okay and did you follow the news of the war while your husband was over? Right and I thought we shouldn't be there. Interviewer: Okay and were there ever situations where you got news reports and you were wondering was, he in the middle of that? Not too much really. because a lot of the women that were there having babies and things, you'd hear a lot about any of their husbands that were gone, and I can't recall any of them that had a husband that had died. Because you had people coming in and out and… Interviewer: Right, alright and I guess to look back on the time and the service, but aside from getting you a husband, how do you think that affected you? or or or what did you learn from it? �From being in the military you mean? Interviewer: Yup. Well like I said I had plan to be a career woman because I had seen so much camaraderie when we were at the airbase in Tripoli, North Africa and that's why I thought I would like to do that and have that camaraderie with other women that are staying in. (19.30) Interviewer: Alright and... And that's what originally had gotten me to the point of going in really. Interviewer: Okay and it did it work out that way? Yes, but I ended up not being a career woman, not in the military. Interviewer: Alright did you continue to work as a nurse or did you- after all that, so did you work as a nurse in different places where he was assigned? Yes. �Interviewer: Okay, alright and so then and when did you retire from nursing? Oh in 2000 when I lost my leg, we're still looking for it. Interviewer: Okay, alright but that was not a service-related injury. No, I should have told people it was. Interviewer: Yeah make it much better. Or a shark story. Interviewer: Alright well thank you very much then for taking the time to share the story today. You’re welcome. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_SuttonC2308V Title A name given to the resource Sutton, Carol (Interview transcript and video), 2019 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2019-06-07 Description An account of the resource Carol Sutton of Muskegon was born in Davis, West Virginia on February 23, 1940. She went to Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing in Cleveland, Ohio, as well as West Virginia University after high school. After graduating in 1963, Sutton went on an extended international trip before joining the Air Force. In May of 1965, she underwent Basic Training in Montgomery, Alabama, and graduated as a Second Lieutenant since she was a nurse. She was then stationed at Wilford Hall in Lackland Air Force Base, San Antonio, where she met her husband in the labor and delivery unit of the hospital. They got married in July of 1966 before her husband was deployed to Vietnam. After his return in 1968, the couple moved to Austin, Texas and they both left the service. Sutton then worked as a nurse at the health center at the University of Texas before retiring in 2000. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Sutton, Carol Ann Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Other veterans & civilians--Personal narratives, American United States. Air Force Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/a6ea6bd471ddf35d72d9c00a3b2da105.mp4 94357a92102d0cae8364fc8a6832ae7c https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/2e444e6154ec41a0c9be2e3c95d3763f.pdf 44ebfafb2ac8fb69c441503ad7b8c148 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Jim Southerland Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Grace Balog Interviewer: We are talking today with Jim Southerland of Nashville, Tennessee. And the interviewer is James Smither of the Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project. Okay Jim, start us off with a little bit of background on yourself, and to begin with, where and when were you born? Veteran: Okay, I was born in St. Louis, Missouri in 1946 to—my mother was a stay-at-home mother and my father was a technician with Bell Telephone. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And in ’54, ’55, he moved to a transfer in Arkansas. And that’s basically where I grew up. Interviewer: Okay. And what town in Arkansas did you go to school in? Veteran: Stuttgart. Interviewer: Okay, and where is that in the state? Veteran: It’s…The middle of the east part. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Rice end, swamp end, duck and gator country. Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: Good training for Vietnam. Interviewer: Okay. And now, did you finish high school? �Veteran: I did. Interviewer: And what year did you graduate? Veteran: ’64. Interviewer: Okay, and what did you do when you got out of high school? Veteran: Well, I had—I was working as a surveyor. Was in a surveyor crew and then I worked for a timber crew there. And then I tried to go to college for a semester and that didn’t work. Then I joined the Army. Interviewer: Okay. So, when did you actually join the Army? Veteran: May 19th, ’65. Interviewer: Okay. At the time you joined, did you have any idea that things were heating up in Vietnam? Or there might be a war to get into? Veteran: That was sort of a glimmer off in the distance. You read about it every now and then and you knew things were getting ready to happen. Interviewer: Okay. And did you, when you did this, did you think hey, that would be interesting to get involved in? Veteran: That’s why I joined. Interviewer: Okay. So, you went looking for the action rather than— Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, now once you enlist, where do they send you for basic training? Veteran: Went to Fort Polk, Louisiana for basic training then Fort Gordon, Georgia, which is just outside of Augusta for U.S. infantry training. Then 3 weeks at Fort Benning for jump school. And then I went to Germany. �Interviewer: Alright. Now, we will back up here to Fort Polk. When you show up for basic training, what kind of reception do you get? Veteran: Well, it’s nothing like Full Metal Jacket. There’s a specialist with a clipboard under his arm, he says, “Okay men, get off the bus. I am going to call off your name, answer. When I call you, move over here. And then go have a seat.” That’s it. (00:02:19) Interviewer: Okay, so some relatively polite at that point— Veteran: Nothing dramatic. Yeah, oh yeah. Interviewer: Okay. And once they—now, do they have a kind—do they have a processing where they cut your hair, all that kind of stuff? Veteran: Oh yeah. And they issue—there’s a rep—if I recall, it’s called a replacement detachment, where you go spend 2 or 3 days and you are issued uniforms and they start your shots and that sort of thing. Interviewer: Okay. Now, how long was the actual training once you started it? Veteran: There was 8 weeks of basic. Interviewer: Okay, so you’re down to 8 weeks by that time. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Now, what did the basic training consist of? Because not everybody knows that. Veteran: Well, it’s…Okay, close order drill, marching, and that’s more important than we realized at the time. When you got to operate as a unit, in unison. Sanitation, military justice, physical training, riflery, rifle marksmanship, gas training, going through just the rudiments. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And everybody gets to throw 1 grenade. I got to throw 2. �Interviewer: Alright, why did you get 2? Veteran: Because I wanted 2. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, you laughed at sanitation. Were there guys who didn’t know how to bathe? Veteran: Well, it’s—there were some…Yeah. Yeah. And I, actually, when I said sanitation, I was talking perhaps in the bigger plane of field sanitation where you put the latrine over here and kitchen over here. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: You wash—yeah, so. But yeah, there were some…A couple who couldn’t read or write. And they sent them off somewhere. And some people had not been raised with the rudiments of personal hygiene and they got special attention until they learned the rudiments of personal hygiene. (00:04:12) Interviewer: Alright. How easy or hard was it for you to adjust to life in the Army? Veteran: I didn’t have a bit of problem. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I was expecting it to be more rigorous. Interviewer: Okay. Did you have people who had told you they were going to be tough on you or how it would work? Or you just kind of assumed? Veteran: They just—there’s drill instruct—drill sergeants. They don’t have drill instructors in the Army. Drill sergeants have a lesson plan every day and they present it and you do what they tell you and if you do it, they leave you alone. Interviewer: Now, were there guys who had more trouble? Veteran: Oh yeah. People who didn’t want to do it or people with poor coordination or low IQ. �Interviewer: And what would they do with people who weren’t doing it right? Veteran: Well, usually they would leave it up to members of the squad. Say okay when this guy gets it right, you get to go to chow. Interviewer: Okay. So, they are building teamwork. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Alright. Now did you, when you enlist, were you asked to have any—express any kind of preference for what sort of training you were going to get? Veteran: Oh yeah. Interviewer: Okay and so what did you ask for? Veteran: I want to be a paratrooper. Interviewer: Okay. And they were happy to oblige you? Veteran: Oh yeah. Interviewer: Alright. So, let’s take us on to Fort Gordon then. What goes on there? Veteran: Fort Gordon is infantry training. You learn infantry school—tactics up through the squad and familiarization with weapons that a squad would use: rifles, automatic rifles, machine guns. And they put me in a mortar squad. So, where I trained with mortars every day. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And then there’s more close order drill. Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: More marching, more PT. Interviewer: What size mortar did they train you on? Veteran: 81. That’s the only—okay, I started to say that. That was the standard infantry company level mortar. 81. It’s changed now, I understand, but we had 81 mortar. �Interviewer: Okay. Because in World War 2 they had 60 millimeter. Veteran: They now have 60s at the company now. Interviewer: And then there are heavier ones but that’s artillery stuff. Veteran: Oh yeah. Interviewer: But light ones or whatever. Veteran: The battalion level mortars they call 107, they used to be called 4.2 inch. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: And that’s what I wound up doing in Germany. (00:06:27) Interviewer: Okay. Alright, so you’ve got mortar training as well as infantry training. And is that another 8 weeks? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, and then you said from there you go on to jump school? Veteran: Go to jump school. Interviewer: Okay, and where was that? Veteran: Fort Benning, Georgia. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: 42nd student company. Interviewer: Okay. And then how does the process work? Veteran: That’s pretty rigorous. You start off with a week of intense PT and then you get a week in the harnesses towers and then you get a week jumping. Interviewer: Okay. Explain the harnesses towers part. �Veteran: Okay, there’s 2 towers. There’s a 34-foot tower and there’s this who was explaining to me the purpose of jumping out of that 20-foot—34-foot tower, is to overcome the natural human reluctance to jump into thin air. And the first time you do it, that reluctance is there. Interviewer: Alright. And now what is protecting you when you jump off? What keeps you from— Veteran: You got a harness. Interviewer: Is that kind of like— Veteran: You slide down a rope. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Is there—is there something that’s elastic that will…Like a giant bungee cord kind of thing or…? Veteran: Yeah, just a rope you slide down. Now, to put that in perspective, we had people—we had troops who couldn’t do it. They refused. They walked down. Now, some years later, I went to a reunion where they let us play with the tower. And we had 10-year old kids that jumped off the tower 22 times in 30 minutes. Interviewer: Now, it’s just great fun. Okay. Alright, so you do the towers. You have the 34foot tower and there’s a taller tower? Veteran: There’s a 250-foot tower that came from the world fair in the—somewhere in New Jersey. And they have a steel ring inside a parachute canopy to keep it extended. They pull you up to the top and they release you and you practice guiding the parachute to the ground. And that’s fun. (00:08:22) Interviewer: Okay. And then you get the real thing? �Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay, so what is the first jump like? Veteran: Okay. If an instructor got up on the platform, he said, “Okay, I need 100 men to jump without a parachute.” He’d have got 200. You’re pretty well indoctrinated by the end. You got it straight on the basics. Safety. Good exit. Good recover. Interviewer: So, do you remember your first jump out of a plane? Veteran: Oh yeah. Interviewer: Okay. What was that like? Veteran: I was so busy making sure that I had proper form and could—I was going to do the execute the drop right. Really didn’t pay much attention to the drop, to the fall. I did not enjoy the—did not have a chance to enjoy the scenery. Interviewer: Alright. Well, how high up do they drop you from? Veteran: About 1000-1200 feet. Something like that. Interviewer: Okay, so there’s not a lot of time to think about it then? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Alright. Now, is this something where the ripcord is pulled for you as you jump out of the plane or do you do that yourself? Veteran: Well, there’s really no—the ripcord is a static line that is hooked to your pack tray and I am trying to remember how…It’s 12 feet or 18 feet long. It’s a yellow nylon cord. It’s got a hook on the end of it. You hook it up over a cable. I give you the proper command. Hook up and there’s a pin that goes through to secure it. And a jump master does this and that says okay, secure the pin. And then you—jump master does this, which the command is sound off. And you sound off, make sure you inspect the man in front of you and his safety. And then the jump �master opens the door and he’s standing waiting for the red light to go green. When the green light goes, he pats you on the back and you go out the door. (00:10:18) Interviewer: Right. But then are you connected so that the parachute opens automatically. Veteran: Oh yeah. Yeah, when you go out the door, that static line pulls your pack, or your chute, open. Now, you have a reserve right here on your harness. And right here is a ripcord for that. And supposedly at that altitude, 1000s or 1200 feet, if you have a malfunction, you’ve got time to react with the reserve. Interviewer: Right. Okay, now how many jumps do you make then? Veteran: 5. Interviewer: Okay. And is it always the same way? I mean, is it always the automatic opening of the chute as you go out? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: That’s just the standard way they do it? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. Okay, so now you have gotten through that. Were there guys who were getting hurt doing those jumps? I mean, could you break things when you land? Veteran: We had more people get hurt in the physical training. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Plenty of PT, so…I don’t recall any injuries… Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: …In the jump week. Interviewer: Very good. Okay, you have done all of this. And now, do they send you home before you go to Germany or…? �Veteran: Yeah, I went home for a couple weeks. And then I went to Fort Dix, New Jersey. Waited around for about 2 or 3 weeks for a replacement detachment. And then we boarded a ship. Boarded a ship and went to Bremerhaven. Took 8 days. Interviewer: Alright. Now, during your time when you were sitting around in New Jersey, could you go into New York City? Or you just sit around? Veteran: You were supposed to sit there. It was pretty easy to get out the gate though. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Yeah, I went to New York a couple of times. Interviewer: Alright. Okay, now you’re on a boat so describe that trip. Veteran: Oh, that’s the worst experience I have ever had in my life. Just 2 or 3 or, I don’t know, 3 or 4000 G.I.s on this troop ship and they are sleeping in bunks 3 or 4 high. You stand in line for hours to get any chow. The chow is nasty. People throwing up in the chow. People throwing up in the dining hall. Food is terrible. Half the people on KP, half the people on guard duty. I used to hide out in the welding shop. (00:12:31) Interviewer: Alright. How long was the trip? Veteran: 8 days. Interviewer: 8 days, okay. And what time of year was this now? Veteran: November. Interviewer: Okay, so north Atlantic, November…maybe not a great place to be? Veteran: Well, you could stand on the rail. You stand on the rail like this, and maybe—you see maybe 30-40-foot seas. And the ship would lift up and come down. And you could see those waves coming at you. And that’s all you see is waves for 1000s of miles. Feels kind of lonely and exposed out there. �Interviewer: So, just as well you didn’t pick the Navy at that point. Veteran: Yeah. The water temperature was probably 50 degrees, 40 degrees that time of year. And we—supposedly, our trip to this was 300 miles to Iceland. Interviewer: Okay. So, now you get into Bremerhaven. What happens? Veteran: You get out. They get the cattle off, cattle boat. And they pack you on trains. And they send you to the various division replacement training centers. Interviewer: Okay. So where did— Veteran: I was the 8th Division in Karlsruhe, which is, I would say, due west 30 or 40 miles from Frankfurt. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. Veteran: That was headquarters, the 8th Division. Interviewer: Okay. And then once you got there, what did they do with you? Veteran: Oh, you stand in line and get—we got new kits—certain equipment and indoctrination and familiarization on Europe and KP and painted and did details. And finally, got out of there after 3 or 4 days and got to the unit. (00:14:12) Interviewer: Okay. And so, what unit now do you join? Veteran: I was in the same thing, 509th airborne in the Robert E. Lee barracks, MainzGonsenheim. Interviewer: Alright. And now that you’re there, what’s your job? Veteran: Oh, they put me in a mortar platoon. And they found out I had an IQ of 70 or 80 or above and understood the basic 4 functions of math, they made me a fire computer. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: The computer, it had an actual computer for air and elevation for the guns. �Interviewer: Alright. Now, when we’re saying computer, are we talking about what we think of as a computer now or you are doing the calculations? Veteran: No, it’s—you, you’re doing it on a piece of graph paper. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And you got a slide rule, it’s not a slide rule. I forget what it’s called. Looks like a slide rule and it’s got the charges on it. And then, you got a range—range tables to give you elevation. And so, they give you—you figure out the target and you knew where the guns are and you plot the arrows with the guns set on their sights and the charges make it go so far. Interviewer: So, you could—charges, so you X amount of powder, explosives, propels it, and you have more if you are going to shoot farther and less for less? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Same with larger artillery? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay so, were these the larger mortars you had? Veteran: These were 107s, yeah. And as a matter of fact, they—the training for the 107s was done on a standard artillery plotting kit and it was conducted by division artillery. Whereas the 81s were conducted at the company level. Interviewer: Okay. So now, what sort of reception do you get within the mortar platoon? How do they treat the new guys when they come in? Veteran: Brutal. It was brutal. “Boy, you’re going to die. You’re little. You won’t last here. You’ll be gone in 6 months.” (00:16:11) Interviewer: So, what actually happens in those first few weeks? �Veteran: Oh, you learn—you learn your spot. But now the unit was out in the field when I first got there and I was on KP every day. Finally, the 1st sergeant comes by. I had been on KP for about 8 days and it’s from sun-up until midnight. I said, “1st Sergeant, how do I get off KP?” He said, “Boy, you want to get off KP?” And I said “Uh-huh.” He said, “When you get off KP, come see me between 2 and 5 in the afternoon.” So, couple days later I go in his office and he said, “I didn’t think you’d show up but come in here.” And he reached down and he got out a stack of field manuals like this. And he said, “Read those, learn how to shine your boots, and get a haircut, and you go up to soldier of the month. You make soldier of the month, you’ll be ED— exempt from duty for 1 month.” So, I shined my boots. I had 2 pairs of jump boots. I shined them both every night. Kept my hair shaved like—almost like this. And read those—read and committed those manuals to memory. And I made soldier of the month. First time a buck private ever made soldier of the month. And I was off—I was exempt from duty for the next month. Interviewer: Okay. How did the guys in your unit feel about that? Veteran: Like chicken shit. Life were—suck ass. I made everybody look bad. And that was right off the bat. So, it was a…It was an interesting experience. I had respect for my superiors and the derision of my cohorts. Interviewer: Alright. Now, does the—how long did you wind up spending with them? Veteran: Oh, almost a year. (00:18:00) Interviewer: Okay. Now, how did your relationship—or, does your relationship with the guys change over the course of that year? Veteran: Yeah, because I got to be their boss in a couple days. Interviewer: So…So, what do you wind up—I mean, how are you spending most of your time then with them? When you’re with that unit, what are you doing day to day? �Veteran: Oh…Endless maintenance. Motor pool every day. Trying to keep that junk hanging together and operating. And there’s daily training on common subjects like nuclear warfare, chemical warfare, drills with chemical warfare and drills with biological drills. The first—you take 2 or 3 first aid classes a week. Interviewer: And would you also get field exercises? Veteran: Oh yeah, you get to go to the field for a month at a time. Interviewer: Okay. And where would you go? Veteran: We would go to, there was—it was training area that belonged to the 8th division called Baumholder. And then there was a 7th Army training area where we’d jump, Grafenberg. That was 7th Army eastern training area and I think we went to a training area called Wildefliecken a couple times. And then right across the river from us, there was a—the 8th division had an airfield, 5th Army airfield. And we would go down there and do a lot of training practice. And that’s also—now, in Germany, you got these ammunition dumps all over the place, left over from World War 2, built since then. And any given time, a 30 company is going to be on guard site. They’re going to be out guarding one of these ammo dumps or quarter master depot. They finally got smart and hired civilians to do that because we stole too much stuff. The quarter master dumped us. (00:20:05) Interviewer: Now— Veteran: At that airfield, there was also the special ammo supply point, which is an Army euphemism for nuclear weapons storage. In any infantry division at that time, you had these small nukes, SASP—we called them Davy Crocket. They had the yield on that weapon is about this big around, like this. I think it’s a tenth of a kiloton. And the ground zero was 5000 meters. And the maximum range is 4000 meters. Do the math on that one. �Interviewer: Well, the 5000 meter is a diameter as opposed to radius so you’re automatically shooting yourself. Veteran: Yeah. Yeah and then let’s see, we had artillery. We had—I think we had 155, 8-inch artillery pieces that had nuclear projectiles. And maybe some—maybe like an honest—I don’t if we had honest, I don’t know if the division had Honest John missiles or not. But anyway, we got—the parachute units got to guard that, the SASP a lot. Interviewer: Okay. Now, did they tell you what your job would be if the Soviets came over the border? Veteran: You know, they never articulated that. They never articulate—and we used to have these alerts. 3 o’clock in the morning, the alert sirens would go off and you’d turn to and get your weapons and get on the vehicle and go to the assembly area. And the assembly area would be some spot you had never gone to before. You get to the assembly area and you do some kind of Mickey Mouse and then about noon you would head back. And from the assembly area, which might be 20 kilometers, to your concern, you could almost walk back on dead vehicles. I knew the Russians were laughing their ass off every time they watched one of these alarms. (00:22:05) Interviewer: Alright. Now, I guess as a parachute unit, you might well be some kind of reaction or reserve force? Veteran: Indeed. Now, we used to have a mini reaction and quick reaction. The mini quick reaction is—they are sitting in a pair and their trailer is outside with weapons and explosives on. And the planes are sitting on the ramp. And there’s trailers with parachutes on. And I think you could be out of there in 15 minutes. The main, it was 24 hours or something like that. And we used to go up to this air force base and some time before I got there, some hooligans—I am not �sure what—I understand they took over the EM club and they had started fights and so. So, when we went on up, they locked us in the hangar. Interviewer: Alright. Now, you were still expected to function actually as a parachute unit? Veteran: Oh yeah. Interviewer: You would drop into places and parachute places. So, you’re not getting helicopters at this point? Veteran: They didn’t really have too many helicopters. 8th division probably had…I would think they would be hard put to lift a company, 200-man company. Interviewer: Okay. Of course, we are now kind of early ’66 for a lot of this and then the helicopter— Veteran: Before air mobile really got—the concept really got going and they had the equipment to do it. Interviewer: Yeah. And the helicopters were mostly in Vietnam. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: They are over there, so you don’t have that kind of thing where you are. Different kind of war expected on someone. Veteran: And we had—we walked a lot. But now on one of the walks, in March or April, I volunteered for it. Nijmegen in Holland…Make a note of this and google it up: Nijmegen March. They had marching units from all over the world. Most of them are civilians that participate in the marches. And the 8th Division made a composite platoon or company. I guess it was a couple—50 or 60 guys who would march from division headquarters to Nijmegen in uniform, full dress uniform. And that took, that was two good days. (00:24:28) Interviewer: Alright. And what was the purpose of that? Or do you not know? �Veteran: Participating in the march. Interviewer: Okay. But why were they having a march? Veteran: You know, I thought it was some kind of war—commemorative of the end of the war or the jump in Nijmegen or the defeat of the Germans or something. I need to look at that better because there were all these civilians there. And you had 100 civilians marching up and down the hill. Norway and Sweden. Yeah it—I am sure the message for it perhaps goes back further than what I imagine. Interviewer: Alright. Now, did you—what did you do when you were off duty? Did you go off base and go anywhere? Veteran: Seldom. Money was the major constraint. You go off maybe once a week and drink a couple beers and come back before you got in trouble. Now payday, payday I didn’t go anywhere on payday but that’s when all the hooligans were out. MPs would be out beating people. They’d be beating MPs and beating the whores and fighting with cab drivers. Yeah, payday was a good day to stay at home. Interviewer: Okay. And when you did go, I mean what impression did you have of the local population there? Veteran: Oh, they were great people. There was one guest house I used to go in and the owner finally confided in me that he was an executive officer on a U boat but he only sank British ships. Interviewer: Good of you. Alright, now are you getting promoted while you’re there? (00:26:04) Veteran: Yep. Interviewer: Okay. �Veteran: I get my little stripe when I got—I got my little stripe about a month ahead of time because I made soldier of the month. And then…July or Sept—June or July, I made brigade soldier of the month and I got promoted to spec 4, which is about 2 years ahead of time. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: And that gave reason—gave a lot of people reason to resent me even more. There’s some people, they are on their second hitch waiting to be promoted to E-4. They hadn’t made it yet. Interviewer: Alright. Now, promotions in Vietnam were pretty quick. Veteran: Oh, it’s just— Interviewer: But that’s a combat zone though, when— Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Now, did you have a lot of people who were being pulled out of Germany and sent to Vietnam while you were there? Veteran: Not at that time. Interviewer: Okay. So, at that point you’re in your unit in Germany. That’s where you’re going to be, for the most part? Veteran: Basically 3 more years of that. I hated—I just couldn’t stay in. Interviewer: Now, were they making any effort to recruit volunteers for Vietnam? Veteran: No, not in Germany. Interviewer: Okay. So, how do you wind up then eventually going on to Vietnam? Veteran: I yelled and kicked—yelling and screaming and kick and fight and finally they said, “Okay, if you re-enlist, we will send you to Vietnam.” I re-enlisted and they sent me to Vietnam. Interviewer: Alright. So, why didn’t they want you to go? �Veteran: Well, they were seriously short—they were the last ones to get replacements. And there were budgetary constraints on the manpower levels and they didn’t really give up anybody once they got them. Interviewer: And even if some of your guys didn’t like you that much, you knew what you were doing? Veteran: Yeah. I mean, I didn’t worry about them. I was worried about keeping my boss happy. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: I had nothing to gain by keeping those shitheads happy. Interviewer: Alright. Now, I mean did they—did they try to bully you or anything like that? (00:28:03) Veteran: Oh my god, yeah. They’d throw my footlocker down the stairs and fold my bunk up. Good training. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, so now when do you actually leave Germany then? Veteran: I left Germany in early September. Early September, I went home for a month. I went to Oakland. Now, at that time they had this stupid policy: I wasn’t good enough to play in the game to take advantage of this, but you had to take all of your field equipment with you. Helmet, web gear, then you didn’t have to take a sleeping bag or tent, but all of your web gear. We had an extra duffel bag and you had authorization to have two duffel bags, helmet, all that stuff. So, I dragged this stuff all the way across the Atlantic Ocean. All the way across the U.S. I get to Oakland and I go to the replacement detachment and I said, “Oh, I got my field gear.” He said, “Throw that shit over in the corner. You’re going to get a new one when you go to Vietnam.” Well, I never did. Stuff I got was hand me down that should have been exchanged a long time �ago. If I had been smart, I’d have left that duffel bag at home and opened that up in 30 years and had a nice trove for a military collector. Interviewer: Alright. So now, how do they physically get you to Vietnam? Veteran: Well, I was assigned to 1st Brigade 1st Cavalry division. And we left Travis Air Force Base on this is the expedited—this expedited trip. Left Travis Air Force Base on these 141s flying backwards and landed twice to refuel. And we landed at Pleiku Air Force Base. And when we got off, there are helicopters and Caribou transports to take us to An Khe, the division headquarters. Interviewer: Right. Okay, so you were going over with the unit at that point? (00:30:06) Veteran: The people—no, all the people that were on those 3 or 4 airplanes were going to replacements in the same place. Interviewer: Okay. You were replacements but you were all replacements heading for the same division? Veteran: Yeah. Right. Interviewer: Okay. And were you all for the same brigade or just the same division? Veteran: All through the division. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, now then the transports were military transports? Veteran: C-141s, Starlifters, which not an uncomfortable way to fly. You fly backwards. Matter of fact, I have jumped out of a couple of them. They are not a bad way to go. Interviewer: Okay. But there is some form of actual seat there? Veteran: Yeah, they are actual seats like in an airliner. Interviewer: Okay, because I guess the C-130s, some of them that people flew on didn’t always have that kind of thing. �Veteran: Oh, fold down bench seats on the side. Interviewer: Right. Okay. What’s you first impression of Vietnam? Veteran: It’s hot and humid. And we get on these planes and we fly over the mountains and we land it at the division base camp at An Khe and it’s hot and humid. And we are there about 5 minutes and it starts raining. And it rained for the next 2 or 3 weeks. Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: So, we go to replacement center, they process us, I don’t know, a day and a night, and we go to our units. And of course, the units are all out—troops are all out in the field. And so…I don’t know. They did some bully rag to you back in there. You had double time and people called you a cherry. Interviewer: Did they have any kind of in country orientation or anything like that? Veteran: Well, after we got issued—at that time, it was pretty primitive. We were being issued our gear in the company battalion and then we went to this training school for 3 days. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And other than handling an M-16 for the first time and listening to some horror stories from people, I…It was pretty much useless. Interviewer: Okay. They didn’t take you out on a patrol or anything like that? Veteran: We actually went out on a patrol outside the green line. And they gave me the—I was the radio operator. And there was this staff sergeant that was patrol leader. We walked a mile out and a mile back. And there was no real training, just a walk in the woods. (00:32:19) Interviewer: Do you have any sense of what the purpose of all that was? Veteran: Busy work so somebody could check off a box on a form somewhere. �Interviewer: Right. Because I had different descriptions of that depending on when you came through. Although, I mean at some point, it had the title of First Team Academy or something like that. Veteran: That was a lot later on. Interviewer: It was ’67. I think someone went in in ’67 and talked about that. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: So, you are a year earlier. Okay. So, you get a little bit of that. But now you’re kind of rejoining, you’re going back to your unit. Veteran: Going back to the unit we get on Caribous. We go to a firebase or a landing some called in English, out in the Bong Son plain. And then from there we helicopter—we go to our company rear areas and they get us a helicopter out to the company. Interviewer: Okay. About how large was the company, in terms of man power, do you think when you joined it? Veteran: TOE of an infantry company was 152 or 154, something like that. And we were, we would be doing good to put 90 boots—90 sets of boots on the ground. Interviewer: Okay. And what sort of reception do you get when you actually join the unit in the field? Veteran: Well, when I got off the helicopter, the first person I saw was somebody I went to college with and he said, “Here, you take this.” I said, “What is this?” And it was a platoon leader’s radio. So, platoon leader calls me over. He says, “Dial me up so and so.” I said, “I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about.” So, he takes the radio, he sets the frequency. He makes a phone call. He says, “Here, put that on and follow me.” (00:34:02) Interviewer: Alright. Now did you wind up staying an RTO? Is that your job? �Veteran: Yeah, that was my job. Now, a couple months later I got promoted to sergeant and they made me a squad leader. And that was a much easier job than carrying that radio. Much less visible, much less visible target. Interviewer: Alright. Let’s talk a little about that time when you are an RTO then. What did you make of your lieutenant? Veteran: His name was—he was a good guy. He was a country boy from West Virginia. Went to Berea College in Kentucky. And he had—he was a solid guy, had both feet on the ground. Little rough around the edges. If you needed a smacking around, he might take care of that. He certainly left the impression he would. But he was very concerned about the welfare of his troops. Were they getting clean clothes and so on. But certainly, the platoon sergeant was a known brawler. He was a typical airborne soldier. Been at it 20 something years. Been in 2 wars, been in the Army, out of the Army, been busted a couple times. Drank too much. But he was good. He was good. And he gave you the right incentive to follow him, do what he told you to. He would keep you in line. He might kick your ass if you didn’t. Interviewer: Right. Now, were you basically just kind of conducting patrols outside of English and that kind of thing? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Alright. And what’s the terrain like there? Veteran: Well, where we were it was pretty mountainous. Yeah, real mountainous. Interviewer: Alright. And was there much going on at that point? Was there much enemy activity? Veteran: We didn’t—we really didn’t get any, into anything too much until a couple of platoons would get into a little fire fight. That died down. Let me see, November we got in the big fight. �Had some casual—first time I had seen a lot of casualties. And then the end of December, when we were having a Christmas truce. One of our sister companies gets ambushed. They got all— most of them got annihilated. We had a lot of casualties there. And we lost a platoon leader there. And the platoon sergeant took over as platoon leader and the platoon sergeant got shot the next day and I became the platoon sergeant, for a day or two. (00:36:32) Interviewer: Alright. Now, let’s see, I guess for the record here, I am not sure we had mentioned this. What specific company, platoon, and so forth are you with? Veteran: I was in the mortar platoon. Oh wait. It’s the 4th platoon, which is a designated weapons platoon. And the weapons platoon is supposed to have mortars and recoilless rifles. And we had only mortars and we only had them in the base camp. And we only brought them out in the field as needed. And the platoon sergeant was an old mortarman. The old guys were all good mortarmen. The replacements we got in didn’t have any experience. And it was less and less often that we would bring mortars out in the field and actually set up and use them. Interviewer: Okay. So, but now is it then your mortar platoon leader that gets killed? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: And is— Veteran: But I mean, for all intents and purposes, it’s the 4th rifle platoon. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: From day to day operations. Interviewer: So, you would go out in the field with the other line units then? Veteran: Oh yeah. Interviewer: Okay. And so, you just function—and so, they use the manpower as extra riflemen? �Veteran: Yeah. The company—yeah. The company commander would say—he would designate the lead platoon for the night and day. He would rotate them among all platoons. And we had a guy named—I forget his name, but he was a good point man. And we spent more than our fair share of time being point. But that’s okay because the point man was very good and the platoon leader and platoon sergeant were very good. (00:38:09) Interviewer: Alright. And then as the platoon leader’s RTO, what are you doing? Veteran: Well…I am trying to keep up with him. He’s 6’4’’ and got legs that come up to here on me. And I am burdened with about twice as much gear as he is. I am carrying all of my gear, all ammo and frags I can carry, and for some stupid reason I had a 45 I later got rid of, and I have got the radio, I’ve got—there’s a long antenna and a case you carry. You got to carry 3 or 4 batteries. Got to carry a lot of smoke grenades. It was a pretty good burden. So, mostly I tried to keep up with him. When the company commander would call him, I would try to get up to him so he could take the call. Interviewer: Okay. And did you sort of learn to operate the radio pretty quickly? Veteran: Oh yeah. Yeah. I mean and—part of my job in the FDO in the mortar platoon in Germany, you’re on constantly, you’ve got a radio handset in your hand constantly. So yeah, that was no big deal. Just—I didn’t have the signal operation instructions which was a little booklet that you carry. It’s supposed to be a classified document. It’s got call signs and frequencies of all the sister companies, the battalion, brigade and so on. Interviewer: So, you were just supposed to know those things? Veteran: No, you’re supposed to keep it close. Yeah, you learn the call signs of the 4 companies. Each company has got its own call sign. We were pistol belt. There was pig iron and canteen cup and those change every couple months. And the battalion commander, his call sign was shiny �boots. The battalion call sign was shiny boots. Now, you have a hierarchy. The number 6 designates the commander, at whatever level. 6 could be platoon leader, could be company commander, could be division commander. 3 is operations, 2 is intelligence, 5 is communication, 4 is supply, 5 is civil affairs. Why would I still know that? (00:40:30) Interviewer: Well, good training at some level. Okay. So, you’re only really doing that kind of thing then for just a couple of months? Veteran: Yeah. And at night, you dig in. The medic—you and—okay, you got an RTO for the platoon sergeant, one for the platoon leader, and you got one for—and the medic. The 3 of you are camped together at night and take turns monitoring radios. And that usually didn’t work too well. Somebody would always fall asleep. Never had any repercussion for it. Interviewer: Alright. And now when you were out at night, I mean would you have anybody trying to probe your position? Or would they leave you alone? Veteran: Where we were at that particular time, it was rare. Much of the time it was just random shots just to keep us—they thought they’d keep us jittery or something. But you’d get jittery if they didn’t shoot at you. Interviewer: Now, when you were out in the field, do you go on the trails or off them? Or…? Veteran: We didn’t—we didn’t go on trails. We made our own. Interviewer: How dense was the under growth in these places? Veteran: It—you had to cut your way through sometimes with machetes. And I never figured…Okay, as much noise as a company makes in the bush, you got equipment rattling, you got people talking and yelling at each other and you got radios…You’re not going to—you will �not arrive unannounced. And then when you start chopping through jungle foliage and bamboo? They can hear you coming 2 miles away. (00:42:00) Interviewer: So, did you only have contact when they felt like making contact? Veteran: You know, that’s always—when there was a significant battle, it was an ambush that they set up. At a time and a place of their choosing. Now, there were random encounters like there would be a messenger coming down a trail and we would pick him off. We tried to stay off trails, though. And then at night, we would—okay, every night you set up a perimeter. And you say well, we got this hill up here and a little stream coming down here. Let’s put 3 guys up there on a listening post. And there’s a trail crossing a stream down here. Let’s put 4 or 5 guys down there and set up an ambush. And that’s where the fun usually started, with the ambush. And I think we had a psychological advantage. When they ran into one of our ambushes, they would break contact and run as hard as they could because they had no idea what they were running into. Interviewer: And when they made contact with you, would they break off once too much return fire came? Veteran: Yeah. Their job was to inflict casualties and run away. Fight another day. Interviewer: Okay. Now, do you know if you were up against Viet Cong or NVA? Veteran: Well, now. We could identify them pretty easy. There was a main force VC unit that would be like a national guard on active duty. And then there were NVA units. And you could tell by the uniforms and equipment they had. NVA were much better armed. They had uniforms. Interviewer: Okay. Did the VC have kind of Soviet type weapons? Or were they using stuff they took from us? Or...? �Veteran: They had—it was interesting. They would pick up weapons and use them as needed but someday the supply chain would bring weapons down and they would turn all the captured stuff in or all the old stuff in and they’d get better weapons down. If we found out—we got in their cache one time. We found where they had turned in all of the captured weapons they had and all the junk that the Chinese had given them. There was British, Chinese, German, everything, stacked up there. The local VC had turned back in and received bolt action Soviet rifles. And that’s what we were encountering. (00:44:38) Interviewer: Okay. The bolt action? So, like World War 2 style as opposed to the AT-47 model or something like that? Veteran: Yeah. They liked carbine—the local VC liked carbines and they were readily available from the south Vietnamese. Interviewer: Yeah, your other source of supply. Did you have many civilians in that area? Veteran: Yeah. They would be right on the edge of—okay, rice paddies would go up here and the mountains would go up here. In this little cusp between, the woodcutters would come up here and then in the rice paddy areas, there would be lots of villages. We hated—we wanted to stay as far away from the villages as possible. This one particular place where we would locate, there was a Bong Son river ran down like this. And this was a mountain chain and these were some low hills. These were the piedmont area and here was the beach. And this valley right here, we called it Bong Son plain. And it was loaded with villagers. And we thought we could pass by the area and let those villagers pursue their crafts and survive and thrive. That wasn’t the case. We ran—we kept—a lot of action over here in this piedmont. And in these big mountains over here. That’s where the Annamite chain started. And it went a 100-miles that way. That was Indian �country. And we had firebases. English is here, Geronimo is here. That’s 15 miles. And we had other firebases around. (00:46:23) Interviewer: Alright. And did you have a standard operating procedure for going through a village? Or did you just stay out of them? Veteran: Yeah, you—okay you pay particularly close attention to walking where the villagers were walking. Pay attention to what’s up over your head. When you go in a hooch, try to look up and look to the side. Because the Viet Cong were ruthless. They would—they would come in and booby trap a…innocent villagers’ hooch—house, grass hut in the middle of the night, knowing that we are going to trip it. We are going to get somebody hurt and retaliate against the village. Interviewer: And did your people trip booby traps and that kind of thing? Veteran: Yeah, yeah, yeah. A booby trap, that’s an interesting word, and it took on a life of its own. A booby trap is a—is something, is an explosive destructive device disguised as something else. A book or a door or a lid on a coffee can or something. What we call booby traps were simply improvised mines. Interviewer: Alright. Now, you were—you have your initial phase where you’re the RTO and you’re in the field a lot. Okay, and then—now does your job shift kind of right after you lose the lieutenant or do you…? Veteran: No, we lost a couple squad leaders and it was—they said, “Okay, we will make him a squad leader. He knows how to read a map.” Interviewer: Alright. Now do you stay in the same area at that point? (00:48:02) Veteran: Yeah, same area. Interviewer: Okay. So, how long were you in the Bong Son area? �Veteran: We were there the whole time. We were there for…Let’s see, we were there from early ’66 through Christmas ’67. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, and then during that time, was it pretty much just a regular routine of doing the same thing over and over again? Veteran: Yeah but we get—we got February of ’67, we got sucked into this big ambush. And I mean, they just wiped our company out. I was gone at the time. I wasn’t out there. And then a couple weeks later, I was out there and one of our platoons was set up in a blocking position. And they got ahold of one by sapper company and they got—they got all messed up. They were—became ineffective. They had 20 or 30 casualties. And then, daily, weekly, monthly, little services, sniper rounds. But that was relatively peaceful. And then after—okay, I left the field in about August or maybe early September. And they moved me into the operations—operations section. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And I was a duty operations officer on the midnight shift. At one of these firebases here. Interviewer: And so, what does that job consist of? Veteran: Well, it was a—you got 2 radio operators monitoring company nets and the brigade net. And you got a battalion. And if a company makes contact, it’s my job to get resupply and med evac going. Write up the after-accident reports. Brief the commanders on them. We had some really good operations officers and some really good commanders. I can’t—there’s one I didn’t like but I can’t say we had a bad operations officer or commander. But we had one guy who was the brightest of the bright. He was a legacy. Father and grandfather were both general officers. He was a West Pointer. And he became 4-star on his own. He was brilliant. But he would insist �that I wake him up. Anything happened, he wanted to be wakened up. So, I go in at 4:30, 5 o’clock whenever I was supposed to wake him for the day and I would say—he’d say, “What happened?” And I would say, “Okay, well about 2 o’clock, Charlie company had a mortar round laying in the perimeter. Nobody got hurt. And about 3:30, somebody tried to probe around at Delta company. They beat them off and they fired some elimination rounds and they think they got a body outside.” He said, “You’re supposed to wake me up.” I said, “I’ll make a deal with you.” He said, “You don’t make deals with me.” I said, “Listen, we need you bright eyed, bushy tailed, alert as possible during the day to run the operations of this battalion.” I said, “I will make a deal with you: if anybody gets—if we have a KIA, I’ll wake you up.” He yelled at me, “I don’t have to make deals with you!” But anyway, that became the procedure. I would wake him up and brief him on what happened during the night. (00:51:42) Interviewer: Alright. Now, you have been in Vietnam a while by this time. Do you get an R and R in there somewhere? Veteran: Yeah. Okay, I had taken 2 R and Rs during my year in the field. I went to—I had an aunt and an uncle that lived in Taiwan. CC Kang Air Base in Taichung. I went and spent a week with them and I went to Australia for a week. And then, when my first year was up, I went back home for a month. Came back. Okay. I think I deferred that for a couple months. I came back and the unit had disappeared. They had left Bong Son and moved to I Corps. And I joined— rejoined them in I Corps. And then I had 6 months down on down the road, I took another— extended my tour again, took another 30-day leave. Went to Australia that time. (00:52:42) Interviewer: Okay. What’s it like to get out of Vietnam after you have been in it for a while? You get into this world where there’s not a war going on. �Veteran: Oh you, first thing you do is you marvel at running water. All the hot running water you want and a bar of soap this big. And you lay there for hours. Nobody is yelling at you to hurry up and get out. You put on clean clothes and you know you’re going to put on clean clothes the next day. And you go to a restaurant and you eat real food. Yeah, it’s great. Interviewer: Okay. When was the leave home? Back to the states? Veteran: That was that year in late ’67. I was there at Christmas time. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And when I went back, the division had moved to I Corps and was taking over from the Marines. And— Interviewer: Just before we get there and I want to get there because that is an important phase, when you go back, are you become aware of some of the anti-war stuff going on or that kind of thing? Veteran: No. You read about it. You read about it in Vietnam but there were—never personally encountered it. Interviewer: Okay. So, when you came back and when you traveled around, would you travel in uniform back in the states? Veteran: No, not once I got out of the airport. And you know, where I—when I got off the airport, got out of the airplane at Arkansas, there weren’t going to be any protesters back there. Interviewer: Yeah, yeah. No, it would be more like in transit, like when you first come into the west coast and— (00:54:11) Veteran: Oh, I was in Oakland one time and they were throwing stuff at us and I had a lay-over at Stapleton in Denver and they were throwing stuff. Yeah, it got bad. As time went by, it got worse. �Interviewer: Okay. So, you did see some of that but a lot depended on where you were? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Yeah. Okay. But anyway, so let’s go back. So, you go—so you basically get back to Vietnam, January now of ’67. Okay. And now the division as a whole has moved up to the far northern part of north Vietnam. So where are you going to be—where are you based when you join them? Veteran: Quang Tri province, which is…15 miles south of the DMZ, 40 miles, 50 miles from the Laotian border. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: And it’s where—the Marines could not control it, where we—it took us a week to pass by here. Interviewer: Now where were—did you start out on the coastal area or were you— Veteran: No, we started out in the—pretty much the center of the country. But now later on— Interviewer: No, no, I mean when you went up north, did you—were you policing the coastal area first and going inland? Or…? Veteran: No and actually we went inland. And later on, we went down to highway 1 and we did in a month what the Marines couldn’t do in 5 years. ‘Course it didn’t really matter because the day you leave, they’re going to come back that night. Interviewer: Do you have a sense of what you were able to do or why you could do things differently than the Marines? Veteran: Okay, I’ll give you an example. I pointed this out to somebody the other day. Artillery forward observer, the Marines, was a lieutenant assigned to an artillery battery. Artillery battery had 4 Marine companies it supported. They had 4 lieutenants and a radio operator. Now, the FO �could only fire his battery. He didn’t even know the radio frequencies for other batteries. The only battery he could fire was his battery. Now, contrast that with—when we went on Operation Pegasus, we had finished a training. Okay, a helicopter you got a pilot, copilot. You got crew chief and gunner. Okay. Crew chief stays pretty busy. The copilot was trained to be an FO, the gunner was trained to be an FO. So, when we are peak op—at peak operation, we’ve got 800 FOs in the air. Not 24 on the ground. 800 FOs that can shoot any battery from any country from any army from any armed service, Air Force and Navy. And for the Marines to get the Air Force or Navy involved, they had these anglo teams, 2 Marine officers and 2 Navy officers. And they have to be requested to bring in any assets. We are refining World War 1. (00:57:16) Interviewer: Alright. So…Now, you’re not up there very long before the Tet Offensive starts? Veteran: Oh, no. We were—they…Night at the Tet Offensive went down. There’s this ARVN compound that’s getting overrun and the battalion commander grabs me and says, “Go get 6 cooks and clerks and get on that bird. You’re going to go relieve them and you’re going to go and meet the first platoon of Delta company out there.” These people don’t even know if they’ve got weapons that will work. Somehow, one of them didn’t even know where his weapon was. Here, take this one. Get on the board—get on the bird. The first bird in was from a platoon from Delta company. And the thing went down on the mechanical about 300 yards short of the perimeter of this ARVN unit. Crashed and landed on top of the headquarters of the NVA regiment it was assaulting. Killed the regimental commander, the political officer. (00:58:26) Interviewer: Now, were you on this helicopter? �Veteran: No, I was over here. So, we come in—we land inside the perimeter and I got this one— one of the people in my spot is a cook, this obnoxious, fat, smelly cook. He was sus—he was thought to be the cause of the spread of gamma—what do they give you? Gamma globulin…? Interviewer: Gamma globulin. (00:58:53) Veteran: Is that hepatitis? Interviewer: Something. I forget. But anyway— Veteran: He was thought—he was the genesis of this malady that we were all suffering from. And he charges through the wire. Goes out to the bird, pulls the copilot out of the bird. Drags him to safety. Pulls the pilot out of the bird, drags him to safety. And he comes up and he says, “I got to sit down, I don’t feel too good.” I said, “What’s wrong with you?” Being kind of contemptuous, I’d like to shoot this guy myself. He had a bullet hit him. He had a broken ankle. Most contemptible piece of shit in the battalion. And he’s the hero now. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Now, what happened to the North Vietnamese? Did they just leave at that point? Or…? Veteran: They evaded it. Yeah, we got enough people on the ground to get enough air support and the artillery in. air support was hard to come by that night but we got enough artillery in. they decided to break off. Interviewer: Okay. Now, before that started, was there any inkling where you were that there was something going on? (01:00:04) Veteran: Nothing. �Interviewer: Okay. So, there was a surprise. Alright. Now had—did they—were you on a firebase when that started? Veteran: Yeah, I was on LZ Sharon. Interviewer: Okay. And did that get attacked? Or was that quiet? Veteran: We didn’t get attacked there. Now, we had another firebase whose name I cannot remember…a mile north where the brigade headquarters was and there were only a small group of people who were securing that. We had a battalion here, battalion here, battalion here and then they were all turned, securing the firebase. There was some…I don’t know. They attacked with mortars and then rocket propelled grenades. And they did more damage to the air but it was insignificant compared to what had happened elsewhere. Interviewer: Alright. Now, we have gotten in your story to the point where we have made it now to the beginning of the Tet Offensive in early 1968. The first fight or whatever has happened. Your base wasn’t attacked directly but your unit was involved in rescuing some ARVN troops nearby. What happens now? Veteran: Okay, we hunker down and we started getting ready for—there’s whispers of something big happening. And our companies are getting in bigger and more frequent contacts. We are having lots of casualties. And February, we found out that we were going to Khe Sanh to relieve the Marines. And I spent about a month…We didn’t have an air operations officer, so I was doing my duty shitting operations in at night plus being the planning the battalions air movements. I don’t think I slept for about a month. And we were—they separated us from our regular brigade and they attached us to the 3rd brigade. And there was a lot of friction there. We didn’t get along too well with these people and they—we didn’t have a lot of confidence in them and our battalion commander grated on them and they grated on us. Anyway, we were second �day on Pegasus. We relocated for a couple days to this border operating base called Stud, about 215 miles—whatever—away from Khe Sanh. (01:02:43) Interviewer: Right. Veteran: And…Let me refresh my memory. We landed on a mountain top 2 miles from Khe Sanh, 2 miles southwest of Khe Sanh. And we set up a battalion support base and we were running patrols out of there. And we were getting significant contact every day. But, first day was hectic, second day was serious, third day…nobody to fight. Interviewer: Well, when you have contact, when you find the enemy, then do you have— can you bring a lot of fire power on them? Or what happens— Veteran: Well, now, the Army doctrine is you return fire, you recover your people, you pull back. Pull back a safe distance so you can get artillery in. And when you can scramble the fast movers, the jets, you keep shooting artillery until they are on station. And then you lift your fires and the Air Force and Navy comes in. Navy in this case. And then you start moving forward and their gunships are out there, working the area over. And the gunships are real close contact. They are working 100 feet away. 200 feet away. And you go up and secure the area. You pick up the bodies and the weapons and you declare a victory and you march on. Whereas Marines would stand up and charge. I would be willing to say that if the Marines had followed our doctrine, they would have killed 10,000 more enemy and had a fourth of casualties. Just obscene, the way they wasted their troops. (01:04:37) Interviewer: Did they have the same kinds of assets that the Cav had in terms of helicopters and fire power? Veteran: They really didn’t. And they didn’t have the doctrine to coordinate the fires. They would often go—the first reaction would be if…would be get their jets in. And jets are not really �a good first response. First response is observed artillery. And then gunships, where pilots can see what they are doing. Those fast movers come in, they—they really have a hard time hitting those exact targets you need hit. They’re good air suppression. And they are great when enemy is moving away from them. They are great at keeping them from going far. But… Interviewer: Alright. So now, you were talking about being air operations officer. Now was this for the battalion specifically? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Planning the air movement for Khe Sanh. Interviewer: Okay. And when you moved, did you move the entire battalion at the same time? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay, and how many helicopters does it take to move a battalion? Veteran: Well, I am going to say…80 to 90. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: In an assault like that, you’re going to go in with the little birds, Hueys. Now, normal course of events, you have 4, 3, 2. I am sorry. The order of trail would be 2, 4, 3. That’s 2 gunships, 4 Chinooks with the first platoon—first platoon end, and then hovering up here, you’ve got 3 Chinooks with 3 more platoons. And after the gunships clear the area, shoot the area up, the first platoon goes on the ground. First platoon on the ground goes on the ground. They secure a landing zone. And then the big birds come in. (01:06:37) Interviewer: Okay. Now, so you’re on the ground for a couple of days. The bad guys go away. Do you go into Khe Sanh? �Veteran: Actually, we never—we never went into Khe Sanh. We just kept moving. Kept securing our area of responsibility. Another battalion actually went into Khe Sanh, relieving the Marines. The Marines left. And we never had more than 2 or 3 companies at the—at Khe Sanh from then on. The Marines had 3 battalions—3 reinforced battalions. Interviewer: Well, that was when it was fully under siege. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: And so, it’s a little different. Veteran: And their solution was to keep digging deeper. Hunker down more. Interviewer: Okay. Now were you kind of continuing to kind of sweep south through that area? Veteran: South and west. Interviewer: So, towards the Laos ocean border and well, you know. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Alright. And how long does that campaign continue? Veteran: I believe we were back within 10 days. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, and then after those first couple of days, did the enemy just get out of the way? Or do you start finding them again? Veteran: We…We couldn’t find them. First day we were there, I looked over the edge of the hill on the opposite side from Khe Sanh and saw a company sized patrol moving down the—moving down the little valley there. We never saw anymore troops after that. (01:08:05) Interviewer: Alright. Now at this point then—so do you go—what base do you go back to? �Veteran: We went back to Sharon and then we continued to operate just day to day infantry sweeps out of Sharon for a month or two. And then we moved down to LZ Eagle, which was…That’s not what it was called. Interviewer: It was Camp Eagle, which is—was a big base. Veteran: It was our division base camp. Interviewer: Right, right. Veteran: I am not sure. I don’t know if that was the name of it at that point, but wasn’t, when we first moved in there, Camp Eagle. Interviewer: Yeah, they called it Eagle. Yeah. Veteran: I can’t remember. Camp Evans, maybe? Interviewer: Well, Evans was another camp. That was a second one that was, I think, north of there. Veteran: Okay. Okay, we launched from there and went to A Shau. And that was—that was an experience. By that time, we had an air operations officer and an assistant air operations officer and a senior NCO do the air operations. And I had been doing the work of the 3 of them before they got there. Interviewer: Alright. So, what do you go to at this point? Veteran: I go back to my normal duty. Duty operations on the midnight shift in the operations center. And then during the day, I am out scrounging stuff and…Every unit I have ever been in, for some reason they assumed I was a natural born thief, and they sent me out to find things. I’d usually come back with… Interviewer: Okay. Well, what kinds of things did you have to go find? Veteran: Okay, tool sets, tool kits, air to ground panels, decontamination kits, radio antennas. �Interviewer: All kinds of stuff. Alright. And how do you come by these things? Veteran: Well, okay, in Germany, our motor pool backed up to this 7th Army or U.S. Army Europe armament pool. And when they would bring new vehicles to Europe, they would park them back there and they would be issued out to units as needed. Well, one day I said—told them, I said, “When they put those vehicles out there, what is inside them?” They said, “Well, everything they’re supposed to have: pair of scopes, decontamination kits, tool boxes, tool kits.” I said, “Oh.” So, while nobody was looking, I borrowed a set of bolt cutters from the supply room, went through the fence, clipped the padlocks on a couple of them, got the stuff we were short on, brought it back. And then the—I’d take care of the other squadron in my platoon. I’d fix them up. And then I gave some stuff to my platoon sergeant and said, “See if you can trade this for something we need.” And pretty soon I was getting a list: could you find… (01:11:08) Interviewer: So, in Vietnam, was it the same kind of stuff that you would need? Veteran: Oh yeah. And in Vietnam, if you left anything unattended, it would be stolen. Now at LZ Sharon, we received a bunch of C rations and the battalion commander somehow got involved and he said, “I am not feeding that crap to my troops. That’s dated 1954. Get rid of it.” They got some new C rations in. They said, “Well, how are we going to get rid of these?” You know, you can’t take forever to burn the things. So, they loaded them on a truck, kicked them off outside the main gate, and put a big sign up that says “1/8 only, do not take.” And the Marines took every one of them. Interviewer: And they had had stuff from 1937, so you know. Okay. Alright, now did you go further afield? I mean, did you, you know, look for beer or other stuff like that? (01:12:08) �Veteran: Oh, I—we never had a digression on that. I got—I fell of this rock. Went up in the bush and fell of this rock. Cracked my kneecap. Terribly painful. And I also did some—my toenail swelled up big. They sent me back to the rear for a couple days of light duty and the first sergeant had me clean—they had this container full of weapons that we picked up on the battlefield. So, I—first thing I do is make sure they are unloaded. And then I get some gasoline and scrub them clean. That’s the only thing I get. Spray the oil on them. Get them fixed up. And we get those on a bird and we take them to Cam Ranh Bay, big Air Force base couple hundred miles south. And we make a contact. We make a contact with this person we were supposed to see and he says, “Okay, first sergeant. What do you need?” First sergeant gets out his green Army issued notebook and he says, “Well, sir…” and he said, “Well first of all, tell me what you got?” “Well, we got 2 Thompson submachine guns, we got 3 carbines, we got an SKS, we got a French MAT-49 submachine gun, a German Schmeisser…” on and on and on. He says, “Okay, what do you need?” “Well, sir, we only started a minute ago. We need coats, we need 2 or 3 pallets of coats and a couple pallets of beer, and we need a bunch of tarpaulins and a 5-KW generator and supply, a couple pallets of…” on and on and on. “And we need a load boy to get this stuff down to the airfield and we need a 130 to get back to An Khê.” He said, “Come back in the morning.” So, we go in—we go to the NCO club, get all messed up. Get drunk. Wake up the next morning, show back up at the—our contacts’, about 10 o’clock. And he said, “Okay, everything is down at the flight line waiting for you.” So, we go down to the flight line and there’s not one, there is two C-130s with our loot on it. And we fly back to An Khê. And it took longer to get it from the airstrip from the company area than it did to get down and back. Okay, anyway. (01:14:18) Interviewer: Alright. �Veteran: Now, a particularly telling experience for me was when we came back from Khe Sanh, the Marines were brought back from Khe Sanh. And we were on this LZ Sharon and there was a top of a hill surrounded by all these units. I don’t know—20 or 30 feet higher than the rest of us. And they dunked 2 or 300 Marines on that hill. Just like they came off Khe Sanh: clothes they had been wearing for 3 months, ragged boots, filthy looking people. And the Marines were bringing them C rations and water. And our battalion commander, who was—he was a gruff, oftentimes theatrically gruff, sometimes sadistic, NC—kind of guy. He’d go up and he said, “Why you fucking jarheads living like god damned animals out here? Well, I tell you what: if you fucking assholes can find your way down to the mess hall tomorrow, we’ll feed you breakfast.” So, we started feeding—we started feeding them. We only cooked 2 day—we only fed breakfast and dinner. And we started feeding them breakfast and dinner, a couple 100 eggs that was more than we were normally fed. And then brigade commander got in on it and had the engineers build a shower point and we were—they were going in there, cleaning up, and we were issuing them Army uniforms. And in a week or so, the laps—no Marine brass ever came by to check on their troops. They would have been perfectly content to leave them out there looking— looking and living—like animals. (01:16:03) Interviewer: So, they eventually move out? Or do you move out? Veteran: Nope. They started doing PT in the morning, running around inside the wire. And then they loaded up a mule, 4 by 8 motorized platform, they stacked sandbags as high as they could and cans of water as high as they could, and they went marching off the firebase. And we never saw them again. So anyway, back to A Shau. Once again, we were second—second day at A Shau and we had every rotary asset that was in theater at that time. Everything the Air Force had, everything the Navy had, everything the Marines had, everything we had. And there was 5 or �600 helicopters and all that. And it was 50 or 60 miles of straight line down there, which is a pretty good haul for a helicopter. But we are sitting there the first day and we are watching these Chinooks bringing all these crashed Hueys back in. Dozens of them. This doesn’t look good. So, there was 3 areas where we occupied and 1 was—1 was an old airfield, one—and I think the other 2 were special forces camp. And our brigade objective was A Loi—A. L. O. I.—special forces camp. The NVA had run special forces out of there a decade earlier. And we landed right smack dab in the middle of one of there supply ports. We found 100s of trucks, 1000s of rifles, 1000s—enough tooth—enough writing stationary for a division for 10 years. Toothpaste. Incredible. And we were busy inventorying that stuff and destroying it. And they are reacting quite violently. They’re throwing everything they got. We are being shot at with artillery and mortars and rockets. And getting a lot of casualties on the ground. Well anyway, they decide that we are going to get—we are wearing our helicopters out, so they are going to land C-130s. So, they bring these Seabees out with a bulldozer and big stacks of perforated steel plating. And they build a runway. And this is brigade LZ, it’s the—I guess about 5-6000-foot LZ runway. So, the first day, they got a serial of C-130s cued up on the short final land. And the first one, the antiaircraft up on top of the hill opened up, chopped the first one up. He exploded in midair. Had artillery rounds in there. And the other two broke off. One of them was streaming smoke and the other one got away clean. So, they said, “Well, maybe that’s not—maybe landing those things and unloading them is not such a good idea. We’ll do low-lex: low level extraction.” Everything is on rollers. And you come down—you touch down, almost touch down and you’re still going 150-175 knots. Way too fast to land. And you throw out a drag shoot and it pulls all the pallets off the rollers and they hit the ground and bounce 3 or 4 feet. Well, they got 3 of them cued up on short vinyl. And the opening volley, they blow up 2 of them. And the 3rd one turns over and �he falls upside down and crashes. So, score is them 3, us—them 5, us nothing. So, they said, “Well, you know really…hammie drop might be in order here. We can drop these supplies by parachute. And we could be low enough to make sure they are landing inside your perimeter. And we could probably do a pretty good job of supplying you like that.” Well, I don’t know if you remember your history but Göring promised Hitler that he could resupply the 6th army at Stalingrad. Didn’t work then, didn’t work now. So, there’s a serial of 5 aircraft lined up, coming in at 5000 feet. They shot down 2 of them. 1 of them goes flying off, streaming. Other 2 break off and leave. Dropped the—dropped the ammo in the ocean because they didn’t want to land with all the several tons of artillery shells. So, they said, “Well, we’ll try—we’ll go a little higher next time.” So, the next day, the…pathfinder. Pathfinder’s got a microphone. He said, “Okay, heads up! Heavy drop! In bound. Heads up!” So, we look up. Can’t hear any airplanes. Can’t see any airplanes. And there’s—all the time, we are still taking in direct fire in the perimeter there. And all of a sudden, there’s a black dot. And then there is 6 black dots. And these parachutes start landing everywhere. So, we got to go out and secure this stuff or we’re giving—or else we are resupplying the NVA. And that was costly. That cost us a lot of casualties, a lot of time. And then the—finally, they said, “Well, the powers that be,” the brass said, “we’ve been gone about 10 days now and we haven’t fed the chickens and the cows need milking. We’d better go on back.” And that was the end of our adventures in the A Shau Valley. And the 101st should have learned that lesson. (01:21:49) Interviewer: Alright. So now, where have we gotten to, in terms of timeframe? Veteran: Okay, we are looking now at April-early in May,’68. Interviewer: Okay. �Veteran: Okay, I stayed there for another month or two, duty—duty NCO in the operations center on the midnight shift. Continued to go out during the day and forage for things we needed. And then I went back to—I extended my tour again and I went back to division base camp where I was operations sergeant in the replacement detachment. And I did that job until…Let’s see…probably November. (01:22:38) Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And then November, boy they threw me in a briar patch. Interviewer: Well, before we get you to the briar patch, what is life like at a large base at that point? Veteran: Well, you shower and comb—you shower everyday if you feel like it, with cold water. There are three meals a day in the mess hall. Never had any—no enemy action at the time I was back at the base camp. Normal politics was life in the garrison. Interviewer: Now, do you have, for this period where—on the base, do you notice anything like racial tensions or— Veteran: Yep. Okay, racial tensions were…You didn’t have those in combat units. And let’s say in our division, we did not have problems. But you get—further back in, you get in the supply and service units and there were…It was awful. We would have the occasional resistor. My job—Okay, at the replacement detachment, we get—you send a bus down to the airport and they bring us 40 people, 50 people, maybe 100 people. we would bring them to our detachment. Excuse me. Process them in, get all their medical records, personnel records, stuff like that straight and get them assigned to a unit. Third or fourth day, we take them back to the airport and send them to their unit. Drugs were starting to become a problem then. There was more drug activity. But if you went to the big logistics bases, racial issues were commonplace. And I would �characterize the same issues we had in Germany. There were no racial problems, there were black thugs causing problems. (01:24:41) Interviewer: Alright. Now, when…Did things like the assassination of Martin Luther King have any repercussions where you were? Veteran: No. Interviewer: Okay. Because you were still in the field at that point when that stuff was going on too. Veteran: Yeah. Yeah. Interviewer: Alright. And…I mean, did the tensions get to the level—I mean, were there— did people just get—were there fights? Or…? Veteran: You would have occasional fights in the EM club and the problem was if a white guy and a black guy got in a fight, 3 more blacks would jump in. I never saw the opposite, the converse, happen. But you get in a—like, Da Nang or Cam Ranh Bay or Qui Nhơn or any place where there are a lot of rear echelon troops, there’d be—after duty I was there’d be gangs and 100s of blacks, looking for trouble. Interviewer: Now, did you see any of that yourself or would you just hear— Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: Yeah. Now, I was fortunate. I didn’t have to put up with too much of it. And then I moved. When I left An Khê, I was working as a personnel assignment in the MOS personnel specialist. And we had a couple situations where in the fog of battle, casualties would be put on an aircraft and flown out. And the pilot for one reason might land it this place or this place or that place or that hospital. And there was no way to really track these people. And we had two �cases where 2 guys got med evaced out of the country but were declared missing in action. That cost a general his job. So, at the time, there were two evacuation flights. One to Da Nang, one to Saigon. They sent me to Saigon. Boy, you talk about a briar patch. 300 miles away from my nearest boss. Making a maximum of per diem, which was more than my base salary at the time. Still getting jump pay. It took me 20 minutes a day to do my job. Okay, the way it worked is C130s would fly around during the night. They would pick up casualties at Army hospitals that were going to be evaced and they would bring them to the stable flight, like Cam Ranh Bay or Da Nang. They would get there 7 or 8 o’clock in the morning. They would take them off, put them in the casualty station flight ward, doing the interview and medical assessment. And most of them were all assist—stable enough to be evaced. Occasionally, you’d have to keep one or send him to a hospital. We had a couple cases where one would die. But my job: to keep any MIAs from being declared erroneously. When the plane landed, I would be on the flight line and I would get a copy—I’d get my copy of the manifest. And I would go through the manifest and identify all the people from my unit. And I would go later and interview them in the hospital. “Hi, you Sergeant Jones? Sergeant Jones, could you tell me your last 4. Very good, sir. And there was a lot of PR to that too so I got a bunch of location forms for you to fill out. Here’s a pack of cigarettes if you need them. You need any help writing a letter, I can get somebody to help you out.” You know, it was…And then the next morning, they would leave. And—but that night, I would compile a report that I would send to our personnel people; the names of all the people who were being evacuated. That solved that problem. But man, that was a tough job. The air conditioning only worked about every other day in my room. (01:28:35) Interviewer: Yeah. Well, you’re getting closer to having a first world problem at that point. Veteran: Yeah. �Interviewer: Okay. Now, was this in Saigon that you were doing this? Veteran: Tan Son— Interviewer: Tan Son— Veteran: On Tan Son Air Force Base. Interviewer: Oh, okay. Veteran: And we were at the Rue de Pasteur Gate. Interviewer: Okay. And so, this is outside of the city proper. But would you get into Saigon? I mean, or— Veteran: Oh no. Yeah, I’d go anywhere I wanted. Interviewer: Okay. Weren’t there restrictions on what Americans could do in Saigon or who could go there? Veteran: There were restrictions on units. If you saw a couple snuffies—brown mud stained uniforms walking down the street yeah MPs would stop them. But I had Air Force identification, identifying me as a member of 22nd Casualty Staging Flight. Now, once again there, I got to do some foraging. I was there when the service issued a report on smoking cigarettes. Red Cross quit giving out cigarettes. I was getting—and the Red Cross was coming into war time. I felt good about that because they really didn’t do anything to help. So, I go down Rue de Pasteur to the USO and I explained to the manager of the facility. I said, “I need cigarettes. I need cigarettes to take down to take down and give out to patients.” And I don’t know what she thought the scale of operation was but she put me on a truck with about 40 cases of cigarettes. I mean, you know, a case like this. So, I go back to the station flight and it’s basically one small building with 40 beds in it. 50 beds, maybe. So, I am stacking that stuff up in the hallway. I make a head nurse take a couple cases in her office. She’s putting them under bunks. And the Air Force stole my �cigarettes. Not a pack or two at a time, it’s cartons at a time. So, I go to the head nurse and I said, “Listen, I got to have a conex container—I got to have 2 conex containers to keep you people from stealing these cigarettes.” She said, “I’ve had, Sergeant, I’ve had a conex container on requisition since I got here.” I said, “Okay.” So, there was a Vietnamese Army signal unit about a mile away on the perimeter at Tan Son Nhut. So, I go up there. I get it—get a guy to give me a ride up there in an Air Force ambulance. And I go in and find these advisor, a black E-6, about 50 years old. Got a kindred soul here. So, I said, “Listen, I am working out at the hospital here. I need a couple conex containers. Do you think we could find something to trade to get a couple conex containers down there?” So, I showed him a case of cigarettes and he says, “I think we can do something here.” So, we go into Sergeant Major’s office. He’s a Vietnamese Sergeant Major. And his eyes light up and you see all these golden teeth when he grins. So, Sergeant Major takes the cigarettes and puts them behind, gives the advisor one carton. And we go out back and a crane lifts 2 brand new conex containers up on this 5-ton truck that appears to be brand new. And I thought man, this is terrible. We are out in the bush trying to do our best to supply our troops with junk that’s falling apart and the new stuff is sitting down here. So, I get in the cab of this 5ton. We go down to the hospital and a crane is following us. I said, “Okay, I want one right here and one right there.” So, the crane takes them up and puts them down there. The truck driver gets in the cab of the crane and they take off. So, that’s kind of strange. Maybe something is wrong with his truck here? So, a couple days go by. “Whose truck is that? We kind of need to move that truck.” So, I go up, I go find the advisor and I say, “That 5-ton that you guys brought the cigarette containers down the other—what’s the story on that?” He said, “Oh, that’s your 5-ton.” So, I find some yellow paint and by the end of the day, it’s got one of these on each door. And it’s got this on the bumper. And I’ve got a logbook. And I—everybody lived happily ever after �except me. I lived in this BEQ. I think it was called the name Wyoming. And it was down this alley. And the 5-ton wouldn’t fit down the alley. So, I went up to Bien Hoa, I think. Went up to Bien Hoa and I finally found somebody that wanted a 5-ton and they gave me a ¾ ton, which I could park in front of the BEQ. And then when I got ready to leave, I sold it for 100 bucks. (01:33:50) Interviewer: Alright. Now, you live—living in Saigon like that…I mean, would you go into town for dinner or other things at night? Veteran: No. No. No, it was—I would stay—I didn’t stray very far. Maybe PX. Now, to digress a little bit, when I was at the replacement detachment, they had a C day. Conversion day. We had this military payment certificate in lieu of dollars. And lightning struck and they said, “Tomorrow, we are going to change.” So, there is this Korean tailor. There’s Korean tailors all over the place. I don’t know who they worked for. But he was crying because he had this box full of MPC that he had legitimately earned doing tailor work. But there was no provision for him to convert it. So, I said, “Bring it over here.” So, I would do up bundles of 200. And you know, there’s a lot of 5s and a lot of 10s. And I’d give—each one of the replacements going through, I said, “Here. Get that changed.” And one of my sergeants would be at the other end when he came out of the building, take the new stuff. And so, we counted it out and we got within 10 dollars of what he gave me. And he was just in tears. So, the day I leave, I am at the airport to leave to go to Saigon. The guy that’s the Korean that’s the boss of all the tailor shops was down there. And I said—he knew who I was and what I had done for his tailor shop. And he said—I said, “I am going to Saigon. You have any of your people down there?” “Oh yes.” I said, “Could you write me a letter of introduction?” So, he takes my notebook and he writes this Korean. And I go into any tailor shop in the country and I get whatever I wanted free. Well, I had �to go to this hospital up in Bien Hoa and the Army had just changed the uniforms that the nurses wore. It was a green, slightly heavier fabric with different configuration than the jungle fatigues made for females. And there are 100s of them there. So, I remember hearing head nurse saying to me they were wearing the class B modified dress uniform in the ward: dark blue trousers, light blue blouse. And they were chafing about that because they couldn’t get white coats or scrubs— they didn’t have scrubs then. They said, “How can we get jungle fatigues? Wish we could get some jungle fatigues.” So, I thought about that and I got a truck load of them down to Saigon. So, I go in and I see her and I said—I don’t know, there was 15 or 20 nurses working. I said, “Make me a list of all of your nurses with the proper name and their rank.” So, I take the stuff to the Korean tailor. And I have 4 sets of fatigues sewn up for each nurse with nametag, U.S. Air Force, and rank. And I take those over and I have them dumped off at the back of the ward. And I said, “Ma’am, could you step out for a minute? I got something for you.” She said, “I—” she said, “I ought to call—I ought to call CID and OSI and the MPs.” I said, “Well, 4 of them got your name on it.” She said, “I don’t know how you do that but you’ve saved us more than one time.” (01:37:21) Interviewer: Alright. Now, was this your last assignment in Vietnam? Veteran: That was my last assignment in Vietnam. Interviewer: Okay. Are there other incidents or things that stand out in your mind from your time there? Veteran: Nothing I want to record on tape. Interviewer: Okay. That works. That works. Now, you’ve had kind of a varied career there. Alright now at this point, were you kind of ready to be done with the Army? Veteran: Yeah. I was ready to move on. �Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I had a lot of money saved up. I was ready to get out of the Army and find something else to do. Interviewer: Okay. So, when do you actually leave Vietnam? Veteran: I left in April…April, ’69. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And I was supposed to go home and get discharged and they screwed—I had less than 60 days left on my enlistment. And they reassigned me to Fort Gordon, Georgia and more than one person said, “You better go to Fort Gordon and get this straightened out.” So, I did and I got—I got that taken care of and I got out of the Army in May, about a month later. (01:38:26) Interviewer: Alright. And now that you are out, what do you do? Veteran: Well, a friend of mine had said to me, “If you would like to be a police officer, I can get you a job.” I said, “I don’t know. I’ll go check it out.” So anyway, this guy lived in D.C. and I wanted to go back to college and I wasn’t too keen on joining the police department. But it wasn’t a real police department. It was the U.S. Capitol police. And it was a generously—I would generously describe them as a 2nd tier security organization. But they made more money than the real cops downtown. Had blue uniforms, carried guns, worked static posts. I got thinking about it. I said, “You know, that might not be too bad.” So, I go up there, I fill out an application and do the test, do all the orals and everything. They said, “Okay, it’s going to take 46 months to do a background on you. Come back—we’ll contact you when you’re ready. Come back, start the academy.” And—so somebody else had told me about an opportunity. I went across the river to the Virginia National Guard. I joined the Virginia National Guard and they were sending volunteers to fire—fight fires in Idaho. And I went out, worked Bitterroot Selway �National Forest area in Idaho for 5 months, fighting fires. And then came back and went to work. And then subsequently enrolled. I guess I worked there about a year and I enrolled at American University. And I finished that in 3 years. (01:40:10) Interviewer: Okay. So, when did you start at American University? Veteran: Well, let’s see…I guess it was ’70—about 1970…Yeah, late fall of ’70. Interviewer: Okay. So, now you’re on a—you’re a Vietnam veteran and you’re on a college campus in Washington D.C. Veteran: Yeah. The fun started. I’d get—sometimes, I’d get an arrest every day. I had one particularly outrageous incident—okay, back up a little bit. There was a demonstration in May of ’70—November of ’70. 250,000 people and they got rowdy. And I got to break two nightsticks that day. Catharsis. Interviewer: Okay. Now, were you working for the Capitol police while you were in school? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And I would go to school…they would agitate the shit out of you. I would agitate them back. I would go—sometimes I would go wearing my National Guard uniform carrying a revolver, my service revolver. Sometimes I go in my police uniform. Sometimes I go wearing jeans and a sweater with police web gear. The police leather gear. And I had one really nasty incident in ’73. A protester spit on me. And I got out a can of mace and got her on the ground. And I got her up on her feet and got her handcuffed up on her feet and she spit on me again. And I lost it. I totally lost it. I beat her with a blackjack. Broke teeth, knocked out teeth. And there was a crowd. I am holding off a crowd at gunpoint. And I am dragging her by her ankles. She’s—I got her handcuffed. Right out in the middle of Nebraska Avenue. Two lanes going each �way. And people—people are stopping and screeching on their brakes from swerving around us. And I got this pig laying out in the middle of the street and I am holding the gun. “Come on, any of you step off the curb, I am going to kill you.” Finally, the police got there, dispersed the crowd. And thank God: a judge convicted her of assault and resisting arrest. And I think she— took 100 stitches to put her face back together. And to this day, if she is still alive, if she looks— anytime she looks in the mirror, she’s going to remember about spitting on me. And there was a—I got a new measure of respect on campus after that. “How you doing?” “Good to see you.” (01:42:54) Interviewer: Wow. So, that was—so people were aware that you had done that? I mean I guess you were right there in that area, so people saw that and— Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay… Veteran: Oh my god, there was a crowd of 100 watching me beat on her and drag her out in the street. And then the—there were, “Well, he’s going to go to jail over that.” “He’s going to get fired and he’s going to go to jail.” Interviewer: Did anybody talk to you about that afterward? Veteran: Oh, yeah. They called me all kinds of names. Interviewer: No, I mean the, like, the people in the police. Veteran: Oh my god, all but...I must have had investigators from metropolitan, not my department. Homicide was—crimes against a person and homicide. Talked to them endlessly. Talked to U.S. attorney. I figured I was done for. I mean I had—and it was pretty bad. If that happened today, you’d go to prison. Interviewer: Yeah. �Veteran: But when she spit on me again, I hit her in the mouth with that blackjack and it felt so good. Interviewer: So, did you get reprimanded or punished in some way? Or…? Veteran: Yeah, yeah. They wouldn’t let me carry a blackjack or a mace on campus anymore. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: But they—and they wouldn’t—and the Dean of Students told me to leave my gun at home. And I said, “You lost on that one already.” (01:44:11) Interviewer: So, did you finish the degree there then? Veteran: Got a degree in accounting. A double major in accounting and statistics. Interviewer: And then where do you go from there? Do you stay with the police? Veteran: No. My word, I got away from those people as quick as I could. I went to work for a local accounting firm in D.C. And I worked there and then I worked a couple of—went to work for the accounting firm, they said, “You’re a good guy and you’ve got a good raise here. You’re a good accountant but you ain’t us. But we will find you a job, don’t worry about it. Not many people are us.” Thank God. They—I got a job with the Washington Post. And I went down there and worked for a couple days. And they said, “Well, you know…We got just the place for you.” They got an internal warehouse across the river in Alexandria where they unloaded ships of newsprint and took them to the various printing plants. Various printing plants. And after a year down there, I was the controller/officer manager/software developer/manager of data processing/customs broker/ships agent and captain—I was the acting ensign in the Coast Guard auxiliary and the Captain of the port of Alexandria. Interviewer: Well, that’s pretty good. So, how long does all that last? �Veteran: Well, I lasted—I lasted about 3 years there and I found an opportunity that was a French company that I thought I was really going to go places. I went to work for them as director of finance and administration and I worked for them for 3 years. And they went bellyup. I had a good time working there. I was den mother for all these young Frenchmen that came over. I had a good time with them. When they would process in, I’d have paperwork for them. And about the third item down was draft registration. Well, it really wasn’t too bad because most of these guys were Cali Polytechnicians. And if you graduated from the Cali Polytechnic, you’re already a commissioned—you’ve got a degree in engineering and you’re a commissioned officer in the Army, Navy, or Air Force. So, that was a little humor. But they all—when they came over, the first thing they wanted to do—they wanted to buy the biggest car they could find. So, they would go out and scour the used car lots for ’72 Monte Carlos and Grand Prixs and Cad—what was the big Cadillac…? Interviewer: One of those Eldorados? Coupe de Ville? (01:46:47) Veteran: Coupe de Ville. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And sound equipment. They could buy it for pennies, what would cost them pounds in the French market. And they were always getting…But if they behaved themselves and were nice to me, I’d take them shooting. And at that time, I legally owned a submachine gun. And if they would buy ammunition, I’d let them shoot my submachine gun. Well…And then I would take them skeet shooting. Well, the company wound up buying a couple skeet guns and a pretty generous layout of shotgun shells. And when the people came over from France, first order of business was go skeet shooting. I think I corrupted half the company. Interviewer: There you go. Alright. So, and then they fold. So, what happens to you? �Veteran: Well, I went to work for this company called Quantum Computer Services and they went bankrupt and they re—they were reincarnated as Controlled…Something else. And then they filed and went—they changed their name to AOL and went public. And they gave me 500 shares of stock and said, “You’re not polished enough for us.” That 500 shares of stock doubled about 12 times. I said, “Cried all the way to the bank.” (01:48:19) Interviewer: So, how did you wind up in Nashville? Veteran: Well, I laid around and I had spent all my AOL money. And I got bored and I bought a restaurant and…I bought several restaurants and ran restaurants and I loved it and I did very well at it. But in the ’03, I started having some health problems. I was 55 years old. And the doctor said, “You need to find a change of venue and a new occupation.” So, I spent a year getting rid of everything and my daughter is living here in Nashville—in Nashville then. And I moved—I wanted to be closer to the family and I wanted to get out of restaurants because I had done some dumb things like done my own TV commercials and publicity stunts. Too many people knew me. And I came down here and started buying real estate. And about to get out of that business and retire fully for the last time. And now I’ve got grandkids to take care of. Interviewer: Alright. So, now you look back at the time you spent in the service. How do you think that affected you or what did you take out of it? Veteran: Well, in my case it was—okay, a whole bunch of things were going on here. There’s a warrior spirit. I don’t want to brag about it; it’s there. Every generation in my family as far back as we can trace, has been warriors. And I would not call myself a warrior on that scale but I feel the urge. We have family members who fought on both sides of the Civil War and by virtue, a couple uncles in the South Carolina Royalist. We had people who fought on both sides of the Revolution. And we certainly had people that fought against the crown in England. And France �and Scotland. And Wales. So, it comes naturally. If you research Hodgecore—Hodgespur— you’ll see I inherited some of his genes. (01:50:23) Interviewer: Alright. But in a way, that part kind of brought out something that was in you. Now do you think that you learned anything from the process? Or…? Veteran: I learned a lot about people. You have an incredible amount of control over people, total strangers, just by the way you speak. How you speak to them. Say that young lady that brought us this pitcher of water? “When you smile, you make me wish I was young and skinny and good-looking.” Interviewer: Yeah, and now you’re on tape saying that so your wife can see that. Or is she used to it? Veteran: She’s heard it 1000 times. Interviewer: Alright. (01:51:03) Veteran: Now, an interesting experience…Last extension leave I went on, before I went on leave, I got to looking at these orders and there are all these numbers down. You know, I finally asked them, I said, “What are all these numbers down here?” They said, “Well, most of them are fiscal authorizations.” And I said, “Tells me—tells somebody where I am able to go to and fly to and…?” “Yeah.” I said, “Well, if I were in Seattle and I wanted to go to Tokyo instead of Saigon, what authorization number would I have to have?” They said, “Well, it would be 0682.” Made a note. I said, “If I wanted to go from Tokyo to Manila, what authorization code would I need?” Wrote that down. Recast the orders with all the right numbers on them. Now, when you, your 30—when you extend, you get 30-days free leave that starts when you hit the U.S. and it stops when you leave the U.S. And it would be unfair to hold you to a stricter standard than that because you will probably have—be delayed a couple days getting back and you might be �getting delayed a couple days coming back. Well, I go to passenger services and I say—I circle the number and I say, “I’d like to have a ticket to Japan. Ichikawa, as a matter of fact.” So, I go there, it’s raining, it’s cold. I said, “I don’t like this place.” So, I go down to passenger services and I said, “I want to go to Taipei.” So, I go to Taipei. Now, I had learned in Taipei at the American Embassy, if you take a set of military orders, they’ll sell you 6 bottles of liquor on those orders. But they cancel out so you can’t use that set of orders again. Well, when I landed in Taipei, I had about 50 sets of orders. So, I would go there every day and I would buy 5 bottles of the cheapest, nastiest blended whiskey you could buy, for less than a dollar a bottle. And a 40ounce bottle of Jack Dan—Johnnie Walker Black Label for 3 dollars. It’s 60 now. And I would go out and I would give the cab driver a bottle—my cab driver a bottle. Go back to the hotel, give the hotel a bottle. Give the guy who managed the hotel a bottle. And then the…The compliment—the hostess staff would get a couple. And then, one of the hostesses and I would spend the rest of the day drinking that bottle of Black Label Scotch. So, about 3 weeks, I get— man, I got to get out of here. My liver is killing me. So, I get a flight to Manila. I wander around Manila for a couple days. I said, “I better be getting back. I’ve been gone 2 months.” So, I go back and I know they’re going to throw me in jail. So, I go up and see the first—I go check in with the first sergeant. New first sergeant—the old one rotated. “Hey top, how you doing? I’m back.” He said, “Who the hell are you?” Didn’t say a word. I got away being gone for 2 months. (01:54:21) Interviewer: Alright. So, it’s an educational experience on a lot of different levels. Veteran: That’s a— Interviewer: It certainly makes for a good story. Veteran: Indeed, it does. �Interviewer: So, thank you very much for taking the time to share it today. (01:54:31) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_SoutherlandJ2153V Title A name given to the resource Southerland, James (Interview transcript and video), 2017 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2017-09-15 Description An account of the resource Jim Southerland was born in St. Louis, Missouri in 1946 and graduated high school in 1966. He joined the Army on May 19th, 1965. Southerland completed his Basic Training at Fort Polk, Louisiana, and then advanced infantry training at Fort Gordon, Georgia. At Fort Benning, Georgia, he also completed jump school. His first deployment was to Germany where he took part in the Nijmegen March in Holland. After reenlisting, Southerland was deployed to Vietnam with the 1st Brigade, 1st Calvary Division as an RTO (radiotelephone operator) for his platoon leader and eventually became a squad leader. He was involved in the Tet Offensive in early 1968 before his last assignment as an MOS personnel specialist in Saigon. Southerland left Vietnam in April, 1969, and left the service in May, 1969, but remained active in the Virginia National Guard. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Southerland, James W. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b203229da78ec83608b418be208f6606.mp4 8536692a753a4e9fa15c8ca2bfe3919b https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/1f26a55d62bb17208bec1a10b6d4c803.pdf 3823906995f5cf16da021c60fcef49eb PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran : Harold Soper Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Christopher Kroupa Interviewer: We’re talking today with Harold Soper of Grand Rapids Michigan and the interviewer is James Smither of the Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project. Ok, can you start us off with some background on yourself, and to begin with where and when were you born? Veteran: I was born in 1920, April 16 in Indianapolis Indiana. I lived there three years and then we moved to Berrien Springs, Michigan. Lived there for about six years and then we moved to Grand Rapids, Michigan. Where I lived all my life. Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Until I went into college and went on my own. Interviewer: Alright, now what was your family doing for a living when you were growing up? Veteran: My dad was, worked for Kraft, Kraft cheese, he was a district manager for Kraft Foods. And he had all of Western Michigan and he had northern Indiana. And his job was to go around to make sure all the salesmen were selling the products and were doing their jobs. Interviewer: Ok �Veteran: So, he was a manager for them. Interviewer: Ok so now was that a steady job for him for him in the thirties? Veteran: Oh definitely. Interviewer: Okay so, there’s a depression going on and maybe not hitting you as directly as some people. Veteran: Didn’t hit us at all. Interviewer: Ok alright and then where did you go to high school? Veteran: I went to high school in Grand Rapids named Creston, Creston High school. Interviewer: That’s still there, yeah, ok. And when did you graduate high school? Veteran: 1938. Interviewer: Alright and after you got out of high school, where did you go? Veteran: I went to Michigan State for four years. �Interviewer: Ok and were you still in college when Pearl Harbor happened? Veteran: Yes. Interviewer: Ok and do you remember how you heard about it? Veteran: Oh yes, I remember, I was, I belonged to a fraternity, and we were, we were, just kinda parting, doing some uh part… (2:00) Interviewer: Partying yeah. Veteran: And at the time of day I heard about it oh it was awfully exciting and awfully disturbing let’s put it that way. Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: Yeah that was terrible because we were graduating, and we knew that it would affect us. �Interviewer: Alright, now what did you do about that? Did you go off and enlist, or did you wait to get drafted? Veteran: No I, well I waited to graduate and I was drafted before I graduated. Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: I had to graduate after I was drafted. Interviewer: Alright and did they allow you to stay in school to finish the term or? Veteran: Uh-huh (Nods head yes). Interviewer: Ok. Veteran: The draft ward had to get another list of men, and I was it. Interviewer: Right, ok now once you’ve been drafted then, so now it’s the middle of 42 at this point, so I guess July, where did they send you then for training? Veteran: Fort Belvoir for basic training, three months of basic training. �Interviewer: Ok and what did that consist of? Veteran: Oh, that consisted of going on marches, learning about various weapons that we used, quite a few classes, but a lot of training to build us up and strengthen us. We did marches and calisthenics and all that type of thing. Interviewer: Ok, Veteran: To get ourselves into shape. Interviewer: Alright, now let’s see, is that in Virginia? Veteran: Yes Interviewer: Yeah ok, now were all of you there just for general training, or were you all going to go into the same part of the army? Veteran: No, we just for general training, Interviewer: Ok Veteran: People went various places after that. �Interviewer: Alright, now when you were at Michigan State, had you done any ROTC there? (4:00) Veteran: No Interviewer: Ok Veteran: I had no interest in that. Interviewer: And that wasn’t a requirement at the time you went there? Veteran: (Shakes head no) Interviewer: Ok, alright so now you spend three months in Virginia, and at Fort Belvoir did you have to stay on the base the whole time? Veteran: On weekends we could, we could take off. Interviewer: And did you remember if you went anywhere? Like to Washington or Richmond? Veteran: Haha, yeah, I went to Richmond and I actually found a young gal there and went to see her every weekend I could. Got so attracted to her that after I was on furlough, I invited her up to �Grand Rapids to meet my family. And I think she was very disappointed but then I went off to the wars and we corresponded for a bit of time, but I finally cut it off. Interviewer: Ok um, but in the meantime, you had a pretty good time while in basic training? Veteran: Yup Interviewer: Yeah, at least better than most, ok now once you finished the training then what did they do with you? Is this where they sent you to Texas or? Veteran: Then, then, we were assigned to an air force administrative group, to go, well we were put on a troop ship, and the troop ship because of the German U-Boats we had to go way around South Africa, South America I mean, South Africa I mean, South Africa way down into the cold area down there and up to Bombay, and I got off at Bombay and four of us were supposed to go to this Air Corps administrative thing I talked about, Interviewer: Mm-hmm. (5:56) Veteran: But when we got there, we found out that the class had already started so then they assigned us to another group. They assigned us to a group out of Wyoming, the head of the group �was a very nice guy from Wyoming and all the troops were sheep herders. And I came in as a private, as a, *Phone ringing in background* Interviewer: Let’s wait for that to finish ringing here. *Phone reads phone number* Veteran: See that isn’t for us. Interviewer: Yeah, right. Veteran: We get those all the time. Interviewer: Yeah, oh yeah Interviewer: Okay, well, let’s Veteran: So, I went into the Army as a private Interviewer: Right �Veteran: And, just by the grace of God I got into this, this particular company, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And these guys were a bunch of, they had never been to college or just a bunch of sheep herders. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: They were prone to drink a lot and, so the guy was a corporal, he goofed off and so I got his position and over a period of about three months I got all the way up to Master Sergeant. How they, there was one guy who was a Tech Sergeant which is which is like may starting salary grade six, there was a guy there that Tech Sergeant fired and he he’d rather have that position which had different duties then the master, so I got all the way to Master Sergeant in a short period of time. Interviewer: Okay, now to get over I mean to get to the Indian Ocean, I mean you talked about going around Africa and so forth, do you remember anything about that sea voyage? (7:59) Veteran: Twice, twice our boat had to make a sudden jerk to avoid a German U-Boat. �Interviewer: Right, do you, Veteran: That was it, that was the only exciting thing. Interviewer: Okay now were you in a convoy or just by yourself? Veteran: Oh we were, the troop ship was, was a large, it had been a pleasure boat. Interviewer: Okay so an ocean liner. Veteran: Yeah and I think we had ten thousand troops I think on there. It was a nice big boat. Interviewer: Okay, and some of those were fast enough that they went without escorts. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: We, we had when we went around Rio de Janeiro, in that area, we had air cover. Interviewer: Mm-hmm, yeah cause that’s available from there and that was part of it, but were there parts of the ocean you were just out there by yourself? �Veteran: That’s right. Interviewer: Okay, do your, was the weather bad or was it ok? Veteran: No, I remember the weather was nice . Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Alright and then do remember anything about Bombay, you stayed there a while? Veteran: Oh yeah, what happened was, the four of us, got there and the place that we were supposed to go, they already started so they put us on a, told us to just stay there so we were there seven days. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: So over seven days we just wandered around the town of Bombay. We were GIs and the people there were all good to us, and it was a nice experience, and then we got on a small boat, it took us up the Tigris-Euphrates River to Khorramshahr, Iran. Interviewer: Right . Veteran: And right across the river was Basra, Iraq. �Interviewer: Mm-hmm, yup Veteran: They were right across the river from each other. And so, we were stationed there for a period of time. Interviewer: Okay, so what kind of setup did you have in Iran, just live in tents or in a town? Or? (9:59) Veteran: Yeah, we were, we were in tents and we were in tents so we got there, they had barracks made by the time we left. They did a lot of construction work there while we were there, making it a little nicer for the troops that came after us. But while we were there, we went into town, I went all the way out to Tehran, took a truck, a truck took us up to Tehran and we had another, Hamadan was another city in Iran that troops went up too that was a nice town and good to us and also we went over to Basra and I went up into Iraq, I can’t remember the names of the cities but up 100, 200 miles up into Iraq. So, we really got to see that country while we were there. Interviewer: Ok, how, what kind of impression did you have of the people in these places? Veteran: Well, the Iranian Government was really bad, they killed off people like, like nothing. They were like the Russians, if anyone stole or something why they just killed them. But the Russians said they buried them alive if they caught someone stealing. They were both the �Russians and the Iranians were cruel to their people. But, Iraq their government was a little more humane. Interviewer: Now did you have a sense that the people resented your being there or were happy to have you there or didn’t care? Veteran: Well see I was, like I said in charge of this what they call the oil dump and their sending all these things up to Russia and I had forty, forty foremen, and they were all Muslims. (12:09) Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: All college-educated Muslims, and they just loved me, Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Because I didn’t smoke or drink and they were so glad to know that Americans weren’t these tough guys that these construction workers were getting drunk all the time, smoking and all. And I told them those guys, they’re not typical Americans at all and I found out that, you know I was Christian and again I didn’t smoke or drink at all and they just loved me. I treated them good and then they oversee the 800 workers that loaded these trucks. �Interviewer: Okay, now had they been educated in Iran or any of them gone abroad? Veteran: I think, I can’t tell ya, they were all college-educated. I don’t know. Interviewer: But they spoke English? Veteran: Oh, very well. Interviewer: Yeah okay, now my understanding is that what was going on in Iran in part was that the British and the Soviets were sorta taking over the main railway that went from the Persian Gulf up north. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: So that was a supply route that you’re using. Veteran: That railroad was one of the supply routes. Interviewer: Okay and the British were in charge of the half from Tehran south, did you ever see any British Military personnel? Veteran: Oh yes, when I went into town. �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So never, I never cozied up to them because usually they were drinking and kinda that’s where I would see them you know in these restrooms and places and they’re kinda rowdy. Interviewer: Okay, so you didn’t have any official dealings with them or anything else like that? Veteran: No (13:58) Interviewer: Okay, now when you’re over in Iran, did you have much communication with people back home? Veteran: Uh yeah, what did we have, we had was it something like an email it was, Interviewer: Now they have V-Mail right? Veteran: V-Mail! (Nods head yes) Interviewer: Right and then they take a picture of it or whatever. Veteran: Exactly. �Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: And I was pretty, pretty faithful in keeping contact with my family. Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay, did you feel like you were kind of missing out on the war over there or was it interesting enough that it didn’t matter? Veteran: Well I’ll tell ya my dad was in World War One and he was a captain. Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: And he actually was right in the fight, in fact we actually was out in no man’s land and caught a German soldier and brought him back but and he was quite disappointed that first I didn’t become an officer. Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And second that I, where I went, �Interviewer: Right. Veteran: He, his first reaction was that he wished it were otherwise but then after that he accepted it. Interviewer: Mm-hmm. And did you have any feeling about that yourself or you were just gonna go where they sent you? Veteran: Exactly. Interviewer: Okay, now eventually you rotate home, you don’t stay in Iran for the entire war. How did that come about? Veteran: Yeah, you have to be over there, I didn’t know that at the time but, eighteen months before you go back to the states. Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: And so after 18 months I, I came to the headquarters there and said I wanted to go to the Quartermaster Officers training, and that’s when they told me, well Quartermaster is already in session, they’ve, in 2 or 3 weeks that will be that, but besides you’re not qualified because you’re not a limited service guy, which is one of the requirements, so I, that’s when I said I �would go with the Corps of Engineers. So, I signed up with them and went into their basic training. (16:36) Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: There’s a thirteen-month thing to become an officer. I was there 10 weeks of that terribly hard training and then I, like I told ya, the officer in charge there said, you know because you’re doing so well in the written exams and all, you’re gonna pass but 40% of these guys are gonna fail because we’re gonna take 60% of them. Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: And these guys ya know they build Bailey Bridges and they’ve been enlisted men, it’s a shame because you can be an officer but you’ll never be able to do a good job of commanding them if you don’t understand the work, and I agreed with that wholeheartedly, and so, I agreed to quit after 10 weeks, Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: And like you say, he, well he just told me to go to wherever the Quartermaster LCS was. Anyway I was sent there and when I got there like I say they were already in operation and �so I went back to the Corps of Engineers and said place me someplace and so I was very fortunate, ya know I had a college education in accounting and so they sent me to Chicago where they were, they were, had military contracts as we got near the end of the war, and many of the military contracts were being closed. So that was my job, (18:30) Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: To close military contracts, filling office standpoint. And so, I lived in Chicago for one year what they call, *Phone ringing in background* Veteran: Called rations and quarters, Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: I stayed in a hotel and got my food paid for, Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: And I had a certain amount of money to spend. �Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: And after one year there, they transferred me to Indianapolis, and I did the same thing up there. Interviewer: Okay, now where were you when the war ended? Were you in Chicago at that point? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Yeah and then I went up there and you know, it was just wonderful the work I did, I was trained in school and I can do and not many people could do that, and I lived (illegible). Interviewer: Right, now when you were doing this kind of work, did problems come up? Were there any companies you were dealing with that were Veteran: Oh yeah. (19:59) �Interviewer: Anything, Veteran: In fact, I had to many times I had to visit these companies. Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: Oh yeah. Oh, I don’t think I ever got one contract closed that I didn’t have to at least one visit. I had a company car and in fact a lot of times I had a company driver to take me these places depending on if it was close by at all then I could drive the company car, but if they thought it was all the way or a dangerous way I’d have a driver. Interviewer: Okay, so a company car, like an army car basically. Veteran: Mm-hmm. Interviewer: Yeah, alright, now you were still a Master Sergeant at this point? Veteran: *Nods head* Mm-hmm. Interviewer: And then did you go in a formal dress uniform and try to look impressive? Veteran: No, no I was always in a uniform. �Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: Always. And actually, in the Army most people have more respect for a Master Sergeant then a certainly a Second Lieutenant. Interviewer: Oh yeah. Veteran: And probably even the First Lieutenant, in fact when I was in Iran there, I had a First Lieutenant who was there to, as my boss, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And he just sat around. Interviewer: Well the Sergeants do the work, Veteran: I did all the work, he didn’t, he was there, he’d been in the war and he actually had been wounded. Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: And he was, he’d been in the hospital, the reserves for recovery. �Interviewer: Now, the unit that was in Iran, you said they were from Wyoming, would that have been a reserve unit or National Guard unit? Veteran: It was a reserve. Interviewer: Okay. So, you had your core group of guys who were in it and, Veteran: Yup. Interviewer: That’s where they got sent, okay. Now in that unit were you pretty much the only guy from someplace else? Veteran: Yeah. Uh no, there were four of us. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: There were four of us. Interviewer: Yeah, the four of you came together that’s right. Veteran: The other three guys, they never advanced at all, (22:03) �Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: They didn’t care to. Interviewer: So, they just joined the rest of the group and, Veteran: Yeah, they just joined it and then they didn’t care whether they got to be an officer, or even an enlisted officer or not, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But they’re nice guys, but they were certainly nothing like me. Interviewer: Right, now it’s a lot of times soldiers, if they’re stationed in a rear area in some other country, can get into a lot of interesting kinds of trouble, there could be women, there could be black markets or other things like that, did much of that happen? Or in Iran was the society more tightly controlled than that? Veteran: Yeah, there were women and some of these guys would get involved with them, Interviewer: Mm-hmm. �Veteran: But I, I just wasn’t aware of much of it, Interviewer: Right. Veteran: I didn’t do it myself, Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: And I just heard what they did, but I’m not too knowledgeable about that, Interviewer: Right, and I wouldn’t think that in, you would necessarily have a lot of bars and places like that. Veteran: They had the bars, Interviewer: They had bars okay, I guess they wouldn’t after the Islamic state took over, but that was a long time afterward. Veteran: Mm-hmm. Right, oh yeah. Interviewer: Alright, so when you were talking about doing again this business of closing contracts and things like that, what kinds of business were you dealing with? Were they manufacturers or? �Veteran: Oh yeah, they were, one of them was weapons manufacturer, a number of them supplied things like clothing, Interviewer: Mm-hmm (22:58) Veteran: Uniforms and I remember several of them were in the uniform and, let’s see what other things were there, supplying that the military need that weren’t necessarily military items, but I don’t remember any food companies, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, okay Veteran: That’s about it. Interviewer: Okay alright, but yeah, I mean you have all this stuff that you need to run the offices with and all the various kinds of equipment besides the weapons and so forth. But basically, you were pretty much responsible for a wide range of different things and the companies that were just in those areas? Veteran: Yeah �Interviewer: Okay, alright now did the Army, *Phone ringing in the background* Veteran: Aren’t they awful Interviewer: Yeah, did they army make any effort to get you to stay on or did they just want everyone to go away? Veteran: They did, they did ask me if I didn’t wanna go into, become an Officer and stay, Interviewer: Right Veteran: I had, in the end they gave me that opportunity. Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But I turned it down. Interviewer: Okay, now so when did you get out of the Army? Veteran: I got out in ‘46. �Interviewer: Okay, so after you got out what did you do? Veteran: I went back to, to University of Michigan and got my master’s degree, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And actually that, my tuition and everything was paid for by some organization that heard about what I did and all, and I can’t remember what the organization was, but it was some organization in Chicago that paid for all of that for me. (26:02) Interviewer: Okay, you mean somebody that you had somehow done business with, or had a connection with from that time? Veteran: No, I didn’t have any connection with them, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: They just made that available and somebody in the military there made that available to me, Interviewer: Okay, �Veteran: And then contacted, Interviewer: So, you got into that from, Veteran: So, I mean they were just doing it for anybody that they felt had done a good job in the military. Interviewer: Okay, and was this in accounting or something else that you did? The master’s degree. Veteran: Business Administration. Interviewer: Okay, and then once you finished that, did you go find a job? Veteran: Oh yeah, first I, I wasn’t sure what company I wanted to go with, and so I became a CPA, certified public accountant. Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I went around and audited the books of a lot of people, I did that for a couple of years, and then, then I went to Ford Motor Company. I was there for 26 years. �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I started out as a, as an auditor, internal auditing, and I worked up to the controller of the company. Interviewer: Okay, and did you retire out of there, or move onto something else? Veteran: No I retired from there. I retired from there about, what I did, no I didn’t, I retired from there but then I went back into a, CPA work. Interviewer: Okay, yeah. Veteran: And it was just, it was just the Lord leading because one of the big clients I had was in Muskegon, and the job there took about two months in the middle of winter, and that’s when I met my wife, one of the gals who worked at the client, was a friend of my, my wife and she fixes up on a blind date, and that was the beginning, (28:11) Interviewer: Alright Veteran: That was, yeah that was wonderful. �Interviewer: Okay, when you kind of look back at the time you spent in the service, what do you think you took out of that, or learned from it? Veteran: Well certainly, oh, I grew up I guess, and became an adult and knew what was going on in the world, and I was a little bit, little bit unhappy with the way I, I lived a more controlled life, Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: In the church, and the church community you know, I just didn’t know a lot, some of the people out there who live so vulgarly, Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: And so yeah, I think the main thing I say is I grew up and knew what was generally going on in the world and I was then happy to come back into a climate of a church and a Christian school, and all that type of thing, it made me appreciate it more. Interviewer: Alright, okay, well you were telling me you know you don’t remember as much as you used to but I can say that you told us enough to make this worth coming and recording the interview, and I can safely say that I’ve never talked to anybody who had either of your jobs, so thank you very much for taking the time to talk to me today. Veteran: Well it’s been my honor and my privilege to do it, thank you. �Interviewer: Alright. (29:54) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_SoperH2123V Title A name given to the resource Soper, Harold (Interview transcript and video), 2017 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2017-04-25 Description An account of the resource Harold Soper was born on April 16, 1920 in Indianapolis, Indiana and settled into Grand Rapids in 1929. Soper was drafted into the Army before finishing college and went on to supervise the American Oil Dump being shipped through Iran and Iraq to the Soviet Union. After being turned away from the Army Corps of Engineering and officers' training, he was relocated to Chicago and Indianapolis to close domestic military contracts. After leaving the service, Soper finished his schooling and earned a master's degree in accounting. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Soper, Harold S. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant World War II https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/677e781488db1034339a2e556db4d925.mp4 15c7047064179627a73d25e78da9bca2 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/4f5e88f9918338e73210a0809714a7f1.pdf 3d5296d5ea016a9e0d9feb814373f5d8 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Wendall Smits Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Grace Balog Interviewer: We are talking today with Wendall Smits of Byron Center, Michigan, and the interviewer is James Smither of the Grand Valley State University Veteran’s History Project. Okay, now start us off with some background on yourself and begin with where and when you were born. Veteran: I was born in South Holland, Illinois, right outside of Chicago, 1936. Graduated from school and high school in Lansing, Illinois, and at Illiana Christian High School. I had a good friend there who had joined the Coast Guard Reserve and pestered me and pestered me to join, and I had to get in before I was 18 to get into the program that they wanted to get, or, that he wanted me to get in at the time. So I-Interviewer: Okay-Veteran: Go ahead. Interviewer: Can we back up a little bit there. Born in 1936, what was your family doing for a living when you were a kid? Veteran: For the most part, my father, during the Korean War, worked in an aircraft engine manufacturer. It was a Ford Plant on the South Side of Chicago. And after that, he was a truck driver for the most part. And just to back up there in World War ll, he operated a machine in Harvey, Illinois that made crank shafts for engines that were produced in Muskegon, Michigan and later ended up in tanks during World War ll. (0:01:51) �Interviewer: Right. Veteran: In between, he was a truck driver back in… Interviewer: Okay, do you remember much of anything about the World War ll period or were you too young to be aware of things? Veteran: I think the only thing that I, the only two things that I remember: one, being, you know, the end of the war and how happy people were and what I heard on the radio. The other was that my dad had a bad ailment in his hearing and he was off of work for about a year. He was running what they called an upset machine to make those crank shafts, and he had to push a floor pedal and then wait for it to form a hot block of iron into a crank shaft. And because he had this ear problem and he would just drop over like a dead fate once in a while. He was off of work for over a year. I do remember that. He was glad to get back to work at the end of the war and he was glad that it was over. Interviewer: Right. Okay, what year did you finish high school? Veteran: 1954. Interviewer: Okay, now you were saying then that while you were in high school, one of your friends was after you, and so you had to actually enlist, before you turned 18? Veteran: Mhmm. Interviewer: But what was the program that he wanted you to get into? Veteran: You enlisted for 6 years at that point in time, in the reserves, with an obligation that during the 6 years, you were going to do at least a couple years of active duty. Once I was in and down the road a little bit and getting good grades and doing what I had to do to get promoted, �there was an edict finally that said if you stay in for 6 years, and you get all of your good grades and you get a progression of advancement, you won’t have to do your active duty for 2 years. Once I finished 6, I said well, maybe I’ll go another 4 and that went on and on and we got to 20 and I said well, maybe I will do 30 and that’s where I ended up, 31 years. Interviewer: Okay, so we will go back now. So if you are enlisting when you are 17, you needed your parents’ permission to do that? Veteran: I did. Interviewer: Okay, and what did your parents think of the idea? Veteran: My mother was very nervous. My dad was relatively proud of it. He was an immigrant from the Netherlands, and really loved this country. (0:04:11) Interviewer: Okay, now once you enlist, now what happens? How do they process you? Where do you go for training? Veteran: Okay, we enlisted at the Customs House in downtown Chicago, and at that point in time, we went to reserve units immediately the following Monday night. Those were done in the evenings at that time. And you didn’t go to boot camp until a year later, so I didn’t actually go to boot camp until 1955. Interviewer: Okay. Now, were you still in high school at that point? Or did you move on to something else? Veteran: I had, I had graduated the previous spring, just before I enlisted. Interviewer: Alright, and now… So what are you, in reserve, you have your evening classes and things like that but what else were you doing at that time? �Veteran: Oh, at the same time I was going to college in Harvey, Illinois. Just a community college there. While I was in at the same time, I was working in the summer. Interviewer: Okay, so during the first year when you haven’t done boot camp yet, what are you doing in the training session? Veteran: A couple of things, I think, that were important maybe. Lots of firearms training and lots of classroom instruction on rescue and search activities. And that was kind of the beginning of the career, that’s the direction it was going in. Interviewer: Now were these classes for new recruits or were these things that all of the reserves and all the men in the unit went to? Veteran: The majority of the time was spent by all the people in the unit, just over and over and over. Interviewer: So you had Monday nights, did you have any weekends that you did training or just those? Veteran: Just the Monday nights at that time. It was probably 3 or 4 years before we began to do weekends instead of Monday nights. And that was good, I always thought, because we’d have to make 3, or 4, or 5 trips down to downtown Chicago from where I lived as opposed to one weekend. And the other thing that I thought was good about it was that you actually became a part time employee at a regular Coast Guard base, and much more productive and much better learning experience than just classes in a classroom. (0:06:40) Interviewer: Okay, so what were you, so is this part time thing, how did that work? When were you there and what did you do? �Veteran: For the most part, we went to local Coast Guard stations in Chicago. At that time, there was one in Navy Pier, right on the end of Navy Pier, there was one in Calumet Harbor, there was one in Jackson Harbor, and we’d spend the weekend right at that Coast Guard station doing exactly what those regular Coast Guard people were doing. Interviewer: Okay, so can I go back here, your first year you say, and then you do boot camp then in 1955? Veteran: Mhmm. Interviewer: Okay, where is the boot camp? Veteran: Over in Cape May, New Jersey. Probably one of the most humid places in the United States, other than Jacksonville, Florida. Interviewer: Alright, and what did boot camp consist of? Veteran: Again, lots of firearms training, lots of swimming and life-saving instruction, and lots of time spent in the classroom, and lots and lots of time marching out on the parade ground. Interviewer: Okay. How much emphasis was there on discipline and spit and polish stuff? Veteran: Lots of emphasis, I guess. Everybody was required to go to chow in the morning in their white uniform, and when you finished chow, you came back and you changed into your dungarees and before you went to chow at noon, you did the same thing, and after chow, you did the same thing in the evening as well. Lights were out at 10 o’clock, and the rabble rouse was at 5 o’clock in the morning and you better have your shoes shined every night and wherever you went, you marched and a couple of petty officers and one chief petty officer ran the show. And �the chief petty officer slept in the barracks as we did, so everybody knew to be up before revelry, because otherwise he was at your bedside, waking you up. (0:08:38) Interviewer: Okay. And how intense was the physical training? Veteran: For a guy who, you know, had just finished high school, and was going to college, probably a little soft, I learned what my mother had done for me real quickly. Wash your own clothes with ice cold water and ivory soap and rinse them in ice cold water. Beat off the mosquitoes in the middle of the night as you stood watch and so forth. So yeah, you learned a lot in a big hurry. Interviewer: Okay. Now the guys who were in there with you, did you learn anything about them? Where they were from? What kind of backgrounds did they have? Veteran: Yeah there, there were two guys who went to boot camp with me from my unit in Chicago, and then the majority of the rest of the people in the boot camp were from the eastern half of the United States, or I should say east of the Mississippi. Most of those who enlisted west of the Mississippi went to Alameda, California for boot camp. So yeah, we got, I met people from New York and New Orleans and Jacksonville, Florida, and all over the eastern half of the U.S. Interviewer: Okay. Were they pretty much all white at this point? Or did you have some race in there--Veteran: We had some black, black folks, we had some Hispanic folks, but for the most part, were white at that time, yeah. (0:10:01) Interviewer: Alright. And how long did the boot camp last? �Veteran: Our boot camp lasted two weeks. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: We were at--we were there for 15 days, and when we arrived, we left on an airplane from Chicago and went to Philadelphia, and we were going to ride the train from Philadelphia to boot camp. They left us at the train station there for 8 hours with nothing to eat, that was all part of the routine I guess. And then when we got to Cape May, we rode from the train station in an old school bus and we had about 80 people in that school bus and you know that no school buses is equipped to hold 80 people. So we were all kind of—it was in the middle of August, it was 90some degrees when we arrived there. So this was all part of the game. We had the first meal late in the evening on Sunday, around 9:30, and it was baked beans and bread. And the chief said you better eat it all, just go back up there and get more. If you don’t, you’ll eat it tomorrow morning. And we thought he was kidding. The next morning, we got up and they had put it in trays, about maybe an inch and a half to two inches thick, and had put it in the refrigerator. They cut it and they served it like brownies, so we made sure we ate it the following morning. Interviewer: Alright, and then you talked about weapons training. Was this just small arms? Veteran: Yes, rifles and pistols. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, so they’re not the anti-aircraft guns or the big machine guns, or things like that? Veteran: No, no. Interviewer: Okay, and this is all on land that you are doing this or do they— �Veteran: Yes, it was all on land at Cape May. Interviewer: Okay, and then having completed that, now did you just go back to your units and— Veteran: We went back at that time, you know, to our regular Monday night unit. And after that, we had active duty every year for at least two weeks, except for two years when I was in, near the end of the time I was in, Coast Guard Reserve was really hurting for money so they asked a lot of people to take waivers, involuntary waivers, for training, which I did. And then the last year of the 31 I was in the inactive reserve, which meant again I could be called up but I didn’t attend any meetings. Otherwise, I went every year for two weeks. (0:12:26) Interviewer: Okay, I got to go back here to the beginning. So initially, you were assigned to the Coast Guard in Chicago? Veteran: Mhmm. Interviewer: Alright, and what, how long did you serve with them that time? Veteran: Approximately two years there. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And then they commissioned the unit in Gary, Indiana. And I chose to go there, we could make a choice. Having lived in Lansing, Illinois, it was easier for me really to get to Gary than it was to get to downtown Chicago. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: So they broke that unit just about in half when they started the unit in Gary. And that would have been about 1956, -57, somewhere around there. �Interviewer: Okay, now when you’re with your—you were with a unit in Chicago, what was your job or your assignment? Veteran: My assignment then was--I was leaning towards engineman training and you know, working down in the engine room in the machinery spaces, so we had a number of classes, as I was saying before, in small arms training, and so actual, actual small arms training was at the armory there and we could actually fire right there in the building. But the other half was leaning towards engineering experience, learning diesel engines and all that sort of stuff. And while I was—after I finished the junior college, then I went to work for an organization that was making diesel engines. So that kind of worked together between the two, what I did at work, working in an engine test lab, and what I was doing in the reserves and that kind of got me into the engineering phase. (0:14:00) Interviewer: Okay, and then when you go to Gary, are you now focusing on the engineering part? Veteran: Yes. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, and how long did you stay with the unit in Gary? Veteran: 21 years. Interviewer: Okay. Let’s kind of take us through some of the different things that you did with them. Did you stay with engineering or did you change what your assignment was after a while? Veteran: No. I went to Gary as what they call a fireman, would have been an E3, and left there as a lieutenant when I moved to Cleveland. But in between, I became a chief engineman, I was an �E7, there was no E8 and E9 at that time. And then there was an opening in the Coast Guard for about 10 warrant officers in the engineering group. And I don’t know, there were a couple hundred people who took the test, and I was lucky enough to pass the test. And then went on a Coast Guard cutter, Bramble, and got my—no, that was on the Coast Guard cutter Woodbine, out of Grand Haven, and I was able to become a warrant officer. I did that for two years. And then again they were looking for some people as line officers, even though you hadn’t completed college, which I hadn’t. And again, it was a process of taking a test, and I was promoted to a Lieutenant Junior Grade. We skipped Ensign because of our age. Interviewer: Okay, so how common—I mean, you seemed to have moved pretty well through the ranks here in this career. Was that normal for a reservist or were you a little unusual? Veteran: There were some people who stuck with the reserve as I did, if that’s the way to say it, and then there were others who enlisted for 4 years and moved on and said I’ve had enough of this, I am done, and they moved on. But for those folks who stuck with it, and as I was saying before, if they did what they had to do to get promoted, there was kind of an unwritten timeframe: you know you go from E3 to E4 to E5 to E6 and on up the line. And if you became stagnant in a particular level, the top officers were looking for you and saying hey, either move on up or get out. However, all of those promotions, all the way from E1 to E7, were all on a written test. And not all of the services have that, most of the tests were about 150 questions, very specific to your particular rank as an engineman and so forth. (0:16:49) Interviewer: Okay, so you had to do well enough on the test as you were going through, so there’s a kind of weed out process going on, it’s not just whether you, you don’t get it just for showing up? �Veteran: No, absolutely not. Interviewer: You have to earn that. Alright, now in the—you’re in the Coast Guard a long time, and a variety of different incidents happen or come up along the way. One of them, you had—so you initially, it’s the Cold War, and there were different things that would flare up in different parts of the world, then eventually Vietnam happens, and so forth. And then, in the latter part of your service, Ronald Reagan becomes president and incidents happen then too. So, you probably have kind of an up and down period of sometimes when things might happen and other times they seem quiet. Veteran: Yes. Interviewer: Now to go back, kind of the early stages of your service, what kind of stands out for you, like in the period when you were an enlisted man: training assignments or any active duty work or anything else like that? What particular things stand out? (0:18:02) Veteran: Okay, in the early part after moving to Gary, there was a normal progression there in the enlisted ranks up. And as it was for me as a chief engineman, once I became E6, which would be 1st class petty officer, and E7, I was responsible for the training of other enginemen in our unit. And then after we, after I had the promotion to warrant officer, which was also an engineering rank, but now as an engineering warrant officer, you’re responsible for boilers and all of the other things that were on ships at that time. I was responsible for some training at the unit and also responsible for some training at lifeboat stations. Younger enginemen who were just learning the trade so to speak, what to do in a 40-foot boat when the engine quit running and so forth. So, I enjoyed the time away from the unit as much as I did the time at the unit. �Interviewer: Okay. And then, where would you go for like your, you had these two week training assignments in the summers or whatever? Veteran: Yes. Interviewer: What places did you go for those? Veteran: I think, well I went to, 12 or 13 times, to Yorktown, Virginia. And Yorktown was a reserve base, and at that time it was only reserves, and most of that was for school and advanced school, and other school, there was engineman school there, there was water pollution school, explosive loading school. Leadership school, I was at there twice as an enlisted man, once as an officer. And I really enjoyed going back every other year almost, to school. In between we went to operating bases. I was at Great Lakes, Illinois a couple of times, Jacksonville, Florida. I was in New York at the capital at the port twice, once when it was on Governor’s Island, and once when it was in Manhattan, right near the battery park there. I was in Concord, California at explosive loading school. That was during the time when we were bombing Cambodia, and we were loading ships with 500 pound bombs that were all the way stacked in the hold and about 12 high on the deck. And they would run the ships out through the river, and out past San Francisco but they would stop in San Francisco to load provisions. And just before I got there, one of those loaded freighters had hit the pier in San Francisco and put a 12-foot gash in the bow. So while I was there, they started loading provisions way back at Concord, and they ran them right straight out of the river, so. But that was a busy time. We worked about 18 hours a day, loading ships with bombs at that time. (0:21:04) Interviewer: Okay. Now you’re, you’re in a long time and you are in kind of through—I guess before we get to sort of the Vietnam era, you get—there’s some Cold War crises that �happen. I mean there actually have been trouble in Lebanon in the late 50s which wasn’t directly Cold War, but that was one thing that put some units in some places on alert, but then you’ve got things like the Berlin Wall crisis and the Bay of Pigs and the Cuban Missile crisis. Did any of those things have ripple effects that made it to your Coast Guard unit? Veteran: I think only at that time, any of those things that you just mentioned, only that we were living under a little more rigid alert. Reminded again that, you know, that we had orders in our pocket that if anybody was called up, they were expected to be at their location, at their base within 24 hours. Most of the time, I carried orders in my pocket to be in Juneau, Alaska within 24 hours after I got a phone call. (0:22:07) Interviewer: Alright. Had you ever been to Juneau, Alaska? Veteran: Yes, I had. Interviewer: Okay, so what was up there? Veteran: I was just there once on a cruise, so I don’t know. Interviewer: Okay, you hadn’t gone there and you hadn’t seen the base or anything like that? Veteran: No, no it would have been brand new for me to, you know, to go to the base. I had been in Juneau, but not at the base there. Interviewer: Okay. And then when Kennedy is assassinated in 63, did that, was that, did that just kind of work the same way? Veteran: Yeah, it worked the same way. We just would be on a regular high alert, if that’s the way to say it. It often reminds me when I hear about the people in homeland security today being �on a high alert. There’s various different levels of alert. It was much the same in the reserves at that time. Interviewer: Okay. Now in 65, the Vietnam war becomes a ground war and we begin drafting large numbers of people and there had been a draft in place taking some people but then that accelerated quite a bit in the next several years. And you had a lot of people trying to enlist in something other than the army, or get into reserve units, or do different things to kind of avoid Vietnam. Did you notice any of the effects of that in terms of what kinds of men were coming into your units? Did you have people who seemed to be trying to avoid Vietnam or did they just seem like the guys you always got? Veteran: There was no question there was some people there to avoid Vietnam, and there were some people who were there because they were proud to be Americans. That created a bit of a conflict in some units. A number of these people were very outspoken about they were only there to put in their time so they didn’t have to go to Vietnam, I only enlisted, for example they would say to me, I only enlisted so that I don’t have to go over there, and yet I know you have to train me so let’s do the best you can but I am not really going to do anything. And we had two brothers, twins, in our unit in Gary, and we knew we were going to have an inspection. And at that time, they wore the old Navy uniform: it was exactly the same as the Navy uniform so you had your rating badge on your left sleeve. And they had taken their rating badge off of their sleeve and had obtained, I don’t know where, but had obtained a badge that looked like it belonged on their sleeve and it had the peace symbol, if you know what that looks like. And we had an inspection from the district office, and I can tell you that the commanding officer from the district office, I thought he was going to kill these two kids when he walked by them. He just �walked over to their uniform just literally ripped it off of their sleeve. And, but they did their 4 years and they were gone. That’s all they really cared, you know. (0:24:52) Interviewer: Now did you have people who were sort of actively interested in actually doing kind of home front, Coast Guard things, I mean just the rescue stuff and that sort of—did you have people who actually wanted to go and do those things or would those people go active duty instead? Veteran: We had a lot of folks who were very anxious to learn lifesaving duties and so forth you know, especially when we started that augmentation of the regular reserve units. They were very anxious to be boat coxswains and to be enginemen on board the small boats, really enjoyed it. I did too. When I did some active duty in Chicago, a couple times there at the Coast Guard stations, we went out on search and rescues any old time of the day or night. The whistle would go off, we ran down to the boat after we put our clothes on and usually we slept with our clothes on, even in the middle of the summer, run down to the boat and be gone within a few minutes, much like airline pilots do today, and so forth. Interviewer: Okay. And then, while you are doing that kind of work with the boats and so forth, are there particular events or things that kind of stand out in your memory? (0:26:03) Veteran: Only two times, I guess, both of which were recoveries of bodies. It was in Lake Michigan and that’s a tough job for some people. It’s a smelly job. And we had one incident in Chicago where a guy had gone overboard off of a ship in November and his body was floating in April. So I won’t get any deeper than that but you can imagine what it was like. Everybody had to bury their clothes after we got back to the base, because of the odor. You can’t get it out of �your clothes, so. His body came apart in pieces when we picked him up, so. But, we had a lot of rescues. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: The beaches in Chicago are always busy this time of the year. And people get out just like they do here on Lake Michigan, and don’t watch the red flag, or ignore it, or want to say I guess I’m better, I don’t have to notice that it’s there, and they go out, you know, and go swimming. But we had a lot of rescues there. There’s a strong undertow in Chicago, even stronger than it is here. I don’t know if that’s, you know, because of the way the lake moves or what it is, but a lot of people were pulled under by the undertow there. Interviewer: Okay, and you have people close enough to be able to actually help or— Veteran: Yeah, when I, at that time, at least in Calumet Park, and they did also at Navy Pier, they had a large tower. It went up probably I guess three and a half or four stories high and we could watch the entire beach. And for weekends in particular, and that’s when we were there for training, weekends in particular at that time, the Coast Guard boats would patrol back and forth and north and south and back again on the beach, and watch for swimmers so we had an active presence, and it didn’t take us but a couple minutes to get to somebody if they were in trouble. Interviewer: Okay, because yeah it has to be pretty quick if they’re going under… Veteran: It has to be if they’re going under. (0:28:18) Interviewer: Alright. Now did you have to kind of go out in bad weather conditions? The famous Coast Guard stuff was often the little boat in the giant waves kind of thing. �Veteran: Yeah, I guess the—we were out in some small boats at that time. They were 40-footers. Most of that wasn’t bad, but I remember when we went across on the Bramble, when I was there for warrant officer evaluation, went on there and we left in November. There was a buoy that had come loose in Chicago and the Bramble was responsible for the entire bottom of the lake, all the way up to and including Chicago, and the buoy had come loose in Chicago. We left from Grand Haven and it’s hard for some people to believe, but when we left the river there, the water was splashing on the glass in the lighthouse there. And we know of, I know of one chief electrician who was not sick, and we don’t know about the captain because he never came out of his cabin. The other 40 guys were sick. And when I got to Chicago and got off, my legs were like rubber, and it was that way for a couple days. Now people talk about being seasick in the ocean, but there is a difference on the lake. It comes up in just a couple of minutes and it was—it took us about nine and a half hours from Grand Haven to Chicago and that’s not even 40 miles across the lake so, it was a rough trip. Interviewer: Okay, did you manage to fix the buoy? Veteran: Yeah, we did fix the buoy. We had another buoy with us and we placed that one in the right position and we picked up the broken one and towed it into Chicago, so. (0:30:06) Interviewer: Alright, and you also mentioned that at one point, when you were in Lake Michigan, there was a massive oil spill in Chicago? Veteran: Yes. I don’t remember exactly what year that was but it started early in the morning on the 4th of July and there was an oil tankard that had come into Calumet Harbor there, or at the east Chicago Indiana harbor where the refineries are there, and it was a Polish vessel. He was upset with something that had happened and he purposely pumped the bilges into Lake �Michigan. And that was during the Cold War period yet, and gobs of oil as big as your fist began to roll up on the beach on the 4th of July as the sun rose. And you can imagine millions of people that wanted to go to the beach…and so we were called up for three days. And I was awake on the boat for probably between 36 and 48 hours. Most of us guys were out on the boat. We messed up a screw on one of the boats so I had to go underneath the water and change the screw. It’s a tough job even when you’re above water. So you go down for maybe three, four minutes with a mask and all of the gear that you need you know, but it was really difficult to work underneath the water and I don’t take any credit for any of that any more than anybody else that was on the boat. Everybody had a tough job. Interviewer: Alright. Were you still an enlisted man at that point? During that-Veteran: Yes, I was. Interviewer: So yeah, you’re the engine guy, okay you go down and do— Veteran: You go down and do this, that’s right. Interviewer: Had you been trained to do that sort of work? Veteran: I had been trained to change those screws, but not to do it underwater. That was a whole new experience. And you had to learn pretty quick that, you know, you can only be down for so long and your arms were fatigued and you had to come up for some air. (0:32:01) Interviewer: So you had an oxygen tank but you, was it still just physically moving underwater? Veteran: Underwater was tough, all the resistance from the water itself, you know, yeah. Trying to operate wrenches and screwdrivers and so forth underwater. I dropped the screwdriver, �dropped the wrench a couple of times, it was gone. Had to get another one from the boat, and so forth. Interviewer: Alright. Now when you make the shift from enlisted to warrant officer, I guess first of all, not everyone is going to know what a warrant officer is, it’s kind of a peculiar rank, so can you explain what that was? Veteran: Yeah, a warrant officer in a naval service, whether it be U.S. Navy or the Coast Guard, is a specialist in his own right. If I look once in a while at people, in the Army for example, a lot of helicopter pilots are warrant officers. But in the naval service, you’re considered a specialist in a particular field. Mine was engineering. The other people who are, you know, operate up on a bridge, or whatever it happens to be. And I guess I looked, once that opening was there to be a warrant officer, I said this is a chance to expand what I am doing. I was a chief engineman and that was a lot of fun and there was a little prestige involved there. You could go to chief club, you couldn’t do that before, and so forth. But this was a chance to do something more than I did as a chief. So an engine—on the Bramble, for example, and the Woodbine that was here in Grand Haven, the Bramble was out of Detroit, a warrant officer was the head of the engineering department on that ship. So it was a chance to do something more. Interviewer: Okay. What differentiates a warrant officer from a line officer? Veteran: A line officer, usually, expected to be more general in nature, as opposed to a warrant officer being a specialist. That’s about the best way I can describe it, I guess. (0:34:09) Interviewer: And so it’s a separate category in between conventional officer—a warrant officer is kind of in between that and the enlisted? �Veteran: Yeah it’s a peculiar situation in the Navy. When you’re a chief, at that time E7 was the highest, when you’re a chief, you are welcome in the chief’s club and there’s an aura about being a chief that he’s the guy who knows. If you’re a young officer, you go to the chief to learn what’s going on. And then you become a warrant officer, you’re no longer welcome in the chief’s club, you’re kind of looked down upon in the officer’s club, and I had some strange experiences as a warrant officer. Just a little harassment. You know, the kind of thing that kids might do in college to freshmen and so forth. Went to the officer’s club one day and it was in the summertime and people were dressed either in khakis or in whites but you, it was all white from head to toe, or all khaki from head to toe, and one of the line officers who was in there recognized me as being a new warrant officer. And he arranged to have my white cap stolen from the rack and brought my khaki one there, so I had to go back to the barracks with a white uniform and a khaki hat so that kind of thing, but we got passed it. We had a lot of fun. Interviewer: How long did you stay at warrant officer rank? Veteran: Two years. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Approximately two years. Interviewer: Alright, but you decided it would be a good thing to do to move up to the next level? Veteran: Yeah, I did. Again, as a chance to do something more. And that opened the door for me in three different units where I was a training officer, and I was able to actually operate the entire training program in the unit and schedule all the people in the unit for their annual active duty. So it was a chance to make sure that people were going to active duty that was intentional for �their rank. And by that I mean if a guy wanted to be an engineman, he went to engineman school or a related school, leadership school, or you know, that sort of thing. So you ran the entire training program of the unit. The unit in Gary had, at one time, had well over a hundred men, so it was a pretty responsible job to make sure that all these people got the proper training all the time to move up, especially those who wanted to move up, if that’s the way to say it. (0:36:54) Interviewer: Okay. Now aside from Gary, I mean where else did you serve as an officer? Veteran: After Gary, I went to Cleveland, Ohio. I had moved on a civilian job and was in a unit there for about a year, in an engineering unit, which was really foreign to me. I say engineering, it was the kind of engineering that goes along with inspections of vessels before they are commissioned, all the drawings and the building of a vessel. That was completely foreign to me. I had no training in that and requested early on that I be moved to a port security unit there in Cleveland. And then I took a job in Owosso, Michigan here, and had to leave Cleveland so the only opening at that point in time was in Chicago again. So I was living in Ada here at that time, and drove one weekend a month to Chicago to do my active duty on the weekend. And then there was a unit in Grand Rapids, at that time, and it was in the Naval Armory on the north side, in Monroe, and I made application to move to that unit. And it was okayed. And a month before I was to move to that unit, the unit moved to Muskegon. So I had to drive from here to Muskegon for some time in the last year that I was in. But again, it was a chance for an advancement. I became an executive officer there. I was responsible for the operations of the unit. (0:38:30) Interviewer: Alright. Now, you had mentioned, before the interview, that you had sort of one kind of other crisis situation or almost crisis situation that you had gotten into, and that was toward the end of your service. When Reagan was president— �Veteran: Yes. When Reagan was president, and they had the prisoners in Lebanon, or the hostages in Lebanon, and they were concerned about getting them out, we were called up at the unit. In fact, I was at work that day and I got a call 1:30, 2 o’clock in the afternoon to be in Chicago the following morning at Great Lakes. And we went to Great Lakes and they herded our entire unit, and a couple of other units, we had probably well over 300 hundred people there. When we left, we were told to make sure our insurance was up to date, our will was up to date, because we were going to the Middle East. When we got there, they pulled the black shades. And we had a couple days of instruction and towards the end of the second day they told us that they’d be issuing khaki uniforms for us, and that was unheard of in the Coast Guard, any camouflage. Interviewer: And so not khaki uniforms but camouflage uniforms? Veteran: But a camouflage uniform, yeah. And that was unheard of at that point in time, you know, we wore blue dungarees and whatever. And one of the guys in the crew asked the commanding officer why are we wearing these? And he said, well, you are going to the desert. And this kid said but we weren’t trained for the desert, we were trained for water. And he said well, you will only be there a few days. And he said, and the kid said, are we going there before the Marines get there and we’re cannon fodder? And the commanding officer said, yeah, that’s probably a good way to describe it. A couple hours later, they told us we could pack up our gear and go home without ever telling us why, what happened, but there must have been something going on behind the scenes that they decided they no longer needed the Coast Guard or anybody like us over there, so. (0:40:38) Interviewer: Okay. Now, during the Vietnam era, did the Coast Guard take any sort of heat from the anti-war movement? Or did people not associate you with Vietnam? �Veteran: I never was privy to see any demonstrations or anything at our unit. It didn’t happen at the unit or any place that I was ever at. We had some people in the unit that I mentioned before that were not so happy to be there but…No, I really never saw any demonstrations. Interviewer: Okay. Now if you were just out in public wearing a uniform, you didn’t get— it didn’t get a negative reaction anywhere? Veteran: No. No, because most of those reserve units that we were in, we ate off site. We ate our lunch off site, we would go to a restaurant. It would be 120, 130 guys eating in a restaurant all with our uniforms on. Nobody ever bothered us. Interviewer: They might not bother 120 or 130 guys all at once, either. Veteran: No, that’s probably true. That’s probably true. Interviewer: That part at least you didn’t necessarily observe. Alright, now the port security thing, was that something that you only went to once you were in Cleveland or had you done that kind of work earlier? Veteran: I had done that when we started in Chicago. The emphasis was more on rescue and search, and that lasted about 2, 3 years. And then there began to morph into, you know, what are we going to do with the port in Chicago? You know people think, well, the port in Chicago, what’s that? Well it’s not much and it wasn’t much at that time, but we began to see some activities already that were a little disconcerting. And, what do we do with these people on the pier who are half drunk and laying around and do we observe some people on the pier who appear to be drunk but they’re not and they are just acting like they are, and that sort of stuff. So we began, the captain of the port in Chicago, began very actively to train port security people on what to do in a port and on the facilities. And that just grew, and all the time, almost all the time �that I spent in Gary, I was involved in port security and that continued in Cleveland and the other units, except for that one year in Cleveland when I was in the engineering unit. (0:42:53) Interviewer: Okay. And then, so the port security, was that mostly just dealing with ordinary people wandering around or did you have to deal with criminal activity, or other things like that? Veteran: Yeah, we dealt with a lot of criminal activity, particularly in New York when I was there a couple of times and New Orleans as well. When I was in New Orleans, we had one night that the training officer in New Orleans—my object when I got to New Orleans was to become completely certified as a port safety officer. And the training officer there went on leave without me knowing it, and I was supposed to work with him the entire two weeks. I got a knock on my door about 3 o’clock in the morning that said get up, we’re going up to Baton Rouge. And I said, what happened? I got dressed, I said what happened. There was an enlisted man there. And that was, as I, you know, mentioned before, you asked the enlisted man what’s going on if you’re the officer to make sure and you’re new on the place. He said well there’s a Russian vessel that left from Cuba three days early. He was supposed to stop in New Orleans and let lots of people aboard, like the state department and the agriculture department and whatever, he was going to load grain. And he roared right through New Orleans and didn’t stop. So he said we’re going up there. So we went up there and it was early, just about dawn, when we got to Baton Rouge. And to make a long story short, eventually the captain and the entire crew of that Russian vessel was detained, he would not allow them off the ship. And the state department was there, the agriculture department and the FBI and I don’t know who all, including us. So it was a very new experience for me. Very tense aboard that ship when the captain was told that he was not allowed to go ashore. He wanted people to go to a doctor, and on his crew manifest, he had two doctors. �He wanted people to go to a dentist and he had a dentist on the crew manifest, all of which were bogus, you know. He had a crew list of more than twice the number of people that was required to run that ship. So you know what was going on, we all know what was going on at that point in time. And he loaded grain eventually in Baton Rouge, and he was escorted with Coast Guard vessels in front and behind, all the way to 90 miles into the gulf. So it was a rough night and a rough day…but a lot of fun. (0:45:44) Interviewer: Okay. Now if you’re in a place like New York or New Orleans, do you have to worry about smuggling activities or organized crime activities? Veteran: Yeah, a lot of the work in New York was on the piers. At that time, the old wood piers. We were concerned a whole lot with activities of the longshore men, and I don’t mean to knock the longshore men, it’s their job. But the old story on the longshore men in New York was the first ten percent that comes off the ship belongs to the longshore men. And no smoking on the pier. We were on one pier in New York when I was there the second time where we caught a guy smoking and he was reported immediately to the supervisor. And when it happens twice, that’s grounds for dismissal: you lose your job. And we told him about it. There were three of us guys. We told him that he had one warning, and if there was another, he was gone. We went aboard the ship to inspect the ship. At that point in time, a lot of those inspections were for radioactive material and so forth aboard the ship and we had all of the instruments necessary to do that. Checked all the papers with the officers on the ship and so forth. We came back off and this guy was smoking again. And the guy who was with me, he said to him I am going to your supervisor, and you just lost your job. And as we walked towards the supervisor’s office, I heard a scream by the guy who was on my right, and this guy who had just been caught smoking for the second time took what they call a bale hook, kind of a round hook that they would hook nets to pull �things off the ship, and he put it right through his back and it came out of his chest. And luckily we got him to the hospital before he bled to death or anything, but those are the kind of people that worked on the piers sometimes in New York so. (0:47:48) Interviewer: Okay, so presumably he lost his job at that point… Veteran: Yeah, he did lose his job and went to prison, I understand, for some years besides, which… So it, you know, wasn’t combat but it was—it could be very dangerous. It could be very dangerous. Interviewer: I mean did you encounter any kind of drug smuggling issues or things like that? Veteran: No, I don’t think that at that point in time the Coast Guard was much involved in it. At least not that I knew of…Like they are today. It’s a big part of their job today. Interviewer: But as far as the port security, it was not necessarily that kind of detective work so much it was— Veteran: No, it was kind of a--almost a law enforcement activity at that point in time. Here’s what we are looking for, if we find it, here’s what the punishment is or you know what’s going to happen to you folks that are involved in it. (0:48:41) Interviewer: Okay, now you mentioned the looking for radioactive materials. That seems kind of odd…Did you get stuff going in, coming out? Any idea what that was about? Veteran: There was a concern I think at that time in the Coast Guard that there might be, you know there was--we already had atomic bombs, and was there any smuggling of radioactivity, radioactive material, that was either coming in or going out. That was one of the concerns when �we went on board the ship. Who’s trying to build a bomb that we don’t want building a bomb. And we have that same problem today, right? Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: It’s never stopped. Interviewer: Okay, let’s see now, did you get any kind of awards or commendations, kind of beyond the stuff you get for showing up? Veteran: Yeah, I got the—you know the pistol marksman, and the rifle marksman and so forth, but the one that I enjoyed the most was the Coast Guard Achievement Medal. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And after spending 21 years in one unit, there were a lot of things I was able to do. One of my tours of active duty was right at that unit for two weeks. And one other fellow and myself spent the entire two weeks, probably close to 70 hours a week for those two weeks, rewriting engineering programs and engineering training manuals for the entire 9th district. And that’s what the achievement medal was for. (0:50:19) Interviewer: Okay. Alright, now while you were—you had your career as a Coast Guard reservist, what kind of work were you doing in civilian life? Veteran: When I was living in Illinois for the most part, it was marketing support, and the same in Cleveland. And then when I moved here to Michigan, mostly how do I support the sales people in the organization that I am working for. It had to do with advertising and sales meetings and all that sort of thing. Interviewer: Okay. And out of what company did you work for the longest, do you think? �Veteran: The longest would have been Allis-Chalmers in Illinois. I worked there 23 years. At that time, they were building engines in Harvey, Illinois and lift trucks when I first started there. And then they built a new engine plant in Harvey and they built a new lift truck plant in Matteson, Illinois, so I worked there for a while before I moved on to Cleveland. Interviewer: Okay. And then did you stay with sort of heavy equipment manufacturers, or did you do other things? Veteran: Yeah, when I moved to Cleveland, we moved to a competitor there. There were 12 people that, over a period of about a year and a half, left Allis-Chalmers and went to Baker Material Handling in Cleveland. And they built lift trucks just like we did there. We saw the handwriting on the wall I think in—at Allis-Chalmers. Had a beautiful plant, had a great product. We sold more lift trucks to the U.S. government than any other manufacturer in the United States, but we saw the handwriting on the wall that they were slowly deteriorating as an organization, Allis-Chalmers in general, whether it be farm trucks, construction machinery, lift trucks, engines, whatever. About a year after I left, the business was sold to a dealer in Ohio, who ultimately peddled it to a place in Sweden, and it no longer exists so we went to a competitor. And then one of the folks at Baker, who knew me from Allis-Chalmers, said I am moving to Midland Heavy Duty brake in Owosso, do you want to come with me? I really didn’t want to move again, I was only in Cleveland for three years. But I did, and then later on, in 1988, they were sold and they were building a new headquarters in Kansas City, and my wife and family said, do we really want to move again? I said well I do, but I knew they didn’t so then I went to work for a petroleum manufacturer here in—or a petroleum distributer here in Grand Rapids, and spent the rest of my time there. (0:53:13) Interviewer: Alright. Are you retired now? �Veteran: Yes. Interviewer: So when did you retire then? Veteran: Last I really worked was about 2 years ago. After I retired on a full-time basis, I worked as a consultant for 4, 5 years and then drove cars for Hertz Corporation between airports between Grand Rapids and Detroit, Traverse City and so forth. But about two years ago I said, hey I am 78 years old, that’s enough, I got enough. Interviewer: Alright. Look back on your career in the Coast Guard, are there other memories or events or things that kind of stand out? Anything you’ve got on your list there that, I guess, we haven’t covered? Veteran: No, I think you pretty much covered everything. There was one, one quick thing that happened maybe in—when I was in the unit in Gary. Just kind of a funny thing if we’ve got time for that? (0:54:09) Interviewer: Yep, yep, yep, oh yeah. Veteran: I was teaching a class, I was a chief engineman at that time, I was teaching a class and there was an announcement over the loud speaker system that there was an emergency phone call for me, so I turned the class over to another fellow, grabbed the phone. And it was my wife. We had just moved into a house that we had bought, it was an old house, and had fixed it up and just painted the bedroom and all of that sort of stuff and it was white and she had a new bedspread and so forth. So she said there’s a bird in the bedroom. I said I am 22 miles away, what do you want me to do with the bird? So she called her father who lived next door. He came over with a broom. He was going to beat it to death in the bedroom. She said no you aren’t. So we knew that the police department had, I forgot what they call that, a gun that kills—or doesn’t kill animals… �Interviewer: Like a tranquilizer, or something like that? Veteran: Yeah, a tranquilizer, we knew that. So she said, and when I hung up, I said what do you want me to do? She said I will take care of it. So she dialed the police and said I’ve got a bird in my bedroom, can you bring the tranquilizer gun over? And the cop said, lady, this is not for birds, this is for animals. And she said well, what do you want me to do? And he said open the window. And she did and the bird flew out. So I’ll never forget it, I’ll never forget what I was doing that day. It was really—I could go on about that story for hours but, that’s it. Interviewer: Alright, now overall, what do you think you took out of your time with the Coast Guard? What did you learn from it or how did it effect you? Veteran: I think that leadership was the most important thing. It went hand in hand with my civilian job. The last civilian job that I had at Midland, we purchased 9 companies in 8 years and melded them into the organization. So there was a constant turmoil, a change of people to work with. My boss at one time, who was my boss for all except about 6 months at Midland, when we had bought—we had purchased a company in Syracuse, New York. He moved to Syracuse and was there for about a year and a half, so our only communication was every two or three months. We’d meet at an airport somewhere to discuss what was going on, otherwise everything happened on the phone, and I think the Coast Guard really contributed to that. Being able to be a leader and at the same time, as an officer, in some cases to act on your own, which I then did in civilian life. (0:56:56) Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: But I think overall, a love of country was really the main factor. �Interviewer: Alright. But now you’ve reminded me of another question I wanted to kind of bring in…You’ve, as an enlisted man staying in one place for a long time, you would have—and then eventually as an officer—but you would have seen a lot of changes in command and things like that. How common was it for, say, you were in Gary for 21 years, for base commanders or high-ranking people, to kind of move on or change positions? Veteran: Commanding officers of most of the reserve units at that time had a job for about three years, so I saw about five or six, maybe seven in that time that I was there. But that was kind of an unwritten rule: every three years, we had a new commanding officer. And there was a way for those folks to move on too. They then became inspectors for the district office, became training people for the district office, where they would write training programs and so forth. So many of those folks got 20, 25 years in as well. (0:58:09) Interviewer: Okay. Now, was it always kind of an adventure when a new guy came in? Did they kind of come in and want to show who’s boss? Or did they just want to fit in or--? Veteran: A little bit of everything, I guess. But for the most part, you knew who those people were because they would be an executive officer before being promoted to be the commanding officer of a unit. So if you were there with them, as I was, you knew those folks for at least 5, 6 years before they became commanding officer. Training unit, and then executive officer, and then commanding officer. Interviewer: Okay, so it’s not like they are usually coming in from the outside? Or are total unknowns when they come in. Veteran: Rarely, rarely. That did happen at the unit in Muskegon. The commanding officer there lived in Detroit, so he drove from Detroit to Muskegon for his weekends. And I lived in Ada and �drove over there. There was another officer, training officer, who drove from Flint. So, and those were all—all three of us were new at that unit. All at the same time, all on the same day. That was a little hairy. Interviewer: So when you go into a situation like that, how do you handle it, or deal with the personnel who are already there? Veteran: I guess at that point in time, you know, I had been in for 29 years, and I often thought about it on the active duty that you went on each year for two weeks. My feeling was that when you arrive there on Sunday, you better find out who you are living with and who you can live with and who you don’t think you can live with, because you are going to be sleeping in the same place for two weeks, you’re going to eat with them, you’re going to go on liberty with them and whatever. So by that time you had done it so many times, it really didn’t bother you. (1:00:01) Interviewer: Now does it help that the Coast Guard is a relatively small group? Is there kind of a standard way of doing things that’s pretty common, from one place to another? Veteran: Yeah, if you get transferred from one ship to another, many of the things are the same. Or if you get transferred from one base to another, things are pretty much the same. I have been at the Coast Guard bases as a civilian, I’ve been on Maui and in Honolulu, and they operate the same as they do in Chicago or over here in Grand Haven. (1:00:34) Interviewer: Alright. Well, you’ve got a good story and you lay it out very nicely for us, so I’d just like to close here by thanking you for taking the time to come in and share it today. Veteran: I appreciate it, and I hope it inspires some other folks to join. (1:00:46) �� Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_SmitsW2141V Title A name given to the resource Smits, Wendall (Interview transcript and video), 2017 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2017-07-06 Description An account of the resource Wendall Smits was born in South Holland, Illinois in 1936. After graduating high school, a friend convinced him to join the Coast Guard Reserve at the age of 17. He completed two weeks of boot camp in 1955 at Cape May, New Jersey and became an engineman for the Coast Guard aboard various ships. He then became a chief engineman and, later, a lieutenant with a unit in Chicago before transferring to a Coast Guard unit in Gary, Indiana. After moving to Cleveland, Ohio, he was promoted to the position of warrant officer, and then to a Lieutenant Junior Grade. Smits primarily worked for port security at the various bases bases he was stationed at and also trained recruits for his Coast Guard units as a training officer. He was later awarded the Coast Guard Achievement Medal for his work rewriting engineering programs and engineering training manuals for the entire 9th district in Gary, Indiana. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Smits, Wendall L. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Other veterans & civilians--Personal narratives, American United States. Coast Guard Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/922469bd979c484043ef9137350a490c.mp4 6156a49516f3a667803e166762c7471a https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/415816136322dd182338fe7b6fdc92ca.pdf ead5fd3220373d916b4817aa2caecdbe PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Joe Smith Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Grace Balog Interviewer: We are talking today with Joe Smith of Annapolis, Maryland. And the interviewer is James Smither of the Grand Valley State University Veteran’s History Project. Alright, Joe, start us off on some background on yourself. And to begin with, what is your legal name? Veteran: My legal name is Joe. Not Joseph, Joe Oliver Smith. Interviewer: Alright, and where and when were you born? Veteran: I was born April 17th, 1946 in Topeka, Kansas. Interviewer: Alright. And now, did you stay there or did you move around? Veteran: No, I grew up as a service brat. I left Topeka when I was 1 month old. My father was in the—he began flying in the Army Air Corps in World War 2, based in England. He flew bomb runs over Germany. He came back you know and so where I start out in Topeka. On the way, I think we went through Fort Dix, New Jersey but we headed to post-war Germany. You know, so I am from about 1 year old to 3 years old in Wiesbaden, Germany. Interviewer: Okay. Did your father ever say much about what it was like to be based in Germany after having bombed it? Veteran: They talked—my parents talked a bit about…not so much the military aspect of the war but life in Germany. You know, living there. We had a German maid, we had a boxer pet for the �family. I remember hearing funny stories about making sure when they took the mare and the boxer for a walk that they didn’t let them out of their sight. It was a big deal, you know. Dogs on the loose would be grabbed pretty quickly. Interviewer: Okay. Grabbed pretty quickly for…lunch? Veteran: For who knows? Maybe for lunch. It’s hard to know, it was not good times there. (00:02:01) Interviewer: Okay, so what you’d still say, there’s still a lot of poverty there at that point before the economy recovers a little bit. So, you do that and then you basically, you kind of bounce around then to other Air Force bases? Veteran: Right. SAC wasn’t—didn’t exist when we came back. But we went from Germany to California. My sister was born in 1950 in California when we were at March Air Force Base. And then moved from there to Colorado Springs, Colorado. My father was an instructor there in the survival school for pilots. You know, if you crash in the Rockies, and that sort of thing. I started kindergarten there, I think in a year or so, and then we came back to Kansas. We were at Salina. At the time, it was Smoky Hill Air Force Base, subsequently it was renamed Schilling Air Force Base. We were there for 2 or 3 years I guess. Interviewer: Yeah, you’ve got 3 years here on your timeline. Yeah. Veteran: 3 years and from there we went to…Went to Westover Air Force Base, in western Massachusetts, out near Springfield. That should have been about the 4th through 6th grades. Interviewer: Yep. �Veteran: That was the beginning of the—well, actually, Salina was the beginning of the strategic air command, the SAC assignments. Interviewer: Okay. Now, is your father still a pilot or was he doing kind of the— Veteran: He was a pilot. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Yeah, he was pretty much a career pilot there. So, the next several assignments were involved with SAC. Going up to Westover was also a SAC assignment. We were up there for 3 years. Interviewer: Okay, so that’s the one that’s in Massachusetts. And then now we’ve got you after that in Maine and Georgia. Veteran: A couple of quick little trips there he was supposed to go to school down at Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama. Sort of midway through the move, it was canceled so my mother and 3 children, we headed down to Texas to her home and visited with cousins and stayed there for a couple of months when I started 7th grade. High school football in Texas was a big deal to play. I played high school football there. So, then we head on up. His next assignment sent him up to Brunswick Naval Air Station in Brunswick, Maine. He was going to be the liaison officer going into—they were going to put a squadron of tankers, refuel tankers there. So, we get up there. I do the 7th grade there in Maine. We lived in a little village up the road called Wiscasset. Great times for a 7th grader. And then they decided not to send the tankers in there. So, he was then reassigned to Robbins Air Force Base in just south of Macon, Georgia. Two more years and at that point, he retired. I finished the 8th grade there. (00:05:10) �Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: 8th…9th grade. Interviewer: So, now what does he do after he gets out of the Air Force? Veteran: Well, he went to work for some—a friend of his that we knew who lived over in north Alabama. That’s TVA country, a lot of recreation on the, near the dam. Lake Guntersville, a bunch of lakes created by dams for the TVA. So, we moved to Guntersville. He went to work. Basically, he was a marine supply salesman. Traveled a bit on the road throughout the area. You know, selling the marine hardware and stuff. Interviewer: Okay. Now, is that where you finished high school? Veteran: I finished high school there, in 3 years, yeah. Interviewer: Alright. And, I don’t know, what was life like for you in those high school years? Veteran: It wasn’t bad. It was pretty good. I was valedictorian of my high school class. I was a jock, I played football and basketball. (00:06:12) Interviewer: And of course, you’ve come in from the outside. Did they accept you pretty quickly or…? Veteran: I was a pretty good football player, so I was readily accepted from the outside, yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. And so, when do you graduate? Veteran: Graduated in ’64. Interviewer: Okay. And then upon graduation, what do you do? �Veteran: At that point, I head up the road to VMI, Virginia Military Institute. My brother had gone to VMI. He was—actually, he was 3 years ahead of me so his last year was my first year up there. During the summers I had a couple of jobs over in Huntsville. You know, the space program at that point. Boeing was there. I got a summer internship at Boeing one of the summers. And then once I got to VMI, they had—we had an ROTC requirement. We could go to summer camp and I have forgotten which of the summers that was. I think I probably worked there in Garnersville one summer. Worked for the power company. Interviewer: Alright. So, when you went to VMI, were you looking to have a career in the military or was this just a way, a place to go to college that kind of fit your background? Veteran: It—it was, you know, the career aspect was on my mind. You know, I come from a military family. My brother, he’s headed off on a military career and I didn’t know anything else. It’s not like, you know, I grew up with a dad who was a corporate guy and…or retail or whatever else is out there in the world. That was—the military was sort of the direction. And I found at VMI among my classmates…we had the Richmond bunch, the Tidewater bunch, these guys— you know, they’re 4th and 5th generation VMI. They knew they were going to VMI because it was a family thing. But you know, some said “I am going to do the military approach” and then some said “this is just going to college for me.” (00:08:23) Interviewer: Right. Okay, now describe a little bit what the curriculum was like at VMI. I mean, to what extent was it regular college and to what extent did you really feel like you were in a military academy? Veteran: Well, it’s kind of a good combination of both. In terms of the academics, it was very much a regular academic college. You know we had…I think we had 11 or 12 majors, we have �more now. I mean, they have really cranked up the academics there. But you know, we had major in civil engineering, we had mechanical engineering, we had electrical engineering, we had biology for the—to turn out a bunch of doctors through there. English, history, chemistry. So—physics, mathematics. So, people were getting their education. Interviewer: Now, about how large was your class, do you think? How many students were there? Veteran: Well, there was some attrition the first year. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: There always is from the military. So, they were rattling, we called it. I think we started with about 375. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: We graduated 275. Interviewer: Alright, now is the attrition from the academics or from people who get turned off by the military bit? Veteran: They got turned off. You know, if they make it through their rat year, their first year, then they are probably well on their way. I mean some people leave. I had one of my roommates, my 3rd class year which is the sophomores. You were at 1st class, 2nd class, 3rd class. One of my roommates left to go join the Army. He couldn’t wait to get to Vietnam. That was—he left to do that. And I remember another—actually, it was one of our class officers who left another year later. I mean, we are 2nds at this point. And he went off, joined the Army and go to Vietnam. Interviewer: Okay. (00:10:41) �Veteran: There were, there were a few of those but the— Interviewer: Explain the rat year thing a little bit. What was that? Veteran: The rat year was kind of life in the barracks as a rat. You know, you’re sort of at the bottom. It is drilled into you that you’re at the bottom and you need to shape up and learn and develop some character. And so, inside the barracks was the worst place. I mean once you are out. And we had two joined quads. So, you come in through a couple of the arches and it’s very much like this hotel. You had the interior stoops that you come out of your rooms, you have windows on the outside wall. You come out of your rooms onto—because it was a 10-foot wide stoop, we called it the balconies. And when you came out of your room, you were bracing. Your shoulders are back, your chin is as far back as you can get it pulled in, and you were marching straight out of your room out to the guard rails, the hand rails at the edge of the stoop. You take a right or a left, and you are marching down there with your chin tucked in and you just hope that you can get out of the barracks without being stopped by an upperclassmen who thinks you’re not really bracing hard enough and works on you. He asks you questions about your—we had a little thing called the rat bible. It had a lot of facts that you had to know. So, you get stopped there on the stoop and you get quizzed on the rat bible. Or you get quizzed on what’s the menu today at lunch in the mess hall. (00:12:24) Interviewer: Now, what happens if you do not answer in a satisfactory manner? Veteran: You might drop for push-ups. Happens a lot. As long as you’re not—I mean, if you’re just not knowing the answers, you just get yelled at and braced more. Some other infractions, you got sent before the rat disciplinary committee, which is an after taps party up on the 5th stoop where you get a sweat party and a lot more physical activity up there. That was another thing, if �you came out and your uniform wasn’t perfectly done, if you had a button unbuttoned or were— whatever, they would send you up. They would write you up and you would get a notice of when you would appear before the RDC to answer those allegations. Interviewer: Okay. And of course, this is now going on in the mid-1960s. Now I gather probably the people inclined to the counter-culture did not go to VMI. Veteran: Right. Interviewer: But there is still some sense of rebellion in the air or whatever. So, there might be people who don’t take to this well? Veteran: Oh, there were. And those were people who didn’t finish their first year. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: You know, they said “I didn’t understand what this was all about. It’s not for me.” Interviewer: Okay. Now, did VMI have black students at this point? Veteran: We did not. In fact, we had—we added the first black students the year after I graduated. We now have women also. The women—we fought that. You know, this long tradition of the male school and you know, we argue that the Mary Baldwin College had an institute, a leadership institute that provided the same opportunity. We fought for a long time. That case—and we were sued. And that case went to the Supreme Court. And we lost. And I was talking with someone yesterday about the difference, let’s say, between VMI’s approach to it and the Citadel. The Citadel later admitted women, but it was a hard time for them and it was—it could have been done better. But at VMI, when we lost that case, we said “Okay, we are in.” and I explained to the guy yesterday, one of the things that VMI did was they arranged with Texas A �and M, who also has a corps and they have women in their corps. We arranged for some of the upperclass women to come to VMI and attend so you’ve got some mentoring and some upperclass women to sort of ease this along. (00:15:33) Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: And, so as I said, you know we fought it, we lost, and we moved on. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, and in the meantime, you are now on schedule to go graduate in 1968. Now you are getting into kind of the peak of the Vietnam war. So, next question is sort of, between ’65 and ’68 as Vietnam is ramping up, how much attention are you paying to that at VMI? Veteran: We are aware of it. And you know, the thoughts are that yeah, probably most of us will wind up in it. Maybe not most but certainly we are not going to avoid that. You know, people are going to go different directions. You know, some of my classmates spent—took a reserve commission, spent time in Germany. So, you have some schooling. A lot of people get their basic officer training and various things. And then you go. So, not everyone went. And some people weren’t excited about going, and they were able to pick another place. (00:16:43) Interviewer: Okay. Now, if you are going to VMI, is it—do you have an obligation to enter the service, either as a reserve or regular officer or is that really up to you? Veteran: No. you…Well, times have changed, but when we were there, to get into VMI you had to be physically able to accept a commission and that you would. If you entered VMI, you know, 2 years later you had an accident that disabled you and you could not, no problem. But generally, everyone else was going to commission. And we had Army, we had the Air Force, we had the �Marine Corps option through the Navy. We didn’t have Navy but the PLC, the Platoon Leader Course, was available. So, there was 3 branches you could have. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, so you’re basically all heading there. Now, you graduate then in ’68. Do you receive your commission upon graduation, or how does that work? Veteran: We did. We were commissioned there. And we had a general officer from the Army, we had people from the 3 branches. And those people would hand you your commission as you came across the stage. Interviewer: Okay. Now, once you get that commission, what happens to you next? (00:18:11) Veteran: Well you could take—you could take maybe up to 30 days before you went. You know I took—took a couple weeks, I think, went home. And then there were a handful of us who got our initial orders and I didn’t think anything about it but in talking with someone yesterday they said “They sent you straight to your unit? They didn’t send you to school first?” I said “No.” We—there were about 6 of us who went directly to the 82nd airborne division down in Fort Bragg. Interviewer: Okay. Now, where did you place in your class? Veteran: Well, there were a couple things. Academically, there were 35 civil engineers. I was 10th. In the military structure, I was the first captain, the regimental commander of the corps of cadets. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, and then when you receive your commission, did some people get regular commissions and some reserve commissions? �Veteran: Yes. Interviewer: Okay, and which— Veteran: Yes, and I was offered a regular Army commission. That’s a 5-year commitment, 5years active duty. You could take a reserve commission and that’s I guess 2 or 3 years. And then I mean everyone would have a reserve commitment beyond but. So, I took it. I am thinking yeah, this is going to—we’re going to take a look. And so, I took the RA commission and… Interviewer: Okay, you take the commission and now you are sent straight to Fort Bragg to join the 82nd airborne division. Veteran: Right. Interviewer: Alright. Now, do you have any idea why that happened that way? Veteran: I am not sure. I am talking to Bob, you know yesterday. Because—he might have been the one who said “You got sent straight down to the 82nd as a leg?” If you know what I am talking about. You know, you show up at an airborne division and you’re not jump qualified then you’re a leg. Interviewer: Okay. Yeah, alright. Veteran: You’re disrespected. (00:20:14) Interviewer: Alright, now did you, once you get there, did you do jump school or— basically, take me through what happens. You show up at Fort Bragg. What do they do with you? Veteran: We are up at Fort Bragg. I was assigned as a platoon leader and then the 307th engineer battalion was 82nd’s battalion. The line companies—in addition to the line company, they had a �little light equipment platoon, no, company I am sorry, company. The 618th light equipment company. I was assigned as a platoon leader to that company. It had more equipment than the line companies did so it was sort of the equipment support. I know at one point we had a field exercise there which was—it was kind of a high light. We went out and then we had a 24-hour period to construct a 3000-foot airstrip out in the west end of the big 40,000 acre area for the FDA. So, in my platoon, we had road graders, we had dozers. And we’re out there pushing the clay around and constructing this airstrip. And a culmination of the exercise, they fly a 130 in there and landed on the airstrip. Interviewer: Okay, so a C-130, a big transport aircraft? Veteran: Yes. Interviewer: Okay. So, this is a light equipment company. What does a heavy equipment company have? Veteran: Well, you know, they had—the heavy equipment has got big dozers. We had the little toy dozers. Although, we had regular size motor graders. Interviewer: Yeah, the graders were there. Yeah, okay. Veteran: You know they say, you know, the light equipment can be air dropped. Well, they all can be air dropped once. But supposedly our light equipment could survive the drop and go on to bigger things. (00:22:13) Interviewer: Alright. Okay. Veteran: So, I got there. Fortunately, most of us got sent to jump school very quickly so we get down to Benning and had our 3-weeks training and come back, jump qualified. �Interviewer: Okay. And so, what does that training actually consist of? You go to Fort Benning, Georgia for 3-weeks, what do they do with you? Veteran: You have some—you start to learn how to land and how to don’t come in stiff legged, you’re going to break your legs. But you know, how you flex. And then we would practice by jumping off a 3-foot platform and then we would tuck and roll, like we are landing. And then we would go—and so, there is you know, a few days of that. And there’s always the physical training, you go out and do some runs. And then you move on to the 30-foot, 4-foot towers. So, you go up in the 34-foot tower. And they hook you up to a chute but basically, you’re—now you’re jumping from 34-feet and it’s going to be a quick hit. But again, now you’re practicing the same techniques from a 34-foot jump. Maybe we weren’t hooked up to a chute, maybe we were hooked up to, I don’t remember, bungee cords. Interviewer: You had some kind of—but there was something that is starting to break your fall before you hit the ground? Veteran: Right. I mean, you’re not going down any faster than a chute would normally get you down. So, we are doing the 34-foot towers. And then the last week was you went out and make 5 jumps. Interviewer: Okay. And do you remember your first jump? Veteran: No. No. Interviewer: Okay. They just kind of run together? (00:24:02) Veteran: They run together. Interviewer: Okay. Did you enjoy doing it? �Veteran: I did. You know, we were—here we got a bunch of us, we all come down from VMI, we are gung-ho second lieutenants and we wanted to be there and so we had…Bob was impressed. He said “How many jumps did you make?” I said, “I made about—in 18-months I was there, I made about 55 jumps.” You know, you had to jump once a month for pay purposes, to remain qualified. But you could find jumps on the weekends, you can go out strapping with you know a plane because there are people that needed those jumps. Especially toward the end of the month, they got to go get their jump in so you could find jumps. And we liked doing that. Interviewer: Alright. Okay, so you get through that and then you’re…Now, do you have schools that you go through at Fort Bragg? I mean once your things—you didn’t go to school immediately, but once you are there… Veteran: So, jump school is at Benning. The next thing that came for me at one, literally there were 3 of us, I guess 3 engineer officers there in the battalion. We went up to Fort Belvoir because that’s where the engineer officer basic course was. So, we were up there for, I don’t know, 6 weeks or so. Went through that. Interviewer: Okay, and what does that actually consist of? Veteran: Well, that’s some leadership skills, that’s some…I don’t remember a lot of it, but you know, more oriented toward the engineer function in the units. Interviewer: Okay, so what do Army engineers actually do in…? (00:26:01) Veteran: Well, you got the combat engineers and they’re, you know, mostly the trip units. I mean you go to the 82nd, it’s not like going to the Savannah Corps of Engineers district, where you are in civilian works. �Interviewer: Right. Veteran: So we’re—this is pretty much focused on the combat unit, trip units. Interviewer: Right. But they’re assuming that you know most of your basic engineering at this point? Veteran: No, I don’t think they do actually. Because I ran into a lot of people who didn’t have, I mean it’s not, the fact that I got a degree in civil engineering. You know, I ran into guys who…Well, you had the OCS guys and they can come from any kind of background. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: So, it was…You know, I talk about the Army manuals, the field manuals that, you know, go look in the manual. You’re going to build some temporary bunkers over there, which we did a lot of. They got manuals and they kind of walk you through where you can find the resources. And then we had some specific classes on that. But it was broad. I think all of the officer basic courses are broad. Interviewer: Okay, because they have to get you ready for wherever they might send you or whatever you might do. Veteran: Right. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. So now you do that, now you can…But you don’t really stop there, you go on for further training. Veteran: No we, you know—we are sort of back and forth to the division. You know, show up, go to jump school, come back, go to Belvoir for the basic. And that was sort of September/October timeframe. And then I went to ranger school back in Fort Benning in—I was �what was called a winter ranger. We started in the middle of January and it was an 8-week school. Interviewer: Okay, did they do all of it at Fort Benning or did they take you different places? (00:28:06) Veteran: We went—there were 3 phases. You had the initial phase there at Benning, which was a lot of physical training and some classroom instruction. Then the mountain phase, we went up to Dahlonega, Georgia. And this is, this is around the 1st of February. Snow on the ground, cold. Interviewer: You’re in the mountains of north Georgia, right? Veteran: We were in the mountains of north Georgia, doing our mountain activities, if you will. And then, sort of late February, we went down to Eglin Air Force Base for the swamp training. Interviewer: Okay, and that’s in Florida? Veteran: That is in Florida, yep. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, so you get all of this. Now, what kinds of people were there? Were they all mostly young lieutenants or were there more higher-grade officers? Veteran: The—mostly they were certainly company grade. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I don’t think we saw any majors and above. I can’t remember. There must have been some NCOs, they would do that as well. But yeah, a lot of—all the west borders, all the VMI guys and—all the VMI guys that want to go. So, yeah. Interviewer: So, what motivated you to do that? I mean… �Veteran: Oh, it was all the same. I mean, you know, we are in this. Let’s not skimp on this, let’s not skip something that you know is going to make us better prepared. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. And then, so you do that, and then you come back to your unit again in Fort Bragg. Veteran: Back to Bragg. I had one more school. I went to the jump master school. So that’s you know, most people making the jumps you know they line up, you’re in the plane, they line up. Everybody hooks up. The jump master is the guy directing traffic. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: You know, he is giving the instructions. He’s running everybody out and then out he goes. So, several of us went to jump master. That was a—just a brief, maybe a couple weeks I think. And that was there at Fort Bragg. So, then we were—so back in the division. And then I, well, most of us got—we went to first lieutenant, beginning of June. (00:30:26) Interviewer: Right. So, you’re basically, you’ve had your commission for a year and done well and so you get the promotion. Veteran: Yeah. That was at that point, you know, they were pretty much cranking them along. Interviewer: Okay, so we have gotten you to basically the middle of 1969. You got your commission, now you’re a first lieutenant. And what do you do at this point? Veteran: Well, at this point, I had the opportunity to interview for a job as an aide to one of the assistant division commanders who was just coming in. General Sam Walker, he went to VMI for a year and then he went to West Point, and that’s okay. But I interviewed and I got the job so now I become the aide to General Walker. He—there were 3, the CG, the commanding general, �was John Dean, major general. The two divisions, assistant division commanders, John Hennessy was the ADC for operations and Sam Walker came in to be the ADC for support. So, I spend the next—well, we get started. So, I am his aide. You know, following him around doing stuff. And that was kind of routine, you would see what these general officers did because they huddled a lot. So, I pretty well knew all 3 of them. And then my classmates started heading across to Vietnam. And, you know, I started seeing you can’t wait too late. You need to be in there at the platoon level, when they get over there. You need that. (00:32:28) Interviewer: Okay, so why do you need that? Veteran: The experience. You know, most of us feel, you know as you go up, it’s important that you understand the jobs. And so if you have never been a platoon leader, you maybe don’t appreciate things that occur at the platoon level and don’t know what your subordinate officers are dealing with. Interviewer: Now, for career purposes, is it important at this point that you get to Vietnam and lead a platoon in Vietnam if you’re going to move up or whatever? Veteran: Yeah, I think, you know if you go in the Army in the middle of ’68 and 5, 6 years later you have—you didn’t mark that off on your ticket? You know. So, yeah I think the people—you know, the good classmate of mine who went to Germany, he was a basketball player. He was there on scholarship at VMI and he had an obligation but going to Vietnam was really not high on his list. But the others who were inclined to make the military a career? Certainly, they want to get over there. Interviewer: Okay, so if you had wanted to, could you just have stayed at Fort Bragg indefinitely or gone on to Germany or something? �Veteran: I could have stayed longer as General Walker’s aide. I mean, I went to him and I said “Sir, you know, I need to get over there.” And I had been his aide at that point for, it was about 6 months, so. He said “Fine do you have any particular interests?” I said, “Well, I know that General Hennessy is—had just gone over.” So, General Hennessy left from the 82nd, went to the 101st. And I said, “I’d like to get to the 101st, and I would actually like to have an infantry platoon.” And he smiled. And so, you know, within a month I was—in December, I headed over to Vietnam. And so, I had my orders read: you’re going to the 101st. (00:34:53) Interviewer: Okay, so did you have those orders before you left? Or did you get those once you got to Vietnam? Veteran: I can’t remember. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: You know, most guys…You show up there at Vietnam and then you’re waiting around, you find out where you’re going. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: So, I knew, and I can’t remember if I knew before or not. But I knew that that was going to happen. Interviewer: Right. Now, what’s the process for getting you to Vietnam? Physically, how do you get there? Veteran: Oh, physically. I flew out of Oakland. That—well, I was at the time, well I was at Fort Bragg. So, I was on the east coast. I mean, you pack up and then you fly out to California and �you get on a—and we are flying commercial. So, I believe going over, I can’t remember. I think I went through Hawaii going over. Interviewer: Yeah, that’s common. Veteran: Yeah, there were two routes. You go through Hawaii or you go up through Alaska and down. So, we fly on in and we land at Tan Son Nhut. Everybody was looking out the windows, trying to figure out what to expect. And I am thinking, “Well, we don’t have weapons. Should we be worried about that?” You know, we are going to get off the plane at the tarmac there and should we be worried about that? What is next? So, we just load on buses and off we go. And then we go to the replacement center. You know, I can’t remember, we hang around a day or two or whatever. And I don’t remember how I got up to the 101st, up to Camp Eagle. (00:36:44) Interviewer: Alright, so Tan Son is the big airfield outside of Saigon. So, you’re down in the southern part of South Vietnam at that point. Veteran: Right. Interviewer: And the 101st airborne— Veteran: We were up at, it was up at I Corps. You know, the country was divided into 4 military zones, were what we called them. We just referred I Corps, the roman numeral, I Corps from the DMZ coming down and II Corps, III Corps, and IV Corps. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: So, 101st and the Marines were up in I Corps. Interviewer: Right. Okay, so when do you actually arrive in Vietnam? Veteran: It was in December, I guess middle of December. �Interviewer: So, December of ’69? Veteran: Right, yes. Interviewer: Alright, now by that time, the 101st had had a pretty ugly engagement with a place called Hamburger Hill about 6 month or so earlier. Had you followed that story at the time, while it was going on? Or were you just doing other stuff? Veteran: I was doing other stuff. You know we maybe heard…Well, you didn’t hear a lot. And they didn’t really want anybody to hear anything about Hamburger Hill. Interviewer: Alright, but that had happened already. Okay. Veteran: Right. Interviewer: And…Now, I guess, when you got off the plane, did you notice the physical conditions? Or was there weather or anything like that? What happened at Tan Son when you first got there? (00:38:13) Veteran: I believe the weather—the weather was not too bad. You know, the monsoon…Vietnam sort of gets, it’s long enough that they experience. In the north they have a different season than in the south. In the north, we had the monsoons from about November through beginning of March. Cold and rainy. If you were down south, you would have the opposites. You had summer. You’re hot and rainy in the south. So, I am assuming that it being December, Tan Son was probably not bad. Warm. Interviewer: Yeah. Some people comment on the heat or on the smell or things like that when they get off the plane. But that doesn’t register with everyone, son that’s just why I �asked. Okay, so then they get you up and normally they will fly you up to Da Nang or Fu Bai or some place. You get in a truck and go where you’re going. Veteran: Right. Interviewer: Okay, so when you got up to the 101st, what specific unit did you join? Veteran: When I got to the 101st, General Hennessy met me. And I spent about 10 days with him and his aide. Went everywhere he went. And so, he gave me a broad picture of what was going on. I remember we flew out to the hospital ship Hope. You know, toured around while he’s putting medals on people who are—they were on the ship. Went to fire bases with him. I do remember that there, around Christmastime, there was a USO show. And I was able to go to that. So, I am—I got a cush job here for 10 days, just going around with him. And then off I go to the—I went to Delta company, 2 506th infantry, the 3rd brigade. Interviewer: Okay so 2nd battalion, yeah. Veteran: Yeah, 2nd battalion 506th infantry. And they were based in Evans, Camp Evans, which was also where B company of 326th engineers was based because B company supported the brigade. (00:40:25) Interviewer: Alright. And so now, once you arrive there at Camp Evans, you have your orders. What happens to you? What do you do? Veteran: I meet my company commander. I meet my platoon. And we were in base camp. Within just a few days, we were going out on our first mission. Mostly what we were doing was you’re out in the field, you’re humping the boonies, you’re looking for trouble. And so, we were—a couple incidents. One thing that happened on the helipad. You were going to fly out of �the LZ, the helipad there at Evans. And I had a staff sergeant, Jerry Pounds, that’s one guy I remember. He was my platoon sergeant. We are up on the helipad, everybody is packing their rucks and you know checking equipment. Sergeant Pounds came over with a case of C rations. And he starts popping the C rations open. And he said, “Here sir, take what you want. Get the meals out to the troops.” And I looked at him. I said, “What?” He said, “Well, take what you want and I’ll get—” I said, “No, no, no, that’s not how it goes. You take the meals and get them to the troops, and whatever is left bring back to me.” He said, “Wow, that’s a change.” And at that point I thought what did—who have I replaced here? I was shocked. I was shocked. So anyway, we continue on our way. We get packed up and off we go. And the platoon was inserted somewhere out in the jungle. (00:42:32) Interviewer: Okay. Now, were you just going out in a platoon sized operation at that point? Was it just you by yourselves? Veteran: Well, the company was going but we would be moving independently, the platoon would move. Interviewer: Alright, but how many men were in your platoon do you think when you joined it? Veteran: About 23, 24. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. Veteran: A little under staffed but most of them were… Interviewer: Okay. And did anything happen on these early patrols? Did you find any enemy? �Veteran: Very rarely. We had some contact. We probably had a couple of contacts you know, where we actually exchanged fire. But it was just very momentary. They were not looking—they were not sticking around. You know, we ran into them and they were not looking for a fight. So, we’re exchanging some fire as they were heading out. So, you know, we did this…I think we were out a week and then we got resupplied and so it was—you know, brief periods but this was during the monsoon you know, so we set up night ambushes, we got a night defensive position, and we’d set the ambushes. We’d set out our claim wars around the NDP and I remember, you know, you’re trying to get a little sleep under a poncho and you’ve taken your poncho and taken sticks to try and hold it off the ground about 18 inches so you can get under and maybe stay a little dry but…So, that kind of stuff. (00:44:08) Interviewer: Okay. Now, to what extent did you try to assert your authority and to what extent did you try to learn from the guys around you when you first got there? What approach did you take to leadership I guess when you joined them? Veteran: Well, I think when Sergeant Pounds went and gave the guys their C rats, I think he must have said something to them, that things are different here. I didn’t feel any need to sort of exert my authority like the guy who knew everything. I mean, I had just come into the country, but I knew the mission. And we had been out for 3 or 4 days and Sergeant Pounds came to me with another little ditty. He said—he walked over, he said “Well sir, I got to hand it to you: you know how to read a map too.” And I thought, “What?” So, you know at that point I thought—I didn’t have any problem. I did make…It maybe wasn’t the first week, I said “Sergeant Pounds, the men need to shave.” He said, “Really?” I said, “Yeah, I want them shaving their faces.” I said, “Don’t get me wrong, it’s not—I don’t care whether they—I dint care about their whiskers. But if they �shave their faces, I know they’re washing their faces.” And that was what was important for me. So. Interviewer: So, you were concerned about infections or…? Veteran: Yeah, this was just hygiene you know? I mean, I’ve gone times where when we go out for a week, you don’t take a shower you know, and so you kind of neglect your personal hygiene and I said at least I want them washing their faces and shaving. And they did. (00:46:09) Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: It wasn’t a big deal at that point. Interviewer: But basically, what you would do is you would have your orders or whatever and you would probably talk to Sergeant Pounds or the squad leaders and then you went and did it? Veteran: Right. I mean really, we got 23 guys and we’re just carefully moving through, looking for contact and seeing what we see. And we’ve got—we’ve got a map, but we are keeping in touch with Captain Wallgood you know, and he’s got orders of where the company needs to be and how he’s covering the area with his platoons. You know, so we know where we are and we know what we are working and that changes as we go along. Interviewer: Okay. Now how long did you spend as a platoon leader? Veteran: It was about 3 months. It was January, February, March. Interviewer: Right. Okay. Veteran: Oh, one other thing that we did in January was called an artillery raid. And that’s where it’s planned and the raid is simply a one day in and out. We had in January, the company had an �artillery raid up to fire base Shepherd, which was up—it was an old Marine fire base. It was not used. I mean, it had been abandoned. So, we got an abandoned fire base and we planned the artillery raid. The company goes in as perimeter security. They fly in a battery of 105 Howitzers. They have already pre-planned their fires. They have targets in that area that they’re planning to fire on. So then we pop in there, they fire for the day, and then we pull out. And it was pretty quiet. You know, you like to think these are surprise raids, that’s why it’s called a raid. We had little or no activity until we were leaving and I remember as the chopper I was on sort of hopped off the hill and started gaining momentum, we started taking fire from the ground. You know, from down the side of the hill. (00:48:27) Interviewer: Okay. Alright, now are there other particular incidents that stand out in your memory from your time as a platoon leader, before we move on? Veteran: Not really. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. So, what brought your time as a platoon leader to an end? Veteran: Well, at that point I said this has been interesting. I had hoped for—I had wanted more contact. And people say, “You did?” I say, “Yeah, I did.” You know, I had wanted to make this a meaningful experience and it wasn’t—it didn’t turn out to be that. I mean, other than leading the troops and having the experience. And at that point I asked, I said “Okay, I am an engineer officer and I think I’ve seen what there is here and I am ready to go back to the engineers.” So, at that point I was able to go back. And at that point I went to B company 326 there at Evans so I got there just in time to go out on April 1st to Ripcord as an engineer instead of an infantryman. Interviewer: Alright. So, explain what happens that day, what do you recall about that and what do you know about it? �Veteran: That was the worst day of my life, without doubt. Ripcord had been abandoned the year before so we are going to go out. This is sort of the springboard again because of the monsoon. The year would go where, because of the monsoon in the winter, we couldn’t resupply fire bases so everybody pulls back. (00:50:07) Interviewer: Okay. You couldn’t resupply fire bases that were up in the mountains? Veteran: Right. Interviewer: And so, Ripcord was basically a hilltop fire base. Veteran: Yeah. There were some that were closer to the coast that were lower but Ripcord was out there. It wasn’t all the way to the A-Shau but it was out there and then because of the elevation, the weather was very, very difficult. You couldn’t drive to Ripcord. Some of the nearer ones, there were roads out, you could drive out to them. But so, we are going back to Ripcord to reopen it on April 1st. We had 2 sorties of 14 birds each: the infantry company and the battalion forward CP went out initially. I had 12 of my engineers. We were in the 2nd sortie, so they took—14 went out, they come back and pick up the rest of us, out we go. By the time we went out, that was around 9:30 in the morning. As we are approaching, I am looking down and there is red smoke all over the hill. So, red smoke means the LZ is hot, we are taking fire. You know. And so as we came in, the Huey I was in, and I am sure most of them, came in at about 5 feet off the ground. They started yelling, “Get out!” So, we are jumping out of the Hueys, grabbing our stuff and off you go. I mean, the birds were getting out of there as fast as they could because they are taking mortars. And by that point, there were people who are already wounded, maybe some killed, I am not sure. There were—I think there were 8 people killed that day at Ripcord. We get off. I just—I had my 12 guys. I made sure I knew where they were. I gathered �them, made sure they were accounted for in foxholes. There was no overhead cover at that point. I mean that was one of our missions, was to go in, get the bunkers going. (00:52:23) Interviewer: Okay. But there were foxholes there already? Veteran: There were foxholes. Just dug foxholes. And so, I made sure the guys were at least below. You know, if a mortar lands, you want to be below. You’re not going to find—if it lands right on you, you’re done. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: And then I had 5 guys with me. We found 2 foxholes that were—well, they were about 5 feet long, a couple feet wide and 4 feet deep. And then there was one here and about 18 inches dirt, and then there was a second one. So, we got 3 guys in here. I am in here with 2 other guys. And we stayed there, because there is nothing else to do. I mean, we are not being attacked. I mean, we are not in fighting positions, fending off a ground attack. We were sitting there taking the mortar rounds. And this all started to be cyclical because the mortars would start firing when the birds came in. So, once the 2 sorties were in, they’re done. We were trying to get med evacs in and we had several med evacs who came in to pick up wounded. They took a few of the bodies out early but it reached the point where when the birds left, the mortars stopped. When the birds came back in, the mortars started. And this went on—and I have forgotten what time of day it was, but you know, you’re talking about being scared to death. You could hear a mortar round dropped in the tube. Everybody knows that thump. And then you hear the whistle going up and then you hear the whistle coming down. And so, every time you hear them, you just pray it’s not going to drop in your foxhole. (00:54:30) Interviewer: Okay. So now, what happens to your men over the course of that day? �Veteran: We just sat tight until the mortar landed in this foxhole. And Milt Swain was my radio operator and my jeep driver in the back. Landed right in his lap. You know, so we are all just kind of crouched down in the bottom and that mortar landed in that foxhole. It was a 60. If it had been an 80-82 millimeter mortar, all 3 of them would have been gone. Interviewer: So, was just—was he the only one killed at that point? Veteran: He was the only one killed. The other 2 were wounded. They jumped out of those foxholes. And I asked Dave Kenyon about this because I couldn’t remember where Dave was. And he said “No, I was over in another foxhole with two other guys.” But he said when Milton got killed, those 2 other guys were out of that foxhole and they ran over to our foxhole, they were—they were just a mess. They were med-evaced. Now, Milton’s body was not at that time. But you know, we are still doing this. And you know, it’s like 2 o’clock in the afternoon and what we have done all day is sit there and get shelled. And all day, we had—General Wright was the division commander. He’s up there in his bird. I know the brigade commander was up there. I don’t remember who that was? Interviewer: It was Bradley at that point. (00:56:10) Veteran: It was not Ben Harrison. Interviewer: Yeah, Harrison wasn’t there yet. Veteran: So, Bradley is up there. You know, everybody is up there trying to figure out what we are doing. And during the day, we had attack air was calling in and dropping bombs. They came in with Napalm. And they had what’s called counter battery radar. I don’t know if you are familiar with that but it was not at Ripcord, it was over on another fire base. But with counter battery radar, you can locate the origin points from tracking the arc up and where—and they can �back it to those points. And they had about 13 different places around Ripcord where firing was being done. And throughout the day, not one of them was stopped. Because what you had was the bunker complexes. And they already knew we were coming in clearly, because they were— their rounds were dropping on the fire base. They were not trying to zero in their guns. Their guns were ready and they would hop out of their little bunker holes, pop a round in or two, and they are back in their hole by the time attack air is there. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: So, none of that—you know, none of that was stopped. Interviewer: Right. Now, there had been an attempt to land in Ripcord in March already. So, they had evidence even from that that this was a place of interest and they had time to plan. Veteran: Right. Interviewer: But even that attack was thwarted in part by enemy fire. Veteran: And yeah, I wasn’t aware of that. You know, it’s funny because sometimes you can be a grunt platoon leader and not know a thing about what’s going on, other than maybe what your company is doing. (00:58:06) Interviewer: Right. Yeah, so that was before you were worrying about that kind of thing and so…? Veteran: You’re right, you’re right. I didn’t know what was going on at Ripcord but…So, middle of the afternoon, the decision was made: okay, we are giving it up today. Everybody is going to walk off the hill and you’re going to meet up with—I think it was alpha company. Alpha over �there. And he was over there, it was not one of the numbered hills. We’ve got 805, 605, 902. He was just over on the next hill in the jungle. And he sent a couple guys down to meet us and you know, so the remainder probably had, I don’t know, 100-110 people by then after, you know, some of them being taken out. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: So, we walked off. Interviewer: And what time of day was this? Veteran: This was hitting late afternoon. It was starting to get a little dark. And then we hooked up with Al. You know, get up to the top of the hill and I know Al. Al was a year ahead of me at VMI and I know him very well. I said, “Glad to see you, buddy.” So, at that point, they’re trying to fire on us but they don’t know where we are because it was not a known hill. We were just in the jungle but they are starting to move their fire. The infantry company that had been the security on Ripcord…You know, we overnighted there with Al and then I think the next day, that infantry company regrouped. And they headed back into the field. Interviewer: Right. (1:00:02) Veteran: To start doing some work. Interviewer: Yeah, that was the B company. They complained they didn’t get enough food from A company. Veteran: So…Oh, okay. Well, all best plans. Well, the plan was that for, so…I am sure it was for 3 engineers, so 13, there were 10 of us. I got 9 guys. And the plan was just to airlift us back to Evans for now. And we couldn’t get out for 3 days. You know we wake up, we woke up the next �morning and look down in the lowlands and we see Evans is sucked in with weather. So, birds can’t get out. Okay, we’ll wait and later in the day…Well, as it lifted down there, it rose and we couldn’t get out. And that happened for a couple of days. And it was fine I think the 3rd day before they could get us out. Well, yeah we were a little short on food at that point. Because that wasn’t the plan, to go in with a week’s worth of C rats for the Ripcord opening. Interviewer: Alright. Now, in the meantime do you get harassed by the NVA at all or do they leave you alone? Veteran: I think they pretty much left us alone. Again, they weren’t sure where we were and now after April 1st, I think the concentration—there was much more effort, trying to locate and root out these spots that…So, I think there was less of that. Interviewer: Now, did the company move around at all or did you just stay in one place? Veteran: We stayed right there. Pretty much. I think Al had people working in the mediate vicinity but the engineers, we pretty much stayed there with Al’s command post. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, so after 3 days or whatever it is, you get back to Evans again. Okay. And now, a few days after that…Okay, so we’ve now basically made it into April of 1970 and the 2nd attempt, I mean there were people would walk up on April 11th. The company walks up rather than flying in helicopters so nobody shoots at them. And once they’re there, it’s time to start building a base. And so, what do you either remember or know about what your platoon did? (1:02:39) Veteran: Well, I don’t remember details but yes, we went back in. we must have gone out on choppers and they would have brought out one of our little dozers. So, I went back in with probably a couple of my squads and David Kenyon was in one of those. And he reminded me. �And then we spent probably 3 weeks or so constructing fortifications, the covered bunkers, doing wire—perimeter wire. You know, that’s the kind of job that typically we did in support of fire bases. You know, opening— Interviewer: Okay. Now, were you coordinating with any of the infantry officers? Because there was a captain by the name of Vazquez who was—he commanded that company. Veteran: I don’t remember him but I have heard stories about him. Interviewer: Puerto Rican captain. It was something. And he--his, I mean he talked a lot about how exactly he wanted the wire laid and how he wanted the fighting positions constructed and things like that. Veteran: Yeah, we weren’t doing so much the individual. I know that he was very adamant about the individual fighting positions. We were—we focused on the big bunkers, the battalion for— the command post for you know, they were underground. They’re constructed out of heavy timber and then covered. (1:04:10) Interviewer: Right, and the artillery positions? Veteran: We would have shaped those up with the dozers. And then they do a lot of the revetments of the—after they have fired a bit, they’ve got the wooden ammo boxes that are great for sort of constructing the revetments around the fighting positions. Interviewer: Right. But the infantry did take their own positions in a lot of cases, so you didn’t do that for them? Veteran Right. In talking yesterday with someone, I realized that we, the engineer, we had a small sector of the perimeter. So, you got infantry so we were out there. So, certainly in our little �sector we were responsible for, you know, clearing the fields of fire the way Captain Vazquez wanted them. And making sure that our fighting positions were in our sector. So, we took care of that. We generally didn’t do the individual positions for everybody around the base. Interviewer: Right. And describe a little bit about what you remember about what the layout of the hill looked like? Or what did you have up there? Veteran: It was very irregular. It’s hard for me to remember. Even from both of April 1 and then later of…The layout, because it had been used before. So, you got a lot of dirt that had been pushed around you know for bunkers and that sort of thing previously. Don’t really remember too much. Interviewer: Okay. How rocky was it? I mean, was it—did you have to blast a lot of rock? Veteran: No, no blasting. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: No blasting. We could push it all with the dozer. (1:06:00) Interviewer: Alright. And while you were there, this is basically most of the rest of April probably that you’re there? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Were you taking in any fire? Veteran: Not that I remember. It was…No. �Interviewer: Okay. Well I guess at this point you got—the line companies are working the area around it, it might have been a little harder to launch mortars at you if they wanted to. Veteran: Right. Interviewer: But anyway, it was relatively quiet? Veteran: I think we were surprised when we went back in 10 days later and…nothing. And you know, so that was the build up of, you know, Ripcord as the fortified base that it later was. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: I have one vague recollection. It had to have happened on Ripcord when we had our own little sector of the platoon and you know, we got word came to the fire base that, you know, you need to get ready, you need to be on full alert tonight. You’re going to get hit with zappers. So, pucker up boys. Nothing happened. It didn’t happen but I do remember that because we were on edge and that, you know, wasn’t that often that we were. Especially with the engineers on the perimeter, which we weren’t— Interviewer: Yeah. So, you’re out there on the perimeter at night. I mean, can you see anything? Veteran: No. I know they shot a lot of flares. And they’d do that. And you’re thinking, we are supposed to hear them? You know, we got trip wires and trip flares in the wire and you’re hoping that you are going to be able to sense their movement coming up the side of the hill. Interviewer: Right. Okay. So, you’re there, you do your job. Now, you just go on to do other jobs from there? (1:08:00) �Veteran: I did. And I expect some of the engineers may have left a squad there to continue. But you know, I am back here and there. I remember going on a recovery mission in the middle of May. One of the resupply chopper from headquarters company 2/506 went down. Went down in the jungle with 4 crew. You had Lieutenant John Darling, was at West Point ’68. I knew—I had met him so I knew him. He was on—I think he was the common officer for the battalion. He and one of his guys were on the bird. They’re going out on this resupply. The bird went down and crashed and rolled. And one of the crew, one of the helicopter crew survived. He didn’t know— he had no idea where he was. He moved out and he was picked up. I don’t…You know, within that day or the next day. He didn’t know where the bird was. It took them about 5 or 6 days to find the bird. So, you’ve got 5 bodies in that bird in the May heat and they’re going out on a recovery mission. And I got tasked and I took 1 or 2 of my engineers in case we needed to go in and blast a landing zone nearby to do our work. We went in with the body bags to get the 5 bodies and make sure that the equipment in the chopper was totally destroyed. The bird wasn’t coming out. So, that’s something that I distinctly remember, going on that mission was horrendous. (1:10:15) Interviewer: Okay, now how did they get you in? I mean if you said there’s not a landing zone there. Veteran: Well, I don’t know whether there was or not. And I guess it’ll be a mystery. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Somehow, we— Interviewer: But basically, what stands out for you is just the nature of the mission. And were the bodies still there? �Veteran: The bodies were there and the smell was horrible. We put on gas masks. Interviewer: Had the NVA been there, as far as you could tell? Veteran: No. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I guess they didn’t know where it was either. So, you know, that was just one of those odd jobs that we did and I remember that one. But you know, we are supporting the battalion fire bases. There were a couple others that were active at that point. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: And, you know, whatever was needed. Interviewer: Yeah. And at that point, at least, well, 2/506 wasn’t having combat at that point but some of the other battalions got into things. 1/506 had some trouble in May. I mean there were—there were sort of different fights that went on at different points but basically—but you’re just doing your job as engineers and you’re going and building things or moving things as needed. Veteran: Right. Right. Interviewer: Okay. Now, how much longer did you spend as a platoon leader? Veteran: Probably the first week in June, I was promoted to captain. So, at that point—at that point I was assigned, I took over headquarters company 326, the engineer headquarters company. And that was at Camp Eagle. So, I am out of the AO there, at least in that area. And I spent the next—about the next 6 months down at Eagle. I was the headquarters company commander part of the time, and then part of the time I was the battalion S-1. And that was coming up on the end �of my tour. And I made a deal, I extended, and I went back out. When I came back, I took an R and R at the end of the year, came back from R and R and I went to B company 326 so I am back up at Evans as the company commander now in January. (1:12:41) Interviewer: Okay. Well, let’s kind of get into parts of that story now. So, when you are headquarters company commander at Phu Bai, what did the job consist of? Veteran: A lot of vehicle maintenance, a lot of administration. So, not out anywhere. Interviewer: Okay, now while you are doing that, that’s when things get hot out at Ripcord, particularly in July. How much of that did you pay attention to, or how much of that were you aware of? Veteran: It must have been a closely guarded secret because it was 35 years later before I came to realize what happened in June and July. Had no clue. I am sitting there at Camp Eagle, no clue. Interviewer: Alright. So, what’s daily life like on a big base like that? Veteran: You’re expected to have clean, starched fatigues, you’re, you know…Not the life that I had been used to there for, you know, for the past 6 months. Ran around battalion headquarters. We actually, the engineer battalion, had the old Seabee Camp. The Seabees had a bunch of Quonset huts that they had used for maintenance and so forth, and that was ideal for us. You know, you go to briefings, taking care of business and kind of a—not a memorable occasion. (1:14:21) �Interviewer: Alright. Now there are a lot of kind of stereotypes about Vietnam and what went on there and so forth. One is particularly with base camps. There was a lot of problems with drug use and things like that. Are you aware of any of that kind of thing? Veteran: I didn’t encounter much of that. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: A lot of beer drinking but I didn’t encounter—I didn’t really come across a lot of drugs. Interviewer: Okay. And the other thing had to do with racial tensions. Was there some segregation? Did the blacks segregate themselves? Or were there fights and things like that? Veteran: Not so much in the engineer battalion. Yeah, I think the grunts had it a little different. Yeah, I think with the engineers. I mean we had, you know, when you’re back in base camp, you got a little bit more meaningful jobs perhaps that you are doing. And i think that, you know, our experiences on the fire bases carried back to the back as well. I didn’t see a lot of that. Interviewer: Yeah. Well, I asked because there is different—a great deal of experiences. A lot of this stuff gets over blown because it’s the sensational part. Veteran: Right. Yeah. Interviewer: But for you, it wasn’t really registering that those kinds of things were issues. Veteran: No. I had a few individuals…You know, had to work through problems individually but it wasn’t so much, you know, racial divide. It was, you know, a guy didn’t want to go out in the field because he was derosing in 3 weeks. He wasn’t getting on that chopper to go out there. You know, that sort of thing. (1:16:02) �Interviewer: Yep. Veteran: So, you just have to work through that. But again, and I am not taking credit for being the dynamic leader that you know, made sure there were no problems. But I just—it just happened that way it seemed like. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, and now somewhere along the line, you decide to extend? Veteran: I did. Interviewer: How did that come about? Veteran: Well, that’s because I wanted to command the line company. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And headquarters company and division headquarters and kind of doing that stuff. It’s not like having the line company out there supporting the brigade. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: And that’s—so, that’s what I got. And I had that for the remaining 6 months. Interviewer: Okay. And in between, you took an R and R? Veteran: I took an R and R. After the 1st year, I took an R and R. I think it was…I think I only took one. Interviewer: And you didn’t go back? Veteran: I didn’t go back to the states. I wasn’t married. And my parents, it wasn’t like, “Oh, I can’t wait to see you!” You know? I mean, they sent my brother and me off, we go off and join the military, and that’s what they expected, you know? �Interviewer: Okay. So, what did you pick for R and R? Veteran: I went to Sidney. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: My week in Sidney, yeah. It was quite a time. It was different. Interviewer: So, like just being out of a war zone for a while? Veteran: People were friendly and you know—which, wouldn’t have been the case had I gone back to the states. But I remember the Sidney Opera House. I mean, everybody has seen the photos of the sort of clamshell stacked up there. But yeah, I enjoyed my time. And then I headed back. Interviewer: Alright. Okay. So, you get back. So, during what time span then are you commanding that company? Veteran: Well, that’s from January to June. I came home in June of ’71. This is ’71 now. (1:18:07) Interviewer: Okay. Now during that time then, what—what kinds of things did you do with the company? Veteran: Well, the big thing that occurred was Lam Son 719. And that was an operation in the works. And I took my company up to Khe Sanh. You know, this was staged. 101st went into Khe Sanh. This thing kicked off I think January 30th was the day they identify. And I went out with— we took some of our little dump trucks, drove out. We didn’t chopper out. Some of the people might have but we basically moved some equipment out. And that had been the Marine base. It had pretty much taken a beating and they had taken artillery fire. And you know, little craters all �over the runway. The runway was made of that steel planking. We didn’t repair, they brought in a specialty engineer platoon that repaired those planks. You can replace them. First thing was to get the runway in shape. That was going on but when we got up there, our job was to again start constructing bunkers. We had the dozers, we start cutting these deep, big slots, getting the timber bunkers built inside of them, filling them and covering them, while the airstrip is getting rehab. And once the airstrip got rehab, then they started flying in C-130s. and never stopped. They would come in from the east end. The runway ran east-west and was sort of a drop off on the east end. But they would come through, drop the tailgate, plop a little parachute out the back and then we’d yank these pallets of supplies out the back of the 130s and they never stopped. It was just kind of a touch and go operation and they started, you know, we started ramping up the prep for supporting the ARVNs going into Laos. Interviewer: Alright, so the ARVNs were invading Laos. The Americans couldn’t officially go with them? Veteran: The only one—right. Which—well, there were advisors and there were helicopters. (1:20:29) Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: And it was largely the 101st aviation assets, and I think we had some additional units for the south. So, we are providing the aviation assets and we are inserting them in various spots over. You know, they had an operation, which again was one of those things that I read a book here in the past couple years to find out really what was going on there. Had no idea. So, we are sitting there at Khe Sanh and building the big bunkers and doing some wire work but largely the bunker operation. And I think we were probably there 6 or 8 weeks. And during that time, a few �things happened. One thing that happened is, and we had been there maybe a couple of weeks. All was quiet, you know we are getting this place fortified. And then one morning, about 7 in the morning, we wake up to I am thinking, at the time I was thinking, 100-120 artillery rounds coming in. Not mortars but big stuff. And it was coming from up in the northwest of Khe Sanh. And Bob asked me yesterday, “Were they coming from Laos?” I said, “I don’t know whether it was coming from Laos or the DMZ, but it was toward the northwest.” And there were mountains going up there. So, you’re looking up at these mountains and there’s artillery up there firing. And so, we are all taking cover. And 15 minutes, it’s over. Didn’t happen again. So, quirky things like that, you know? (1:22:26) Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: And the other thing that I remember, because what—as I said, east-west runway. We are—the engineers, we are all on the south side. And we are not on the perimeter, we are at the inside of the perimeter, a little bit close to the airstrip. On the far side of the field, the 2nd of the 17th Cav, the air cav, they had their set up. And they had a sector of the perimeter. And they had their Cobra gunships in there and then they had built their revetments. It’s all tucked away nicely. And they had their perimeter and they had their ground troops. You know, they have not just the aviation people but they had their ground troops. About 2 in the morning, a fire fight erupts. And we realize that the cav across the runway are being attacked. And it was a very serious encounter. It went on for about an hour and a half to two hours. Pretty crack sapper unit. And it was just a pitched battle. And you know we are sitting over there and nothing else is happening, just right over there. And then something got into one of the storage things and stuff started cooking off and they had some of the Cobra rockets started…We are watching the fireworks. And this is going on and on and finally the cav repelled them. They’re done, they pull �out. A few bodies. And you know, daylight comes along and everybody is checking out and the cav had the perfect set up. These guys knew what they were doing. They had the defensive positions, they had the works. Everything. If the sappers—they couldn’t have picked a worse spot to come through. And the next morning, the sort of camp commander I guess, I don’t know really who he was or what he was, he did a tour of the perimeter of Khe Sanh. And down at the east end, we had about 150 yards of perimeter. There wasn’t a soul there. No one had been assigned a sector of the perimeter. No one. And we are thinking had the sappers done their homework and found that, it would have been different. But they picked the absolute best defended section of the perimeter and they got kicked. (1:25:23) Interviewer: Okay. Well, I suppose they knew where the helicopters were? Veteran: Yep, yeah the Cobras were over there. For sure. The rest of them, I am not sure where they were. Because there were a lot, a lot of just slicks to carry the people. But that was, yeah. So… Interviewer: Alright. Other things that kind of stand out for you from the time when you are commanding that company? Veteran: Not too many. Interviewer: Okay. Were you starting to turn bases over to the Vietnamese by this time? Veteran: Oh, we did have one other thing I remember, when I had the company. During the—it was during the monsoon. We were tasked, we went down to…It was, it might have been on QL1, but it was right around Hue. There was a bridge over a significant sized river there. And the monsoon was washing all of this debris down, and there was so much of it that it started hanging on the bridge abutments and started building up and the water started rising. And the concern �was it was going to get blocked and then the bridge was going to go out. So, we were down there with the equipment and we were fighting to keep the debris clear. And again, that’s one of those vague memories but I do remember that. (1:26:58) Interviewer: Now that’s near an area that would have had a civilian population in it, probably? Veteran: Yes. Interviewer: Okay. And did you see much of the Vietnamese people while you were there? Either civilians or military? Veteran: Very little. We had civilians who came on the base camp at Evans. I think I might have made a couple of trips, maybe to one of the villages nearby but generally not. I mean even Evans—we weren’t that secure, we would take RPGs and rockets. You know you think we are way back here at the back, you know but it didn’t matter. These weren’t NVA, and so you are very careful about what you’re doing and where you’re going. Interviewer: Right. Okay. And did you see much of the ARVNs or were they elsewhere? Because I guess they would have gone through Khe Sanh. Veteran: They were elsewhere. During this period of time, the set up starting from the DMZ. The Marines had pulled out, the Marines were back down to Da Nang. The ARVNs then filled in the upper slice and I am going from the coast to the lay ocean border, coming down from there. The ARVNs area of operation was that first slice, and then you moved down and we got the 3rd brigade…I think the 3rd brigade. (1:28:29) Interviewer: Well, that’s the brigade that you were mostly with, or at least that’s what— �Veteran: Yeah, that was at…I got a little confused talking with Bob last night about what— where the 2nd brigade was, 101st. I thought they were all south. I thought 3rd brigade was the uppermost, and so then we got that next slice. When Lam Son 719 kicked off, basically it was an extension of the ARVNs and some other units who were joined in. And we moved up to Khe Sanh to kind of backfill there and support. But we didn’t go up and take over the AO. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: The 1st of the 5th Mech was at Quang Tri, they were up there as well. I only—I never really saw them. I know that from reading the book, Keith Nolan’s book called Dewey Canyon II/Lam Son 719, that the 1st of the 5th Mech was running QL-9. They were running escorts for convoys, they were doing some maint—we weren’t maintaining roads. But they were up there and that was where they had been. Interviewer: Yeah. So, the Vietnamese were mostly elsewhere. Veteran: Right. Interviewer: Okay. And most of the area you were operating in didn’t have civilians in it at all? Veteran: Right. Interviewer: Yeah. Okay. Alright, now so you kind of get to the end now of your time. You have extended in Vietnam. You get kind of to the middle now of 1971. What happens next? (1:30:11) Veteran: I head back to Fort Belvoir. Orders from Belvoir: no stops along the way, just head on back. I was there for another 2 years. �Interviewer: Okay. And what was your job there? Veteran: I had 2 jobs, about a year for each one. One of them was—I was a—and I am a captain at this point, I had a…I was assigned to the student brigade there at the engineer school. The student brigade was AIT students. They finished their basic, they are coming through to do specialty engineer MOS’s for their…I was a company commander for one of the companies. And there were about—must have been about 6 companies. I mean basically we were holding companies while they are going to school. And then they are off. You know, so it’s a very transient thing. That was…Well, that wasn’t all that exciting. But once in a while, things happened there. I remember that one of my troops, one of my student troops, on payday, he approached another soldier somewhere on post. And robbed him. And it turned out that—well, within the week or so, the CID showed up at my company and said, “Sir, do you have a student in the company named Moore?” I said, “Yes, I do.” They said, “We want to talk to him.” Well, Private Moore was wearing his field jacket with his name on it when he robbed the guy. Didn’t take them long. So, off Private Moore goes. What do we got here? (1:32:20) Interviewer: What kind of recruits were you getting in the army at this point in time? Veteran: Kind of a mixed bag. Interviewer: Well, were there still draftees coming in? Veteran: They were still draft, yeah. We weren’t to the volunteer army quite yet. It’s interesting, I mean now look at the volunteer army today. And I got to look at the students. I mean, these were engineer students so I—you know, you sort of think, well maybe, a little bit brighter. Interviewer: Right. �Veteran: But not so—I remember in Vietnam, even in my infantry platoon, in both my platoons, I had college graduates. You know, I had what I considered a mix of society in the units. You know? You draft some, some volunteer, but you got a lot of people and not just the ones who are sort of you know, self-identifying that they want to go into the army or they were offered the army versus something worse. So, you know, that was a change. But I don’t think I was seeing that quite yet there at Belvoir. Interviewer: Yeah. Okay. And so, you have that assignment for your first year. Veteran: No, that was 6 months—oh yeah, yeah. That was a year, right. Interviewer: Okay. And then what do you mean…? Veteran: And then the other assignment was I was an instructor at the engineer school. And I believe it was—most of the classes were the second lieutenants coming in for their basic course. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I don’t even remember what I was teaching. You know, I went through an instructor training class and off we go. And so, we’re, you know, training the young officers to go out and do their job. Interviewer: Okay. So, this is—and then, where exactly in Virginia is Fort Belvoir? Veteran: Fort Belvoir is just on the south edge of D.C., if you know where Mount Vernon, if you come down into Virginia. (1:34:28) Interviewer: Yeah. Yeah. Veteran: Fort Belvoir is right across the—it’s just below Mount Vernon actually. �Interviewer: Alright. So, you’re in the D.C. area and now we have made it into the early ‘70s. And then we’re moving—we are Vietnam, we are doing Vietnamization, we are kind of pulling out of Vietnam but also the anti-war movement has become pretty powerful. The political move is very much against the war and so forth. To what extent did that make it into your world? Or, how aware were you of all that? Veteran: Oh, I was well aware of, you know those past couple—past 2 years, I was well aware of what was happening around the country. You know, you’re there, you read the paper every day, you watch television, whatever. But in the D.C. area, it was very heavily militarized. And so in terms of my personal space, you wouldn’t know it. You wouldn’t know what was going on because there was so much military support in the area for the military. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. So, now while you are there, you are getting into ’73. Are you thinking, okay is it time to get out? Or what are you looking for? Veteran: I was thinking…And I am trying to remember. Oh, I must have been involved in court martial maybe. I worked with some of the jag officers and I thought you know, I think what I will do is apply to law school through the jag program. See if I can do that. I got turned down for that. But I thought, you know what? I am going to do it anyway. I am going to resign—I resigned my commission, I applied. I got into University of Virginia Law School. Very fine law school. I resigned my commission, took a reserve commission and continued with that but went down to Charlottesville, Virginia, did my 3 years of law school. And then I moved up the valley a little bit to—well, it wasn’t actually the valley. Up to a place called Warrenton, Virginia. Joined a firm. It was small. Small town firm. And I thought, you know this—and I practiced for 2 years with the firm. There were 3—there were 4 of us attorneys. The 2, father and son who were the �main partners, and then there was another partner and then there was me. And I did that for 2 years and I said, “Not doing this.” (1:37:11) Interviewer: Well, what kind of law were you doing at that point? Veteran: It was just general practice. I handled a lot of stuff. And I thought no, I am not going to do this for the next 40 years. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: So, I had been in touch with a fellow reservist who I knew who was also an engineer. And he worked for a small general contractor, building contractor. He said, “Joe, you ought to go up to D.C. You ought to get in with—there’s a big, big contractor up there, the George Hyman Construction Company. You ought to go up there and hook on with them as an assistant project manager. See what—you know, so you can go in and learn the nuts and bolts about contracting. You got the engineering degree.” But he said, “I work in a little company and we are small and we don’t have sort of specialists.” He said, “When I have a project, I am doing everything.” And he said, “That would be hard for you to come into a small company like ours and start from scratch. That probably wouldn’t work.” He said, “But go try it.” So, I wrote a letter to the personnel director up in Hyman and I sent in my resume and he gave me a call. And he said, “I got your resume. It’s pretty impressive.” But he said, “We just hired a general counsel recently, and we don’t need any, you know, another lawyer right now.” I said, “No, no, you got it wrong.” (1:38:54) Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: I said, “That’s not what I want.” He said, “Oh. Well, why don’t you come on up and talk to us?” So, I went up and I hired on as an assistant project manager. And Hyman was a fairly �large, you know, national contractor. And I started out on a small project there in D.C. It was an addition. It was a 6-story addition to the Republican National Congressional Committee Headquarters there on Capitol Hill. And so, you know, I sort of took over running the job as the, I was an ABN. But my boss was simply a mentor. He was running other jobs and he said, “I’ll look over your shoulder once in a while but you got it.” And so off we go. And I did that and then I, you know, continued on to bigger and better things. And then, I think—let’s see, how long have I been there? I think I was there 5 years. And I thought you know, there’s some things about the way the company runs that…You’re sort of a cog in the wheel. So, I went down to Charlotte, North Carolina. I interviewed with a guy down there. McDevens Street was another big contractor. And I went to work for them down there. And was a senior PM and vice president. They had a lot of vice presidents, no big deal. I was there for 2 years and I said you know, I don’t think this is going to go here. So, I went back. I returned to D.C. I spent a year consulting. I did some work for small contractors, in terms of…I mean, I had some expertise. I helped them out with things. And then after a year, I went back over to Hyman and said, “I’d like to come back to work, if that’s okay?” And they said, “Great!” So, I worked, total I worked for Hyman for…This was in, I went back in about ’86. About 8 years later, the company—Jim Clark owned Hyman. And he owned Omni Construction. Omni was an open shop company Clark had. Hyman was the union contractor. Originally, they had sort of separate markets because in D.C., you could work downtown if you were union. Open shop guys, you need to stay out by the beltway. But it reached the point where we were starting to chase the same jobs. The split between union and non-union was fading. And Cark said, “What are we doing here?” So, the two merged and became Clark Construction. The Clark Construction Group. And I stayed another 10 �years doing that. Running some big government work and various private work. I enjoyed it. I found—you know, I found my calling. (1:42:35) Interviewer: There you go! Veteran: I got the satisfaction out of building things and showing my kids, you know I worked on that job there. Interviewer: Alright. Well, aside from the whole engineering background experience thing, what do you think you took out of your time in the service? Or, how do you think that affected you? Veteran: Well, I think that along with the VMI experience, you know, kind of rolled into realizing that you’ve probably seen the worst you’re ever going to see. You know, things in front of you are never going to be that tough. You know, just the ability to pick what you’re going to do and know that you are going to accomplish it. Well. (1:43:27) Interviewer: Alright. Well, the whole thing makes for a pretty good story. And you have actually done a very good job of pulling it together. So, I’d just like to thank you for taking the time to share it today. Veteran: No problem. Well, I can tell you a little bit about what I am doing now. Interviewer: Sure. Veteran: Volunteering with veterans. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I actually, I am involved with a project that’s done through a—Touchstone Discussion Project. They’re an educational based focus. They don’t teach classes, they teach teachers how to �train—how to conduct classes with their kids. This is K-12, college , this is around the world. They’re in a bunch of different countries. And it’s a discussion-based sort of program. And you get a group of people together. And you do multiple sessions. And it’s based on texts. And what we—they recently got a grant from NAH, through the Veteran’s History Project, to put on something. And so, the president of Touchstone’s wrote this program and it’s called Completing the Odyssey: The Journey Home. And it’s an 8-session program where we review the issues that some of us members face re-integrating into community. You know we started with, first of all, who goes and serves? That’s one session we talk about. But we each bring our experiences. And it’s all veterans. And we each bring our experiences. But a bigger part of it is, the skills that we are conveying, is critical thinking and active listening. And you know, I confessed to Howard, who is the guy who wrote this thing. I said, “Howard, 70 years of my life, I never did critical thinking. I never even thought about critical thinking.” And a lot of people come through and you know we sit down, and the idea—Howard is a professor at St. John’s College there in Annapolis. And he started this 35 years ago. He said, “You know, we’ve got the educational approach all wrong. Because we keep reinforcing to the students that there is an authority figure in that class and they are always looking to that authority figure for the right answer.” And he said, “There’s no right answer.” And so, you know, we have a couple of guys, couple of vets, who lead the program. I am one of the group leaders. And we sit down at the beginning. We read a text from—we have the ancient texts and the modern texts. We have Ulysses’—we got The Odyssey, we got stuff from The Odyssey. And Ulysses is trying to get home. And then we’ve got modern texts. We use Karl Marlaantes, wrote—we use one of his narratives about him coming home on the ship from Vietnam is what he should have done. You know he talked about—we get on the commercial airline, here the stewardess is handing out cokes and peanuts and he said, �“You know, this is just not right. Yesterday, we didn’t know if we were going to get out of the jungle and today, we are here?” And no time to decompress. You know, it should have been like World War 2: you ride the boat home for a week. Got to calm down with your buddies. And so we read a text, the group leader reads a text out loud, so there’s no homework. We just come in, we read a text and then I say, “Okay, everybody just jot down a question about tonight’s issue that you think would be worth the group talking about.” And we go and we read the questions out. And then if I am the group leader, I say, “Okay, let’s start with this question.” And I will throw out a question. And we spend 20 minutes talking about the question and the focus on so what is the experience of people joining the service? You know, and we have all got that experience of joining the service. And so we go through these things. You know, we talk about the absence and you know, what do you think about when you’re…And we talk about coming home and thinking about things have changed. Yeah, they have. In big ways. And not only have the people you have left behind changed, but you need to recognize that you have changed yourself. So, you know, we are getting people to think and talk who a lot of them haven’t done that before. And in the group, the group leaders are looking to pull the people in who are kind of—kind of sitting back. (1:48:21) Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: And we have done this—we have done this several times. And we just got another grant for it. And that has been a lot of my time. So anyway. Interviewer: Now, for you, I guess because you were still staying in the army and actually in a way, you had the really intense experiences in the field and then things kind of ratcheted down by degrees. And then you’re back, probably still in the army for a while �before you leave. You think that helped you become a civilian again or did you still have hurdles to get over? (1:48:53) Veteran: I’ll tell you my story in the Touchstone, in the discussion group. Because we talk about coming home and what do you think about? What are you picturing when you are coming home? Are you coming home to a place? Are you coming home to someone? Or what? And I shared with the group the first time through. I said, “Military family: my parents sent us off, my brother and I, to go do our military thing. No regrets. You know, small town in north Alabama. I never went back there. I visited my parents but there was never a thought. You know, a lot of guys grew up in a small town. They got lifelong friends, their buddies through high school, and they go off and they come back to right there. There was never a thought for me that I would come back to that place. And my parents wouldn’t expect me to. So, you know, I continue on my way. And then when I got out of the army, I am doing other things. I am going off to practice law and I am going up to D.C. to build—work.” I said, “I have finally realized where home is for me and what it is. I am in a bubble. And wherever I am, that’s my home. It’s wherever I am. I have no expectations I will be placed anywhere. And I have people. But” I said, “growing up as a military brat, there was nothing more heartbreaking than every 3 years, moving. And saying goodbye to your 7-year old buddies or your 9-year old buddies.” And I said, “I think because of that, I could tell over my lifetime that it was probably harder for me to form close relationships. I have my third wife.” And you know, I am sharing this with a group that that’s, you know, that’s my thoughts of homecoming. And there was never a place that I was going to be going back to but you know there were perhaps people and things. (1:51:25) Interviewer: Yeah. And of course, a lot of that isn’t even necessarily what the military did to you from your own career, it was more just how you grew up. �Veteran: I grew up that way, yeah. Interviewer: But in a way, it also kind of prepared you for a military career at the same time. Veteran: Yeah. I remember my parents’ best friends were people they knew in the service. You know, and with the SAC group I mean there were—there was a circuit there. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: And so—and we are getting ready to start, in September/October, it’s going to be another vets group. (1:52:03) Interviewer: Alright. I am glad we got a chance to add that here before we close that out. Veteran: Okay. Great. (1:52:09) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_SmithJ2318V Title A name given to the resource Smith, Joe (Interview transcript and video), 2019 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2019-07-27 Description An account of the resource Joe Smith was born on April 17th , 1946 in Topeka, Kansas. After graduating from high school, he attended Virginia Military Institute where he graduated with a degree in civil engineering in 1968 and joined the Army. He was then sent to Fort Bragg to join the 82nd Airborne Division, with which he became a platoon leader and General's aid. He later requested a transfer to Vietnam, where he was first stationed at Camp Eagle and saw combat at Firebase Ripcord. In 1971, Smith was stationed at Fort Belvior where he served out the rest of his tour and instructed the student brigade at the engineering school. He retired from the military in 1973 before pursuing a law degree at the University of Virginia Law School. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Smith, Joe O. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/c98193bd879105585881368ec342e33f.mp4 59cf50917e16f5e0bc7ee8835a057947 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/d49d2619ac6dd4403d27bf0ee237fba8.pdf ccbe31dfc9c4589a2504e1677c9327c9 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Glenn Sheathelm Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Grace Balog Interviewer: Okay, we are on session number 3, hour number 5 with Glenn Sheathelm who is still 5 or 6 hours away from a record here for an interview. But we have at this point gotten most of the way through his Vietnam tour but we have the last phase of it yet to cover. So, you can kind of pick up here wherever. Veteran: Okay, after 11 months in Vietnam, you know, it was a 12-month tour. I’d seen some of the things that had gone on out in the field where infantry units had had some real problems because the officers didn’t have much experience, they didn’t know much about the North Vietnamese or Viet Cong. And sometimes the lieutenant type forward observers were not too sharp on reading the maps. You know, there were ROTC officers that figured that you know, this is just a class I am going to; my life and death is not going to depend on it. They found out later on that it did. Well anyway, I decided that I could go out as an artillery recon sergeant, which was the NCO version of a forward observer. After a unit had been pretty badly mauled in the An Lo River Valley, they did—you know, inexperienced new officer who, you know, basically had to spend the rest of his life in a mental institution after he got back. Interviewer: Right. Because in the previous— Veteran: Because of the losses that he had. �Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And also, you know, they didn’t have a forward observer with them at the time. So, I said—I told our battalion commander, I said, “I will extend if you get me a job as an artillery recon sergeant.” I said, “I would prefer 1st of the 8th Cav because this was the unit that I had heard so much about, I had seen stuff about them, and they seem to be one of the better units in the 1st brigade.” And he said, “Well, you sure you don’t want to stay and work in intelligence operations?” Because I was doing a real good job for him—this was Vernon Gillespie. And I said, “No, I am only going to extend if I get an artillery recon sergeant job.” (00:02:18) Interviewer: Okay. Now, I think at the end of our previous section, you were talking about your response to that unit being mauled in the An Lo River Valley. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Where you had kind of lost it there for a bit and they had to kind of take you aside and— Veteran: Oh, yeah. Interviewer: And pull together. So—but after that, basically…So, you—so you kind of just pulled yourself together after that and— Veteran: Oh yeah, I—the next morning, I was able to function normally again. But they had to kind of send me to la la land for a few hours because, you know, they are talking about moderate casualties. Well, that was true: moderate when you’re comparing with the whole 1st Cavalry Division. But I had just seen the dead and wounded, mostly dead, from this unit and there was nothing moderate about what I had seen in that helicopter. And you know, the—I wasn’t looking �at the big picture like, you know, I had been trained to do at that time. I was emotional. And I got too emotional in the talk and they decided, you know, they probably would be better off sedating me and having somebody else run the radio rack and so forth until the next day, which was what they did. And after that I came back but, you know, there was still a lot of guilt that, you know, if these guys had a good forward observer with them and some experience with them, they might not have made the mistake. They might not have been hit with this North Vietnamese company from the back. They may not have focused just on the 3 Viet Cong that walked into their ambush. But I figured, you know, I can do a good job out there for them. (00:04:02) Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: So, that entered—you know, guilt entered a little into my thing. You know like, I had been over here almost a year, I know the job, I know the Viet Cong. I can do a lot better job than a crispy new second lieutenant. So anyway, I asked for the job artillery recon sergeant, which you know was a bit more hazardous than what I had been doing prior to that. And of course, I— when I extended, I told my mom kind of a fib that, you know, their Army decided they needed me for another 3 months. I didn’t put that I had volunteered for this and also what I had volunteered to do. I mean, you know, after that I just started telling her about sunsets and asking questions about family back home and, you know, I remembered the Christmas with and Easter and…You know, those types of things. They got very, very whitewashed as far as the letters that went home. There was one person that did get a little bit more accurate picture but—and that was Lisa Medendorp who worked for the Muskegon Chronicle. My mom referred to her as “Glenn’s hippie friend” but she didn’t really talk to her at all and I knew the fact that, you know, my mom was not going to even think about asking Lisa if she got any letters from me. So, she was the only one that had even the vaguest idea of what I was doing towards that tail end. �Interviewer: Now, this is now late in 1966 that you are doing this? Veteran: 1967. Interviewer: 1967. Veteran: Yeah, because I got over there in November of ’66 so this is starting the beginning of November of ’67. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And my first day out in the field, they—the company had been back, you know, at LZ English but they had already gone back out again and were doing some patrolling in a bunch of mountains called the Cai Gaps. And there wasn’t really a placed where they could drop me off right where they were so they dropped me off where I could go ahead and go up the side of the mountain and basically intercept them. And you know, being a map reader and stuff, I knew I could hit the right place and I did. (00:06:33) Veteran: And I didn’t really get to know any of the guys during that first half day I was with them because they were on the move and basically hacking their way through the jungle. But I did know that they were later on going to quiet down and sneak in behind this village where they thought supplies were being brought in from the South China Sea in Saipan up the river to supply the Viet Cong. So, we were supposed to sneak in behind this particular village at night and watch for them to do that type of thing. I didn’t really get a chance to talk to many of the guys like I said but I did call some artillery fire in that night, tried to make it look like it was just interdictions because I didn’t want them to figure out that we were already up there. So, I just fired a few rounds and it turned out later on that at least one of those rounds had been in their vicinity because we found some bloody bandages there and later found some more bloody �bandages in a hut, oh probably 7-800 yards from there. So, you know, I had had some effect but that—the following morning, like I said, we are on a hillside behind this village and we were supposed to get resupplied. They didn’t re-supply us the night before because the, you know, helicopters coming in would have given away our position. So, in the morning helicopters came in dropped off some C ration things. The helicopter came in on a hillside and of course the rotor blade goes across like this. We had a guy that, by the name of Walter Bentley. (00:08:26) Veteran: I had actually briefly met him the day before. And he’d been doing point man part of the time and was hacking through the jungle. He was a little bit overtired. He carried a C ration case away from the helicopter and then decided he was going to go back and mail a letter. Well, he ran back towards the helicopter from the uphill side and went right into the rotor blade. The guy’s name was Walter Bentley. And his—you know, it—the officer’s daily staff journal says, “EM while running to the helicopter from uphill side; hit main rotor blade, decapitated head.” And that’s what it said in the daily staff journal. Well, Bentley’s mom sent some angry letters to Captain Canetto: why did you set up there? You know. My son got killed. You know. Well, Canetto actually felt pretty guilty about that for a while and it wasn’t until one of our reunions when I explained it to him. I said, “You know, we were supposed to be parked on that hillside. We were supposed to be behind that village. And I said that, “You didn’t—you weren’t the one that decided exactly where that helicopter was going to set down.” I said, “Sergeant Gary Wilson was the one that actually brought that helicopter in.” And he brought it in on the side of the hill, close to where all the stuff was going to be distributed. And you know, rather than guys carrying it up the hill. And I said, “That decision was made by Gary Wilson. It wasn’t made by you.” And I said, “You know, you didn’t even see this guy when he walked into the rotor blade. There were some other guys that saw him and screamed at him.” And…But, you know, Canetto wasn’t close �enough to actually see the thing happen. But, you know, ran over there after he heard what happened and they had him wrapped up in a poncho and the boots sticking out. And, you know… (00:10:41) Interviewer: And that’s the kind of thing where people in the air normally are supposed to know basic safety procedures around helicopters. Veteran: Yeah. That you never approach from the uphill side. And although you do approach from the side, normally you don’t do it on the uphill side. You come at it from the downhill side or straight from the front where the helicopter pilot can see you and you know he will give you hand signals if you got to be down lower. But in this case, the guy was running to the helicopter, a little overtired from the day before and didn’t stop to think about what he was doing and went right into the main rotor. And like I said, you know, it was one of those things that I was outside of the perimeter looking at the blood trail from the artillery fire mission that was going in at the time it happened. And I heard “Bentley is dead” and I am thinking I didn’t hear any gunfire. You know, how is Bentley dead? And then they told me and I thought you know, there’s a whole lot of ways you can get killed out here and, you know, it was kind of striking me that this could be a very long 4 months. And—but you know, it was kind of a hard realization but I can’t say that it really bothered me for any long period of time. I still remember exactly the situation and, you know, I had not seen Bentley when he got hit with the rotor blade but seeing him after he had already been wrapped up in the poncho with the blood running out of it, I remembered seeing that extent of Bentley but I didn’t see the incident actually happen. Some of the guys that actually saw it happen, it would have been harder on them mentally for a period of time, especially if they had yelled at him or warned him. (00:12:43) �Veteran: And…But anyway, we went from there and several other missions. One of them that I remember the most distinctly is in November. It was the one that I wrote about with the helicopter going down in front of us and you saw the 5-page thing I wrote on it. And that one was tough on me too because I had seen the helicopter come in the first time and almost stall when it pulled out. I thought either the pilot is trying to fly beyond what his ability is or there is something wrong with that helicopter that it’s not performing quite as well as it should. And I was worried about that helicopter stalling out. And the second pass, it did. It fell back into the trees. And we ended up charging across the rice paddy to rescue the crew. And of course, that meant I had to move artillery fire a little bit farther away because I didn’t know where the crew had taken cover if they had even gotten out of it because you know when it dropped down into the bushes, I couldn’t really see whether anybody, you know, got down on their knees and ran away from it. I could just see all this smoke and stuff coming out. (00:14:08) Interviewer: Now, what was the context of this? Veteran: Okay, the context of that. Yeah, that’s true that they haven’t read the story but the context was that we’d gone in, we’d surrounded a village, we’d done a cordon mission. We’d had a couple firefights early—earlier on in the, you know, that day and two days before. But we were just walking along this gravel road. It was the middle part of the day. The sun was coming down; I remember it was pretty hot at the time. 3rd platoon was in the lead. They’d gone past these two rice paddies and were starting to enter the pine trees. And about that time, there were some Viet Cong who fired from the village that was across the rice paddy on our left-hand side. Fire seemed to mostly be directed at the headquarters group because there were more antennas sticking up from the RTOs there. There were probably only two of us in the 1st platoon that had antennas: me, because I was artillery recon sergeant, and Lieutenant Reed’s radio operator. But �anyway, the fire came into the company’s CP area and we initially took fire, or took cover, behind the side of the road which was raised up above the rice paddy a couple feet. And we were, you know, away from where the fire was coming from and setting up a, you know, where we could have a base of fire. And Captain Canetto was going to do a normal firing maneuver and he figured his—whatever unit probably ought to be 3rd platoon because they had the cover of some trees since they had already gone past the rice paddy. So, he ordered them to start moving forward there and we were going to put down a base of fire. He had me call in artillery fire on the edge of the village and also on the left-hand side, which I did. And then this aerial rocket artillery unit showed up. Now, they are the ones with 24 rockets on the side for—so, we are talking 48 rockets. (00:16:30) Veteran: They—these were the C models before they had the Cobras. So, they had 48 rockets on the—or 24 rockets on a side, total of 48. And they, you know, put down a lot of rockets. And anyway, they made the first pass and I would, you know, I kind of yelled out the warning to the ARA, which is aerial rocket artillery section leader because that’s the one I could talk to. Told him, I said, “You know, the second ship almost stalled out that last time. I don’t think you ought to make another run.” Well, I couldn’t hear the helicopter to helicopter talk but I imagine that was probably something like, “No, I am just fine. Don’t listen to that dumb infantryman. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about” kind of thing that was going on between the second helicopter pilot and the section leader. Well, the second one came in and stalled out and crashed into the trees. Well, Captain Canetto thought well, so much for our nice laid out plan of fire and movement. You know, we got to get over there and rescue the crewmen if they are still alive. So, basically what he ordered was a charge across the rice paddies that would have included his CP group plus the platoon that was next to them plus the 1st platoon which was the bunch that I was �with towards the left-hand end. And we went ahead and charged across through muddy rice paddies about knee deep. And it’s really kind of hard to run that way. And it doesn’t do much for your pulse and blood pressure and all that other stuff when you’re running and getting shot at. And there was one Viet Cong that was over in the trees on the left-hand side and he’s going from tree to tree and occasionally taking a pock shot at us. (00:18:38) Veteran: Well, I fired three rounds. I think all three of them were misses because my heart was beating so bad at the time. But anyway, he apparently decided they were close enough that he had better find something else to be doing and I didn’t remember seeing him after that. Also, I put some artillery over there to give him another concern. But—because on the left-hand side, I could fire but I couldn’t fire near the edge of the village right straight ahead because we didn’t know where the crew had gone. Well, we were getting across there and I had put in fire on one of the bunkers that we had gotten fire from and it had collapsed the bunker and there was a wounded Viet Cong that was trying to climb out of the bunker and the guy that was with me, a guy by the name of Hillary Craig, took a shotgun and basically finished the guy off. And I went to grab the pack and weapon and he says, “Leave the stuff alone. We’ve got, you know, we are too much in a hurry.” And I thought yeah, he’s right. You know, gathering intelligence is not what I am supposed to be doing right now. We are still looking for the two guys or three guys that might have gotten out of the helicopter. So anyway, we moved on. They had found one of the other guys, one of the other platoons had found him. I think actually Canetto was with them. And then we found the co-pilot and he was down on his knees. He was pretty smoke blackened and stuff. And he’d been vomiting and stuff and, you know, we sort of got him calmed down. He wasn’t seriously injured but he was definitely suffering from smoke inhalation and possibly a compression fracture of the back. (00:20:40) �Veteran: He also had a broken wrist. But so anyway, Doc Adkins real—you know, splinted him up. And they said something about the crew chief. And we started looking around and one of the infantrymen saw some legs sticking out from underneath the helicopter. And he ran over there and says, “We got another guy underneath the helicopter. Come on and we will roll it off of him and pull him out.” So, a bunch of infantrymen are leaning up against this helicopter, which is smoking, it’s still got some live rockets and explosives onboard. And everybody is putting their shoulders into this thing, rolling the helicopter off. And anyway, we got it rolled up enough so that Doc Adkins and one of the other guys were able to pull the crew chief out from underneath there. And they dragged him, you know, a little roughly probably. You know, a long-axis drag like you’re supposed to. But, you know, kind of quickly. And they moved probably 30 yards maybe away from the helicopter. And I thought, you know, why did they take him so far from the helicopter? I am thinking yeah, it’s got all of those smoking explosives on the side yet. So, it started to make sense. And when they got him laid down, Doc Adkins says—said to me, he said, “221, can you help me get his helmet off?” And I grabbed the sides of the helmet and pulled it open a little bit and rotated the helmet off in case he had a neck injury. (00:22:22) Veteran: But…and underneath the helmet, his skin looked pretty normal. Underneath his nomex gloves, his skin looked pretty normal. But he looked sort of like an overdone steak on the face because all of the burning fumes from the helicopter fuel. And Doc Adkins went ahead and tried doing mouth to mouth on him and got nothing but, you know, charred flesh and pieces of flesh and he realized it wasn’t going to—nothing was going to really work. And I remember him being on his knees, kind of looking up at the sky with, you know, God please give me somebody that I can at least do something for. You know? But he had this, you know, kind of lost look on his face. And I was in the process thinking, you know, he probably needs a hug and the tendency �was to go over there and give him a hug. And I, you know, there were tears coming down my face too because when I pulled the guy’s helmet off, he had a picture of a girl in there, a darkhaired girl named Carol. Don’t know whether it was his wife or his girlfriend. And a short-timers calendar. This guy just had a couple weeks to go before his tour was going to be up. And you know, I felt really kind of frustrated by the situation. And so, I thought well, I will open my camera. One of the guys says, “No, you don’t take pictures of the dead guys.” And I said, “No, I am not going to.” And I walked over and took a picture of the helicopter and I still do have a picture of the wreckage of the helicopter. (00:24:12) Veteran: But you know, I just had to sort of get away from this thing, let the tears come down behind my camera and focus as best as I could and get the picture of the helicopter. And I did and as I got a little bit more composed, I heard—noticed some more gunfire farther back in the village. Now, what had happened was that Thomas Caulkins from 3rd platoon had gone through the trees on the right hand-side and actually gotten behind the Viet Cong and he was shooting towards them. Well, some of his rounds were coming towards us and of course, we had guys shooting that way too. And so, Caulkins ended up having to, you know, hit the ground so he didn’t get shot by our own guys because, you know, bullets whizzing both ways across where the Viet Cong were. And Caulkins was on the other side, you know, sort of as a backstop for things. And so anyway, he hit the ground and we got over into that area and there was a bunker between several of the huts, it was kind of a rounded top thing. And I got up against the bunker and was initially going to just toss a grenade into it and I thought yeah, but there might be some civilians in here too. So, I flopped down against the top of the bunker, pulled the pin out of the grenade, held the grenade so it could be seen from inside right over the doorway, and yelled “lai dai” and anyway, to get them to come out. And eventually, there was some movement down in there and �an old man came out, followed by a bunch of civilians. And the interpreter asked if there were any more Viet Cong or any more people down there and the older guy said, “no.” So, I pitched the grenade in, you know, just to make sure and…that there were no bad guys that were still hiding in there. And anyway, the old guy it turned out had fought during the time the French were fighting over there. (00:26:36) Veteran: And, you know, was sort of a village elder in this group of people. And after the fight got over, a helicopter came and picked up the wreckage of this ARA helicopter and we moved on. A day or two later, we went back to LZ English and showered. But that was one of the fights that I remembered distinctly in November. Now, air assaults were hit and miss things. Sometimes the bad guys were there, sometimes they weren’t. But about 5 minutes before the infantry went in on an air assault, there would be artillery that would fire on this field or hilltop or wherever we were going. And the artillery would come—would be coming in and the last round that each artillery battery fired was supposed to be a white phosphorus round. So, if there were two batteries firing, there was supposed to be able to see two white phosphorus rounds hitting the LZ, which would indicate we were all done shooting because helicopters didn’t want to go in and land and unload troops when there are still artillery rounds en route. And it sometimes, you know, if there weren’t, I wouldn’t see enough white phosphorus rounds and I would be standing on the skid alongside of the helicopter and reach over with my M-16, slap the pilot up the side of the head, you know, because he’s wearing a helmet and he’d turn around and look at me and I’d wave go around and, you know, okay. You know, there is something that I know about that LZ that says he’s, you know, supposed to make a circuit before he drops us off. But most of the time, there were the right number of artillery rounds there and we would jump off onto the ground. (00:28:36) �Veteran: The door gunners, the helicopters that we rode were called Slicks. They look a lot like the Huey that’s sitting on the pedestal down there by Mona Lake, except they had an M-60 machine gun hanging on each side. And those were the types of helicopters that our first lifts would go in on. Subsequent lifts would sometimes come in on Hueys, sometimes on CH-47s, which were the twin rotored helicopters. Now, when the CH-47 ran a daily trip around the artillery bases, we referred to that as the school bus. And for guys that weren’t familiar with a CH-47, they quick like got familiar with the fact that if the thing is landing somewhere near there, you’d better hang onto your helmet too because the wind blast from the thing is bad enough, it would lift the helmet off your head and send it flying. I mean, it would pick up water cans and bounce those around. I’ve got a picture of that happening too. But like I said, mostly we went out out of regular Hueys. Now let’s see…The next big fight for 1st of the 8th actually we gained information on it. We made an air assault into the mountains between the Bong Son plain and the An Lo River Valley. This was 1st platoon of Delta company and Bob Reed was in charge. (00:30:16) Veteran: And we had a prisoner that had been picked up that was going with us and, you know, he knew where there was a place where the Viet Cong quite frequently stopped and also the North Vietnamese stopped and would meet with the Viet Cong. Well, we got fairly close to there and we were talking to some villagers who said, “Yeah, there was some North Vietnamese that went up that way last night.” Well, while this conversation was going on, one of the infantrymen was looking with my binoculars into this ridge and he says, “Yeah, they got 3 or 4 people up there.” And he says, “Apparently one of them has got some type of a mess kit and,” he said, “they seem to be set up and not too worried about us.” Bob Reed says, “Well, let’s make it look like we are going away from there.” So, we got on a path and made it look like we were walking �away from that particular ridge. Then he had us drop down into a stream that had bamboo growing along the side. Well, we got down into the stream, we are about waist deep in the stream which was relatively clear water because it came down from the mountainside. There was actually a waterfall up on the mountainside above that. And anyway, we followed the stream and it got us up close to the base of this ridge and he had us deploy into a skirmish line and he said, “22-I, I want you to go with the bunch on the left-hand side.” He says, “it will put you on higher ground first but,” he said, “I want you to put artillery fire up where, you know, they saw the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese.” And he said, “Keep it going until we get up real close to them.” He says, “Since you’re going to be up on a little higher ground, you might be able to see some of us in spite of the heavy underbrush between the rocks.” So, I went up there and there were some North Vietnamese and Viet Cong that were having a meeting. (00:32:23) Veteran: It was actually a planning meeting so that the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong were going to attack the town of Tam Quan and hold it over the Christmas truce. Well, we didn’t know exactly what they were doing there when we went up. But as they overtook the area, there were primarily rear North Vietnamese troops which were sort of an easy battle for a line infantry platoon like Bob Reed’s, which was a real sharp infantry unit. And it was a kind of a one-sided fire fight. And Bob Reed says, “Well, we have what we think was their CP under control right now.” He said, “Go ahead and start bringing in the left flank.” And as I was coming in, there was a North Vietnamese that sort of popped up in front of me. And I didn’t think there was, you know, I was wondering how he got there so suddenly because I didn’t see him walk in there. Well, I fired a shot at him as he ran off and I caught him across the ass cheek. And another one of the guys had a better shot at him and killed him. But I went to where this North Vietnamese had first appeared and I thought okay, how did he get here without me seeing him. I thought I �wonder if there is maybe a cave entrance around here. So, I started poking around the bushes near the base of kind of a rock wall. Lo and behold, there’s the entrance to a cave. And I pull my flashlight and shine it down inside. I can see the edge of a great big, you know, metal box—like, you know, milk boxes they used to have on your back porch years ago. They were a metal mound and they had some insulation inside. So, I told one of the other guys, I said, “Come with me and give me your 45, I am going to check it out.” And I dropped down into the entrance of this cave and, you know, here’s some North Vietnamese web gear hanging on the side. Of course, that sort of runs up the blood pressure and pulse rate real fast because okay, where’s the guy that belongs to that. (00:34:46) Veteran: You know, I have just dropped into his cave—he knows where everything is; I don’t know where anything is. And it turned out that he wasn’t there. He’d gotten out of the cave and my artillery fire had kept him from getting back there to pick up his web gear. Well, I checked these metal boxes and checked around for booby traps and they were okay. And I thought well gee, I wonder what’s in these? And I lifted up the top and in the top of one of them there’s some North Vietnamese guidons. You know, they are triangular flags like you see Custer and the cavalry coming to the rescue with in the old-fashioned movies with the cowboys and Indians. Well anyway, I found one of these—actually, there were two guidons and a North Vietnamese national flag in there. And I grabbed the top guidon which said roughly ‘resolve to advance’ which was the motto of the 8th Battalion, 22nd Regiment. And I wrote it down on a piece of paper, put the piece of paper in there, for intelligence information, everything that was written on the flag. And do a real quick sketch of what it looked like and set the flag inside of my shirt— this is going to be my war trophy. Well, I mail it back to my sister and I labeled it ‘scarf.’ She was going to Western Michigan University at the time. And you know, for some guy to send his �sister a scarf seemed reasonable. I figured if I labeled it ‘North Vietnamese flag’ some rear guy was going to pick it up and so much for my war trophy. (00:36:22) Veteran: Well, it got back to my sister and she kept it and then I put it on my wall at home. And after a number of years, I stopped at West Point, noticed they didn’t have a whole lot of North Vietnamese stuff like that there. And I said, “Would you like a North Vietnamese guidon?” He said, “Well, there weren’t any of those that made it back.” And I said, “Would you like a North Vietnamese guidon?” And he says, “You’ve got one?” And I said, “Yes.” He immediately went up and got a registered mail box and so it was sent to West Point. It’s on a rotating display there right now. But so that flag did make it back, along with the web gear. I took the Browning 9millimeter out of it. It was made by Ingalls Company in Canada. And it’s too bad that pistol couldn’t talk because it would have had a lot of stories. Like I said, it was made by Ingalls Company in Canada for the nationalist Chinese back in…I think 1942. And so, it had been used by them when the communist Chinese took over. It probably was on some communist Chinese officer’s web belt for a while. And then when the Chinese started making their own pistols, it got passed down to the North Vietnamese. And I understand the last person that it belonged to before I liberated was the pay officer for the 8th Battalion, 22nd Regiment. But anyway, I carried that the rest of my tour in Vietnam. Was not able to bring it back stateside because I couldn’t get back to rear in time to get the paperwork processed. And we are talking a semi-automatic pistol. And— (00:38:17) Interviewer: But did this raid succeed? Did you capture some of these people who were at the meeting? �Veteran: Yes, we did. It included not the pay officer. We understand that he had a pack full of money and we never found him. Now if we had, the money probably would have been used by guys in 1st of the 8th for getting their laundry done and stuff like that which probably wouldn’t have turned it in. I mean, Bob Reed was known as Lieutenant Reed and his Bandits for Good Cause. He had a real problem with the operations sergeant, a guy by the name of Dave Wright. And I’ve got a picture of the two of them. Both of them are smiling and one of the other guys said, “Seeing Dave Wright and Bob Reed both smiling in the same picture is practically unbelievable.” You know, because they were almost at each other’s throats most of the time. I remember Bob Reed had, you know, his platoon was back in the rear and some of the guys had gotten a little bit feisty back at the rear and he had me go out with him and pull his guys out before the MPs came to get them. And you know, I was sober and I was in the platoon CP at the time and he got the word that some of the guys got in a fight in one of the NCO clubs some place so we went and dragged those guys back before the MPs dragged them back. And of course, they would have delivered them to Sergeant First Class Wright who would have probably made sure they were written up for various charges of one type or another. And Reed wanted to keep his guys out of trouble. We went and got them first. But Bob—or, Sergeant Wright still at reunion time referred to Lieutenant Reed and his Crazy Bandits. And he didn’t think Lieutenant Reed was much tighter wrapped than most of the guys that he ran with and they had the…When the platoon was out on an ambush, they used the call sign ‘Chinese Bandits’ and Reed thought that was a very appropriate call sign for Reed’s bunch. (00:40:45) Veteran: And that name had actually come from a long-range recon group, which we had several guys that were put in Reed’s platoon. And, you know, they were some real aggressive soldiers. But probably not too much to have in the rear area. One of them was a guy by the name of Joe �Musial. And Joe was actually from down in Daggett, Michigan. He hosted one of our company reunions. I went down and helped him with that. And one of his squad leaders later on became a prosecutor down in Louisiana. And he’s the one that did the eulogy for Joe Musial. And I remember in one of the closing comments, he says, “Joe was a fantastic soldier. He was not the type of soldier that you would pull out if you wanted to have a parade or something. He was one of those types of soldiers that you would like to mount on a wall with a sign up above: ‘in case of war, break glass.’ And you know, that’s the type of guy Joe Musial was. You know, he was a bit different. And one of his earlier exploits with the company, this was before Canetto was even company commander, the battalion S-3. This was prior to Major Burba. But he was—battalion S-3 flew in. He said to the company commander, he said, “You know, you’ve got troops down there bathing with no clothes on down in the river.” (00:42:40) Veteran: And the company commander said, “No, I don’t.” He says, “I know where all my troops are and there’s nobody downstream.” And anyway, this S-3 officer said, ‘Well, you hop in the helicopter with me; I will show you.” And they went ahead and flew over and lo and behold there’s these naked bodies laying on the rocks down in the river. And company commander said, “Could you take us a little lower?” He says, “Those aren’t Americans, those are Vietnamese.” And of course, the S-3 officer said, “Why are they naked and why are they laying out in the middle of the river on the rocks?” And of course, the company commander didn’t really want to say too much about what his suspicions were but the previous day, Joe Musial had an ambush out near there. And they caught some North Vietnamese who were crossing the river and were coming out. Well, Musial’s platoon went ahead and gunned them, stripped all these North Vietnamese down, folded up their uniforms like they were going to be washed and stuff, you know, and laid them along the side of the—laid them alongside of the path and then put all these �bodies out on the rocks. Well, the S-3 officer said, “I want those bodies buried.” And you know, whoever was responsible for it, they are going to go down there and dig graves for these guys. Well, Joe Musial took his platoon down. They did dig some graves right behind these nicely folded uniforms, and then they put ‘death from above cards’ on every one of the uniforms and left them right there alongside of the path that came out of the river. It was like a warning for a Viet Cong, you know, look out: we are here. (00:44:38) Veteran: But they did have ‘death from above’ cards. And Joe Musial carried a whole bunch of those. I remember several other guys that carried large stacks of them. I think I only had 3 and I’ve got one that is still in my collection at home with the photographs. But you know, I was not too much into that. And we were told not to use those because CBS News had had a camera crew over there and the camera crew had taken a picture of a—one of the guys putting a ‘death from above card’ in this Viet Cong’s mouth and taking his boot and pushing the guy’s teeth shut, you know, around it and apparently, this was seen back stateside as you know very, very unfavorable. So, officially we were not supposed to use the ‘death from above’ cards. But they were still occasionally used. We had, like I said, a few guys carried whole bunches of them. But you know they had actually been started by Captain Bill Mosey from Charlie company, 1st of the 8th. He lives in the Duluth, Minnesota area. And he and I still correspond back and forth. But his war platoon leader came up with the idea and Bill Mosey went to Barnes and Bigelow and had a whole bunch of them printed up. (00:46:18) Veteran: And then they showed up at 1st of the 8th and for a while they were okay and then of course after this CBS News report, the word went out you know: unofficially, we were not supposed to use those anymore, so their use declined but they were still used occasionally. �Interviewer: Might have worked in an earlier war but not one on television. Veteran: Yeah. It—and that was that, you know. To go ahead and take a pin or fasten it to the top button of some Viet Cong’s uniform, you know, the ‘death from above’ card. It’s…You know… Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: What we frequently did: we’d make a little slit in the card so we would slip it in the button. Interviewer: Okay. So, how long did you actually spend doing this forward observer— Veteran: I did that the last 4 months. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And I was involved in the second battle of Tam Quan. And then come January of 1968, we got Agent Orange once in the An Lo River Valley real bad. Number of guys were real sick and were actually taken out of the field that same day. Also, that day we were being led by a 4th platoon leader that none of us can remember his name. I just refer to him as Lieutenant Lost because he couldn’t read a map. And that particular day, he’d been lost most of the day. The engineers were dropped off where we weren’t and he said, “Oh yeah, we got the LZ secured.” I said, “But sir, we are nowhere near that mountain.” And he said, “Don’t worry about it, they’ll be okay.” I watched this helicopter, you know, it’s probably 1500 yards away, drop these guys off on another mountain. (00:48:11) Veteran: And you know, like these guys have got a whole bunch of explosives, a couple M-16s, and 45s. They are supposed to blow up this whole North Vietnamese underground hospital �complex. And of course, they think they’re—that we are right around them, that we got them secured. Well, they look around and like no, they’re out in injun country all by themselves for about 40 minutes until I got over there with the squad and said, “Okay, just follow us. We will meet up with the rest of the platoon.” Well, it was late that day and we were supposed to meet up with the rest of the company and the lieutenant says, “Well, we won’t have a problem getting there because we will just go back on the same trail we did getting out of here because we know where we left the company. And then just go follow their trail back up to where they are.” And I am thinking okay, that’s an awful long way around and it’s going to be dark before we catch up with them. Some of the infantrymen figured that out too. They said, “22-I, is there a shorter way we can get back to the company?” And I said, “Yeah, there is.” And they said, “We would kind of like you to lead the way because we don’t want to follow that lieutenant the rest of the day, especially after it gets dark.” And it was practically a mutiny but it—we were kind of late when we got back to the company area. And all of this time, Captain Canetto was getting chewed out by Lieutenant Colonel Dubea who was the battalion commander, about “Why haven’t your guys got this hospital complex blown? Why did they not have the area secured where the engineers were?” And of course, Captain Canetto can’t do anything about it because he was several kilometers away from where 4th platoon was most of the day. So anyway, one—the lieutenant says, “Well, it was all a guy by the name of Barrett’s fault. And—or Barrett’s fault.” And anyway, Barrett was a black guy. And Captain Canetto, after hearing Barrett’s story, says “Barrett is saying that the lieutenant is a racist.” (00:50:38) Veteran: And he called me in, he says, “You think the lieutenant is a racist?” And he—and I said, “No. Why?” And he said, “Well, Barrett is filing a racism charge against him.” He says, “I’d rather not deal with one of those.” And he said, “What really went on today?” I told him �what had happened, about this lieutenant getting lost and that he wasn’t where he was supposed to be. And I said, “That’s what really slowed us down.” And he said, “Well, what about Barrett taking off after some Viet Cong without permission? And getting called back and not coming back?” And I said, “Well, I was with Barrett and,” I said that, “there were two Viet Cong that crossed in front of us and we took off after them. And Barrett wanted to keep going after them and I said ‘No, we can’t do that because the lieutenant has called in a location that might not be right and they might not clear my artillery fire mission because they’re so far away from each other.’ And he says, ‘You mean we might not be able to get artillery fire?’ And I said, ‘Yeah, that’s right Barrett.’ And he says, ‘Well, I guess we better turn around then.’ So anyway, we turned around and went back and the lieutenant had stopped on the path and he had the rest of his platoon stacked up behind him and they’re just basically sitting there doing nothing. And you know, Barrett and I and Barrett’s fire team came back and we got in line. And shortly after that, we got sprayed by Agent Orange and the—you know, because we were in the wrong place.” And then he said, “Well, sounds like lieutenant Reed made quite a few map reading errors.” And I said, “Yes, sir.” And he said, “Well, I remember when we went back to An Khê at Christmastime where he said he was in a certain location and I remembered having to straighten him out.” (00:52:34) Veteran: You know, and he said that, you know, Canetto had called him up and said, “Well, if that’s where you are, you ought to be able to see the green line from there.” He said, “Also, if that’s where you are, you are standing in an old French minefield.” And he had the lieutenant pop smokes so somebody could go find him and bring him back to where the company was. But anyway, towards the end of this conversation with Captain Canetto he said, “Well, if you don’t think he’s a racist, do you think he’s incompetent?” And I said, “Well, yes sir.” And he said, �“Well, this guy has been out a month and a half. He’s not learning his job and he’s still making some of the same mistakes.” And he said, “I think he is incompetent too. I am going to have him replaced.” Well so a little bit later he calls the lieutenant up and, you know, the lieutenant comes to his CP. And he says, “Lieutenant, I am sending you back to the rear.” He said, “You make too many mistakes to be a platoon leader in my company.” And this lieutenant said, “Well, I can read a map at 30 miles per hour out of the turret of a tank.” This guy had been an armor officer someplace. And Captain Canetto said, “Well, that may be true but out here there are no road signs.” And he said, “You’re going back to rear.” And that was the last that we saw of Lieutenant Lost. (00:54:02) Veteran: The story was that he was given the job of brigade sanitation engineer, which was basically the officer in charge of, you know, making sure the garbage was properly disposed of and the shit was burned properly. But I don’t really know if there is any truth to that but I heard that from one of the other infantrymen. But so, Canetto was not above getting rid of incompetents if he had them. And he did get rid of that lieutenant. And the rest of the officers we had were all pretty good. Now, Captain Canetto thought Reed was probably the best in his—he thought Lieutenant Barrick was good too but Barrick was wounded. And his replacement wasn’t quite as sharp as Barrick was. So, his second choice after that was Nelson DeMille. Nelson DeMille was a very famous mystery book author. One of them was turned into a movie called The General’s Daughter. But anyway, he did Nightfall and a whole bunch of things. Mystery authors are quite frequently familiar with Nelson Demille. He’s written a lot of mysteries. Usually one of his main characters is a Vietnam vet and sometimes the Vietnam vet is based on the composites of several guys that were with our unit. For instance, in Up Country, he mentions the fight between a Viet Cong who had a machete and an American troop who had an �entrenching tool. And the American with the entrenching tool wins the fight. Well, Hillary Craig had actually killed a North Vietnamese with an entrenching tool while I was with them and I said, “Hillary, what did you do that for?” And he said, “Never killed anybody with an e tool before.” And Hillary Craig was one of those guys who was a very aggressive soldier. I never saw him abuse a civilian at any time. You know, he was good there but he loved being in battle. (00:56:25) Veteran: He was very good at it. And he later on went—you know, had difficulty adjusting to civilian life for a while so he was a guide up in the Yukon area for a number of years. And eventually was building sets and huts up there for the National Film Board of Canada. And one of them discovered that, you know, he was also a very good cook and went back home to open a restaurant in the state of Washington. Which he did, which is called Alligator Soul. And later on, his second wife was from Atlanta, Georgia and they also opened an Alligator Soul in a historic district of Atlanta, Georgia. And the story behind Alligator Soul is, you know, an alligator is an ugly creature but it’s still got a soul and personality that, you know, we ought to pay attention to. And that was why the Alligator Soul. And you know…But he died—well, let’s see: he was awarded the Silver Star for fighting in the A Shau after I left. He knocked out a tank with an M72, a light anti-tank weapon from the side. And you know, captured a lot of North Vietnamese equipment. Matter of fact, there’s a television thing where it shows the American troops coming back with a bunch of Russian trucks they captured in the A Shau and Hillary Craig is the one standing in the back of the first truck with his M-16 in hand and this big smile on his face, a scarf blowing in the wind. (00:58:19) Veteran: But like I said, he was a real aggressive soldier but real good at what he did. �Interviewer: Okay. Now, was the event with Lieutenant Lost, was that one of the last things you did in the field? Or…? Veteran: Actually, that—we fought the second battle of Tam Phon. There weren’t too many of us there because most of Delta company was kept to look for the 18th North Vietnamese regiment. There was one battalion that hadn’t arrived and the idea was that 1st of the 8th would find them first and put artillery fire on them. So, I really only spent one night in the second battle of Tam Phon. Now, during that time I picked up a compression fracture of the spine, some burns on one hand, and also some lacerations from a bullet that bounced off the APC. None of this stuff was serious but the fact that I was limping, somebody thought I was more serious and they sent me back to the hospital at LZ English. And from there, I was supposed to go to Qui Nhơn where they would get a better look at the back and determine how bad it was and whether I ought to be in a back brace and ought to be back in the rear or whether I could go back out to the infantry company. Well, I wanted to go back out with the infantry company even though I still hurt, so I put my backpack frame on and it felt better with the backpack frame and the radio. So, I went out to my company but I forgot to make sure everybody knew that. And for a while, I was listed as missing in action. They were looking for me at hospitals and they eventually got it straightened out but I didn’t get paid for my last two months in Vietnam. (01:00:15) Veteran: You know, December—well, actually December, January, and February I didn’t get paid for those until I got back stateside so I couldn’t buy another camera after the one got ruined during the battle of Tam Phon. Interviewer: Okay, so what actually happened to you at Tam Phog? �Veteran: Actually, the compression fracture of the spine—there was a .50 caliber machine gun that was on this burning armored personnel carrier. And there were a—you know, we are getting shot at. This armored personnel carrier was burning because it got hit by a recoilless rifle. And there were other guys—one guy that was put in for a Silver Star there actually climbed into the burning vehicle and amputated a guy’s leg at the knee that was trapped in there. And of course, I had some blood from him on because I helped, you know, bandage and put the tourniquet on the guy’s leg. Well, people saw all the blood on me and thought I was a whole lot worse than I thought I was because I knew I had a sprained ankle, I knew I tore my back because I jumped off this armored personnel carrier with a .50 caliber machine gun across my arms. This is a heavy load of steel, you know. Not really good to be jumping 7 feet and carrying this so that was probably my first compression fracture with the spine. And I’ve done several since then with various things that I have done. But Lottie is not pleased with what my spine looks like right now. Interviewer: Alright. This is now hour 6 of the Glenn Sheathelm interview. We had now kind of made it sort of to late 1967 and you’re getting in the last couple of months now of your Vietnam tour. And now you get a change of scenery. (01:02:16) Veteran: Okay, after December of 1967, we did a little bit of patrolling in the An Lo River Valley in early ’68. Now, I mentioned about lieutenant; he was replaced probably a little bit before the middle of January of ’68. And it was a week or two after that, we got word that we were going to go up to the de-militarized zone and help the Marines at Khe Sanh. We boarded a C-130 at LZ English. When we boarded the C-130, one of the infantrymen decided to pull a typical infantrymen’s thing and he had a hand grenade pin in his helmet and he pulled it out and he says, “Anybody know where the rest of my hand grenade is?” And of course, the load master �on the C-130 turns white as a sheet. And you know, then he realized that he had been joked, you know, on this thing. But you know, there was some real concern that someplace there was a hand grenade minus the pin rolling around inside that C-130. And but, it took our whole company on board the C-130 and of course, the story from the C-130 load master had told us that you know, we couldn’t carry hand grenades. Well, Captain Canetto told us to go behind the conexes and he said that, “I don’t want to see a hand grenade outside of your packs, you know, when we get back onboard the helicopters.” Or onboard the C-130. So, we hid all of our stuff in there but Captain Canetto was not going to leave any stuff behind. He knew that maybe when we got up there that they might not have enough ammo or grenades or anything like that and he was going to be combat ready. You know, it’s like 5 minutes after we walked off that C-130, we were going to be ready to go into the field, which basically was what he was set up for. So anyway, we took the C-130 and landed it the Hue/Phu Bai, which is the airport at Huế. And they loaded us on C130s and flew us up to near the de-militarized zone. (01:04:30) Veteran: A place—well, Quang Tri is the last big town before you get to the de-militarized zone. There’s small villages like Qua Viet and Con Thien and so forth north of that. But Con Thien got the name— Interviewer: Could you land a C-130 on Quang Tri? Or did you take trucks up there? Veteran: We took C-47s. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: The CH-47— Interviewer: Helicopters. �Veteran: --helicopters up to there. And they dropped us off but yeah, at Quang Tri at the time, there was not a place where they could land a C-130 there. Later on, there was. Now, the Marine Corps had this attitude towards the 1st cav coming up there that we had so many helicopters, you know, it was just like mosquitoes swarming around. And our helicopters also were better armed than theirs were. And the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese learned that pretty quick, that you know, you can’t just expect one or two passes from a gun ship but you can expect these ARL helicopters to come back, you know, six or seven times and fire rockets at you. So, you know, the North Vietnamese found out some different things about the first cav. Also, we could move a lot of troops a whole lot faster with the number of helicopters that we had. Now, one of the places that we worked off of was LZ Ann, which was a mountaintop landing zone. The artillery battery was on the very top. The infantry was down on a kind of a ledge partway down. And while we were on that ledge, we had a mortar round come in one night that…Oh, probably hit about from me to the copy machine over there from me. And I was laying in my hole, you know, it was at night. (01:06:27) Veteran: And I had a couple layers of sandbags. Well, I—when I heard what sounded like a mortar round coming in and the pop, I didn’t get up or do anything, I just laid there in the hole. The mortar round went off. Now, Lieutenant Carney was laying in a hole probably about the size of that table over there. And it had one row of sandbags around it and his pack was leaning up against the outside of the sandbags. That mortar round came down right on the pack. And he had shrapnel from his ankles all the way up to the back of his neck. There were two other guys that were wounded. One of them got hit in the neck but Carney and the one guy that got hit in the neck with shrapnel were medevaced. I was mostly covered with dirt and gravel, you know. No serious injuries of any type. But anyway, Lieutenant Carney was flown out. He was the �lieutenant-type forward observer. Not real popular with the infantrymen because he made a couple mistakes. One time, he’d called in white phosphorus. White phosphorus doesn’t fly as far as HE does. And he should have given, you know, an add 75 to it. And instead, he gave a drop 75. And the white phosphorus came down right on the perimeter and a guy lost his leg because of it. So, like I said, he was not real popular with the infantrymen. Sometimes they would say, you know, Lieutenant Carney is calling in interdictions around the perimeter and you’d see the infantrymen heading for their holes—about like rabbits. And so, some of the infantrymen were not real sad to see Lieutenant Carney go, you know. (01:08:26) Veteran: Well, it’s kind of bad that somebody got wounded but they were kind of glad that he was gone and that also meant that I was running the forward observer team. There was no lieutenant that was sent in to replace him for a long period of time. And anyway, the next morning Captain Robbins, who was in charge of A battery, 2nd of the 19th which was the unit on the hill, he said, “Have you got Lieutenant Carney’s binoculars?” And I said, “No, sir.” And he said, “Well, are they a combat loss?” And I said, “Yes sir, the round hit right on his pack and his binoculars were attached to the pack.” He said, “Well, we need the serial number.” And I am sort of trying to sort through the various bits of shrapnel laying around for a green painted piece of metal that’s got a serial number on it. And I said, “Well, this is 3 digits of it.” You know, and I called that in and he considered that good enough. He marked off, you know, Lieutenant Carney’s binoculars as far as being lost in battle. And I said, “You know, you’ll have to mark the compass the same way.” And he said, “Well, for some reason or another they didn’t ask for the serial number of the compass, so I’ll just, you know, go ahead and say yeah you know, that was destroyed when Lieutenant Carney was wounded.” Anyway, we ran some patrols off there and one of the units called in that they’d shot a Viet Cong elephant. And one of the guys farther up �the line says, “Well, how do you know it’s a Viet Cong elephant?” And I said, came back on the radio when I said, “They said it was dead so it’s got to be a Viet Cong elephant.” (01:10:22) Veteran: It—you didn’t say well, we had killed some dead civilians or something like that. They were either Viet Cong or Viet Cong sympathizers, you know. So, things were run that way most of the time. Occasionally, we did report, you know, civilians and stuff. I kind of remember one time we were on a patrol and we came to a place where there was a village that the Viet Cong had taken the civilians out and were using them like porters to carry supplies. And there was an old woman and a young girl. The young girl had been, apparently, was put by a fire in a blanket. The blanket caught fire and she was badly burned. And the old woman, who I am assuming was her grandmother, was staying with her while pretty much everyone else in the village there were moved out. Well, a little bit later when the company was getting ready to come into the perimeter at a different location, I said, “You know, about that girl that we passed up,” I said, “Would it be possible that we go back and pick her up and then take her into LZ English and have her flown to a hospital?” And Lieutenant Reed says, “Well, we’ve got the rest of this patrol to finish but,” he said, “if you can find some volunteers who want to go with you, you can go back and pick her up.” So, I asked and I immediately had volunteers. And we went back and picked her up. And I remember we brought her into the artillery fire base. And she had been badly burned. The medic from the artillery came over there because the medic with first platoon was still out with them at the time. And I remember making chicken noodle soup out of, you know, a chicken noddle C ration thing. And I added some water to it and made a broth, you know, with a canteen up because she was dehydrated from the burns so I could tell that. (01:12:39) Veteran: And we propped her up on a backpack and she was eventually flown out with the grandmother to a hospital down at Qui Nhơn. How she fared after that, I have no idea. But you �know, we’d—sometimes, were in situations where we would go out of our way to, you know, help civilians out. And that was one of them that I remember because I was personally involved in it. But anyway, when we were up there near Quang Tri, we worked off of LZ Ann and LZ Betty and you know, there were several other ones we worked off of. And then they had us go ahead and do some recon of the area between Quang Tri on the south side of highway 9 where we could put artillery batteries and kind of hitch hop over to help the Marines at Khe Sanh. Well, that was when the Tet Offensive broke, while we were doing that. So that mission didn’t actually take place until after Tet and I had left by that time. I had actually pulled off. But they had actually did use two of the firebases that I had reconned and said what had to be done. And you know, there would be suitable places where they could, you know put some infantrymen on there and det cord blow the trees down and you know, then bring artillery pieces in with CH-47 Chinooks and go to work. (01:14:22) Veteran: So anyway, when the—just before the Tet Offensive, we had some heavy engines. We had 5 man—what they called a Killer Team—that was out along the river. We were having Claymores set up. Supposedly, the Viet Cong were bringing rockets down to fire on Quang Tri by raft on the Dong Ha River. Now, the Dong Ha River is the one that if you see the movie Bat 21, that’s what it’s based on is the Dong Ha River. Where he got picked up, it’s just south of the de-militarized zone. And the North Vietnamese took over that area during the ’72 invasion and also they basically held most of it during the Tet ’68, except where there happened to be some Americans standing on that ground. But they had basically—did control that area. And so anyway, we had this bunch of heavy vehicle engines and I called on the radio, I said, “Are you sure there’s not any South Vietnamese unit out here with tanks because I am pretty sure what I am hearing is tanks.” And they said, “No.” And anyway, I had one of the guys climb up to a little �ridge with a starlight scope and I said, “You want to take a look and see what you see out there?” And he says, “Oh yeah, they are definitely tanks and there’s infantry with them.” I thought okay, we haven’t got any good guys out there. They have got to be the bad guys. Well, we didn’t want to get cut off from our company so we quick like picked up all of our Claymores and got away from the river and zig zagged, you know, a path. We did not encounter these guys on the way out. So, by sound I ran an artillery fire mission on them. And I apparently damaged one because we found the following day that they had had to stop to repair one of the vehicles but they had moved it to where it was better cover by the time daylight got there. (01:16:36) Veteran: I reported them as Russian PT-76 tanks. This is before the Tet Offensive. And military policy was from Westmoreland’s office because he was military assistant command in Vietnam, that information on North Vietnamese build-up in the two northern provinces was politically unacceptable at the present time. And apparently, CBS News might have had a copy of that because Westmoreland was going to sue CBS for defamation of character when they said that he had, you know, not been prepared for the Tet Offensive. And so, they knew there had been some lies that were purposely spread around because of his office so I am assuming somebody had a copy of that even though it was stamped secret and I didn’t see it until a bit later on. But nobody was informed the fact that there was a Russian built jet shot down in South Vietnam or that there were Russian built tanks in South Vietnam. Now, these tanks apparently were supposed to have been used for the Tet Offensive towards Quang Tri but their commander apparently saw the fact that the Marines had M-48 tanks with 90-millimeter recoilless guns. He was basically outgunned so they turned around and looked for a softer target. And there’s a book called Tanks in the Wire which is about a special forces camp that got hit by some PT-76 tanks roughly two days after we had seen them. And I am thinking that it could have been some of the same tanks. (01:18:27) �Interviewer: Depends on how long would it have taken the tanks to get there. Veteran: Yeah, you know, it would have been possible for them to get there in two days but that’s assuming they were able to run, you know, at a normal cruising speed at night when they didn’t have to, you know…That they’d have lights out. But anyway, the Tet Offensive broke and most of the Americans were pulled back to guard the cities like Quang Tri. Our battalion commander Donald Rattan, also known as Snapper Rattan. There was an LZ Snapper named after him when they finally pulled that thing at Quang Tri. But that was his nickname from West Point. And he decided that since we had some people that were real good at calling in artillery fire, and some good platoon leaders—we had some leading these guys that had come from recon platoon and myself—he figured, you know, we will leave you guys out there because the North Vietnamese coming south to go after the cities might be a little sloppy because they figure they basically control that area out there—it’s Indian country. Well, one night we did catch a battalion of them that were getting supplies from underground caches and they were using flashlights to sort supplies out. We were about 600 yards away, the platoon that I was with anyway. And I got 4 artillery batteries to p0und them. And the North Vietnamese lost very heavily that night. (01:20:10) Veteran: Sort of like the North Vietnamese were probably ‘Chicken Little, the sky is really falling.’ You know? Because 4 batteries of artillery—they just pounded them for about 10 or 15 minutes, starting with the time on the target wall to when the first rounds came in at the same time. And the infantrymen just, you know, get some 22 like…you know, they’re watching through binoculars as this stuff was crashing in on them. With the flash of the artillery, they could see these North Vietnamese just get torn apart by their artillery fire and they thought that was really cool and I am thinking you know, this is kind of strange: I’ve got a cheering section �for killing people. And come to find out, I eventually got a Bronze Star for that too. And my sister said, “But you’re a hero! You got a Bronze Star.” And I said, “No, that’s just for being very good at my job, which was making the other side die faster than we did.” And I told her about that particular fire mission and I said that that probably played a big part in that Bronze Star because it was for January/February ’68. Well, the Tet Offensive—we continued to do well against the North Vietnamese. Towards the end of the Tet Offensive, there was one of these— actually, a couple of these North Vietnamese units that had been so badly hit they were broken down and put into one company. And it said there was a Viet Cong platoon guarding this bunch of Viet Cong cadre and this was right after I left. They went and got involved in a battle with them. There were several of the guys that I knew pretty well from 1st of the 8th that were killed in that battle. We had a new forward observer there at the time and there was—the guy that they sent out as artillery recon sergeant was not real competent. (01:22:19) Veteran: The lieutenant-type would have been but he was overly cautious because he’d been safety officer for 1st of the 30th Artillery before that so obviously he did not want his name on an artillery incident thing where some people got killed by friendly fire because he goofed up. He was real careful about that, which made him a little slow getting the first rounds in. But there was a guy by the name Gary Nelson Frey that ran the artillery fire for A Company, 1st of the 8th during that battle that actually kept one of his platoons alive because of the artillery fire he put in. And there’s a guy by the name of Tom McAndrews who was company commander for A company, 1st of the 8th that was really praise worthy of this Gary Nelson Frey who was later on killed in the A Shau. But yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Now, I want to steer back here to your story. Now you get pulled out? �Veteran: Yeah. Now, I mentioned about running the artillery stuff and I did that throughout the Tet Offensive. And the—there was one night where some North Vietnamese had walked through one of our ambushes and they didn’t spring the ambush. And I put some artillery fire where I thought those guys wanted—you know, it did cause some casualties. And I didn’t know the North Vietnamese had already pre-planned positions, had already dug their so it didn’t do as much damage to the North Vietnamese as it would have if they had been troops in the open. (01:24:10) Veteran: During that day, the medic—a guy by the name of Adkins—knew that I was having trouble keeping up. I had dysentery, I had blood poisoning, I had all kinds of infections. I was basically a rotting piece of meat. I’d—when I went to Vietnam, I weighed 195 pounds. At this time, I probably weighed about 130 and was, you know, not really in great shape. And Adkins and Lieutenant Reed came to me and said, “You know, you’re going to take that med-evacc there back to Quang Tri. You’re so sick,” well Adkins said, “You’re so sick that within the next day or two, you’re going to fall over and people are going to have to carry you.” And he said, “You also might make mistakes because you’re not thinking as clearly as you should.” And he said, “It’s about time you took the medevac out.” So, they flew me back to Quang Tri. And the next day, you know, Adkins was right: I couldn’t even climb up from the floor into this wooden bunk that I was supposed to sleep in. And this was about a week and a half before I was supposed to leave country anyway. So, that first week I spent basically under the care of Dr. Risaand, you know, they loaded me up with all kinds of antibiotics and cement pills to stop me up so I didn’t have diarrhea. And you know, I started putting on weight and I could actually walk by myself before Captain Risaturned me loose and said, “Okay, you go ahead and take a C-130 back to An Khê. You know they’ll—I’ll process you and you’ll be going back home.” And he says, “By the time �you get there, you’ll be under 90 days so you’ll get an early out.” And when I got back to Fort Lewis, Washington they said, “Well, you can stay here another month. We will see what we can do about curing the jungle rot and the other stuff you got wrong or we’ll just write out a prescription and you’ll get it filled back home and you know, that’ll—that should take care of you. If not, you got a VA hospital in Grand Rapids.” (01:26:36) Veteran: So, I did that. I took my early out and figured no, I don’t want to be treated here at Fort Lewis, Washington. You get assigned little duties that don’t mean anything, like go out and shine the sidewalk or—you know, whatever sort of nonsense that they might come up with. So, I took an early out from there. I flew from Fort Lewis, Washington on a Northwest Airlines conveyor twin engine prop plane because I wanted to see some of the country at at least a lower altitude than I would from a big jet that would fly me directly from SeaTac near Fort Lewis to Chicago and from there to Muskegon. So, I must have stopped about 5 or 6 times, you know, in North Dakota, South Dakota, or wherever. And Billings, Montana and…So, I made several stops on the way back. And it took me a whole day to get back on that. Interviewer: Now, did you fly in uniform? Veteran: I did because I flew out from a smaller airport near Seattle. And some of the guys didn’t because there were not there but if you flew out of Oakland, there were people throwing rotten fruits and vegetables at you already. You know, it’s ’68. So, I did fly back in a uniform and I stepped off the plane in Muskegon in uniform. Some of the guys, you know, figured that they’d get rid of their uniforms in Chicago and come back in civilian clothes. (01:28:30) Veteran: I didn’t—I actually walked off the plane with the uniform on. And of course, since that was March—or actually at the tail end of February, I had a khaki uniform on and a field jacket �over the top because it was cold here. I mean, when we flew into SeaTac, it was cold and rainy too. So… Interviewer: Okay. Now, I want to back up a little bit and talk about a few different themes that tend to come up a lot when people think about Vietnam. One of the stereotypes that has to do with drug use, for instance. Was there much of that— Veteran: Any what? Interviewer: Drug use. I mean, were there people smoking marijuana or things worse than that? Or…? Veteran: Occasionally there was someone that smoked marijuana but it was always back in the rear and the thing was that the guys figured that they couldn’t get any ice for a mixed drink or something like that so they smoked a little marijuana, got out a little happy. Nobody ever smoked in the field in my unit—either 2nd of the 19th Artillery, which I was in earlier, or 1st of the 8th. Now, there was one guy in the commo section in 2nd of the 19th that I heard smoked marijuana, didn’t actually see it. Interviewer: Okay, so it’s not been a major part of your experience. Veteran: No, it wasn’t. Now, later on during the Vietnam War, it was a bigger part. And I understand that was true even in good units like the 1st Cav and 101st Airborne. A great pointer who was a first sergeant in the 1st Cav was later 1st sergeant with 101st Airborne, I think ‘69/’70, and he talked about—you know, the fragging of NCOs and they had officers and the drugs and the drug problems but I didn’t see it during the time I was there. (01:30:40) �Interviewer: Okay. And then another one you touched on a little bit has to do with the question of race. I mean, you had the one issue there with the person accusing Lieutenant Lost of racism. Did you notice much by way of racial tension? I mean, you did when you were in Germany. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: There was a sergeant that— Veteran: Yeah. And that seemed to be mainly true of rear infantry groups. You know, when you were out in the field, you relied on this other guy with a rifle or machine gun to help you stay alive. Didn’t make any difference if he was black, white, or purple: as long as he was wearing our uniform, you know, you could depend on him. And you know, I saw white guys going out and grabbing wounded black guys and hauling them back and the other way around with white guys wounded, black guys putting their lives on the line to go out and drag them back. You know, we didn’t see that out in the field. Now, I don’t know whether I mentioned Ling? He had been—he was Vietnamese and for a while he had been my interpreter when I was in 2nd of the 19th. He was a South Vietnamese that could speak English and he was an interpreter for headquarters—actually, the S-2 for 2nd of the 19th. And he used to go out on these village sick calls with us and short-range patrols. And I said, “Ling, you only carry two magazines.” You know, they are generally clipped together where—the bottoms weren’t taped together. You know, two 20 round magazines. “You never carry web gear. How come?” And he says, “Sergeant Sheathelm, if it takes more than two magazines we ought to be running, not fighting.” (01:32:35) �Veteran: And I found that true of the South Vietnamese: they realized that they were in this war basically for their lifetime and, you know, if you have a chance of determining what this fight is going to look like from the very beginning, you know, you pick your fights so you got a good chance of winning. And we tried to do that too but the Viet—South Vietnamese or the ARVN were definitely more into that, you know. Well, if you think we can win this, you know, we will go ahead and attack or…You know, like let’s see: there is 8 of them or 8 of us and 45 of them…Let’s just slide off and find a fight with them some other day, you know. So, I did find some differences in South Vietnamese troops. Some of them were very bold and brave; some of them…so-so. But one of my cousins who worked with the Cambodian mercenaries against the Viet Cong really thought a whole bunch of them. Gillespie thought a whole bunch of the Montagnards that fought on our side during the Vietnam War as far as being very brave. There’s a book called Abandon Hell that was written about a battle in 1970 where the Americans were already looking at, you know, were pulling out of this war and they didn’t send the re-supplies and ammo that they should have to help out this bunch of Cambodians. (01:34:23) Veteran: But they, with a couple American advisors, they did manage to fight their way clear of this Firebase Kate, which was right along the Cambodian border. And that was a pretty good book about that time of the war and the fact that, you know, where a lot of Americans were beginning to look at, you know, not really too sure about being the last guy to die in this war that we are going to give up on anyway. Whereas there was more gung-ho during the time I was there, you know, in ’66, ’67, early ’68. Interviewer: Yep. �Veteran: Now, after the Tet Offensive was when most of the guys said that things started going downhill. Walter Cronkite had come out on the news and said, “This is a war that no sense being there anymore because we are going to lose in the long run.” Interviewer: Well, he didn’t actually say that. Veteran: Well yeah, some of the— Interviewer: He declared it a stalemate. That was as far as he went. If you look—but that, so— Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: But basically, it was still—as far as Lyndon Johnson was concerned, he had lost Walter Cronkite. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: And so, yeah. Veteran: Yeah, and…But yeah, Walter Cronkite had looked at it, you know, this war is being mismanaged—it’s probably not going to come out well. And the American people saw that and of course, they saw the Tet Offensive with the Viet Cong getting into our embassy. Of course, the Viet Cong all died that got into our embassy and a large number of them died at Huế and they died at Quang Tri and probably the biggest example of North Vietnamese dying was at Khe Sanh. You know, they had the Marines surrounded and pounded the Marines and caused Marine casualties. But there was—there were more bombs dropped on the area around Khe Sanh than were dropped on any Germany city during World War 2. I mean, the North Vietnamese admitted �to losing just under 200,000 troops, you know, that were supposed to be taking over Khe Sanh. (01:36:41) Interviewer: They didn’t—that’s not. Okay, that’s a different issue. But they lost a lot. Veteran: Yeah. The North Vietnamese—you know, there was one general that admitted that that cost them close to 200,000. And you know, they were just chewed up by B-52s, you know. This was not artillery fire from the Americans but just, you know, their trenches, their battalions coming south to reinforce the North Vietnamese. You know, B-52s strike and 400-some men was reduced to 18, you know. Interviewer: Yeah. Alright, I guess now the—another good question: how did the men in your unit, as you observed them, how did they seem to view the South Vietnamese civilians? Veteran: They were actually pretty good about the South Vietnamese civilians. They recognized the fact that, you know, we were going to be there a short period of time and maybe the Viet Cong were going to take over at night so that, you know, made them understand that the South Vietnamese didn’t always get as free as they’d like to be about giving us information. Sometimes the, you know, we felt pretty good because the civilians did give us good information. Sometimes they just didn’t say much of anything. But you know, we realized they were in a tough place. And I think most of the infantrymen felt that way. Like when we pulled into a village—the village cordon—the American troops generally would share their rations with the Vietnamese civilians, particularly the kids. And you know, they would gather around and share a peanut butter jelly sandwich made with bread canned in 1943 and peanut butter before it was homogenized—looked like desert salt flats with a little peanut oil on top. (01:38:36) �Veteran: Yeah and we only—I only remember one guy that was down on the civilians. He was our first sergeant. And one time he threw a concussion hand grenade back on the kids that were picking up the supplies we had left behind. And one of the infantrymen threatened that this first sergeant might have an accident in the next fire fight. And the first sergeant said, “You heard that. He threatened me.” “Heard what, sir?” Just, you know, just playing dumb but I knew what was going on and I knew why, you know, this guy was a bully. He was doing stuff wrong. We had a—one guy that actually later on became a probation officer in the Denver area who actually got ticked off; this first sergeant punched him out one time. And he, naturally, got busted for doing so and even Captain Canetto said, “I hope you hit him hard because,” he says, “that guy was totally worthless.” And you know, he knew that this first sergeant was not one of our sterling characters. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Okay, go ahead with your next question. Interviewer: Another piece of your story I wanted to go back to a little bit. You mentioned at a certain point in your tour you had a job going around and talking to people after firefights or actions and finding—getting their different accounts of what happened. So, you were essentially interviewing people— Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: --LZ Pony I think was where that was. �Veteran: Now, that was early on. I interviewed some of the people that had been involved in earlier battles to write up lessons learned for artillery on what we could do better with artillery fire to support the infantry. (01:40:41) Veteran: And of course, the la Drang battles were a part of that and then the May 21st-22nd battle which SLA Marshall wrote up in his book, Bird: The Christmastide Battle. And SLA Marshall also wrote up David Dolby’s Congressional Medal of Honor thing and he had some errors or exaggerations in there. And I knew that because I knew that the artillery fire that they got there was primarily illumination. Later on—or, the one artillery fire mission run by Charlie company’s FO early on drove the North Vietnamese out of some bunkers. But once the battle got started, the Americans and the North Vietnamese were too closely mixed up to effectively use artillery fire. And David told me he didn’t do that, in spite of SLA Marshall’s praises for his good artillery fire and ARA and so forth during that battle. He told me he didn’t do that. He was a brave soldier that put down one of the North Vietnamese machine guns that had some guys pinned down. He took his lieutenant and hid the lieutenant’s body where the North Vietnamese wouldn’t find it and helped get some wounded guys down to the streambed where…First name was Bill but anyway, one of the 3rd platoon leaders from Bill Mosey’s—not 3rd platoon but 2nd platoon made it from Bill Mosey’s company came up and helped get the wounded back from Roy Martin’s platoon that had walked right in front of the bunkers and been hit right at the start of the battle, which resulted in David Dolby’s lieutenant getting badly wounded then eventually killed during that battle . (01:42:49) Veteran: And there were a couple other guys that were hidden in the rocks and then not pulled back to the streambed the next morning when Bill Mosey took his company there because his company was up to strength. They picked up those other two bodies but there were two of them �that were actually left out in no man’s land that first night. And one of the stories that got passed off that it was, you know, Roy Martin was a chicken for not being sure that those two bodies were policed up. Well, he got information verified that those two guys were dead and, you know, the area was controlled by the enemy. It had turned dark. Roy Martin’s platoon, or company, had—they had taken some heavy casualties. And the decision was made that B company would pull up to the side of the valley where Captain Bill Mosey had his company set up. And the next morning, they brought in chainsaws and lowered them down from, you know, helicopters and the guys went ahead and cleared some trees so that medevac helicopters could pick up the wounded that had been laying in Mosey’s perimeter all night. (01:44:19) Veteran: And so…You know, that’s how it went there. Interviewer: Yeah. When you were doing these sorts of inquiries, were you talking to both officers and enlisted men? Veteran: Yes, talking to both officers and enlisted men. Also, I had access to a lot of the secret documents and so forth concerning those fights which is why I knew that there was information out on that second battle in the la Drang, the one at LZ Albany. But it was basically kept quiet for the first 14 years after the battle took place and I knew it had been released in 1979 which would have been 14 years for the secret classification to be removed from that, unless somebody had upgraded it to top secret. So, at Grand Valley I knew that there was going ton be information out there to write the report, The la Drang: Almost Forgotten, which Grand Valley still has a copy of it. And it apparently is available out there on the internet or somehow on the internet, they know it’s available because Hal Moore used it and JD Coleman used it in writing their books. So… �Interviewer: Yeah. And when you were talking to people, did you have—were they pretty forthcoming or did you have the sense that people were holding stuff back? Veteran: They were very forthcoming because they knew that this was going to help some other people out in the future and anything that was going to help other people from going through the same type of hell they did, then some of these battles was worthwhile. (01:46:16) Veteran: So yeah, they were pretty open. And the guys I talked to—I mean, Rick Rescorla would be one and he, you know, there were several people. And Rick Rescorla reminded me a little bit like that’s probably what Winston Churchill was like as a young man. Rescorla was a Welsh immigrant. He fought in the British Army prior to coming to the United States, joined the United States Army, went to OCS, got a lieutenant’s commission, and led an infantry platoon during that second battle in the la Drang, which was the one we called LZ Albany. And now, he was killed during the World Trade Center bombing. He was the head of security for Morgan Stanley. Interviewer: Oh. Veteran: And he had been down in the basement. He had seen the van that had blown up down there and said, “You know, this building is still a target.” And he said, “Next time, it could be an airliner.” He says, “We are going to have a—have fire drills.” Well, the big mucky mucks at Morgan Stanley said, “No, no, no, you’re just a crazy, paranoid Vietnam vet.” You know? And he climbed on the table and unfastened his belt and he says, “I’m going to moon everybody until you listen to me.” And they thought this guy is probably serious so they said, “Okay Rick, you calm down. Sit down—tell us what you think we ought to do.” And he told them that they would take the computer, clear everything—you know, have everybody that was there for Morgan Stanley check in and check out so they knew who was there in the building. And he said that, �you know, different floors had different places they were supposed to go to. And there would be security people that would check, you know with a clipboard, they’d take the thing off every half hour. And so, Morgan Stanley actually did practice that once where they went to other locations. The rest of the time, they’d just go to the doorways they were supposed to exit from. And you know, the security people would take charge so Morgan Stanley didn’t shut down for real long periods of time other than that one fire drill. (01:48:38) Veteran: And anyway, when the plane hit the World Trade Center, the port authorities said, “Everybody, stay put. The fire department will tell which floor to evacuate and, you know, they will do a nice, orderly evacuation.” And Rescorla says, “No. this building is coming down. Everybody head for the stairwells. And you know, go to the fire drill procedure.” And it saved close to 2800 guys—or, 2800 people from Morgan Stanley. And— Interviewer: But he stayed behind? Veteran: He stayed behind. The last that anybody saw him that escaped, he was standing in a stairwell with his bullhorn, singing rather risqué Irish drinking songs as well as some patriotic songs like God Bless America over his bullhorn and telling everybody to keep moving. And they don’t know for sure exactly where he was when the building came down but he didn’t survive that. He was later put on for—put in for the Presidential Medal of Freedom. A couple guys that actually circulated petitions. One of them was General Hal Moore and another one was the guy that played Hal Moore during the movie, We Were Soldiers, Mel Gibson. (01:50:12) Veteran: And everybody thought that maybe he might get the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Well, anyway port authority, among others, kind of tried putting a monkey wrench in everything because he had been right when port authority and the Department of Home Defense had been �wrong and that, you know, yeah next time it will probably be an airplane and you know, we got to have an evacuation plan in order. Well, Morgan Stanley was the only one that really did and he saved most of the employees of Morgan Stanley but the fact that he had been right and they had been wrong…They started a campaign against that and I understand he never did get the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Interviewer: Alright. We’ve got about 12 minutes left of this tape and I would like to have— Veteran: Okay, you go ahead and take other questions, right? Interviewer: Yeah. Basically, once you got home, what did you do? Veteran: First thing I did was I wanted to do something that was positive so I kind of thought a little bit about going back over there as a pacification officer but I immediately got back into ski patrol, which was a search and rescue type of thing. And actually, got in my 12-day minimum during 1968 in March. And so, I was credited with that year and then I had to take a review first aid class in spite of the fact I had been doing medic stuff but some of the stuff there didn’t fit the, you know, the rules on what first aiders were allowed to do. So anyway, I got upgraded on first aid and did that. I spent some volunteer time with [?] County search and rescue and [?] County search and rescue on some rescue things there. I took up mountain climbing and backpacking in the mountains because of the sense of adventure, you know. You got to have some things that kind of put your mind on edge but they have to be politically acceptable and hopefully something that is not going to get you killed. Now, that’s part of the reason that some of the Vietnam vets got these high-powered helicopters or high-powered motorcycles and died shortly after they got �back from Vietnam. They tried getting this sense of adventure out of this and died as a result. (01:52:49) Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And… Interviewer: Did you wind up going to college? Veteran: I did go to college. I did some time in community college here then went to Western Michigan University where I got my Bachelor’s degree. Then got a Master’s degree in library science and AV media. That was mostly through Western Michigan and University of Michigan extension office in Grand Rapids. And then after I got the Master’s degree there, I started working on a Master’s degree in history and I took some classes from Western and some from Grand Valley State University, which resulted in that paper that I mentioned: The la Drang: Almost Forgotten. That was a paper I wrote for one of those classes. And the battalion commander—or, the instructor said, “You can’t find enough information to write a paper on that.” I knew the stuff had just been de-classified, I just had to find out where it was and I’d, you know, start it from there. Some of it I got the papers, some of it, you know, I was still waiting for it from National Archives from the time I finally wrote the paper. And then that information got passed on to Hal Moore and JD Coleman. They both wrote books dealing with the la Drang campaign. So… (01:54:19) Interviewer: Now, you are taking these to Greece. Do you have a job at this point? Or…? Veteran: Yeah, I taught for Muskegon Public Schools starting in 1972. And taught for them for 35 years. Part of the time I taught 5th and 6th grade. I was in elementary libraries for a while and �the last 20 years as head of libraries and the media center at Steele School where I did actually get a chance to create a video on a project the school was doing on environmental improvement of the creek that was behind Steele School. That was the—one of the two things that I—well actually, the only thing I did—with video that was actually part of my AV media Master’s degree. I did a slide tape dissolve program on commercial fishing in the Great Lakes which won some awards. Frank Friel turned it in at Western Michigan University for me. And it did pick up a couple awards for outstanding slide tape dissolve program for AV program. And it only got used a few times for Muskegon Public Schools and then something happened to their spindle soft page dissolve control and there was no longer the equipment that it took to run it. But…so…. Interviewer: Okay. Now, you had also gotten yourself involved with veterans’ groups of different sorts. Veteran: Yeah. Let’s see, in—oh, it must have been about 1982, I started helping psychiatrists and psychologists with the rat groups. (01:56:25) Veteran: You know, I would turn Vietnam speak into something they can understand. And you know, so I did that quite a bit. I actually probably did it for somewhere around 10 years and I got to know a lot of the vets around Muskegon county. With that, I get thank yous from some of them and some will come up and ask me questions. You know, even years afterwards, I had one that was out for dinner just a week or two ago. And he was one that used to walk around the house at night with a loaded AR-15. But he doesn’t do that anymore according to his wife but he’s still more than a wee bit paranoid. And you can see it in his eyes. But he has not done anything thoroughly bizarre. He’s functioning, still feeling kind of bitter about some stuff but he’s getting by okay, which one of the things was that I had when I was helping run Grant’s �group was this sign on the wall: ‘Vietnam changed me but I don’t live there anymore.’ And that was…Yep. Vietnam War changed our perspective on outlooks, on what life was going to be afterwards. But you know, you can’t carry on like you still live there because it’s totally unacceptable. Hal Mooreat least told a story about that. He was a psychiatrist who had been in World War 2. And he said, “Yeah, you know when you are invited for a dinner?” He says, “That’s not the time to talk about…You know, in the Ardennes when you’ve been walking pretty hard and you were tired, looking for places to sit down.” He says, “That’s not—you know at the dinner party, that’s not the time to be talking about stacking up these 3 German bodies and sitting on them and opening up your rations to eat.” He says, “That’s the last time you’ll be invited to a dinner party at that house.” He said, “There are certain things that you just have to be careful of. The rest of the world doesn’t understand what we did in Vietnam.” (01:58:52) Veteran: Or anybody did in any war. And he said, “You have to kind of pick things that you say and do that are socially acceptable.” And you know, that’s what I talked to the other vets too. Interviewer: Did you have to learn that yourself? Veteran: Well actually, I had been told some of those things by Fred Rice who had been a World War 2 vet. And you know, it was one of those things that a couple times when I was starting to get really hostile and mad, I’d cool it—you can’t do that kind of stuff now. And a couple times, had first aid situations. Okay, that’s considered practicing medicine without a license. You know, you could get sued for that. Do not do that for the first aid thing. And you know, there were times I had to kind of restrain what I was doing. You know, like…You know, student has got a gun. Well yeah, but you can’t go ahead and grab him by the throat and kill him right there. You know, that’s…And I did have one billing principal that there was guy that had actually been �kicked out of the Heights and the principal and I had walked him down. He was threatening to kill some student at the school. (02:00:26) Veteran: We walked him into the office and I let go of him. And this guy pushed me from the back, right into the corner of a file cabinet. And it broke two ribs. But I mean I kind of put the pain of ribs out of my mind and both hands went around his neck and lifted him up off the floor. And the billing principal said, “Glenn, you’ve got to let go of him.” And you know, it was yeah okay. Interviewer: So, you had some conditioned responses that still worked. Veteran: Yeah. There were some things that, you know, if I saw my life or a threat to my health by somebody, you know, it was—yeah, I’d go ahead and grabbed the guy around the neck. And then there was another time a kid came in and started hitting me in the chest and I had the idea about reaching out throwing him to the floor and falling on him was there but I knew I couldn’t do that, you know. I was going to get in trouble for, you know, what if I dropped on him with both knees in the middle of his chest, it’d probably break a whole bunch of ribs and maybe puncture a lung and put him in bad shape and that was not really what I could do in spite of the fact the guy is slamming the heels of his hands into my chest saying, “Old man, I am going to make you have a heart attack.” And you know…But yeah, there were some things you had to just kind of put back. You know, no I cannot let emotions and anger take charge right now. I’ve got to handle this as a totally rational school teacher or whatever I happened to be doing at the time. (02:02:12) Interviewer: Alright. �Veteran: And… Interviewer: This tape is now about done. I think I will close out here and say you’ve got really a remarkable memory for this stuff and you reflect on it in ways I think people are really going to appreciate as they watch the story. So, thank you very much for sharing the story. Veteran: Well, thank you. And like I said, I am still trying to work a little bit with vets, including this one that mentioned about having the anger problems. And I said, “We will get together with salmon chowder at a park and have supper out there and talk about it sometime, you know, when there’s not other people around. So… Interviewer: Alright. Very good. (02:02:50) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_SheathelmG2270V3 Title A name given to the resource Sheathelm, Glenn (3 of 3, Interview transcript and video), 2018 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018-08-08 Description An account of the resource Glenn Sheathelm was born in Muskegon, Michigan, in 1946. Enlisting in the Army in 1965, he joins the Army Artillery and undergoes Basic Training at Fort Knox, Kentucky, and AIT at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, before being deployed to Nuremberg, Germany. He is then redeployed to Vietnam where he served with the Fire Direction Control and S2 Military Intelligence sections of the First Cavalry Division until after the Tet Offensive in January of 1968. He sees combat while on patrol, during rescue missions, during Air Assaults, and during the Second Battle of Tam Quan when he receives several minor wounds and is sent to the rear for treatment in the final days of his deployment. He then returns to the United States in February of 1968 where he attends the Western Michigan and Grand Valley State Universities for masters' degrees in library sciences, literary media, and history. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Sheathelm, Glenn H. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/f3b57d865e327ed5ddce09ca37d47449.mp4 70e05d055300e3f57e295d399d63eec2 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/8b38252c413adf56faff109a25c3b223.pdf 6e1d4cef5acbc45b503f9bea765fd390 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Glenn Sheathelm Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Grace Balog Interviewer: Alright, this is part 3 [hour 3—this is the second interview session] of our interview with Glenn Sheathelm. Glenn, okay: we had gotten you in your story to late 1966. You had made it as far as Vietnam, you were assigned to the First Cavalry division at An Khê, you had already gone up I guess as a courier, fly up to Pleiku. And now— Veteran: That was actually across to Pleiku. That would be west on highway 19, yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And it wasn’t really much north, it was mostly west. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: And…which was where they, you know, they staged out of for the whole Ia Drang campaign and so forth. Okay and on the way back from Pleiku, we had a little bit of excitement. But it wasn’t any major thing and I got back and they said, “You haven’t been to the welcome camp yet.” And I said, “Welcome camp?” And they said, “Yes, First Cav’s training school or training academy or something like that.” And they said, “We’ll pick you up tomorrow with the deuce and a half.” And I said, “Well, what do I have to take?” They said, “Well, due to the fact that part of this is to get an infantry run camp acclimated but also to get anybody that was working closely with the infantry acclimated to life of infantrymen so you can understand it.” So, �they said, “You’ll be gone five days. You just take your normal field gear and your M-16.” I said, “Well, I haven’t shot the M-16 yet.” And they said, “Yeah, no problem. You’ll go ahead and zero it and get a chance to shoot it at this welcome camp.” So, I jumped onto the deuce and a half and we got to where the welcome camp was and they had some classrooms there that were kind of sandbagged outlines. And they had general purpose tents over the top. They had generators outside some of them that kind of clattered away. And they a piece of fairly new equipment at that time which was an overhead projector. Now, any teacher in the ‘60s, ‘70s, and ‘80s wouldn’t have been able to survive, I don’t think, without an overhead projector. They had those there and they had oversized slides and as we got started in the camp, I noticed that there were a couple names that popped up, one being familiar. (00:02:38) Veteran: One of them being Captain Ted Danielsen, who was the guy I had seen in this television program prior to going there. And the other one was a guy by the name of Roy Martin. Both of them were infantry captains. And I thought hey, that’s kind of cool, you know? I thought Danielsen’s company was real well run and he’s—and he and Roy Martin apparently had some input in putting this whole welcome camp program together. And they had been infantry officers and they’d served combat time. So anyway, I was pretty receptive to that and one of the things they had was…One of the instructors came in and proceeded to give us a very gruesome lecture about all the various types of venereal diseases that were around Vietnam. And I think probably everybody in Vietnam at every welcome camp probably got those. And they also happened to mention that if you signed out, you know, at a base camp there were boxes of condoms there. You were supposed to take a couple with you when you signed out that you were going off post anywhere. So, that was—that was part of the classroom education. They also showed us pictures of various types of booby traps and the wounds from various types of booby traps. We got some �more introduction to first aid, dealing with gunshot wounds. We practiced bandaging each other up, throwing different types of splints on. And it was probably about the third day, they took us out to the range with our M-16s and any other weapons we were assigned. Well, I at the time was just assigned the M-16 and of course .45 that I would just carry when I was a courier. (00:04:40) Veteran: And I shot the .45 and didn’t do very well. I never mastered the .45 during the time I was in the service. The M-16 was a little different. They had some wooden, or dark black squares, about like that that had a notch out of the bottom. And those were set out at 25-yards, which they called their thousand-inch range. And we were supposed to go ahead and line up different sights that came up to the bottom of that little cut out, hallowed out square and go ahead and fire three shots and see where they went and we would make the sight adjustment until we had in this area the size of a quarter that had a circle around it and was right below. Well, I did that and I was kind of enjoying shooting the M-16. Didn’t kick bad, seemed to be pretty accurate. And I’d heard some strange stories about it that yeah, it was so deadly because the bullets came out of the barrel flipping end over end, which I immediately knew was just a jungle story. Had absolutely nothing to do with reality because I knew firearms pretty well prior to going over there and no, that would not work if it actually flipped the bullet end over end. It would be terribly inaccurate and I noticed they all made nice clean bullet holes, not only in my target, but every other one that I looked at up and down the line. Well, I kept shooting two that I knew were going to be in. And I would shoot one a little bit off to the side and there was a sergeant there by the name of Carlo. And he says, “Okay, you go ahead and get off the range. They’re not all three in but,” he says, “you’ve done this five times in a row now where you have managed to pull it off. You just want to burn ammo.” (00:06:34) �Veteran: And I said, “Okay.” And he said that—I, you know, heard his name was Carlo and I said, “You have a brother that served in Germany?” And he said, “Yes.” And I said, “Did he get some burns while he was in Germany?” “Yeah.” Well, this was the same guy that dumped the aviation gas, you know, it was his brother that dumped the aviation gas in Germany and that caused the fire in our tent there. And he was, you know, glad I knew his brother but not real pleased that I knew the situation about that. And anyway, we finished sighting in the rifles and he didn’t let me play around a whole lot more that afternoon with the AR-15—or, M-16, he decided that I had it pretty well zeroed. Now, the M-16 was—the First Cav was the first unit to actually go to Vietnam and have that as the issued weapon. You know, there were some special forces troops that had them earlier but a regular Army unit? The First Cav was the first one that went over with it. And it was kind of nice because it only weighed about 7 pounds. That was 2 ½ pounds lighter than the M-14 and the ammunition was only a little over half the weight of what the M-14 ammo, which fired a 762 round, which is also known as the 308 Winchester in American terms. But it had a plastic stock on it, it had a plastic handguard and gas tube that came up underneath the front sight and one underneath that stock and went into a gas impingement system that went down to three little…Well, I guess cylinder rings that sealed it and then the thing worked. (00:08:42) Veteran: Now, it sounded kind of strange because when it fired, both the bolt and bolt carrier came back as one piece and went whipping by your ear where there’s a spring inside of the stock. So, every time you fired it, if there weren’t a lot of other people firing where you had, you know, disturbances from noise, it sounded like a kid just jumped by your ear on a pogo stick. So, you know, you would hear that spring go back and forth. And so, it was a different type of rifle. I liked it. We had at that time—we were only getting the ammo that was made by Remington �Arms and it used the original powder that gun was tested with. So, we didn’t—First Cav didn’t have a real problem with those to begin with. Now later on, they had a different powder thing that caused some calcite build up and they got a little bit less reliable. And you had to clean them pretty carefully because around helicopters, there’s all kinds of dust and crap that was getting blown into them. Well, after the—after the rifle range— (00:10:00) Interviewer: Before you go on with that, just with the M-16: the rap on the M-16 on the main one that I have run across and people have told me about was that they tended to jam a lot and particularly, if you had a full magazine of 20 rounds in it, the standard thing that a lot of them were doing, say by 1969-70— Veteran: Was putting .18 rounds in it and you know, with some of the magazines that seemed to be true. We had Colt magazines. They had some made by companies that made metal toys and you know other things like…there was even the joke that the M-16 was made by Mattel. I saw M-16s made by hydramatic division of General Motors but I never saw anything made by Mattel, in spite of all the jokes. And again, most of them were made by Colt. And anyway, after getting familiar with the M-16, they went ahead and took us out to an area where they had a training center that had a tower in it. And at this tower, there were helicopter skids attached probably 40 feet off the ground. And we would climb up a ladder, get on the top of this tower and they would show us how to hook on to the rope with a thing called a carabiner. Now, you just didn’t hold on to the rope, you put on what they called a Swiss seat which was made of larger diameter but a little bit softer rope. And they issued us one of those and that was something that most of us carried through Vietnam. We’d have them hooked on to our web gear. And now, this Swiss seat—it’d start with a loop around your waist and it would cross in the center and then it would drop between your legs, come up over around your buttocks, loop over �the rope again and then go around and tie off. It also got the nickname the Nutcracker but you know, the real thing was the Swiss seat. (00:12:07) Veteran: And you would tie that on while you were squatting down so there wasn’t any slack because if you didn’t have slack in there, there was less chance of the sudden jolt and some discomfort of this Swiss seat. So anyway, they taught us how to get into the, you know, get those on and we would stand on the top of the tower, hook our carabiner to that where it had a loop over the top. And then we would step onto the skid. Now, when you stepped onto the skid, they would have you lean back and tell you that when you first jumped to go ahead and let out 6 feet of rope. Now, there was a reason why you didn’t let out 2 or 3 feet of rope because if you let out 2 or 3 feet of rope, you were going to come right back into the skid with your forehead just about at the base of your helmet. So, you wanted to make sure that you let out enough rope so you’d actually swing underneath this platform a little bit. And when we actually did it out of the helicopters, we would actually swing underneath the helicopter for the first swing then let go, you know, 4 or 5 times and we’d be down to the ground. Now, there was one video of the First Cav where it shows the helicopter having a problem and coming down very quickly, right after the guy hit the ground with his—with his seat. And you could see this soldier looking very disgustedly at the helicopter and that whole military video. But anyway, we did that several times, just with our web gear on first and then with our packs on because your balance was a little different—you had to hold the rope on the front a little bit different so you didn’t tip over. Now, the first two times, they had a safety guide down at the bottom so if you panicked and let go of the rope, he was going to—you know, there were actually two ropes going through it, he was going to pull one, the thing would jam up on the carabiner. You may be hanging upside down but you were not coming all the way to the ground until he released pressure on that rope �so that you would slide down. So, they had some safety procedures involved in the training with this. The other thing that we did was learn how to survive around helicopters. (00:14:33) Veteran: You know, watching tail rotor blades, approaching from the side not the front where the pilot or copilot can see you all the time, and you know, not all of a sudden little pitch, you lean forward and take your head off or do a pedal turn where you were back there by the tail rotors some place and you know, all of a sudden you’re going to walk into this big fan. Which did occasionally happen in the First Cav, you know you…I think incidents like that generally happened in the Army because you know, you get a bunch of 19 year old kids doing things they have never done before and you’ve got all these dangerous machines around. There was a good friend of mine that never made it to Vietnam because he was moving onto a train car and a bulldozer kind of goofed and he caught a bulldozer blade at the knee. And you know, okay, medical discharge and he’s out. And so, those types of things happened. There were guys that got hands caught in a breech box in Germany. Guys that ran over—you know, got their feet run over by a tank or you know. Things like that happened when you’re around that much equipment. Interviewer: Okay. Now, you are talking about going out off of this platform. A lot of people talk about training. They talk about repelling and learning to do that. (00:16:01) Veteran: Yeah, and that’s what we did. We repelled down. Interviewer: Okay. But then they say that they never actually did that in the field. Did you actually use— Veteran: We actually repelled in twice during my time that I was there. It wasn’t something that we did all the time. But another thing that we trained for was how to get into a CH-47—it’s the �big twin rotor helicopter—if they couldn’t land. now, there—they did have a hoist on them where they could bring you up by hoist into a CH-47 but you didn’t want to do that because if that happened, you were probably going up because you were wounded. And you know, where they would hoist you up on a Stokes Ladder. But the normal way of getting up into those was to climb a ladder somewhat like the Navy used to use getting troops off ships and stuff. Well, with the ship, you’ve got something that ladder hangs up against. Climbing up into a Chinook [CH47] on a ladder that is swinging like this, especially if you were the last person on the ladder because there was nobody hanging on, helping to hold that thing still. And you know, you are kind of falling, trying to grab rungs of the ladder and trying to get your feet on the rugs of the ladder which is constantly moving. That scared me a whole lot worse than repelling out of helicopters, you know. It was just one super frightening experience for me. and I hoped I was never going to have to do one of those in combat and fortunately I did not. Now, they had another thing where they showed us how we might possibly get picked up and it was called the McGuire rig. Now, that was one that not only had the seat down here but it had a shoulder harness attached to it. They were used primarily to get recon teams out. And you know you had carabiners on both sides and this McGuire rig actually hooked onto the carabiners and it would fly you out hanging underneath this helicopter, bouncing through branches until they got to a safe area where they could land on and then you climbed on it normally. (00:18:18) Veteran: Now, this is basically being swung around like a sinker on the end of a fish line. Not really a fun situation. But it didn’t scare me near as much as climbing up the ladder. Now, I didn’t have to use the McGuire rig other than one time in Vietnam. But anyway, that McGuire rig was there and I thought it was in a way kind of cool. It also gave me a sense of understanding special forces and recon teams—what they needed and, you know, so forth. Then they took us �out on a couple patrols where we actually first time went through a village that was all in our safe area. But it had dummy booby traps in it so we could see what it was actually like going through that type of situation. And then we went out and actually did it for real. We went probably a mile and a half outside of the perimeter and did a patrol out there. Pretty much like they normally did around base camp. You know, infantry platoons would be sent out. They would primarily encounter mortar ambushes. You know, the idea was to catch the bad guys setting up the mortar out there to fire mortar rounds at the base camp at An Khê. The targets were that they took were occasionally in troop areas but more frequently it was a big area which they called the golf course. And it wasn’t really a golf course but Harry W. Kinnard says, “You know, that area is where the helicopters are going to come in. We are not going to chew it up with bulldozers. You are going to go out there with shovels and machetes and,” he said, “when you get done, it’s going to look like a golf course because don’t want all kinds of debris messing up our helicopters.” Now, the helicopter—like I said, the First Cavalry Division had more helicopters than anybody else in Vietnam and more than the whole Marine Corps did. (00:20:27) Veteran: So, helicopters were going to be an important part of our life. Well, I got through this— this training thing and got back to the battery area and there was a guy by the name of Henry Stiller who definitely talked like he was from Tennessee but he may not have been. You know, might have been from the Carolinas but anyway he said, “Well, you know, you got your clothes all dirty,” because during that 5-day thing, they didn’t let us take a shower, they didn’t let us change clothes. It’s okay, we want you to understand these infantrymen that you’re going to be supporting, you know. It’s—the only advantage was the first three days we got to sleep on cots in a tent but the last two days, we slept on the ground. You know, like infantrymen would. And the one night we did 9 am bush practice, we actually dug in. So, you know, we said, “Well, we �will go to the laundry in An Khê where you know, the women would wash them in a stream and stuff. And anyway, Stiller decided he wanted to enjoy the features of a young lady that lived in this laundromat area. And he said, “Well, just kind of watch the jeep.” So, I am sitting there out in the jeep with my M-16, wondering where the first grenade is coming from. I’m kind of new to the country and a little bit jumpy at this time. So, I mean, my head is on a swivel continuously this whole time. Now, the jeep actually was not a problem as far as some kid dropping a grenade down the gas spout because number one, it was too narrow and it had the bend in it where it was going to hang up before it went down in there. But the story was with the deuce and a half trucks, that somebody would take a grenade with a rubber band wrapped around it after the pin had been pulled, drop it in there and as the grenade jostled around and the rubber band got weaker because the attack of the fuels on it, the grenade would go off and you know, this truck would go up in a ball of flame. (00:22:46) Veteran: I don’t know how often that happened but you know I had always heard the stories about it and I had some concerns about that type of thing. Well, I also had my First Cav patches with me and they sewed those on at this laundry thing because there was a seamstress right there so you know, I had my patches and all of a sudden I looked not like a new guy but I looked like somebody that actually belonged with the First Cav after that. And Henry told me, “You know, you got to get a flappy hat too.” And I said, “We are not allowed to wear floppy hats.” And he said, “Well, when you get out in the field, you’ll be able to get away with them sometimes.” And I thought okay. So, I went ahead and got one of the floppy hats in town at one of the stores that sold them. And we referred to them as “go to hell hats” because when the majors and generals put their helicopters to bed for the night, that was sort of a comment about generals and spit and polish officers that might be around, you know, that the guys would wear them some at night. �And we wore those on colored teams later on when I got out with the foreign observer team. But didn’t wear that much, you know, when I was with the 2nd and 19th but I did have it. (00:24:15) Veteran: Well, my—we got back in and about two days after that, we got a warning order that we were going to be moved on highway 19 across the An Khê Pass. That’s the one between An Khê and the coastal town of Pleiku. And—or, the coastal town of Qui Nhơn, which was on the South China Sea. And then there would be helicopters to pick us up. Well, I got in the back of this deuce and a half truck and there was a guy by the name of Rufus Bedford. He was from the Detroit area. And he had a hatchet with him, which he set on the top of this stuff we had covered with tarp in the back of the truck. And I made a comment to one of the other guys about the hatchet. And I said, “Is that to help clear the underbrush when we get down?” He says, “No. Not last time we were out but two times ago, there was a Viet Cong that came up the side of the truck and was going to throw a satchel charge into the truck.” And he says, “Rufus took him down with a hatchet.” I am thinking oh, okay. This supposedly, you know, semi-rear job working with artillery FDC may not be as quiet as I thought it was going to be. And so anyway, I kind of thought well, I will keep that in mind about Rufus Bedford being pretty good with a hatchet and you know, being kind of an aggressive guy in the field should I ever want to know who to kind of follow along behind. So, anyway, they took us to this area over the main—over the An Khê Pass. (00:26:09) Veteran: Now, the An Khê Pass by this time had a fuel line that went up alongside the road. And everyone once in a while, they’d have guard posts there that had, you know, like big things where they’d turn the fuel off because the Viet Cong would occasionally find one of these places that they didn’t think was guarded adequately, put some explosives on it and then blow the fuel line. Now, that brought helicopter fuel from Qui Nhơn, where the big, big boats came in, tankers. �They had tank farms and everything there up to An Khê. Now, at An Khê we had fuel, not in big tanks but in things called blivets. They were big rubber things. Interviewer: Kind of like balloons. Veteran: Fuel ones were actually a little bit larger than this room. And they had those, you know, various places. They’d be filled with helicopter fuel and they had little gasoline pumps that would move them from there to the helicopters when they came in to land. So, you know, a good way to stop the First Cavalry division would be to stop the fuel supply. The Viet Cong knew that so there were these checkpoints where they’d close it off and you know, immediately there would be somebody that would be sent out. The engineering thing and get a—you know, pull a bulldozer down because they usually had bulldozers parked at most of these checkpoints so they could get a bulldozer and some engineers. The engineers wouldn’t necessarily stay at the checkpoint but there would be one flown out by helicopter to drive this bulldozer and you know, cover up the dirt holes and craters and so forth. And they’d go ahead and fix this pipeline and the First Cav would continue getting fuel. (00:28:05) Veteran: Well, we had seen those along the An Khê Pass and then we got to this area that looked like a sort of a truck pull over and stop thing and we pulled in there and there were Ch-47 helicopters that landed. Now, this was my first time going into, you know, what I figured could be a combat situation. I thought well, I am apparently not going on the first lift because I am climbing onto a Chinook helicopter. First lift would be Huey helicopters. And so anyway, I climbed in there and they drove a jeep with a combo trailer behind it. And they flew us to a place called Landing Zone Pony. Now, Landing Zone Pony from the town of Bong Son is southwest of there, not too far from a place called LZ Bird, which you know is going to be of significance a little bit later on. But anyway, they dropped us off at LZ Pony with these helicopters. And there �was barely enough room to run things like the combo jeeps around, you know. But we started hacking away at the underbrush and we dug holes and from the hole that I slept in to the jungle, it was about the distance you and I are apart. You know, those first couple weeks. So, we were pretty close to things back there. And we also set up our fire direction center. And the fire direction center was a matter of filling a whole bunch of sandbags and then a, you know, GP medium tent over the top. And you know, the plotting boards in there, the radio was in there, and we had two generators because when you are in a battalion fire direction center for an artillery unit like 2nd and 19th was, now artillery is supposed to move, shoot, communicate. And communicate was a big thing because artillery landing zones were kind of like forts in the far west. (00:30:18) Veteran: You know, where you had the fort with the cavalrymen at it and you had this big open area with nothing around it. Eventually, you’d come to another fort. Well, the idea was to try building these firebases to where one firebase could fire artillery to help support another one. And we could support LZ Bird. They could support both Bird and Pony from LZ Hammond with the 175-millimeter guns but we were out of range of the 8-inches from there. Now, the 8-inches and 155s could both support us from a little bit farther up, towards…Bong Son. But…and of course, Bird and Pony can each support each other. So, anyway we proceeded to go ahead and hack away at stuff with machetes and shovels and after about a week, they brought in a bulldozer in pieces. And the thing was assembled. And that started plowing the whole top of this little hill top that we were on. And, which was cool until monsoon season came a little bit later in December, because it turned it into a total sea of mud. I mean, this is boot-top deep mud because when your drive—well, at that time they also during the monsoon season, they brought in a 3rd of the 18th artillery. Now, the 2nd of 17th artillery, which was an old-fashioned 105 unit. But 3rd of �the 18th had 8-inch and 175 self-propelled guns. To even get those in there across the mucky rice paddies we had to go out with det cord and wrap it around palm trees and blow them in half and lay down a quarter of the road to even get these artillery pieces up to LZ Pony because they had to come across this muddy rice paddy. Interviewer: Okay. Now, were your own guns there at this point? Or were they still— (00:32:31) Veteran: 2nd of the 19th at that time did not have any artillery pieces on Pony. We did on LZ Bird, we did on a couple of the other nearby LZs, like B battery 2nd of the 19th was on LZ Bird. We had 2nd of 17th, which had the old-fashioned 105s on Pony. And these big 8-inches of 175s came in and also at the end of 1966, first brigade First Cav went off airborne status. They wanted to have a last hurrah so they laid on this big mission with C-130s flying over and big pallets of 8inch 175 ammo dropped by parachutes. And they said they wanted us to all make sure we were in our tents or our sleeping quarters in case one of the parachutes failed. I am thinking okay, this canvas tent is going to be a whole lot of protection from this thing that weighs about as much as a car that’s coming down with this parachute. You know, if it doesn’t land out there in the rice paddy, it lands on the LZ right where we are. Well, they dropped the stuff down. And we went out and picked it up by helicopter. Now, remember this is rainy season so the rotor blades on the Hueys did a lot of static building in the rain in, you know, the very dense atmosphere. (00:34:05) Veteran: We quick like learned that when you unhooked one of these parachutes and rolled it up and got ready to hook it on to a helicopter, that the helicopter would come down. You know, you would be looking at the hook probably about that much over your head and you would have this bunch of straps that went to this thing that you know was kind of an eye hook with a bolt through it—a big bolt through it. And you’d go up like this and sort of throw it onto that hook. Because if �you were still hanging on to that metal thing, it—the, you know, as it hit the helicopter, you were going to get a jolt that was going to throw you right off that pallet of ammunition back into the rice paddy with a very noticeable “hey stupid.” But so anyway, we hooked up the stuff and had it flown back in the 3rd of the 18th which was on LZ Pony. And some of the times, the Viet Cong got a little bit bored and we would get some sniper fire while we were out there but generally, you know, there was no real heavy fire that we got during that time period. (00:35:18) Interviewer: So, if your guns aren’t there, why are you on LZ Pony? Veteran: Because at headquarters 2nd of the 19th, we controlled where every gun and force brigade was going to shoot. So, in other words, we controlled what—where 2nd of the 19th shot, where 2nd of the 17th shot, where 3rd of the 18th shot, where 6th of the 16th, which is 155 unit, shot. And of course, any batteries attached to us or any of those other units. So, there were a whole bunch of people that were in an artillery fire mission would call in to us by radio and give the location—grid location—nature of target, and where the nearest friendlies were and we would go ahead and look on our chart, figure out which battery could most safely fire this particular mission, pick the unit and say, “Decent Speech 33, this is Tiger to India,” you know, which is the call sign I used working in intelligence and operations, “this is Tiger to India. Your grid is clear. Go to Fox 13,” which was code for radio channel they would flip to and then they would talk to 1st of the 30th. (00:36:50) Veteran: And we would also put a radio on 1st of the 30th’s fire control frequency because we would check their original data. In other words, they would figure out where, you know, from where they were and where the target was, they’d give the distance in number of meters, the elevation that they had to have on the guns, and we would check that with our slide roll and our �plotting board in headquarters 2nd of the 19th. And then would say, “The grid is clear. The grid is safe.” You know, and 1st of the 30th, they had permission to fire it. (00:37:28) Interviewer: Alright. So, you are doing fire direction control… Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: But you had not trained? Back in the states? Veteran: Yeah, that was an the job training thing where they taught me how to use the plotting board and how to use the slide rule. I’ve got a 155 slide rule still sitting in my attic at home. But you know, it’s—and it’s one of those…Well, later on, there was a girl here in Muskegon. She was a 3rd grader at Marquette School. And she was going to do a project on how artillery uses mathematics. Her teacher was a Carol Vance, over at Marquette School. And Carol knew that I had been in artillery in Vietnam so she had this girl come over to Steel School and talk to me about whether I would be willing to help her do her project. Well, she really got into this. I mean, really, really got into this learning fire direction control. And we went ahead and actually made a plotting board. (00:38:47) Veteran: We made a deflection fan out of wood. Not a nice, you know, super cut one with aluminum and stuff but we made the thing out so that she could go ahead and figure distance, direction and look on a map. And we had Steele School, Marquette School, you know, with the difference in elevation. The whole thing plotted out on this map. And she wanted to learn how to use the slide roll so I taught her how to use the artillery slide roll. And she said, “Can we go shoot artillery?” And I said, “Excuse me but these bullets are real big.” And we went down to a place called Foxhole down in Holland that was run by a World War 2 vet. I showed her what artillery rounds looked like. And she said, “You can’t shoot those at your rifle range?” And I �said, “No.” And they said—and she said, “Well, do you know the Reserve units and the National Guard units, where do they shoot?” I said, “Up at Camp Griffin.” “Can we go to Camp Griffin?” “No, we are not going to Camp Griffin.” And I finally worked out a deal where we could go over near Lansing. They had a small field training area where they didn’t actually shoot but where they went through the motions. And there was a chief of firing battery there that was an old guy. And he thought it was the neatest thing he had ever done in his life was teach this little girl, who is standing on top of a couple ammo boxes, how to run the aiming circle and lay the battery. I mean you know, here is this little girl standing up there on these ammo boxes and calling commands to the guns on—to make sure they are all pointed the same way. (00:40:35) Veteran: Now, they didn’t actually load any rounds and tear up anybody’s farm outside of Lansing but you know, they went through the motions. And this girl really, really loved that experience. And I know the chief of smoke did too. He thought that was the coolest thing in the world. So, anyway, back to fire direction control and you know, kind of learning this as on the job training. And captain decided that, you know, I seemed to be pretty comfortable out in the woods, I had hunted and stuff, and he said, “You know, here’s some stuff to make some maps.” And he said, “We want information on where there are any foxholes and spider holes outside of LZ Pony.” And he said, “Go ahead and get three guys to go with you and go ahead and start running, you know, putting together maps on what the terrain outside of LZ Pony looks like.” Well, one of the guys I picked was Rufus Bedford. And one of the times when we were out doing that, we came across this skull. Rufus decided he wanted the skull. Well, I did some checking, made sure it wasn’t booby trapped. And we picked it up and carried it the rest of our patrol. And we got to going back in the perimeter and Rufus Bedford has got his elbow crooked like that and he’s got the skull underneath his elbow, and he’s petting the top of the skull like you �would a little dog or kitty cat or something like that. And of course, the guys on the perimeter, they see him coming in like that and they’re just “Oh, gross!” You know? (00:42:23) Veteran: And we got it back in and I said—you know, he said, “Well, here’s the skull.” And I said, “Rufus, I don’t want the skull.” And he said, “Well, you can put it on top of your radio on the talk.” And I said, “No, I get along pretty well with some of the officers right now. I am not going to put that skull on top of my radio in the technical operations center,” which is this tent surrounded by sandbags. And he said, “Well, nobody sees it real well by where I am.” And he says, “We ought to show it off.” And he says, “You’re—by the way, most of the guys walk along that side of the perimeter to go to the mess tent.” I said, “Yeah.” He said, “How about if we put it on the sandbags by your tent?” And I said, “Well, yeah. Well, okay.” So, I got it put there. About two days later, there’s a guy that walks by and he sees the skull there. And when he caught me at the tent, he said, “Could I by any chance have that skull?” And I said, “What in the world would you want that skull for?” And he sat down on the sandbags with me and pulls out this Dear John letter that he had received. And it’s getting—you know, we are starting into December. And he says, “I want to send it back to the girl that sent me this letter.” And I thought oh, well, that will get rid of the skull and probably get the point across quite clearly to this girl that, you know, this guy was very disappointed in getting the Dear John letter. So, I asked Rufus and Rufus says, “Sounds like a good idea.” So, this guy packed up the skull. We didn’t hear the screams all the way to Vietnam but they probably heard it for quite a while quite the distance around her house when she opened that thing up. (00:44:34) Veteran: And a little bit after that, there was a guy that walked into fire direction control and I looked up real quick and I thought that’s Vernon Gillespie. Now, he’s this guy that had been in special forces. I mentioned that they had had the article written about him in National �Geographic. And I looked and he had a Browning high power that I recognized on his hip. Now, this is not a standard issued weapon. Most other countries in the world used it but the United States did not. And I commented, “Hey, nice looking high power, sir.” And he says, “You recognize that?” I said, “Yeah.” And he said, “What do you know about it?” I said, “Well, Canadian government uses them, Belgian government uses it, most other NATO countries use it.” And he said, “Do you know how to field strip one?” “Oh yes, sir.” And he goes ahead and flaps his Browning high power down in front of me on the radio table and you know, I got a bank of radios in front of me. Go ahead and pull the thing apart and, you know, check to make sure the magazine safety works and then put it back together for him and he said, “Do you know much about foreign weapons?” And I said, “Yeah, I have studied them but,” I said, “I haven’t really had a chance to get to actually handle one of them.” But I said, “I spent a lot of times with Smith’s small arms.” Orel Smith was the curator of the firearms museum at West—at Smithsonian. And he said, “Do you know how to take an AK-47 apart?” And I said, “Yes sir.” And said, “How about an SAS?” “Yes sir.” And then he said, “Next time I come in,” he says, “I’ve got access to an AK-47.” Well anyway, we talked a little bit and he said, “You seem to know your way around pretty well for somebody that has been out of—been over here less than a month.” And I said, “Well I studied it pretty carefully before I came over.” And he decided that yeah, I probably ought to be in the S-2 section and forget this plotting board stuff. So— Interviewer: Okay, and then for the benefit of those who don’t know what S-2 is— (00:46:59) Veteran: Yeah. And you know I was going to be able to help him figure out some information in advance. So— Interviewer: Right. So, you go over to intelligence from fire direction? �Veteran: Yeah. And so that—which was the other half of this GP medium tent. Now, during monsoon season, we actually dug a trench through the middle of it because the water piled up too fast against the sandbags so we had to drain some right through the middle. And we actually built a bridge across which we christened and since Rufus and I were two from the same state, it got christened the Mackinac Bridge across this stream that on rainy days the monsoon had about that much water in it. And you know, just ran right through underneath the sandbags. And so anyway, I got, you know, Gillespie was at that point sort of entering a big part of my life as far as decisions that I made and where I got moved to. And he asked me about Landing Zone Bird and Landing Zone Pony. And I said, “Well, you know, that the Christmas truce—” he said, “What do you got for data on where the North Vietnamese are?” And I showed him on the map, you know, the locations where they had been spotted. (00:48:22) Veteran: And he said, “Who do you think is going to get hit?” And I said, “Probably Pony, sir.” And he said, “Okay, what is your reason for Pony?” I said—or not Pony, but Bird. And he said, “How come Bird?” And I said, “Well, you know we have only been here at Pony for a short period of time.” And I said that, “The North Vietnamese are usually pretty good about putting together sand tables and planning their attacks real careful with these three dimensional sand table types of things.” And I said, “They don’t know that much about LZ Pony yet.” And I said, “We’ve intercepted one of their recon teams on one of these things I had been out with Rufus Bedford and downed several of their North Vietnamese guys that, you know, they had—they had paper and they had already started a map at that point.” And I said, “You know, we may have interrupted them but,” I said, “I really don’t think they know much about Pony yet.” And he said, “Well, I am thinking the same thing because Bird has been there a couple 3 months. And you know, whereas we have only been here a few weeks.” So, he said he was going to explain that to �Lieutenant-Colonel Culp. And Lieutenant-Colonel Culp flew over to LZ Bird and told the company command—or battery commander—and the officers about this beehive round, which is the one that fires all these flechettes out of the 105-millimeter. (00:50:03) Interviewer: So, like a giant shotgun at face— Veteran: Yeah, like a giant shotgun except instead of shotgun pellets, there are nails about that long with fins on the back of them. And anyway, Colonel Culp explained about the flechettes and said that, “Okay, this is the way to warn everybody: you are going to fire beehive rounds and we want at least 6 beehive rounds in every one of the gun pits for the 105s.” So, that was all properly arranged, you know, Colonel Culp got everybody prepared and also had beehive rounds put to the 2nd of the 17th. Now, the thing is the 2nd of 17th was not familiar with beehive but they were, you know, told how to use one. Unfortunately, 2nd of the 17th was not really in a position where it could fire much support except for about one quarter of the LZ with beehive rounds. LZ Bird was a little bit better set up for using beehive rounds, even back into their own perimeter which turned out they did have to do. And anyway, as we are kind of looking at what is going to happen over the Christmas truce, day before there was another one of these recon teams of either Viet Cong or North Vietnamese that slid into a gulley just outside of LZ Pony, between where the brigade headquarters was and where, you know, we were with 2nd of the 19th. We had to be fairly close together because we actually used landlines to communicate. So, there was an area where they had a helipad and all the lines went down the helipad and the perimeter was there. There was this injun country area probably about 75 yards in between. Well, that’s where the bad guys got. And there was firing back and forth at each other between the guys near the helipad and the guys on our side of the perimeter. And even worse, the 3rd of the 18th had just come in and really didn’t know much about this area yet. (00:52:17) �Veteran: And they proceeded to cut loose with 50 caliber machine guns off the top of their armored personnel carriers. Well, I mentioned the antenna farm; we lost two antennas that night as they’re cranking across our own perimeter with 50 caliber. And they also destroyed one of our own helicopters in this little thing. And it turned out to really be nothing except a couple, you know, Viet Cong or North Vietnamese that got in between, fired a couple shots to see what sort of trouble they could stir up and then you know…There were yells to cease fire. And the next morning, I went out and walked the perimeter and was talking to different guys about what they actually saw. Well, except for the incident in this gulley, nobody else had seen any other action around the perimeter. One of the guys I talked to was a machine gunner. Had the name of Thomas Duggar. And some of his gun crew were in getting breakfast at the time so Duggar was the one I talked to. He said now he saw really nothing out in his area. And that evening, this is just a little bit before the truce started, Duggar and his machine gun squad were going out for an ambush and I took a picture of the three of them walking through the mud on LZ Pony, just as they were leaving the perimeter which there’s a copy of that print down at the infantry museum at Fort Benning. It also became the cover print for one of the vet centers annual reports here and it was also used as the cover of a book, Breaking Squelch by a guy by the name of Steve Saunders, which is an excellent book. He wrote that for his children, you know, who were asking the question what did you do in the war, daddy? (00:54:24) Veteran: And it is not loaded with profanities but it’s a very, very accurate picture of what life as an infantryman was at…And I purchased copies for a lot of the libraries around Muskegon. But the cover photograph on there is the one that I took and it show Tom Duggar leading his gun squad. The second guy in the middle was Steve Saunders. Now, Steve Saunders found out about that picture in 1990. He came to the 50th anniversary of airborne. Now, 2nd of the 8th was not near �as well organized as 1st of the 8th was because we’d started getting together in 1986. So, this was reunion number 5 for us. And he came over and says, “Well, I probably don’t know any of you guys because I was with 2nd of the 8th.” I said, “Well, I got a picture of some guys from Charlie company, 2nd of the 8th walking off of LZ Pony, back in December of ’66.” I said, “I don’t know who the guys are.” I said, “One of them…the last—first name was Tom, last name started with a D.” I said, “It was not Dare because I knew a Tom Dare.” And I said, “I can’t remember exactly what it was.” He said, “You got the picture?” I said, “Yeah.” I pulled open my briefcase that I had next to me because I was up at the registration table. And he looked at it and quickly grabbed ahold of chairs, the arms of a chair, and sat down. And he says, “That’s me.” And he points to the middle guy. And he says, “That’s Tom Duggar. He died two months later; was shot in the head.” And he said, “Could you have a copy of that print made?” Well, this happened to be an 8x10. So, I gave him the copy of the 8x10 and I said, “I’ve got a slide. I can make other pictures.” (00:56:22) Veteran: Well, from that point until he closed down his law office, the picture of his family and the picture of him in Vietnam, you know, in that mud, were the two pictures that he had on display at his law office. And he said those were the two most important things in my life, were my Vietnam tour and raising a family. And so anyway, you know that incident turned out to be a picture that is showed up various places. Well, anyway, the Christmas truce came along. We knew where some of the North Vietnamese were and they were close enough they could have attacked either Bird or Pony. But you know, the consensus with some of us was that it was going to be Bird and there were other people that thought it was going to be Pony because we didn’t have any wire out yet. And there was, you know, practically no field to fire for us yet. But �anyway, they hit LZ Pony. SLA Marshall wrote a pretty good book on it called Bird: The Christmastide Battle. Interviewer: Wait, you just said they hit Pony. Veteran: What? Interviewer: You just said they hit Pony. (00:57:45) Veteran: No, they hit Bird. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Yeah. They hit LZ Bird but they hit Bird the Christmastide Battle. And—but I was on Pony in, you know, roughly 5 kilometers away. And we fired a lot of support for that. One of the missions that I controlled was the 175 unit that was firing off of LZ Hammond and I could talk to them because we had the long antennas and I was talking to a guy that was on outpost from actually 1st of the 8th cav. And he could see where the mortars were firing on LZ Bird. And I thought well, 175s at that distance are not terribly accurate. I don’t want to use them on LZ Bird because I might hit somebody. But mortar rounds—mortar tubes—sounded like a good target. So, I—he couldn’t give me a grid location but I said, “Well, pull out your M2 compass.” (00:58:46) Veteran: And I said, “Put it under your poncho and charge it with the light and then go ahead and give me an azimuth and approximate distance.” So, he did. And I said, “Is there a hill on the right-hand side?” And he said, “Yeah.” And I said, “Is there another little ridge before you get to the big hill?” “Yeah.” “Okay, where are they in reference to the ridge?” And he says, “Well, they are near the left-hand end of the ridge.” I said, “Okay, good. I think I got it.” So, I went ahead �and started having them shoot 175 rounds. Well, Captain Webber, who was the S-2 officer, had taken off to try to put some mortar because by this time, the 2nd of the 19th artillery’s fire direction control for B battery had actually abandoned their thing and shot up the radios because the North Vietnamese were just outside the tent. And they’d retreated back to where the guns were. So, we really had no real radio communication with the guys inside. Well, Captain Webber took off in an old H-13 helicopter, had a pilot go out fly the thing. And he’s out there, you know, directing artillery fire and then of course the other fire is being directed direct fire by Lieutenant Piper and Captain Leonard Schlenker. Schlenker was B battery’s battery commander and Leonard Schlenker was one of his lieutenant officers. And they were the ones that were primarily running the artillery fire that was shooting at the North Vietnamese, you know, coming at them. Well anyway, Captain Webber made some passes. And he turned around and noticed that there were artillery rounds going off where he wasn’t expecting artillery rounds. Well, he called up on the radio and wanted to know why he saw these big long linear type explosions like 175s. (01:00:52) Veteran: And I said, “Well, I am running those off of LZ Hammond.” And he said to the pilot, you know, “Did you get your advisory on that?” “Well, I don’t know. It was kind of confusing when we took off.” So anyway, Captain Webber is out there circling in this darkness and you know, coming back for another pass on LZ Bird, not realizing this safe area of darkness was also the same one these 175 rounds are going through. So, he changed where his circle pattern was after that. And he continued calling in fire. They then later on sent 1st of the 9th out there to help the guys on LZ Bird. They fired beehive rounds at the North Vietnamese that were trying to turn some of the guns around, like all those Charlie 6 of the, 16th. Guns had been captured. There was a guy from Hudsonville by the name of Gary Peasley who was killed at LZ Bird. He was �awarded a Silver Star. He stood—well, he actually stayed on top of one of the bunkers with his M-60 machine gun and kept pouring fire into these hordes of North Vietnamese. (01:02:16) Interviewer: Okay. Here we are on part 4 of Glenn Sheathelm’s interview. We had been talking about the Christmas fight at LZ Bird and gotten to the point where a soldier from Hudsonville, Michigan had been killed. And so, why don’t you kind of wind up that and move us on from there? Veteran: Okay. Anyway, 1st of the 12th did have some heavy fights and stuff in there. And some of it was—well, when they got to the 6th of the 16th artillery, it was to the point where it got to hand to hand combat in the gun pits around their 155 guns. And some of the North Vietnamese found out that their funny karate things didn’t necessarily work too well when there were some American who was willing to go ahead and grab them between both legs and take their head and turn it around. And then throw the body back over the—back over the side of the fire pit, which did actually happen a couple times there. But that—and you know, some of the North Vietnamese got beaten to death with rammer staffs and so forth as they came in. And you know, when the guys ran out of ammunition, didn’t have enough ammunition with them with their 16s, maybe they had it in a sleeping quarters that was not right by the guns or something at the time, but anyways, you know, there were a number of people that ran out of the small arms ammo. Well, most of the guys as the North Vietnamese took over the artillery pieces, they’d retreat into three guns of Bravo 2nd of the 19th. And there was a Lieutenant by the name of Piper and Captain Schlenker that I already mentioned and they went ahead and were supposed to fire 5-star cluster prior to firing beehive. Well, in the confusion, they couldn’t find the 5-star cluster so they just went ahead and sufficed with, you know, just yelling beehive. And people got down and the North Vietnamese were trying to turn around an artillery piece and fire at the Americans, were �yelling and screaming about, you know, all the things they were doing. “Americans, you die!” all this other stuff and they are trying to turn around the guns and they fired two beehive rounds. (01:04:43) Veteran: You know, the first one was fired and I think it was Piper that said, “traverse left” and they traversed about…Oh, maybe 5 or 6 degrees and fired the second round. And there were, you know, just huge hunks torn in the North Vietnamese line. And that was followed by a rather stunned silence from the North Vietnamese. Like jeez, you know, we just lost about 60 guys in 2 shots from those guns. And so that kind of slowed things down as far as the North Vietnamese. And their attack eventually bogged down. 1st of the 9th was flown in on a sandbar quite near there and a gentle slope that came down to the river and out. LZ Bird got its name because it’s the river’s streams came together and almost looked like a bird from the air, from a helicopter. And anyway, they dropped off 1st of the 9th near there. They managed to go ahead and they hi the back of one of the North Vietnamese units. The North Vietnamese backed away. Now, there was a…Lieutenant Piper had been injured during this. He had a lot of shrapnel and stuff from grenades in his legs. Colonel Culp, who was our battalion commander, got into the other H-13 that we had available at Pony and flew over to LZ Bird. And he got dropped off and he took command of LZ Bird from that point on. Schlenker had been injured, Piper had been injured. And they told—you know, Lieutenant Piper didn’t want to give up, he wanted to stay there at LZ Bird. (01:06:37) Veteran: And Lieutenant Colonel James Culp insisted that he go back to brief Major Hay, who was the S-3 officer, back at LZ Pony, that Major Hay had to be briefed. Well, actually that was not the case. It was a trick to get Piper to get on the helicopter. And he had the helicopter pilot put the word out to me that, you know, when Piper arrived, I was to take him directly to Captain �Risa. who was the battalion surgeon. And so, as this battle is winding down, I walk over to the helipad. And you know, directed the helicopter in when it came in. You know, I could see it, I had a pair of C-25 that I had put in my bag so I could communicate with him as he was coming in. And anyway, I had another medic, you know, form 2nd of the 19th with me. And he had a stretcher because I heard that Piper had lots of leg wounds. And I figured well, we might have to carry. So, we had a stretcher. The two of us would carry Piper down to Captain Risa. Piper was going to have absolutely nothing to do with that stretcher. He had to go talk to Major Hay. It was important that he talked to Major Hay to debrief him. So anyway, I realized there was no way I was going to get him to go down to see Captain Risa so I told the guy with the stretcher to go back down, get Captain Risa and have Captain Risa come up to the tactical operations center. (01:08:20) Veteran: Well, I walked Lieutenant Piper over there and he’s sitting in this folding metal chair on this dirt floor with a GP medium tent and a couple bare bulbs for light, which is what we had in the operations end of the thing. And anyway, he’s really pretty animated. I don’t think I have ever seen anybody so high on adrenaline as Lieutenant Piper was at that time. I mean, he was chattering away continuously to Major Hay. Meanwhile, Captain Risa is digging hunks of shrapnel out of his legs and he’s sitting there on the metal chair. And I am looking back over my shoulder at this going on. I thought boy, that guy is really high. You know, it’s got to be adrenaline because Piper was not one that would have had any drugs at that time anyway. And I thought wow. You know, it was just totally—totally amazed at how wound he was. And I kept doing my job, you know like taking calls on what, you know, they really wanted. Helicopters, if somebody had a target that we could fire towards where the retreating enemy were with artillery. And if I got the call, I would figure out what battery would shoot it and pass it on to the guys �who would do all the data checks with the plotting board on the other side. You know, I could just, you know, from one end of the tent to the other. So, that went on. The battle ended. I had…I think where I went out to wash clothes and wash my body once where I had a guy by the name of Scott with me. And we thought it was going to be perfectly quiet out there. We had a brief fire fight with two Viet Cong. They weren’t North Vietnamese regulars; they were not real well equipped. (01:10:22) Veteran: One of them had an M-1 carbine, the other one only had 2 grenades. And we both had M-16s but you know we were busy washing up at the time so we didn’t see them at first. And when I first saw them, I thought oh jeez, you know. There’s a—you know, Viet Cong or at least, you know, a Vietnamese civilian and he’s got a gun and he’s looking at me kind of evilly and he’s starting to fidget with that gun, getting it pointed towards me. So, I yelled at Scott. Scott got down. And then I noticed some movement off to my left-hand side and there was another Viet Cong that was coming at me and he had his arm back like this. Had a grenade. And you know, they talk about, you know, careful sight picture and everything. There was no careful sight picture on my part. Matter of fact, I think I figured that, you know, I could keep him father away if I stuck my rifle out farther. It wasn’t even on my shoulder at the time. And I got off a couple rounds with semi-automatic. And he started pitching forward. And anyway, it—later on, he started falling and I saw the grenade come out of his hand but it didn’t have any distance to it, you know. He apparently was already dying at that point. But anyway, just came a few feet away from his head and it went off. And you know, I yelled grenade to Scott and Scott got down. And then when he came back up, he didn’t have a good look at the guy with the M-1 carbine either but he fired some shots at the guy with the M-1 carbine. And we did find a blood trail but did not chase it down because there were only two of us out there and we were just out there to wash �clothes and wash our bodies. We were not, you know, we are not going out there for a hunt you know? It’s—that’s just the way it was. Well, this one Viet Cong that I had hit—I hit 3 times in the chest and then once kind of on an angle up through the shoulder as he was apparently falling. (01:12:42) Veteran: And he also had lots of shrapnel wounds on his head and shoulder from the grenade going off. So, I don’t know whether I killed him or whether the grenade going off close to his head killed him. But it turned out to be one dead Viet Cong. Well, we got back in and I reported it. Gillespie was real pleased that, you know, we had gotten the kill out there. Captain Graningham was not so pleased because we hadn’t cleared it with him that we were going outside of the perimeter to begin with. He was the battery command—battery commander for headquarters battery. Well, I was fortunate by this time I was getting along real well with Gillespie and Webber and they basically covered my ass for me on this little incident about being out and not letting his people know. Well, a little bit later we had been out and came back in actually after dark and we found the trip wires that our guys had set out and found them real easily. And I told Captain Canetto and Captain—or Captain Webber and he went over and talked to Graningham, said “Well, you know, I had a guy that just came through the perimeter in darkness,” and he says, “perimeter is not secure.” And Graningham was insisting everything was right. Well, then Gillespie got into it. They went out and found that yeah, it was probably not real well secure because some of Graningham’s infantry—Graningham’s rear guys from 2nd of the 19th work com put lines and stuff up like that. (01:14:32) Veteran: It didn’t occur to them if they wrapped white adhesive tape around these trip flares, they would show up even a little at night. So, anyway Graningham got kind of chewed out a bit on that for not checking the perimeter properly. And so, I am like oh I am in trouble with �Grenningham now. And it…he and I never really struck it off real well the whole time I was…or that he was with 2nd, headquarters 2nd of the 19th. But I got along well with Webber and with Gillespie and with Culp. So, you know, I had some officers covering for me. Now, Captain Webber came to me one day and he says, “We got a correspondent that’s flying in today. She’s a French woman. Her name is Michelle Ray.” And he says, “I’ve heard from some other officers that she’s a bit of a leftist. Now, she wants to come in and look at maps so make sure you have all of the overlays off of them when she comes in because she will just see terrain then and nothing about what we knew about the enemy or what, you know, where our units were.” So, when she got there I had that done and listening to the conversation I thought dumb broad, you’re going to drive your Renault up highway one and normally the only people who figure they are safe driving up highway one are the ones in convoy with a 40-millimeter duster and you know, all this other stuff in line. But you know, she’s going to drive her Renault up highway one. And I explained to her about the, you know, Viet Cong sometimes when there weren’t Americans there’s South Vietnamese regulars around. They had road blocks. (01:16:28) Veteran: And they were—they would collect ransom, you know, taxes, from anybody that was on the road. And I said, “Also, you know, you being a woman and a French woman, you know they might decide to collect you for taxes and ransom you off to your newspaper.” And that is exactly what they did. They caught her and I am thinking well, I told you you were being pretty dumb about that thing. And she wrote a book. I think it’s called Two Shores of Hell. And they’ve got a copy of that book down at the Hackley Library which I donated to but I met Michelle Ray that way. Now, the other correspondent that I saw at LZ Pony was SLA Marshall. Did I tell you about SLA Marshall? Or did I tell you— �Interviewer: You talked about him in terms of background earlier but not about this… (01:17:23) Veteran: Oh, okay. Interviewer: What you are seeing him for at this point. Veteran: Yeah. Well, SLA Marshall I mentioned the book—the battle of LZ Bird had taken place. Well, he was collecting material to write the book Bird: The Christmastide Battle. And I didn’t know that he was coming at the time. All of a sudden, there’s this kind of paunchy, graying haired guy that walks in. he’s got a name tag that says Marshall on it but no rank. And I quickly grabbed ahold of the guy and escorted him back out because all of these maps have the overlays on them, everything is, you know, secret and stuff that’s on there. And I walked him back out and I said, “Well, sir, you’re not allowed in there because it’s all classified.” And he said, “Well, I’ll be back a little later.” (01:18:12) Veteran: Well, lo and behold he comes back in with Captain Webber who introduces him as retired General SLA Marshall, who has written Pork Chop Hill, and I apologized to him but you know. He said, “No problem. You know, you did your job. You didn’t know who I was and you immediately got me out when I walked through that canvas door at the end of the tent.” And so, that was my one and only meeting with SLA Marshall in Vietnam, was at LZ Pony. During—it got close to Tet, 1967. And Tet was not a big battle in 1967 in Vietnam like it was in 1968. Well, about that time we moved to a place called Landing Zone English. Landing Zone English was near Bong Son. It was bigger than LZ Pony was. Matter of fact, they were in the process of expanding the length of the—what they called the PSP, or perforated steel plank, runway so that they could handle C-130s on it. Now, they had been running Caribous in there for quite a period �of time. And at LZ English, we had to start all over again with, you know, a tent with sand bags around it. Put up a new headquarters thing and start building our little individual bunkers that we were going to sleep in. And there at LZ English, they actually had enough generators around there where they were able to run a generator and run movies that they showed on a sheet at headquarters 2nd of the 19th. So, every once in a while, I got a chance to see a movie. Now, one of them was called The Last Centurions. And—or The Last Centurion possibly. But it was about this French officer during the Vietnam war when France was there. And then later on after that was over with, he ended up fighting in the Civil War in Siberia. He was a French Foreign Legion officer. Well, I managed to see the movie later on and see all of it without the clatter of the generator going outside. (01:20:35) Veteran: But I thought that was kind of neat. And they—but primarily, they showed old western movies and so forth, which seemed to be relatively popular. And it was a diversion from the rest of things that were going on. Now at LZ English, we used to get mortared occasionally. And one of the things I did fairly early on was I started putting together a sick call program where we’d go to the villages around LZ English. And actually, started that on LZ Pony. Graningham didn’t like that at all. Gillespie and Webber initially weren’t sure about it until we started bringing back some good intelligence information, you know. That’s when we started patching up the kids. Some of the parents started talking to us. “Oh yeah, yesterday afternoon, there were 20 Viet Cong that were on the far side of that rice paddy out there and they were going which direction.” You know, so they started giving us information. Captain Webber decided that, you know, okay we will start supporting these things. Interviewer: Okay, so to back up a little bit. Explain how you wound up doing this and what your inspiration for it was. (01:21:57) �Veteran: Okay, the inspiration on it was, like I said, I had been a ski patrolman before. I had been involved in first aid. I thought, you know, these poor little kids are caught up in the middle of this battle. They got infected sores primarily on their feet because, you know, if you got a war going on, you got all kinds of artillery shrapnel laying on the ground. You got—the kids were always stumbling over that. They had cut up feet and, you know, infections. Sometimes they had shrapnel in them. (01:22:27) Veteran: And eventually, we got a medic that went out with us and helped with that. A regular, trained medic. And eventually Captain Risa started going out with us some when we were at LZ English. Now, we got started on that right away and everything seemed to go pretty well. One time we went out and there was Viet Cong that were in the village already. They had basically told people to stay in their huts because they were going to ambush the village sick call program. At the time I was in charge of security for the thing. I was not doing much in the way of bandaging things anymore because Captain Risa went along and a couple of his regular medics. Now, initially I had been doing more stuff: cleaning up stuff with phisohex, pulling out little pieces of shrapnel, cleaning the stuff up, debriding the wounds and bandaging things up. We used an awful lot of a thing called zinc bacitracin which now you can get without prescription here in the United States. But we must have used that up by the gallon, you know. And also, I told some people in the church that I was doing this. Well, there were some people that worked for…drug stores and stuff like Runsel Drugs over here. His daughter was dating John Mixer and…not—no, Runsel’s wasn’t. Russell’s daughter was dating John Mixer. Anyway, through the church Runsel’s found out, you know, there were certain things that they had that were outdated. You know, they couldn’t keep the bandages on the shelf anymore so he wrote them off that they �were being sent to Vietnam, boxed them up and sent them off. So, we got some extra stuff like that that could be used. (01:24:36) Veteran: And one of the things was that there was a Girl Scout Troop from Ravenna who had decided to adopt me as big brother in Vietnam. They started, you know, at Christmas time they sent me Christmas cards. That was the start of the thing. And then they’d send letters and every once in a while, I would send a letter back to them. And I mentioned about the poor condition the kids clothing was in. Well anyway, this Girl Scout Troop did a knitting project; they knitted up a whole bunch of red mittens. Obviously, no use for red mittens in Vietnam but we got a big box of them and I explained well you know, it doesn’t get cold enough they really need mittens in Vietnam, you know. Mid-winter it gets down to about 60 degrees and raining which you know, if you’re cold and wet means shivering time but not any danger of frostbite or anything like that. And…but the kids thought the mittens were kind of neat because the color red is considered a sign of good luck. So, they had gone ahead and hung those on their fruit trees around their village. That was supposed to keep away the bugs, or at least they thought so. I don’t know whether it did or not but anyhow that, you know, the mittens ended up hanging on trees and bushes. (01:26:06) Interviewer: Okay. Let’s wind back around to your story. You said you were with one of these patrols heading into a village when the Viet Cong were there. Veteran: Okay. Yeah. Now, at that one there was a girl that ran from around the hut and she started screaming, “You look, no VC!” which meant many VC. And as she was running at me, I noticed that there was a Viet Cong that had just appeared from around the back of the same hut she had come around and he had an AK-47 in hand. And I had the M-60 machine gun at the time, not the M-16 but I actually had an M-60 with me. And normally around the LZ we would �have about 12 or 18 starter strip in it, then they had that ply—or, paper box that had another 100 rounds in it and you’d clip the end of that to the end and it would pull it out of this box but you’d try to keep the box closed so that ammo didn’t get dirty. You just had to keep wiping down these 18 rounds out front. Well, this Viet Cong came around the hut, pointed his AK at this girl that was running and I got on the M-60 and fired. And I remember seeing his Ak-47, firing full auto mind you, and now in this movie Saving Private Ryan that bothered me at the one incident where it shows the troops in the surf and you can see somebody screaming, there’s all the bullets coming in, but there’s silence—nothing going on. You just see this stuff happening, you can’t hear anything. Well, that’s where my mind went. You know, I can see this thing and it was almost in slow motion, just like on the movie Saving Private Ryan. I distinctly remember seeing a couple of those AK-47 cases coming out like this and tumbling in the air with a stream of smoke out of the front of the case. And they flipped off to the side. I am thinking bullets get there faster. I was on the M-60. Well, as the girl got closer to me, I somehow managed to hold that M60 up with just one arm which normally is not something that you can do. (01:28:36) Veteran: I don’t know, maybe the adrenaline was running too high for me right then. But I didn’t drop the thing down. It seemed to stay right where it was even though I was only firing with one hand and I reached over and knocked this girl down so that she was by this dead palm tree, or downed palm tree I should say and was probably, you know, destroyed by something during the war. But anyway, she was laying behind this palm tree and I flopped down to a prone position and this Viet Cong had gone down. He had just kind of gone backwards, slammed up against the wall of this hut and I remember his AK had a death grip on it. He was still firing the thing. And the AK rounds were going up into the thatch roof. And I remember thinking just like snow is this, you know, because it’s winter time and I am thinking about this little back home type of �thing. And they had this stuff was falling down on him. And you know, some of the other guys who were a little bit less savvy at fire fights…You know, they hadn’t started shooting yet and I said, “Shoot the Viet Cong!” And that, you know, finally—you know, a couple of the other guys starting shooting because about this point, the Viet Cong out of frustration starting shooting the civilians. And there were two women that were standing in front of the hut. I saw one of them get shot by this Viet Cong that was behind a well, a stone well. And anyway, I fired a couple rounds at him and a little bit later, he got up and ran towards the hut where he had shot this one woman. (01:30:30) Veteran: And I went ahead and swung at him with the M-60 machine gun and pulled the trigger and it went shunk! It was empty. I had not…Forgotten to hook the big strip onto it, you know, so I could just fire this 12 to 18 round starter strip. And so, I quickly flipped the switch on the righthand side so I could pull the feed cover up, pull the thing back, drop the new belt in, got it lined up, closed the feed cover, and swung back on this guy. Well, he was by this time just about inside of the hut. He was right by the doorway. And I fired and I hit him through the guts and through the hip. But what I didn’t notice, there was a young boy inside of the hut that I couldn’t see because it was dark, you know, this Viet Cong was out in the open. The boy was in the darkness, there was no window on that side behind him. And anyway, one of my rounds went in and hit this kid at the elbow. And after this fight was over, I went in there because I could hear the screaming and, you know, this kid’s elbow was just totally mangled. And that kind of really bothered me because I basically turned this kid into a cripple. You know, just smashed his elbow up with that 308 round. And I had, you know, nightmares about that after I came back. And I used to go down to Lake Michigan and draw it out on the sand when I after a while realized that �with the angle I was at, I—you know, even if there had been a window, I might not have been able to see him in there. (01:32:23) Veteran: This was one of those things that yeah, you know, you’re supposed to make sure of your target and what’s behind it from the hunter’s safety class. But this was not a hunter’s safety class, this was a gun fight. I was shooting at the bad guy. I couldn’t see what was in the darkness anyway. And I had hit the kid. Well the kid was medevaced out to a civilian hospital down in Qui Nhơn. I don’t know what their final result was but I am assuming they probably just cut his arm off. And…But anyway, we sorted out the bad guys. We had not gotten all of the bad guys. We did get a bunch of them. There was a group from another one of the units that heard the gun fire and came running down. They put a quick reaction team together and they followed blood trails and did catch up with a couple more of the Viet Cong later on but most of them, or at least the ones we hadn’t shot in that first fight managed to escape. But you know, it was a thing that once I got the other guys shooting, things kind of went our way. It’s just that there were some poor ones—you know, poor civilians that also got messed up, including this one that I knew I was the guy that did that. And so, that was the only time that we went out on the village sick call that I remember having a problem. Now, there was an Australian correspondent. Came to LZ English. Her name was Kate Webb. And there’s been articles written about her. She’s—you know, you can find her on the computer with no problem. But it doesn’t have, you know, all of her articles that she wrote. Maybe if you were on the internet in Australia, you could find those. But one of the articles that she wrote was More Than Big Guns and it was about our village sick call program. (01:34:32) Veteran: Now, Kate Webb was really only there for one full day. And she, you know, went to other First Cav units, I don’t know which ones that she visited. But she was real popular with us. �She got the nickname little sister. And she looked like somebody had taken this 9th grade girl and said, “No, you don’t go to high school, you go directly to Vietnam and here’s a clipboard,” you know, “and a camera.” And anyway, you know, the press corps down in Saigon had quite a time with her because they just didn’t believe this was a bonified reporter that had had a year of college as well as, you know, a high school graduate and had been sent by one of the Australian newspapers. Now, she actually was born in New Zealand I understand. But like Joe Galloway, she kept following wars for the rest of her life. She went and did a lot of stuff with the Marine Corps later on during the war. I don’t know how much time she spent with the 1st Cav but one of the—one of the stories involved her. The company she was with had stopped because they were just starting to clear a path through a minefield. And this officer, either a major or a lieutenant colonel, showed up, you know, all spit and polish and really looking sharp except he’s huge. You know, he’s maybe 6’4” and just has this, you know, Dan Blocker type of character. And supposedly, he had been a professional football player and had been in the Marine Corps reserve and decided that he was going to do his time over there. (01:36:33) Veteran: Well, I am not sure but there’s an article about the battle of Huế that talks about a guy that commanded one of the units in the 5th Marines that had been a lineman for one of the pro football teams and was over there in Vietnam and was considered a pretty good leader. Well, the story on Kate Webb was that she was sitting there and this guy goes out, he’s ready to walk out into the minefield. And she runs out in front of him and puts her arms out and, you know, like what’s this young woman trying to do, telling me where I can’t go and where I can go? And he goes ahead and brushes her aside and she gets back up off the ground and, you know, he’s by this time headed further into the minefield. And she runs out and grabs ahold of him. She’s wrapped around his neck on his back. And he goes ahead and brushes her off and she falls down �off to the side and about that time, the infantrymen get it across to him that he’s standing in the middle of a minefield and she’s laying in the middle of a minefield that they were just starting to clear. And they had to spend about the next 20 minutes getting the two of them extricated from where they had walked into. But yeah, that’s one of the stories about Kate Webb. And also, in Afghanistan, she spent about two hours perched out on a…the drainage pipe, outside of the window with the bad guys looking for her inside. And it’s cold, you know, this particular time in Afghanistan, and she’s standing up there on the third or fourth floor outside the building, you know, hanging on for dear life to a water pipe or something. And you know, she continued to do that sort of thing and she eventually died of cancer just a couple years ago. But she was somebody that we kind of thought quite a bit about because she was willing to go out and do the different things. Well, stuff continued on LZ Pony. Interviewer: Pony? Or, I thought we were on English now. (01:38:55) Veteran: I mean, not Pony but LZ English. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: And the Gillespie, who by this time had moved up to battalion commander and you know, decided that yeah, we probably ought to have an underground bunker at LZ English because he thought we would be a pretty good target. So, somebody from the engineers came with a bulldozer and plowed this trench. And Captain Graningham was sent to go ahead and be in charge of the bunch that went to get some stuff to build this. And we flew on a CH-47 down to Qui Nhơn. And at Qui Nhơn, they had a big storage depot. You know, there’s this area about the size of maybe 6 tennis courts that says—you know, they are stacked probably 10-12 feet high. Toilet type one flush. And we are saying wait a minute…Now, at LZ English, we don’t have any �flush toilets anywhere that we know of. I mean, we have got these tubes that the powder for the 8-inch rounds came in stuck into the ground. The—you know, we call piss tubes. And then for the other job, they had a place where they had 55-gallon oil drums cut in half and you would go into those. There was like an outhouse type of situation. (01:40:24) Veteran: And every once in a while, somebody would be designated to pull that out. Now, there were usually guys that had worked in the field that weren’t very smart and really shouldn’t have been out there anyway and many of them were project 100,000. Now, that was LBJ’s thing where they were going to, you know, turn these guys that were unemployable skills like in World War 2, they had done a really good job at training people that didn’t have a whole lot of skills to do, you know, some fairly important stuff. Well, these guys with project 100,000 were really, really slow and if they got assigned to an infantry unit, the infantry company commander platoon sergeant said you know, this guy is going to do nothing but get people killed. You know, send them back to the rear. And they basically sent them back to the rear where they were turned into what’s known as shit burners. And that’s what they did, you know. A couple times a day they would go out and pull these barrels out and pit some diesel fuel in there, stir it up with a metal rod and set fire to the thing. And I mean some of these guys were so…so dumb that one of the guys was told to go burn—to go out and burn the officers’ shithouse. Well, he didn’t even take the barrels out from underneath the thing when he set fire to it and burned the whole building down. And so, you know, there were some of those guys from 100,000 that made everybody else look bad because so many of them got less than honorable discharges and, you know, or eventually were section eighted out that you know, unable to adapt to military life. And you know, so you saw a lot of the other than honorable discharges out of that. But most of them actually came from LBJ’s, you know, project 100,000. (01:42:26) �Veteran: Well, we would occasionally get mortared at LZ English. Since we were a good stopping point on highway one, they would go ahead and stop with the dusters and convoys there rather than running the bridges through Injun country to the north of us on highway one. During the nighttime, they would pull up and circle the wagons. And there was a guy from here in Muskegon that was on one of the dusters that I will get you his address and phone number later on. But he was one of those guys that spent time in LZ English and he knew where I was. He recognized several of the places and recognized several of the incidents later on. But LZ English, since it was brigade forward, also meant it had a huge ammo dump that provided ammo for all the artillery pieces all over the Bong Son plain and the Sui-Ca Valley and everything near there. And during that time period, 1st Brigade was sent to clear the An Lo River Valley. Now, there’s a book called Brennan’s War that talks about the An Lo River Valley and the Tiger mountains. The Tiger mountains are actually what really is called the Cai Gat mountains just south of Bong Son and then the south China sea coast. But the An Lo River Valley was one of those places that if you went outside any firebase that was there, within 500 yards you could find a fight, you know, any time day or night. And anyway, they decided to move all of the civilians out of there and turn it into a free fire zone. So, all the civilians were moved out. Well, during the process of moving everybody else out, they found some water buffalo. Some—not water buffalo but elephants. (01:44:30) Veteran: And some of those had been shot and were dead, you know, by passing helicopters. And, you know, you put enough 308 bullets, even an elephant will die from it. And a guy by the name of James Kenaffel who was in 1st of the 8th mentions that they had to wait and secure this dead water—or, dead elephant until somebody could come out with a chainsaw and harvest tusks off of him. Well, there was some officer that was crazy enough about elephants that he figured �they had to bring them back to LZ English. They brought them back and put them into a POW compound at LZ English. Now, according to Major Polk who was—took over from Hay, you know, the official report was an intruder had started the fire at the ammo dump at LZ English. Major Hay said no, that wasn’t it. That the barbed wire didn’t really stop the elephants and they stampeded and went into the ammo dump and there was some border ammunition that was already sling loaded, ready to go out to some infantry company the next morning. And there was one infantryman guarding the ammo dump that sort of panicked and he takes his M-79, touches off, misses the elephant but hits this pallet of 81-millimeter mortar ammunition which actually started the whole thing. But, you know, Westmoreland probably did not hear that this had anything to do with elephants. And the press didn’t either. But Major Polk, who was a black major who took over from Hay, said yeah that was the stampede of elephants where the guy cut loose the mortar round. But anyway, that was at, like I said, at night and I saw the explosions going off there and I thought oh jeez. You know? That means we are going to be very short of ammo. (01:46:35) Veteran: So, I quickly went down inside of the fire direction control bunker and said put on an entire niner-niner to check fire except for troops in contact, no interdictions. And then I went over and woke up Major Gillespie. And I told him, I said, “Sir, the ammo dump is on fire.” And the next thing he told me was, “Go ahead, go on the dock and tell them to check fire on any interdictions because,” he said, “all they are going to have there for the next day or two is what they got on the firebases.” I said, “I have already done that, sir.” And I was—he said, “Well, thank you.” You know. “Go ahead and continue on with what you were doing.” So, I ran back over to the fire direction control center, which by this time was underground because of the fact that this little trip with Graningham had been very productive. When we got to Qui Nhơn, we �found out that they had all kinds of stuff there: big timbers to keep things from shifting onboard the boats. So—oh, good timbers to hold up the side walls and all the sandbags that hold up the roof. And we had permission to get those because there was a civilian in charge of that. And he said, “Oh yeah, you can take all the timbers you want. They are just trash over here. They were used to keep tanks from sliding around and other things, you know, when they were coming over here.” (01:48:15) Veteran: But they also had some other vehicles there. They had a front loader there and Captain Graningham was looking at this load of a bunch of—several big bundles of PSP, that was perforated steel plank. He said, “I sure wish we could get those back to LZ English. It would be real good to put across our beams and put sandbags on top of them for good overhead protection.” And I said, “Well, I remember that when the civilian left to go to his air-conditioned hotel room, that there’s a board with keys on it.” And he said, “Really?” I said, “Yeah. I know how to run a front—a forklift.” And he said, “Go ahead and see if you can find keys for the forklift.” And he says, “Go ahead and take two of those bundles outside and, you know, put them in a sling.” And I said, “Two bundles might be a little bit much for that sling, sir. And he says, Well, we will have—we will tell the pilot to take it easy when we go back. But,” he says, “I want both bundles.” So, we went ahead and put the bundles out there on the sling and this guy didn’t come to work until probably 10 o’clock. And we were going to leave earlier of course. One of the other things that I probably ought to digress on: Graningham told me—he said, “Go find their artillery fire direction control center here and, you know, and find out what frequencies and what batteries we can call for if we need artillery fire out here.” Well, I couldn’t find the real fire direction center but I did find a place with a couple antennas and it said ‘officer of the day.’ So, I tapped on it and introduced myself. And I said, “Captain Graningham wants me to get the �instructions for where we can call in artillery fire from and the radio frequencies.” And he—this lieutenant looked at me and he says, “No, you don’t get any frequencies.” And I said, “But Captain Graningham told me.” He says, “Nobody shoots around here. You’re not about to start that.” (01:50:38) Veteran: And I said, “Well, can you sign a note that you’re refusing to give me frequencies and firing batteries?” So, he did. And I went and caught up to the other guys that were going to an engineer mess hall. And I went in there and I noticed that they were awfully quiet and everybody is kind of looking at us like who brought the elephant into the room? And they’ve got—you know, it looks like a mess hall back stateside with metal trays and the whole bit. And of course, we got helmets on, we are all wearing all our gear. And there wasn’t room for all of us to sit at one table so I went to a table nearby where there was some engineers. And I said, “Mind if I join you?” “Oh, that’s okay.” And I went ahead and put my knee on the chair while I went ahead and slid my helmet underneath and then hung my web gear over the back and held onto the chair so I could sit down because if I just had my web gear on, it was going to flip that chair over with. And so anyway, I sat down and he’s looking at me and he says, “You got a magazine in that rifle?” And I said, “Yeah. In 1st Cav, if you go anywhere, even to the outhouse, you better have your weapon with at least one magazine with you at all times.” And I said, “Otherwise, you can get you can get an article 15.” And he said, “But you got all that gear.” And I said, “Well, I carry that to work with me every day from the bunker I sleep in to fire direction control. Hang it on, you know, hang it on the post there.” (01:52:21) Veteran: And he says, “Are those real grenades?” I said, “I wouldn’t be carrying them if they weren’t real grenades.” I am looking across to him and I said, “Where’s your rifle?” And the guy goes ahead and pulls out his billfold and he’s got a number on there that says someplace in Qui �Nhơn there’s a rifle that if they ever get hit, he can go ahead and sign that rifle out. I’m kind of shaking my head like this. A little different world in Qui Nhơn than what we’ve got at LZ English and the head of LZ Pony. So anyway, we go out the next morning and a helicopter comes in and we climb aboard and have somebody who’s sympathetic to our cause go ahead and hook this sling of PSP to the bottom. And we take off and I remember flying back to LZ English at Bong Son. And all of a sudden, this helicopter lurches upward real quickly. I’m thinking oh no. And the door gunner on the front of the helicopter is looking over the side and then I hear him yell to the pilot that we just lost our sling load. Well, apparently there was too much stuff for the sling load. And I quickly ran up to the front and I said, “Can you give me the grid location of where that PSP went down?” And he did and Captain Graningham said, “You get the location?” I said, “Yes sir.” And he said, “Well, we will send people out with two more slings and we’ll see if we can recover that.” Well, they did. I mean, there were some kind of bent up corners and stuff, you know, where this stuff had crashed into somebody’s rice paddy down there. But anyway, we recovered that and used a sledge hammer to kind of, you know, square out the corners a little bit and used it for the roof of our bunker. Now, the motto of 2nd of the 19th artillery was on the way. (01:54:36) Veteran: And Gillespie was, you know, a fairly gung-ho type of officer. He was battalion commander. And he had us paint sandbags that said ‘on the way.’ And we laid those on top of our bunkers so any passing officer would know where the top of 2nd of the 19th was. And so, when our bunker was done, it had ‘on the way’ on it and all kinds of stuff. Well, as the tour went on, I came to a point where I was going to go on R and R. R and R was rest and recreation. Married guys got to go to Hawaii because their wives could meet them there. There were other places like down in Hong Kong where people went. I picked Japan because I thought I will never �get another chance to see Japan. So anyway, from there I went from LZ English to Cam Ranh Bay. And I noticed the guys had air-conditioned movie theaters there. They had outhouses and they slept in dry places. Now, at LZ English it was rainy season and we sometimes had to share our bunker with snakes and that was not good because some of the snakes over there, although they were only about that long, they were related to the coral snake, which we have in the United States. You know, you have to get ahold of a finger or something to gnaw on but the poison was deadly. I mean, they referred to them as two-step snakes. I don’t know if it was really that bad or not. But so anyway, went through Qui Nhơn, went to Japan. (01:56:22) Veteran: When I was in Japan, I spent several days at Camp Zama. Camp Zama is where they had the big house built for the guys who had been wounded. I would go over there every evening and play the piano for the guys that were hospitalized. And during the day I would travel around Japan. I didn’t spend much time with the Ginza or any of those places. But I went to a couple PXs and did my Christmas shopping there because we were headed—I mean this was October of ’67 so I thought it’s a good time to get Christmas presents. So, I got stuff for my sister and all those—all the other relatives and stuff and the girl that I was dating at the time. And sent all the presents back from there. I went to see Odawara Castle. Got some good pictures of that and also, I went to Koni National Park, which is their equivalent of a Yellowstone. And just a beautiful mountain area. Got a chance to go to Mount Fuji. And I ate some good Japanese food there, sitting cross-legged on the floor on a bamboo mat and the whole bit. You know, I had a chance to do all those neat things. And one of the guys that used to meet me on some of the things. And you know, we talked quite a bit. I kind of picked up that he was a helicopter pilot with 22, 9th. But we talked mostly about family, places we had been stateside and the things we were seeing that day and you know, what each of us had learned. He was rather surprised when we got back �on the airplane to go back to see that I was only an E-5. He assumed I was an officer and he says, “You talk like an officer.” And I said, “I live in officer country.” I said, “I didn’t mean to deceive you or anything but yeah I really am just an E-5 who works in S-2.” And he said, “Well, you probably ought to be an officer because you seem to know your way around officer country real well and have a grasp on what’s going on.” (01:58:44) Veteran: Well, a little bit after that I had another incident with a Chinook helicopter At LZ English. I had gone over to get some supplies from the brigade supply area to bring them back, you know, where the, you know, papers and clipboards and scissors and whatever else. But— maybe some typewriter ribbons for the guys that typed on these old-fashioned manual typewriters that, you know, put my notes together. But on the way back, I saw this Chinook come down and it wasn’t right near the helipad but I saw there were a couple of ambulances waiting. And I thought okay, I’ll go—I am a first aider, I can help move some of the guys off the helicopter. And I ran towards the helicopter, hit the rear ramp and fell down because it was all covered with blood—it was slippery and slimy. And I went in the helicopter and most of the guys were dead. I helped carry them out and, you know, I was really, really kind of upset about the whole situation. You know, like who let this happen that so many Americans got killed in such a short period of time? And how did it happen? And as—we were getting—this helicopter was getting ready to leave. I went up and the door gunner was kind of slumped over the M-60 machine gun. (02:00:38) Veteran: And I thought he had just been vomiting over the side. And I went up to him and I said, “It’s alright, you know. They’re all gone.” And he fell back. And he’d taken a 50 round—or, a 50 caliber round had gone right through his chicken plate armor and killed him. And anyway, it seemed like that length of that helicopter seemed like it was forever as I was trying to run in the �blood and stuff and tell the guys, you know, we’ve got another one inside. And as they came back up with me, I took the guy’s helmet off and the, you know, helicopter was already starting to crank up and the thing started lifting off and I was like well, if I go back to where this battle was then I am going to take revenge on somebody for what I have just seen. And you know, I was probably a little crazy at that time. And maybe even a little bit more than a little crazy. But, you know, I wanted to see somebody on the other side die for what I had just seen inside of this helicopter. Well, he flew maybe 100-150 yards and landed at the place where the helicopter was normally supposed to be parked. And I, you know, went to the—where the pilots’ section was at the front. You know, just walked through that open hallway and he recognized I was not his normal door gunner on that side. And he said, “Where is so-and-so?” and he gave the guy’s name. I said, “If you mean the door gunner, he’s dead.” And he threw the logbook at me that he had, you know, next to his seat. (02:02:29) Veteran: And you know, I kind of backed up a little bit because he was obviously really ticked too. And we went outside the helicopter and sat and cried for a while on the sandbags around us where it happened. And I went back to headquarters 2nd of the 19th and I walked back over because I told the jeep driver to drive back when I, you know, went to help with the helicopter. And anyway, they are in there talking about the report going back to MACV that, you know, this particular unit had suffered moderate casualties in the on lo. And I mentally came unglued at that point, you know. I started yelling and screaming like mad. When I woke up the next day, the Captain Risa or one of the medics, somebody had come up and sedated me. And I had been moved to my normal sleeping quarters. And the other guy that worked in the S-2 section under Captain Webber came over and saw me the next morning. He says, “You started yelling and screaming, acted like a straight crazy man last night.” And then I told him what I had seen and he �told me what had happened. And apparently, this unit in the Li River Valley had seen two Viet Cong coming down the path in front of them and went to ambush these two guys. What they didn’t know was that a North Vietnamese company had come down the hill behind them. Stop there? (02:04:18) Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: Okay. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_SheathelmG2270V2 Title A name given to the resource Sheathelm, Glenn (2 of 3, Interview transcript and video), 2018 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018-08-08 Description An account of the resource Glenn Sheathelm was born in Muskegon, Michigan, in 1946. Enlisting in the Army in 1965, he joins the Army Artillery and undergoes Basic Training at Fort Knox, Kentucky, and AIT at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, before being deployed to Nuremberg, Germany. He is then redeployed to Vietnam where he served with the Fire Direction Control and S2 Military Intelligence sections of the First Cavalry Division until after the Tet Offensive in January of 1968. He sees combat while on patrol, during rescue missions, during Air Assaults, and during the Second Battle of Tam Quan when he receives several minor wounds and is sent to the rear for treatment in the final days of his deployment. He then returns to the United States in February of 1968 where he attends the Western Michigan and Grand Valley State Universities for masters' degrees in library sciences, literary media, and history. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Sheathelm, Glenn H. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/d56aecb34b893abab981f74141472758.mp4 9eeeda9df26ff184183da612c5f9407f https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/3cb7b64c53fa1619e39faf95b40e0745.pdf 4ca856b8148c5376bf3d08c7cf5219c9 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Glenn Sheathelm Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Grace Balog Interviewer: We’re talking today with Glenn Sheathelm of Muskegon, Michigan. And the interviewer is James Smither of the Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project. Okay, to begin with Glenn, give us some background on yourself. And to begin with, where and when were you born? Veteran: I was born here in Muskegon, Michigan. My dad was actually born in Lansing. Mom, here in Muskegon. They met playing tennis out at Pioneer Park, when they had a tennis court up there. My dad and mom both had brothers that served during World War 2. My heroes were quite frequently World War 2 vets. There were several that lived in the neighborhood and of course, I am named after an uncle that was killed during World War 2, also a Glenn H. Sheathelm who was killed between Remagen and Cologne in March of 1945. Interviewer: Alright. And what year were you born? Veteran: I was born in 1946. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, and what did your family do for a living when you were a kid? Veteran: My dad was a school teacher at Muskegon Public Schools. He had taught at a couple other schools before then in a place called Delton down near Hastings. And he came to Muskegon initially with—because of Walt Mosner. Walt Mosner was the director of Camp �Pendalouan. He had been youth director at the Lansing YMCA and my dad knew him real well from there and Mosner asked my dad to come as a junior counselor to Pendalouan so that’s what brought my dad initially to Muskegon. And he liked the area. Later on, moved up to counselor and then assistant camp director during the summer. And that included part time while he was teaching. Now, during World War 2, in addition to teaching, he worked at Bennett Pumps. He and another printing teacher, I believe at Muskegon Heights High School, split a job: printing instructions for Bennett Pumps products that were going to the military all over the world. So, he figured that that was some way he could contribute to the war effort. He was actually on the borderline for being too old but my parents decided not to have children until the war was over and they knew really what the future had. (00:02:54) Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: So, that’s why I was born in ’46 and like I said, my uncle was killed in ’45. Interviewer: Right. Okay. Veteran: And another one on my dad’s side was wounded while he was a Marine in the Pacific. And on my mom’s side, I had a couple that served in Europe. One, a troop carrier command, that he had nightmares about Market Garden because he had put together crews of several planes that went down during that. And the other one was a photographer for the Army. And he had some beautiful photographs that unfortunately for history, his daughter has not written back to me. You know, I said, “Those belong in a university library or, you know, a library of congress because he had beautiful black and white 8x10 photographs of things in World War 2 that you don’t see in books.” And then, you know, it’s a big wood bound volume. Interviewer: Alright. �Veteran: So, it was—it was one of those things that I am really sorry didn’t get…Didn’t get out there some place. I have always had an interest in history. Like I said, my heroes were guys that had served in World War 2. I started reading about the Civil War. I, you know, read Bruce Catton and everything he wrote. He was a Michigan author, incidentally. And I tried to expose students to history. You know, reading sections of, like, This Hallowed Ground to show them how beautifully the English language comes together and explains some of the stuff really clearly. So, I’ve—I’ve tried spreading history around ever since. Interviewer: Okay. (00:04:59) Veteran: Now, where did you want to jump to? Interviewer: Well, we are going to go back here. So, okay now, did you go to high school in Muskegon? Veteran: I went to Glenside School for grade school. One of the teachers I had was Isabelle Herbert who is still alive and I still go over and visit her at her nursing home about every 3 weeks. She was one that kind of encouraged me to go ahead and pursue just about anything I wanted to. You know, if I got done with my assignment early and got up and got out of my seat, went back and grabbed an encyclopedia, that’s fine I wasn’t bothering anybody—let Glenn do that. So, I probably read the section on World War 2 in the encyclopedia multiple times while I was in her class. And she also taught me a lot about science and nature, which I have enjoyed throughout my lifetime. And junior high, I went to Bunker. While I was at Bunker, I got involved in the band. I got to know people like William Stewart, Fred Royce. Fred Royce was a World War 2 vet who was also a POW. Unfortunately, he’s passed away because his story was amazing. He was captured during the Battle of the Bulge. Spent some time as a POW. One of the �guys in his unit was Jewish and you know, his story about that whole thing was really very impressive. I also found out from talking to him that, you know, being in combat was going to change people forever. (00:06:41) Veteran: And they didn’t call it PTSD at the time but after I got back from Vietnam, he and I had some long discussions on that particular topic. And…But he was actually the high school band director until Carl Beauregard came in. Now, Carl Beauregard has been very active not only there but at Western Michigan University with the West Michigan Wind Ensemble. And then as an instructor at Blue Lakes Fine Arts Camp. I was in the drum section in both Bunker and Muskegon High. I played with Jerry Royce in the drum section. Jory was later in the Air Force Band. Also, knowing Jerry Royce, I got down to the basement of their house and I again got exposed to a little bit of post-traumatic stress disorder. I went down to the basement and I had never seen great big wooden cases of 30-06 ammunition before. And I mean, we are talking big wooden cases with handles so somebody can grab ahold of each end and carry them around. They are loaded with boxes of ammo inside. And anyway, I found out that this did have some connection to a repeating nightmare that Fred had had about the Germans coming down this hallway at him and he’d shoot them and there were always more Germans. I’m thinking okay, that makes sense that he might have about 5 or 6000 rounds of 30-06 ammunition down in the basement. But he unfortunately, like I said, has passed away so we haven’t got his stories anymore. (00:08:31) Veteran: After—now, I mentioned that my heroes were World War 2 vets. Many of them were pilots. I decided I wanted to be a pilot. I applied for the Air Force Academy as well as Michigan Tech. At—I had been accepted to Michigan Tech and I was also accepted for—I got a nomination for Air Force Academy but when I went to take the physical, I failed the physical �because of a fractured left leg from skiing that had not healed properly. And I had taken a fall— baseball tip right across the eyebrow and I had a fracture there that apparently, somewhere along the line, damaged some muscle. So that—I didn’t focus well, even with glasses. So, I was you know, not allowed to go to the Air Force Academy. Well, at Michigan Tech I thought well, what am I going to change to since I can’t fly for the Air Force. And I thought hmmm…Smokey the Bear Forest Ranger sounds good. I could see myself as one of the historical guides at Gettysburg or Yosemite or Yellowstone. That sounded real good to me. Except as I got along there, I found out that they were more interested in having their forestry students work for papermills and cruise timber. So, they could make lots of money for the lumber companies. And I thought I have grown up right near a papermill, you know, lakeside area. Don’t want anything to do with papermills. So, I grabbed— Interviewer: Okay, just to back up a little moment here. When did you finish high school? (00:10:13) Veteran: I graduated in 1964. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: ’64, ’65 I was up at Michigan Tech. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I started ski patrolling up there. I got involved in search and rescue up there. Was actually living where history took place because it was the copper country. I mean, I used to explore old abandoned towns and illegally explore some old abandoned mine shafts. A good friend of mine was a geology major and we got into places we shouldn’t have been. One time when I wasn’t with him, all the climbing ropes were in my locker down in the sportsman’s den. �Now at that time at Michigan Tech, if you were a hunter, they had a place called The Sportsman’s Den where you could keep your firearms locked up in there and you know, when you want to go out hunting, you’d come down, sign the little card and put the card on the thing in the, you know, in the dorm there and then you could take your firearm out hunting. Well, I also had climbing ropes in there. And the particular day that they went out and decided to explore some mine shafts, I was ski patrolling at another area. And they didn’t ask my roommate for the key for my locker. And one of them slipped and fell and went about 150 feet down in one of the mine shafts on the ice. Well, they had to write a very apologetic letter in not only the school newspaper but the local newspaper for being there because the county had to actually plow a road to the top of this mine shaft and the Calumet Hecla Mine Rescue Team had to get two of them out. Now, one guy had gone down to help the one that had fallen and gotten hurt but he couldn’t get himself back up. And the other guy had gone for help. And so, you know, some of those—some of those stories do abound and one of the guys that was helping on that was—the guy that went for help was the guy who’s dad had been a conservation officer as well as, you know, an Air Force retiree. So, he was an interesting guy to be around. Interviewer: Yeah. (00:12:51) Veteran: Now, when I dropped out of Michigan Tech— Interviewer: So, when did you leave Michigan Tech? Veteran: That would have been 1965. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I was just there one year. I had gotten very involved in ski patrol and search and rescue and stuff like that. And I liked that type of thing. But I thought well, I worked for a while at �Quality Beverage here in Muskegon for a little while. And during that time, I realized the Army is kind of breathing down my neck and I probably ought to decide how I am going to deal with this military thing. And I thought well, I want to be in a good unit. So, I went ahead and signed up for airborne artillery, which really pleased the recruiter because everybody wanted to sign up to be computer operators or something like that. You know? No, I didn’t. Don’t want to take the chance on getting in Vietnam and then some messy job but I thought well, if I end up in Vietnam, I’ll at least be with a good unit. So, I enlisted for airborne artillery. Interviewer: Now, why did you select artillery as opposed to just— (00:14:07) Veteran: Well, actually the artillery probably goes back…that was what my uncle was in that was killed in World War 2. And one of the earliest pictures of me, my dad plunked me down where I am sitting straddling the barrel of one of these 75-millimeter guns down here at the Veterans Memorial Park. You know, I am actually sitting there on top of the barrel of the firearm. I don’t know if it was predestined I’d end up in artillery. But you know, that sort of ended up—ended up that way. And also, I figured that with all the mathematics experience I had had at Michigan Tech since it is primarily an engineering school, that you know, it was not going to be hard learning any of the artillery jobs. So— Interviewer: Okay. (00:15:00) Veteran: So, I signed up for airborne artillery and during basic training, they gave us a whole battery of tests. I really was too tired to do well on that but I did surprisingly well. And they said, “Well, you can go to any school other than foreign language school. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Somehow, I got through high school without taking any foreign language. �Interviewer: Now, we are going to back up a little bit. So, when do you actually sign up then? When do you enlist? Veteran: I enlisted in May of 1965. Interviewer: Okay. And then had you had a draft physical already? Or do you go for a physical after you enlist? Veteran: I went to Fort Wayne, down near Detroit. They did the physical and from there, they loaded us directly onto buses and we went down to Fort Knox, Kentucky. Interviewer: Now, when they did the physical, did you tell them about your Air Force issues? Or…? Veteran: No, I did not. I did not tell them I had anything wrong physically. You know, check, check, check on everything. I wanted to go into airborne and I figured, you know, if they decide there is something wrong with me, they won’t let me do that. So, I sort of neglected to mention that. Now, that caught me a little later on. Interviewer: Okay. (00:16:21) Veteran: Because in basic training, I had scored real well on doing just about anything I wanted. And they decided I would make a good officer. Well, in order to become an officer, you got to get a secret clearance. One of the things the secret clearance turned up was the fact that I had been rejected for Air Force Academy for physical reasons. Which I got grilled on quite heavily on that, on why I lied on my enlistment papers down at…You know, and I said, “Well, I really wanted to serve my country. And I really wanted to serve in a good unit.” And they said, “Well, unfortunately, we are putting you down as not qualified for artillery because—or for airborne, �because of the leg injury.” They said, “We will still get you into artillery.” And they said that “we might even, you know, get you an OCS after a while.” Well, I went to—through basic training. Interviewer: Okay. Now, but—let’s talk about basic training. What was that experience like? Veteran: Ah, what? Interviewer: Basic training. Veteran: Well, okay. Basic training I found was more hard psychologically than it was physically. I ran cross country in high school. The physical stuff didn’t really bother me. They made me acting sergeant for a while. And they gave me one guy by the name of Wing who was a lot like in the movie Full Metal Jacket. You know, overweight, very much out of shape. And they said, “You know, it’s your responsibility, make—your responsibility to make sure this guy eventually passes the PT test.” Well, Wing and I would go out every night after supper with his pet log that [raises his arms as if he were carrying a log in front of his chest] he would hold like this. And we would go jogging around the parade grounds. Well, when Wing got ready for the PT test at the end of the session, he could take his elbows like this and stick them down inside the pair of pants that he had been issued, you know, when he first got to basic training. Well, he passed the PT test. I got congratulated for getting him through. (00:18:48) Veteran: And you know, we did a bunch of marching. We were actually trained with the M14 rifle because that had just fairly recently replaced the M1 Garand as the Army’s general rifle. And you know, I did fairly well with that but I never felt real comfortable with it because I had a lot of jams and stuff. Well, part of the reason was because sometimes I had duty at the sawdust �pit, just before we would beat each other around with the rifles and you know, they got awfully dirty. And you know, I had rifles blow up on me, I had just all kinds of stuff. So, I never really developed any particular confidence in the M14. And anyway, I got through basic training. My parents came down along with my sister to visit me. When I got out, we did a tour of the Smoky Mountains. Now one of the things: I had practically grown up sort of like a water baby, here in the Great Lakes. My dad was a real good swimmer. Matter of fact, he had rescued a girl that would have drowned in Duck Lake if he had not jumped in and pulled her out. So, he had me real comfortable with the Great Lakes and swimming. Well, anyway, we were at a swimming pool. My sister, who was 3 years younger than I was, and I swam in the pool and that—you know, they said, “Well, you can’t swim because haven’t got a life guard on duty.” And after they watched us swim for a while, “I guess you’re probably okay.” So, they let us—they let us enjoy the pool there at the motel without an adult supervising. And we enjoyed that quite a bit. Interviewer: Okay. So, from basic where do you go next? (00:20:50) Veteran: Next one was Fort Sill, Oklahoma which is home of the artillery. There I was trained primarily to work on gun sections, which would be the crew of an artillery piece. They trained us on the 105-millimeter, it was called the M101. It was a split trailed 105-millimeter that was very common both in World War 2 and Korea. It was a fairly old, old piece of artillery. But it—it was relatively accurate and the Army had lots of them. So, anyway, we did advanced artillery training at Fort Sill. I did first aid there on a couple accidents where people had gotten hurt. The worst one was at night. We were firing and one of the guys thought his particular artillery piece had already fired. And he stuck his arm up to catch the empty cases and eject it. It had not fired yet. It recoiled and you know, we’re talking a major open fracture. I heard that he got a medical discharge out of the service because you know, the arm was never going to work right after that. �But you know, I was the first one there to start first aid on him. They eventually got a medic. They, you know, had an ambulance there and took him away. But he never came back to our advanced individual training unit. Like I said, I understood he was— Interviewer: Right. Now, how long—yeah. (00:22:30) Veteran: --given a medical discharge. Interviewer: Now, how long did these—how long was basic training and how long was the AIT? Veteran: Basic was 8 weeks. AIT was also 8 weeks. And you know, we would go out and fire the artillery pieces. And now, on the gun crew, we didn’t do any of the slide rule stuff that was done by fire direction control. But we were given the data to put on the guns and tell us how many mills we had to be up, what the azimuth was to our aiming stakes, and we would go ahead and set those off and the guns, level their bubbles, everything. And the round would go 10 or 15 yards of where it was supposed to. You know, some place about 5 miles away. Interviewer: Now, with the 105, can you adjust the charge on the— (00:23:17) Veteran: Yes. The 105 was what was called a semi-fixed artillery piece. Now, that meant that the—it had the projectile and the case. And in the case, there were 7 bags and they were fastened together with the string. For instance, they might say “charge 5.” Well, we would pull bags 6 and 7 out, drape them over the side. The section chief of the gun section would look to verify that we had, you know, charge 5 and 6 and 7 were hanging on the outside and that it, you know, goes to command. Round approved, would push the thing down so it would cut the string and pass it on to a guy that would then go ahead and load the thing into the breech of the 105-millimeter howitzer. Now, the 105-millimeter howitzer had a breech block that went side to side. And you �would put it in and the breech block would slam shut. Now, other artillery pieces, like the one I worked on in Germany, that was what was called separate loading. That had separate—a separate bag that had bags of powder that would be put in the breech after you wiped it down with a watery mop so that sparks wouldn’t set the stuff off because if you had sparks in there when you put the powder bag in there, there was going to be this maybe 2000 degree flame thrower that was going to go ahead and basically cook anybody’s arm that was behind it. So, you know, you had to wipe the breech down after each round. And it had a primer that went in the back of the breech block. Looked about like a 38-special shell. And that was what started the thing that—the lightest bag had a red pad on it. It was actually loaded with black powder that ignited real quick and that would set the whole bunch of other bags off. (00:25:23) Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: But anyway, anything else you wanted to ask about AIT? Interviewer: Yeah. How was AIT different from basic just in terms of how you were treated or how you used your time? Veteran: Actually, there was less of the emotional harassment and a lot more training time towards what we were actually going to be doing. Now, advanced individual training would vary, depending on what job you were going into. They were training me to work on gun crew. If I was being trained to fire direction control, they would have trained me on doing the slide roll type of thing. And those—and, or survey, which were the 3 major artillery skills that were taught. And then if you were a medic, they would of course give you training in that particular field. Now, you know, your first infantry division thing—there’s a book that I am reading now called Blood Trails, where the guy talks about you know, his experience in basic training after he �finished…You know, he said, “Well they went down the line. You first 9 guys are going to be medics.” And he said this did not make him feel real good because these guys, you know, could have been trained as mechanics or whatever and they are going to be putting somebody’s body back together. But he was with the first infantry division. The first cavalry seemed to have people generally that, you know, were trained in that job. (00:27:05) Interviewer: Okay. Well, normally in order to be a medic, they would send you for training. You didn’t just magically become a medic. Veteran: Well, he describes the situation in the First Cav that—or the first infantry division—that some of the guys were assigned jobs as medic were not actually trained in AIT as medics. Interviewer: Oh, so they arrive with the unit and then the unit just tosses them— Veteran: Yeah, and then unit went ahead and assigned them to someplace else. Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: Like in Germany, we had one guy that was a—he had been a multi engine pilot. You know, had the license for multi engine, and they assigned him to a gun crew. You know, a 105millimeter howitzer. You know? It’s like okay. Interviewer: Now, to go back to your story, I guess. Now, while you were in AIT, I mean, could you go off base when you were off duty? Or…? Veteran: Yeah, I actually have more stories about Fort Sill, Oklahoma when I came back through there one time later on. We will get to that. But I—yeah, I did do a little bit off base. Got into Lawton a couple times. But also, I played drums for the battalion when the battalion marched anywhere so if the battalion or company was doing something that Saturday morning, or you �know, I ended up playing drums for them to march them from. And our battalion commander was real pleased with that because we had a drummer that actually knew what he was doing. And…So, yeah, I didn’t get out and do a whole lot when I was in the AIT. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, so after AIT, what happens next? (00:28:52) Veteran: Then I came home for about a 2 week leave and then went to Fort Dix, New Jersey. They decided to send me to Europe instead of Vietnam. Got on a plane, flew to Frankfurt—the Rhein-Main Air Force Base to Frankfurt, and then they gave me a train ticket to Nuremberg. And took the train down to Nuremberg and I also had a little card and a phone number I was supposed to call when I got to the train station. And I remember the train station. It would just really impress me by the size of it in Nuremberg. Well, there was a deuce and a half truck that picked me up after I made the phone call. And then things got real strange. The deuce and a half took me to the south side of town. And there was a guy at the gate, you know, with a rifle and a guard post. And we went into this complex that looked more like a castle than an Army barracks. I mean, I was used to the Army barracks at Fort Knox, Kentucky and Fort Sill, which were leftover ones that they built during World War 2 that were made out of wood and were probably built to last 10 years at most and they were going to knock them down. But we are still using those. Well, here’s this huge archway that we drove into. (00:30:32) Veteran: And the deuce and a half stopped. And he says, “Well, this is where you get out.” He said, “You go out firstly out of this archway and then you turn left.” And he said, “There will be two quadrangles.” And I said, “Are they painted on the ground?” He says, “No, quadrangle buildings.” And I mean, these were areas that had about a block and a half square inside this inside quadrangle. And the building is about 5-stories high. And stone. And the archway that I am standing in…I look up and lo and behold, there’s all this inlaid stone all in the ceiling in these �big huge lights like you see in the inside of a church. And I am thinking this sure doesn’t look like any Army barracks I have ever been to before. And, you know, I am just kind of turning my head around like this, looking at it thinking well, this is really kind of bizarre. But I grabbed my duffel bag and started walking out of this archway. And as I got out of the archway, there was a big balcony overhead. And I couldn’t see all of the balcony, I was just looking at the bottom of it first. And I walked out to where the parade ground started because that’s where the road was, right along the edge of the parade ground. And I turned around and looked back and all of a sudden, the hair stood up on the back of my neck. I’d seen this place before. Matter of fact, I had seen it watching Walter Cronkite and the program 20th Century. Except in—while Walter Cronkite was talking, Adolf Hitler was standing on that balcony like this and there were half trucks full of SS troops running underneath it. You know, through this same road that I walked out to this left-hand turn road. And I thought oh my goodness. I am now at a big SS barracks. (00:32:43) Veteran: And I am thinking okay, that is beginning to make a little sense now because I can see pockmarks in the stone. Okay yeah, this was here during World War 2. And then it was shot at and bombed some. And anyway, I followed instructions and walked up to the third floor where Charlie Battery was because I was being assigned to Charlie Battery, 2nd of the 34th Artillery [Regiment]. And when I got to—when I got up there, I set down my orders and introduced myself. And the person in charge said, “Okay. You’re going to be assigned to…” I think it was the 5th section, but anyway he said, “You can go ahead. There’s, you know, bunks down there and a wall of lockers.” And he said, “You know, you can get a key for the wall locker and everything tomorrow.” So, I walked down there and I thought yep, this is really strange for a barracks because the hall I was walking through was about the width of a two-lane highway. And �it’s polished stone floor. I am thinking I can see why these SS guys got the idea they could conquer the world because you can imagine people goose stepping down these hallways with a clack, clack, clack. And I thought yeah, this place was all built for the psychological effect too. And there were racks built into the wall where they used to keep firearms at one time. They didn’t then because, you know, that was from the old German days. And I walked into the— walked into the room that I was assigned to and you know, I was—I walked through the room. Yeah, the walls are about this thick going from the hallway to the room. (00:34:54) Veteran: And I got in the room and looked out the window and yeah, these walls are just about 3 feet thick stone. And you know…wow. And anyway, I slept the first night there. And I immediately started…what can I find out about this place? And they wouldn’t let us off base for the first 3 weeks. We had to go through what was Soviet Military Liaison Mission Training. Now, Soviet Military Liaison was a semi-legal organized Russian spy group that was supposed to drive certain cars with certain types of license plates that could go around and visit our military post but there were areas that they could not get into and if they tried to get into them, they were supposed to be stopped and arrested and so forth. And also, they told us about, you know, talking to people and you know, civilians outside. About not saying anything about our unit because the Cold War was on and we didn’t want the other side to know that our unit was only at about half strength. And I mean, we went through great pains to make it look like we had more people and more rank than we really did. Like later—well, when I was driving when we went out on alerts outside military areas, I wore corporal stripes even though I was only a PFC at the time, driving this 27-ton armored vehicle. (00:36:49) Veteran: I’d done real well on the driver’s test. They decided okay, we’ll start you in that job. And there was a guy that was really a spec 4 that was wearing E-6 striped that was standing in �the top of the turret of this thing. Now, this 155 self-propelled that looks like a tank but it’s got a bigger gun on it and it doesn’t have as much armor on it. Like a 50-caliber piercing round is going to come through that aluminum alloy armor and rattle around the inside for a while. But anyway, that is except if it’s in the front slope. And I thought well, this is kind of nice because you know as a driver, I am sort of behind the front slope. And anyway, it was one of those big, huge things that you’d think could go just about anywhere but you know, they tend to slide and stuff in the mud. And even worse was when winter came. We got ice on the cobblestones. Sometimes, it got so bad you were sitting in a 27-ton hockey puck. And like the 2nd and 17th, it had 8-inch self-propelled. One time there was a little Volkswagen parked on the corner. And by the time the battery had gone over it, it looked like a bale of scrap metal. You know? It just… There wasn’t much left of it except that sort of rectangular hunk of scrap that was ground clearance on it, on the 8-inch howitzers. (00:38:31) Veteran: But like I said, I tried learning as much as I could about the barracks. I had probably only been there about 3 days when I asked one of the other guys who had been there for a while. He said that—I asked him, I said, “What’s the castle like?” And he says, “The castle?” I said, “yeah, the castle on the other side of town.” He said, “You haven’t been off base yet. How do you know about the castle?” And I said, “Well, you can see it from the roof.” And this guy—you know, eyes got about this big. “The roof? How did you get up on the roof?” And I managed to find a way I could get myself up on the roof. And I could see all across Nuremberg from up there. And also, off on the—as I was looking towards the castle, off on the right, is this big horseshoe shaped building, which officially was known as Osterlings Rundgebau. Well, or Osterling’s Round Building. If you read the Nazi stuff on, you know, that time period, it’s called Kongresshalle and it's where Hitler planned on having the puppet rulers of the different �countries. And he was going to stand at his little podium in the middle and give the office—the orders of the day to all of these people. Well it’s—the building is still there. There were still some places where there was bomb damage in the roof. But I found out later on that some of it was being used as storage and some of it was being used as practice rooms for the Nuremberg Symphony Orchestra where these masters would have other kids from the high schools and stuff and would teach violin lessons and clarinet lessons and so forth inside of that building. So, it was still being used for something and it…But I found out what its original intent was. (00:40:35) Veteran: Well, I could see part of a building beyond that. It was a long stadium type building with columns sticking up. And I couldn’t see the center section of it real well but I thought could that be Zeppelinwiese? Well, after I was able to get a pass to go out there, I found out yeah, it was Zeppelinwiese, which is where Hitler would also stand there with the—everybody, all the troops, out in front, tanks out in front and so forth. And I’d also seen that on newsreels when it was totally intact. And I had also seen newsreels when Patton’s Third Army got there. Because what they did—there was a big swastika surrounded by a wreath up on the top. And Patton had his demolition people from the Third Army go ahead and blow that off. And of course, the newsreels took pictures of this big swastika and wreath tumbling off the roof of this building. Okay, that one is kind of interesting too. And after I had been there a while, I got a chance to actually go out to the castle and so forth. And I enjoyed taking pictures. And I signed up for a photography class in the post. Well, the photography instructor had been a photography instructor—or, he had been a photographer for Signal, which was the German Army’s magazine during World War 2. He had made documentaries showing the German people that the American bombing really wasn’t doing any real damage. He had pictures of a park that everybody knew in Berlin with German people having a picnic in this park. Of course, what you didn’t know was �that they had to have about a battalion of German soldiers moving in trees that actually had branches on them and planting them so that that’s all you saw in the background and you didn’t see the ruined buildings and so forth. (00:42:50) Veteran: And he told me how they had made the thing and he says, “Yes, you can make photographs lie.” And I used some of those techniques a little bit later on. Like, I had pictures of various historic buildings, including Fayette which is a state park in the Upper Peninsula, when I was teaching school. And kids said, “Do you ever go to anyplace that other people go to too?” Because they never saw other tourists in my pictures. And I said, “Well, you see that old wooden wall with the handle and the trough?” I said, “You notice I got it at a fairly low angle.” I said, “That trough is hiding a school bus.” And you know…So, I used some of those angle things later on. But an interesting thing about him was that he had also done some movies and so forth in Nuremberg during the Nazi Party rallies as well as stole pictures. And he gave me some of those stole pictures and stuff later on. And I mentioned to him, I said, “You know, our parade ground is cobblestone.” I said, “One side of it seems to develop frost and the other side of it doesn’t early in the winter.” And I said, “Any reason for that?” And he wrote out a note in German and gave it to me. And he said, “You know where the boiler works is?” And I said, “Yeah.” And he said, “Go down to the boiler works.” And he says, “It’s got the name of a guy on the top. And he’ll show you.” So, I went down to the boiler works. I couldn’t speak much German. And this German guy goes and meets me at the door and has a steel beam lighter and he motions for me to follow him. (00:44:50) Veteran: And we go through the boiler plant and there’s a tunnel that goes out. And I figure yeah, this is pretty close to where the parade ground is. And I looked and from this catwalk we were on, you could see the tails of ME 262 jets sticking out of the water. During World War 2, �we damaged their storm sewer systems such that water got into a section of what had once been an aircraft assembly plant underneath their parade ground. And the Americans had tried to go ahead and get the water out of there except the Germans had left booby traps. After they lost several demolitions experts, they decided to leave the storm sewer water down in there. So, there’s a whole bunch of highly—what were at one time—highly valuable, historical ME 262 jets rusting away down underneath their parade ground. And he also showed me a couple other places where I could get underneath the buildings and there were half trucks like that too, in underground storage areas that were partially underwater. (00:46:13) Veteran: And our barracks area was actually some places 3, some places 4 stories deep below ground. And we had special weapons things there where we had classes on nukes and nerve gases and so forth. But they had classrooms down there and I was involved in a bunch of those because I did have a secret clearance. But one way to get the German taxi cab drivers a little angry, if you were coming back into town, was to say, “SS Caserne.” And they didn’t like to be reminded that that barracks had once been an SS barracks. (00:47:00) Interviewer: Okay. Now, you mentioned getting a security clearance. What did you need that for? Veteran: Well, the thing is, they did that because I had—they were going to send me to OCS at one time. And also, once I had the security clearance, they went ahead and upgraded things all the time so I could go to the special weapons classes and learn how to put together the detonating devices and nuclear warheads. Which, you know, you think you mean the military actually turned loose this technology to 19 and 20-year olds? Yes, they did. You know, we had way too much responsibility for, you know, what our job classifications were. And then now, to get into the particular area where these nuclear warheads were, you know, there had to be an officer that �had to open the thing up. But they made sure that they had one person out of every 2 gun sections that knew how to actually arm the warheads after they were in our vehicle if they got into World War 3. And they had a place they referred to as the Fulda Gap where they figured they—the East Germans and Russians would come through with large amounts of tanks and stuff. And we had—we had some pre-planned targets on bridges and so forth there. And that was basically to slow them down until the family members of the troops and so forth, all the civilians, could get to ports and get out of there because you know, it was like—you know, you’re just being sacrificed to hold them up for a couple, 3 weeks, you know. And your nukes and your artillery rounds, which I started doing the checking on and I thought now, according to the figures, we wont quite glow in the dark after we fire these things because the range, even with the rocket assisted projectiles, which you know gave it more oomph, then the charge 7, which was normal maximum load that they called a wrap-around—or a rocket assisted projectile—and that would kick it out farther. But it, you know, we were still going to get some radiation from these things. (00:49:38) Interviewer: Not to mention whatever radiation you got from whatever came your way. Veteran: Yeah, whatever was coming our way too. But yeah, it was—it was one of those glowin-the-dark type of prospects if something went. And there were a couple incidents where things got pretty iffy. There was an American Major that was killed that was part of the American liaison group that was shot by the Russians. And that caused an incident. The only incident that I was involved in got quieted down pretty quick. That was one where we were near the Czechoslovakian border. We were on a training exercise. We were, you know, out there with our 155 self-propels, jeeps and trucks and so forth. And we got a call for help from one of the guard posts along the Czechoslovakian border. There were some people that were coming from east to �west that had been shot at by the East Germans or Czechoslovakians, you know, in one of the towers. And there were some of them that were dead. There were some of them that were wounded. An American had gone out there and tried rescuing them. He had been shot and wounded and these guys were asking for help. (00:51:07) Veteran: The battery executive officer, you know, picked two vehicles, mine being one of them. And you know, said, “Follow me.” We went to the border and he immediately started yelling commands. You know, like “target that tower!” And we unhooked the travel locks and opened the breech box and cranked the barrel around. I said, “Sir, we haven’t got any live ammunition for the main gun.” And he said, “They don’t know that.” And so, we cranked the main gun around on the thing and you never saw some people abandon their tower so fast in your life as those guys did. You know, coming down when they saw this huge barrel swinging around on them. But that was the only one of the border incidents that I was involved in. Like I said, the guys abandoned the tower. An armored personnel carrier went out along with the other vehicle that I was with and you know, since they had armored plates that at least had small arms on, the 155-SP. And they went out there and picked up the people that had come across the border. And after about an hour and a half, two hours, some generals somewhere had gotten together and decided okay, everybody be cool about this. We went back but… Interviewer: Alright. Now, how long did you spend in Germany? (00:52:48) Veteran: I spent just about 11 months there. Now, while I was in Germany, I also had a chance to do some things that were pretty unusual. One day I was in the NCO club and I was playing the piano and pretty quick, I am surrounded by about a half dozen beautiful women who were singing Broadway show tunes as I am playing the piano. And everybody is kind of looking at me: how did he do that? Well, it turned out that USO had sent these Miss America also rans who �were singers to do a variety show at various places around Europe. And that—these women had showed up a little bit earlier and they heard me playing Broadway show tunes and they, you know, they started singing them. Well, they passed the word on to somebody else who later on, you know, mentioned that I knew how to play the piano. And the service club program got ahold of me and said, “We would you like to play piano with the variety group the month of November, 1965 in southern Germany?” So, for a whole month, I played piano with a jazz trio and variety group that went around the various military bases in southern Germany, which was a real, you know, real step aside for—you know, a guy that’s used to working at a gun cruiser with big guns and big noises. (00:54:30) Veteran: And they asked about, you know, we can get your orders cut where you stay here and do this type of thing? And I said, “No. I signed up for artillery. I am going to go back to artillery. I had a nice break; I enjoyed this but, you know, I’ll go back to my artillery unit.” Well, I did and then we got some replacements in. Now these guys—there’s a 34th Artillery in Germany—2nd of the 34th Artillery, which I was in. except there was also a 34th Signal Corps in Germany. Somebody did the wrong thing on a typewriter. There were about 40 guys that were supposed to go to 34th Signal to repair telephone lines and they showed up at 34th Artillery. Now, like I mentioned, we were about half strength at that time. Our battalion commander was not about to let anybody know they’d goofed. So, these guys end up getting moved into 34th Artillery. And in the section bay that I was in, there were two guys that were from this 34th Signal. And they came in and started asking about “Well, where do we go to fix the lines?” And I said, “What are you talking about?” And they said, “Well, we are phoneline men.” I said, “This is an artillery unit.” And they said, “Well, what are we going to do here?” And I said, “You have just been assigned to a gun section.” And they said, “A gun section? What do you mean a gun section?” I said, �“Well, we have this thing called a track.” And they said, “You mean like railroad tracks?” “No, this is a 27-ton armored vehicle that’s tracked like a tank and it has this big cannon on it.” And they’re totally aghast at this and can’t figure anything out. You know, like “Well, what do they really look like? What is it like inside? What do you do in those?” (00:56:36) Veteran: And I finally gave up but I went down and asked the first sergeant, I said, “I’ve got these guys asking me all kinds of questions. And since I have been answering the questions, they keep asking more.” And I said, “It would help if I could just show them what the thing looked like.” So, he calls down to the guardhouse and tells them that I am bringing yea number of people down there. And I took one of the guys as a ground guide for me. And we went down there and I, you know, had the key, opened up the back of the thing, swung the doors open. And shined the flashlight around, explained what all the different stuff was and you know, about the pentacycles. I go in order and they said, “Well, what’s it like when it moves?” And I said, “I’ll tell you what: I’ll just let three of you guys get in and I’ll have somebody as a ground guide. And I’ll drive it around the motor pool.” So, the rest of them watched as I went ahead and of course, this was all—this was winter months. You know, winter was just getting over at that time and so I had to go ahead and turn on pre-heater and stuff. We are talking about a great big, huge diesel engine. And I went ahead and fired the thing up and it blew the white smoke for a while and then eventually it turned to black and I went ahead and checked with the ground guide and, you know, that I was clear to pull forward. I pulled forward, went around the motor pool and came back in. The guys had been, you know, shaking around a bit on the inside. But they thought this was really cool. This was a whole lot better than putting phonelines together. They thought this was neat. So, about two days after that, our battalion commander says, “Okay, we are going to train �all of these guys as artillerymen. Now, these guys have not been through artillery AIT, they had been through common AIT to fix phonelines.” (00:58:44) Veteran: And so, he assigned me to the training group that would go ahead and teach these guys the skills of artillery. So, I taught them how to cut charges and you know, the loading procedure for getting the rounds into the vehicle and what different jobs that they would do. We didn’t put them on the gunner’s slot or assistant gunner’s slot, or the driver’s slot at the time because those were kind of important. We wanted people that really knew what they were doing there. But we used them and, you know, to go ahead and cut charges. I showed them how to put a, you know, cut the time fuses and stuff like that. And to, you know, make sure everything was right there. And anyway, about 3 or 4 weeks later, somebody found out that these guys had been shipped to the wrong place. And most of them decided they wanted to stay with us instead of go to the 34th Signal because this was a whole lot more interesting. And you know, the idea that at 0 dark 30 in the morning, we might go out on an alert some place in this big armored vehicle and go whaling down this gravel road out in the middle of nowhere and pull up and then you’d watch daylight come and you’re overlooking this field of hops and stuff for, you know, making beer and so forth. Then you know, they’ve got all the data set on the guns and yep, if this had actually turned into World War 3, we would be firing right now. And you know, we would have those types of alerts and they—they were kind of fascinated by that. (01:00:30) Veteran: And then I went to a place called Grafenwöhr. Grafenwöhr was filtrating area. That is, the Germans had fired artillery back there in the 1800s. So, there’s a bunch of duds laying around, a bunch of smashed up stuff laying all over the place. And also, there was a saying about Grafenwöhr that Grafenwöhr is the only place that you could run into so much dust that you won’t see the mud hole that’s going to swallow your vehicle. And it was just about that bad. You �know like I said, it was all chewed up by artillery fire and armored vehicles just charging all over it for years and years and years. Well, they got a chance to actually fire the artillery pieces at Grafenwöhr. One time there was a—what they called a target acquisition battery. And the target acquisition battery was one that uses radar to figure out where the enemy shells are coming from. (01:01:34) Interviewer: Okay. Alright, we are back for hour number 2 with Glenn Sheathelm. So… Veteran: Okay. My—this was actually my third trip to Grafenwöhr, when we were training these new guys. The first trip was during mid-winter and when you’re dealing with 27-ton armored vehicles, you quickly learn you don’t grab anything without mittens on because your skin is going to peel right off. We had tents that we actually slept in that were on concrete slabs. They were heated by coal stoves. And sometimes the coal stoves didn’t burn real well. Well, we found that a little bit of diesel fuel would blow the soot out so that they would breathe a little better and that worked pretty good. Except one day, one of the guys went to the wrong 55-gallon drum to fill up his coffee can with whatever he thought was diesel fuel. It was aviation gas. And he came back to the coal stove, started pouring it in. Flames jumped up to the coffee can he was holding. Of course, he let go of that which then hit the floor. And so, we got burning gas all over the floor of the inside of this GP medium tent. We are talking about a tent maybe 16 or 18 feet wide by maybe 30 feet long. (01:03:16) Veteran: And anyway, we got flames. And of course, there was one of the guys that was real anxious to get out of his sleeping bag and he—the zipper ripped and he jumped out of it and then his sleeping bag caught fire and just kind of exploded into this little bunch of sparklers. Everybody was real anxious to get out of their sleeping bags and out. And I remember, you know, exiting underneath the sidewall of the tent and scraping myself all up as I crawled on the �concrete because the smoke was so bad, I couldn’t really see exactly where the end of the tent was. Now, this GP medium tent has two tent poles in it—one part way down towards each end. They were probably, oh, about that big. And one of the guys in the process heading for the doorway, ran smack dab into one of those—one of those tent poles. And he knocked himself out and I found out that, you know, that they had thought he had run into a tent pole. I got down low, grabbed ahold of him, pulled him the rest of the way out. He was really scraped up bad after I dragged him across the concrete. But anyway, that was one of our excitements during that winter there. (01:04:46) Veteran: The other time we had gone there and fired 105-millimeter howitzers because this target acquisition unit used radar to track the rounds, they had ordered the wrong kind of ammunition for us. And I knew how to run a 105 as well as a 155 so I got picked to be part of the crew on that. And we went out and shot the 155 so they could figure out where we were shooting from and track the thing back. So, I had been at Grafenwöhr several times. And it was exciting but always dusty and dirty. I mentioned about having pictures, I got one picture where I looked like a Mexican bandit—you got, you know, here and goggles and nothing but just covered with dust. And then standing up next to the driver, you know, in the driver’s compartment and you know, gives people an idea of how bad the dust really was out there. And we also, like I said, ran some field problems where we are actually out in the Germany countryside. While we— Interviewer: Okay, just to go back to the Grafenwöhr for a minute. You mentioned there was a lot of unexplored ordinance out there. Were you driving right over it? (01:06:04) Veteran: They usually had little red flags. Now, sometimes we drove over stuff without realizing we were going over it. But when they found the stuff, they would put little red flags and we �would go around it until we had an EOD team come blow it up. But we undoubtedly ran over some old stuff somewhere along the line. Interviewer: Okay. But as far as you know, there weren’t any incidents where anything blew up? Veteran: No, I can’t actually say that. Because there were—there were incidents where people were injured, you know, going ahead and digging out an old mortar round with a trenching tool to dig a foxhole. And yeah, there were people injured. Now, there was one incident too. It was what we call an artillery incident and it involved an investigation. Didn’t involve our unit. And anyway, either on the receiving end or the sending end, but there was a thing called an aiming circle and it looks sort of like a surveyor’s transit. But it can be set up 3200 mills out or 180 degrees wrong. So, the lieutenant who sets this up, or chief of smoke which is the chief of the firing battery, is responsible for checking to make sure which direction he’s actually got this thing oriented. Well, it turned out that there was some first lieutenant somewhere who hadn’t done that. And the 8-inch were set up to fire the wrong way. The lanyard was jerked and there were immediate radio calls that, you know, Grafenwöhr niner niner, cease fire immediately. So, in other words, anybody firing anything at a whole post to Grafenwöhr. You know, niner niner means everybody stop shooting. And then they figured out what had happened. And I have never seen so much brass investigating an artillery incident as that one. Because an 8-inch round is, you know, almost 200-pounds of steel and explosive. And it landed in a mess hall. Fortunately, there was nobody in there other than a couple KPs and a cook at the time. (01:08:33) Veteran: You know, and it would have been a major disaster if the unit had been in there for lunch or something at the time. But yeah there was lots of brass surrounding investigating that. And later—well, when I got to Vietnam, there was an officer that was a full observer that had �been safety officer for another unit earlier and I never ran into anybody so cautious about what he was doing. And but it—like I said, we were at Grafenwöhr several times. Now, one of the few problems we’d get in the countryside…Our battery was set up and they sent me out with the sergeant and one other guy who was the radio operator for the group. And we were supposed to do a recon on some road junctions that were a distance away. Well, it turns out that the aggressor, who was actually the Third Infantry Division, that’s the same one that Audie Murphy was in during World War 2. They had blue and white stripes on their vehicles. And anyway, they chased our battery away. So, here I am—I haven’t got radio communication with anybody because they’re too far away. And I don’t know where we are supposed to go and the sergeant doesn’t know where we are supposed to go either. We are outside of a little town called Fürth which is outside of Nuremberg. And from the map I knew, you know, where we were and everything and what road we were on. but I couldn’t tell anybody because I couldn’t reach anybody that was on our side on the radio. So, we sat there for a while and eventually there’s this jeep that comes down the road underneath this overpass. And just as he gets out of the overpass, he stops. (01:10:41) Veteran: And there’s this lieutenant in the front seat; he’s looking at his map. I thought, hmm. They’re the bad guys in this field problem. I whispered to the sergeant, “Why don’t we just capture them and their jeep?” We did. And now what do we do? Well, we don’t really know what exactly we are going to do but we know where we are. So, you know, they had me navigate us back to where our barracks was in Nuremberg where we turned these 3 guys over and we missed the last two days of the field problem because they’re….we are in Nuremberg with these guys that we captured, you know. And so, the field problem ended right there. Now, while that field problem was going on, a guy by the name of Johnny Rogers who had been my section chief �and I had worked with him as far as getting ready for the 7th Army gunnery test, which you know was one of the things that identifies some of the top people in gunnery in the whole 7th Army. And he did very, very well on that. Like I said, I had worked with him with the test target and stuff, so he was doing a lot of stuff real fast including laying the battery. And you know, sometime—sometimes we would use my artillery piece, sometimes I’d just use, you know, wooden stakes and mark them where the site was and you’d go ahead and lay the stuff from there. But anyway, he got a lot of practice and did real well on the test. Johnny Rogers was an E6. We had two E-7s and an E-8 in our battery. (01:12:29) Veteran: Johnny Rogers got appointed chief of smoke or chief of firing battery, which is the most important job in a firing battery. You know, the lieutenants and captains may think they run the show, but it’s the chief of smoke that you know, if he’s good, he can run the whole show by himself. Well, it turns out that one of these guys that outranked him and also had more log time and grade was very anti-black. Johnny Rogers was black. I don’t know whether he was a member of the Klu Klux Klan or just knew where there was a Klu Klux Klan cell in 2nd Armored Cavalry regiment which was also stationed at Nurem… barracks in Nuremberg. But anyway, I was out running around the parade field one night and I noticed 8 guys grabbed ahold of a vehicle and flipped it over outside of the NCO club. And I ran after them and yelled for the guard as I was doing so. And they broke up because they knew I couldn’t chase all of them, you know, at one time. And one of the guys ran into one of the barracks areas that I knew pretty well. He didn’t—apparently didn’t know it real well and didn’t realize that he was going to run into a dead end and was going to have to come back to the stairway. Well, he came back towards the stairway and I tackled him just as he was starting up. And both of us went down and he came out with a switchblade. And I was about ready to put a foot in the side of his head and I hear this �she-shunk—an M-14 bolt closing behind me. Everybody be nice. So, I stopped and the guard asked me what was going on and I mentioned about this vehicle being flipped over and he says, “Yeah, I am aware of that.” And I said, “This guy was one of the guys flipping it over.” I said, “I wasn’t able to chase down the other guys but this guy was definitely one of them.” (01:14:42) Veteran: So, anyway they took him away and a little bit later on, there was an officer from second enlisted student battery—or I mean second armored cav, that tried to get me to change my story. And I said, “No.” Well, about that time, I found out that the vehicle also belonged to Johnny Rogers. And Johnny Rogers had his wife and two kids in Germany. And he didn’t want to make a real big fuss because he was worried about the Klan coming after his family. I had a couple Klansmen try to get—try to get to me. Like I said, this was after we had come back from field problem. Once I was down at the wash rack and I had taken the 155s and howitzer down there. And you know, used the hose and was spraying it off and getting the mud and stuff off of it. And I saw these two guys coming towards me; they looked like they were up to no good. And so, I went to the back of the vehicle, reached in and grabbed a pick axe handle. Well, one of these guys came at me with his switchblade out. I promptly broke his wrist and the other guy ran away. Well, there was some concern that I was sort of a loose cannon around the area and so I got shipped back to Fort Sill, Oklahoma. I thought I was going to go to gunnery instructor’s school. (01:16:30) Interviewer: So, when was this that you go to Fort Sill now? Veteran: This was in the late summer of 1966. And anyway, I was sent to Fort Sill, Oklahoma. And thinking I was going to go to gunnery instructor’s school because I had applied for that. And I’d cancelled my application for officer candidate school because this time, if I had gone to officer candidate school, it would have meant another year in the service. I thought no, you �know. Without a college degree, it’s not really a good job to go to OCS because you know, you’re going to make maybe captain before they rift you out, if you survive that long. And I thought well, you know, if I am going to become an officer, I might make a career out of it. Well, I thought well, I got to get the college degree first so I told them no, I didn’t want to go to OCS. They said, “Well, if you don’t go to OCS, you’re going to go to Vietnam.” I said, “Okay, your point is since all these crispy new second lieutenants are going to go to Vietnam as artillery forward observers? I’ll take my chances.” So, they sent me to a place called second enlistment’s student battery, which was on the main post. Interviewer: Okay. Now, I do want to pause here and back up a little bit… (01:17:51) Veteran: Okay. Interviewer: There are some other aspects of Germany. Part of it is, while you were in Germany, did you pay much attention to what was happening in Vietnam or anything like that? Or were you just focused on— Veteran: Yeah, I did pay some attention on it and on a Stars and Stripes magazine, I saw a picture of a guy by the last name of Scanlon standing on top of an enemy bunker with a captured weapon. He had been in basic training with me. And but my view of Vietnam at that time was you know, if we want to fight communism, we could have gone a short distance off of our coast and gone to Cuba. You know, why—why this big fuss about communism halfway around the world? You know, it was like I am not sure this is really a logical war to be involved in because of the distance and supply problems. You know, it’s halfway around the world. Most of the people in the United States didn’t even know where Vietnam was; they knew where Cuba was because it was just off the coast of Florida. I mean, it seemed like, you know why the big fuss �about—why do we have to go to Vietnam? I had read some about Vietnam when I was in Germany but not a lot. I did most of my reading about Vietnam when I was at Fort Sill, at second enlistment student battery. Interviewer: Alright. And then the other thing about Germany is: how did the German civilians seem to view the American soldiers? (01:19:21) Veteran: Generally, pretty good except for the ones where American soldiers had gone to bars and gotten in fights and so forth. But I found Germans quite willing to show me around in Germany to some of the churches. One night, in the Nazi Party rally area, I had gone into one of these places, entrance “verboten” or “forbidden.” It was a big tower. There were a whole bunch of big towers. They surrounded an area about ¾ of a mile on a side called Marsfeld and you know, which stands for marching field, really. But it was supposed to be a place where Hitler was going to raise the next master race, complete with big beams over the top. This would have dwarfed the super bowl type of buildings, you know. But the building never got completed. You know, there was bomb damage to it. Hitler had other things to do with any manpower, including slave manpower, that he’d use for that. Well, one of these towers—it was pretty close to completed—was being used for a rotating beacon for the airport for the military, which was actually inside of this Marsfeld area. They didn’t have big planes in there; they had, you know, Beavers and Otters and some helicopters. You know, they were basically light observation planes and you know, hacks and stuff for Army officers. (01:21:13) Veteran: There was a, you know, the equivalent of a Beech 18 that was there, which was a twinengine thing. But I think the largest plane I ever saw inside of there was a C-7 Caribou, which is a short take-off and landing cargo plane that was used quite a bit in Vietnam. But anyway, I was in the tower right next to that and I had gone up to the top and I was just sitting there, admiring �the scenery. And I heard this bunch of footsteps on the—or, a set of footsteps on the stairways and stuff coming around the inside of this tower. And I thought I sure hope it’s not a policeman. It was his dog. And I thought how am I going to explain this? And I thought well, I can always play super dumb. And so anyway, the guy comes out: it’s not a policeman. It’s a guy that’s a…what do they call them? Youth hosteling—college student around Germany. And he’s got his guitar with him. And he opens up his guitar case and he’s sitting up there and I am looking at him. And in the background is this Zeppelinwiese, this place where Hitler one time had all of his troops lined up and…Oh, that’s probably a mile, mile and a quarter away but I can see it off there in the distance because it was just a huge building. And he gets out his guitar and he’s singing this song: where have all the flowers gone, long time passing, young girls picked from everyone, young girls gone to young men everyone, where have all the young men gone, gone to soldiers everyone. You know? And anyway, he’s singing this song up there on the top of this big tower. I am thinking, how appropriate. You know, here’s this anti-war Peter, Paul and Mary I believe, song that he’s singing on top of this. And you know, he’s singing it in German. (01:23:25) Veteran: And I thought gee, this is kind of weird. And you know, I listened to him for a while and then it was getting close to sunset so I went over and shook hands with him and said, “Guten Abend” or “good evening.” And walked down. But you know, that was one of those encounters with one of the German civilians. Now there were occasionally some that were really kind of uptight about getting their pictures taken. They possibly might have been involved with the SS at some time during World War 2 and figured that I might have been with the Mossad, which was the Israeli Secret Police that you know, sometimes you know, wrapped people in blankets and flew them to Israel. But yeah, there were some Germans that were kind of fearful of that. I �remember one time coming back on the streetcar, I got a picture of a young girl. She’s, you know, standing by the front of the streetcar, she’s got a balloon—she has been to a friend’s birthday someplace and…But it was—so, I got some neat pictures of some civilians but I generally avoided taking pictures of civilians as much as possible because I knew some were kind of uptight about it. You know and…But we didn’t—didn’t seem to have any real hostility. And some of them were very appreciative of the American soldiers because some of them remembered the Berlin airlift. And you know, so they were real positive about some things like that too. (01:25:22) Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Okay, yeah. Interviewer: Alright. Now, we can take you back to Fort Sill where you have gone in now, having been sent back from Germany. So, pick up the story there. Veteran: Yeah. Okay, anyway they said, “Well, you sure you don’t want to go to OCS?” I said, “No.” So, they sent me to a place called second enlistment student battery. That was on the main post. Second enlistment student battery was several stories high. It had balconies on the back that overlooked the parking lot. My job there was to pull CQ, or charge of quarters, every other night, which meant I was sort of like the babysitter for roughly 200 guys. You know, making sure they got tucked into bed, signing for guys the MPs brought back and you know, taking all the paperwork and putting it in the right file cabinet in the right drawer for the first sergeant to deal with in the morning. You know, when he got back in. So, that was my job. Now, that—that was only an every other night thing. The rest of my time was free. Well, I went ahead and went over to the pistol range and shot every day, usually twice. I spent a lot of time in the library, figuring I �am going to Vietnam—I better learn a whole bunch about that. So, I started reading everything I could on Vietnam. I started reading, sometimes, some confidential reports, that you know, since I had a secret clearance. They let me back in that room and let me read some of these reports of earlier battles that were, you know, still appropriately stamped. And anyway, the time came for me to go to Vietnam. And I got another couple weeks leave back home and reported to Oakland Army Terminal. Interviewer: Okay. You had mentioned before when you talked about Fort Sill and I asked about going off base and things like that, and you said, “We’ll have a story for that later on.” (01:27:26) Veteran: Okay. The thing is, I didn’t spend a lot of time off base. But there was one guy from second enlist—second enlisted student battery. It was also known as OCS casual. Now, these guys in OCS casual were guys that had been in OCS for anywhere between 3 weeks and about 4 months. The Army said, “Can’t make you into an officer.” And they turned them loose. Now, you have to remember, OCS beats you down to absolutely nothing. I mean, you know like that in the movie Lord of the Snake Shit type of thing. (01:28:08) Veteran: And anyway, these guys had never been built up to where they really had any selfconfidence or self-worth at all. There were guys that walked out in front of trucks on purpose to get killed. There was one guy that I heard the stuff on the loud speaker system: there was an incident going on up, you know. Talk about privacy. I mean they—in the Army you don’t have that. I mean, I could flip to different bays and listen in on what was going on all over second enlisted. And I heard the confusion up in one bay and I got on the PA and I said, “What’s going on?” They said, “Well, we got a guy from the OCS casuals that’s got a bayonet that he got from some place and he’s threatening to jump off the balcony, into the parking lot.” So, I grab one guy �that was playing pool in the room next door. I said, “Come on with me.” And we ran upstairs to where this room was. And lo and behold, the guy was out there on the balcony. And he was threatening to jump off. And he says, “I’ll kill anybody that tries to stop me.” I grabbed an Army blanket off one of the bunks and went at him like a bull fighter. Got his bayonet folded up in that and three of us jumped on him and held him until the MPs, the guys with the straight jacket, came to take him away. And they actually did. Now, this was not an American bayonet. It was one that he got at some surplus store in town. And that’s how he happened to come upon that…that bayonet that, you know, we caught him with upstairs threatening to jump off into the parking lot. And it was a few days after that that I got orders that I was going to go home and then report to Oakland. (01:30:17) Interviewer: Right. Now, were any of these OCS casuals people who maybe had flunked out of OCS intentionally? Or stalled? Veteran: Some of them may have, yep. Now, there was on guy that came out of OCS…He had only been there two days. The guy had a degree in geological engineering. He worked for some local oil company prior to getting drafted. And he saw what was going on with this breaking everybody down to nothing in OCS. And he said, “I spent too much money on my brain. They’re not going to screw with me.” So, he purposely started screwing with them. Purposely doing everything wrong. Like you know, when an upperclassman told him, you know, you don’t do anything until I tell you to. Well, this upperclassman gets caught by another upper classman and this guy went ahead and marched his troops right through the floor garden and smack into the side of the building. And you know, he kept doing things like that and after about three days, he basically told one of the officers, he said, “You know, you try screwing with my mind, I am going to screw with your program.” And they let him go. And he was somebody I could talk to �pretty well over the OCS casual thing. But there were some of those guys that were mentally gone. They should have—they should have had some real severe psychological counseling before they got turned loose. I can’t—you know, some of those guys, I can’t imagine they ever did anything productive in their lives afterwards. But… (01:32:06) Interviewer: Alright. So, a rather digression there. So, you’re going back now. So, you have gone—you are now headed to Vietnam. We have gotten you as far as Oakland with the— was that the depot you flew out of? Veteran: Yep. Yep. Now, at Oakland, one of the things that we did there: we went to donate blood for the city of San Francisco because once we started taking the anti-malarial meds, they couldn’t take our blood at the blood collection center. Well, it was my first real encounter with anti-war. They were throwing stuff at us. We were baby killers and all this other stuff and I am thinking hey, we are donating blood to your city and to people who need blood in your city. And we are the bad guys? You know, there’s something wrong with this whole picture. Well, my picture of California hasn’t much improved, you know, over the years. It’s like there’s an awful lot of people that maybe if the next earthquake dropped California off into the Pacific Ocean, we might be better off. You know? But because we encountered the same thing when we came back after Vietnam. And— Interviewer: Now, this time when you were at Oakland—so where did you encounter the protesters? Was it at the— (01:33:31) Veteran: That was right downtown San Francisco, at the blood collection center. Interviewer: Right. So, they knew you were going to be there? �Veteran: Oh, yeah. They knew—they knew that, you know, like the Army was brining guys in and that was—it was probably 3 or 4 busloads a day that the Army brought over there to donate blood. And you know, the Army buses rolled up and they were already angry with us. And throwing things at us and you know, the baby killer signs and the whole bit. And I am thinking, why? I mean we are doing—we are trying to do something for your community. And we are the bad guys? You know. But did you want to go from there to the flight over or where do you want to go next? Interviewer: I mean yeah, that’s—I think we’ve… Veteran: Okay. Interviewer: I guess how long did you spend at Oakland do you think? (01:34:32) Veteran: I was there probably about 5 days. Interviewer: Okay. And aside from doing—going and giving blood—how did you spend your time? Veteran: They had us walking around the post. You know, if you can pick it up. You know, please call kind of stuff. If you can’t pick it up, paint it white. You know, types of—types of things. And a lot of times we, you know, spent time reading or just sitting in our bunks. And then they had the thing where we had flight calls and they called my name off and we went out to the Air Force terminal. And we slept in a big hangar in bunks. You know, they didn’t have any bedding or anything on them. We just laid there on the bunks. I didn’t sleep real well that night because I knew where I was going was—I knew I would probably go to a gun crew some place. I’d read about artillery firebases being attacked and the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong coming through the wire. And those types of thoughts were in mind so I just didn’t sleep real well. And I �got out and was standing in a kind of like a porch area outside the side of the hangar. And I am looking and there’s this tractor coming down the taxi way. And the tractor is pulling these wagons that are loaded with coffins. I am kind of…They are sneaking all of these dead Americans back in the middle of the night. Does anybody know that this is going on? And that there are this many Americans coming back every night? Because I had heard the tractors go by but had never paid much attention to it until I went out that one time at…Yeah. There were wagons full of coffins coming back from Vietnam. And so, you know I was thinking yeah, this is…this is going to be a pretty tough year. So… Interviewer: So, when is this now, chronologically? (01:36:49) Veteran: That would be the fall of’66. Oh, probably two weeks before Thanksgiving. We had had a—actually, combination Christmas and Thanksgiving at my parents’ house the week before I reported to Oakland because they wanted me to get a chance to see the relatives before I went. So, my mom had basically everybody over from, you know, for the relatives. We had a Thanksgiving dinner a couple weeks early. So, I finally got a call for a flight and so forth. And we stopped at Hawaii but I—you know, I can’t say I saw anything of Hawaii. Because we got off the airplane and walked around in this fenced enclosure and they wouldn’t let us go anywhere. We got a chance to stretch our legs but that was about it. Got back on the plane and then flew to the island of Guam where planes were taking off to bomb Vietnam already from there. We saw B-52s, we saw B-47s, some of them we could see bombs hanging from the bottoms. (01:38:10) Veteran: We knew they were probably not heading towards Vietnam empty. And anyway, they got us back on the plane and we were supposed to land at Tan Son Nhut Air Base in Vietnam, which is right near Saigon. And the pilot says, “We will have a slight delay before we land.” He said, “There’s a fire fight going on on one side of Tan Son Nhut and the artillery battery is on the �other.” And he says, “I don’t like sharing airspace with artillery rounds so we are going to wait a while until they are done shooting.” And I am looking down at the Saigon River and the mud and the little boats in the river. I am thinking…awfully long year. You know? Well, we landed at— landed at Tan Son Nhut and they put us in some barracks that were right there at the Air Base for that first night. Now, these had mosquito nets on them but they didn’t have any mattresses on them. So, the mosquitoes come up from the bottom and anyway, we were still in our class B uniforms, khaki at the time. And then the next day, they out us on a bus and I noticed okay, the bus has got screens on the windows, heavy screens, and somebody asked the bus driver, “Why are the screens on them?” “Oh, that’s so the Viet Cong doesn’t throw a hand grenade into the bus.” Okay, I am not even to a base yet, I haven’t been issued a weapon yet, and they’re already talking about how the Viet Cong can do me in. and I thought not good. And I also saw a lot of refugees along the road. Now, some of these refugees were sleeping in the wax coated cardboard shipping boxes. That was their house, you know. A family was living in a…in a box a little smaller than the bathroom down the hall here. (01:40:27) Veteran: And sometimes there were people who had died that were just laying along the road that other people were walking around. And that was, you know, a different world than I had ever been exposed to before. From there we went to a place called Long Binh, which was where 90th Replacement Depot was located. Now, at 90th Replacement Depot, I got there just—I had been assigned to Vietnam but no particular unit yet. And 90th Replacement Depot was where they assigned me to a unit. I fully expected to go to the first infantry division because they had 155 self-propels and I was—I had, you know, all my records showed I was an expert gunner on the 155 sp. It only seemed like they would put me in the job that I was probably best trained at. And after a few days, they called my—now, 90th Replacement Depot I noticed they had the �wooden boxes that said poison on the outside. They were yellow boxes, probably ¾ of an inch thick wood on the side. And I found out that they were rat trap—rat poison—boxes. The rats would get the rat poison out of there. And I noticed there was some kind of scummy water around. And I also notice that there was some Vietnamese—they were using like a big hand drill to drill holes for bolts to build a barracks. You know, because some places they had barracks, some places the replacements were still in tents. And 90th Replacement continued getting bigger and bigger as things got on. (01:42:21) Veteran: Well, they eventually called my name and that I was supposed to go to the first cavalry division. And I went to the office and I said, “You sure that isn’t first infantry division?” I said, “First Cavalry Division doesn’t have any 155 self-propels.” And they said, “No, but we have looked at your scores and they want somebody with your capability. You’ll be trained up there.” And I thought oh jeez. I had seen, just before I went to Oakland, I had seen a program called Saga of Western Man on television. And they had a program on that called I Am a Soldier. And it dealt with the A company, First Battalion, 8th cavalry. And a company commander by the name of Ted Danielsen. And I watched those and I thought hmm, well I…at least, you know, if I am going to the first cavalry division, I could end up like a unit like that, which is a real straight unit. I mean, it’s not what I have been trained for but that’s a real straight unit. And I kind of filed that, you know, in the back of my mind. And also, during that time period, I read a 1965 National Geographic article on the use of special forces in Vietnam. And they had quite a bit about a Major Vernon Gillespie who—well actually, at that time he was a captain. (01:44:12) Veteran: But this Vernon Gillespie was quite influential in ending the 1964 Montagnard Revolt. They had a lot of pictures of him in National Geographic. He had been photographed in several other places. Well, I didn’t know that this Ted Danielsen thing and Vernon Gillespie were people �I was going to cross paths with later on. And along with some of the other guys it showed with Ted Danielsen from his A company, the 1st of the 8th. But again, you know, this was kind of at the back of my mind. And I thought well, you know, it might not be a bad assignment anyway. So, they put me on a C-130 and flew my up to An Khê, which was the headquarters of the 1st Cavalry Division at that time. Now, 1st Cavalry Division had gone over there in 1965. They had been there a year already when I got there. The commander of the first cavalry division when they went over was Harry W. Kinnard. Harry W. Kinnard was well known in some of my former reading, particularly about the Battle of the Bulge. Harry W. Kinnard was the operations officer for McAuliffe of the 101st Airborne Division. So, I was familiar with the name Harry W. Kinnard and so forth. And there also, during that first year, they had some rather unusual battalion commanders that went over there. One was a guy by the name of John Stockton. John Stockton later on wrote a book called A Cavalryman’s Life. Actually, his wife finished it up after he died at McGill University Hospital in Toronto, Canada. And anyway, John Stockton had been a young lieutenant during World War 2. He had been involved in, you know, the final few months before Germany fell and he mentions a number of incidents in his book, The Cavalryman’s Trade, about you know, his time in that. (01:46:51) Veteran: But he commanded the 1st of the 9th. Now, Stockton was a rather unusual personality. While they were at Fort Benning, Georgia, he went ahead and bought a mule and decided the mule was going to be their mascot for the 1st of the 9th. And it was going to go to Vietnam with them. Well, it was put on the boat. The Navy threatened to stamp it property—brand it, property of the United States Navy. So, he had a guard put on it. And they went to Vietnam like that. Stockton was not too aware of how they were going to land in Vietnam. He had heard they’d make a beach landing. And so, he went to the captain and asked to see, you know, their landing �nets. He wanted to ahead and inspect everything. Captain had not even been informed where he was going at the time. He’s getting this story about landing nets and people going over the side of his boat in landing nets. And a lot of confusion here. Well, eventually they get to Vietnam and it turns out that there are civilians as well as officers greeting them as the boats pull into Vietnam, a place called Qui Nhon along the central coastline. (01:48:23) Veteran: It had been used as a base by the Japanese during World War 2. And you know, it had a nice harbor and stuff. Well, they unloaded there. John Stockton’s mule was taken off but he gets this letter from Kinnard, or notice from Kinnard, the mule is not to set foot on the ramp of one of the helicopters. Kinnard wants this mule to basically stay in Qui Nhon and doesn’t go to base camp at An Khê. Well, general—a brigadier general knows—points up, taps Kinnard on the shoulder. And here is this mule—it’s in a sling underneath the helicopter. And going by. Of course, Kinnard was kind of irked at the situation. Stockton got to Vietnam. The first raid that they had when they got to Qui Nhon, Stockton has got his mule out. Stockton is wearing his black cavalry hat and a saber and leading this mule, it’s got a pack on the back with two 12 load batteries powering this rotating beacon that’s supposed to be on the back of a helicopter. Kinnard is not at all pleased with, you know, Stockton’s behavior on all this stuff. And Stockton was one of the two guys that if you saw the movie Apocalypse Now, the crazy colonel there played by Robert Duvall? Well, Stockton was one of the two guys they actually used for the model for that character. The other one was James [Jack] Smith who was also later on brigade commander. But he was—General Smith had a photographic memory. But Smith used to go down in his helicopter and shoot up at snipers in the trees. You know, he was that—that type of person. (01:50:37) �Veteran: They also sometimes referred to him as Sniper Smith because when he was battalion commander and then he was in the command helicopter, which was a Huey, he carried an M1 Garand. And if there was Viet Cong running down there all alone, he had the helicopter get to a position and you know, hold it as still as he could and he’d plink the guy with his M1 Garand out of the helicopter. So, some of the guys referred to him as Sniper Smith. Other ones referred to him as Crazy James. But he was a good, straight officer. Now, Stockton, in—you see in the movie We Were Soldiers actually, that was a couple later battles. There were a few battles that actually took place before that. One was called the Mure River, the Tay River, Hospital Complex, and LZ Mary. All four of those were not as big as the ones that showed in the movie, We Were Soldiers. But they were still some fairly significant battles. Stockton played a part in the one at LZ Mary because it was his battalion from—that had the company the 1st and the 9th, that attacked what they thought was a North Vietnamese platoon. It turned out to be the lead element of the North Vietnamese battalion, which probably came chasing after Stockton’s platoon which assembled with the rest of the guys from the company on a small hilltop that got the name LZ Mary. (01:52:26) Veteran: And Stockton went ahead and decided that he was going to reinforce LZ Mary at night, which had never been done by helicopter before. And on the middle of the battle, reinforcing the things at night. But he went ahead and made plans for this. The unit that was split, the reaction force was A Company 1st of the 8th, which is the one commanded by this Ted Danielsen. And they went in by helicopter at night since the landing lights or the normal navigation lights made the helicopters too much of a target, they had infantrymen put the angle head flashlights down on the deck so that they could only be seen by helicopters at the same altitude. And they managed to go in without tangling blades together and dropping off A company 1st of the 8th. One of them �was a guy by the name of John Handlin who I met later on again. But he was shot in the spine and paralyzed. His platoon sergeant was a guy by the name of Ken Revere who took over the platoon. And they managed to hold the thing during the night. Some other guys were like Earl Waters and so forth that there were guys at that time that I got to know later on real well that were in on that. And Earl Waters—if you have ever seen the documentary Shadow of the Blade, about this helicopter that was fixed up and they went and visited Vietnam vets before it went to the Smithsonian in Washington D.C. But it’s last stop on the flight was Agent Fire, New Mexico where they have that chapel that is now actually a state historical park, run by the state of New Mexico. (01:54:40) Veteran: But anyway, the—these guys went ahead and fought the battle and the North Vietnamese backed off because they realized once daylight came, there were going to be lots of helicopters coming in, lots of air and rocket artillery. So, they backed away from this thing. Now, Ted Danielsen said until I wrote the chapter on the 1st of the 8th cavalry for the book 50th Anniversary of Airborne which was put out by Turner Publications, I wrote—Ken Myrtle who was the battalion commander, asked me to write the chapter on 1st of the 8th, which I did. And up until that point, he had refused—Danielsen had referred to the LZ as LZ Spiderweb because of all the tracers going across it at night. He didn’t know it really had another name for the LZ. And he you know, he and I got to be pretty good friends later on. But there were those battles that went on. Now earlier, the hospital flight complex—there was a guy by the name Bill Mosey who was a company commander of Charlie company that actually captured a North Vietnamese weapon that Colonel Myrtle wanted. And after capturing the guy, you know, he sent the weapon back along with the—along with the wounded North Vietnamese. (01:56:15) �Veteran: And Myrtle called him back on the radio and said, “You know, I didn’t know you were going to send the guy that was attached to that rifle back too.” And anyway, you know that became kind of a standard joke. Ken Myrtle was actually offered the job as head of what they called S3 Air and Jet, sort of in charge of the helicopters for air assaults for the 1st cavalry division. Kinnard had offered him that position. Myrtle decided he wanted to command one of the airborne battalions instead. Now, 1st brigade was airborne. I was 1st of the 8th, 2nd of the 8th. And 1st of the 12th plus the 2nd of the 19th artillery. So, those units were airborne when I went over there. And Ken Myrtle was in charge of one of those infantry battalions and he was the one that asked me to do some of this writing. And of course, later on, he put me in a job as the publicity officer for the Charming Mustangs, which was a—the guys that served in Vietnam together, we started with 23, we got about 600 guys contacted right now. But anyway, the Sergeant Major McAuliffe also had a real good choice of NCOs that he picked so we had some real good NCOs over there. Now, one of the other first battalion commanders was a guy from 1st of the 7th, which was Harold G. Moore who was co-author of the book We Were Soldiers Once and Young. Now, I think that is probably one of the best books on the early time in Vietnam. (01:58:17) Veteran: It captures the mood of the American people: the idea that, you know, we thought we could defeat any foe, defend any friend as Kennedy had said. You know, we firmly believed in that and a lot of guys enlisted under that concept. And Moore’s book does a good job of explaining that. And also, it does an excellent—now, I mentioned these earlier battles. Those took place in October and the first part of November. The 10th of November, the 3rd brigade took over. And 3rd brigade was the unit that Hal Moore was with—1st of 7th, 2nd of 7th. And 1st of the 5th. And that made up 2nd brigade—or 3rd brigade. And Hal Moore was commander of one of �those battalions. McDade was commander of 2nd of the 7th. Now the book—I am not going to get too much into the book but it’s very accurately done. The movie is very accurately done except for the last 10 minutes. It shows Elmore going out and chasing the North Vietnamese out of their headquarters and took the Chu Pong Massif. They were, number one, Hal Moore fought for two and a half days. His troops were beat. He went out far enough to account for all of his dead and wounded and pulled them back in. Now, when McDade lost so many guys, a number of people say that McDade had a nervous breakdown during the battle and basically lost control over everything. Hal Moore doesn’t say that in his book but a lot of the other people who were there say that. (02:00:06) Veteran: Now, Hal Moore probably didn’t say it because he was a fellow West Point graduate. But, you know, he didn’t want to put him down. But it was actually Elmore that went out and accounted for the 3 missing guys that, you know, McDade had left behind after that battle in which they’d lost 155. Hal Moore lost 79 during his battle plus one Air Force officer who was flying an A-1 Skyraider that went down. And..but you know in the movie, Hal Moore talks about I will leave no one behind. He, you know, that part is played by Mel Gibson and I think Mel Gibson does a pretty good job of portraying war up until that last 10 minutes. (02:01:02) Interviewer: Okay. Yeah, and… Veteran: Did you want to stop there? Or did you— Interviewer: Well, I mean you are kind of talking a lot about people. Now, which of these different characters were still with the division when you got there? Veteran: Okay. There were guys from Hal Moore’s unit that had come back for a 2nd tour, some of them that were still there. So, I had a chance to interview some of them. Now, when I first got �to 2nd 19th artillery, I got there—by the time I got there, it was getting dark. There was a light on the sign that said “2nd 19th artillery on the way, airborne.” I thought hey, I originally wanted to go to an airborne unit. I am going to an airborne unit now. And I was introduced to them and one of the first things that they did was—I had a secret clearance, so they assigned me as a courier to fly in a helicopter over Pleiku, where I dropped off some secret documents there. Flying over Pleiku was an interesting experience because we flew across what’s called the Mang Yang Pass. Mang Yang Pass is the pass between those two towns. It’s where Group Mobile 100 was pretty much wiped out during the Vietnam War with the French. And you see that at the beginning of the movie We Were Soldiers. (02:02:29) Interviewer: Yeah. But that’s a case where they didn’t do a very good job. It looked nothing like that. Veteran: Yeah. And as I flew over it, I noticed that it looked like a Chinese checker board; there were all kinds of dents on the ground in nice, neat order and nice, neat pattern. And I asked the pilot, I said, “Why does the ground look like that? They are too close together to be foxholes.” And he says, “Well, that’s where all the Frenchmen are buried.” I said, “What do you mean?” He said, “Well, the Viet Minh, after they won the battle, they’d go and put two of these Frenchmen in each hole in standing position and they’d use a—like a large post hole digger to dig a hole and they were all facing back towards France. And the saying was that France was where they should have stayed. They should have never come over there.” So, as the bodies decayed, these left little depressions that looked like a Chinese checkerboard all across this hillside. And so, that was kind of a different introduction to Vietnam and the country we were in. Interviewer: Okay. (02:03:40) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_SheathelmG2270V1 Title A name given to the resource Sheathelm, Glenn (1 of 3, Interview transcript and video), 2018 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018-08-08 Description An account of the resource Glenn Sheathelm was born in Muskegon, Michigan, in 1946. Enlisting in the Army in 1965, he joins the Army Artillery and undergoes Basic Training at Fort Knox, Kentucky, and AIT at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, before being deployed to Nuremberg, Germany. He is then redeployed to Vietnam where he served with the Fire Direction Control and S2 Military Intelligence sections of the First Cavalry Division until after the Tet Offensive in January of 1968. He sees combat while on patrol, during rescue missions, during Air Assaults, and during the Second Battle of Tam Quan when he receives several minor wounds and is sent to the rear for treatment in the final days of his deployment. He then returns to the United States in February of 1968 where he attends the Western Michigan and Grand Valley State Universities for masters' degrees in library sciences, literary media, and history. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Sheathelm, Glenn H. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/da66908e136d51dc4d79027a46e7e3d5.mp4 21f75a0ad3fef6089d6e16de01b97bf2 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/ec871d930876ce3cc4f393ff2a481c2f.pdf 0204a1a3ed534e6dd5d1516f7f3bac43 PDF Text Text Saladin, Philip Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Interview Name of War: Iraq War Interviewee’s Name: Philip Saladin Length of Interview: (3:05:31) Interviewed by: James Smither Transcribed by: Chelsea Chandler Interviewer: “Okay. Start us off with some background on yourself, and to begin with, where and when were you born?” Okay. My name’s Philip Saladin. I was born in Bayonne, New Jersey. January 19, 1982. Interviewer: “Okay. Did you grow up there, or did you move around?” Yes, I grew up, I guess, up to after high school in Bayonne, but I traveled back and forth. Had family throughout the state. Interviewer: “Okay, and what was your family doing for a living when you were a kid?” When I was a kid, it was—I remember my mom being home and my dad working all the time, and pretty much one of those families just parents working and… Interviewer: “What kind of job did your dad have?” Factory. Mom—And my mom worked—She eventually worked in a factory too, but a lot of the time it was my mom at home. And then we had a huge family, though. I have five brothers, two sisters. Interviewer: “All right. Okay, and when did you finish high school?” 2001. (1:02) Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and then what did you do when you got out of high school?” I was playing football—I was an athlete—so I went to college. I gave that a shot. I lasted all but a year, and then… Interviewer: “Okay. What school did you go to?” Western Connecticut State University. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now how did you learn about 9/11, or where were you when that happened?” �Saladin, Philip Oh, that’s a—I—That’s a good one. I remember that day like right now. I was in college. Was driving to class. I had a morning class. I’m driving, and the news is already going. Something’s happening, and I’m like, “Okay.” So I stop at the chow hall, get breakfast, and as I sit down, I look up. You know, the image that everybody remembers—bam, second plane crashing—and I was just like, “Okay. Something—” You know. “Something’s going on.” You get that feeling. You just know it then. And I go to class. Five minutes into class, teacher’s like, “Everybody leave.” So, you know, I go back, and I’m in Connecticut. My whole family’s in New Jersey, so—And, of course, cell phone reception is out. I can’t get in touch with nobody, and so me and a friend of mine was like, “Okay. We’re going to drive home this weekend.” As you imagine, the bridge—Everything is just—Military all over, everything is shut down, and it’s like, “Okay. Are we going to get home this weekend?” (2:15) But eventually they were letting traffic through the bridge, and, you know—And I finally got home, but I—Crazy. One of the most imprinted images of my [?]. It’s—Besides the airplane crashing—Is when I was driving over the George Washington Bridge. You know, and I grew up there. I seen that image. Or I lived—My brother has a house across the street. I could see the Twin Towers from his porch. Coming across the bridge you just see dust, and it’s just—It’s—It was—I wanted it to not be real. I’m like, “No.” This is, you know, one of those situations, and then, you know, weeks go by, a couple days go by, whatever. And then it starts sinking in. You’re like, “Oh, wow. This is real.” And yeah. Interviewer: “All right. Now I’m going to ask a side question. Your last name is Saladin, which is of Arabic origin.” Yes. Correct. Yes. Interviewer: “Is that part of your background, or is it a black Muslim thing, or…?” I think it’s—I’ve been trying to look into it a little more. My dad said that my grandfather is from Egypt originally, but my mom and dad and all my family that I know are all from Dominican Republic. So I guess my grandfather moved to Dominican Republic, met my grandmother—But information about my grandfather is limited to none. My grandmother passed away, so it’s word of mouth. And, you know, it’s not easy stuff to find, so—And then that was another thing. When I went to Iraq, that was a pretty cool thing. Everybody saw my last name, and that—I got to find some good information out there about that, so it was pretty sweet and interesting. And then even as a kid growing up—When I was doing, you know, history at that time in grade school, they were still talking about—I seen my last name in a book, and I’m like, “Oh, that’s so cool.” You know, and then that kind of got my little bug going on that one. (4:04) Interviewer: “Okay, but you didn’t really identify as Middle Eastern, per se, or Arabic ever?” No, I’ve never—You know, never—As a—Just—Only thing in common is just the last name. Interviewer: “Right. Okay. All right. Now you don’t join the Army until sometime afterward. So you go to college for a year, and that does not work out particularly well. So what do you do next?” �Saladin, Philip Well, I always had the bug for the military. My brother was in the military during the initial— The Kuwait—The invasion. He was there, and he did a small stint. He did it more for college purposes, and then—But I just always had it, and then I tried to join when I was in college. But I was still unsure what I was going to do, so I never fully committed. And then I left college, and I became a car salesman out of everything. And I’m a car salesman. It’s about a year or so in— maybe a little bit more—and, you know, it’s like I was bored. I just—It wasn’t what I saw myself doing, it’s not what I wanted to do, and it’s—I say it’s funny. It’s a coincidence or whatever it was. A friend of mine thought it was a joke. He had bumped into a recruiter in the street. He’s like, “Yeah, I’ve got a friend who wants to join the Army.” He sends the recruiter to my job. I guess he didn’t think the recruiter would show up. Sure enough, I’m selling cars, and this guy’s like, “Hey, are you Phil?” And I’m like, “Yeah.” And I thought he was going to buy a car, so I’m talking to him. Next thing I know, I’m like, “Sure.” I’m taking the test, I’m at MEPS doing some paperwork, and then I got a date. And I was like, “Hey. I’m joining the infantry.” Yeah, it was awesome. Interviewer: “All right. Now as you were doing the testing and the paperwork and stuff, were they asking you what kind of specialization you wanted or training or…?” There was a—I had a—I really—I didn’t know much about the Army, or I don’t want to say I was super into it. I knew about different jobs, but I was—I wanted to fight. I was just like, “Okay. That’s what I want to be.” I sat down, and I’m sitting in the recruiter’s office. And this guy walks by, and he has this badge on his chest. And it’s a Combat Infantryman Badge, and I was just like, “What is that?” Dude’s like, “Oh, that’s a Combat Infantryman Badge. You get it if you’re in the infantry.” And I was like, “Well, that’s what I want to do, so…” (6:18) And they had this giant book of jobs. I took the test, and they’re all like, “These are all your jobs.” I was like, “Is that one on there?” They’re like, “Yeah.” I was like, “I want that.” It was like, “You sure? They’re—” And he was kind of trying to talk me out of it. He was like, “There’s so many other jobs there.” And it’s funny. He even recommended to me. He’s like, “I’ve got a friend in the Air Force that—I could get you into the Air Force, and you’ll probably like the Air Force more.” And I was just like, “Do they have infantry?” He was like, “No.” I was like, “I don’t want to do it.” So that was my mindset, and I guess it must have been—You know, high school—I played football and wrestling, and I was just always that—Just had that—I guess, that mentality, and, you know. And I went, and I initially joined the National Guard. And I’m in—And literally three days into basic training I was like, “I want to go active duty.” I was like, “This is—” Interviewer: “Okay, so initially when you sign up, you sign up for the National Guard, and then one of the things they do with the Guardsmen is they then send them off for Army basic training. But then, as a Guardsman—Okay, after that, you would normally go home.” Correct. Interviewer: “Okay. Now—So when do you report for basic training?” �Saladin, Philip So it was September. I reported to basic training. It’s a little process. They flew me in. You know, they flew me out to Georgia. In Georgia, you’ve got a whole bunch of brand new guys. Don’t know nothing. They throw you in a school bus, you’re on a bus for a couple hours, and then soon, you know—You’re, you know, pulling into a base. And then, “Hey!” You’re— Interviewer: “Okay, so they fly you—Did they fly you to Atlanta?” Yeah, so, I guess, depending on where you’re from—But everybody—The central, final airport is Atlanta, and then Atlanta—They’ve just got the buses lined up, and then—And it’s weird. It’s an airport within its own because you come in, you land, you do all the stuff, but that’s where it ends. (8:04) As soon as you come out the check-in, it’s their own little area. You get your bags and then straight to the buses, and it’s like you’re separated from everybody. And then, you know, at this time you’re new, so you don’t know. The military still hasn’t kicked in, but in your head it has. You’re—Well, you know, and then—So you’re there, and you meet people. You’re on a bus, and they just drive it. And it’s—Tinted out bus, so… Interviewer: “Okay. Now what base are they taking you to?” Fort Benning, Georgia. I was going to Fort Benning—good, old Sand Hill—and you get there. We first get to the reception. I think it was 150 or—No, that was my unit in basic. I—I don’t— Whatever they called the reception in Benning. So we’re there. You’re there for a week processing, getting your clothes—you know, everything—and just sort of waiting to get the—I guess, the next class to open. Then, all of a sudden, bam. Your drill sergeant’s calling. Interviewer: “All right. Now what kinds of people were going in when you did?” Oh, it was a mix. I—When I tell you—I thought growing up in New Jersey in that area and New York that I knew a wide variety of people. Oh, no. I got there, and it was just like, “Man.” You meet—If you think of a personality, you’ll meet that person there. It’s every walks of life. It’s interesting too at that time. What? 2005. I’m meeting people. They’re like, “Oh, you’re the first colored person I’ve ever seen.” You know, and it’s interesting. You know, you don’t think that in your head. You’re—You know, you’re—By this time you’re like, “Oh, yeah, everybody’s—” You know, you pass them, but it was like,“Yeah.” It was like, “I’ve never—” And it wasn’t in a malicious way. It was like, “I’ve never—” Like, “I’ve never seen somebody.” “Hey. What’s up?” And then—But you discover so much stuff. That’s where I first found out about the Confederate flag. (10:07) Me growing up from New Jersey—I see a Confederate flag. I’m like, “Oh, that has to be something racist.” You know, so I see this kid. He’s got this giant, full back tattoo of a Confederate flag, and I’m looking. And I’m like, “Great. This is who I’ve got to bunk next to.” And the guy turns around, and we’re just staring at each other. And he was like, “I’m not racist.” And I was just like, “Are you reading my mind?” I’m like, “Does it say it on my head?” And he’s like, “You’re looking at my tattoo.” He’s—And I was like, “Okay.” And then we started talking, and we ended up becoming best friends. We talked, he explained it to me and everything, and I was like, “That’s so awesome.” Broke down to me how—“No, it’s like, you know—We have our small, little community. This is what we believe in. This is what it’s about.” And I was like, “This stuff is awesome.” And then you start meeting more people like that, and then, you know—And then you also meet some special people. You’re like, “Wow.” Like, “I �Saladin, Philip know why you’re here.” And—But even those people—When you talk to them, you’re like, “Yeah…” But then when you’re out there doing stuff, you’re like, “All right. Yeah.” Like, “We’re all here for the—” At the end of the day, we’re all here doing the same thing. And it’s weird how. It takes a little—Couple weeks, but once you’re in—How that brings you, you know—Somebody—You probably just got into a fistfight two days ago, and the next thing you know you’re sleeping in a muddy hole with him. Like, “Come on, dude. Get closer. Keep me warm.” Interviewer: “All right. Now what—So you do your battery of tests, and you’re kind of sitting around. Do you spend—Now in that first week when you’re processing, are they keeping you busy with one thing or another?” They—Yes and no. It’s almost busywork. The physical training was minimal. It wasn’t a scheduled—It was minimal. I think they purposefully feed you. They’ve got this—The lunch is this great spread, you know. You’ve got your ice cream, snacks, and everybody’s in there eating pizza. And I think they do it on purpose. Like, “Okay. Here. Enjoy this because, you know, you’re not going to have this for a long time.” (12:03) So they—And me? I was—Knew a little bit from, you know, just family and people I knew, so I was like, “I’m just going to, you know, keep it easy.” I was already a little heavier—on the heavy side—so I was like, “I’m going to try to—” So we’re doing that, and it’s a lot of class. You know, it’s like, “Okay. Come to this orientation. We’re going to—” It’s a lot of like, “We’re going to read about this weapon system. We’re going to teach you this. We’re going to teach the super, most basic basic of the basic things that is not going to get your head chewed off when you first show up.” That’s it, and then a lot of it was like, “Okay. Clean.” A lot of cleaning, sitting around. If you were sitting around, be reading. Be—Just doing something productive was the thing. If we didn’t have nothing scheduled, do something productive because then they’ll find something to do, and that was, you know, what you wanted to avoid. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now when you actually start the training cycle, now what are you doing?” Okay. Now it’s almost a crawl, walk, run phase. You start—Basics. You get to your room. “This is your canteen. This is your canteen cup. This is your gear. It goes on your gear like this. This is how you wear it.” So pretty much you first—The first week, I would say, is the standards. You’re getting shown the standards. “This is how you have your closet. This is how you have your bed made. This is how we expect everything to be.” So it’s a consistent drilling of, “This is—” And then, after that first week, they kind of slack off a little bit, and now you’re a lot more responsible for your stuff. Like, “Okay.” Like your shoes. “Oh. How come your shoes—” You know. Then you start feeling the problems. Okay. Like, “You guys are not looking—” You know. “You’re not keeping the standard.” We start doing the physical correctness and all that, and then—But at the same time, you’re learning. You know, it’s like, “Okay. Here’s this rifle. Take it apart and put it back together as fast as you can.” You know, some people do it in thirty seconds. Some people do it in ten minutes. You know, it’s—But—And it’s like, “Okay. You couldn’t do it in ten minutes. You’re going to start knocking out pushups.” Okay. Now you’re like, “I don’t want to do pushups again. Let me get this together faster.” And— �Saladin, Philip Interviewer: “Okay, so you mentioned physical correction. They’re not hitting you, but—” (14:03) No, no, not like that. Physical fitness, I would say. Interviewer: “You’re doing pushups and things.” Yeah, and—But it, you know—In the moment, you’re like, “Ugh. Why am I doing this?” But then now I look back. I’m like, “It worked. It definitely worked because, you know, you don’t want to do pushups all day.” Interviewer: “All right. Now, I guess, how hard did they ride you?” At first, discipline-wise, they rode you. Because, you know, you came in there, you had this street mentality, you know. It’s—So man, it was like, you know, “Head and eyes forward. Don’t talk unless you’re spoken to.” Like, “I don’t want to hear a peep. You’re going to sit there for three hours and clean your weapon.” Or, “You’re going to learn this.” Or, “You’re going to learn how to read a map.” It was discipline. It was like when they say they break you down to build you back up into a soldier, they—Yeah, they strip you from any ego you have. Everything is gone. You think you’re good at something, or you know everything? No. It gets taken from you, but then you just—Then you start learning everything, and it’s like, you know, you thought you knew how to walk a certain way. You know, you come in there like, “Well, now I’m being taught how to walk?” You don’t think that, but that’s how it is. Like, “No. Thirty inches. Hands like this.” You know, and then—And at first you’re like, “I’m never going to do all this.” But then you start seeing—Little by little, it just, you know—It starts clicking, and—But definitely— The discipline is—The first three weeks it’s there. You have a constant drill sergeant with you at all times. You’re never left alone. There’s a task always if—Even at nighttime. You know, two people up. It’s always something. There’s always a task and purpose, and then every phase they lighten up. But they always leave it hanging over you that they can bring you back to—They call it “red phase”. That was like, “We can go back to red phase really fast.” And, you know… Interviewer: “Okay. Now how long was the basic training itself?” When I went, it was thirteen weeks and—It was either thirteen weeks or fifteen weeks. I want to say thirteen weeks and five days or three days. Some weird thing like that. (16:09) Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay. Now how large was the unit that you actually trained with?” It was—in basics—a little different from the standard units, especially at Benning, because your typical soldier goes basic one place and then specialty training somewhere else. In Benning, you stay all there for the whole time, so we had, you know, usually a company. You have three platoons. These companies were, you know, four, five, six. They were oversized, but it was probably—It was Fox? We had—Oh. We had four platoons, so… Interviewer: “About how big was a platoon?” �Saladin, Philip I want to say we had—What? We would say, in basic anywhere from forty—Between forty and fifty starting, but then, as basic goes on, we—I think we graduated with maybe twenty something people. We lost probably fifty percent of our class. Interviewer: “Okay. Yeah, that is, in fact, where I was kind of heading with that line of questioning. You get a lot of people who have come in and enlisted, but then an awful lot drop out. Now what kinds of things knocked them out?” It’s—A lot of stuff —Different kind of—One is physical. Some people get, you know, stress fractures, break an ankle, something, and they’ll get rolled back. So they’ll just either get— depending on how far along we were—So let’s say we were on week nine. Instead of them getting thrown into week one of the next group, they’ll just hold them, recuperate them, and then they’ll be able to start week eight or nine with the next group. But if it’s a discipline problem, you’re going to week zero. You’re going to week zero no matter what. We had a guy—a week before graduation—Guess where he went. Week zero. Because he went out on pass and got in trouble, so—But then you have people that ran away, and that’s a whole other amazing thing in itself. You’re like, “Why?” You know, we had a few AWOLs, and I’d say probably three or four of them. But—And they would make examples of the AWOLs. It was—Because they would get caught, you know, because you’ve got somebody in the middle of Savannah, Georgia who’s from North Dakota or something. He’s like, “Oh, I’m going to run away and go somewhere.” And you’re this private who—Everybody probably within two hundred miles can spot you. Like, “That’s a private running away.” (18:24) And then you’ll see them two days later in the back of an MP car, getting drove in, and it’s—But, you know, some of them got out. Some of them got recycled. Interviewer: “Okay. Now did some of them just quit?” Yes, yes. You had people that just refused. Like, “No.” You know, and then it’s like, you know, besides from physically grabbing them and dragging them out of the room, which, you know, the drill sergeants can’t do—They were just like, “No. I’m not—I’m just—This is not for me. I’m not doing it.” And then, you know, they’d—Somebody would come, they would take them, and then we wouldn’t see them again. So I don’t know if they got recycled, they got sent away, or what it was, but we had two people that—Then they call them, I guess, “failure to adapts,” and they just ran them out. But… Interviewer: “Right. Okay. Now how long do you think it took you to adapt? I mean, was there a point when you kind of understood—while you were still in basic—what was going on and just rolled with it, or…?” Yeah. I would say—I thought it—For instance, it was almost a two-step process for me because when I first got there I thought I knew it. I was like, “Okay. I’m just going to go, I’m going to shut up, and I’m just going to do what I’m told. And I’ll survive.” And I was like, “That’ll make me through it.” But, you know, they just had this thing of picking out the people who were just trying to play the shadows and not get in trouble but not do too much, and that was just what I was trying to do. And I had a drill sergeant that, you know—I guess he just wanted to encourage me, and he would call me out now and then. He put me in a leadership �Saladin, Philip position, and, you know, I never—You know, I grew up in a city. (20:01) I had never held a weapon, and I’m like, “Okay.” You know, I can’t embarrass myself right now, you know, so I don’t know. So—And I failed. It was a—We were doing a—Almost a base operation, and I think he knew it. I think he did it on purpose because he knew that I’d kind of been playing it back, and I was doing just enough. So he put me in this position, and I completely dropped the ball. I didn’t have my sectors of fire correct. It was—But he set me up. I—To this day, I say he set me up, but it opened my eyes. And I was just like, “Okay.” And then he made me understand the picture. Like, “Okay.” Like, “Yeah, you may know what you’re doing, and that’s it.” But he showed me how everything was just—Came together, and then I was just like, “Okay.” Then that kind of started that wheel rolling, and I was just like, you know, “Click.” And then it started clicking and clicking, and I was—And I started looking at everything from more of a leadership position and, you know, more than just being an individual person. When I saw it as a group— And I’m like, “Okay. This is not just—” You know. “I’m not graduating.” Like, “The class needs to graduate.” And things went a lot easier. And things went a lot easier, but I tell you what. It was a process, and I’m kind of glad I went through it because I had to—It was a huge ego check for me because I was like, you know, “I know this. I’m tough.” You know, whatever. It was just like, “No, you’re not. You don’t know nothing.” Like, “Here you go.” Interviewer: “Okay. All right, so you get through the end of this. Now do you stay at Benning for infantry training, or where do you go?” Yeah, so usually what they do is when you’re done with your—I think it’s the first three or four weeks were considered the—Or six weeks were considered the basic training, and then we would go—So instead of us getting shipped off somewhere else, our drill sergeant was like, “Hey. We’re going to celebrate your graduation from basic training.” You know, and they were just like, “Okay. Turn around. Hey. Guess what? You’re in AIT.” So we stayed in the same exact place. Interviewer: “Okay, so it’s Advanced Individual Training at that point.” Yes, and then—Now that’s when it got fun. (22:05) The physical—And I don’t want to say it got relaxed. It’s more, I think, we were just already conditioned, and we were—It felt easier to us, so the PT was easy. We were to the point where we would go—On Sundays, it was considered our downtime. We were doing PT on Sundays for ourselves, so we were—Physically, we were pretty good, and then we started doing all the infantry tactics. Learning how to do ambushes, learning how to react to an ambush, platoon attack, squad attack. You know, the infantry tactics—all our battle drills—and that was the stuff where I was like, “Okay. This is why I joined.” You know, we get to get—We don’t just have the basic M4. We get to put the little lasers on it and the optics and throw the grenades and play with claymores, and it’s—And I’m like, “Okay.” You know, and—But the—And as the ball was rolling, December came along, and in Benning, you get a Christmas break. So it was—And you’re forced, so I was like, “Ugh.” So we got to home. It wasn’t bad, but we got to go home for—It was two weeks, but when we came back, it was just horrible because it was almost like you’re in the mood. You know, and you just got snapped, so it’s not—You’re starting at week zero, but you’re not week zero. So that was an interesting one. �Saladin, Philip Interviewer: “Okay. Yeah, so you get to relax for a little bit, and then have to snap back to attention essentially and go back.” Yeah, yeah. Interviewer: “Okay. Now, of course, you’re doing this now at the end of 2006 and going into 2007, so we’ve been in Iraq now for several years. To what extent was the training you received geared toward the Middle East?” Oh, it was—I want to say—I don’t want to say primary, or that was the sole objective. But it was probably, say, eighty-five percent of the training because we still did out in the woods. Besides urban training, we did other, you know, land nav and stuff like that, but there was a heavy emphasis on urban combat pretty much. (24:04) Because Iraq was kicking off, and that was a huge—And I think,—At that time was the—No. Was it—No, that was right before the—That was a little bit before the surge, but the numbers in basic? It was mad. The drill sergeants. I remember the drill sergeants saying a lot. Like, “The numbers are a lot higher, and they’re like the summer’s when it’s the highest.” And the winter numbers were matching the summer. They just had recruits flowing through there, so it was a little faster pace. But we got through a lot, and it’s—And I liked it because I like that urban stuff. And we did—We ended up knocking out a week of drill and ceremony. Instead of doing that, we got to do some urban tactics, which is awesome. I’m like, “Who would rather not go clear a building than march?” You know. Interviewer: “Okay, so they teach you sort of physically how to operate in an urban setting. Do they give you any kind of cultural training or orientation?” No, not in basic training. I don’t know if now they do that, considering how long we’ve been there, but it would definitely be a—You know, a smart thing to do, but when I was there, they— It wasn’t, you know—They—But when you get to your individual unit, they did that a little more, but at basic it was more of a—Even in tactic-wise, it was the overall. They never got into it, and they just, you know, maybe—Step A and B is the furthest they got. They never got too deep into anything. Interviewer: “Okay, so these are really still kind of combat problems for you. How to physically fight in these different kinds of environments and what to do with the weapons and maneuver.” Yes, yes, yes. Mentally training how to enter a room and, you know, raise your weapon without thinking about it. That’s just second nature. That’s the stuff they drill into you. Memory. Muscle memory. Learn to keep your weapon on safe until you do this. That’s the stuff. The basics pretty much. Interviewer: “Okay. Now were your instructors people who had been to Iraq or Afghanistan?” (26:06) Yes, yes. I had one instructor. Great guy. He—I would say—I had three instructors. Two of them were huge impacts that I still—And then one of them—He was actually—I’m pretty sure you’ve �Saladin, Philip probably heard of it. The—It was in Afghanistan. Battle of Anaconda, I think it was. Pretty much—He was pretty much part of the Spearhead Force with the 10th Mountain Division, and he was, you know, just—The training and tactics and the stuff he was telling us was just—I loved it, and they—Of course, he would give us the stories too from his time, and, you know, just the knowledge. And, you know, he would tell us like, “When I went through basic, it was nothing like this.” You know, and then he had that experience, and I don’t know when he went through basic. But he was—You know, he was a Sergeant First Class at that time, so he had to have over, you know, ten, twelve years in the military. So—And I’m like, “ Man, this guy knows.” And he’s telling me like, “Stuff’s changing.” And hearing that from him and just seeing that they’re applying it to us—He’s like, you know, “Because this is how we used to do it, but this worked for us when we was in Afghanistan. This was being—And turned into doctrine.” And then it was good because I started seeing stuff like that flowing in as it went on. And more of the drill sergeants were from combat deployments. You started seeing that, which was good because when I get to units, I had stuff that some people were just like, “Oh, okay.” And it’s—It helps you a lot as a private. Interviewer: “All right. Now when do you actually finish then the AIT?” I graduated—It was December—I think it was February. Yes, because I was in basic for my birthday. I remember that. So February. Interviewer: “All right. Okay, so February of ‘07. All right. Now do you get assigned to a unit from there?” I went actually back home to the Guard because they couldn’t do none of my paperwork while I was still in. I had to report to my unit in New Jersey, and then I get to my unit in New Jersey. (28:03) I was there maybe three months total, but the first day I get there I’m like, “I want to go active.” Like, “Who do I have to talk to? Where’s the paperwork? What do I got to do?” You know, I did everything I did, and, you know, just short of three months I was—I had my orders, and I got stationed to go to Germany. Actually, I got to pick, so I picked Germany. Interviewer: “All right. Why did you pick Germany?” I thought—And I had some great places, but I was like, “I—It’s probably my only chance to go to Germany.” My only other overseas choice was Korea. So I was like, “Either Korea or Germany.” But I was like, “I kind of want to go to Germany first.” So that’s what made my choice. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now what unit do you join?” I join the 1st Armored Division, 2/6 Infantry. Interviewer: “Okay. The 2nd Battalion, 6th Infantry Regiment?” Yes. 2nd Battalion, 6th Infantry Regiment, 1st Armored Division out of Baumholder, Germany. �Saladin, Philip Interviewer: “All right, and how do they get you there?” Flew. I felt like I was going through basic all over again. They actually flew me to South Carolina, and I had to sit at the basic training reception. But I wasn’t a basic training soldier, so it was weird because I was still technically this brand new private. And I’m walking around a basic training place, and all the drill sergeants are looking at me. But I have a unit patch on, and they’re like, “What are you doing?” You know, they think I’m faking or something. Ready to start drilling down, and then I pull my orders out. I’m like, “No. I’m just here waiting for my flight.” And it’s crazy when they see that you’re not a trainee, and you’re actually a soldier. The attitude change. The drill sergeant was—And he actually just came from Baumholder. This one drill sergeant. He was like, “Oh. You’re going to Baumholder? I know this place and that and that.” So I was like, “Sweet.” You know, tension, relax, and then from Fort Jackson they flew me to Germany. So I got to fly to Germany. I flew into—I can’t remember. It wasn’t Frankfurt. I can’t remember the base. It was one of the larger ones Interviewer: “But was it—It was a military base. It wasn’t a civilian airport.” Yes, the military—No. Well, we flew into a civilian airport. Into Frankfurt International. Interviewer: “Okay. That’s quite possible. Yeah.” Yeah, and then, of course, they’ve got the little military section. We got on our buses, and we went to this reception. (30:19) I don’t even remember where the reception office was, you know. I just—First time flying that far out. You know, I was in another world. But we get there, and then we get our orders to our individual stations because I knew I was going to Germany. And I knew I was going to Baumholder, but that’s about the furthest you knew. Get your orders. It’s like, “Okay.” Then you’re like, “Oh. I’m going to Baumholder, Germany.” Then you get split up like that, you get thrown on the bus, and the buses drive. Stops at each base and calls out the lists of names. “Okay. You get off here. You get off here.” I get to my—In Germany, I get to my base. Get off. Of course, it’s a four-day weekend. They’re like, “Hey. Reception is not open, this is your unit, somebody will meet you over the weekend, and if not, Monday morning show up for PT.” And I’m just like, “Oh, yeah!” Interviewer: “Did they give you a place to sleep?” Yeah. They set me up. They brought me to my barracks and all that, and when I got there, one of—They had an NCO assigned for me, you know, and he was like, “Hey.” You know. “You came on a four-day. There’s pretty much nothing we can do.” It’s just like, “This is the base.” He showed me around. We took a tour. Completely, you know, different world. I’m—I was what? Twenty-three probably. I think I was. You know, and I’m just like, “Man.” It’s—I’m just—I’m in Germany, and I just got this twenty-minute tour of this random base and—“See you Tuesday.” And it’s Friday, and I’m—“Okay.” Interviewer: “So how did you spend your time that weekend?” �Saladin, Philip I bumped into another new guy. We happened to get—They put two new guys in the same room. Me and him were sharing a room, and we were just like, “Let’s go walk around.” (32:00) And just walking around, we started meeting people, and it was like, “Hey. Yeah, you know, you guys—You’ve got to go—You’ve got to stay in town. You’re like—” We were restricted to posts and whatever, so we got to just hang out the first day. Then the second day we went out to town. It’s really small. Baumholder. It’s small. That thing. That town. They call it the Rock. It’s on top of a mountain or something but super small. So got to hang out. You know, enjoy the weekend, and, of course, you know, Monday—Tuesday morning PT. Get up. You know, me? I’m—I don’t know what I was thinking. I wasn’t thinking, should I say. Long four-day weekend. Brand new private in Germany. I just had my—Too much fair share of my drinks. And we’re running, and, of course—Company commander. We’re in formation. I’m, you know—I see a couple of them—and in great part I’m cutting back and forth—but I show up to formation Tuesday morning walking. And I just hear, “Sal!” Because they call me “Sal” for “Saladin”. Because the Army is by last name. “Sal!” And I’m just like, “That’s the most familiar voice in the world.” And it’s my bunkmate from basic. He’s like, “What are you doing here?” He’s like, “You’re supposed to be in National Guard.” And I was like, “I told you I was going active. You didn’t believe me.” And we got put in the same company. We were literally in the same unit, and I was—Ended up being four, five more guys from basic, so it was great. You know, it was euphoria. I was like, “I’m not alone.” But, of course, it’s like, “Let’s go for a run.” And my buddy’s like, “Don’t worry about it. It’s going to be an easy run.” And I’m like, “All right.” And, of course, I’m hungover. It’s just horrible and miserable running. Company commander walks up to me. “Oh.” Well, runs up to me, should I say. We were running already in formation. We’re probably on mile one or two. Early in the run. Company commander comes up next to me. “Oh, so you’re my new guy?” “Sir, yes, sir.” “All right.” He’s like, you know, “You’re a good soldier.” And chitchat. “Good soldier. Yeah.” We’re running. Then, next thing I know, he looks at me. He’s like, “Oh. You were drinking.” And I was like, “A little bit, sir.” He’s like, “How you could tell—” He just looks at me. He goes, “You’re about to throw up.” (34:03) And not two seconds later—And he’s like, “Don’t stop running.” So here I am—the new guy—company commander is running next to me, I’m throwing up—trying not to puke on him—and all he’s saying to me is, “Don’t stop running.” I’m—And he doesn’t care. He’s running through my puke. He—And I’m all worried. Like, “Oh my god. It’s the company commander.” You know, I’m scared. I’m over here throwing up. I’m like, “I’m the biggest—” Whatever. And he’s just like, “Hey. Welcome to Germany. Keep running.” But I didn’t stop running, and I guess he ended up liking me. And, you know, I ended up becoming—I got picked up to go work for the Battalion. You know, I guess they just saw me as a good guy, you know, and I rubbed them the right way, I guess. And… Interviewer: “Okay. Now initially when you got there, were you just an ordinary grunt at that point? You’re just an infantryman?” Yes. Yeah, just basic, general infantryman. No specialty training. Nothing. Just… Interviewer: “Okay, and now how did they have a unit like that spend your time? So you’re with a mechanized infantry unit, right? Because you’re with the Armored Division. All right, so day to day when you’re on the base and on duty, what are you doing?” �Saladin, Philip So it’s—At this time we were actually—They were at the end phase of their recuperation from that last deployment. That unit just got through a pretty intense deployment. They were in—They were part of the attachment that was in Ramadi in that phase, and they lost a lot. So they were just in the ending of it—of rebuilding—so we were at the beginning of the training phase. So— But that first initial month was a lot of just maintenance—you know, maintenance of the vehicles—and no assignments were really made. People were getting tasked out. They’re reorganizing the task formations and all that, and at this time now they’re like, “Okay. We’re picking who’s going where.” (36:07) So they got all the new guys, and it’s like, “Okay.” You know. “We’re going to interview everybody.” I got interviewed. They chose me to go work at the Battalion S3, and then it’s like, “All right.” But even then you’re still—You’re at the Battalion S3, but you’re still doing everything else, too. So it’s like you’re still doing the line unit training, so when they go out, you go out. So you have to do all the computer stuff, but then you also have to go out, qualify with your weapons, and do all that. So—And at first I didn’t like it because I was like, “Man. I’m a brand new private, and I’m sitting behind a desk.” You know, and to me, it’s like that’s the worst thing you could do to a brand new infantryman. I was like, “What? A desk?” But it ended up—It was pretty good. You—I learned a lot, and I lasted probably—My first half of my career with that unit was in the S3 because we had—We ended up getting a completely new chain of command, so, you know, all the—We were all new, from the privates to the commander. Everybody. Sergeant major. The colonel. Everybody was new, so we kind of just meshed instantly because we knew this was the unit that was—We were going to deploy together. We were protecting—We were their PSD. Their Personal Security Detachment. We knew that that was our job. That’s what we worked for, so, yeah, it was like, “We’ve got to go do computer stuff.” It was like, “Blah!” But we got to do—We got a lot of perks of working directly for the Battalion commander, and I was—You know, of course. Interviewer: “Okay, but you were still doing some of the training and the exercises?” Yeah, you still had to do it. Interviewer: “So you’re still going in the field when they do stuff, and…?” Yes. Interviewer: “So you are getting some part of that at the same time?” Yeah, it was—The only part we didn’t do were the larger maneuvers like a platoon or a company maneuvers. Those were the line units, but as far as our individual training? Doing our mount, which is the urban training? We still had to do all that. (38:06) We had our Bradleys assigned to us. We still had to qualify with that. We had to do everything except for what an infantry company would do. Our primary job was running the Battalion S3 and the security detail, so while they were working on, you know, platoon maneuvers—“Oh, okay. We’re going to go learn how to shut down this village.” We were learning how to escort the sergeant major through the raid or the village or whatever it needs to be. It’s, you know—And my part in the whole thing—I was enjoying sitting behind a desk, but I did get to go—The benefit was we would get to go shoot, and it’s like we’ll have to go. And, of course, you have a couple hundred soldiers, so there’s lines. You have to wait. “Oh, sergeant major’s here. Sergeant major doesn’t wait.” So we �Saladin, Philip get to go in front. So we train, and everybody’s miserable waiting. We do what we’ve got to do. Qualify. “Let’s get back in the Humvees. Let’s get the sergeant major and the commander back to the office.” Interviewer: “All right. Now you talk about being in the S3, and so, for a civilian, explain what S3 refers to.” So the S3 is a mix of the command and the control. It’s just—It’s pretty much the overall operations of what’s going on. Interviewer: “Operations. Yeah.” Yeah, the operations. And I—My specific job—I was running—They call—It was a computer system, and pretty much just watching all the troops, learning—At this time I was still learning it, so learning, you know, how to map. Read maps. You know, place the troops out in sector. Identify. You know, so pretty much the AO. Can you—How to, you know—A private working with the commander, controlling the AO, identifying—Commander comes out the office. “Where is Alpha company?” “Sir, right here.” And it was like that. He asked a question. You have to come up with an answer. I mean, it—And brand new private. But it was good because you learn a lot as far as the overall picture. (40:01) Interviewer: “Okay. Now how long did you stay in Baumholder before you’re deployed?” We did a—It was a—Oh, man. It was under a year. I know that. I don’t know exactly because we were doing a lot of training, but it was probably—Maybe seven months. Between seven months and a year. That is the window I was there. Interviewer: “All right. How would you characterize the morale in the unit at that point?” Oh, it was great. It was—And I don’t know if it’s just because it was my first unit experience, but everybody was—It was—You know, everybody was—Just good mood, and everybody— Morale was up. You know, the command group. And I think it’s because they gave us a lot of free time because we were doing so much training when it was like, “Okay. We’re not in the field,” it was like, “Go, go.” We had a lot. I traveled. In that short window I traveled a lot. I— And it—But if I wasn’t training—if I wasn’t in the field getting dirty—I was out. There wasn’t no like, “Hey. Just—Let’s relax at home.” It was… Interviewer: “Okay, so how far afield would you go when you were traveling?” I—Sometimes we would get day passes if we were lucky. I went out to Paris for a weekend. That was great. I went out to Munich for a weekend. So the longest you would get is a weekend pass unless it was scheduled leave where we could—But the furthest I—Drive-wise, I would say was probably France. I didn’t get too far. We were—We wanted to go to London one day, but they denied that pass. It was too far of a drive, they said. �Saladin, Philip Interviewer: “Yeah, it would take a little while. Okay. All right, and then the people in Baumholder in that area of Germany. What kind of relationship do they have with the American soldiers?” Oh, amazing. These people were probably some of the nicest people I’ve met. It was—It, you know—And you think too—Being brand new, you’re like, “Oh, these people. I’m not going to be able to talk to nobody.” The whole town spoke English. You go—I’ll go to a bar, and they’re like, “Hi!” And I’m like, “Whoa.” And—But it’s—They were really nice and super—They were super tolerant and accepting. Because I tell you what, man. Some of the stuff them soldiers did in that town. You’re—Houses on base are burned to the ground right now. (42:14) One year the soldiers—They burned down one of the oldest buildings in the town—a historical building—and apparently some soldiers did something. And it caught on fire, and I’m like, “How are we still here?” You know, but very, very, very nice town. Very accepting. And the military’s really intermingled with the town. I noticed a lot. When we would get there, the first three weeks you would have to go to a German immersion class, so I got to learn how to speak German. And it’s really—It’s—All the employees on the base are German. It’s a good relationship. It’s—I’ve, you know—I had a better relationship there than I did with the people around Fort Hood, Texas, if that says anything. Interviewer: “All right. Okay. Now as you—Because, I guess, the Army works things in cycles, so your unit is deployed. And then you’re kind of refitting, and then you gear up for the next deployment. So there’s a phase there when you’re getting ready to go back to Iraq?” Yes. Interviewer: “Okay, so now what kinds of things do you do?” Now the training is picking up a lot more. You’re—You don’t have these month blocks. We did a thirty-day, came back for a weekend, did a sixty-day training, came back, had a month off, then deploy. So it was—And so now it’s like when you get your orders, that’s when it’s official. You know, it’s game time. You’re packing, repacking, and then double-checking and repacking again. It’s crazy how—And it—How they are with that. Meticulous. It’s like you pack everything. It gets checked off the list. Then the next person comes. You have to take everything out. It’s—But once you’re done with that part, and they put the seals on everything that’s packed, you’d probably get a good two weeks before your time to deploy, depending on when they take in the stuff. So it’s a good lull at this moment. You’re not training because all the gear’s gone. (44:00) There’s nothing you can do, so at this time they give you downtime. But don’t get crazy. You don’t have—You don’t get leave. It’s not like, “Yeah. You get to go home for a month.” No, it’s—”We’re just going to relax.” So at this time everybody’s—The somberness is kind of kicking in, you know. People’s like, “Okay. We’re going to war.” You know, people start having that—Like, “Okay.” You know. Me and my friends—We kind of celebrated a little different. We—It—We actually—This was—Kind of took us to Paris. We just went. We were just like, “Well, we’re going to war.” And we heard all the horror stories from the previous deployment. We’re just going to take out a $3,000 loan and go to Paris. And blew it in a weekend. So it was three of us, so $9,000 between three privates in Paris before we go to Iraq. �Saladin, Philip You know, it was one of those—And it’s—I—It’s one of those nights I love. You know, it’s— And—But that right there brought us—Gave us this—Us three—To this day, we still talk, but man, we got so close that weekend. It was—You know, we bonded. It was almost—I don’t want to say we knew we were going to die or something like that because I—You know, that cliché. Like, “I’m going to go do this because I’m going to die.” No, but that’s how we thought. It was like, “We’re probably going to die, so let’s just live this weekend like we’re never coming back here.” And that was probably my second aha moment in the military where I honestly was not fearing the deployment no more. It was just like, “Okay. Accept it.” It’s, you know—Faith is here almost. It’s going to, you know—“If it happens on this trip, it’s going to happen.” Like, “Why fight it?” Interviewer: “Okay. Now what proportion of the unit that you were with at the time you went had been on the previous deployment?” In my specific company in the—Because I was in the headquarters company. We had—In my platoon we had a pretty good—Seasoned guys. (46:06) And I’m pretty sure a lot of it had to do—Because of the position we held. Was with the Battalion command group. But a lot of the NCOs were, you know—Multiple deployments, you know. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, because, I guess, you mentioned that a lot of your command group was new or at least—But they’re new to the unit.” Yeah. New to the unit. Not as far as new as like new to the Army. Interviewer: “Okay, but the men in the line companies. Did you have a fair number who would have been the previous—” Yes, we had a good—Lot of—A lot of the NCOs were from—And that’s the thing about Baumholder. They retained a lot of their people, so a lot of the NCOs were from the previous deployment. And even, you know—They had two deployments with that unit, but what—The way they would do it is they would shuffle the companies. So you wouldn’t be in the same company, but you would stay in the same unit. So that was—I think that was a good thing. A lot of the—It was a lot of new privates too, but a lot of them saw that, you know, all our leadership was seasoned. Seasoned people. Interviewer: “Okay, and at this point now do they give you any kind of orientation for, ‘This is Iraq,’ or, ‘Welcome to the Middle East?’” When we get—Well— Interviewer: “Or did that happen only after you got over?” Right before we went we would do a couple, little computer things. They make you do these little classes where it’s—Try to teach you about it, but, you know, it’s check the box teaching. So it’s not much. It’s like, “Here’s a pamphlet. Learn it.” Nobody. Maybe the command group, but… �Saladin, Philip Interviewer: “Okay. All right, so you’re not touring mockup Iraqi villages or things like that.” Not yet. Not—We—To an extent, to your specific leader—your NCO—if you wanted to be like, “Hey. Let’s put a sand table together—” If you had some leaders that were that, you know, ahead of the game and wanted to do it, yeah. But a lot of that didn’t start until we got there. Interviewer: “All right. Okay, so now you head over to Iraq kind of late 2007. Is that…?” Yeah, it was around—I want to say—It was the winter. I know that because we left Germany in the middle of a snowstorm, got to Kuwait, and it was hot. (48:09) And it was the most miserable thing ever because I remember going on the bus on the plane. I’m like, “It’s so freezing.” And when they open the bus, it just instantly got 120 degrees, and you’re just like, “Oh.” So like, “We’re here.” Interviewer: “Okay. You land in Kuwait. Now what happens?” We land in Kuwait. We get to—We’re at the base. It’s a fast process. You get to the airport in Kuwait there. You—It’s not like here. You get off the plane. You go into the terminal. No, in Kuwait you get off the plane. You get on the bus. There’s no—You don’t even see the civilians. It’s a complete police escort. It’s—And you get on the road, and it’s a hundred miles an hour nonstop. It was—Each bus had two guards. Like, “Okay. Here.” You know, you got a full mag. You just went from carrying a blank weapon to—“Okay. Here’s two magazines full of ammo. You’re the guard for the bus.” I’m like, “Wait. What?” Like, “We’re not in Iraq yet.” So, okay, we’re there. You got—And you’re flying down the highway. Police escort. Just buses zooming. We get to the large base in Kuwait, and there’s when classes start. We’re there for about—Is it two weeks? Fluctuates. A week. On return you might stay there for three weeks. Depends on, you know, the movement. Whatever. But classes. It’s classes, classes. You’re doing classes on animals. We literally had a class telling us not to fight spiders and scorpions. There’s so many classes, from bombs to animals to culture. They really were—And, I guess, at this time it was the whole—When... Interviewer: “Was it the period of the surge or around then?” Yeah, it was around the surge, but it was also when Petraeus—When they’re pushing the whole—From the inside. (50:04) The COIN strategy that they were implementing. Interviewer: “Well, that was part of the surge. The surge is sort of just adding—Was called that because they added more men, but that’s what they were doing. They were sending them into the local communities. Yeah.” Yeah, and then that’s when they were teaching the more culture stuff. Like,“Okay.” Like, “This—” You know. “This means this. This is what’s going on here.” Like, “Okay.” And then they would try to teach more specific region. We were going—My first deployment we went to southern Iraq, so it was like, “Hey. This is what the—Mostly population you’re going to �Saladin, Philip encounter. This is, you know, the lifestyle. This is do’s and don’ts pretty much of Iraq.” And then do a couple more weapons training, weapons qualification, knock the dust off, make sure everybody’s still good, and then—We were mechanized, so a good group of people had to drive the Bradleys to the base from Kuwait into Iraq. But we were in southern Iraq, so it wasn’t, you know, nothing crazy. But other people—Me? I was part of the advanced party, so I got to fly into the base we were going to. That was pretty cool. It was in the night. It was—That was awesome. Flew into a really small—It was a small—maybe three square mile—base. It was a COP, they called it at the time. A Combat Outpost. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and did you fly in a helicopter, or…?” Yes, it was a Chinook they flew us in because it was—We stopped at three different bases, and, you know, each group got dropped off at their little base. Interviewer: “All right, and when you got into your base, now what do you see? What happens?” Oh, man. I’m not going to lie. I—The helicopter lands, ramp was open, so—But I got—I was scared a little bit because it was nighttime. And they were dark conditions at night at this time still on the base, so I don’t see nothing. You know, I’m coming off a helicopter. I’ve got a couple guys there to greet me. “Hey.” You know. “Welcome to COP Carver. This is what’s going on. Follow me.” (52:06) And you look around. You don’t see walls. So you’re like, “Am I out in the open?” I, you know—I’ve never been on a—I’m a brand new private—never been here—so I’m—You know, I’ve got my rifle. I’m like, “All right.” Wait—I’m waiting for the attack. I’m like, “It’s going to happen.” And everybody’s like, “You’re all right. Relax. It’s cool.” And I’m just like, “Okay.” So getting the tour of this small base, which you still—I don’t know what they’re touring me because I don’t see—I can’t see nothing. And then they take us into the TOC. “This is where you’re going to be working.” I’m like, “All right.” Interviewer: “That’s the tactical operations center?” Correct. I’m—They’re like, “This is where you’re going to be working.” So I’m getting familiar, and, of course—Me—As a private, I go to where my job’s going to be. Who’s doing my job? A captain. And I’m like, “This—” And the guy turns and looks at me. He’s like, “You’re doing this?” And I’m like, “Yeah.” I’m like, “Great.” I’m like, “Great. This is the experience I wanted on day one.” You know, and it’s—But, you know, luckily they were a great group of people. The—It was the 3rd Infantry Division. We were replacing a great, great bunch of dudes. We replaced them. I sat by this guy. I was there for a week before my unit came, so I sat every day. I was next to this guy, learning everything, and it wasn’t as bad as it seemed. You know, I—But it was—They had to give me that initial like—You know, like, “Oh, man.” But it was—That first week was pretty smooth because it was more of shadowing him. Come in. Shadow for a couple of hours. And it was twelve-hour shifts. It was twelve on, twelve off, twelve—So I would come in maybe for three, four hours. The first day was an hour or two. Then I pretty much—The rest of the day I’m, you know, sitting in my room, reading a book, or working out in the gym. And that was my life for about a week. �Saladin, Philip Interviewer: “Okay. Now—But you got a chance to see outside in the daylight?” (54:00) Yeah. In the daytime, so— Interviewer: “And was this basically just flat, open country you were in, or…?” No. So we were—The terrain was flat. A lot of dust. Moon dust. Just this soft, powdery, red sand that’s everywhere. And then we had about two or three square miles of the big T-wall barriers on the outside with two entrances—a north and a south—and, you know, once I saw that, I was like, “Okay, okay. There’s some order here.” It’s not Wild West. You know, you’re not going to have a charge over the hills. But it was—And—But then, besides the base, it was clear all around it. It was a previous chemical facility or something that got blown up, so it was half of a solid structure standing, which they used as a building. To this day, I don’t know how it didn’t fall on nobody, but hey, it worked. And then my first dinner in Iraq was—Well, breakfast or meal, should I say, because I don’t even know what time it was. Was eggs and biscuits, but I called it a soup. Because we had no overhead cover, and it was raining. So, of course—Me? I’m like, “I’m not going to go inside. I’m eating.” I—“Welcome to Iraq.” You know, a plate of soup breakfast. Interviewer: “At least it was raining.” Yeah, the one time, and it was that—It was crazy. The two times I went to Iraq—I experienced rain in southern Iraq for the first time, and then when I was in northern Iraq the second time, snow. When I was up there, it snowed, and that was the first time in so long. And I was like, “Hey.” Interviewer: “Lucky you. Okay. Now you’re—Was there anything going on in that area when you got there?” It was a pretty—Before—The unit before us—They had some losses. It was a rough, little spot. They were actually—That unit was the first unit to—American unit to step in that area. It wasn’t, you know—And then we came in. They had—They just—In the middle of building of this base. They still had, you know, Humvees outside. (56:02) They lost a couple people building the base. It was a pretty rough spot. It was a stronghold for—At this time it was—AQI, they were called— Al-Qaeda in Iraq—and this was—It was—They had a pretty good grip there. So we came in. We had a lot of focus on capturing high value targets. That was our huge task force’s mission. We— A lot of captures. We went on a few raids. We went on—Early on. Even when I got there—you know, before the unit was even there—we’re conducting raids that I got to sit on the office on and help coordinate and all that. And my unit—We finally come in. Get established in that area. Probably about, you know, a few months. It’s just—It’s quiet. We’ve got, you know, one or two arrests. You know, we’re trying not to come in and cause too much a commotion. We’re picking up where the last unit left off. Ask, you know—Asking for aid, what you need for the town, we’re establishing a—They got the little, I guess, town hall conference. Whatever you call them. Getting that going. It’s going good. It’s about three months in, and that’s when we get our first— Bam. Something happens. �Saladin, Philip Interviewer: “All right. Okay, so before we kind of get into this—So in those first few months when things are quiet, are you going into any of the towns yourself or seeing any of the Iraqis?” Me myself at this time? I’m not. I’m still working in the TOC, but I’m having a—I know a lot of what’s going on because of my position, and I’m interacting with a lot of the people. Because we have a lot of people coming into the base. I’m—So I’m having a lot of interaction like that. I’m seeing the town from our camera. We have the giant blimp watching everything, so I get to see that. (58:02) So I’m seeing it from afar, but I’m seeing everything that’s going on. And it’s a pretty—As far as conflict-wise, on each other. They—We had a—These—Constantly going after each other in this area. Interviewer: “So the Iraqis were going after each other?” Yeah. Yeah, the locals. Just, I guess, power grab. Whatever. Whatever was at this time because there was nothing… Interviewer: “But your guys were kind of largely standing aside from that?” Well, we were conducting raids. The—We were arresting—We had a few good raids under our belts early on because this place was just rich with targets, so we had—But that was one of the things. We went on all these raids and didn’t fire a single shot. It was good. We got—I got to go on one actually with the command group. It was a nighttime raid—my first raid ever I went on— and man, it was—The way it was done. The way it was conducted. We marched in at—Well, that’s probably the walk thing. Nighttime. Cover of darkness. From a mile out, we cut all the vehicles, we all walked in, and we essentially shut down a whole village. It was—So right when we were about getting ready to enter the village on foot—Call up the trucks. The trucks drive in, so by—When they hear the trucks, we’re already inside, so there’s no way to leave this village. It was completely locked down. We—It had to be over fifty houses. Not a single round fired, and I think we arrested three high value targets. It was—And then seeing it, it was amazing. It was— Just how, you know—Just watching it. It was—It was organized chaos—is probably the best way I could put it—because you’ve got doors being kicked in over here, you’ve got yelling over here, you—You know, explosion on this road, but it’s still coordinated. And I’m sitting there with the command group, and you hear it over the radio. Everything collapsing according to— Like, “Hey.” You know—“This is our own phase line Alpha just crossed. This is complete. We’re moving in here.” And before you know it, you know, systematically we just shut down this whole town, arrested these three guys, and not a single round fired. (1:00:19) You know, and that stuff just amazed me. You know. Me? I went in. I was like, “Okay.” You know. “All hell’s about to break loose.” Well, you know, you think of the movies. Like, “Oh, you’re going to the bad guy. Bombs are going to be blowing up everything.” But no. Just almost surreal, you know. It was a real—That was a surreal moment for me. Interviewer: “But they’re still kicking in doors? Or were there—” Yeah, yeah. �Saladin, Philip Interviewer: “As opposed to just knocking and talking to people.” No, no, there wasn’t no knocking. It was, “Yeah, you know we’re here.” It was, “Yeah, we’re here. We’re coming to get you. We know you’re here.” And... Interviewer: “ But nobody resisted?” No, no, and it’s interesting because our own—We had two—Well, not two. Well, we had a bunch of other, but as far as what we received—mass cal or something—none of them were on operations. It was—It’s crazy. All the operations we did. Nothing. The first one we were doing a town hall meeting. At the end of the town hall meeting, one of the members—a council member—And I’m like, “We’re giving these people everything.” They ask for it. We give them—We’re at this point where we just have a lot of money, I guess, and we just, you know— We handed them tens of hundreds of thousands of dollars. Cash. Like, “Here.” Like, “Let’s fix this place up.” This guy comes out of the town hall meeting. He’s walking to his car. He pulls out an AK and just starts spraying. He ended up taking out two of our guys, badly wounded our interpreter, wounded one of our medics, but he got taken out pretty good. Pretty effectively, to say the least. (1:02:00) But I wasn’t there. That one was—I was working at the TOC, and I had the night shift. Got off the night shift, was going to my room, and I met my guy—one of my guys that we lost—Well, not my guy. It was a friend of mine that we lost there. We were talking. And it’s crazy because we were talking the whole time— Interviewer: “Now was this someone who was there later, or…?” Yeah, well, this was—I kind of, I guess—I jumped ahead of myself. This was one of the guys that was—He was out there, and this was before they left. I just finished my shift at the TOC. Now we had a little conversation crossing path. We talked for a while. He’s like, you know, “Hey. You coming out?” But it was one of those more—He knew I was coming off shift. Then it was a little—Almost a jive. You know, he knew I wasn’t going nowhere. So it was like, “Hey.” I was like, “No.” You know, we talked—whatever—and we left, you know. It’s another routine moment. We see each other every morning crossing paths. I get off work. He’s getting ready to go do whatever he’s doing. And, you know, I go to my room, and then a few hours later, you hear a different pace in people’s footsteps. (1:04:00) You know, you hear people walk because there was a lot of gravel where we had our rooms to kind of keep the dust down. So you could hear people walking, and you could tell. But this moment there’s just a lot of scatter and running. You’re like, “Okay. Something’s up.” But you don’t know. I go out, and they already—They were already back at this moment, so I go out. And it’s like, “Whoa.” I was starting to see. Haven’t heard nothing yet. I’m just seeing stuff. I see the truck. Bullet holes. See some of my buddies over there upset. I’m like, “Okay.” But I just instantly go to the TOC because we all had designated jobs to do in situations like that. So that was our first incident. As far as my recollection of it, it’s more of the office part from the debriefs. Putting together the stuff like that. I don’t have firsthand knowledge because I wasn’t there. But, you know, talking to all my friends you get a pretty good picture, you know, of—Because I had to sit there and listen to everybody during their investigations and all that, so—Because of my position I held in the TOC, so… �Saladin, Philip Interviewer: “Okay, and was that sort of the first real sort of shooting incident that happened while you were there?” Yes, that was the—“Okay. We’re here.” You know. We had a few minor IEDs, but none against us. It was always civilian stuff. We had a couple civilian—You know, local populace on each other incidents. Nothing like that. That was our first—“Okay.” You know. “It’s real.” So… Interviewer: “Okay. Now also when you were talking about the event when the shooting took place, you talked about—And you’re—Because the officers are going in there and basically handing out money to the Iraqis. And now what, as far as you can tell, was the money supposed to be for?” It was—They had—This was around the time they were setting up—We called them Sons of Iraq. They were the names where—And they were pretty much allies we were getting, and they were manning more in-depth checkpoints in the towns. You know, we would have a little—But they were 24/7. (1:06:14) We would get the local—Pretty much it was better local militia. To put it. I don’t know what they would call each other. And then the head Sheikh would come, have— “Hey. I have fifty guys, and they’re willing to man checkpoints such, such, and such.” And we would give them money, and then he would pay them. And that’d be their job, so we were— Pretty much we were paying them, so—And the money, you know—It went, and it was interesting to see because, you know, you’re just like, “Okay. I see the process.” Like, “Okay. We’re paying them the money.” And then there’s always that thought. Like, “Are these guys really getting this money?” You know, it’s—Because you give it to this one guy. He’s the head of the town or whatever you want to call them, and then you’re like, “Yeah. I’m sure this guy is probably…” Interviewer: “Yeah. Well, there’s probably a certain amount of graft built into the payment. I mean, there’s the assumption he’s going to keep some of it. On the other hand, he’d have to pay the guys something if they’re going to—If he’s going to deliver. But yeah, so kind of part of this sort of larger strategy to get into the community and engage it and get people on our side essentially.” Yeah, it was almost like buying a militia to our team. You know. Because I’m pretty sure a lot of these guys were the guys we were fighting, you know, few—You know, throughout the time, so it’s just like, “Okay. Hey. Let’s just do the smart thing. These guys are really—You know, they’re here, want to protect their town, so okay. Let’s pay them to protect their town.” Interviewer: “Okay, and were there any other kind of significant instances that took place while you were still in the TOC, or does the other stuff get more interesting after you move on?” Well, there was a—I’m trying to think. There was one other incident, but it wasn’t no—We had no casualties or nothing, but I remember because it was the day I was leaving to go on my R&R. It’s like I’m in the TOC trying to get, you know—Get your last minutes of work in because, you know, it’s—That’s how it is. And I’m sitting there, and as I’m getting ready to leave, it’s like, “Oh. This truck got hit with an IED.” And I’m just like, “Oh.” And I’m like, “I don’t want to go �Saladin, Philip now.” You know, I’m like, “What’s going on?” So I’m halfway out the door. They’re like, “The helicopter’s here.” And I’m just like, “No.” (1:08:12) So—But it ended up being—It was okay. Just—It was—The truck is what got hurt. They were able to get up—leave—and then I went on my vacation a couple weeks. Interviewer: “Okay. Now do you get—Where do you go on the R&R? Do you go back home, or do you…?” You could actually pick where you want to go. And they’ll pretty much you give a plane ticket anywhere in the world for your R&R. Me? I decided to go back home. Just wanted to go to family, so went back to New Jersey, spent—It was—I think it was two weeks they gave us. Spent two weeks home, you know. It was awesome, you know. It was the—Probably the best two weeks ever. Interviewer: “All right, but was it okay going back again? I mean, were you ready to do that?” It—I was, and I wasn’t. The whole time home too I was like, “Okay.” You know, in my mind I’m ready. I’m like, “Okay. It’s my job. Let’s go do this.” You know. Like, “Okay. Let’s get back.” When I get to the airport, and I check my ticket, it all hit me at one time, and I was just like, “Oh.” And then my family’s standing there, and I’m like, “No.” You know. “Just hold it together. Just hold it together.” And then they start crying. You’re like, “Great.” And then I couldn’t hold it. I start crying, and I’m just like, “Oh, come on. Stop.” I’m like, “I need to get out of here.” You know. I’m in uniform. But it was kind of—It was really weird because then I go, and then they’re like, “Oh. You can’t leave until tomorrow.” So I got an extra day. So all that huss and fuss, and then the next day I was like, “You guys ain’t even allowed in the airport.” I’m like, “Just stay in the car. I’m out of here.” And I walked right in and left. I was like, “No. I can’t do that again.” Interviewer: “All right. Now when you got back again, did you go back to the job in the TOC, or were you switching to something else now?” That’s when the process started. So I get to the TOC, and it was pretty cool. I—My—One of the—The Operation Sergeant Major walked up to me. He’s like, “Okay.” He’s like, “It’s your turn to rotate to the line companies.” (1:10:07) Because that’s just how they do. They don’t want to keep a private too long in the office because, you know—So—But he was like, “I would like to have you with the PSD.” Which is—It was an attachment of—That was still responsible to the command group, but they just didn’t work in the TOC. They did all the patrols and maneuvers, so whenever the command group would choose the head, the higher-ups would go out and travel any engagements. Because they would go out and meet with the locals, too. So they were pretty much the headquarters line company, you could say. So they were like, “Okay.” Because they had sent two of those guys down to the line company, so it was like, you know, “We need—” So I was like, “Sure.” You know, I was—Not too many times the sergeant major’s like, “Hey. I would like if you do this.” So I was like, “Of course.” You know, me? I’m like, “I’m not going to say no.” So I was—I ended up staying in the TOC for two more weeks, and I think that was the hardest part because if I would have went to the line company, I was gone that night. But he �Saladin, Philip was like, “You go to the PSD.” He’s like, “You’re going to stay in the TOC for two more weeks. That’s just so we can get stuff rotated around.” Whatever. And it was so hard. It was—It’s so there. I taste it. I was like, “It’s there.” And then finally, in that period, we had our second incident while I was in the TOC still, so—And this one I was on the radio. Full from first contact to the end out. And this one, I would say—The other one I knew the people a little more that passed, and it affected me hard. But this one? I think it was because I was so direct with it. It hit me a little bit harder, and I was just like, “Whoa.” You know, so then you’re sitting there on the radio. It’s quiet. Afternoon, you know. Just—And then, all of a sudden, you know—“Troops in contact.” (1:12:03) And then that’s the—And it’s like this is probably one of the loudest, most organized rooms ever. Then, all of a sudden, it’s those three words. It’s just pin drop. Everything gets quiet. The only person talking is the man on the radio and the man on the other end of the radio, so that’s me. You know, I’m sitting here, talking to this guy, you know, and everybody’s just there like the commander, sergeant major—Everybody’s looking, and I’m just like, “What— ” We’re talking, and it’s going. And you start seeing the situation start developing. I’m like, “Okay. This is getting serious.” Start spitting up elements to go, and then you get the report. “Such and such is down.” And then they report it. You don’t get the name. It’s like you get your battle number, and I know the battle number because that’s part of my job. And I’m like, “Oh. I know this person.” And that’s when—Boom, boom. And then, all of a sudden, everybody’s coming back, and at this time the night—The morning shift—No, the night shift is coming because I got switched to morning shift now at this time. So the night shift was getting ready to come into the TOC, so my replacement comes. They’re like, “Hey. Man the radio. They’re already off the area. They’re coming back. There’s no units out.” So—And then me? I’m like, “What’s going on?” They’re like, “You get to go now to the aid station and direct the traffic to the helicopter that’s coming.” Because I had the radio, so now I’m communicating with the TOC, the helicopter, and the medics. And I wasn’t ready for this. I walk into the room to tell them the helicopter’s coming, and I open the door. And I just see—It’s—I’m like, “Wow.” It was—I don’t even know how to—It was—I’m lost for words. It was just one of those moments where you just—“Oh my god.” And it just—It… Interviewer: “So you’re seeing people with battle wounds?” Yes, and being worked on. (1:14:02) And it’s just—You just see blood. And the first incident I saw blood, and I saw the aftermath of the bad guy. That didn’t bother me. You know, he had body parts coming—It was perfectly fine. I come here, I go in the room, and it’s blood and somebody being worked on. And I’m just like, “Oh.” And it just—Everything just got sucked out of me. It was like, “Wow.” Reality. And I don’t want to say “reality” because that sunk in a while back, but it was just like, “Whoa.” Okay, so I’m—Snap to. I’m like, “All right. Bird’s coming in. You’ve got five mikes. These people need to be there as soon as it comes.” They’re finishing up. I’m on the radio yelling the time, and that’s my sole job. Is just stand there and yell the time as loud as I can. Nothing else I’m responsible for, so I’m just—By minute, by minute just counting it down, and it’s—I felt like it was forever. I—And then, next thing I know, it’s— You know. “Helicopter’s thirty seconds.” And I look, and they’re on the table working on him. And as soon as I tell them, “Thirty seconds,” they’re gone. I’m not even—I don’t even realize. I’m—Just like, “Oh. I’m behind now.” So now, you know, we go out. We’re sitting at the landing right outside the landing zone. You know, buddies there, and all you can do is look at them. And it’s just one of that—Surreal moment. You’re just like, “Wow.” You know. But on �Saladin, Philip the upside of that, good friend of mine was there, and his actions—I’m telling you, man—was just—And hearing it from everybody else that was there, I’m like, “I would have loved to have been there just to see his maneuverability.” They were, I guess—They got ambushed from a house or something—I don’t know the exact layout—but he was positioned in a point where he had direct view and access of the house. (1:16:09) So these guys are under fire from a house and pretty much an ambush. He just goes. You know, this twenty-something-year-old kid goes, grabs a guy, and they just—headstrong—charge into this house. And he’s carrying a SAW—249 SAW—and they just head charge into this house and just light it up. And it’s—And everybody was like, “Dude.” And it’s funny because the way everybody described it—It was funny. They were like, “It was just like a movie.” And—Because you hear everybody tell you like, “Oh. It was nothing like the movies.” And here everybody was like, “This is just like the movies.” Like, “He just got up and went in that door, and it was so systematic.” And I was just like, you know, “That was amazing.” You know, and I—Just to—That I heard that happen on a radio and then hearing everybody’s accounts, I was like, you know, that’s—That goes to show you how in the middle of all that you can still go and, you know, function. And I just thought the whole matter that he did it in—And he was a specialist, too. Young. You don’t expect that from a younger, newer guy, you know, but man, this guy—He—I was like, “Yeah.” Interviewer: “Okay. Now you mentioned hearing a SAW, and a lot people won’t know what that is.” Okay. Yes. That’s a—It’s squad automatic weapon. It’s pretty much our machine gun for the line companies. You know, you have your big ones on the trucks and that, but that’s more the dismounted. You know, you’ve got your two riflemen and your machine gunner. He’s— Supposed to say suppressive fire. That’s the guy. You usually don’t go into a building with a SAW. If you go in with a SAW, he pulls rear security, covers the door for you, keep anybody coming in or whatever. Interviewer: “But it’s a lot of firepower?” Yes. That is—They—It’s known for the—What we call in the line company the most mass casualty producing weapon in the squad. And you carry the SAW. You hated marching with it, but you love shooting it. (1:18:02) It’s one of those things. You hate having to be responsible for it and deal with it, but I’ll tell you. When it came time to need the firepower, you were like, “Yes.” Like, “I’m glad to be behind this one.” But yeah. That was… Interviewer: “Yeah. All right. Okay, and, I suppose, in the meantime you’ve now had these experiences, so if you’re going to be out in the field, and stuff will happen, you’re maybe a little bit more prepared for that than you were?” Yes, yes, and that I took to my—To, I say, my advantage. Being around the higher-ups and those situations. And almost being out on every patrol without being out there because I saw it. You know, and I just saw. And I got to see it from—As opposed to brand new private, you’re told, “Hey. Go pull security. Cover this sector.” So that’s what you know. Me? I’m looking at it from the bigger perspective. The tactical. I’m like, “Oh. I know why they’re here. Because they’re securing this section.” And, you know, sectors of—So I get—So now when I go to the unit—No, �Saladin, Philip to the PSD. I’m not your average private. The squad leaders come in. They give us the report. “Hey. Listen. This is what we’re doing.” In my head, I’m like, “Oh. I can see this whole thing planned out.” I’m like, “Yeah. Okay. So we’ve got this.” You know, and then—And they loved it. And that kind of gave me an upper hand because I always—I’m always picking at the commander’s brains and stuff when I was in the TOC, so I knew a lot of stuff. I knew a lot of formations, and I knew a lot. And it just helped me, and I became a team leader pretty fast. It was within a month. I was already a team leader, which is… Interviewer: “Okay, so when you’re actually out there in the field now—Now what does PSD stand for?” It’s security—Personal security detachment. Yeah, it’s—I almost forgot. I was like, “I can’t remember.” It was personal security detachment, and we pretty much were assigned to the command group. The sergeant major. The… Interviewer: “Now a company commander?” (1:20:03) No. Battalion. We were the battalion PSD, so we had the battalion commander, the battalion sergeant major, the op sergeant major. And if we would have the supply officer or something like that that had to go do a logistics run. Pretty much any of the officers in the battalion we were responsible for. Interviewer: “Okay, so you’re working with some of the same people you were already working with, but now you’re in the field with them rather than—” Yes, yes. Now I’m going out and doing the whole field engagements and—Because they would go out and meet the tribe leaders and stuff like that, so now I was actually getting to go. And it was really cool. I got to sit down on a lot of goat grabs, and that was—Oh, man. Interviewer: “Goat grabs?” Yeah, so that—My first experience of that thing too is for the books. So a goat grab—What they’ll do is—The locals—They’ll get a whole goat, and they cook it. And they surround it with veggies, fruits, and bread, and it’s just this giant platter. And they set it down, and everybody’s just sitting in a circle. And it’s literally that. Everybody’s just grabbing at it and eating, and that’s how, I guess, politics are done over there. You’ll spend three hours drinking chai and eating goat and an hour talking about what you came to talk about, you know, so it was like there were times we would have to go. And we’re pulling security for hours, and we’re just—And you look over, and all the leaders are drinking chai and eating. And you’re just like, “Come on.” Like, “Really?” And—But we would benefit because they would come around, give us food and stuff like that because it was a little bit more of a—I don’t want to say relaxed, but because we were with the higher-ups who we were engaging with, we weren’t as much expecting—No. And I don’t want to say expecting because we always were expecting, especially after the first incident. It was like we were on high alert, especially that platoon, because, you know, we took the biggest casualty of the deployment. But it was almost as opposed to if you go out on a raid, you’re pulling security on that where you’re expecting it. These—You’re, you know—These leaders are �Saladin, Philip welcoming you into their house, and you don’t think this guy’s going to do something where he got, you know, all of his kids and everybody just walking around open freely. (1:22:06) That stuff you could pick on. If you go somewhere, and all of a sudden you notice all the kids are running in the buildings, you’re like, “Okay.” You know. Like, “Let’s tighten it up a little bit.” But if you got everybody running around, and you can notice the environment, you’re like, “Okay.” You know. “I’m in this guy’s house. We have supremely overwhelming firepower. We’re all right right now.” So—But we always had, you know, June 23rd in the back of our head because it was just—You know, it was just an event. You know, it was—But it was really cool. Got to experience it. So my first goat grab—“Hey. Here’s a plate of food.” I’m like, “Yes!” It was so good. All of a sudden, I don’t feel well. I get dysentery, and we’re still about a few hours left on out in sector. And I’m just like, “I don’t know what I’m going to do with myself.” I’m just—“Ugh.” I got so sick my—And it was—That was probably my first week. I don’t want to say my first patrol but definitely my first week. It was—You know, now my impression is I’m here with the commander—sergeant major—in his truck, heading back to base, and he’s like, “What’s wrong?” And I’m on the floor like, “I don’t know.” You know, like, “I think I’m poisoned.” But nobody else is sick, so obviously we didn’t get poisoned. But it was just like, “Man.” And it was so bad, but couple days later, I was fine. And— Interviewer: “Now did they treat—Did you get any treatment for it?” Yeah, I—Yeah, they gave me—They had these pills. I don’t know—Remember the name of it, but I was down for the rest of the day. It—Good thing. It was only a day. The next morning—Of course, I didn’t have a choice. I had to get up and go out, but I was fine the next morning. But it was—I was just like, “Whoa.” But I think it kind of helped me because every other time I ate it—I didn’t learn my lesson. I went out and ate again, but I was fine every time. So I was just like, “Maybe I just had to get used to it.” Because you get tired of the military food fast. (1:24:06) You know, you get the same thing, and you’re just like, “Okay. You know what? I’m going to try that meat on that plate.” Interviewer: “All right. Now when you’re on a base like this, I mean, are they cooking any food, or is it all MREs, or…?” Oh, it’s—At this time—the early part—I say the—Probably eight months out of the whole time we were there, we were pretty small. First, we had a little trailer. It was—They call it an MKT. I don’t know—Mobile Kitchen Trailer. Yeah, so that’s what we had. So you had—It was enough space for them to cook and you to walk through, get your food, and walk out and find a place to eat. Because we were—Still had tents and our conexes, so, you know. And we never ate in our rooms. Just no. You don’t want that. Critters coming in your room. So we’re eating outside. Then eventually we got a bigger tent, so now we could actually—It was a—I forget what they call them. A GP—A big, you know—So we had it in there. We got to set up in there. Had to probably sit maybe a hundred people. Eat in there. It’s a lot better, you know, and then towards the end of the deployment they got contractors. And they build this huge, nice facility, and I’m like, “Of course. When we’re leaving.” And they get the private contractors coming in, and you see all the—You know, the good food. You’re like, “Oh. They’ve even got midnight chow.” I’m like, “I’m lucky if I, you know, ate twice a day. Now these—You go twenty-four hours and get a �Saladin, Philip meal.” But it was one of those things that was kind of glad. You’re like, “Oh. I see where it came from.” But then it was like, “Whatever. I’m going back to America. I’m happy.” Interviewer: “All right, all right. Now going to sort of take us now—So you basically got just sort of this—You got into the first few months of your tour now, and now you’re going into the rest. You’ll be there for fifteen. Now how does—What—Describe the kind—Okay. Aside from going out and meeting with the local leaders and having goat grabs, what else were you doing? What kind of missions would you run?” (1:26:09) The operations tempos actually. It was a pretty high operation tempo. We had a lot of—In that area there was a lot of targets—high value targets—that were wanted, and if we weren’t out conducting raids to arrest people or kill or capture missions—I guess they would call them at that time—we were securing. Doing—Pulling security for other units. Doing—And we had our command group. They were out every day. If it wasn’t a key leader engagement, we were attaching ourselves to a line company to go assist in whatever missions because it was—It wasn’t a huge task force either, you know. We were—And our area was just two line companies, headquarters company, and then another company got tasked out or attached to another unit. But we had other small units attached to us, but for the most part it was just—Majority of the missions was the two line companies, so we would go out and attach ourselves to them and go off base. We—Majority was just a lot of arrests. We did—I couldn’t even tell you the amount of people we—Even when I was working in the TOC, we had a lot. When I was out on the line with the PSD, it felt like every other day we were going out, and if it wasn’t us, we were securing a mission. A raid going on. And it was actually, you know, pretty impressive. All of—You— Considering all of our incidents weren’t on raids. They were—Like that one. The second incident we had. They were just doing a presence patrol. They were just walking around the town, you know. Two minutes before that engagement, they were talking to a little kid on a bike. You know, just neighborhood stuff. And out of all the raids we did—You know, high value targets. It was, you know, some scary guys. (1:28:03) We were—We would go in expecting—Like, “Something’s going to happen.” It was like, “Okay. We’re going to get contact tonight.” But never. Not—It—They were all just good. And, you know, it’s just—They all went down. And I wish I remembered how many we did. It was a lot. I think we even got recognized. Our unit got a Presidential Unit Citation for that achievement. Interviewer: “Okay. Now did you have any idea what sorts of people you were going after?” Yes, from—I knew that from my experience of being in the TOC and seeing, you know, the paperwork. You’re like, “Okay. This target is wanted, suspected of IED making, kidnapping—” Whatever crime. I saw all that, so—And then we would get told, too. Before the mission, you get a mission brief. You get your package. It’s like, “This is what we’re going after.” Because even though we weren’t the front line going in first to the house, everybody had to know who the target was. You never know. They try to escape. So we could recognize. So you would study the—You know, see them. Who they are. But it was—A lot of the times it was a lot of information because it’d be like, “Okay. Look out for these vehicles.” And sometimes it was a list of eight vehicles, and then you’d have these license plates. And then, on top of that, they were written in Arabic, so you’re just like, “Okay.” Like, “If it’s the bad guy, I think we’ll know �Saladin, Philip by the time he gets to us.” So there were—But me? I just knew from working in the office, but some of them were some real bad dudes. There was one guy we arrested, and he was known for—I think he was responsible for—What was it? Not—Mass graves. Killing. Just killing a bunch of people. (1:30:02) And, you know, we were like, “Okay. This guy’s going to go down with a fight.” No. He’s—You know, and you see them come out, and you see these guys. And they’re—I don’t know if they just—I don’t know. It was like you read these lists, and you’re like, “This guy’s a real evil man.” And then when we come down on them, they were just like, “Here. Just take me away.” And I don’t know if it was because they knew whatever it was at that time. We had a lot of guys going in, coming out. I don’t know if just they knew that if they waited out long enough, they might just get recycled through the system and released. Because at that time there was the surge. Government of Iraq was still—Favorites were being played. You know, such and such religions, people, whatever. However you want to look at it, we’re getting—You know, like, “Oh. We don’t have evidence on this guy. You’ve got to let him go.” And so it was a lot of that, too. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and do you have—And were these, at least as far as you could tell, basically local residents, or were there Al-Qaeda types from somewhere else?” Oh, a lot—In this area, a lot of it was an influx of Al-Qaeda, and at this time—It’s when they would call themselves Al-Qaeda in Iraq. AQI is what we knew them as, and then what was the other name? There was another name they were transitioned to. I can’t remember. It was AQI and then something. AQ—Something. Whatever. But we definitely had a few that were not from that area because we—One thing that we had good was the unit before us—They were doing a lot of civil, I guess you could call it. Investing on schools. They just got done building a brand new school. So we kind of knew, but then you would tell. Like, “Okay.” And then you have a lot of—It was—This part I was in southern Iraq, so this part was still very tribal. It wasn’t urban, so you could tell. (1:32:01) But then you also have times where the Sheikh would come. “Hey. This guy’s not from around here.” And then we would go, and then you talk to him. And you’ll find out that this guy lived here thirty years ago, and he came and moved his family out. And he came and took—So a lot of times that was hard because it was a lot of disputes like that, but there was a few times where, you know, we would have—Like, “Okay.” You know. “We know this guy. We’ve got the intel. This guy just came in. He’s hiding out in this area.” And those were the ones that were a little more—Because this place before we came was a real, real hotspot for them. It was a safe haven, you could say, because it wasn’t that far from the Iranian border, so they had easy access. So it was a good hotspot for them. I think we were the second unit there from the unit we replaced, so they had some good—And we had a few raids that actually Special Forces Groups were conducting, and we had to pull security for them. And those were the ones where we were like, “Hey. I notice that guy from a deck of cards.” So those were pretty cool ones. You know, though, and—But we didn’t get to—I would love to go inside a building with them and— But we just kind of were the outer security. We got to hear the chatter on the radio, and, you know, it’s like, “Boom. You’re on target.” Next thing you know, they’re leaving in a helicopter, and you’re like, “Oh. We got our guys. See you later. Thank you.” And stuff like that. Interviewer: “Okay. Now how bad were the IED problems?” �Saladin, Philip That? For that deployment, they were a lot, but we had the engineers roadside. EOD. Their vehicles—Oh, man. But they had the vehicles that were designed for it, but they went through so many. We had—They would do route conditions—green, red, yellow—meaning, you know— Green: safe to travel. And I tell you what. At least seventy percent of our area was red. It’s like we could not travel because it was like you know you’re going to get hit if you go down this road. And it was for the whole fifteen months. We had roads like that. And it wasn’t a speculation. (1:34:05) It was like, “Okay. Route clearance is going to go down this road today. This road is red. We’re going to expect to encounter, you know, half a dozen IEDs.” Sure enough, two minutes into it—“Oh. We got our first IED.” And it was intense. That was a huge— Especially because it was a marshy, swampy terrain, so it was real easy. And then we were limited to our vehicles. We couldn’t use the big MRAPs all the time or the Bradleys. We were confined to the Humvees, and we took the MRAPs out a lot because the IEDs were a lot. So we needed the more protection. Interviewer: “Okay, and explain what an MRAP is.” So it’s a Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected vehicle. That’s what MRAP stands for, but it’s pretty much a reinforced—if you want to think of it—oversized, mini school bus. The bottom is designed to reflect explosions to the side. It’s a well-armored vehicle, but they are so big and clumsy them things. It’s—Because it—They—High center of gravity. The slightest uneven terrain that thing is bouncing, and you’re just like, “Oh, man. I’m about to roll over.” And that happened often. That is—We got pretty good at self-recovering vehicles because them things— as much money they spent on them—would just get stuck and for nothing. But they did good against bombs, so you’ve got to give or take, you know. I wouldn’t—I’ll get stuck in mud and not get blown up. Interviewer: “All right. Did the overall rhythm or pattern of things change at all during that year?” Towards the end our—We noticed—Because we would get a lot of sporadic engagements with the checkpoint personnel. And we noticed towards the end that died down a lot. (1:36:03) The IEDs—That died down a lot, but I think it’s because we recovered a lot of stashes. We would— Found so many caches. It was insane the amount of caches of IEDs we found. It was almost like they had so many they just didn’t care. It was like you take a metal detector, walk outside, and— “Beep!” “ Oh. Here you go.” It was insane. And that died down a little bit. The engagements kind of started dying down, and I would say for the better part of the last four months it was just nothing. It was pretty quiet, you know, with your exception of your local disagreements and that stuff. But as far as against the coalition troops, it was—I don’t know if we just did that good of a job, which I doubt because I kept in touch with people in that area after we left. And, you know, there was—They still had the same stuff going on, but I—We did reduce it enough. It was— Especially me going from the TOC and seeing it—It definitely—We definitely put a huge impact in that area. I wouldn’t say an American solider is going to walk off the base and be perfectly fine, but it was a lot safer than when we first got there, too. And I’m pretty sure, you know, it’s just the gradual improvement, and I’m pretty sure—Who knows if I go there now, though? I don’t know, but… �Saladin, Philip Interviewer: “Yeah, and that does seem to be part of a larger pattern that was taking place, and so there was some progress being made at stabilizing things at least, which is sort of what they sort of were supposed to do. And then it’s up to the Iraqis to clean up their act after that. Okay. Did you get to know many of the Iraqis at all, or…?” At this time—the first deployment—I did a little bit, but not too much for the simple fact of who we were engaging with. We weren’t at this time—They didn’t have the whole—You had to be with an Iraqi army and stuff like that. So at this time we were still independently operating, so when I would engage with the locals, it would be more like the higher-ups. (1:38:10) So short conversations with them. Stuff like that. So I never really—But I did get a feel for the environment going out because you would notice enough the first few months going out. Just the looks on their faces compared to the—Once they realize you’re—Okay. I’m actually here trying to do something positive for them. You get the friendly waves. You get a smile. You’re like, “Okay.” You know, you start noticing that. You’re like, “Hey. They like us.” Interviewer: “Now did you have any Iraqis assigned to you as interpreters or whatever?” We had interpreters, but at this time they were from the U.S. They were assigned. They came over with us, and—Because we still didn’t have—The closest interaction with the locals were base contractors. They would bring us, you know, whatever supplies or whatever it was we needed, but that was—And even that interaction was minimal. If you wasn’t in charge of them, you wasn’t talking to them. Interviewer: “All right. What ability did you have to communicate with anybody back home?” That was actually pretty—They had a good setup. It wasn’t the best, but it surprised me. I was like, “Oh. Maybe I’ll get a phone call every couple weeks.” But they had a pretty good, little tent set up. It was maybe a dozen computers, a dozen phones, and you would go. But, you know, it’s—The service—It wasn’t that—And then me? It’s funny. I was deployed for about six months before I told my mom I was deployed, so you can imagine that one. And, you know, it was one of those things. I would call her and be on the phone, and, of course, she’d be like, “Where you at?” And I’m—You know, it’s like, “I’m out training. Bad reception.” And then—I don’t know. I guess, finally, she caught on to it, and then I was like, “Well, I’m in Iraq.” (1:40:00) And she was—So it was like that was a whole other—Man. And so all my friends would make fun of me. Like, “So you were scared to tell your mom you was in Iraq, but you wasn’t scared to go to Iraq?” And I was just like, “Oh. You haven’t seen my mom.” Like, “That’s a different battle.” But the service was, you know, okay. It was—And then, plus, I tried to keep communication minimum with back home. It was more of a personal thing. Just made it easier for me the less I talk to them. It was just, you know, get through it. I wouldn’t be thinking about home. It was just one of those things. Interviewer: “Right. Okay. Now are there other particular incidents or impressions that stand out for you from that first tour?” �Saladin, Philip On that tour? I don’t know. That was about the major parts of it, and, you know, besides the high tempo of the tour, that was pretty much the peak point of it. Interviewer: “All right, so then when do you rotate back to the States?” So at the end of that, I went back to Germany. I was in Germany for about three months. You do your whole—You know, just back to your unit. People start getting their orders to go to new units. And right around the time they start restructuring that unit to—They were going to Afghanistan. I had re-enlisted, and I got stationed in Texas. So I get sent to Texas, and I’m like, “Okay.” You know. “I’m in a new place. Just came back from a deployment. I’m in Fort Hood, Texas.” Interviewer: “All right, so, roughly, when do you go to Fort Hood?” It was around 2010. I want to—October, November-ish 2010. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and what unit are you assigned to now?” In here I got assigned to Bravo Company 2/12 Cav. Interviewer: “Okay, so 2nd Battalion, 12th Cavalry. And that’s 1st Cavalry Division?” 1st Cavalry Division, 2nd Battalion, 12th Cavalry. Interviewer: “Okay. Now the 1st Cavalry Division has been a lot of different things in its history. It’s sort of Armored Cavalry in World War II. It was Infantry in Korea. It was Air Cavalry in Vietnam. What was it when you joined it?” (1:42:12) We were a cavalry unit, but the way they had it broken down it was like all of that because it was a cavalry battalion—Brigade, you could even say. We were—But the battalion was comprised of—What’d we have? One—We had two infantry companies, two tank companies, and then Scouts, so it was—And the form of Scout—It wasn’t a Scout unit. It was just Scout in name. So it was 1st Cav Division in historical context because it was no longer just a cavalry. They don’t even—They didn’t even use the term “Cav Scout” no more. It’s just a Scout. You know, so it was a kind of—Just a mash-up of everything. Interviewer: “All right, so 2/12. Was that a line company or a Scout unit, or what was it?” 2/12 was the battalion. Our line company—We were Bravo Company. And Alpha Company. Were the two line companies. And then we had three other companies, which were the support companies. Interviewer: “All right. Now did the unit have helicopters or vehicles or…?” �Saladin, Philip We had—We were mechanized, so we had Bradleys and Humvees. But the Division had the air—You know, the helicopters division. All that was comprised under the Division, but as far as our battalion was—Was just Bradleys and Humvees. Interviewer: “Okay, so you’re mechanized infantry again, which is sort of what you had been originally.” Correct. Yes. Right back to it, and here—The interesting—Was here in Fort Hood—In Germany, they kind of embraced a lot more of the mechanized role. It was like you were mechanized. You—But they had the light infantry stuff they did. Because they did a lot of, you know, foot marches. Lot of groundwork. (1:44:00) Same thing at Fort Hood, but Fort Hood—They were a lot—The catch, I should say, was a lot more focused on the mechanized part. We did a lot of dismounted tactics, but it was almost like they wanted to—We individually got our stuff, so we got—I was mechanized, so it was like I got thrown into this—It was a sixteen-week course. Just the mechanized crew. We had civilian contractors come in. It was almost a mini college semester. It was—It was testing, learning the vehicle, operations—Everything you’re doing. And then, once you qualify to be on that—and you’ve got to pass the test to qualify—then okay. You are officially a Bradley Unit, so now we got attached to the rest of the company. And now we’re working with the dismounts, and the Bradley has six or eight seats in the back. And we would put our light infantry guys—if you want to call them—and we would combine our operations. Mechanized and dismounts. And so it was kind of a little mash-up of light infantry and mechanized without the full aspects of light infantry. We didn’t have no Airborne or none of the stuff like that. It was like you was in a tank, Bradley, or the ground. Interviewer: “All right, and how long did you spend at Fort Hood?” I was at Fort Hood from 2010 to 20—Was it ‘14? 2014 I got out. I got out at Fort Hood, so 20— So— Interviewer: “Okay, but you had a second tour to Iraq?” Yes, and that was another thing. I leave Germany. They’re getting ready to deploy. I’m like, “Hey.” You know. “I just got out of a deployment.” I get to Fort Hood. I’m there three months maybe—probably not even three months—and you start hearing the rumors. You know, the rumor wheel’s— “Hey. We might be deploying. We might be deploying.” And I’m just like, “Here we go again.” And then it comes down. Like, “Yeah. We’re going to—” We get thrown into the training cycle, so we don’t get orders yet. (1:46:04) But you get thrown into the training cycle, and then, from my experience—I’m like, “It’s on.” You know. Like, “Okay.” And here the training tempo—And I thought Germany’s training tempo was intense. But here it was more because in Germany we would have to travel out to the training grounds. Because the base we was at was small, so we could maybe qualify with our rifles at the base and small tactics. But for the larger tactics we would have to travel, and it was couple hours drive. And then you had to maneuver a whole unit. Expensive, so we would do long trainings, but not often. Fort Hood—It was medium training very often, so instead of going out for thirty days, we were going out for a week or two, coming back for a weekend—three or four days—go out for a week or two. And �Saladin, Philip that was just the tempo for the better part—A better part of the next nine months because I was only at Fort Hood for about just under, say, nine months before I deployed again. Interviewer: “Okay. Now what rank were you at this point?” At this point I’m a specialist, and I’m a gunner on a Bradley. We’re doing all our training. And I’m trying to remember when was it that I came off the Bradley. So we do all the training, but I’m—And then we do our major training, which is to either California or Louisiana. We go there. I’m still mechanized at this time. Everything is set up, and then we get our—Oh. At this time we get our orders. I remember. When we—Right before we go to Louisiana—Okay. Bam. Your orders are cut. It’s set. You have your date. We’re packing bags. We’re training. Now it’s fullfledged operation tempo. Now we know when we’re going. We get back. All of a sudden, the mission changes. It’s, you know—We’re pulling out. We’re giving them back the base. We’re— Pretty much the transition phase. (1:48:02) So it’s like my first deployment was under the troop surge under Bush. My second one was a transition under Obama. It was pulling out. So it was like I got to see both ends of the beast. So I’m like, “Okay.” I’m—In my head, I’m—I was interested for this deployment because it was like I wanted to see how this one was going to go. Because—And they’re already telling us—It was like, “It’s not going to be heavy operational. It’s more of advise. Assist. We’re standing back a lot this deployment.” So I’m—“Okay.” So… Interviewer: “Okay. Now in the middle of that did you actually go to Louisiana?” Yes, we went to Louisiana. We spent—Was it thirty days? We went twice. I’m trying to remember. We went thirty days, came back for about—Little bit less than a month. Went back out. Interviewer: “Okay, so you go to a swampy state to train to go to Iraq?” Yeah. Interviewer: “Well, of course, some—You had a little bit of swamp in Iraq first time, but— Okay, but was it at Fort Polk, or somewhere else?” Yes. Fort Polk, Fort Polk. And they have the JRTC—the Joint Readiness Training Center— there. Complete mockup town of Iraq except for Fort Polk is a million percent humidity every day, but—And then that was our experience there. Did that for the next two, three months. Back in that cycle. Interviewer: “Okay. Yeah. Now you had mentioned something earlier about Fort Hood not being one of your favorite places?” No. No, it’s—I’ll say—I’m trying to see how to say this thing. Not in a way that I didn’t—That I didn’t like the military. (1:50:01) But I didn’t like Fort Hood, how Fort—How the place itself was ran because I felt it was—When I got there, I felt it was more of a corporation than an Army unit, and I don’t know if it was because of the size. And Fort Hood does have a division headquarters on it, so okay, you need to uphold, I guess, a better image because it’s a lot higher a �Saladin, Philip rank. I don’t know the reasoning, but in Germany it felt more military. You were in a military unit. You did military things. Everything had a militaristic purpose. You get to Fort Hood. Some of the stuff you do you’re just like, “No.” It’s a lot of just weird admin stuff, you know. It’s just random. You get there. It’s like, “Oh. You have to learn how to do a PowerPoint slide on—” I’m just trying to—One of the most random things like a PowerPoint slide on going out on boating and barbequing for the weekend. I’m like, “You’re trying to tell me how to be safe barbequing and boating, but you just gave me a gun and bullets and sent me to another country. And I had not a single safety brief or a PowerPoint slide of how to not to do something.” You know, and then it’s like at Fort Hood you’re told, “Okay. You can’t go—If you go on pass, you have to do a course on or computer thing on how to drive. You have to rest every two hours.” Weird stuff. But then we’re in Iraq. They throw you in an MRAP. “Oh. You have got to go drive for twelve hours nonstop.” I’m like, “Wait. So it’s okay for me to do it over there when I’m in a lot more danger, but if I want to drive home for the weekend and if it’s over three hours, I can’t do it because I don’t have more than a day.” Interviewer: “So there was a lot of chicken bleep.” Yes, yes, and for some reason Fort Hood just felt like it was extremely good at that. And it was everything, and it kind of—It’s just like, “Man.” It’s like, “Let us be Army. Let us do Army.” (1:52:09) It was like they were so concerned with—“Okay. You need to go to the motor pool and pick weeds out of rocks.” Like, “We have Roundup. Just let me go spray it.” But no. It’s like, “Go get a group of guys and go pull grass.” And stuff—I’m like, “I could have been teaching how to land-nav or read a map or doing something else, but you want me to go clean a rock.” And it wasn’t that dramatic, but it was stuff like that where you were just like, “Why am I doing this?” And, again, it was just that whole, I guess, bureaucracy of the big base, and it—And that—It just kind of—It just took a taste out of my mouth and just—It just—And yeah. Interviewer: “So going to Iraq then is a refreshing change of pace?” Yes, it was. And I tell people that, and they look at me like I’m crazy. But I’m like, “I actually looked forward to that.” And then, “Okay, besides the fact that I need to stay alive—which I do that here too—that’s my only worry. Besides my Army stuff, which is almost instinctive because—” But it’s like, “If I want a drink of water or Gatorade, I don’t got to pay for it. I just go walk in the fridge and grab it. If I’m hungry, I don’t—I’m not worrying about my meal. I just go walk in the building and get it.” But it’s so much simpler. It’s almost—It’s a primitive lifestyle, you want to say, to put it—The simplest words. It’s like, “Okay. All we got to do is worry about is eat and live, and that’s it.” And the stresses of war are—Yeah, it’s a whole other animal, but the stress of life is not there. And it’s weirdly a great feeling, and you—At the moment I didn’t notice that until—When I got out and I started—I guess you want to say—for the better part of it being an adult, having responsibilities, paying, you know, mortgages and all that. I’m just like, “Man. I was in Iraq. I just had to not get blown up.” Interviewer: “Right. All right. Now what’s the process for getting you out to Iraq this time?” (1:54:05) �Saladin, Philip So now this one was a little bit different because Fort Hood has their own—Pretty much is its own mini country. Own airport. Everything. So all the staging we did in Germany last time— Everything got done from Fort Hood. Loading up all the supplies, leave ahead of time, all the vehicles—It was probably two months ahead of time. All the gear’s gone, so now we’re just sitting and waiting. Formations every other day. “Bring all your gear. We want to make sure you have it.” So, you know, and that stuff. Finally, we’re going. It’s the day we’re leaving. We’re just getting on school buses and two minutes down the road to the airfield. And we’re sitting in this giant gym, get loaded up in the plane, and the next thing you’re taking off. I think we stopped in Ireland or something for a few hours, and then from there we went right into Kuwait. And this time it was—Even in Kuwait I noticed a change because I get to Kuwait, and a lot of those briefings it wasn’t like, “Hey. This is an AK-47. This is how you handle it. This is how you take apart.” You know. Or, “These are IEDs.” It was more like, “This is the population in this area. This is how you engage them.” Which is the right thing to do because okay, you don’t want to go in there and just—“Oh. I’m going to destroy everything.” You know, you want to know that, but it was a lot more of that than, “Okay. Hey. You’re going to a combat zone.” And then we get there. It’s a huge base. The lifestyle compared to my first deployment—It’s night and day. This was a—What—It’s an Iraqi airbase. I’m in northern Iraq in Kirkuk at this time for this deployment. It was, I think, Kirkuk Air Base actually. Was where we were on. Really nice. Lot of contractors. This thing was—We had, you know—For what it was, I wasn’t complaining. (1:56:10) I was like, “Hey.” You know. “I’ve got electricity.” I had Internet in my room. It was good, so hey. And the life—The living conditions was better. The food was better. By this time contractors were well-established. You know, my first deployment—From having the showers that were going to electrocute you to the second deployment—To you have some guy coming in replacing all the napkins in the bathroom. You’re like, “Whoa. Okay.” So—But this deployment was the whole—“Let’s be nice to everybody.” And it’s interesting because this deployment I feel like I thought was the deployment—I was not more in fear for my life, but I was like, “If this is the deployment, this is it.” Because it was every other—Probably every day almost we were taking rockets incoming, and, you know, the first couple days you hear the alarm, you run to shelter. Before the end of the first week, we would get rocketed, and I’d just stay in my room. I’m like, “I’m tired of running.” I’m like, “Whatever.” It’s like, “If it’s going to hit, it’s going to hit me playing video games.” And I’d just stay in my room, and that’s the mentality a lot of us took. And I don’t know if it was just the infantry guys—that we took that mentality—because you still had a lot of people around us that as soon as that alarm goes off, they scatter, you know, in the wind. Me? I’m like, “I’m going to wait for first impact, judge from there, and that’s it.” It’s—Because I was like, “I’ll be damned if I run out of my room and get blown up running to cover when I was in cover.” But, you know, it was just one of those things, and then by the third week we’re making fun of it. We’re—And I don’t know if it was because their rockets were just so whatever. And I’m pretty sure they probably just lined up five rockets, launch, and forget. But we would come outside, and rockets were coming in. (1:58:01) Me and my buddy would run around. “The Russians are coming! Everybody take cover!” And then everybody’s like, “How are you joking?” And we’re like, “Well, you can’t be serious.” It’s like, “I’m not going to—I’m already stressed out.” It’s like, “I’m not going to go crazy worrying about some random rockets.” And, you know, fortunately I don’t think nobody on the base—I think somebody got shrapnel, but no casualties besides that. And it was small. We had—But it was a constant barrage the whole deployment. Well over hundreds of rockets were fired at us. �Saladin, Philip Interviewer: “Now was this hill country you were in?” It was pretty flat. They really, really, really urbanized our setting. The base was huge. It was a— Half of it was—At this time half was Air Force, half was military, and Iraqis even had a little part of it, too. It was a big base. And, you know, they would launch the rockets, and half the time it was hitting random spots on the base. But we had a few times. We had one time. We’re driving out, and rocket landed right in front—It was a dud. Just—And you hear the fin, and we’re just like, “Wow.” That—And you know. And stuff like that. You’re like, “Hey.” But—And you know. And that was the lifestyle there at that place. Interviewer: “Okay, so what were you actually doing then?” This—We were doing a lot of—They called it—We just did a lot of presence patrol. That’s probably the best way to—We would do a constant presence out there. We were just constant. If we—We would do forty-eight hour guard shifts with an Iraqi unit at certain police headquarters and checkpoints throughout the town, and if we weren’t even doing that, we were literally just driving around the town for twelve—Twelve-hour shifts you would just drive, and it was—I think it was just drawing out the bad guys because it was a lot of rockets attacking at this time, and we would—While driving out, the overall idea was to try to have a unit out of sector, so when they would start launching rockets, maybe have a chance of being close. (2:00:09) Because we could ID where they were being launched from from all the stuff we had, so, you know, sometimes we would get a—“Oh. We’re right down the road.” And you’ll go, and it’d just be a rail set up. So it’s like we could tell it’s a timer, and I don’t—My unit personally—We never got to catch one of them, but we definitely found a lot, a lot, a lot of rockets and rails. And that was just—By that time that was their thing. Just set rockets and go. There wasn’t—IEDs weren’t a big thing, but at this—It was—Can’t—The—I think they’re called RKGs. They were handheld IEDs that they would throw, and that’s what my truck got blown up with. This was this deployment. And that’s another thing. We weren’t doing a raid. Nothing. We were—We just got done with a presence patrol. End of our shift. No, we’re actually QRF. That’s the funny part. We’re QRF, and we’re out in town. Interviewer: “What is QRF?” So quick reaction force. So that’s for—Let’s say a unit’s going out, and they get in contact. We’re pretty much their reserve. “Hey. These guys are in contact. We’re going to come and multiply the force and whatever has to be done.” The way you usually handle QRF—You want to keep them stationed at a location. Us? The way they did it we would drive. We’re out in sector, so it’s like, “Okay. We’re QRF. What happens if QRF gets hit?” And guess what happened that night. QRF got hit. So we’re driving. It’s probably, you know, last—Towards the end of our shift. We could see the base lights. Maybe a mile from the base. And it’s crazy. The way I remember this story was completely different from my driver, and I didn’t notice until me and him talked about it a few years later. (2:02:08) So the way I—The whole time I thought of it I’m in the truck. It’s my driver, my truck commander, and then me. I was a squad leader at the time, but I had—I was driving in the platoon sergeant’s truck, so he was the highest ranking NCO. So he was the truck commander. Him and the driver in the front seat, have the gunner in the middle standing on top, and it’s me and the squad in the back. You know, and I’m like, �Saladin, Philip “Okay.” You know. “We’re pretty close to the base.” And we stopped. Or, at least, I thought we stopped. And next thing I know I was just—Just this real loud explosion and this—I can still taste it. Just this funky taste in the air. It was just—I don’t even know how to describe it. I don’t know. You know, it’s from the smoke system. I don’t know. It was just this weird taste. And come to, realize, you know—“Okay. We just got blown up.” First thing I do is, you know, the body check. I’m intact. That’s a good sign. Still could not really hear stuff. Everything was just muffled. At this point I’m putting two and two together. I knew it was an explosion. You know, you know, and I look over. My medic—He’s standing there. Everybody for the most part was good. We—Our truck behind us—We push out of the kill zone, which is what you’re trained— You know, if you get hit, you don’t want to stay in that spot. You want to try to push up, back, wherever. Couple hundred meters out of the way in case it’s an ambush. You don’t want to stay on the X. We push out. Personnel gets arranged. We call up. “Hey. We just got hit.” “Oh. We need to spin up QRF.” We’re like, “Oh. We are QRF.” (2:04:02) Interviewer: “Okay, so what condition was the truck in when it was hit?” The truck—It was interesting. The truck was almost—I give a lot of credit to the truck because this thing was—At first, we was like, “It’s immobilized.” We’re like, “It’s done. The slug apparently—Because it was—The way this IED was—It’s a copper plate, and the explosion— What it does—It melts that copper plate, so it’s pretty much molten metal just shooting towards wherever it’s going. And where we’re hit in the truck was right between the driver’s seat and the engine, so it just hit the perfect sweet spot where it—But it went—It was the craziest thing. It’s this big diesel engine, and it went clearly through the engine. You could see the ground. So we’re just—You know, at this time we didn’t know it was that bad. We’re like, “Okay.” You know, we took the truck. So we hook it up. Well, they hooked it up. At this time I’m still—I’m in the back of the other truck. I’m kind of dazed still a little bit, so I’m just—And I’m, you know—The recovery operation is happening, to say the best, and then, all of a sudden, it’s—I remember this because this got me so angry. We hear on the radio. The guy’s like, “Okay. We got our troop— We self-recovered.” They was like, “We got the truck hooked up.” We pretty much just put a tow bar on it to the truck in front of us.” We’re like, “We’ll just pull it out.” Headquarters comes on the radio. “No. The next QRF just spun up. They left. Let them come and recover you.” (2:06:00) You know, and it’s—You get that pause. Like, “What?” Like, “Is that what you’re—” You know, and now I can—You hear people on the radio like, “What the eff are you talking—” Like, “We’re not going to sit here and wait for somebody to come.” So that situation developed to what it was. This whole time I’m in the back of the truck, and all I hear is, you know, F-bombs and every other word you could imagine in the book because we’re sitting here still. And, you know—But we just got blown up five hundred feet to our rear, and we’re just still here. Eventually, the next—We had our sister platoon. Happened to be coming back from their shift on guard from one of the checkpoints. They were like, “We’re out in sector. We’re here.” They pulled up, load up the truck, and literally did exactly what we were doing. But, for some reason, they didn’t want us doing it. We get back to the base, which is maybe five minutes. We go to the—Automatically, everybody has to go to the aid station for evaluation. I get out of the truck. I’m like, “Oh.” You know. “I’m fine.” I’m—Then, all of a sudden, I’m just puking my brains out, and it’s just—I’m just like, “Okay.” It’s—I was—And then—And everybody’s being checked out, and I’m just puking. And next thing I know it’s like, “Oh. You’re staying here overnight.” I’m like, “For what?” I was like, “I’m just throwing up. I’m cool.” And no. So kept �Saladin, Philip me overnight. Me and my platoon sergeant got kept overnight. He got rocked pretty good because he was in the driver’s seat, so he got—Good concussion. The blast of that concussion. Because it was right in the—Directly—If we were going two, three miles an hour faster, he’d probably be dead right now because he would have gone right through that door. But he was a little bit more out of it for most part of the night. You know, wake up the next morning. We get released. You know, it wasn’t nothing too crazy. Interviewer: “Now did you get diagnosed with a concussion?” (2:08:01) Yes, I got diagnosed with a traumatic brain injury and pretty good one because I couldn’t go out for, you know, I think—I forget. I think it was a week or something. And I don’t remember hitting my head or none of that. I thought I recalled the whole thing good. You know, I’m telling my story. I’m like, “Yeah. This is what happened.” I couldn’t be more wrong. Interviewer: “Yeah, so what’s your friend’s version of it?” So my buddy—He’s the driver, so I take his—You know, I was like, “Okay.” You know. “That kind of makes a lot more sense to me.” Me? I was—My story—It was like we stopped at the light. Whatever. He was like, “No. We never stopped.” He was like, “We were driving the whole time.” And he was like, “We’re driving, I saw a guy at the corner, and I yelled to the gunner.” He’s—I don’t want to say names because I just don’t want to put nobody out there like that. And I haven’t talked to them to—You know, I let them put it out if they want to in the future. Whatever. But he’s saying his name. “Hey! Two o’clock.” You know. “Somebody’s fishy there.” Because he said he saw the guy look, turn back, and cross the corner. We’re coming up on the corner, so he peeks. He said he seen him peek. The guy comes back, and that’s when he told him. I don’t know if our gunner was sleeping, La-la land, what it was—Because then all I hear is, “Oh, shit.” And, you know, my driver’s like, “I didn’t know what to do after that.” He’s—He’s driving, he’s telling the gunner, the platoon sergeant’s like, “Oh, shit,” and he’s like, “That’s— We got hit while we were driving.” He’s like, “We never stopped. The whole time we was driving.” The part where we pushed through was right, the part that we couldn’t self-recover was right, but we never—I guess we never got to the point where we were leaving with our vehicles. (2:10:00) He said we were in the middle of setting it up, and then we got told, “Hey. Don’t selfrecover.” And apparently, our sister platoon was already there when we got told. You know, and I’m just like, “Well, okay. Well, you know what—” I was like, “I knew this story completely different. Me? I thought we was at—” I was like, “I thought we stopped.” And there’s this bridge—this overpass—we always drove under, and I thought that’s where it happened. And it wasn’t even there. It was quarter mile up the road. He was—I don’t know. I was like, “Didn’t we stop at the light at the underpass? And that’s where we got—” He’s like, “No. We never stopped at that light.” And I’m like, “I know.” That’s what was weird to me. He was like, “No.” He was like, “We drove through, and it’s right when we got past the underpass at that store—” He’s like, “This little restaurant—” He’s like, “That’s where it happened.” I was just like, “Oh.” And he’s sitting out—And it was—I was just like, “That’s—” But it was crazy how I thought—If you were to ask me—If that’s a report I gave—my debrief—I would have swore up and down that’s what happened verbatim, and no. It’s—And I found that very interesting, you know. It was like how? I don’t know if it was a coping mechanism that my body just went into, or maybe I just— �Saladin, Philip That track of period—I just lost it or whatever it was. But I just found it really interesting how— That my perspective was completely different from his, and it was—I just found that interesting. Interviewer: “Okay. Well, I mean, with a brain injury and a concussion and things like that, stuff can happen, and the brain can actually fabricate memories in places. If there’s something that’s missing, it will fill in the space for it. So who knows there? But yeah, so very, very distinctive thing there. Okay. Was that really the only time that you kind of came under fire or were that close to it?” For that—For us, yes. For that—I’m trying to think. For—Yes, yes, yes, yes. I know that one was—There was another story with another platoon that was pretty interesting. (2:12:02) It—I say it’s interesting because the outcome—Nobody was hurt, but this guy—I think he was a brand new private. He wasn’t in my unit—my platoon—but we had—We were going out on patrol, and we come back. It’s a—It was a fairly large maneuver. We come back, and we’re going into the base. And all you hear on the radio is, “Oh, chunk. I think I got shot.” You hear that. Okay, you know, you’re—Everybody’s buckling down. We’re like, “Is there a sniper?” You know, because we’re driving. You know, there wasn’t no gunshot, so nobody’s mind thought of anything. We’re just like, “What? Wait. What?” So everybody—And then it’s like, “No, no, no. Not right now.” And then—So okay. So we all come out the trucks, and the kid touched his vest. And his plate was shattered, and take it off and check it. And he had a slug dead center mass in his chest. Didn’t realize it. He was a gunner on a truck. Did not realize he got shot. And—But the irony was he had a plate in his vest that he was supposed to switch out for the new updated ones. He never did, so he got in trouble. So his plate saved his life that was supposed to be changed for a plate that was supposed to save his life, and he still got in trouble because—But I just thought that was—That was kind of interesting. You know, you took a round to the chest and didn’t—So I don’t know if it was just that far away, but it—That thing right there was always—I was—Very interesting to me. I was—And—But we never—I don’t think we was ever in a spot that that happened. I don’t—So the real story—Who knows? You know, I’m—There’s my perspective, but I just always found that interesting. Like, “Hey. You could say you took a round to the chest and walked away.” (2:14:00) Interviewer: “Yeah, and I suppose you were bouncing along on the truck. Might not even notice the moment when the impact took place if it sort of was timed that way, and then realized that you’re—The plate’s shattered. Okay. Now you’re—Are you now doing more in conjunction with the Iraqis?” Yes. At this deployment, it was hand in hand. We were to the point where every time we left the base we had to have an Iraqi contingency with us. So whether it be the local police, military— There had to be some kind of Iraqi force, and at first we were the lead. They would following. Towards the end, they were the lead, so we pretty much were the supporting force. But that didn’t always work out. There was one incident we were going on a scheduled raid. This was a big maneuver planned. We show up to the Iraqi Army base. They decide to not show up for work today. We get there. There’s one Iraqi guy there. It’s the chief. He’s like, “I don’t know where my men are.” And I’m just—And company commander walks up to me. Grabs me by the shoulder. He’s like, “Me, you, the chief, and this Iraqi. We’re taking point, and we’re going to go in the building.” And I’m like, “Fuck.” You know, and me—And at this point—I’m a sergeant at �Saladin, Philip this point, so I was like, “Okay. I’ve got the leadership role. I have to assume my leadership position.” So it’s me, two of my guys, two Iraqi guys, and, weirdly, the company commander. You never see that. A company commander does not go on a stack on a wall into a building. Sure enough, company commander’s like, “I’m coming in with you guys.” Me—as an NCO at that time—I was kind of a little bit disgruntled because I felt like, you know, my power just got snatched. And I was like, “Ugh.” But then I felt good. I was like, “He has trust in me. He’s going to do this maneuver with me.” So I was like, “Sweet.” You know, and that one—We ended up arresting some guy, but it was very interesting because our intel on that raid was—It was pretty grim. (2:16:04) A few weeks earlier, another group had came in and got into a firefight. There was—A Special Forces group came in and got into a firefight. The same exact area. And then we show up to the base, and this Iraqi Army guy’s—Decide to call out. I’m like, “This—” You know, the whole thing was just—It’s like, “Oh, man.” I was like, “This is going to be bad.” It was nighttime. It’s two in the morning. It—The whole time I’m driving to this place my heart’s jumping through my chest. I’m just like, “Oh my god.” I’m—I want to get sick at this point. I’m like, “I want to be sick.” But you can’t, you know. But it turned out good. Went in. Simple thing. Got the guy. I don’t even know if it was the guy we were looking for, but it was a guy we wanted to arrest. Arrested him. Turned out good. Really long. Really, really, really long night, but it turned out really good because, you know, nothing happened. But that was probably one of the scariest—Because, you know, it’s in your head, you’re—All the calling cards for an ambush were there, and, you know, at that time I’m—Yeah, I’m a fresh sergeant. I know enough, but the overall picture—You know, who am I? I’m not going to be like, “Hey, sir. We can’t do this mission.” He’s going to be like, “Yeah. Go. Get out of my face. Go get me some—A new sergeant.” You know, but—And it’s—And it made you think, “Are we walking into it?” It wasn’t—You know, it was—We benefited. Lucky. It turned out good for us. In our favor. We got some great intel out of it, and it’s weird because I look back at a lot of this stuff. And I’m like, “Man. All the times that it could’ve been—It was like it wasn’t.” And… Interviewer: “Okay. Yeah. Now did you ever see the Iraqis function effectively?” No. Just—Honestly, no. (2:18:01) One time close. We—And this was because we were just sweeping a large field, and we had them online. And they were sweeping the field. That’s probably about as effective—Like that. But there were other units that were pretty good. We got to work a little bit. We were in Kirkuk, so we seen the Peshmerga Army and stuff like that. Those guys are legit. Those guys—They know what they’re doing. There were small groups of people that we didn’t work with directly that—They were functioning right, but—And that was the thing with that area, especially in that Kirkuk area. Is you would have some units—You’re like, “These guys [?] way—” You know, we would leave a checkpoint. Don’t even turn around. Just don’t even look back. We just—“Adios.” Like, “You guys got this.” Another checkpoint— You show up. You’re like, “Wow.” Like, “What’s going on here?” And—But we never worked with one of the better units, should I say, or all the ones we worked with—They were small, and I didn’t—Probably were—You met good people, but as far as tactically, no. I seen them shoot themselves in the foot and try to say somebody shot them. Like, “No. It’s—No.” Like, “You have well over twenty people here.” You know. “We know—” We could tell the difference where, you know—Got shot. But that? I probably seen that about three or four times. Dude shooting—And they just had this thing. They would rest their AKs on their foot. The muzzle. Right on their toe. And they just loved playing with the trigger. They just always had their �Saladin, Philip finger—Always. And then it’s—You would think they would learn and—But never. It was just like, “Dude. Just don’t play with it. Just don’t play with it.” And then that was a little big of a problem. When we would stay on the compound with them, we put them—Unless you were sleeping, we made our guys wear their full gear all the time. Because we slept in separate rooms, so we had a little bit of control over the room. But if we were just walking around the area, it’s like, “No. Put your gear on.” Like, “I don’t care we’re indoors.” Like, “These guys are too reckless.” (2:20:07) And I don’t want to say it was just almost on purpose. Because they weren’t dumb people. They just—Relax. Everything was like, “Meh.” Like, “If it happens, it was meant to happen.” And when they literally say, “Everything is like that,” everything is like that. Nothing is, “Hey. We’re on a schedule.” They’re just like, “It’ll happen when it’ll happen.” I’m like, “No, no, no!” So—But it was interesting. That part was really cool. But met a lot of nice people. But that mentality was… Interviewer: “All right. Now, I mean, do you actually get to know any of these people at all?” Yeah. Yes, I—Especially in Kirkuk I got—And when we were staying—We would stay overnight in the compound for a couple days. Of course, you’re going to develop a relationship with them, and then my last name being Saladin—That intrigued them. Oh, man. That—I think the first day they saw me, and they saw my name badge—it says, “Saladin”—they were— Instantly just gravitated towards me. And we were talking, and it’s funny because I don’t speak a lick of Arabic. And they’re just—And I’m just like, “I don’t know.” Then we had an interpreter, and at this time our interpreters were actually locals. So he was talking, and then got to talking. I can—That right there built me a real good relationship with them. They would be like, “Hey! You want some of this, you know, bread?” And they would have their meal, and then they would call me over. Like, “Hey! We got some—” You know, super nice, and I just—I was intrigued by it, you know. Then I found out more. You know, they would tell me stuff about my last name and the origins, and how he was from—He was Kurdish and all this stuff, and they were real fascinated by it. And—But I kept the relationship there because we had a lot of other guys— They would go friends on Facebook and stuff like that, but I was real sketchy about that because at this time it was still—It was a lot of sketchy stuff going on over there, and a lot of the interpreters—We would have to meet them out in the town and away. (2:22:10) Secluded areas. They wouldn’t come to the base, or—Or they would get—You know, driving in the trunk of somebody’s car and get drove onto the base because they were in—Living in that area. And if they saw them—Like, “Oh. You’re working with the Americans?” You know, and it’s crazy because at this time we were handing it back over to them, but compared to my first deployment, I felt like the second one was more—I don’t want to say war zone or warlike, but it was because we had—It was a lot more stuff like that. Our interpreter for instance. We’re over here sneaking. Meeting this guy in the middle of this desert practically, climbing—With a full mask on, climbing into the back of our truck, so we could go talk to somebody, and then dropping him off miles away. It’s stuff like that, and then, you know—And then taking the rockets every night. Some of our checkpoints or other platoons got in firefights, and I’m like, “When we’re here to give you everything back and be nice, we’re getting a lot more attacked than when we were here kicking down doors and taking you guys away.” And I know it was two complete—It was southern Iraq and northern Iraq. Two completely different places. Maybe that had something to �Saladin, Philip do with it, but I just found that interesting that I felt like the combat intensity was more during the drawdown than the surge. Interviewer: “Yeah, so did you have much perspective in terms of thinking of the sort of bigger picture of what was happening? You know you’re part of a drawdown, and do you wonder, ‘What are these guys going to do when we’re not here?’” (2:24:05) Oh, yes. That was a huge thing. It was—Just seeing how they operated already with us, it was like, “Man.” Honestly, we were calling it. It’s—Knowing today what we know, it’s easy to say, “Hey. I knew this was going to happen.” But we were saying it. We were like, “Man. This is not going to turn out good because we’re just giving these guys bases and then the checkpoints—” We start off with the checkpoints. We would—And we’ve put generators in these things. Air conditioners. We took—We upkept them good—refurbished them—and, you know, come back a week or two later, they’re stripped bare. Generator’s gone, air conditioner’s gone, everything— And then it’s like, “Come on.” Like, “This is for you guys.” Like, “Now you guys are going to be manning this checkpoint with nothing.” And one of them was completely abandoned. I’m— So I’m like, “Okay. This is going to—” You know. And then we were giving them the bases, too. The big bases we were shutting down. We actually were part of a big maneuver. We drove from northern Iraq all the way to southern Iraq, and I forgot how they described it, but it was probably one of the largest convoy maneuvers in Iraq besides the invasion. We were pretty—It was—It was pretty much a whole base left at the one time, and we had all our vehicles maneuvering from northern Iraq to southern Iraq over a—It was a three-day period, and it was like, “If we’re drawing down, and stuff is this good—” We had fighter jet escorts, helicopters— You know, each leg of the trip we were never unescorted by air support, and we’re this massive firepower. (2:26:03) You got—It was well over a hundred vehicles. We’re armed to the tee, you know, and—But I’m like, “So we’re giving this back, and stuff is so good. Why are we leaving like this?” And everybody had that kind of feeling. Like, “Man.” Like, “We’re just giving this up. We’re giving this up.” And then, you know—And then me seeing two—From two deployments—None of these other people have way more deployments and a more intimate experience in certain places, but I’m—I almost felt like that work—I’m like, “All that stuff is— It’s done. It’s—It’s done.” Like, “This is the end. Is this the fruit of my labor? Is this it?” Like, you know, “Blood, sweat, and tears. We’re just going to walk away?” But, you know, that’s what happened, and then, you know—Then you look at the news, and you see the whole ISIS thing. Kirkuk was one of the first places that fell. I’m—Got a little sick. I’m like, “I know this town.” Interviewer: “All right. Now when you had that convoy—So were you leaving the base that you had been on initially?” Yes. Interviewer: “And then do you set up a new base, or you just leave?” No, we left the base and turned it over. We officially turned it over to the Iraqis, and then we were traveling down to other bases that we had. And we would either grab an attachment with us, and they would shut down, or they were probably still another unit there. But the main base we were on—When we left, it was—“Okay. This is yours.” �Saladin, Philip Interviewer: “And from there did you just go on and leave the country?” Yeah, yeah. That was pretty much our trip home. The start of our journey home. Usually, they were just throwing us on airplanes and flew us to Kuwait. It was like, “Oh. You’ve got one last mission. You’ve got to drive all the way to southern Iraq.” Because we had to—We were turning in the vehicles to the—I guess, the main logistic port or whatever, and it’s a lot cheaper to have a bunch of people driving than it is to fly them down, so—And it—And that itself was an interesting trip because we got to drive to a lot of towns in Iraq. (2:28:01) We drove through— What’s Saddam’s hometown? I can’t— Interviewer: “Tikrit.” Yes, and the path we took—You see everything, you know, and I was sitting up front. I got to see all that. Some of the stuff—You’re just like, “Man.” It’s mesmerizing, you know. You’re like, “Wow.” These buildings. And even when you see the palaces, and you go—It’s just—Man. But then you—So destroyed. Interviewer: “Oh, so were the palaces impressive, big things, or…?” Yes, to me. They definitely impressed me. I got to see two of them. I didn’t get to go inside none of them, but it’s—Just driving by and seeing them, and then just the—A lot of them—I was looking at—Of a lot like a historical, pure perspective. I’m like, “Man.” You know. “Thousands of years ago, this was a whole—” Interviewer: “Yeah, yeah. You were in Assyria.” Yes. Yeah, and actually when I was in southern Iraq, the—It’s called the Arch of Keshra. The Gateway to Persia or whatever. My base was right there. We were tasked with keeping that place—whatever was left of those ruins—up. But that amazed me, you know. They were like, “This is considered the cradle of civilization.” Like, “This was the—” They called it the Gateway to Persia, and it was like, you know, “This is the old—Historical way.” And I was amazed. I was just like, “Man.” Like, “This thing is—It’s older than this county that’s here protecting it.” Like, “This—” And like I got to go to one of the shrines for one of—It was, I think, one of Muhammad’s prophets or something. I forget who it was, but it was a really religious, super religious—I got—And then I didn’t know—I don’t know a lot about it, but it was just being in the presence of that and understanding the historical value of it. You’re like, “Man.” Like, “This could have been where stuff started.” You know, like, “All this kind of stuff—” It was like, “If you really look at it, it all kind of started right there.” (2:30:05) Interviewer: “Is there other things that stand out or particular experiences or impressions you had that you hadn’t brought in yet?” From the last deployment, I would say significant events—impactful events—most likely not. That was the major we covered, but everything else was more, you know, just the day-to-day �Saladin, Philip operations. My son was born during my second deployment. That—I can’t believe I missed that out, but that was huge. Interviewer: “Okay. How do you deal with that? I mean, are you able to communicate with home and through the process—Or do you get to go home somewhere in there?” Yeah. I don’t know if it was set up, or just a—Fortunate of events. Just managed to work the way—Like this. But you get your R&R during deployment, and my R&R came up exactly at the nine months. So I was like, “Okay. Yeah. I might be home to see my son born, or, you know— Or he might be born, and then I get home.” So that’s when I’m there. It’s like, “I might have a good chance to see him.” So I’m like, “All right.” I’m excited about that, and I get leave to go. It was two days worth of flying. Just long. You know, just—Get off the plane. I’m like, “Okay. We’re going to get something to eat.” She—Son hasn’t been born yet, so we go get something to eat. Get something to eat. We go to the house, and literally right back in the car because she went into labor. So it was like, “Perfect timing. Let’s go.” So my—It was a two-week long R&R. My whole first week—well, five or six days—It was spent in the hospital. (2:32:01) Then got done with that. Got to spend the next week with my son, so I got to—That was awesome, you know, but on the other hand, my whole perspective just changed. It was like, “Okay. I’m going back.” But now I’m—Everything I do I’m—I don’t want to say second-guessing, but I definitely was more cautious. I wasn’t—As opposed to just like, “All right. Let’s go do this.” Now in the back of my head I was like, “Okay. Let me just methodically—Let me—” Not methodically. I was always a little methodically in planning, but this time I was, I guess, just being more redundant. I—It’s weird to say—Because you’re being careful already because where I’m at in the environment, but it kind of increased a little. I don’t know. It—I wasn’t all about myself, but this kind of just brought it out more where it’s not just about me, I guess you could say. I was like, “Okay. I’ve got to make it back home.” As before, I was like, “I would like to make it back home.” This time it was like, “I have to.” Interviewer: “Yeah. Well, it’s sort of a reason why at times different military organizations wanted single men for certain kinds of jobs and things like that.” Yes. I definitely see why that would be. Interviewer: “Yeah. Now you’ve got different set of responsibilities there at that point. Now—And so how far into that tour was that?” That—And it was—That was right at the middle. It was—It—I want to say probably just above—Just past six—Either at six months or just past. Right in that middle point. Not sure exactly. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now a different kind of question. How would you characterize the morale in your unit on the second tour with the 1st Cavalry as opposed to your previous one?” I would say the second tour—The morale was—It was—As far as cohesiveness morale, we all got along. We’re all really good. That was great. You know, our platoon—We were—Great �Saladin, Philip bunch of guys. (2:34:00) I was—That was my first significant leadership role in combat because before I was just a team leader. This time I had the role of a platoon sergeant for a few weeks because I was a senior staff sergeant. Just, you know—No, not staff sergeant. I was a senior sergeant. I was— Interviewer: “In the platoon, right?” Yes, so we had—Our platoon sergeant was gone, so I got—I had to fill in that seat, so I did that for a little bit. So I got a lot of good experience, and in that manner it was all—The soldiers were good. A lot of young guys. They were, you know, just fresh, full of energy, ready to go, but this was a different—Their perspective was—I guess what they thought they were going to go—You know, they were like, “Oh, yeah. We’re going to war.” I don’t know if they were like, “Okay. We’re going to go get into this shooting war.” They’re expecting intense firefights or what it was, but I’m—And I told them. I was like, “Even in my first deployment where that was—Was going on in a lot of parts of Iraq—That—For us, we didn’t see it as much as you would think, even though we had some catastrophic events.” It’s like, “You didn’t—” I was like, “It’s not like that. In other places I’m pretty sure many other soldiers experienced that.” I’m like, “From my experience—” I’m like, “It’s not like that.” You know. “And if they do happen, matter of a couple of minutes, it’s done. It’s not this, ‘Oh.’” You know. “You’re in a three-day firefight.” You know, it just wasn’t happening at that time, so I think that kind of took away from them a little bit because they kind of felt—I don’t want to say short-changed in the deployment, but as an infantryman, you’re naturally looking for that. You join to be in combat. To go fight. That’s what you want, and it’s like, you know, you’re letting them loose. Like, “Hey. Go.” But there’s nothing there. You know, it’s just this constant defensive posture, and then you’re like, “Okay. Why am I doing this? Why am I doing that?” And I think that was one of the hardest challenges. Was being able to keep that morale up with those guys because all we were doing was just, you know, driving around in circles pretty much. Interviewer: “Yeah, but there were still people trying to kill you, but it wasn’t IEDs. It was rockets.” Exactly, but, you know, I understood that. I was—You know, but them—They were like, “Nobody’s shooting. We’re not shooting.” (2:36:03) I’m like, “Okay, but you don’t need to be shot.” I’m like, “I’d rather get shot than blow up.” You know, I was like, “You could fight back a bullet.” I was like, “You ain’t fighting a bomb.” So it’s—But they didn’t see that perspective. You know, they wanted to come and hunt the bad guy. You know, kick down—We were kicking down doors, but it was—It wasn’t the movie scenes, I guess you could say. It wasn’t that, and they were a little bit bummed about that. But they were still a great group of guys. Everybody was always happy. I never had an issue with worrying about, you know—Like, “Okay. Is this guy going to do something he shouldn’t do?” I never had to deal with that. Everybody was— Great people. It’s a—And the environment was better, too. The quality of living. So I guess that improved. You know, that helped a lot as opposed to if we were stuck in some horrible, little box with nothing. Then maybe a different story. But yeah, quality of living was pretty good there, too. �Saladin, Philip Interviewer: “All right. Now how much time do you have left on your enlistment when you head back home?” So I headed back home—I was about—Was it four years I had? Probably three or four years. When I came back—So I was probably finishing the better part of three years left to my— Because I don’t know—I was in my window I think in the next year or so where I could be reenlist, so I think I was at the three year mark because—It’s funny that question came up because that kind of rolls into the next—My, I guess—I call it my next event in the military. We come back. You know, now we’re just resetting. Doing normal stuff. Just qualifying with weapons. Nothing intense or crazy. Just—Almost just your basic stuff, and then... Interviewer: “Okay. Are you back at Fort Hood?” Yes, yes. We came back to Fort Hood at this time. We—Getting all the new guys because usually when you come back from a deployment, units get reshuffled. People leave. I stay at this unit. We get a whole group of new guys in. Slowly building up to start getting to a deployable force again, but that’s still, you know—We’re not on those calendars, so we’ve got a good stretch of downtime. (2:38:02) I get orders, and it’s—My first sergeant comes walking down the hallway. He’s just—All I hear is, “Saladin!” And I turn around, and I’m like, “Great. He has a piece of paper in his hand.” I’m like, “What’s going on?” You know, that’s—Any soldier—You hear your name, and somebody higher ranking than you with a piece of paper in his hand is coming at you, you’re—You’re never thinking nothing good. Automatically, you’re like, “Wait. What’s going on? I didn’t do nothing.” You know, so I’m—He’s like, “I’ve got a surprise for you.” And he has a smirk on his face, and I’m like, “Great. I probably got some dumb detail I’ve got to do now.” He’s like, “I’ve got you orders.” So I’m like, “Orders?” So I’m like, “Oh. Am I going to a new unit?” I’m like, “Interesting.” So I’m thinking—He’s like, “You’re going to be a recruiter.” And I was like, “Oh.” So yeah, and then he starts laughing. And I didn’t want to be a recruiter. It just wasn’t my thing, but, you know, got my orders. Complete the mission. It’s Charlie Mike. Okay. Interviewer: “Okay. Now how do they turn you into a recruiter?” So that’s the next awesome part of that. So you have to go to a school. So you do a bunch of stuff, do a bunch of paperwork, get all your stuff ready. They ship you off, and the school was— It’s a—This one—I don’t—There’s probably more or not, but the one I went to was in South Carolina. It’s a bunch of—A mixture of different schools and basic trainees. A bunch of different schools on that base. Interviewer: “Okay. Were you at Fort Jackson or somewhere else?” Was it Fort—Yes, it was Fort Jackson. Was it—Yes. Interviewer: “That’s a big Army base in South Carolina.” Yes, yes, yes. Fort Jackson. It was Fort Jackson because I remember I had to walk the first day, and it was far. So get there. Get to the airport. I’m in Fort Jackson. I get dropped off at my �Saladin, Philip sleeping—And they’re like, “Okay. The school is down this road. Be there. Seven o’ clock in the morning.” (2:40:01) “Okay.” You know. Get up at seven o’ clock. I get up early. It’s like I don’t know nobody. First day here. So I just start walking down the road, and I’m like, “Where’s this school?” It’s pretty early in the morning. You know, I gave myself enough time, but it was a long walk. It was a few miles. I’m not sure. I finally get there, and I’m like, “Okay. I’m here at the school. I’m doing everything I have to do.” And I’m—I don’t want to be here. You know, that’s—I’m not hiding the feeling. You know—Well, I’m not showing it to other people, but everybody that knew me knew I didn’t want to be there. So get there. First day. Meet friends. Meet a bunch of people. Start doing classes. About three days in—I think it’s a month-long class, too. I’m not—I don’t remember. But three days in, they come in. They go, “Everybody has to go and do a one-on-one sitdown with a civilian doctor.” Okay. I get called up. It’s my turn to go. I sit there. We talk for about two hours. Just asking me all these questions, you know, and, all of a sudden, we’re done. We leave. Okay. Go back to class. Do everything I’m doing. And I actually had to re-enlist to be able to go to recruiter school. I forgot to mention this. Because my window—I was at two years, and you needed three years to be able to go to recruiter school because you had to do a three-year commitment. So me? I was—I could’ve took the opportunity and just got out of recruiter school. I was like, “No. I’m going to do the right thing.” I re-enlisted. I was like, “I’m going to do it.” In my mind—Even though at this time in my mind I was—I was still thinking I was going to be a lifer. I was going to do about twenty plus years in the military. So okay. I re-enlist. Get everything done. Show up to class the next morning. I’ve got a yellow slip on my desk. “Go see such and such.” Okay. Go downstairs. “You’re disqualified from recruiter school.” So part of me is relieved. (2:42:01) I’m like, “Yes! I get to go back.” But part of me is like, “Wait. What? What’s going on?” I’m—I was doing good on all my tests. I’m— Every test I took I passed. Everything—I’m getting along. Everything’s good. There’s no strikes against me. It’s like, “Yeah. This doctor said you can’t be a recruiter.” I’m like, “Why?” They were like, “Oh. From your interview results, it says you’re not fit to be a recruiter.” It’s—I don’t know. I was like, “What are you trying to say?” Like, “Am I crazy?” Like, “What’s going on?” But that was the most of any information I got. Then they just call your unit. Get a plane ticket. You’re out of here tomorrow morning or whenever it is. And I’m like, “This is crazy.” I’m— And part of me is still upset, but I don’t know why. I’m like, “ I didn’t want to be here to begin with.” I’m—But this person has no clue about anything I just did, what I’ve done, what I’m going through, and I can’t be a recruiter? I’m like, “Who else would you want to be a recruiter?” Like, “I’m doing everything that you’re recruiting people to come do.” And so I didn’t—I’m, you know—“Whatever.” I ate it with a grain of salt. In the back of my head, now I’m like, “I just re-enlisted. Ugh.” So I’m angry. I get back to Fort Hood. We’re in a training cycle, so I go straight to the field. So I’m doing that. Training. Boom, boom, boom. Then, all of a sudden, I have to go see some doctors. Doctors are like, “Hey.” And I guess I was referred to go see a doctor earlier. I don’t know if I blew it off, or I just forgot. I say I forgot. They say I ignored them. So I had to go, and then that kind of started my process of me getting out. That’s what I call it at that point. That was my turning point because I started seeing—I don’t want to say—It was almost like, “Oh. You should get out.” But it was like they almost make it to the point where it’s like that because it’s—You know, you get limited to what you could do. They’re like, “Oh. You can’t go out and do this no more.” Like, “You’re not allowed to do this no more.” (2:44:05) And then it’s like, “Okay, so I can’t go train. I’ve got to stay here.” And so now I’m—Because these doctors want to keep evaluating me and talking to me and all this stuff. I’m—“All right. Whatever.” I’m doing everything they want to do, but I’m still training at the same time. Then, �Saladin, Philip finally, it just got to the point where I had a lot of physical stuff I was trying to deal with, and that was just another headache on top of itself because they really wasn’t—It was more—You know, my shoulder, for instance. I’m like, “Hey. This hurts.” It was like, “All right. Let’s go do this.” It was almost like just keep putting Band-Aids on it, and I guess you could say I got tired of it, which—I think that part was the worst because I was—I didn’t want to do it no more. I was just like, “It’s not what I—” It wasn’t what I wanted. I wasn’t doing my stuff, and then at this time the Army—The military itself was taking an interesting turn as opposed to when I first came in. It was starting to be operated a lot more like a public corporation—business—as opposed to an army. You’re training people to kill, but you want me to not discipline them when they do something wrong? So it was just—It was getting interesting. You know, when I was a brand new private, I messed up. I was going to sweat. You were going to learn. You was either going to be strong or smart in the military, and that’s the way it was, especially in the infantry. Like, “Okay. Your—” Your sole purpose of joining is to fight. But it’s crazy. You have—“Okay. You can’t make them do more than five pushups no more.” So me—as an NCO, as a leader—I got guys in there, and there are right ways of training, a right way to correct people and all that, but your power was getting so limited. And it was getting to the point—I felt, personally—I don’t know how everybody else felt, but personally, it was like the brand new privates were having more power than the NCOs. (2:46:04) It was almost to the point if you made a brand new private feel uncomfortable, you could get in trouble. They would report you to such and such— AIG or whatever, whoever you want, whatever they were—and next thing you know, you have an investigation on you because you’re supposedly, you know, mistreating soldiers because you’re making them stay late. Because you’re making them mop the floors. Because you’re making them do Army stuff. But apparently, the Army stuff is not good no more. So that was—I was like, “I can’t do this no more.” I couldn’t—I was like, “I don’t—” I was done with all the medical stuff too piling on top of me, and then you have these doctors telling me, “Oh. You know, you should take all these medications. You—” And I was—And me? I felt perfectly fine. Nobody around me thought I was—Issues. I was still training with my guys, leading them, and effective, so I was—I was going through the ranks pretty fast. I made staff sergeant in what? Five years? So—And I actually received my staff sergeant before I received my first evaluation as a regular sergeant, so I think I was doing pretty good. And then just to get these civilian doctors telling me that they think I don’t—I’m not mentally capable—or physically or whatever they want to say—of doing the job that—I think that was my turning point because when that happened, I was just like, “I’m done.” Interviewer: “Okay. Now these civilian doctors—Did you have a sense of whether they were psychiatrists or just regular doctors or…?” It was a mix. I was seeing a little bit of both. I was seeing a psychiatrist, and I was seeing regular doctors for physical stuff and stuff. And the physical stuff, I would say—Okay. Some of it was a concern, but I still wasn’t being limited on my performance, I would say, at the time. I don’t know if it was just what it was going on. Interviewer: “Yeah, and do you know where the shoulder injury came from?” That is the—I have no one event. (2:48:02) It could be a cumulation of events or something, but it’s interesting because the doctor who looked at it—He tells me it’s one of the top ten worst �Saladin, Philip cases he’s ever seen, and I’m like, “Well, I’ve been living with that for so many years.” And it was in the military, but that was one of those things, too. I was so focused on just doing my job and what I had to do that all that stuff was secondary. I get up. My shoulder—Arm’s going numb on me, but I’m like, “No. I have to go to work and make sure my soldiers are there and make sure they’re taken care of.” And just—I think years of just throwing that on top of each other left me to where I’m at now, but at that time I wasn’t thinking like that. At that time I was, you know—“I’m a robot. I can do this.” Interviewer: “Yeah, but you didn’t notice any one specific injury that happened. It’s just that over time it accumulates, and whatever it was got worse. And you weren’t complaining about it, so it wasn’t get treated.” Well, I—Sometime—It got to a point where it was getting bad, and I started complaining about it. But I didn’t want to take it to the point where they would—It would remove me from the unit because honestly, if it got to the point—If I keep complaining, keep complaining, then they’d be like, “Okay. So obviously, you can’t do this. So guess what? You’re not going to go train. You’re not going to do—” And I didn’t want to do that at the time. I still wanted to be with the guys and training, so I would’ve complained to tell them like, “Hey. I’ve got something wrong with my shoulder. Could we look at it?” And that’s it. I wasn’t—It wasn’t every day I’m like, “Hey. My shoulder, my shoulder.” I was just—I’d bring it up. “Okay. Yeah.” And then—Or I would go, and they’d be like, “Hey. Just take a couple Motrins and some water. Keep it moving.” Interviewer: “Yeah, yeah. Now did the psychiatrists think you had a traumatic brain injury?” I did have a traumatic brain injury. They were saying—They thought I had PTSD and—I forget what they said. Not—Reintegrating. (2:50:10) They said I was having issues reintegrating, but I’m like, “You spend a year in a country where everybody’s trying to kill you, it’s going to take a little bit of time to adjust when you get back.” You know, it was like I’m laying in my bed at night alone—apartment—and I hear a loud noise, for the last couple months I’m reacting. Of course, I’m going to get up and react. And that was my thing. I understand there’s people who do have those issues, but I felt I had it under control because I recognized it from the beginning. Like, “Okay.” Like, “I notice I’m extra tentative. I notice I’m triple-checking my windows and doors.” I noticed everything I was doing. It wasn’t like people are telling me like, “Hey. You’re acting different.” It was like I was intentionally doing it, and I knew what I was controlling. Controlling what I—I was purposely doing it, I guess to say. But they—I guess that wasn’t the— I should—The way I should have been acting when I came back. Interviewer: “Yeah, well, it looks like—Especially if you’re—Were you telling any of this to the doctors? The psychiatrists?” When they would ask me, I would tell them. Because I’m the type of person—I didn’t see it as an issue, so I was like, “I’m not going to hide it all back.” I was like, “I’m going to tell you straight up how I’m feeling. I’m not going to sit here and be like, ‘Oh. Nothing’s going on.’ And then, you know—” If I had something wrong, I’m like, “Hey. Am I extra aware right now? Yes, I am.” But I knew why. I knew it was because—Okay. I just spent twelve months getting blown �Saladin, Philip up, and random rockets falling around me at three in the morning almost five times a week. Yeah, I think anybody would be a little jittery, but… Interviewer: “But at that point then they’re checking off boxes, and I expect that in the Army any box ever checked off just follows you.” Yes. Interviewer: “And so these can accumulate, and they go, ‘Oh, okay, so he’s damaged goods. So we’ll move him out or something like that.’” And honestly, that’s how I felt. (2:52:00) But it got to that point where I was just—I’m just, you know—And it’s funny because when I was in, I kind of saw that with soldiers prior. Got hurt— whatever—and you would see them. As time would go on, you would know. You’re like, “Okay. He’s about to get out.” Because you could kind of like just see the change in the person and everything. And then when you’re on that side, you’re like, “Man.” It hurt. It was one of those few moments that I said it hurt, and I was just like, “Man. I’m actually—” When I realized it’s coming to an end, I was like, “Okay.” Then—And then I, you know—And then you start seeing it, and you’re like, “Whoa. I’m not part of this.” They start going out, you know, and it’s… Interviewer: “Okay. Now did they allow you to end your enlistment early, or what happens to you?” No. Well, that depends how it falls because if you get—Because the way I got out—They medically retired me. So they do the process, and that can take six months, a year, two, three years. It all depends on how fast the Army’s moving, how much paper you have, whatever random unicorn reason the Army has that they—Takes them thousands of years. But mine was— It probably took the better part of a year and a half to do everything, but you get the notice. I go to—I had an appointment with one of the doctors. I go there. He gives me this piece of paper. He’s like, “We’re starting your separation as of today.” And then I’m like, “Ugh.” You know, it’s like, “Ugh.” Like, “Okay.” You know, and at that point I’m not going to say I was completely against it. But part of me was upset because—I was like, “Okay. This is coming to an end.” But then I was also like, “Whatever.” You know, it meant—It was my faith. It meant to happen at that point. I was just like, “Whatever.” So—And then that’s where I was at there, and then it’s just like, “Okay.” And then this time the union’s kind of picking back up because they got—They didn’t come to orders yet, but I guess they were coming down on orders because you started noticing all the restructuring and started putting together teams and everything. (2:54:12) And me? I’m trying to get in there so bad. I’m trying. I’m talking to everybody I can. I’m like, “There’s nothing you can do.” I’m like, “Come on. Just let me deploy.” I was like, “When I come back from this deployment, I’ll get out. I’ll listen to whatever doctor wants to tell—Other than—Let me just do this one deployment.” And I don’t know why I wanted to do it so bad. It was—But—And in my head, I’m like, “You’re about to get out.” But in my voice I’m like, “I want to go.” So—Of course, I didn’t go. They didn’t take me. I got stuck in an office. I was the—They made me the Supply NCO, so I got to sit in a supply room for a few months and just twiddle my thumbs and check the boxes off, you know. “Hey. Okay. Blah, blah, blah.” Go to this �Saladin, Philip appointment. Go to this meeting. Do what you’ve got to do. Then that’s—It was pretty much it, so it was almost a slow Band-Aid. It’s just, “Shh.” And it—Ugh. Interviewer: “Okay. Now when you come back from a deployment, do they make any effort to sort of help you reintegrate?” Yes. They have a thirty-day reintegration period. I—My first deployment, I swear, was a little bit longer. Well, no. My first deployment was thirty days. I think my second one was a little bit shorter, or it might have been thirty days. But they do have it. You’ve got to go to classes. I know my first deployment. I know that one a little better, and I don’t know if it was because we were overseas they did it like this. But we weren’t even allowed to leave the base. Curfew’s set in. You can’t leave. You have to be at work, you know. I think the first few days you weren’t allowed to drink. The rules come down. It’s just—You’re locked in. (2:56:01) But then as time went on, we were allowed more stuff. In Fort Hood when we came back, it was a Friday, and it was like, “Okay. Four-day weekend. See you guys Tuesday.” Monday. Whatever the following workday was. But then when we came back, it was classes, orientation, just… Interviewer: “Did any of that stuff do any good?” Oh, man, I—Personally? Physically, I would say I saw—For your physical health, I saw a purpose because they did all that too, and there they could—They’ll get a little bit more stuff, but as far as, you know—Like, “Hey. Okay. You’re back here.” Social—No. It was more like, “Okay. Welcome back to the Army. Blah, blah, blah. Don’t go out. Don’t drink and drive.” It wasn’t—It’s not like what, I guess, somebody would think. Like, “Okay. Reintegration. They must be like doing all this crazy, scientific stuff.” No. It was just a lot of just sit down, paperwork, talk to doctors. Interviewer: “Yeah. I guess I would expect something along the lines of just talking to you, reminding you of the differences between the civilian world and the military one. Which kinds of reactions and responses or things you might have are going to be normal and what you have to watch out for or adjust.” Yeah. You would think, but no. They—And if they did, I don’t remember. But I remember a lot of it, and I don’t remember that part. You know, them saying, “Hey.” They do tell you—I’m trying to think if there’s anything like that or something that was close to that. It was more probably—This is probably more personal. More me because I got a lot of extra classes, I guess, for my stuff. They were to teach you—They called it self-induced stress or real stress. Like, “Okay.” They’re like, “Okay. You’re actually tensing up yourself. The situation’s not tense.” (2:58:01) That was—But that was, I think—Not everybody got that. I—Yeah. Interviewer: “Yeah, so some of it is they’re talking to you. But some of it—Kind of the PTSD type symptoms and things and here’s what to watch out for and here are coping strategies, or—” That? Honestly, no. And you would think, especially at that time with everything that was going on, they would have focused on that a lot more. But that was something—If you had a legit issue �Saladin, Philip going on, and then they took you—So you would get singled out and brought to a doctor and then probably dealt with like that. But as a mass? Maybe now, but they didn’t have that then. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Okay, so when do you actually get out then?” So it was 2014. I don’t remember the month. It was summertime sometime because I was in Texas, and it was hot. I get out. I took about, say, three to five months—Just did nothing. I was like, “I’m not—” Interviewer: “Where did you go?” I stayed in Texas, but I was like, “I’m not—” I went back to Jersey. I took a little road trip. I drove from Texas to New Jersey. Just me, my son, and the dog. Just traveled. Just pretty much saw family. I just didn’t want to do nothing. I was like, “I just don’t want no—” I can’t say no responsibilities, but I was like, “I don’t—I want to be able to wake up and not be having a timeline or a schedule.” Like, “I want to get away from all schedules possible.” And then—And, you know, did that. After a couple months—I think it was three, four months—I went to school because I got bored. I was so bored. I was like, “Okay. This is fun.” I was like, “I need to do something.” And— Interviewer: “All right. Now did you have money saved up from being in the Army, or…?” I had a little bit of money saved up from being in. At this time, I was with my wife now. We were together. She was way more financially conscious than me, so—She was in the military, too. When we met, I was that guy—You know, like, “Okay. I got paid. Now—” Tomorrow wake up. “I’m broke.” (3:00:06) But she reined that in fast, so when I got out, we were pretty—We were okay, and then since I went—Since I always got the med board and all that stuff, I was still kind of—I was still getting paid, and then I went to school. So I started bringing some income in like that. Interviewer: “Okay, and where did you go to school?” I—My—Initially, I went to Austin Community College, and I got an Associate’s degree in automotive technology. I wanted to work on cars—I love cars—which is crazy because my initial entry—I was going to be a teacher. And I was like, “No. I want to go work on cars.” And I went into the field. I was actually working at this pretty nice shop in Texas—you know, super high-end shop, working with these cool cars—but my back and my shoulder catch up to me. And it’s probably six months in, and I’m just like, “Okay. I’m hurting.” You know, but I’m—I couldn’t see myself doing this and supplying for my family, and at this time my daughter was born. Had a newborn at this time too, so it was just like, “Yeah. This is not going to work. I’m— ” You know. “I could probably do this job for another two years, and I’m not going to be effective anymore.” So I went back to school, and—Well, actually, we moved to Michigan, and then I went back to school. Interviewer: “All right, so how did you wind up in Michigan?” �Saladin, Philip My wife’s from Michigan. Interviewer: “Aha.” Yes. I call it Southern Canada because it’s so cold. But I gave in. I fought the good fight. We were in Texas for a while, but then she kind of hit me with reality. My son at the time was living in Indiana with his mom. She was from Michigan. My family’s from New Jersey. We had nothing in Texas besides Army friends who themselves were stationed to somewhere else and leaving or getting out and going—So, finally, it’s like, “Okay.” You know. “I’m planning on going back to school. Let’s just make the move now. Just in time for Michigan winter.” (3:02:05) It was November of—Was last year or two years behind now. Just in time. So, you know, I went from my Texas, beautiful winters to this. To real winters again. Interviewer: “Oh, come on. It gets cold in New Jersey sometimes.” Oh, yes, but Texas kind of babied me. I would go there. Have winter for what? A month? But— And then it’s like, you know, I’ll be barbequing for Christmas. But it—I came back here. Then I was like, “Oh, yeah. This is what winter feels like.” But it’s—You know, it’s good. It’s good. I like it. Interviewer: “All right. Now if you, I guess, sort of look back a little bit on the whole thing, in the end, what do you think you took out of being in the Army?” Oh, man. I took out so much. I would do it all over again. I say I wouldn’t change nothing as far as my experience and everything. Maybe a career choice or a school or something like that I would change, but I have no regrets. Maybe push myself a little harder in some things. Maybe, you know—Who knows what could have happened? But it’s always easier to say, “Who knows,” than at that moment. But I would do it all over. It definitely—I was pretty all over the place before I joined. I wasn’t—You know, I wasn’t thinking of next month. I was—Whatever. I got in the Army. The Army showed me to grow up. I—Responsibility. It definitely showed me how to handle stuff. I definitely learned that, and, I guess, the best way I could put it is be a leader. But I’d say the qualities like being able to listen to people, being able to talk to people, being able to see things from a completely different perspective. As—One time—Even before I joined, I would see something. I’m instantly—Be like, “Boom.” Make up my mind. I’m like, “Oh.” You know. Like, “That’s a chair, and that’s it.” You couldn’t change me, but now I’m like, “Well, that’s a chair. I could also use it as a stool. It could also be a fortified spot if need be.” (3:04:05) You know, now I’m analyzing everything at—Which it’s a—It—I look at it as a plus—a good thing—because I use it with my kids and everything and life in general. And I’m—Overall, I would say, one of the—Personally, the best things I took out of it was I’m at peace with myself, and I’m so much more accepting of everything. It’s a weird, weird way, but it’s just—Stuff that used to drive me nuts before—I’m just like, “Well, I’m—I can’t do nothing about it no matter how angry—Whatever I get to try to do.” It’s like, “It’s not going to change. It happened. Let’s think about how to fix it if I don’t like it or how to make it better or just get away.” And it just— The—It just took—Everything now was like that for me in life. It’s like everything is way more—Even school. I went back to school. I joined the Army to, say, get away to—From college. Is what I say. And I’m back here, but I see the difference of how I was in school then �Saladin, Philip and now. And I’m just like, “Wow.” If I had this brain back in 2004, who knows the possibilities? Interviewer: “All right. Now this tape is just about done, so we’re kind of going to—We’ll close out here before we cut you off in a sense. But thank you very much for taking the time to share the story today.” Yes. Thank you. (3:05:31) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_SaladinP2293V Title A name given to the resource Saladin, Philip (Interview transcript and video), 2019 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2019-02-12 Description An account of the resource Philip Saladin was born in Bayonne, New Jersey, in 1982. He was attending college during the attacks on 9/11 and eventially joined the Army National Guard in 2005. While in Basic Training, he decided that he wanted to go on active duty, and was sent to Baumholder, Germany, where he joined the 2nd Battalion, 6th Infantry Regiment, 1st Armored Division as part of the Battalion Headquarters S3 (Operations) staff. When it was deployed to Iraq, his unit operated out of combat operations post Capper, conducting patrols and raids targeting Al Qaeda leaders. His unit eventually returned to Germany, and Saladin was reassigned to the 2nd Battalion, 12th Cavalry, in the 1st Cavalry Division. In 2011, his new unit was redeployed to Iraq where it conducted armored patrols and worked with Iraqi and Kurdish forces in Kirkuk. Saladin suffered a traumatic brain injury when his truck hit an IED, but was able to remain with his unit and return with them to Fort Hood after the deployment. He was finally discharged in 2014. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Saladin, Philip Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Iraq War, 2003-2011--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/5da2b7d08ef29ae62f15a9b6fda8ee6e.mp4 243309637396203599edfdad69a2ecd8 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/5df7d63d8d09b23ac5391f7a001ac2f5.pdf eeb7d8fe4ca0bee4660893e27f3977a0 PDF Text Text Robson, Sally Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Interview Name of War: Vietnam War Interviewee’s Name: Sally Robson Length of Interview: (38:04) Interviewed by: James Smither and Janet Coryell Transcribed by: Chelsea Chandler Interviewer: “Okay, Sally, begin with a little bit of background on yourself. To start with, where and when were you born?” I was born in Muskegon, Michigan at Hackley Hospital. I graduated— Interviewer: “In what year?” I was born in 1937—January—and I graduated from high school there, went to Albion College, got my teaching degree— Interviewer: “Okay. Now you’re going very fast, so we’re going to roll things back a little bit here. Okay, so what was your family doing for a living when you were a kid?” My father owned a steel company in Muskegon, and we had—I had wonderful parents, and we went to the Methodist church there. And then we had a home on Lake Michigan that I spent six months out of the year in, and then lived in town six months out of the year. Interviewer: “Okay. Now in your—Now you’re a little kid during World War II, and I take it having a steel business during World War II was a good thing?” (1:06) Yes, it was. It was very good actually. Yes, it was. Interviewer: “Okay, and you’re really too young to remember sort of Depression per se or whatever.” No, I don’t remember that. Interviewer: “Now do you have any kind of memories of the war years?” My biggest memory is that—Was my mother and sister and I sitting at the radio and listening to news of World War—I was just little—and my mother with tears coming down her cheeks. And I remember feeling bad that my mother felt bad because I didn’t really understand what was going on. I had cousins on Iwo Jima and Guadalcanal and one that flew over Africa, and my father had cousins in the war. So it was a very sad time. It’s scary. Very scary. �Robson, Sally Interviewer: “Yeah. Now were you doing well enough that you weren’t really affected by rationing or things like that, or…?” I do remember buying war bonds. You know, going to school and buying war bonds, and I don’t remember rationing really. It maybe happened, but I don’t remember it. (2:09) Interviewer: “Okay. All right, so now—So, basically, now did you—So you go through the school system in Muskegon. So what year did you graduate?” I graduated in 1955. Interviewer: “Okay, and then—And you went to Albion after that.” Yes, yes. Interviewer: “All right, and then trained to be a teacher.” Right. Interviewer: “Okay. Why Albion?” Well, I didn’t really want to go to college at all because I wanted to stay home. But I was such a home person, and so—But my sister intervened and said to my parents, “You better make Sally go away to college because otherwise she’ll be here the rest of her life.” Interviewer: “This was your older sister? What was her name?” My older sister, Nancy, and she died a few years ago. She lived in Petoskey, and we were very close. But anyway, so I chose Albion just because it was a Methodist school. I’d heard about it through my church, and that’s really why I chose it. Interviewer: “And was Nancy in college herself?” Yes, she went to Hope College for a year and then graduated from Michigan. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now—Good. We’re interviewing you in part because you wound up being married to a doctor who served in the Vietnam War, and we’re getting— recording stories who went through—So at what point in your life do you meet your husband?” I met him really my freshman year at Albion, and we started dating our sophomore year and got pinned. And that was it. Interviewer: “Can you explain what ‘got pinned’ meant because a lot of people today will not know what that means?” �Robson, Sally Oh, that’s right. That—You wore a pin. Your husband’s fraternity pin. He was a Delta Tau Delta, and I was a Delta Gamma. And I was in a sorority, and so you got pinned, which meant that you were engaged to be engaged kind of thing. Interviewer: “Okay. Now did you get married after you finished school, or while you were still in school?” No, we got married after his freshman year in medical school. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now were you in the same class at Albion?” Yes, we were in the same class. Interviewer: “All right, so he starts medical school, and where does he go to medical school?” (4:15) Michigan. University of Michigan. Interviewer: “All right, and so what did you do then right after you graduated?” I taught school in Walled Lake, which is a town near Ann Arbor, and lived with two other girls there. And it was fun and wonderful, and— Interviewer: “So wait. This was before you got married?” Yes, a year before we got married. We didn’t get married because Larry wanted to make sure that he was secure and could get through his freshman year of medical school, which I always knew he could. But he was worried about that, so… Interviewer: “What did you teach?” I taught second grade. I loved it. It’s just—Loved it. Interviewer: “How big was the school?” My school? Interviewer: “Yeah, the one you were teaching in.” Oh, gosh, I don’t know. It had two second grades, I know, and lots of—You know, it was a great time really. I had a lot of fun. Interviewer: “All right, and so did you just teach for the one year, or did you stay around?” �Robson, Sally No, then when I—When we got married, I taught in Ypsilanti at an Erikson school, and there I met some wonderful friends. So then I taught then until Larry—Until we—Until—Through Larry’s first year of internship, which was here at Blodgett Hospital. Interviewer: “Okay, so how long did it take him to get through medical school?” Well, it was four years. Interviewer: “It was four years. Okay. All right, and then he had an internship and then a residency?” He had a year of internship, four years of general surgery residency, then he went in the service for two years, and then took a year of residency in vascular surgery at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit. (6:17) Interviewer: “Okay. Were you teaching all the time that he was doing that?” No, no, I didn’t teach after I had my son. Interviewer: “Oh, okay, and when was he born?” He was born in 1964. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now in the period there where, you know, you’re married and he’s going through his medical training and then the internship and the residency and so forth, did he know he was going to have to go in the service at some point?” Yes, he had signed on. He went to Detroit. He had to sign on for the—It’s called a Berry Plan, and so that guaranteed that he, you know, wouldn’t be drafted right away. That he could finish his residency in general surgery. But he knew then that he had to go into the Navy for two years. Interviewer: “Okay, and so what year did he actually go in?” Let’s see. That would have been what? Would have been in 1968, I believe. Yes. Interviewer: “Okay, so your son was four years old.” Yes, he was four, and my daughter was a year old. Interviewer: “And their names are…?” Bill and Becky. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, so as he’s going through his residency, the Vietnam War is heating up substantially.” �Robson, Sally Yes. Interviewer: “All right. Now had he chosen his branch of service already? Did he know—” Yes, he chose the Navy. Interviewer: “Why the Navy?” He said he liked the uniform. Interviewer: “And how did you feel about the uniforms?” Oh, well, they were fine. Of course, I wish he hadn’t gone at all. Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay. Now basically—So when—So you were already basically living in the Grand Rapids area at the point when he actually has to go off into the service, or…?” (8:13) No, no. No, no. We—He went into the service after his residency, and we were sent to Corpus Christi, Texas for his first year of Naval duty. And we lived there for seven months with our children, and then he was called to go to Vietnam. Interviewer: “Okay. Let’s go down to Corpus Christi now. You’ve got two kids. You’re going down there. What kind of setup did you have? Did you live on base? Off base?” No, they didn’t have officer housing at the time, so we bought a house, which wasn’t—Was nice at the time, but there were problems afterwards. I’ll just put it that way. Interviewer: “Yeah, well, you weren’t going to be staying there very long.” Well, we—No, just two years—we hoped—and we didn’t—When we moved there, they said, “Oh, you won’t be sent to Vietnam. Nobody from here has ever gone to Vietnam.” And then, of course, he got his orders, and I cried a lot. And you know. Interviewer: “Yeah. Now during those years before you went down there and you knew he was going in, were you paying much attention to the news and following what was happening?” Oh, yes. Oh, yes, we certainly were. It was a very scary time. Interviewer: “Okay. Did you yourself have any particular attitude of the war during that period?” I really felt—Because my parents—You know, we all talked about it a lot, and at the time we felt that our country was doing the right thing. You know, at the time. It’s easy to look back and say, “Well, we didn’t.” But at the time we felt it was the right thing to do. (10:06) �Robson, Sally Interviewer: “Right. Okay, so really the prospect of Larry going in—It’s just like, ‘Okay. It’s what he signed up for. It’s his duty. We’ll just do that.’” Right, right. Interviewer: “Okay, but in the meantime when you went down to Corpus Christi, then they’re starting to say, ‘Oh, don’t worry. You don’t have to go to Vietnam.’” Right. Interviewer: “Well, Vietnam had gotten pretty ugly by then, and we needed more doctors. Okay, so what was daily life like in Corpus Christi while you were there?” Well, I had my children. Larry worked on the base. I would take my children either to the—It was really hot. We moved there in July. It was really hot. So I took my children to either Padre Island—you know, the Gulf of Mexico—and we would picnic there and whatever. Or I would take them to the officers’ club. They had a pool there, and we would swim there. And we didn’t go out for dinner very much at all. My parents came to visit, Larry parents came to visit, and I cried when they left. I mean, I felt like I was at the end of the world. You know, you’re at the tip of Texas, you know. It’s, you know—I did not like my time in Texas at all. Larry did because he got to go hunting, and, you know, that was okay. Interviewer: “So you’re in your own house. Is there—Are there other military wives around you, or…?” There were a few streets over, and we did get together with people. And I was in an officers’ wives club thing, which was very nice, and that’s how I got to meet people. And that part was very nice. Interviewer: “Okay. Now when you got there, did you get to meet some of them right away?” Yes, I did, and that was so helpful because I didn’t—We didn’t know a soul, you know. Interviewer: “Yeah, and then did they—What kinds of advice or information did they give you?” (12:04) I don’t know. Of course, for me, it, you know—I had my kids, and that was wonderful. And Larry, as I say—He enjoyed his time there, and then we met a lot of doctors and their wives. And next door to us there was a lawyer and his wife who—He was drafted into the service. He wasn’t happy about that, and they were nice. But there was no one on my block that I could talk to. Interviewer: “But now your kids are how old now?” Bill was four and Becky one. They were little. �Robson, Sally Interviewer: “Right, so that’s really hard to move that far away from your folks, and—” Yeah, it was hard. Oh, it was awful. Interviewer: “Yeah, and there’s no school community to become part of because there’s too young at that point.” No, because he was too young. Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay. Did you have a church down there that you went to?” Yes, we did. We went to a Methodist church, so that was nice. Interviewer: “Yeah. Now did they provide much for you, or…?” Not really, no. Interviewer: “Okay. You just went there on Sundays. What kind of schedule was Larry working?” He worked every day, was on call every other weekend, on call at night. The first week we got there he had to stay on the base, and that was scary to me because I was all alone with my kids. And I didn’t like that at all, but that’s what you did, you know. Interviewer: “All right. Was the culture—the way of life—down there different from what you were used to?” Oh, it’s very different there, you know. People are different, I think, in Texas. You know, they’re, I think—It’s a generalization, but I think they’re a little phony. The people that lived on my block, and—But, you know, they were friendly people, too. I don’t know. Interviewer: “Yeah, but it really did not feel like home at that point.” (14:07) No, not a bit. No, not a bit. Interviewer: “All right. Now—So when Larry gets the call to go to Vietnam, and you—Now what do you do?” Well, I cried a lot, and then—Well, and then I was embarrassed to think that I had cried when we moved to Texas because I didn’t like it there. So then I felt terrible because it was so much worse what was happening. But then I moved back—Flew back here with my kids and went to my parents’ house in Muskegon, and they wanted me—I stayed with them. I lived with them with Bill and Becky and a dog for almost that year that he was gone. Interviewer: “What did you do with the house in Texas?” �Robson, Sally Oh, we sold—Well, we rented it, and then a year later, the people were going to buy it. And a flood happened. Or no, I mean a hurricane happened, and it leveled the house. So we lost a lot there. Yeah, that was kind of awful. Interviewer: “Yeah. No flood insurance coverage or anything like that for that kind of thing?” No, no, nothing, so yeah. That part wasn’t so good, but it happened. Interviewer: “Okay, so Larry heads out. Now what kind of contact or communication did you have with him once he was gone?” I only talked to him twice that year, and he called me once from a ship. And he called me once— He had gone to Japan to take an injured person there, and so he called me then. But we did make tapes, and I sent them every week. And then we wrote to each other every day, and so that was mainly our communication. Interviewer: “Did you know he was going to call, or did the phone ring and you picked it up and it was him?” I didn’t know. Yes, the phone just rang, and it was him. (16:05) Interviewer: “That must have been amazing.” Oh, it was, and then when you talked on the phone from Vietnam and the operator was there, she would break in if you were saying something—Like I said to Larry—He was on a ship, and I said, “Oh, I hear a typhoon is coming.” And the operator broke right in and said, “You’re not allowed to talk about that.” And then you’d talk, and you had to say, “Over.” You said something, and you said, “Over.” It was very odd. Interviewer: “Yeah, it was a radio communication set up kind of like using hand radio type. So it’s like you talk, and then they have to switch over so the other side can hear. Yeah.” Yes, yes. Yeah, it was weird. Interviewer: “Yeah, not ideal in a lot of ways.” No. Interviewer: “Okay. When you wrote to him, what kinds of things did you tell him?” I just told him about everything we were doing and, you know, who I saw. And the neat thing is is that Larry wrote Bill and Becky letters, and a couple Christmases ago, in their stockings I put �Robson, Sally those letters. And they loved that. I mean, that was very touching, and they got very emotional about it. But that was nice that I had those letters to give to them, so… Interviewer: “Right. Yeah. Now when he’s talking to you or writing to you, I guess—So when he’s talking to you, I guess, those two times on the phone, there’s somebody listening. But when he wrote, what kinds of things would he say?” He told me what was happening, and he, of course, did not like what was happening over there at all. Well, they were pretty awful. In fact, you know, they were upsetting, to say the least, and my sister would say, “He shouldn’t write about those things to you because they’re so awful.” But I was glad he could to express himself, you know. Those are very hard times. They were hard times, and so at least I had that. I had the nicest mailman who would come say, “Oh, here’s a letter for you.” You know, it was really nice, and it was wonderful that my parents had me live with them and my children and our dog. They couldn’t have been more wonderful. (18:10) Interviewer: “Was it hard—I mean, could you talk to anybody about the contents of the letters?” Well, my parents and my sister, and I had aunts that lived across the street. And they were wonderful, too. I had some marvelous support group with my parents and my aunts and my sister and her husband and Larry’s parents, too. I would go to their house every so often with the kids, and they were wonderful. Interviewer: “Did they live in Muskegon, too?” No, they lived in Alaiedon. That’s where Larry was born, and they lived in Alaiedon. So I would go there, and so it was—You know, that part was wonderful. Interviewer: “Okay. Now at this period—A lot is going on in ‘68 into ‘69 at home as well as in Vietnam. How aware were you of some of the whole anti-war movement going on?” Oh, I was very aware. I would go like to the bank or to the store, and they’d say, “Oh, you’re husband’s in Vietnam? Well, he’s going to be a changed person when he comes back. You won’t even recognize him. He’s a—He’ll just be awful.” And that was scary to me, of course, but, you know, because of our letters and our tapes, he sounded fine, you know. Interviewer: “Yeah. Well, that was one of the kind of stereotypes that was already starting to pop up by that time, you know, based on not always a whole lot of evidence or what happens to some people but not others. I mean, Larry was serving primarily on a hospital ship, right?” No, no, he was just on a ship for two weeks. He was on—He was right in Quang Tri on the base there. Interviewer: “Okay, so we do have an interview with him on file. I should have looked at that before, but, anyway, if you’re interested in this, yeah, you can watch her interview and �Robson, Sally his. Yeah, so he’s there, and that’s up. And that’s very far north part of South Vietnam, and there was a lot of fighting going on there. And so he’s seeing a lot of things go through there. All right. Okay. Now did people—Did you ever get any kind of trouble or negativity from people in the sense—Because on the one hand, they’re saying, ‘Oh, bad things can happen to him.’ But were they also negative just to people who were there at all?” (20:15) No, I didn’t get that. I did not get it then. Interviewer: “Now after he came back, did you encounter any of that?” Well, yeah, Larry did. He—When we moved back here—you know, that was a couple years later—a friend of ours asked Larry to speak to a youth group at—Downtown. At the Methodist church downtown. And he did, and people were very angry that they’d asked him. People at the church were angry that they’d asked him to speak. They did not like that at all. That probably was the only time that—You know, as I say, I’d run into people at the store or wherever before when he was in Vietnam, and they would tell me awful things about their politics or whatever. And that was scary to me, but I—That was what I ran into, but then Larry ran into this other thing at the church of all things. Interviewer: “Was he speaking about Vietnam?” Yes, he was, and they, of course, were very much against the war. And they just didn’t think that he should have been asked to talk there. Interviewer: “All right. You were also part of the time in which the women’s movement had really taken hold that came out of the anti-war movement. Did that have any impact on you that you can think of?” No, I don’t remember that at all. I really don’t. Interviewer: “I mean, I guess, do you remember sort of news about women’s liberation and all of that kind of stuff, or was that just out there somewhere?” Yes, it just didn’t affect me. Interviewer: “Yeah, I guess you’d already been a professional yourself by this time, and you were college-educated. And you were doing what you wanted to do, so might not have registered in quite the same way as with some of them.” Right. No, it didn’t. Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay. Now what about the civil rights movement? Now that’s the same era, too.” (22:05) That was when we were in college. No, when we were in Ann Arbor, and, you know, I remember watching it on TV and thinking how awful and whatever and thinking, “We should go �Robson, Sally and do something.” But we didn’t. You know, I mean, we thought about it, but—So that really didn’t—I mean, it affected me in a certain way, but I never went through with anything. Interviewer: “Okay. Now when Larry’s tour in Vietnam ends—and that would get you into ‘69—did he still have time left in the service?” He did. He had four months left in the service, so we were sent to—He was sent to the Naval base in North Chicago, and we lived there for four months. And our son was in kindergarten, so he left Muskegon and went to the—To a grade school in North Chicago. And… Interviewer: “Is that the Great Lakes training station?” Naval. Or—Yeah. I don’t think it’s there anymore. I don’t think— Interviewer: “Well, there’s something there, but not—But a lot of it has closed down. The Navy does a lot of its training now in San Diego, but yeah.” Right, right. Interviewer: “But yeah. But it was a big—At that time, it was a very big base, and there was a lot of training going on at its hospital and all the rest of that.” Oh, yes, yes. We would go and see the men. They would—It was in the spring, and they would sometimes take them outside. And I did take my children to a sailor graduation, hoping they’d remember it, but they didn’t. But—Of course. Also gave them their first train ride, which they don’t remember either, but… Interviewer: “Did you socialize there on the base?” Yes, yes. Then I— Interviewer: “So you were living in—on the base itself?” On the base there. Yes. Interviewer: “That must have been a little bit easier than Texas.” It was much easier, and yes, I met a lot more—And I became—I joined a doctors’ wives’ group there as well, and that was nice. We had friends from here that came to visit us while we were there, and our parents came. And so that was nice, and I was, of course, very thrilled that Larry was out of that horribleness, you know. (24:17) Interviewer: “Okay. What kind of effect did the experience seem to have on him? I mean, they’re warning you, ‘Oh, he’s going to be all different,’ and so forth.” �Robson, Sally He—You know, it didn’t seem like it bothered him. I mean, of course, it—Things troubled him terribly, but he didn’t show it. When he got off the plane, I remember, I gave him the keys to the car, and his hand was shaking. So he couldn’t put the key in the keyhole, but other than that, you know, for a long time, you know, he talked about it a little bit to me. But he didn’t really want to talk about it, which I think a lot of men don’t want to, and—But then when we—Then we moved from North Chicago to Detroit so that Larry took his vascular surgery residency there, and he— Then the Fourth of July came, and we went to a fireworks display. And that started nightmares. That was awful because when he was in Vietnam, they would send rockets up every thirty seconds or something. And that’s when his nightmares started. Interviewer: “How long did they last?” Well, you know, through the night, and then, you know, that was kind of it. But, you know, he doesn’t like to do fireworks because of that. Interviewer: “Yeah, but I mean was there sort of just a—Would he have—Was there a period in his life there where he would have nightmares regularly, or was it just kind of a— Triggered by that particular thing for that particular night?” Right, right, and he hasn’t had many of those. Just on the Fourth of July. (26:05) Interviewer: “You were sort of in a situation where you’d been kind of the boss of the family while he’s gone because even—although you’re living with your parents when you’re in North Chicago, to some extent—but was it difficult at all for you to—” No, I was thrilled to get—The minute he came home I forgot everything I knew. I mean, really, it was—Yeah, no, it wasn’t difficult at all. I suppose— Interviewer: “Happy to turn the responsibility back to him.” Yeah, that was wonderful. Now I probably shouldn’t say that, but it’s true. Interviewer: “If it’s true, it needs to be said. Okay, and then let’s see. So you had a—It was basically a year in Detroit for that residency?” Yes, a year. Interviewer: “Okay, and then did he have a job lined up after that?” Yes. Then we came back here, and he worked at Blodgett Hospital and St. Mary’s. He divided his practice into two places. Interviewer: “All right. Okay. Now when you’re back here, and you’re kind of settling in and meeting people—And there’s a whole generation of doctors who did military service in that era. A lot of them had various versions of the Berry plan, and then—And, I guess, the �Robson, Sally circle that you associated with or whatever—Were there other doctors who had done the same thing that Larry did?” Just one other, and he was a general surgeon. And they were friends of ours before, and they went to Germany. And so he had to stay in for three years. If you chose a place that was not under attack, you had to stay in for three years, so—But he—This other fellow was the only one that had to go to—We knew older doctors who had been in World War II, and their plight was much worse than ours because they would go for two to three years without ever hearing from anybody. And their wives didn’t hear from them. (28:16) Interviewer: “Well, they could still write. They just might have not have been very good at it, but yeah, because they were going in for the duration. And in Vietnam, things were on a calendar, so you did it that way. Okay, so I kind of asked that question in part because you—So you didn’t really have anybody else to kind of compare your stories with or experiences with. It was just sort of something that happened, and you went on.” Right. Interviewer: “Do you think that the experience changed his perspective at all either about the war itself or politics or just how he went about things?” I don’t think so really. I mean, he just knew that he had a job to do, and, you know, he’s not a politician by any means. He just—I mean, he took an oath to help people, and so that’s what he did. I mean, it kind of was as simple as that. Interviewer: “What about you? Did his experience and your experience together change your opinions about the war or politics or the world at large?” No, you know, what I—Truthfully, at the time we believed it was the right thing to do. Looking back now, obviously, it was not. It was—I mean, I worried about him terribly, you know. I was told that if anything happened to him, I would hear from the Red Cross, and—Before it was in the paper. But, you know, in a paper every other day it would say, “Quang Tri rocketed,” and that’s where Larry was. And that just scared me to death, and I must say when Larry had been gone about—to Vietnam, about four weeks later—You know, my mother was very proper, and we always ate at the table. (30:13) And she had breakfast, and we all went to breakfast. And I started just—I think I had a sort of mini breakdown, and so my mother put me to bed. And my children were rubbing—Patting me. And my mother called the doctor, and he came. And I don’t remember what he did now or anything, but I just stayed in bed like for that day. I just kind of couldn’t come to terms with it all because it was very frightening, you know, to have your husband in a war. And so I— Interviewer: “And Bill was only four when he went.” Four and then five when we lived— Interviewer: “Did he ask her, ‘Where’s Daddy?’ And—” �Robson, Sally Oh, yes, and then what’s interesting about that is that when we would send tapes, the first tape we sent—Bill loved to talk into the microphone, and so he did say, “Daddy, have you been shot yet?” Interviewer: “Oh, jeepers.” I know. I’ve got a tape. “Daddy, have you been shot yet? I hope you’re not shot.” And that—I didn’t realize he was thinking about that. That was helpful to me to talk to him about—You know, you could see the news every night on TV and see what was happening, and so we talked about that. You know, about how safe or whatever his father—And, see, I thought my husband had a gun with him. He didn’t. He turned it in. He didn’t want to be responsible for the gun, but I thought he did. And I—That made me feel better to think he was safer with a gun. Interviewer: “Okay. Now you’re talking about television news, so were you regularly watching a TV news through that whole period?” Yes, we did. Interviewer: “Okay, so you didn’t just tune out after a while and decide not to—” No. Interviewer: “But—And then your son would also see that going by, anyway, and it was there. Because I’m a little older than he was, but, I mean, that was something that had a very profound effect on me to the point where I didn’t want to watch the evening news.” (32:11) I can understand that. Interviewer: “Yeah, I was like eight or nine, but it was sort of—” You know, I don’t know if we watched it all the time, but I certainly remember sometimes that we did. And I’m sure it was scary, but Bill thought it was kind of—You know, he’s a little boy, and he thought it was kind of exciting. You know, I didn’t, but I wanted to know what was going on, too, you know. And Becky was too young to realize. She didn’t really even know her dad when—She was just two—barely two—when he came home. Interviewer: “How did she react?” Well, there’s a—You know, when she—When he was in Vietnam, she—We took my kids to the airport when he was flying away, and so she’d say—She could barely talk, and she’d say, “Daddy in ky.” You know, “in the sky”, and so when he came back, you know, she was fine but a little bit standoffish, you know, because she didn’t know who this man was. And, of course, Bill was thrilled to death to have him back. We have darling pictures of when he came back, you know. They’re really cute. �Robson, Sally Interviewer: “Okay. It’s different when soldiers come back today than it was when Larry came home.” Oh, yes. Yeah. Interviewer: “What do you think about that and how we treat veterans now compared to— ” Oh, well, I think how wonderful. You know, they get to Skype. They get to talk every day if they want to. I think it’s a wonderful thing and how lucky for them that they have all these new devices, you know, to help them. (34:03) Interviewer: “And then you also have the community itself. Is a lot more positive towards them.” Oh, yes, so much more. Yes. Interviewer: “Yeah, I mean, would it sort of—Would—You just dealt with people generally in the community. You know, Larry’s back, and he’s a doctor and this kind of thing. Does it sort of not come up that he was in the service or in Vietnam?” No, not very often. Not really. You know, I’d heard about people spitting on doctors and, you know, doing terrible things. That did not happen where we were, so that was a good thing. Interviewer: “Yeah. Now in the communities where you were living—whether it was Muskegon while he was gone or Grand Rapids afterward or in Texas or in Chicago or whatever—did you have a sense that people were generally supportive of people in the service, or…?” Well, I did because, you know, in Texas we were with military people, and in Chicago we were with military people. And they were—I actually loved that part because—and in Texas—I loved the aspect of people in the service who were so dedicated. I found that very impressive that all these people were so dedicated to working in the service and, you know, were behind anybody who was in the service. I really liked that aspect of meeting people like that. Interviewer: “Okay, and then if you’re in Muskegon or in Grand Rapids, is it more just indifference, or…?” I think it was. You know, people—I don’t think—Of course, Larry didn’t want to talk about it, you know, so people were very nice. I didn’t find it any different really. Interviewer: “Yeah, and these were not, you know, areas with big colleges in them or places that would be hotbeds of unrest or whatever.” No, no, no, not a bit. �Robson, Sally Interviewer: “Yeah, so you don’t have that part of that in the community in that way, so yeah. So, I guess, if you look back on the whole experience now of having your husband go off to war essentially and come back, how do you view that, or how do you think that affected you?” (36:14) Well, I just wish—and Larry would say this too—that there should never be another war. It’s horrifying. It’s horrible. It’s—I mean, I still can’t imagine what Larry went through. I mean, I can to a certain extent, but it was so awful. I mean, they would have what they—These body bags, you know. They would dump these, and then he also treated the North Koreans— Interviewer: “Or Vietnamese.” Or the Vietnamese, but also the—And they would, of course, want to kill you as much as look at you, I guess. That was a very awful experience. People will say, “Oh, didn’t you learn a lot?” And Larry said, “Yes, I learned you don’t go to war.” You know, and I—You know, I think that’s true. It only affects me in that I had someone that I loved be in a war that was horrific, but I’m very proud that he did it. He did what he was supposed to do, and he did it. And I’m proud of him for that. I really am. Interviewer: “All right, and do you think that you kind of grew or changed at all because you had to go through it on this end?” Well, I guess I hope I did. You know, I don’t know, but I think I did a bit. You know, I feel like I’m still the same person in most ways, so… Interviewer: “But you did have to take care of two kids by yourself with support from family, but still. That’s different.” Oh, I did. Yeah, but, you know—Yeah, but I—But it was—But, you know, I just loved it. I loved being with my kids, you know. That is not a hardship to me ever. No. Interviewer: “And they still talk to you.” Yes, they do. That’s the best part. Interviewer: “All right. Okay. Well, thank you very much for taking the time to talk to us today.” Well, thank you. That was lovely. (38:04) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_RobsonS2295V Title A name given to the resource Robson, Sally (Interview transcript and video), 2019 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2019-02-15 Description An account of the resource Sally Robson was born in Muskegon, Michigan in 1937. She graduated from high school in 1955 and began studying to become a teacher at Albion College and taught second grade in Walled Lake, Michigan, after graduating. In 1969, her husband, Larry, enlisted into the Navy and moved his their family down to Texas during his Basic Training. When he was sent to Vietnam to work as a doctor at a base in Quang Tri, Robson and her children moved back to Muskegon and lived with her parents. After returning from Vietnam in 1969, Robson's reunited family moved to Chicago where Larry worked at the Great Lakes Naval Station before moving to Detroit where Larry started his vascular surgery residency. A year later, the family settled into Grand Rapids where Larry worked at both Blodgett Hospital and St. Mary's Hospital. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Robson, Sally K. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Coryell, Janet (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/4d0ab5d50365d55b8ac7f7cae4517e0f.mp4 c7bbeab42830b1b5ab11ca7e7b14e842 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b61c1e4f727018bb80943dd9be584a8b.pdf 53276e1bedc6b4b162a1166fc2cf26bc PDF Text Text Robinson, Michael Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Interview Name of War: Vietnam War Interviewee’s Name: Michael Robinson Length of Interview: (1:55:33) Interviewed by: James Smither Transcribed by: Chelsea Chandler Interviewer: “Okay, Mike, begin with some background on yourself, and to start with, where and when were you born?” I was born in Grand Haven, Michigan on September 17th, 1947 at North Ottawa Community Hospital. Interviewer: “Okay, and was your family living in Grand Haven or somewhere else?” They just moved to Grand Haven. They were—lived in Chicago until just before I moved, and then when they moved, it probably helped things along. And I was born. Interviewer: “All right. Now did you grow up in Grand Haven, or did you move around?” Until I was—about the sixth grade, and then we moved to Saginaw because my father got a better job. Interviewer: “Okay, and what kind of work was your father doing?” He was a salesman for Construction Aggregates, which is a stone and gravel company, and he ended up doing it over on the other side of the state. And I don’t remember the name of that. (1:02) Interviewer: “All right, and then did you finish high school?” Yes, I did. Interviewer: “And what year did you graduate?” ‘66. Interviewer: “Okay, and what did you do after you got out of high school?” Dodged the draft and went to Delta College for a year in Saginaw. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. At this point how much do you know about Vietnam?” �Robinson, Michael What’s sitting in front of you. I was on a boat, and they told me, “Hey. We’re going in the Army.” And I— Interviewer: “Well, no, but the point when you’re—Before—We’re still at the point in your story where you haven’t gone in the military yet, but you said you were dodging the draft and going to Delta College for a year. So, I mean—” Yes, I understand what you’re saying now. I had an older brother, Steve, that was in Vietnam in 1965, and he had gone through ROTC in the—for the Air Force. And he got orders to go over there, so when I was still in high school, he was over there. And he used to let us know what was going on a little bit. And he was so close to the fighting and all that. (2:05) Interviewer: “Okay, so your impression was that would be good to stay out of?” Yeah, it sure was. It was a very good impression to stay the heck—That’s why I tried to go to the—I was not a very good student, so I went to Delta College for a year. And it wasn’t good for me. Interviewer: “Okay, so basically you leave school, and once you leave school, you don’t have a draft deferment.” Correct. Interviewer: “All right, and then did you get a draft notice?” Yes, I did. Interviewer: “Okay, and what did you do once you got that notice?” I thought about it, and I said, “Jeez. Two years in the Army on the ground in Vietnam, or I could be four years Navy on a ship five miles off shore. I think I’m going in the Navy.” And, of course, that’s not what happened. Interviewer: “All right. Do you remember what time of year it was that you went in?” It was after—It was probably mid-summer or late summer or early fall or something like that. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, so it’s sort of after the spring term or whatever at the college, and you’re out, and…” And now they found out about it. They says, “Ah.” Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now when you went to sign up for the Navy, what kinds— What did the recruiter tell you you could expect, or…?” �Robinson, Michael Yeah, he says, “Make out a list of ten things you want to do in the Navy since you’re going in for four years.” And so—“You have to give at least ten.” So I started listing—And I love photography, so I said, “I want to be a Photographer’s Mate.” And so I listed that up front, and he said, “No, you’ve got to keep going until you get all ten of them filled out.” Well, the last thing I could come up with was a Gunner’s Mate. You know, what he did—Went, “Ah, you’re going to be a Gunner’s Mate.” So that’s how I became into weapons. Interviewer: “All right. Now did you go through a physical, or had you done that already before the draft, or…?” No, I—When I went in the Navy, they sent me to a physical. I did my boot camp in Great Lakes, Illinois. Interviewer: “Okay. Now what did the boot camp consist of?” (4:09) Just normal drill, and first they knock you down to nothing and make you feel like dirt. And then they build you back up to be a military person. You know, that type of thing. Interviewer: “All right. Well, what kinds of things do they do to knock you down?” Made us—An awful lot of marching and physical—Lot of physical stuff and lot of training, schooling, and, of course, drills and that kind of stuff. Interviewer: “Okay. Was there stuff on just how to keep your uniform and your—” Yes, we had to learn—Well, I—Yes, that was solely part of it that I had already learned how to take care of myself and keep, you know, my clothes clean and all that. I had a very good mother, and she taught us how to—You do your own dishes, you do your own clothes, and all that stuff, so that helped me because I wasn’t starting from scratch like a lot of these people were doing. And it was easy for me to take care of myself. Interviewer: “All right. What kind of people were you training alongside? Do you have any sense of what their backgrounds were?” Yeah, there was two different styles. One was a—I want to say he was a New Yorker—city of New Yorker—and he’s a, you know, gang, cool, badass. You know, he knows toughness, and another one—The other one was a guy from Tennessee Hills. Real hillbilly. Literally a hillbilly, and he—He wasn’t going to know how to keep himself clean and stuff like that, and then the city guy—He was very hard on him, and he was going to teach the little Tennessee—Little guy. He’s a tiny guy. (6:02) He’s going to teach him a lesson. He’s going to take him into the—what we call the drying room where you wash your own clothes, and you hang them up and dry them in this drying out room. And he’s going to take him and going to kick his ass and make him clean up because we get demerited more. And he went in there, smacking his hand in his fist. He’s going to kick this little, Tennessee boy’s ass. Well, about less than three or four minutes later, the little, teeny, Tennessee guy came over and was hitting him in his face, and we all kind of �Robinson, Michael watched him walk away. And he—Nothing. Absolutely nothing. About ten minutes later, he, you know—The old, New York, tough, badass guy comes in all bloodied and beat up, and—But— Interviewer: “Well, did the guy from Tennessee learn to clean up?” No, he ended up getting out because they—They put him in a—what they called a mouse house. Was trying to get him to do that. He never learned, and he ended up getting out, you know. Interviewer: “All right. Now—And how long was the boot camp part do you think?” I really don’t know. I want to say at least three months or more. Something like that. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. I guess the Army was eight weeks fairly consistently by then, but the Navy could do things their own way.” Oh, no, maybe it was less because I don’t really remember for sure. Interviewer: “Well, it could have been twelve weeks.” It seemed like forever for me. Interviewer: “Yeah. All right. Now did you understand what they were doing at the time— this idea of breaking you down and building you up—or did you just figure that out later?” Oh, I kind of knew about that because I could say I had an older brother that was in the Air Force, and he went through ROTC in college. And he went through some of this, and then we kind of, you know—We would watch [?] and everything, so I kind of knew what they were doing. And I was always going to be the best I could be, so I didn’t get picked on. The more you—The more you didn’t abide by the rules, the more they made you. And so I kind of just said, “Hey. I think I’ll just do the right thing from the very beginning and kind of stay the hell out of everybody’s way.” (8:12) Interviewer: “Okay. Yeah, that seems to be a good approach. All right, so once you finish that, now what do they do with you?” I went to weapons school. It was a big—Big weapons like five-inch .54s and all that kind of— gyros, how to operate the—Do maintenance on the big ships. When they roll, the guns stay stable, and our job was to fix and repair all that kind of stuff. Interviewer: “Okay, and where were you doing the gunnery school?” In Great Lakes. Interviewer: “Okay, so you’re staying at Great Lakes. Now are you actually going out onto ships now, or is this still on shore?” �Robinson, Michael Just on shore. Yeah, we didn’t go on any ships until after we’re all done. Interviewer: “All right. Now are you really firing any of the guns, or were you just working with the gyros and the stabilization?” Yeah, that kind of stuff. We didn’t do any firing while we’re on there. They just teach us how to fix things. Interviewer: “Okay. Now while you’re there, do you get to go off the base at all?” Yes, we did. We did a little bit of partying. Yeah, and we tried to, you know, do the best we could to stay in one piece. Terrorizing the world. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Well, did you go into Chicago or just stay at near the base?” I had some relatives that lived in Chicago, so on weekends I got to go to their house. And so that was kind of a really big thing to have home cooking and sleep in a real bed and that kind of stuff. But most of it was on base, but every once in a while I’d get a weekend where I got to—And I’d even come home some weekends. I was still doing—Back to—I was back to Saginaw. Interviewer: “Okay, and now do you have a recollection of when it was that you finished the gunnery school? Was it still ‘67 at this point? Before Christmas, or…?” I really don’t know. No, I do not know exactly when it happened, but— Interviewer: “Do you remember where you spent Christmas in ‘67?” (10:13) I may have been able to go home. Interviewer: “It’s possible. Okay. All right, so after gunnery school, what’s the next step for you?” Well, they sent us out into the fleet, and I was on a ship that wasn’t even—It was in dry dock, and so I didn’t really get out in the sea when I was stationed to it. And then they quickly sent me on a different ship. It was an ocean-going minesweeper, and I was told once you get on those, you don’t get to get off. And I’m thinking, “Damn. That’s great because I don’t want to go to Vietnam.” Because, like I say, it was going on pretty good then, and so when I got orders for there, I was very, very happy. Interviewer: “All right. Where was that ship based?” I think it was Charleston, South Carolina. I’m not sure, but I think so. Interviewer: “Okay, and did you actually get to serve on that ship for a while?” �Robinson, Michael Yes, yes, and I was very happy. And I ended up being the ship’s diver because they pull probably almost a quarter mile to a—Maybe it is a mile. I don’t know. A very long line of cable. What they do is they—The minesweeper is made out of wood, so they send down the signals and find the mines. And then the cable comes along, and they’ve got cutters on them. They cut them loose, and then they pop up to the surface. We had twenty millimeter cannons on there and one single, and when they expose these tops—pop up to the surface—we would shoot them and blow them up. But they—This was all mock back then, and they would float a fifty-five gallon drum half full of diesel fuel. And you have to try and hit this with this cannon, which was almost impossible, but we… Interviewer: “So what does the diver do?” (12:04) Well, this is why—how I became—Divers are new commanding officer on board. Stopped. Well, the cable doesn’t. It’s still coming forward, and it wrapped around our screws. So we were out there for about three days. Dead water. We couldn’t even go—Getting them into the wake. We had—We got sideways, and we—Because we couldn’t turn on the screws or anything, so we had to have divers come out and cut the cables off the screws so we could get back in. And they says, “Oh, we’ve got to have somebody on board.” And I was a very good swimmer from Grand Haven. “Yeah, I’ll be—” You know. That was another—Don’t volunteer, okay? So that’s—I went to school for that and did some training basically. We never ran into that problem again, so I didn’t really—I went to a lot of training in the rivers. Interviewer: “And was this still near Charleston where you were doing that?” Yeah, I think so. Yeah, because we were in the river so filthy, dirty you couldn’t see your hand in front of your face, and so I was—Well, we went down—We were supposed to go down and feel around the screws and see if there was anything around them. Well, it was kind of a weird feeling being pitch-black. And so I did it, but thank god we never came across that. Interviewer: “At least if you were out in open ocean, you might be able to see through water.” I was hoping that. Yeah. Interviewer: “All right. About how long did you wind up staying on the minesweeper?” Supposed to have been forever, and it wasn’t. But I think it was more like—I want to say maybe six months or so. I don’t really know, but I know my officer coming out there so happy. He said, “You’ve got new orders for Vietnam.” And I said, “Kiss my ass.” Interviewer: “All right, so I think we’re getting into 1968 now at this point if you’re there that amount of time.” (14:01) Yeah, latter part of—Yeah, yeah, ‘68. Early part of ‘68. �Robinson, Michael Interviewer: “Okay, because you get to Vietnam at the end of ‘68, so okay. Now a lot of stuff was going on in ‘68. I mean, you had—I mean, the Tet Offensive went on early in the year, and then Johnson decides not to run. And then Martin Luther King gets assassinated, and eventually Bobby Kennedy gets assassinated. Did any of that stuff get noticed where you were?” I can’t remember right now, but I’m sure it did have some effect on our orders and stuff. But I can’t really remember a whole lot. Interviewer: “Okay. Yeah, but it’s just not something that stands out in your memory because you’re focusing on what you’re doing on the ship at that point.” Yeah, well, I was on the minesweeper. Something must have happened to ramp up the war. We didn’t know about this. I was a very low rank person that—I think things had gotten a little more heated, so when they had to ramp up more— Interviewer: “Okay. Well, I mean, I think some of it kind of is indicated by the nature of your story and what comes next. So you get orders. You’re going to go to Vietnam, but you don’t go straight to Vietnam.” No. Interviewer: “Where do you go next?” Coronado, California is where the West Coast Swift Boats was doing all their training. Well, we went there. There was ten crews of five apiece or six apiece—six people on each boat—and they’ve got ten of us groups like that. And then we all trained together, and we learned—The boat—Because it’s so small—Only fifty foot long. And you can go like this, and two guys can touch at the sides. It’s pretty narrow. That we had to learn everybody else’s job. (16:02) That’s why it took us so long because you had to learn the radars, the radios, the engines, the weapons system, helmsman, how to take care of stuff. And that’s why it took so long. Interviewer: “Okay, so how many months was that?” I want to say it was—Months. I want to say—Seems like it was like three months to me. I don’t remember. Interviewer: “Yeah, that’s quite likely. I mean, the right chronology. ” Yeah, because it was a long time, and then I was so happy. Because we had to also go through survival training where we had to learn how to survive if we got separated from the boat. Interviewer: “Okay, and what did that consist of?” That was pretty hell. We went up to would be [?] up in state of Washington, and the first part of the week—you’re there for a whole week—they don’t feed you. You only—Whatever you’ve �Robinson, Michael got to eat is what you forage, and they teach you how to dig—In low tide how to dig snails or clams or whatever the hell you dig, and I didn’t—And you always had to be doing—Like in a scenario where you’re—You’ve got to be careful, so you only got to go out there at night in low tide. And we would dig—If we got our bucket full—And it was probably about eight inches tall and about six inches in diameter. If we got that full for our group, which is like twelve, fourteen of us, then we could keep digging because they gave us a time period. And you can eat whatever you can get from then on, and, of course, I don’t like seafood, so—But I tried it because you get pretty hungry, and I couldn’t do it. You know, I—And they—That’s what they did, and then, after a while, they’d teach you how to do snares. How to catch rabbits and stuff like that, and so basically—And then, of course, they did how to—If you’re walking down a trail, how to get— You know, if you come up across a VC, how to shoot because you—Right there, all of a sudden, this big thing pops up. It’s supposed to be a VC jumped up in front of you, and you’re supposed to know what to do. (18:14) And you shoot the first one low, so you can see where it hit. And then you bring it up to the height of the target. So that you do boom, boom! Two quick shots, and you only get two shots. So you’ve got to hit it supposedly, and we did that. That was quite an experience, and then after that they—We learned how to do all that, and then they decided that, “Okay. You’ve got to go through a capture stage.” And they gave us a compass and a map and says, “You’ve got to go to Point A to Point B, and you’ve got so much time to do that. And there’s so many of you.” I don’t know how many it was—like maybe four or something like that—and you’re supposed to make that point. If you make it to that point and don’t get captured, then you went to the next point. And you keep—One thing, learn how to use a compass obviously, and that we did very well. In fact, I’m kind of a country boy living up in Grand Haven and stuff, and we lived on an old farm. And so we—I knew how to play in the woods, so to speak, and so I could spot movement. So I knew when to get the hell down and stop and freeze and all that, and so we made it all the way through. And most people didn’t. Most groups didn’t, and after you get all done, we say, “Well, we made it.” And they say, “Yeah. Come on. You’re camping.” They put us in concentration camps anyways just to give us—For the experience of being in a—In that scenario of being captured, and then they start doing a lot of things to you, trying to break you mentally. And, of course, they beat you up and propaganda, and one of the things that I—I have two things I have problems with: small spaces and drowning. (20:06) And that’s—Of course, that’s the thing they work on, of course. “Oh, you’re in the Navy. In Vietnam, there’s water, so…” And they would take you and put you in this box about maybe this wide and just wide enough for your shoulders but just long enough to where you had to—You know, on your hands and knees type thing, and then they’d push the top down until you’re down and right against your—Your face against the floor almost, and then they lock it. And they leave you there, and it really works on your mind. And I played golf in my head to keep me busy, and when I got out, I was a little bit—Probably a little bit screwed up, but I didn’t—They, of course—They’d say, “Who’s your commanding officer?” And they’d keep slapping you around a lot and trying to get you to give your—The name of your commanding officer, and I was so freaking scared I couldn’t remember his name anyway. And then they kept—They did that for a while and then put us in classes again—the propaganda classes—and if you didn’t pay attention, they grabbed a—Of course, I’m trying to always resist type of thing, and I was not being cooperative. He grabbed me by my hair and pulled me out of the room and put a gun to my head and pulled the trigger a couple of times. And I knew that they—God, they’re not going to kill us, so I kind of half-ass believed that they weren’t going to kill me. But you kind of get weird, and then they—That didn’t do it for them, so they put me in a—You know what a fifty-five gallon �Robinson, Michael drum is. You know how tall they are. (22:09) What they did is they welded them—A whole bunch of—Like four of them together so that you’ve got a big, long tube you’re in, and they set the end of the tube—One on the ground and one on a board, and then they shove you down there headfirst. And it’s full of water, and it’s just going over the edge. That way it’s staying flat or almost flat, and you’re standing up. And you can’t get up and high enough to get out of the water, and they wait until you—your last burst of air. And they bring you back down, haul you out, and, of course, you— Interviewer: “Okay. Now it seems like an awful lot of production for somebody who’s going to be an enlisted man on a Swift Boat in terms of—Why are they doing all of this stuff to you?” Because we’re going to be in the area where we’re going to get—Maybe get captured. Interviewer: “That’s possible.” Yeah, very possible. Yeah, and so that was one of their reasons for this was to see what we could take, and I think that was a separation point. Because when we got back from there, they said, “Well, a lot of people got—didn’t—I mean, we’ve got too many crews over there, so we’re going to send you all back to the fleet.” And I think that was when they were—The ones that didn’t make—Because they made us go into a concentration camp where they made you pick up boulders and move them to this pile, and then, “No. Move them back over here.” You know, and they broke you. They did everything they could to break you. They got a lot of people that did break, and they were up there on the walls acting like a chicken and everything. I mean, there were some people that really broke bad, and it was—I think that’s what they were doing. They’re weeding out the ones that couldn’t make it, and so when we got back down to…(24:06) Interviewer: “Coronado?” Yeah, Coronado. Thank you. Going crazy. And that’s when they told us we’re going to go back to the fleet, and I was so happy. And a lot of them did, and there was one more group left that was my group. Five or six guys. And I says, “Hey. Where’s our orders? You gave everybody else orders. Where the hell’s ours?” And he looked down in his office—I was about to go to the office to get my new orders, and he pulled out my papers and handed them to me. It’s the same ones, and he said, “You’ve got a week. Get your—Get everything in order.” And so I called my mom, and I says, “Hey. I’m going after all.” You know, and, boy, she was so goddamn mad at the Navy that—But then went out and got shit-faced drunk, and I was just not—Just about ready to turn twenty-one, so that was in September, and we went off base and got drunker than a skunk. And I ended up in jail somewhere. Interviewer: “All right. Now this is—Coronado’s by San Diego, right?” Yes. Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay, and in general how do the locals seem to view the sailors?” �Robinson, Michael Not very well, not very well. They didn’t like them, and probably—Because we were probably kind of rowdy, and I don’t blame them because we were stupid. But anyways, I got thrown in jail for I don’t know exactly what, but I know we were drinking because I—Yeah, and they couldn’t get out of me who I got my alcohol from, and I kept saying, “Just a minute.” And I’d throw up, and then they did it. Asked me again. I says, “Just a minute.” And they were probably thinking, “Okay. He ain’t going to talk,” and so they—That’s when they kept me overnight and sent me back the next day, and... Interviewer: “All right. So now how do they get you to Vietnam?” (26:01) They flew us after they gave us ten billion shots. You know, they filled our arms full of shots, so they walk you down a line with these guns that shoot into you. They’re not needles. They actually shoot a stream of medicine into you, and after I don’t know how many shots, then they put us on an airplane. And we got to California—Not California. To Hawaii, and they knocked us off the planes to get more shots. And that’s all I thought of Hawaii was get off the airport, go through a line, and get back on, and they shipped us off to Vietnam. Interviewer: “Okay, and where did you land in Vietnam?” I think Cam Ranh Bay. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. What was your first impression of Vietnam when you got there?” That was a stable part of the country with that being the Air Force base there and all that, so I’m just kind of like, “Wow.” You know. Not until the day—Flew us down to Cat Lo Coastal Division 13, and then it was getting a little tighter. And, like I say, I came on base, and I had my duffel bag and all this stuff. I handed it, and he’s, “Oh, come on, come on, come on.” They took me down to the pier, and that boat—The picture of the boat with a big rock in it. He says, “That’s your boat.” And, “Holy shit.” And, of course, I didn’t have to go on that one because it was pretty bad up. Interviewer: “So the boat that you were supposed to go on had just been shot up.” Yeah, he got knocked out the night before. Interviewer: “All right. Now are you joining an existing crew as the new guy, or what’s happening?” Yes, so one person—You know, we went over there as a crew, but they only allow one new guy on a boat at a time because they don’t know how you’re going to react to—Especially as the gunner’s mate, I couldn’t be on the main guns because they didn’t know if I would freeze on them, and so—And that was every—Everybody did the same thing. They did it to all of us. We all went on a different boat, and… �Robinson, Michael Interviewer: “All right. Just describe a little bit what a Swift Boat is like. You said it’s fifty feet long, it’s pretty narrow at the beam, and what’s it for?” (28:14) It’s a river patrol boat. Further up north as you go—Because I was always down in the delta area, but up north—the DMZ—they actually patrolled the ocean a little bit, too. And that’s when the North Vietnamese didn’t have aircraft, and they could come over the ocean and knock out them. So they were in pretty bad shape, too, but we just ran the rivers. We didn’t go out in the ocean. The only time we ever went out on the ocean is when we did a one-day patrol, and I was supposed to guard the bases. It was a day off basically. You just tuck around the base, and we would go out to the ocean. And right there—That was, you know, in country in our place it was a pretty safe patrol to have. I can’t remember. I think it was Vũng Tàu. Interviewer: “Vũng Tàu, and, well, that would fit the description. Yeah.” Yeah, I think it was Vũng Tàu, and so we went out—You know, we went out on the beaches partying all the time, so it wasn’t really a patrol, even though we had to go back in behind them. But, I mean, that was all friendly. Interviewer: “Okay, but did you go into the ocean to get from the estuary or one river to another? Kind of in and out of the rivers and the delta?” Yes, every one of them. We would leave the Saigon Basin or whatever it was, and we would travel along the ocean just to get to our patrol river. Interviewer: “Right. Okay, and as a gunner’s mate, what’s your job?” I was fore gunner in the main defense and destruction. Both. We—I sat up high—real high—so I could really see what was going on, and I was the main defense and the main destruction. (30:06) Interviewer: “Okay, and what kind of weapon did you have?” I had—Beginning I just had two twelve—No two twelve. Two .50 caliber machine guns, and as I realized when we would do search and rescue missions—not rescue, but search—that my .50s could not—Were useless because I couldn’t get the guns down too far, so I ended up carrying an M16 behind me and M79 grenade launcher. And so when we pulled up alongside a sampan, I would take my M16 down, and they would—A lot of times they would pull me out of there completely and go down and do the search because I was useless up there with the big, big guns anyway. So they said, “Well, you do the search, and thanks a lot, buddy.” And so I did a lot of the climbing through the sampans and checking for stuff. Interviewer: “All right. What was your main base?” Cat Lo. Interviewer: “All right, and describe what that facility looked like.” �Robinson, Michael The big flotation of piers, and they had barracks there, commissaries, hospital type places, and a big, big warehouse for food because we would have to—When you go on patrol, if you went on a—like a—two and three-day patrols, we would get allotment to have food because we cooked our own foods on board while we were out. And so we had places like that and mess halls and places to drink. Interviewer: “Okay, and how much time would you actually spend at the base?” We would go on a one-day patrol. Then they have a day off. Then we’d go on a two-day patrol and have a day off. Then a three-day patrol and have a day off, and so… Interviewer: “All right, and what do you do during the day off?” A little bit of drinking. Sleeping. Oh, lord, a little bit of drinking. Quite a bit of drinking, sleeping, and have our own bed and all that kind of stuff, so it was kind of nice. You had your own locker, and you had, you know, barracks. It was kind of nice. It was very well—nice—I mean, showers, and that was nice because we didn’t use the showers on more of the boats. We had to just jump in the river, and so…(32:20) Interviewer: “All right. Let’s see. Now did you have to stay on the base?” No, it’s supposedly all friendly around the base, so a lot of people went out. And I know I—One of my favorite foods was—They made french fries using pure butter, and that tasted so good. And so—Of course, it’s like five bucks for a little packet of french fries, but they’d have little— Vietnamese would have a bunch of little stores and stuff to buy and get in trouble in. You know, women and things to buy and places to eat and—But at night we were all supposed to be back inside. Interviewer: “And were there ever problems with Viet Cong in the village?” Yeah, we—Normally, not individually, but one time we were all on base and I was sleeping on my rack, which the house—Or what do you call that? Barracks. Our barracks was long, and mine happened to be way up front by the showers—my bunk—and we heard a mortar leave a—Mortar round. You hear that boop that goes off, and, “Boom!” It hit pretty damn close. I said, “Jesus Christ, you idiots. You’re almost hitting us.” Well, it wasn’t us shooting. It was them shooting at us, and they hit our barrack for that—Our back end, and all the people back there were on patrols. (34:03) So nobody got hurt. The building got damaged, but nobody got hit. And the officer in charge of our base security—Yeah, I seen him in the bunkers and stuff like that and the sandbag area, and he says they— “We know where they’re coming from, and they’re right there. Can we shoot them?” And he says, “Oh, that’s all friendly over there.” And, “No. No, it’s not.” You know. “It’s not all friendly over there.” And we never—They never shot back. They weren’t allowed to, and we went out on—Got on the boats. The duty boat. We’d get on this boat and go behind that area, so—To try and cut them off, and we never did find the people that did it. And— But they never did that again, so, you know… �Robinson, Michael Interviewer: “Okay. Did they just fire a couple of rounds and leave, or…?” About six. Yeah, six mortars and left, I guess. I mean, because, I mean, we never found anything. Interviewer: “All right, but there weren’t cases of people going into the village and having trouble with the VC or things like that?” No, no, it—We—Supposedly all friendlies, but yeah. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now do you remember your first mission on a Swift Boat?” Yes, it was the very first Sea Lord Raid. Yeah, I was still fresh in country, and then they—We went up one of these rivers, and then we went off on this canal. And we went in. It’s pitch-black as night, and we chugged up there real slow. We have a radar that we can see where their nets were spaced across the river, so we could maneuver around them. And so—And I can’t see nothing because it’s pitch-black, but the guy in the helm could. And we went all the way up to where—I was going to show you that. Where the VC supposedly had some of our guys captured, and—So we’re supposed to go up, and there’s a T in the canal. (36:05) And we were supposed to go up there and go to that T, and then if nothing happened, we were supposed to turn around and come back out there. But we would get up there and nothing, of course, and the minute we started to turn around they hit us from everywhere. And I was on the—Because I was not out on the .50s, they put me on the bow with an M60 machine gun, and there’s so much light from them because you couldn’t see because there is no street lights or anything like that. So we—The only—Anything you could see was basically from the flash of the guns, and you’re shot at. Flashes of guns, and there was some big stuff that came in, but it went over our heads. And I just shot at everything I—It was—Whatever. And we turned around, and we ran our asses back out of there, I think. And I sat back, thinking, “Oh my god, we made it. Nobody got hit.” And officer says, “Reload. We’re going back in.” I said, “You’re out of your freaking mind.” You know, and an M60 machine gun—You take the handle, and you flip it this way. You can dump the barrel right off, block a new one on, and a nice, new barrel, and that’s—So that’s what I did. I put a new barrel on and reloaded, and we turned around and went back in at full water because they— When you’re out in the ocean—You know, if you get out to Lake Michigan, you can be twenty miles inland and still hear the power boats going, so they didn’t know exactly where we were. But they heard us, but they didn’t know where we were. They didn’t realize we were coming straight at them with exhaust going behind us, and they didn’t hear us coming. So they were out on their—Had campfires going and cooking fires going. They’re outside the bunkers, and they’re—Everybody’s sitting around, and we came in there and started just blasting away. (38:02) We got up to that T again, and we slammed on the brakes. Basically stopped, and, well, here they all was. About twenty feet in front of me was a VC in a sampan. Caught him dead right in the middle of the river, and, you know, it’s like, you know, “What am I going to—” Well, I’m—I leveled my, you know, M60 at him, and I killed him. And we—I don’t know what else we did. I mean, I know we—I did a lot more shooting because we got—We’re still getting shot at from all over, and I know a lot of the times—I don’t know if you see this in some of the movies of Afghanistan where they’re shooting like this, you know, and not aiming. They’re just—And I’m pretty sure there’s a lot of that because we had an awful lot of firepower, so they didn’t want to stand up and be brave because we could—Thing is, we could rip bunkers apart, �Robinson, Michael buildings apart, knock trees down with my—With the .50s, not with my M60, but—So they didn’t—They weren’t too accurate in their shooting, but they were shooting with—You could see the muzzle flashes, and you could hear some of the bullets go whizzing by. But I didn’t—We would just turn around and shot our way out and, “Ah, man. We made it. Second time.” You know, and so it was— Interviewer: “Now was your boat by itself on this mission?” No, we never go on raids—Sea Lord Raids—It’s at least two to three or four sometimes, and I don’t remember how—In our patrol areas themselves, we always have two, and then if we go on the raids, it’s probably three. Interviewer: “Okay. Now you’re using the term ‘Sea Lord’. What does that refer to?” That’s the type of raid that they gave a name to, and it was in the—Out—Go out, and we were going to go do some damage. We know where the VC are. We’re going to go in there and rip the place apart. Interviewer: “Okay. Now as far as you know, did you always encounter Viet Cong as opposed to North Vietnamese troops?” (40:03) No. Never. I have no idea. I just saw muzzle flashes, and that one poor guy in the sampan—I don’t think he was a North Vietnamese regular. I think he was just a regular guy. Was told to— “You shoot at the Americans, or you die. Or your daughter dies.” So... Interviewer: “Okay. Now what proportion of your missions were conducted at night?” I want to say that the heavy-duty ones—the Sea Lord Raids—were about fifty percent because a couple of times—There was a lot of times we did day raids, too. Interviewer: “All right. Now, I guess, you’ve got—You have a—You’ve written a memoir, which we can include actually in the file we’ve made for your interview here, and you talk about a variety of incidents. And another one—a different kind of incident—We talked about—You talked a little bit about going out in the ocean, and if you’re going out in the ocean in a small boat like this, could that be dangerous or at least unpleasant?” Not when you’re out there. Is this when you try to come into—during a monsoon season, coming into that—In the Saigon Basin? Because the waves start coming up the land, and then it gets all huge. They’re bigger than us, and we’re going in—We would back in because the waves were pushing us in, and so you get up to the top of the wave. And you had to power up it, so you didn’t get pushed all the way down to the ground in— back in the boat and get just buried into the ground. So we’d power up it, and as it went by us, we come this way. And then you would try to back up to go up the thing, so you don’t want to hit so hard at the—on the front of the wave. So we had to keep maneuvering forward and backwards and get—We kind of—You know, we had to—Of course, we could thank god we can lock it all up and close it all off, but— �Robinson, Michael So you wouldn’t get buried nose first or ass first into the ground, and we had some people that did. And it’s—That was very dangerous. (42:16) Interviewer: “And when you’re bringing the—Now is the base itself—Does it have a breakwater or something to protect you against the waves?” Yeah, you go around the—Where are base was—Because going up the river basin—That was one thing, but we—Our base is over to the side, and so there was no waves there at all. It’s just a river coming down. Interviewer: “Okay, but you had to get through the area that had the waves first.” Yeah, we had to get through that, and then when we got through that, we were home free basically. Interviewer: “All right. Now what different kinds of missions did you have over the course of your time there?” We had gun support missions, we had troop insertions, and Sea Lord Raids. Types—Things like that. The—We would—Troop insertions we would back them up. When we’d get like—They’d get them like six or eight big, huge sampans or whatever. You called the troops on us, and then load us with a bunch of troops. And we’d go in as shallow as we can, and they—Those boats would go on shallow water, so they would go in. And we would stay out there with our support. My 81 and my .50s and— Interviewer: “Okay. The 81. Explain what that is.” That’s the 81 mm mortar—single-shot—that—You can do couple things with that. One: You could drop the mortar down just like you see on the TV when they drop the mortar, and it goes, “Boop.” Then we also had a tracker system on ours, so if we wanted to kind of lower the angle to where we want to shoot it at something with a different type of rounds, that we could stand it up straight, cock the firing pin back, then drop it down in there. And it would seat, but it wouldn’t go off. So then we could aim it like a great, big shotgun, and we could do…(44:09) Interviewer: “Okay, so you could use direct fire with a mortar—” Oh, yeah. Oh my god, it was a—Definitely a—We only had to use that twice. I only remember using it twice, and it was so devastating that—We were in a bad firefight, and this one bank was just tearing us apart. And he only had an M—.50—One single .50 on his—Top of his mortar, but he had that mortar, too. 81. And I cannot shoot straight behind me, and we were getting hit pretty good. And he couldn’t—He wasn’t—His .50 calibers couldn’t hit everything all at once, so he just leveled that 81 and let that thing go. And the whole bank went, “Whoosh,” and there’s nothing. There was not a single sound after that. Interviewer: “Okay. This was an anti-personnel round or something?” �Robinson, Michael Yeah, it has a—Thousands of tiny, little darts in them. I have them in my hat there, and it shows you what they are. They’re little, black darts that—They’re packed in there, and it’s a 81 mm long round. And probably about that long since there’s thousands of rounds in there, and, of course, as soon as it leaves the mortar barrel, it spreads out like this. And— Interviewer: “Okay. Now is this called a flechette round or a beehive—” Yes, a flechette, I think. It might be called beehive round, too. I think the— Interviewer: “Yeah, but that same idea. A whole bunch of little flying things.” Yeah, it— Interviewer: “So—But a giant shotgun effect.” Yeah, basically. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now the troops that you were bringing in. Do you have—Did you form much of an impression of them or get to know any of them, or would you just see them once and that was it?” I didn’t get—The South Vietnamese I did not get a good impression with because they didn’t have the—They were not there for—They thought that they were fighting our war. (46:06) They really believed that, and, I mean, we were starting to turn our boats over to the South Vietnamese. We were going to—They knew we were going to go—The people that were supposed to go on our boats with us and be training with us. When they found out where we were going, they wouldn’t show up, and so we knew—“Oh, this is going to be something because they won’t even show up.” So it usually was a little bit more of a gunfight than a—That they—They knew. It’s probably their brothers or something, I’m thinking. I don’t know. Interviewer: “Okay, so you take South Vietnamese troops in.” Yeah. Interviewer: “Would you take American troops in as well?” We—Couple of times we took in some of our Marines and stuff like that. I want to say the— Interviewer: “The Navy Seals?” Seals. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah, Navy Seals. We were going to go up this one canal that went back to—We know it was a very strong—Big stronghold of the VC, and we were supposed to go up there and tear them a new one. Whatever. And we got part way up there, and we knew this was there. That they had a—They put a barricade underwater about a foot and a half below the waterline, so we take—At slow speed, we take three feet of water. I mean, we have all our stuff—props and everything—hanging underneath, so we couldn’t go up there. And we had like �Robinson, Michael eight tubes almost the length of our boat of C4, and they packed it around that huge, monstrous barricade they had. And then we back off. I don’t know how far. We have a very, very long way, and they detonate it. And the water and everything flew about thirty, forty feet in the air. It was unbelievable, and after they cleared our way, we went in and did our thing. (48:01) And we also had a—We know where the VC were, and we know where the campsites were. And they’re way inland, and we sent some Marines—or Marines or Seals or whatever—inland to capture, I guess, some general. And so we ended up doing a—Running our bow up on the beach real tight, so we were really stable. Got these quick—Read coordinates to where we know we were going to be, and they knew where they were going to be. And we set up our mortars. You have to—It changed the distance that the mortar flies. You have a little—powder bags on the side of them that when you drop them down the mortar, they’d get so much push, and, of course, then the angle and all that stuff they figure out. And—So we were ready to support them, and they were going to go on and do this. Get this army’s general or whatever. And we were waiting I don’t know how many—it seems like forever—before they got on the radio and says, “We got him. We’re on our way out.” And you could hear that they were running, and they were on the radio. And so it’s, you know. Okay. And a little bit—Not too long later, he says, “We need support. Drop some rounds in on our positions right here.” And they told us where it was, and, of course, they were on the run. So once we dropped the rounds, they’re away, and they did that. And we could hear the gunfire. You know, they’re in a firefight, and you could be—Kept telling us that. They did that a couple of times, and then finally he says—He came on the radio very, very excited, and they said that—“We’re pinned down. They got us surrounded. Drop some mortars right on top of us.” “Right on top of you?” So we did, and nothing. (50:07) “Jesus Christ, we just killed them?” And it was like in between the other transmissions there were only like five minutes or so, and this was ten or fifteen minutes. And nothing, so we thought we killed them. And he came back on the radio. “Oh, yeah. We got them. We’re coming on out.” And, I mean, as calm as can be, and they came out. And we were saying, “Jesus Christ.” You know, and you’re smiling and laughing, and one of the guys reaches into his pockets. And he says, “Here,” and dropped it in one of our guys’s hands. It was part of our mortar. “Thanks,” he said. Interviewer: “Did they come out carrying—with a Vietnamese prisoner?” Yeah, I think so. I don’t remember. I just remember them coming up. They’re as happy as hell, and I’m assuming they had because they said, I mean, the whole time—They said they had him, they had him, you know, and they’re coming out with him. And then that last bit when they finally came out and said thanks. That’s all they said, you know, and it’s kind of bizarre. Interviewer: “All right. Now when you’re going up these—You get into the canals and the very narrow waterways. How hard was it to maneuver? What kinds of things did you have to do in there?” Yeah, they were always—When we got into the canals, they—We couldn’t turn around. We had to—If we were going to turn around, we had to ram the bow up on the beach and back off, ram the bow up on the beach and back off, ram the bow up on the beach—Did that until we got turned around because you—It was too—Obviously, the rivers are too narrow to even— Interviewer: “Okay. Would you do that under fire?” �Robinson, Michael Yes. The last one I was on we went up—It was supposed to be—It was going to be four of us, and we’re going to run up this one canal that we knew would belong to the VC. (52:12) And we were supposed to come in with four boats in a row—come in like a lickety-split—and the canal went in at an angle and then did a hard right about—I don’t know. Not very far in but less than a quarter of a mile. And go up there, and it was very, very narrow. And as we were going to go up there, the command boat was the last boat in line, and he was—He wanted to be the lead boat, and we were lead boat. So we had to stop. You take four great, big boats with two twelvecylinder diesel engines apiece and slam on the brakes and throttle back, and the noise it makes is unbelievable. And so we all stopped. The other three boats had to stop, and he went around us. And, of course, then we had to get back going again, and—Because I couldn’t—Canal went up and did a hard right. I could see in front of me, but I couldn’t shoot because of the boats. And I was watching the front boat, and it got to that corner. And the front boat just went, “Bam,” and laid right over on its side. I mean, hit it with something huge, and it laid right on its side. It popped back up and went around the corner, and I said, “Holy shit.” I couldn’t shoot. I could not shoot, I could not shoot, I could not shoot. And then the second one went around, and it’s getting all this smoke. And the fire is so much that I couldn’t see anything, and then the next boat. And when we got there, I just opened up. Didn’t even know where the hell I was shooting because it’s so smoky, and, all of a sudden, our boat goes, “Boom.” We got hit in the—in our port engine. It knocked us down out of the water, and, you know, you’re up at full board. You’re up on the plane, but it knocked us right down to where we just stalled. (54:06) And we went over on our side, and we’re shooting. They knocked out our engine, and so we’re trying to get it started. And we’re screaming on the radio, “Come back for us! We’re down! Come back for us! We’re down!” Well, at the same time, the lead boat was saying, “Turn around and get the hell out of here any way you can. I mean, we’re sinking.” And we thought they were coming back for us, and so we were kind of shooting all the time. And he’s cranking the engine, trying to get it started. Well, it started. Somehow it started. It had a bullet hole that big right through the goddamn thing, and it still started. So we said, “Hey. We’ll take the point,” because we thought we saw them coming back. So, “We got it. We’re okay.” And we didn’t get the transmission that says, “Get out of here any way you can,” so they left. So we went up there all by ourselves, and—“Jesus Christ. An awful lot of fire.” We didn’t know that until we got to a little straightaway and looked back. There’s nobody there. We’re all by ourselves, so I kind of reached down and grabbed the hull and what I only was saying and screaming—I says,“Get the—out of here because we—We’re all alone.” And so he just rammed the hell into it and went, “Bam,” right up on the beach. Then we had to do this to turn around because it was so narrow. Well, I’m—While he’s doing that, I look down, and I’ve got five rounds hanging from my guns. That’s all I had. I only had five rounds, and that’s five out of a thousand or so. So I had another belt down in the deck, but the way a clip loads, you know, you’ve got to have a male and a female type fitting. Then you put a bullet through there, and that’s what locks them together. Before I could hook into the newest set of belts, I had to get everything up, and I’m shaking so hard. And you hear all this gunfire, and, you know, it’s just—You know, I—You just hear it. I mean, I just kept hauling them up, and I’m shaking so hard. And I can’t lay them straight enough. (56:09) If you’re trying to lay them down—And I was trying to lay them down in there. I finally get it to— The blast went up there. Then I can hook into it. Then I had to do the other side, and all this time we’re doing this, trying to turn around. And about the time we got turned around, I got them both loaded. I got in those last five rounds. I look down, and there’s a bunker right there. I never saw �Robinson, Michael it going in, and, of course, I filled the slot. And I—As we went by—And I swung around, and, “Jesus Christ, there’s another one.” And that’s the way it was all the way out, and I shot two—I didn’t—You’re supposed to shoot your short rounds, so you don’t cook your barrels and get them all—And I didn’t. I was shooting at anything, and pretty soon near the end—Of the end of the—Where we got back—Going to go get back out—My rounds were coming out, and my gun’s going about ten, fifteen feet and hitting the water. And the cherry—The redness of the barrels were so cherry-red and totally worn out that I was just making noise, but I don’t know. I still—If you hear a .50 caliber machine gun coming at your direction, you—They probably kept their heads down a little bit, and we got back out. And we got around that corner, and our engine died. And all the shooting stopped, too, so I put my guns up like this. And the barrels were so hot they’re still going off. The gun’s still going, “Bam, bam. Bam, bam, bam,” because as soon as the round chambered, it cooked. We called it cooked off, and it kept going off. And I’m laying back. I say, “Holy—We made it.” And I look down. There’s holes in my gun tub. Where the fuck was I? Excuse me. And, you know, where could I have been? I must have been down getting ammo when they went through, and we got out. And then—Oh, we had—I forgot to say that we had a big TV crew from like NBC or ABC or CNN or whatever that came onboard, and they were going to film this thing. And we knew it was going to be bad because they were going to film it, and he got sick before we even left the dock. (58:24) And he was laying on the port engine cover, and because we got hit in that engine, we thought he got killed because he was just laying there. And then we had a choice to kick him off or throw him onto the starboard engine cover, and we ended up—thank god—We threw him on the starboard engine cover because he was still alive, and he said, “Is everybody all right?” And— Interviewer: “Okay. Now was he—Did he have like a TV camera or just a—” Yeah. Great, big— Interviewer: “Oh my goodness. Yeah, so what happened to that?” He never even got it out. We—He put it inside the boat itself in the inside, and before we even left the pier, he was so seasick he never got it out. Interviewer: “All right. Now do you suppose the unit commander decided to be the lead boat because he was going to be on television?” I’m not going to answer that. I would think it may have something to do with it. Interviewer: “All right. You were talking about encountering bunkers and so forth. Aside from a machine gun, what else could you use against a bunker?” Well, that was my main one when I—we get into that type of situation, but I know that we— When we did other raids, I carried an M79 grenade launcher, but we didn’t—I didn’t use that against bunkers because it’s—They’re not more safe. In other words, mostly rounds like that— They have to be about so many feet out the barrel before they’re armed, and so if you shoot at something too close, you can—The shrapnel can get you. Yeah. (1:00:01) �Robinson, Michael Interviewer: “Okay, so what would you shoot at with the M79?” I would knock out hutches and stuff. I could—A football field away at full bore I could drop a round from the M79 right in the doorway. Interviewer: “Okay. You’ve got a story in the memoir about using white phosphorus grenades.” Oh my god. Yeah, this was at—We had this new guy onboard. He was 6’2”, 3”. Big guy. And he had this blue beret on, and he was a real badass-looking dude. And we went in to destroy the— this village. It was all VC. That was the one where the—We moved up the barricade for us. We got to the village, and they were all gone. I don’t know why, and so we’re just going to burn it to the ground. And this white phosphorus grenade is very big and heavy, and he looked like a big, strong guy. And the kill radius of the white phosphorus is like thirty feet, so you had to be—You had to throw it—It had a long fuse—thank god—so you got time to throw it way out there and back off. Well, this guy—He pulled the grenade because he was just going to—We were going to burn up some hooches over there, and he pulled the pin on the grenade. And he wound back like he was going to throw it to the length of a football field, and he ended up getting—throwing it just like a girl. And it landed right beside our bow. I mean, that’s not past our bow but right beside our bow, and, of course, we backed out of there so damn fast. And, you know, two twelve-cylinder diesels going in full. We burst the whole boat. Just shaking, trying to jump to get out of there. We get out of there just in time when it went off. Interviewer: “What happened with him?” He said it was an accident, and he’s going to do another one. (1:02:01) And he went over to the other side. Did the same thing. Five feet. We had to back away, and he said, “Good. That was an accident.” Because—But he’s, you know, real tough guy, and he was going to go throw another one. I said, “No. No, you’re done. You’re not going to throw—ever throw another grenade. You aren’t going to throw it.” And he—Of course, he’s a lot bigger than I was, and he says he’s going to throw another grenade. I says, “No, you’re not.” And he stepped outside the—on the—by the door there to get—And that’s where—Right below my .50s, and there’s a guard, so I don’t shoot my own man. But that barrel was only about six inches above his head, and the tip was right over the top. So that was going to be pretty loud, and he stepped out there. And I shot a six round burst, and it knocked him right down. Knocked him right down, and he—Of course, he called me a bunch of names, and he went out to go to the other side. I just swung my .50s right over his head again, lowered as far as I could go, and opened the .50 calibers again. And he went down and didn’t come back up, and he didn’t throw a—Never threw another grenade, but I know when we got back, they took him off the boat. And we never saw him again. Now I don’t know if they—He went into a hospital because they—I’m sure it blew his eardrums out, and I didn’t know if he went home. All I know is he was gone, and nobody died. And that’s all I could think of is, “You’re going to kill us, and you ain’t going to.” Interviewer: “All right. You’ve got a couple other stories in your memoir about different kinds of characters, and one of them was a new officer who came to the boat.” �Robinson, Michael Yes. Yeah, he—We—Like I say, you don’t have a new person—Only one new person at a time because that way you don’t have any—Nobody freezing, and if they do freeze, you only have one person freeze. You don’t have the whole boat, and he was cockier than hell because he was an officer, you know. We were just enlisted people, and he was being very “I’m in charge” type of attitude. (1:04:08) And he tried to—He wasn’t going to stand any night duty, you know. He was going to sleep, but for our boat to function at night—Was—We usually had one guy on the helm and watching the radar, watching the—Anything around us, and then we had like a bank of three or four radios that we monitored all the bases close by. And so we had two people—You had to have two people all the time, and the rest were just—Slept on the boat somewhere, and mine was the starboard engine cover because it was nice and warm. And—But he would—And we really had a long discussion about him not standing watch, and plus, he wanted to paint our boat nice and pretty. And the whole thing is is when you have a boat that’s all shiny and new, that’s like throwing on a red flag. You know, everyone wants a piece of that new crew, so you don’t paint your boat. And he—We had a discussion about that, and he kept saying, “Well, you made us get the paint. We brought it onboard, and we aren’t going to use it.” And we pulled up alongside—You usually patrol a minimum of two boats in the same river at the same time, so you could back up, you know, and kind of support each other. And during—Sometime during the day, you would pull up alongside and have dinner together or some dang thing, and we pulled up alongside our sister boat. And we were talking. I says, “This character wants to paint our boat, and we’re not going to do it.” And he kind of like—“Yeah, probably not a good idea.” And he says, “Yes, you are,” and, well, we got into a big discussion about that. (1:06:02) And he—I’m getting my stories mixed up here, but anyways, we didn’t paint the boat. And we ended up getting into a position where we were boarding sampans to the—You know, check out for contraband and all that stuff, and we usually locked the boat up against their boat. And that’s when the—I no longer am any good because I can’t lower my .50s there, so they usually have me crawl out on the boats. And we were getting ready to do that, and the helmsman—He, you know, walked the boat right up to it, and then we tied them to us. And then he has a twelve gauge shotgun right by the helm where he pulls off, and he stands there and helps guard while we’re down there. And we pulled up alongside, and we didn’t even tie it up. And something happened. I don’t know what it was, but he was standing out at a very—Almost by the bow there, and the rest of us was just starting to get down. And then—And he hit the throttle, and two twelvecylinder diesels—That boat just leaps right out of the water, and you can’t be—I mean, you can’t stand up. You have to grab onto something. Well, the guy who was standing by the helmsman did this kind of thing trying to grab a hold of something. Well, he—The only thing that was hooked right there was a twelve gauge shotgun, and it was still loaded. And it went off, and the officer up front—He hit the deck, and he got hit. And we find out later—I’ve got to say it. This was a [?], and he got hit with one BB. He didn’t get hit with a whole shot, and—But we had medevac. I mean, he was screaming and hollering and all that stuff, and we went down to the mouth of the river and met a medevac ship. (1:08:01) And we were offloading him, and they kept yelling down at us, “You really did it! You really did it!” “Jesus Christ. Shut the hell up. We did nothing now.” “It’s you that shot him. You did it.” “Oh, Christ.” And, “We don’t know where that round came from.” We said, “It didn’t come from us, man. And, well, somewhere. It came from somewhere. We don’t know.” But he was only gone for three days or maybe less. I don’t know. I can’t remember, but he came back on the boat. “Damn it. He’s a good officer.” But we didn’t have to paint our boat, and he’s—He helped night watches. I mean, he ended up being the best officer we had. �Robinson, Michael Interviewer: “Okay. How many officers did you have?” One officer onboard. Interviewer: “Yeah, but I mean over the course of your tour.” Oh, I had—I probably had three or four. I know I had at least three because I was on three different boats. But may have had another replacement—Well, he came onboard when I was on one, so at least four then that I had. And he was—Yeah. Interviewer: “Okay. How did you wind up switching from boat to boat? Did boats get damaged, or you just rotate, or...?” Rotate, rotate. They had a new gunner coming onboard, and they says, “Hey. We need you to cover this boat, so we can put him on all by himself.” Because you never want more than one guy at a time, and so we rotated. I was on at least three boats. I don’t remember too much about that. But I know I was on the 28 boat, the 37 boat, and I don’t know what the other one was. But I was on three different boats, and we would—When a new person would rotate in or somebody—Because we came in country at all different times, they would get shipped out, so then we’d get a new guy onboard. Interviewer: “All right. Okay. Now was there—Would the men who were in crews on different boats—If you’re all in the same barracks together, do you know each other, and…?” Yeah, because when we—Like I say, we always—When we were patrolling the same river, we pulled up and made dinner together and all that stuff, and so we knew each other pretty well. (1:10:07) Interviewer: “Okay, so you know more than just the crew of your own immediate boat. You know some of the other guys.” Absolutely, absolutely. We—Like you say, because we would patrol a river with boat 29 or something like that, and then later on we’d end up being on a different boat. We always shift off because we don’t have always the same boat we’re patrolling with, and we—So we had all different boats that we—But our barracks was always the same place, and when we did go back, we partied pretty hard together. Interviewer: “Okay. You’ve got a story in the memoir about, I guess, a new guy coming in at night and not being very happy.” Yeah, this—He was a radarman. I mean, I knew what he was, but he had gone out on base. We just came back, and I was—got to sleep in my own bunk for the first time in quite a while. And he was coming in off of partying at night off base, and he was a big, big guy. And I hear some guy cussing and swearing, and I hear pounding and screaming. And I get up, kind of look up �Robinson, Michael over my bunk, and here’s this great, big, monster guy with a guy hanging off each arm, trying to settle them down. And he’s punching lockers. He hits them so hard they go flying, and I’m thinking, “I’m not going to stop him. Those two big guys are hanging off his arms. I’m not going to stop him.” So I guess I look at my locker and think, “Ah, shit. I’m going to have to clean all this up.” And he was walking down and cussing because somebody—He got drunk and got his wallet stolen, and so he was kind of mad. But by the time he got to where my bunk was, I’m thinking, “Yeah, well, this is it.” His bunk was right across from mine, and he got him in bed. (1:12:00) And then, “Cool. My locker made it.” And the next day we got our new radarman. It was him, and holy shit, he ended up being the nicest, gentlest, loving, hardworking, doing—You know. I mean, he was awesome to have onboard, and we actually became—He was the only one I actually became friends with. We—I went to—He lived in Detroit. I went to his family’s when we got out. He came to my family’s when we got out, and... Interviewer: “All right. You have another story in here about working with a Coast Guard ship.” Yeah. Yeah, okay, that’s a good one. We were down in this one river. I don’t remember names, but right in the center of the big river was a great, big, huge island. And down one side of the island there’s a canal, and he wanted to—They wanted to get their Combat Action Ribbons. Is what they wanted to do. They want to go up there and get shot at. Well, they couldn’t even think about turning around, so they would have to back out. Because they thought they could go straight through, but it got too narrow. And I guess they got in—They got what they were looking for. They got into a firefight with the people on the island, and all they had was one .50 on the left side—or on port—and one was on the right side, you know. And then maybe an M60 here and there, but they had less firepower than we did. And they’re so high off the ground that they couldn’t shoot anything, you know. And so they just screamed at us, “Come back and help me! Help us! We need help!” And so we went on in there, of course, and we did take care of business and got them stopped. But we had to escort them out because they had to back out, and it took them forever because they, you know—In the great, big ship they’re in. Interviewer: “Okay, so what was that boat supposed to be doing?” (1:14:01) Out on the coast. He wasn’t supposed to be on the rivers. Interviewer: “Okay, so you’re looking for sampans, not looking for firefights.” He was looking for— Interviewer: “Well, he was looking for a fight that day.” Yeah, but we do—Our normal thing is patrol the area and looking for sampans and looking for trouble. You know, that type of thing, but he bit off more than he could chew. Interviewer: “Okay. Now are there a lot of islands in the rivers?” �Robinson, Michael Yes, quite a few islands in the rivers. We—One of the rivers that we—It’s probably the very last one in the chain that we normally patrolled, so we spent a lot of fuel getting down there. And so when we—First chance we got to cut in, we cut in just by that island, and we had to go the Army base, which is around the tip of the island. And we hadn’t even uncovered the guns. They said, “Well, we better get refueled to do our patrols then.” Because I think it was a three-day patrol, so we had to refuel before we could even start patrolling. So we were going around that tip, and we—A little bit too close, and we had them open up on us. And our guns are still even covered, and I said, “Holy shit.” You know, so we went straight away, and while we were going straight away, I uncovered my .50s and got them ready to go. And we spun the boat around and come back. I just chewed up the beach, you know, and we didn’t even get hit. And I don’t know what we did, but we never got shot at again. And we went and refueled, and we did that. That was quite an experience. Interviewer: “All right. Now aside from supporting ground troops, what else could you— are the mortars for? Or, at least, you have another story in there about using them, I guess, when you were just using up extra ammunition. ” Yeah, at the—Usually, when we have a long, open sea run, that, you know, salt in the air and all that stuff—You’ve got to—If you haven’t used your mortars in a while, then you don’t want to get salt in there and saltwater in the mortar box, so we sometimes empty it. (1:16:16) And then we say, “Hey. Where’s a good spot to shoot these rounds?” You know, and we—They gave us the coordinates to give us, and so we just sat there and emptied our mortar rounds in this one area. And, I guess—Because they say, “There’s a bunch of VC there. There’s a whole bunch of them.” We said, “Yeah. Okay. We’ll drop them in there.” We did, and about two days later, I guess, a VC Chi Hoi—Is that right? Turned himself in, and he says we hit them pretty bad. And so we did some damage there, and that was just getting rid of the old rounds. Interviewer: “All right. Okay. Do you have encounters with wildlife or livestock?” Yeah, well, livestock was only one thing, but wildlife—We went up in this one river where we— It was a pretty long ways. Where we were patrolling it was long, and at night you can hear our engines. And so we’d go out, and we’d turn around and come back. And we’d go out, turn around, and come back. And they’d listen to us, and we got far enough away. They’d quick go across the river and get—Before we could turn around and come after them, they were already on the other side by the time we got there, so we’re going to be real smart and dropped off two of our guys on this tiny, little island. And that was right where they were crossing, and so we told them, you know, “Let us know when they—” This was when we could first see them getting ready to go and all that stuff, so we went down. And they called back kind of excited—very excited—and so we ran back up there. And they didn’t catch anybody, but there’s, I guess, wild pigs on that island. (1:18:10) And they move around at night, and here these poor two guys with M16s and couple of grenades on them. And, you know, they didn’t—I mean, that’s all they had on them, and they called us up, like I say, on the radio. And, “Come and get us, come and get us, come and get us. We don’t know—” And they couldn’t—They didn’t know what the heck’s going on. They couldn’t see. It was pitch-black, so we get there. And here’s a poor—Guys were backed out of the river up to their waist, aiming their guns at the beach, and then they—And it’s just pigs who scared the hell out of them, and so we didn’t do that again. We didn’t—You’d �Robinson, Michael think we could learn, but pretty cocky Americans. And we were going to get them, but we didn’t really get them. And then we—Couple of times we almost caught—Just at dusk we would come down the river, and we’d come around a corner of an island. And we’d come around the other side, and there’s somebody crossing. And I remember you were going to try and stop him going full bore at them. They kept going. We had great, big speakers telling them, “Don’t lie. Stop.” And stop and all that stuff, and I ended up shooting some rounds in front of their bow, thinking that will stop them. All I know is there’s something coming, and it kept going. And I’d bring him in a little closer, and then he just kept right on going. And so there’s somebody onboard that they didn’t want us to catch, but we—I didn’t shoot him. I didn’t kill him. They made it all the way to the other side, and about the time we got there—the same time—And here’s the boat just jammed up into the brush, and nobody’s onboard. And so I just kind of did damage on the boat a little bit, but we never caught anybody. But...(1:20:03) Interviewer: “All right. There are some kind of standard sort of Vietnam stereotypes and things that come up, and I’ll kind of just ask your perspective on them. One of them has to do with race relations. I mean, was everybody on your boat white, or was there a mix of people in boats?” There was never any trouble there. I don’t know if there were—I don’t even remember. I know a lot of them are white. Most of them are white, but we were—You know, we were crew, and we were brothers. And I don’t remember a whole lot about that, so... Interviewer: “And it wasn’t—The base—I mean, there weren’t a lot of just base personnel or other people that you saw much of.” No. I heard—We heard an awful lot about—In the Army. The Army bases had a lot of problems, but, you know, it’s only six of us on the boat. So you’ve got to be—And, you know, you rely on those six people, and so we never—We had one person that—He came onboard our boat, and, you know, you hear about all this drugs all the time. Well, we didn’t have any of that, and we had this one gunner’s mate who came on our sister boat. And he smoked marijuana and stuff, and we got out into a pretty good firefight. And he didn’t do a very good job. He was higher than a kite, and when we got back, he never came back on the boat. And so we didn’t—I mean, we drank, but usually afterwards. But nothing to jeopardize our people. Interviewer: “Okay. Now you were in Vietnam for a full year. Did you get an R&R at some point?” I was supposed to. Yeah, and I told them, “You know, if I leave this place, I’m never coming back.” So I stayed right in my barracks. (1:22:00) There’s an in country R&R place right by us. I think it’s Vũng Tàu. Is that…? Yeah, and I didn’t even go there. I didn’t even go there. I mean that’s—We—You can—The people that—I mean, they did water skiing and swimming and all kinds of stuff on that base, but I said, “If I leave here, I am never coming back.” So I didn’t go anywhere. I mean, we got to go Australia, Japan, and all kinds of—I mean, people would come back saying, “Oh, man.” And I’m saying, “I wouldn’t come back.” You know, so no, I didn’t go. �Robinson, Michael Interviewer: “All right. Okay. Now I just want to see—Okay. You mention at a certain point you actually got up as far as Cambodia.” Yeah, that river where that big island is—They had a new PBR for—to go up to Cambodia, and they were stationed where we went and got, you know, fueled. And so we went up there and— To refuel, and we have big gas tanks. And the PBR that we’re going to escort up there had obviously smaller gas tanks, and so they were going to ride in our wake and save fuel. And I don’t know how this ever happened, but we got drinking quite a bit. And they were in our wake trying to, you know, save fuel and their bow slid off our wake and caught in the river and threw everybody overboard. It did an 180 degree—It threw—The only person that wasn’t—didn’t get thrown overboard by the PBR was the guy hanging onto the helm, and the rest of them did. We went back for them, and they went back. And we loaded them back up, and we all got sobered up pretty quick. Interviewer: “Was that an American crew, or was that Vietnamese?” No, American. No, we never did—They weren’t turning over the boats just then. It’s all American, and by the time we got to the Cambodian border where we escorted them to, everybody was sober and dry. And that’s the only— Interviewer: “Now were you on a branch of the Mekong River at that point do you think, or…?” (1:24:16) Oh, we were on one of the rivers. Yeah, I don’t remember which one. I can’t remember which— what the name of it is, but it went all the way up into Cambodia. Interviewer: “Okay. Was it a big river or fairly wide?” It started that way, and it kept getting, you know, smaller and smaller and smaller. And it got faster and deeper, and that was an unusual situation because a lot of times we’d get caught into a whirlpool. And the boat would just sit there, and you’d—You got—We were trying to go forward, and it wasn’t going forward. And so—But usually we could work our way out of it. You know, kind of overpower it. Interviewer: “Okay, but you were—If you’re drinking on that mission, was the expectation that that particular mission was not dangerous, and nobody was going to bother you?” I don’t know the answer to that. I think that’s what we figured it—They’re going up there with no guns on them, so we were escorting them. And it was just going right up the center of the river. We weren’t looking for— Interviewer: “Okay, and then did you bring that crew back with you?” No, no, they went up there, and that’s where their station was. �Robinson, Michael Interviewer: “Okay, and, of course, you’re there basically in 1969, and the official Cambodian incursion doesn’t happen until 1970. But we’re operating there in ‘69.” Yeah, they were doing it long before I—we went in there. That’s for sure. We were there—Many years before us, and then I went up there. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now you mention at a certain point also working with Marines. Did you actually—I mean, Marines are known mostly for being up in the far northern part of south Vietnam.” (1:26:01) Well, I want to say the Marines. I never met the people, but I was—They were—We went out— Again, we didn’t have a Sea Lord Raid, so we were just going to—For the night we were going to anchor, and we usually go out in the deepest part and the widest part of the river and anchor. And I think we were too close to one bank, and we were anchored there. And I was sleeping on my favorite starboard engine. You don’t sleep inside because if you got hit with a rock or—A concussion would kill you or pretty mangle you. And so we were just anchored there, and we had one guy in the boat. I mean, one on the radar and one on the helm, and we’re basically anchored. And I’m laying there, and, all of a sudden, I hear gunfire. I hear AK-47s and M16s, and, of course, they’re so close together that I couldn’t tell—All I saw was muzzle flashes like this. I thought at first they’re coming at us, so I jumped up to my gun tub, lowered my .50, and was just going to open up on it. And the guy down on the helm banged my foot. He says, “Hold fire. Hold fire.” I said, “What the—What do you mean hold fire? You—” And in that second or two that I held fire I realized that the bullets were going this way—not coming out at us—and so I just—We just stood there. I just stood there and just ready to go any minute because we didn’t know what’s going on. And, obviously, we found out later that—I say the Marines because that’s what I said. I don’t really know for sure, but I—They—A patrol—let’s put it this way— ambushed a VC patrol. They’re going to ambush—They were out on the beach getting ready to set up and ambush us, and they ambushed them. And after the firefight was over with, you know, you’re sitting there. “Who won? What do we do?” And, finally, the—I keep saying Marines. They called us on the radio and says, “We got them.” And he says, “Okay. All right. I think we’re going now.” So we pulled away and got the hell out of there. (1:28:13) Interviewer: “Right. Odds are they were Army just because of where you were, but—” Probably, but I said Marines because—one thing—my—I have a Marine buddy that—We did a lot. He got blown up pretty bad over there, and we—And then we did do a lot of Special Forces people, and so I don’t know. Like I say, I was Navy. I didn’t know. Yeah, they all look alike to me. Interviewer: “All right, but yeah. All right. Now let’s see. The—At a certain point, you got a Navy commendation, and what particular action was that for?” First three months—That’s not for it. It’s for the middle three months. For six months, I mean, in the middle that—And that’s why—I don’t know what officer it was, but he was very—Kept a lot of good records and stuff, and I can’t—I mean, because I never knew—I mean, I’m just shooting, man, and he wrote me up for the number of sampans that I knocked down because I— �Robinson, Michael We’d go in through a place, and I just blow everything up. And bunkers, and we’d just blow them all up and everything. Interviewer: “So basically it was something for just kind of doing your job.” Yeah, exactly what that was, and it was a six-month period he must have been on my boat. And it was—I read it, and it scared me, you know. And the very first firefight I was in, you know, is not in there because it was the middle six months, so those firefights—They’re not in that book, and the last three months are not in. It’s the ones in-between, and those are the two ones that affected me the most. Is the first and the last. (1:30:14) And so that blew my mind when I read that because they put us up in a nice, big parade and—Trying to make it sound glorious. It was— It wasn’t too glorious to me. Interviewer: “All right. Now to think back at the time that you spent in Vietnam, are there other particular memories you want to bring into the story that you haven’t talked about yet?” I know we went to go on a raid that we were coming up the river, and we’re supposed to cut into this one canal. It was daytime, and it was going to be all VC camp back there. And we knew it was there, and they knew too that we were there. And coming up the river we’re coming up fast at full force, so they sound like we would go right on by. And what we did was make a hard left and then go into that canal. Well, soon as we made the hard left, I looked up, and here’s this cable hanging across about this high on me. And, of course, I was screaming down there to— “Stop, stop, stop!” And we came to a stop, and that thing was right up against the gun tub. And we didn’t—If we didn’t—If I wouldn’t have saw it, it would have chopped me right in half, and we didn’t know if it was booby-trapped. Were there claymore mines on both sides of us, so it wiped us all out or what? So once we got stopped, we cut the cable, and then we went up there. And it was all—I mean, people were just standing there with their—They didn’t have time to go anywhere, and so they’re just standing there with nothing in their hands or whatever. And we had a couple of—I don’t know if there were Vietnamese policeman or army regulars, but they lined—They were already lined up. (1:32:01) They made them line up a little straighter, I guess, and they were asking them—We knew it was VC, and they yelled, “No, no, no!” And then—And they killed them, and that’s when they showed us where all the guns were. And we hauled them off, and that was wow, you know. I don’t even know where we took them. I mean, it must have been an army base close by that we took them to or whatever because we picked the army guys or the policemen or whatever they were up close by within, you know, like five, six miles. And we went in there looking for trouble, and... Interviewer: “Okay. In the pictures that you’ve got, you’ve got a shot of what seems to be a kind of—What’s along the shore, but some kind of store or shop or something like that. Was that a Vietnamese operation, or was that on a base, or…?” Yeah. Well, it was a general—Yeah, it was a general civilian grocery store or boat rental or whatever it was. Just a little town, and that was supposed to be always friendly. And we ran into a couple of places that weren’t. I—Something to that effect—I don’t know if that was the picture �Robinson, Michael of whatever, but I’m always up on my gun tub. And somebody opened up on us, and we’re in town. So all I did was just lay a line of fire right over top of the town, and it stopped. And so… Interviewer: “And would you stop at any of these towns and get off, or would…?” The only time we got off is when we blew the heck out of that one company or whatever—I don’t know—and they told us that we wiped them right out. And, for some reason, we said, “Oh, let’s go take a look.” And we got off the—Couple of us got off the boat, and we walked into where they—Where we supposedly wiped everything out, and that was the stupidest thing you could possibly think of. But we did it. (1:34:11) Normally, you don’t get off. Some of the South Vietnamese that we stopped—I mean, we fuel, and we pick up people and do stuff like that. But we don’t normally—We would help them fish. We would—The poor, little Vietnamese boys down with these little throw nets. You throw it in a big circle, and it comes down. And you pull it up, and you get a little minnow or some damn thing inside there. We told them, “Back out of the way. Get out of the water. Get back on the shore.” And we would drop a concussion grenade over the side, and all the fish would float up. And, “Ah!” They’d come over there and grab all the fish because if the big ones—They couldn’t find them. This—That way they’d pull them right up to the top, so we did that a couple of times. Interviewer: “All right. Now did your duties change at all at the end of your tour?” I’m not sure what you mean by that. Interviewer: “Or did you stay off the—I mean, you talked about your last mission, and in the memoir it suggests that for a while they just kept you on shore or at the base.” Well, yeah, after the last mission where I—we got shot up really bad and my gun tub was full of holes—There’s a couple of times I’ve been—Where we were in some pretty bad firefights that I’d go into shock and just—I’d come off of—We came out of a patrol that—“Hey. We did all right.” I’d look around, and from where—my vantage point, I could see everybody’s fine. I’d say, “Hey. We’re all right.” And I climb down, and the guy in the other aft .50 come up and started shaking me. He started screaming at me, “You all right? You all right?” And I say, “Yeah. What the hell’s up, man?” And he says, “You should have seen the tracers going by your head.” So I crashed a little bit during that time, and—But—I mean, now you’ve got me going on this. (1:36:03) Another time we came out of a patrol, and we thought we come out smelling like a rose because we couldn’t—“Nothing’s hit? Nobody’s hit? Cool.” So we’re sweeping the old— The brass off the back, you know, into the river, and the guy who was—The aft gun guy who was cleaning up—And he looks over, and he looks at the back of our mortar box. And there’s five holes in it, and there’s no holes in the front. So—“I wonder where they went.” And so we very carefully unloaded the rounds and kept looking at them, and we found a—See, they’re in cardboard boxes, and the thing is there’s open bags of gunpowder for the projectile part of it. And so if you hit one of those, or—I mean, one 81 mm mortar would blow our boat to hell, and the whole mortar box full—We wouldn’t have been—They wouldn’t even find anything, and so we very gently found them. Very carefully and very gently lowered them over the side and thank god. �Robinson, Michael Interviewer: “Okay. Now that time when your boat was—It was a recoilless rifle that went through the engine?” Yeah. Interviewer: “And then did that shell not explode? Did it just push right through the engine and out the other side?” I think it blew up inside the engine because we had a hole that big going in, and there was nothing coming out the back sides. I don’t know what—Because the engine covers were opened up this way, so we got out. And, I mean, they’re so tight together that I couldn’t—We—It didn’t hit the other boat—Other engine, so it had to get stopped inside there somehow. Interviewer: “Okay, but if it blew up, it would’ve—You probably couldn’t have started the engine.” I can’t answer that, buddy, because I tell you, Jim, I—There’s so many times that I don’t know how I’m still alive and here. I really don’t. I have no clue because as many times as I should not be here. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now you get now to the end of your tour. How do they get you back to the States?” (1:38:00) I flew back. I was off the boats for the last probably week or two because I was worth a shit because that was the time that they hit that mortar, and my gun tub was all blown to hell. I was useless, and you get—When you first come into country, you’re scared after your death, and you ain’t worth a damn. And then about halfway through, you say, “All right. I’m going to take as many of these bastards with me as I can.” So you—You’re getting a little bit cocky, and then after you get started near the end, you think, “Maybe I’ll make it after all.” And so you start getting a little bit nervous, and it gets worse and worse as you get closer. And so when it was time for me to go, they just— “Robinson, why don’t you take the last week or two off?” I don’t know, and I was just on base. I didn’t do anything, and then they flew me out. Interviewer: “All right. Okay, and where do you land in the States?” California. I want to say—I don’t know the—what— Interviewer: “Would it be San Francisco, or…?” Yeah, something—Must be something like that, but I don’t remember exactly. But all I remember—Coming off the plane, and there’s no barbed wire fences. And it was so cool, and we had such a tailwind that I got back—The next day I had a flight to go to Saginaw, Michigan, and we got back so early that I had enough time to get checked in and got on the plane a whole day early. �Robinson, Michael Interviewer: “Okay. Now when you get back to the States, did you encounter any protesters in the airports or anything like that?” I was blessed in that way because I heard—We heard a lot about that, but on the—In San Diego where we flew in at I think that was a big enough place that they didn’t—And I wasn’t there very long. That I didn’t see anything. And then I flew into my hometown, and there was all kinds of people there. But they were for me, and my little brother—He was supposed to be—go to Vietnam, and I told you he got orders. And I was there, and he didn’t have to go. So he came home on leave the same day from the Army, and I flew in. (1:40:07) And I—The last—From Chicago to Saginaw I flew standby, and, of course, military standby is one thing, but then the veteran—The Vietnam veteran standby gets a little more, and so I bumped somebody. And this is my story in its own. I’m going to tell it the way I have it, and Richard says they don’t know for sure. But I bumped one person obviously, and I think he was supposed to be on that flight coming up from the army base down south somewhere. And he got bumped, and that was fine by me. By the time I got home, we have all the people waiting for me. I got drunker than a skunk again. We—Of course, I—My dad says after about an hour and a half—He says, “We’ve got to go back to the airport.” I—“What do you mean?” He says, “Rich is coming home.” So he’s a bigmouth, and he’s always smart-mouthing on shit. When he got off the plane and saw me— Because he was supposed to do that for me the next day. I wasn’t due back. He didn’t say a word. He couldn’t talk. It was so cool. “Hey, Rich. That’s the first time you ever shut up.” And we got kind of drunk out that night, but we were home for—I had thirty days leave. Plus, they gave me a little more time because whatever, and so we were home for thirty days together. And he went to Germany, and I went down to—I don’t know if it was Charleston, South Carolina and got on these same boats. On base only, so I didn’t have to go back out at all. Interviewer: “All right, and so how long did you spend down there in Charleston or whatever the last part of your—” It wasn’t a whole year I don’t think. I don’t know how long it was, but I remember that they wanted to do a bunch of maneuvers with, you know—“See, we’ve got to give them some practice.” And they’re supposed to go on these—When I went up to what would be island that the training we did in the woods and all that stuff, they wanted me to go in there and help them. (1:42:16) I says, “I’m not going—” You know, we’re going to—We’ve been shooting all blanks, and I said, “I’m not—I mean, you can’t shoot a .50 caliber machine gun or [?] at me.” You know, I was pretty bad, and I probably still am there. And I said, “I’m not doing that. You’re shure out of luck. I’ll take care of the boats.” And that’s what I did. Is I stayed home basically. Interviewer: “All right. Did they make any effort to encourage you to stay in the Navy?” Yes. Malta, south of Italy. The Maltese police were having a lot of problems with drug runners, and they wanted us to go over there and teach them on our—On my Swift boats how to, you know, search and—Search boats and all that stuff. And I was supposed to get a three months early out, and then they says, “No, we’re going to actually extend you.” And it didn’t go over too good with me, and I got kind of a little bit upset about it and told them where to go. And they says, “Well, if you can find somebody that can take your position on the boat, we’ll let you go.” �Robinson, Michael Well, I found a PBR guy, and I trained him on my boat. And then he took my place, and I got to come home. That was… Interviewer: “All right, so once you’ve gotten out of the Navy, now what do you do?” I guess I went into civilian life. I started—The guy I came home was just home on leave, and then somebody was installing carpet and linoleum in my parents’ house. And I was kind of laying on the floor watching him, and so he says, “Do something.” (1:44:07) And so I ended up doing—I went into floor covering for a while and countertops, and then I did all kinds of things like custom cabinet building. I did electric mower repair, and then I ended up writing manuals for machinery for—When the Ford and Chrysler and GM all have these great, big machines in the plants that assemble the engines, I wrote the step-by-step instructions how to operate them, maintenance, and the training on them, so I did that— Interviewer: “How did you wind up with that job?” Yeah, my little brother—the one I went in the Army with—He’s very good at writing this stuff, so he got into that. Well, I like photography, and I wanted to go in the service. That’s what I wanted to be, so I had taken that up after I got out just for playing. And he says, “Hey. I’ve got to go down to this one plant down in Indiana, and I’ve got to have pictures taken. Can you go with me?” And I wasn’t doing anything. I said, “Yeah, I’ll go with you.” And after I was there taking pictures for him and all this time, and he was so swamped at his regular job—This was another plant that—down there. He says, “You’ve got to write the manuals.” “The hell I am.” Because I don’t know how to write manuals, and he got me started. And I kept getting better at it because I always want to do the best I can possibly do. And I got pretty good at it, and the fact is he says, “You know, these manuals are pretty nice. Now you’ve got to teach it.” “I can’t talk in front of people.” And he says, “No, you’ve got to. You’ve got to teach.” So they ended up—And my sweet, little brother—He says, “Yeah, he’ll do it.” I says, “You what?” And I’m shaking like hell in front of everybody, but the only thing I figured out which helped me is I wrote the manuals. (1:46:01) I know every inch of those machines, and so when I got in front of all these people standing there looking at me, I’m like, “Yeah, what do you know?” And I started to tell them that if you have any problems with these manuals, and you have—“If there’s anything you find wrong, and it doesn’t explain it right, you let me know. I’ll kick the guy’s ass.” And then I—And they all—“Yeah, right, you will.” And I said, “Well, yeah, because I wrote them.” And then it came easier because they did have questions, and I could answer them. Well, I did that until cancer got me. Interviewer: “All right, and you have health issues that relate to Vietnam service as far as you know?” Yeah, I started out with mantle cell lymphoma, which is a blood cancer, and lymph nodes—Your lymph nodes try to clean your blood. Well, they swelled up huge, and I tried to get the Army— Not the Army. The military to do something about it, and they says, well, I have to get on a list to get on a list so I can get on the list to get in. And I couldn’t—You know, I’m watching this thing swell up almost—The side of my leg. And I finally went to a private doctor, and he did a biopsy. And he says, “Yep. You’ve got stage four mantle cell lymphoma cancer. You’ve got to �Robinson, Michael start chemo right now.” And I was paying for this for myself, and I says, “I can’t—I’ve got to make the military pay for this because I can’t afford that.” And so I got the paperwork from them, and I went to the VA. And they still—I couldn’t get in, and I slammed that down on their desk and told them what the hell I—What the story was, and they took me in the back room. And I got talking to a doctor, and he says, “Just a minute. I’ll be right back.” (1:48:01) And two, three days later, I was in the ER getting chemo, but I had to—It’s been years. They wouldn’t pay off my initial thing because they says, “Well, you could’ve come to us.” And I said, “You son of a bitches. I tried to come to you, and you wouldn’t—You know, you wouldn’t take me, and I didn’t—I don’t have time to play around.” And so I ended up having to pay for my own original, but they—From then on, they were absolutely fantastic for me, and then I did—I had—I ended up getting prostate cancer after that, and then I ended up having to have a bone marrow transplant. I did all kinds of things. Interviewer: “Now do you think you were exposed to Agent Orange?” Absolutely. I was sprayed with it at [?]. Yeah, we were on a support mission. We dropped off a bunch of troops, and we just run our bow up on the beach. And then we sit there with our 81 ready to go, and we wait and see if they need any help. They—We give them some help, and we’re sitting there. And it started to rain. I kind of look up. I says, “There isn’t a cloud in a billion miles.” You know, and it was the Agent Orange. We got sprayed with Agent Orange, so that was how I got zapped with that. Interviewer: “All right, and did you have some version of PTSD or something along those lines?” Yeah, yeah, quite a bit. I still do. Yeah, I don’t know if that will ever go away or not, but I still jump. And it was worse the first ten years. The first year I had to sleep with a gun, and then the next ten years I would—I’d cry myself to sleep because I was thinking of all the things I did. I killed a lot of people. I killed a lot of people, and I was so ashamed of what I did. (1:50:12) And it was—So I married a woman in ‘71 or ‘72—something like that—and she was a godsend to me. I mean, she helped me the best way she could, but she could stick around so long. And it just never went away, and so after twenty-four years, she had enough. And I put her through enough, so I let her go. And that was in ‘95, and—But pretty much not—It was pretty much nothing like it was at the beginning when she had to go through—I still have nightmares. If it wasn’t for these memoirs that I wrote, it still would have a hold on me. For the first time, I could feel it let go of me. I know what I did, and I know what really helped was the fact that my people—all my people on my boat—came home alive. My people came home, and that’s the only thing that saved my ass because I never looked at it that way because I just looked at what I did and the families I destroyed and the people I destroyed. And for the first time I understood that my people came home, and that was war. That was war, and people die in war. And it took a long time for people to get that through my thick skull, and my little brother was one of them. And Amy here that’s—She’s helped me talk through some of this stuff. It really—I understood that that was war, and I did my job. (1:52:08) And it—And nothing to be ashamed of, and so my people came home. You know, I was kind of proud of that, and that’s when I finally started to get out of this murder realm of cancer and stuff. �Robinson, Michael Interviewer: “Yeah. Now to look back at the time that you spent in the service, do you think you took anything positive out of it?” Oh god, that’s a good one. I know—I don’t know if I can answer that. I was very bitter for so many years, but… Interviewer: “Do you think you learned anything, or gained any kind of perspective, or…?” Yeah, well, that war is stupid. War is stupid, and the only people who get hurt are the little peons. The generals and the presidents and all that and not just our side. I’m talking both sides. They don’t fight the wars. They don’t get all thrown in the nitty-gritty. They don’t die. They just point their finger and say, “You go.” And that’s—I’m a little bitter in that sense. Is the fact that you don’t have a clue what you just told me to do. You don’t have a clue what it means to go over there and shoot these people and kill them. You know, they—Well, they’re—These poor guys that I was fighting were people just like me except on the other side. They were told, “You shoot those Americans, or I’ll kill your daughter.” You know. “Here’s a gun. You fight the Americans, and if you don’t, I’ll just kill your daughter.” And so what choice did they have? And so I have nothing against the Vietnamese people. I do have to do with the generals and those people. I will never be very happy with them because I—You’re not—They don’t have a clue, and what you’re doing right here—I hope to god that this helps people understand that it isn’t pretty. (1:54:16) It isn’t pretty. There’s no honor. You know, they tried to tell me I’m doing this for God and county. I wasn’t doing it for God. That’s for sure. I’m not killing these people, our people, my people for God, and I certainly didn’t think I was doing this for country. Big business. The weapons people, the Agent Orange people. Always making all this money off the wars. I wasn’t doing it for my country. I wasn’t doing it for—And my [?] fight. The six people. That’s what I was fighting for. To keep them alive. That’s—And get them—So they can come home. And for their families. Because that big radarman—Remember that? He was my buddy. He had a family with three kids then or four kids or something like that. They’re Italian, you know, so they have a lot of—And I was so glad that he got to come home to his kids. I was so proud of that, and, of course, we did it together. You know, all of us. Interviewer: “All right. Well, it makes for a pretty powerful story, and I appreciate your willingness to come and share it today. So thank you very much.” Thank you very much. (1:55:33) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_RobinsonM2286V Title A name given to the resource Robinson, Michael (Interview transcript and video), 2018 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018-11-12 Description An account of the resource Michael Robinson was born in Grand Haven, Michigan, in 1947. He graduated high school in 1966 and only attended college for a year before recieving his draft notice. So, Robinson decided to enlist into the Navy in which he trained as a gunner's mate and was assigned to a minesweeper based at Charleston, South Carolina, becoming the crew's designated diver repairman. He was then transferred to San Diego for training in Swift Boats before being deployed to Vietnam. In Vietnam, Robinson was assigned to a Swift Boat unit based at Cat Lo, conducting patrols, searches, raids, escorts, and fire support missions in the Saigon and Mekong River deltas during which he served primarily as a machine gunner. After his tour was over, he returned to Charleston to complete his enlistment. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Robinson, Michael W. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/7bd70447e62db54bbcca4a45d17d7d6d.mp4 3c4fa8ad8ef273c3d50a2c23c5487734 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/eacc49e68c27448f93acbfa2b887cf14.pdf 78d5252dd7fff167f2b528938695a218 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Edward Ramon Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Grace Balog Interviewer: Alright. We are talking today with Edward Ramon of Winston-Salem, North Carolina. The interviewer is James Smither of the Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project. Alright. Ed was, among other things, a helicopter pilot in his military career and as such, he served as a cavalryman. And that’s why he is sporting a cavalry hat here. It’s also got his captain’s bars and then you’ve got—now what are the wings on the hat for? Veteran: Those are senior Army aviator wings. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I was a senior Army aviator. Interviewer: Alright. Okay, good. And now you can take the hat off because it’s shading your eyes a little. Alright. Veteran: I’ll put on my other hat. I don’t have my hair combed. Interviewer: Okay, well it shades your eyes a little bit which is— Veteran: Oh, it does? �Interviewer: Yeah. So, okay, that’s better. Okay. Now, let’s begin at the beginning. Where and when were you born? Veteran: I was born in San Antonio, Texas during World War 2. I was born at Fort Sam Houston. Interviewer: Okay. And was your father in the military? Veteran: My daddy was a gunner’s mate in the United States Navy in the South Pacific. And he served a good portion of the war. Interviewer: Okay, now you have other relatives or ancestors who were in as well? Veteran: Oh yes, quite a few. Interviewer: Now, talk about your grandfathers. Veteran: Well, my Comanche grandfather was Marshall Chikoh-Chikoh-Ko. And he was killed in France 4 days before the end of the war. Had another grandfather. He was 14 years old. He was in the horse drawn artillery in France. He survived the war. He served in World War 2 in the U.S. Army Air Corps, which became the Air Force. So, he stayed with them and became Air Force and he served in Korea with the Air Force. So, he served—he got his share. Had uncles that were infantrymen and combat medics. World War 2 mostly and Korea. And several cousins that were Marines. They were all killed in Korea. So, quite a family. (00:02:32) Interviewer: Okay. Now, when you were growing up, what kind of job did your father have? Veteran: My daddy was an employee at the Lonestar Ordinance in Texarkana. He started out there as in the bank department. He ended up in security. His principal occupation was after he �got off work; he was sort of a handyman. Built houses, kitchen cabinets. He worked his butt off; he was a hardworking man. Interviewer: Alright. And then, did you go to high school in San Antonio? Veteran: No. We moved to Decatur, Texas. Up in the northeast corner of Texas. Interviewer: Okay, so that’s about— Veteran: Until I was about 3. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. Because your father worked up there? Veteran: That’s where I grew up. Yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: My mother’s father owned a farm up there and when he passed, my young mother, my young daddy, and my baby brother and my sister, we moved up there and that’s where I grew up. Interviewer: Right. Okay. And then, when did you finish high school? Veteran: May of 1960. Interviewer: Okay. And what did you do after high school? Veteran: Well, knocking around. There wasn’t much for me to do. I hauled hay and I worked and I did a few little things. And that fall, I got a scholarship. Football scholarship. My father couldn’t afford to send me to school because he elected to send my sister. She was a very hard worker. I was kind of like a wild kid. So, dad decided to invest what little he had into my sister’s education. Interviewer: Okay. (00:04:31) �Veteran: He was pleased that I got a football scholarship. Interviewer: Okay, now what school did you go to? Veteran: Texarkana Junior College. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: We were national champions, junior college champions. Tough football team. Interviewer: Alright. And then, what happened to you after you started college? Veteran: Well, I broke my leg. My girlfriend dumped me. My little brother wrecked my car. And my two best buddies joined the Army. So, I followed along: I joined the Army. Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: And I reported for basic training at Fort Hood, Texas— Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: --on January the 17th. Interviewer: Alright. Now to back up a little bit, when your friends joined, how exactly did they do that? Veteran: Oh. Back then, you could volunteer for the draft. And they would draft you and you would do a 2-year hitch and get out. If you enlisted in the Army, it was 3 years. If you enlisted in the Marine Corps, the Navy, or whatever, it was 4 years. So, I thought it was appealing to do 2 years to find out what it was like and continue my education. GI Bill. Interviewer: Yep. �Veteran: But they were trying to send—they wanted to send me right before Christmas. I said, “No, I don’t want to go before Christmas.” So, this shrewd recruiting officer, he said, “Well, you can enlist.” And so, I did. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And I started my career. Interviewer: Alright. And so, where did you go for basic training? Veteran: Fort Hood, Texas. Interviewer: Okay. And what was basic training like in 1961? (00:06:12) Veteran: Little different from what it is today. I showed up at Fort Hood about 3 o’clock in the morning. And there were dirt trails, tack trails. Wooden barracks with the windows broken out. And I had been traveling all night. I got there at 3 in the morning. When I got there, I still had on civilian clothes. They put me on KP. No kidding. And I was on KP for 11 hours. Peeling potatoes, washing pots and pans, and then we got put into this barracks. They issued us our clothing and stuff. And it was tough. We did forest marches, lots of calisthenics, and a corporal was God. So, you imagine what a sergeant was or a lieutenant. So, it was an eye opener. And I wanted to make my uncles and grandfather and my dad proud so I stood up and I was sharp. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. And how long did the basic training last? Veteran: Basic training was 8-weeks. About 8-weeks. Then from there you would advance to individual training. I went to an infantry center at Fort Ord, California. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And did the—I think about 8-10 weeks there. �Interviewer: Alright. Now, how was the advanced training different from basic? Veteran: Well, you had been a soldier for 2 months. You’ve learned how to behave yourself and most of it is academic pursuit so it’s not really a challenge to what…You know, if you were a Rambo or not. It’s just they’re going to teach you something. And then during this time, you were always wondering where you’re going to end up. You know, where you are going to go. So, when I was at Fort Ord, California, I went on to Fort Benjamin Harrison, Indiana. And I took finance training. I thought that sounds pretty good: you don’t have to walk around in the hot sun, you know. (00:08:42) Veteran: So, I had completed that. That was about I think 4 weeks or 8 weeks. I can’t remember. So, they sent me to Fort Sam Houston, Texas. I thought that was great. Got back to my old country then. I got there. 566th ambulance company. 82nd—37th Strike medical battalion, 82nd airborne. And they didn’t need a finance clerk. They had one. You know? So, I was sitting there, you know, a private. So, they decide they are going to make me a combat medic. A 9-10 and a 911 was the MOS. So, I became a medic. And that was interesting. I was oriented towards that kind of stuff. Interviewer: Okay. So, what were they actually teaching you? Veteran: I am sorry? Interviewer: What were they teaching you? Veteran: Oh. I think quite a bit, really. You know, just to be an enlisted corpsman or a medic. Lifesaving things. You know, heart functions, bleeding—stop the bleeding. Elevate this. Tourniquet that. Blah blah. Chemical warfare. Atropine injections. But a lot of it was just ABCs. Aspirins and drinking water and treat the blisters. That was a bad thing about being the medic: �you had to carry extra water because these other guys would drink all theirs and you had to give them some of yours and water is heavy. (00:10:20) Veteran: So, I decided I would—we had a battalion. Part of our mission was to put on combat exercises and the doctors sat on their butts up on the bleacher and I thought they got their basic. They watched us fight. We had casualties and we would put them in the litters and carry them to these old cracker box field ambulances and take them to sorting stations. And they would sit up there and they would watch all this. So, that’s what I ended up being: I was an infantryman. I was a machine gunner shooting out at one of the bad guys. And so, I would shoot at all of the guys coming up the hill. And they had a pit right behind me with a dummy in it. And that these fighters were to come over from the Air Force place. And they’d set off these charges. So, I’d bounce off the ground and end up with a mouthful of dirt and then I had to pick up all my brass and get stung in the butt by scorpions and crap and have to go back down. That was part of my PFC job. That was it, you know. Interviewer: So, how long did you do that? Veteran: Oh, from ’61…Half of ’61 on up to…I left the Fort Sam Houston in January, ’64— February, ’64. But I went in the Cuban crisis with the 82nd. We showed up at Ocala, Florida. My company struck with a battalion. We showed up in Ocala and it was kind of like up until that point, I had been painting fences and hiding from the first sergeant. And now, it looked like this was what it’s all about and we are going to war. And I was, back then, a medic. I had this little pack of crap and I said, “How the hell am I going to save somebody’s life with this stuff?” And we were—I was scheduled with a third wave to go over the shore. And the third wave would be, you know, very high casualties. And so, what are you going to do? You know? You going to lay �out there on the beach and treat guys and get shot yourself? What you going to do? What you going to do? (00:12:41) Veteran: And I was a brand-new father. I was 19 years old and had a little baby boy. And it was—I think that’s when I became a soldier. I realized they wouldn’t listen to grandpa or Uncle Glen or none of that. It was here you are boy. Here’s your job, you know, you’re going to do it. And they had the Bay of Pigs. You know how tragic that was. But I had an uncle at the Normandy invasion. Uncle Charlie. He was Charlie Bee. And he was the last living Comanche Code Talker. He died a few years back. And he was a funny guy. He was tough. He’s a boxer. A little guy. Interviewer: Alright. Okay, so for you. So, you spend several years at Fort Sam Houston. You were a medic. I am just revealing a little bit. So, you spent several years at Fort Sam Houston— Veteran: No, not 7. Interviewer: Several. Several. Veteran: Several, yeah. Interviewer: Like 3. Yeah. And you—and then you went to Florida briefly at the time of the missile crisis. Veteran: Oh, yeah. But that was just for the crisis and then I went back to Fort Sam Houston. Interviewer: Right. Right. Okay. Veteran: And then, January of ’64, my 3-year enlistment was up. So, here I was: 20 years old and had a baby, had a baby on the way, had no idea what I could do for a living. You know? It �wasn’t too good when I left. I didn’t think there would be much when I went back. So, I guess my family—my daddy was not military—but I decided I would make a military career. (00:14:33) Veteran: So, I enlisted. And I asked to go to Fort Jackson, South Carolina. Infantry center there. When I got there, I had a hearing impairment from a hand grenade blast and so I applied for this defense information school. So, they teach you how to report things, how to write things, how to do the…And so I was selected. I was sent to the—and right before I was supposed to go to Fort Slocum, New York, they called me. Told me they had cancelled my orders. “Well, why?” “We have a hearing profile. H-3 hearing profile from this grenade.” “Oh, god.” You know, so I said, “Well, can I go take another hearing test?” And the authorities said, “Yeah, sure.” So, I went down to the hospital. Sit there. I took this hearing test. And I marginally passed. So, then I was off to Fort Slocum. Wonderful school. Really good school. Went to Fort Slocum. Made it—I was E-5 already. I made E-5 pretty fast. So, while I was at Fort Slocum doing all of this stuff, I said—oh, I had applied for flight school and was turned down for my hearing—so, I said, “Well, maybe I ought to apply for flight school again.” I got home to Fort Jackson and I did. (00:16:27) Veteran: And I scored very high on the test and things. They sent me to Fort Bragg, North Carolina. You know Fort Bragg. Went over to Simmons Field and they flew you around on an orientation ride. See if you get airsick or vomit or, you know, wet your pants or what you’re going to do. So, I enjoyed the orientation flight so that—I passed that. I did really good on all the testing. And I went to take the physical. Passed it. So…And there was a waiting period to go to flight school. They sent me right away that month so this was all like in December of ’64. Interviewer: Okay. �Veteran: And January of ’65, I was at flight school. Interviewer: Okay. Now, was this flight school for fixed wing aircraft or for helicopters? Veteran: Rotor wing. Interviewer: Okay. Helicopters. Veteran: So, I went from Fort Bragg—Fort Jackson—I went to Fort Wolters, Texas. Little old facility. I think they were active during World War 2 or something but they were kind of—well, they had become now the primary helicopter training center. That’s where you go for your primary. So, I reported to Fort Wolters, Texas. And they taught me how to fly a helicopter. And when I finished that portion of the program, they sent me to Fort Rucker. Fort Rucker, Alabama is for your advanced helicopter training. Interviewer: Okay, now to back up a little bit, you said they taught you how to fly a helicopter? Veteran: Yes. Interviewer: How easy or hard was that? (00:18:08) Veteran: Well, I was a pretty good athlete. I was agile and bidextrous—ambidextrous—and I thought I was a stud, you know, and I was cool. And I looked at the literature and stuff: helicopter flying? That is easy. You push the stick forward to go forward, pull it back you go backwards. Obviously, left, right. You want to turn around, you step on one of the pedals and you turn around. If you want to go up you just pull up and down on the collective. That’s easy. Hell, anybody can do that. I remember my first flight. And a Mr. Reeves was my flight instructor; I will never forget him. And took me on this roughage: big open field in a helicopter. �He’s sitting—we’re sitting in the helicopter just like this, you know. And he said, “Okay, you take the cyclic.” So, I took the cyclic. And we starting running around, just...And then he said, “Okay, you take the pedals.” So, we started going around with like a spin. And he said, “Now, you have got the collective.” So, we are going up and down, around and around. And it’s like…I am remember getting on that bus going back to the barracks. And I said, “There ain’t no way in hell I will ever fly one of these things. There ain’t no way. I mean, it’s—there ain’t no way.” And I looked around the bus and everybody else had their lip down in the dirt. We had all learned that this was complicated. So, by little increments, we began to bring it down where we could control it. Make matters worse, we flew Hillers, OH-23s. Worst helicopter ever designed. It is just a piece of junk. And you really had to work to fly the thing. But that’s when I learned to fly in. (00:20:16) Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And if you didn’t solo pretty damn quick, you get washed out. They didn’t cut you no slack. You better catch on quick. And I was probably the worst helicopter pilot student they ever had in the military. But I made it. Over half of them didn’t make it. So, I made it down near the bottom of my class but I—still, I made it, you know. Interviewer: Right. Now, did they have a lot of accidents? Veteran: No, we had very few—no accidents. No fatal accidents. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. Veteran: Then. But later on, they started having a few. Interviewer: Okay. �Veteran: Because they were just pushing everybody through. Anybody that could fog up a mirror could graduate, you know? Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And we had…We had a lot of cowboys. What you call cowboys is our Vietnam veteran pilots that were—they were good pilots but they weren’t—they didn’t teach good, safe, steady practice. They were kind of like wild boys. So, they were training guys. And they had one of my friends that hit some wires and killed himself and his student. They had midairs. Really a very safe record compared to how much they were doing. Interviewer: Right. Okay. So, you go on now to Fort Rucker? For the next stage? Veteran: Yeah, I went…When I finished up at the Fort Wolters, I went to Fort Rucker, Alabama and started different phases of training. More sophisticated navigation and more maintenance training and more different maneuvers and blah blah blah blah. And transitioned into the Huey. I flew an old H-19 Chickasaw. That’s another piece of junk. World War 2 stuff. You know, if this heavy iron wouldn’t oughta lift itself off the ground but that’s what we trained in. And then I went over into Hueys, which is state of the art then. And both the—actually it was an accident looking for a place to happen. But there I was, flying the Hueys. And we had had to have so much flight training, a lot of stuff: navigation, formations, organizational things, heavy on maintenance, meteorology. I mean, just lots of stuff. And you got cranked out of there, it was straight to Vietnam. (00:22:56) Veteran: You knew that. And this was kind of frightening. I now had 3 babies. Interviewer: Okay. �Veteran: My little baby girl was born in February of ’64, right after I reenlisted. And then, September of ’65, found out my youngest boy was born. And I graduated in December. But before I graduated, the class ahead of me—you knew these guys because they—boy, you talk about harassment. They were on you. You would always lose-lose. You never win-win. You had to run everywhere you went. And they’d say, “Whoa, candidate.” And if you stopped, “Sir, Candidate Ramon, yes sir.” They’d come over and say, “Are you a mule? Only mules stop when you holler ‘whoa.’” You know. So, they’d chew you out for being a mule or mules, stupid mule. The next guy you run by, he’d holler “Whoa.” And you just keep running, he’d halt you. He says, “Sir, what’s wrong with you? You stupid or something? Even a mule knows to stop when you say ‘whoa.’ You don’t know that?” You know, they’d say—it was kind of—but you got to know these guys. (00:24:21) Veteran: And the harassment eased up right when you got near the end. Not a whole lot but it did some. But you did have these guys. And they put rosters up on the bulletin board with all their names on it. As they were killed, they drew a red line through their name. And you started seeing entire rosters disappear. And you knew that’s where you were going. I went to Texarkana. I bought a 4-bedroom brick house with a chain link fence on a one acre lot. Payments were $106 a month. I had no idea how I was going to make that much of a payment. But I knew it was a great possibility that I would be killed. And I wanted my children and my wife to have a home. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Well, I didn’t get killed and I got a battlefield commission to lieutenant, which was a pay raise exactly what my house payment was. �Interviewer: Alright. So, when you become a helicopter pilot, then you become a warrant officer? Veteran: Yes, you get commissioned as a warrant officer and they give you your wings and your… alright, tell you a funny story: this is—my daddy was a sailor. They don’t have sergeants in the Navy, they have chief petty officers. But from my uncles and grandpas and stuff, he knew that a sergeant was a pretty important person. Well, as luck would have it, I was a specialist. I was an E-4, an E-5, but I wanted to have the hard stripes. And I was always telling my daddy when I was home every so often, “Boy, I sure would like to make sergeant. You know, be a sergeant.” My daddy would nod his head. You know, he is non-military. (00:26:23) Veteran: And then…So, I went to flight school. I became a warrant officer. That’s way higher than a sergeant. And my daddy, bless his heart, he came to my graduation at Fort Rucker. So, I was late for the damn ceremony. I had never been—that’s—you get thrown out for that. But my wife and my mother and the commander, the commandant, he liked me. He knew what was going on. It wasn’t my fault. But I was nervous. And so, he—the commandant called me aside and commissioned me. This and that, this and that. And my mother pinned my wings on my chest. And my daddy and the commandant put my little warrant officer bars on. You know, the little epaulets. So, they put that. Warrant officer is nothing, he’s just a W-1. You know? But it’s more important—way more. My daddy put his arm around me and he said, “Son, I bet you by God now they’ll make you a sergeant.” That was funny, funny, funny. But I sent my wife and my children to our new home in Texarkana. And I had a—I didn’t have any leave to speak of. So, I stayed at Fort Rucker and my job was to fly these instrument helicopters. TH-13-Ts. The military has a policy where you try to keep the seals wet. You fly these engines and transmissions and such, keep them going. Every 7 days you get them wet, you know. So, I had a fleet of these �observation helicopters that were turned into instrument ships. And I got to fly those all day long and that was—paid for my room and board, I guess. And so, finally they let me go home, I think right before Christmas. And I got to spend two or three weeks with my wife and my babies before going to Vietnam. (00:28:41) Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: And I knew that all these guys were going and getting killed. And they wiped out my class. They just wiped them out. I think there was 4 of us left. And the one died in a training accident, hitting these wires. And we went back to Vietnam, another was killed flying Chinooks. And myself and another one were two out of the bunch. I think we started off with 87 but… Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: It was a high attrition rate. Interviewer: Yeah. Okay. Now, how do they get you to Vietnam? Veteran: Huh? Interviewer: How did they get you to Vietnam? Veteran: How did they get me? Interviewer: To Vietnam. Veteran: Well, I…My family took me to the airport in Dallas. TFW. I flew to…I think San Francisco. Interviewer: Okay. �Veteran: And had a night there. Met up with a Green Beret. Young lieutenant. He and I kind of like pals so we went out to the bar. You know. He and I had a farm. And the entertainers sang songs to us. You know, like—kind of like in a…One of the songs they sang was Beeping and Hiding, Slipping and Sliding. You remember that? And the next day we went back and it was just, you know, like this barracks and that bed and you got your duffel bag and all your stuff. We boarded a Northwest Orient flight. Flew to Japan. Stopped in Japan for about 45 minutes. And then flew on into—I flew into Tan Son Nhut, Saigon. (00:30:32) Interviewer: Okay. So, when did you arrive in South Vietnam? Veteran: It was…I don’t really remember. January ’66. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I’ll have to check my records but it was…It wasn’t long after Christmas, I’ll tell you that. Might have been earlier than early part of January, ’66. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. Okay, and what was your first impression of Vietnam? Veteran: Coming in out of altitude, I was looking around and I could see tracers are going to the ground. And you could see forever, you know. Up in the—I could see explosions across the artillery barrages and stuff and explosions. And I said, “Oh crap.” It was spread out. Way spread out. So, then we come in and we land at Tan Son Nhut. And when you get off the airplane, first thing that hits you is the odor: rotten fish and, you know, just feces and it stinks. And a lot of fumes and gasoline and diesel and stuff. Just stinks. It was hot. It was sticky. And I got an appointment there called…Oh, I forgot where but Camp Alpha where they took us into this little city of barbed wire and tin, sandbags. That was a funny feeling. (00:32:13) �Veteran: You stuck out like a sore thumb. You had on brand new fatigues, brand new boots and you looked like a new penny. They put you back in this area back there. And here’s all the guys that are leaving. They’re dark, tan. Faded clothes. And they got that other world stare. They aren’t friendly. They don’t want friends because friends will get killed. And you mix in with those guys. And you’re like a little puppy, peeing on their shoes. You know, you’re trying to get in there with them. And most of them are real quiet. Most of them have no advice to offer. And that was funny. That was a strange feeling. So, you stayed there at Camp Zama while they assign you to a combat unit. So, I was there for about 2 days. Then they told me to report to the helipad, that they were coming to pick me up, my unit. That was the 68th Assault Helicopter Company. Tough, tough, outfit. And I got in the back of the Huey and we took off and the door gunner pulled back the bolt on his machine gun and the crew chief. And I am looking through the cockpit and there we go. And now we are at, you know, like 1000 feet, 1500 feet, and I can see the rice paddies and I could…So, it was an eye-opener. It was a lot of experience, that just getting there. Interviewer: Now, was this company attached to a specific division? Or just part of a—was this a helicopter company? Was it part of a larger aviation unit? (00:34:02) Veteran: Sure. Yes. We belonged to the 145th Combat Aviation Battalion. They belonged to the 12th Group and they belonged to the 1st Combat Aviation Brigade. A brigade is something they put together out of necessity to meet a need. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: So, the First Aviation brigade was essentially a bunch of red-headed step children that nobody loved. You know? So, you were used to going here to go there to go there. That’s why I �served with so many good combat units. I served with all of them: 1st Infantry, 4th Infantry, 9th Infantry, 25th Infantry, 196th Light Infantry Brigade. You know, 173rd Airborne, 101st Airborne, 82nd Airborne. Wherever they needed a regular soldier, that’s where they would put me, you know. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: And we went up as far as the battle of Bong Song, which was a son of a gun. That was in January of ’66. And it was, the Battle of Bong Song, was hand-to-hand. And you were trying to support your troops. You couldn’t deliver ammunition when they were like this. You know, you had to check ID cards before you did anything, you know. And so, that was an eye-opener but I was young and dumb. And we did combat assaults all day long, every day. Nonstop. And the first couple of combat assaults just terrified me, paralyzed me. Unbelievable stuff they did. You’re going into—it looks like, if it’s early at dawn, looks like a spiderweb of tracers. And you’re flying right through it because they’re—and there is depth in there. But you hear people receiving fire. May day calls. People going down. Helicopters crashing and burning. And men getting shot to death right out in front of you on the LZ. (00:36:10) Veteran: Sometimes you were successful, sometimes you had to pull them out. And it was just like that. And I didn’t fly. I’d sit there, I was a sandbag, you know? And in case my pilot got killed, I was—I could fly it out. And I had the unwelcome privilege of looking. My aircraft commander had his hands full. I mean, he was—helicopters everywhere. There was stumps and stuff and you don’t want him to land on dead guys. And so, my aircraft commander was busy, as I was later on. But now, it’s sitting there, you know, picking my nose, looking at all this stuff. So, you get to see all the stuff you don’t need to see. �Interviewer: Okay. How long did it take for you to—how long did it take to adjust to that? Veteran: I’d say 2 or 3 months. It varies. You can only get so scared. You can only get so—and then you start to numb. What I did is I reached a plateau. I had, very painful now, accepted the fact that I was going to die. Period. Ain’t no way you can survive this crap. So, I took my family pictures, throw them in the trash can. I’ll never see them again. I became a zombie. I became a robot. Mechanical. And highly efficient. And it was painful. After about 2 or 3 months, then you get where, hell, you don’t care. You’re a pretty good pilot. Up until the end and then you got about 2 months left or a month left, you started getting scared again like you’re not going to make it to the end of the tunnel. But the middle of your tour, you’re—you seem like you do better. But at the beginning, it’s hell. At the end it is hell. (00:38:28) Interviewer: Okay. So, how long was it before you started to actually fly? I mean, to be a pilot? Veteran: Oh, I started flying on the first day. Interviewer: Yeah, but piloting your own? Veteran: Aircraft commander? Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: I don’t remember. It was…I was in the process. I was with the—I was flying Slicks. Slicks are the UH-1D models that carried the troops into battle. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: Hauled them out. Hauled out the dead and wounded. Took in water and ammo and stuff and things. So, I was in the Slick platoon. I got tired of getting shot at, shot all to hell, and not �shooting back. And my buddies were in the gun platoon. So, I asked my commanding officer if I could go to the gun platoon. He said, “Well, I will think about it when an opening comes.” So, they put me in the gun platoon. So, then I started flying gunships and help provide rockets and machine gun fire around the LZ while my buddies went in and out, you know. Interviewer: Right. Now at this point, were you aircraft commander or…? Veteran: Oh yeah. But before that, like I said, I was in my company doing these things. The United States Navy had what they called a brown-water Navy. These are your PBRs and your RAG boats. River rats, they called them. And these guys were working their runs in swamp. Treacherous, treacherous, swamp. They call it the Forest of Assassins. It’s the devil’s swamp. It was horrible. (00:40:08) Veteran: But brown—these PBRs were out there. They get in big trouble, they had to call for a helicopter. A gunship. Golly, that’s like, you know. Take forever and every second is precious. So, the Navy decided that the—that this Naval operation should have its own in-house helicopters. The Navy, finest pilots in the world, didn’t know how to fly Hueys. They flew other stuff. So, I was selected as one of the 8 Army pilots to go down there and fly their combat missions to support these PBRs and RAG boats and stuff. And SEALs: SEAL team 1, SEAL team 2. So, all of a sudden, I am able to do that. And here comes all these Navy pilots. They get trained and dispersed and stuff like that to pick up on that, not only how to fly the helicopter but how to fly a whale. How to do combat tactics and strategies and of course all the maintenance that goes with it and all that stuff. So, I was down there for a little while. But I was an aircraft commander down there. And you just—whenever your boss thinks you’re smart enough to come out and come home again, that’s when they make you an aircraft commander. But we had a �turnover, you know. We had boys killed so we had new guys all the time. So, if you lived long enough, you became an aircraft commander because you had the experience. Interviewer: Okay. Now, when you were with the Navy…When you were with the Navy, where were you based? (00:42:02) Veteran: Well, I was at an R and R center called Vũng Tàu. Beautiful place. And it was pretty peaceful, pretty quiet, pretty—I had a shower, I had meals. I spent the day there. And at the night, I would fly out into a place called Máy Bay, which is the worst place on earth. It was incredible. But it was right at the long tunnel at the start of the Red River and middle of the…Mosquitoes are so bad, you open your eyes and fill them with mosquitoes. Open your mouth, they’re filled with mosquitoes. Dead people floating down the river. Had rats. It was not good. Pythons. It was not good. But that’s where I was. I was out at Máy Bay. And we flew at night. Leaving Vũng Tàu late afternoon was my daytime flying and I sank sand pads and do a little combat target opportunity. But when we got to Máy Bay, put the ship down, fully armed. There’s quite a check—there is quite a procedure to start a helicopter. Circuit breaker this, switch that, do this, throttle this. Quite a thing. Same thing with the shutdown. But when we shut down, at Máy Bay, the only thing we shutdown was the master switch. And I guarantee you, when you called me on the radio, I’d be on my way in 5 minutes. That’s turning up the turbine and getting everything and the door gunner’s on and rocket pods connected. I mean, out the door we went. (00:44:14) Veteran: Because it was crucial. Critical. Every minute—every second counted. And it wasn’t bad. Here you are in the middle of the river. Here’s the tree line. I got tracers going for the tree line towards you or I got you shooting at them, showing me where they are on the riverbank. So, I’d go down, I’d just mow grass on the riverbanks. I mean, I’d put some stuff in there: rockets �and machine gun fire. So, we were pretty efficient. But you, out there floating around on that little river, dinky boat, boy you were highly vulnerable. And you know, a lot of guys got hurt. Well, I was honored by the Seawolf Association. I was a guest speaker in 2012. And it’s kind of funny: I was the old guy. I was 23-24, so I was the old guy. And I had—I was a mentor or ‘school marm’ they called me. Instructor, teacher, with this green flight suit. And they called me ‘Granny in a green gown.’ But they loved me and I loved them. And these Seawolf guys, they went on to be the Navy’s most decorated, most honored aviation combat assault unit in their history. So, they took off for—I lift off and boy they went. And they had a lot to do with that preTet Offensive stuff. The bad guys were down there in our part of real estate and that’s what they were getting gearing up for. The Tet Offensive was planned by the communists. And so, we were down there messing around, stumbling over things and finding things and trying to prevent things and discovering things. And when I left the SEALs, I went with the Special Forces and that’s what we did up around Tay Ninh—Tay Ninh to west Sông Bé, Cau Sông Bé—is look for bunkers, look for ammunition caches and stuff. So, that’s what all my effort was about was that pre-68 preparation. Junction City was a huge helicopter mission. (00:46:48) Interviewer: Yep. Veteran: And I was leaving as that…I was working up until that started to kick off and I left to come home. Had my tail rotors shot my last day flying. I flew my last day. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Back early on, they’d give you 30 days at the end of your tour. You didn’t fly. It—you know—work around the company area or do something, you know. But I flew the very last day. Interviewer: Now, did that helicopter crash or did you get back to base? �Veteran: Oh, it wasn’t bad. Shot a hole through the blade. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: You got a real high frequency buzz in the pedals and you’re in danger of your blade coming off. if your tail rotor comes off, you started spinning. That’s not good. Because that blade creates a lot of torque, the issues is it wants to go counter that to catch up with it. So, they put that tail rotor on to stabilize it so you can have a…So, if you lose that, you’re in deep trouble. If you lose the tail rotor, you’re in deep trouble anyway. If you lose a gear box—if it falls off— you’re dead because you do this and you can’t catch time. (00:48:05) Veteran: But I took a bullet hole through my tail rotor and…And I had a—this was funny too—I received a direct commission. So, enlisted men and warrant officers can move from one assignment to the next without orders, printed orders. A commissioned officer has to have printed orders in his hand. So, I got extended beyond my deros about 6-weeks. Boy, that was terrible. I sweated every day until my deros and then I got there and realized I got to wait on these damn orders. Well, I was out flying and they called me and said they had my orders. So, I looked at my aircraft commander, or—yeah, my aircraft commander, I looked at him. I said, “Well…” He said, “Ed,” he said, “if you leave, I’ll have to shut this ship down. If you stay with me, we can do about 2 more hours worth of work and I’ll take you back.” And I said, “Okay.” Like pulling teeth. But I—my captain was a really, really good guy. And I was a brand-new second lieutenant so I wanted to be a good guy too. So, we finished out the day. Well, another guy that got commissioned with me was a really good friend. He was a punk kid just like me. And he was held up on waiting for orders in my same outfit. So, he and I were kind of like sweating it out every day. So, I got my orders and he was out there jacking around in combat. And Major Schroeder—Harry Schroeder—was our commanding officer then. He goes in to see �Major Schroeder. And Major Schroeder sees him coming to the door and he says, “No, you’re not going to quit flying. You’re going to keep flying.” You know…And he didn’t have his orders in. And they had, right after we left, he had taken—Hal had gone to take a shower to shower point. And this was just a big meadow-like strip. And they had all kinds of goods for Junction City: ammo, you name it, they had stacked out there and stuff. And Hal had gone over to this little shower point to take a shower. You took a shower when you got a chance, you know. (00:50:48) Veteran: And he was walking back from the shower and Hal was skinny as a broomstick. I mean, he was a little skinny guy. He’s walking back wrapped in a towel. And mortars start flowing on the meadow-like. And Hal was too far from the damn bunkers so he jumped in this ditch. And the mortars are raining down. And I guess Major Schroeder thought this would have scared the crap out of him and he wanted to go home. He didn’t want to fly anymore but he walked in the tent. You know, and Major Schroeder said, “No, you’re going to keep flying.” He said, “No, I am not.” he got hit in the ass with a piece of shrapnel. To make it even worse, you know where his orders were? On the backside of mine. Interviewer: Oh… Veteran: They didn’t turn it over to see that he was on the backside. And I didn’t know that. I didn’t know this was going on. So, I got down and the sergeant major, command sergeant major, just rolled up the red carpet for me. He ran from here to there, turn in this, turn in my weapon, get my records, do this, get my duffel bag and take me down to the processing center where you go home. (00:52:13) �Veteran: And I was unexpected. Nobody expected me there. So, I showed up at this Camp LBJ I think it—I can’t remember what they called it. And it was dark. It was night already. It looked like a chicken house with chicken wire and had these clerks back there, getting these guys booked onto flights to fly home. And I walked up there to that wire like that and I looked at his—and he was a lieutenant. And I was a lieutenant. I said, “Lieutenant so-and-so, what’s the chance of getting a ride home?” You know. I said, “I have already been extended 6 weeks, you know.” And I was kind of buddying up with him, you know. And he was pretty serious. He was a serious chap. He looked at me, he said, “Well,” he says, “stick around right here.” He said, “I got either 4 or 6 enlisted men—they had gotten sloppy drunk and they weren’t going to let them board the airplane.” So, their seats came up for grabs. And he said, “Now I got you a seat.” You know, I guess they reported that these 4 boys were drunks. And this guy pushed me from the back over the top of my shoulders, “I need a seat too.” I look back and he was Hal Sharpless. And he must got there faster than I did but my god, we wanted to go home. We were ready to go home. That’s kind of funny but…You did—at the end there Jim you get kind of like I am not going to make it. I am not going to make it. You know like bugbear is going to get me before I get to the loader, you know. But it was…It was something else. Something else. (00:54:10) Interviewer: Okay. Now, you get to go home then? Veteran: Huh? Interviewer: You got to go home—you come back from Vietnam. You get a leave? Veteran: Yeah. I flew to Travis Air Force base. I got there and had to go to I think Los Angeles. And I was going to take a cab to go to the airport so I could catch my flight to DFW. And well, outside the cab driver wouldn’t let me inside his cab because I had on my uniform. They had a �shuttle bus—an old Army shuttle bus—so I went over. I sat on that damn bus for hour or two and then they drove me over to the LAX. And I missed my flight. So, I had to spend about 20 hours there at the terminal. You don’t know how bad I wanted to be home. But I sat there, had these flower children and weirdos and stuff that were trying to sell me a diamond watch or making fun of me or crap like that. But I sat there and when I got home, it was good to be home. Good old rural America, you know. Interviewer: Right. Alright, did your children know who you were? Veteran: Huh? Interviewer: Did your children know who you were? Veteran: My little hometown was a little bitty town. Texarkana Gazette wrote me up for these banners flying across and all that kind of crap. Helicopter pilots were heroes. I wasn’t. I was wetting my pants all the time. I was scared to death. You know? But if you were a helicopter pilot, you didn’t buy beer in a bar. If there was an infantryman in there, you didn’t buy a beer. He bought you a beer. And blah blah blah. It was a helicopter war, highly publicized. (00:56:11) Veteran: And so, I think that’s why as a helicopter pilot, I experienced this notoriety or stuff. But to be honest with you Jim, I was just a scared young man. And, funny, my biggest fear was that I wouldn’t look good in front of my peers. And boy, they were outstanding. And I think that they were doing the same thing: trying to be the best. And if I numb you out, you can function that way. You’re not nervous, you’re not screwed up. You’re clear thinking and ah, okay. You go do it. But when you are scared out of your mind? Boy, it is a tough job. And I was scared. I got into weather situations. I got shot down. I had maintenance problems. Things like that. Had some pretty desperate missions to go pick up a lurp team or recon team and not know where the hell �they were. Triple canopy jungle and Charlie’s right on them. And you got to get there. You got to be worth something. You got to get there. So, that was always frightening. But I always managed to get there. And we had what you called FM homing where you key your mic on an Fbox mic radio and my little needle would point at you. I didn’t know how far you were out there but my little needle would point at you. So, I would go through there and you get down at a different canopies or soft grass where this is at and you say, “Mustang 2-4,” or whatever my call sign was. “You’re over the top of us.” So, then another one sets down. And a lot of times we pull them out with jungle penetrators. That’s a 200-foot long rope with a horse collar on it. Pull the guys up through there. And I pulled a guy up through the—it was like I broke his arms. He put his rifle across his arms and the donut broke his arms but he didn’t turn loose. We saved him. (00:58:25) Veteran: But it got really down to nip and tuck. I mean, in little situations like that. A lot of young men are very fortunate to be alive because they missed it by that much. And I think helicopters were the reason why. I hauled guys to the rear. Jim, they looked like hamburger meat and they lived. But it was getting in there to blood expanders and lifesaving stuff that saved their lives. And I am grateful that I got to do that. I am grateful. I am not proud of killing people, I am proud of saving people’s lives. Interviewer: Right. Now, yesterday when we were talking, you talked about an incident where you got into trouble with your commander— Veteran: Oh, yeah. Interviewer: --because you took too big of risks? �Veteran: Yeah. Well, I had a thought process that if you call me—you’re an RTO or whatever— and you got a guy down there that is dying, or about to die or…If I go get you, I may or might get killed. Very likely I might. That’s what I said to them. If I don’t go get you, you definitely will die. I couldn’t turn them down. And I am telling you, I did wet my pants. My tongue swelled up and filled my mouth out of fear. But by god, I went and got them. (01:00:11) Interviewer: So, why did your commander have a problem? Veteran: Well, I was flying a gunship not designed for extractions or med evacuation. But a damned, old, heavy gunship. And on this radio, this RTO was pleading for somebody to come get this infantryman, young enlisted man. He took a chest wound. He was going to expire. And there I was, turning around the gunship, and this slick called and said, “Well, we’d like to help but the situation is too hot.” This other one called in, said “Well, we’d like to help but we can’t wait around. We are low on fuel and, you know, the situation hasn’t improved.” I said to myself—I said, “Just get out of the way.” What I did is going in, I shot all my rockets, shot all my—just exhausted my ammunition ordinance, just lightening it up a little but which wasn’t enough but it…And I went in there and I picked up this grunt. It was an unbelievable challenge to take off out of that hole because of the heat and the…But I got him out. There were two other crew members with the other 4 pilots, they reported me for being a—reckless. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. I am going to pause right here. Alright, so the other pilots basically turned you in? Or, they reported you? Veteran: They were good men. They were heroes. They did a lot of stuff. But they weren’t as abandoned as I was. I had given up my life. I was going to die. I might as well die looking good, you know. They were practical men. My mission was to access them. That’s all. Save my bacon. �But if my door gunner or crew chief or co-pilot or even me, if we had been badly wounded, it’d have been different. If the helicopter would have sustained serious combat damage or even been shot down, they had to—they had a poker hand. You know? (01:02:41) Veteran: But they reported, not to make me—not to hurt me but to kind of straighten me up. So, I went in front of my commanding officer. He was a wonderful man. And he began to chew my butt out. Like I am liable. I put these men’s lives on the line. One thing I always did, Jim, is when I took on something like this, I asked my crew: hey, we got this guy out here, shot through the lungs. It’s pretty hot—you guys want to go get him? And my men, my enlisted men, and my co-pilots would always say, “We are with you, sir.” Can I tell you something? Those men were heroic too. Maybe more heroic than me because they were a cardinal group. They were thinking. And they were backing me up. But they could have said, “Now, I ain’t sure.” And they could hem and haw around and I would have come up with something different then. But any rate, I would sit there. And I really didn’t give a damn. And I mean, I was going to die. Who cared if— court martial, what are you going to do? Send me to Vietnam? (01:04:10) Veteran: You know? So, I sit there and out of respect. I respected my commanding officer very much. I sit there while he told me what I already knew. But it made me think. It really did make me think that well boy, you sure did put them guys in a tough situation. By the way, the man lived. He took a chest wound, shot through his lungs. But I got him before he died and he—we saved his life. But I was still pretty cocky. After the major—I was a warrant officer. After the major got through chewing my ass—I mean, chewing it out. Naturally. He, like a good commander, would always say, “What do you have to say for yourself?” And I looked at him, you know, and I said, “Well sir, if it was you laying on that ground in the hot sun and the hot LZ, with a bullet through your lungs, and I come and pulled you out, would you be chewing my ass �right now?” That was really unfair of me but by god, it was true. And he told me, he said, “Mr. Ramon, get out of my sight.” He ran me out. I am sure that he had a respect for what I did. But I am sure he had enough managerial thought to take care of his own men, take care of his nation, and do it the right way. I was just a loose cannon on the deck but I got chewed out a couple times. And I did some things that should have been decorated for but I got, you know, my butt kicked for them. So, you can be-you can be too reckless. You can kill people in combat if you’re a stupid lieutenant or stupid captain or bad sergeant. You can…You can cause harm trying to do good. But by the grace of God, I was blessed. I was okay. (01:06:42) Interviewer: Okay. Now, you told another story. You told me about having a CBS news reporter fly with you? Veteran: Yeah. That’s kind of funny. You know, the news media…You know, they want to—if you bleed, it leads, you know. And I think it was Walt Thomas on the news with CBS. I don’t remember who it was but it was a big, big media. And they wanted to know about this Cobra. Cobra was pretty sophisticated, pretty new stuff. So, they worked with the information office in different places. And they come up with this young reporter. They gave him permission to— what do they call that? A quitclaim or something like that. Or release of liability. Whatever. But they got the young man cleared to ride with me on the Cobra in hostile territory. Nice kid. Very curious. Good, smart boy. And I took him around and showed him the helicopter. And it was pretty sophisticated. We had 400—40-millimeter grenades. Bad boys. We had 72 rockets with 17-pound warheads. And we had 8000 rounds of linked 762 ammunition. Blah blah blah blah blah blah. (01:08:15) Veteran: How fast it would go and what it would do. It was only 36 inches wide. So, it was a fighter plane, is what it was. And we got in and since I was on camera and everything, I went by �the numbers. Went through the checklist and why we did it that way, so that if we were low on ammo, we wouldn’t skip a circuit breaker or do anything wrong. Kept turning up. Had another slick over here with cameras on it and they were going to film us. And they communicated with us a little bit. First thing you do when you take-off is you make sure you don’t fly into an artillery barrage somewhere. So, I checked with all the artillery centers and found out where it was safe to go. We had free fire zones that were bad places. You could shoot in there any time you wanted to. You didn’t need to talk to nobody. You go in there, you see activity, you know, it was imminent activity. So, I got over one of those and I was going through my radios. And I came up with this outfit and they were pushing some bad guys into the canals or into the—So, they had some bad guys. And I said, “Well, you need a Cobra strike?” And they said, “Oh, yeah. Sure.” I said, “Well, puff some smoke.” And they did and I identified their smoke. And the bad guys are on this side and they were on this side. So, I went in there. Well, in a Cobra strike, the ones I like, you take the aircraft straight nose up at about 3000 feet. You need some altitude because when you come down, you come down fast. Take it up about 3000 feet, zero up the air speed and you roll it over. And you end up nose down and it’s like dropping marbles in a coffee can. I mean, those rockets—you don’t miss. It’s a challenge to shoot rockets. (01:10:35) Veteran: And trajectory is like shooting a basketball. You might be good or you might miss. But this was mass effective. And I was out there by myself. I didn’t have a sister gunship. So, we got into that and I winged it over like that. And this voice started to break up. I don’t know if it’s G forces or fear but he said, “Captain Ramon, we are upside down.” I said, “We are.” And then we are coming down and he is looking right at the target, you know, and it don’t take you long to go 3000 feet. And it’s boom, boom, boom. And he was better than any sports announcer. He was announcing about what he saw down there. We came down, we came out and we came out into �some intensive automatic weapons fire. We got the main body but we didn’t get…And you could hear the machine guns—the automatic weapons fire. But when you come out of that dive, boy you are cooking. So, when I climbed back up—and the survivors of our attack, they were headed for the canals to get to these sampans to escape. So, we went back and we just shot all those sampans. And the good guys caught up with them and I guess they took them as prisoners or killed them or whatever they did with them. That was funny. That reporter, he—And, just a while back, he contacted—I guess by social media or the internet or—he found me. (01:12:23) Veteran: I think he found me because of my book. And he called and asked me if I was so-and-so and I said, “Yeah.” Asked me if I could remember him. I said, “Well, yeah.” And he asked me if we took off out of Long Thôn north. I said, “Yeah.” And it was him. It was this kid. And he was thrilled. And he’s a big shot I guess in film-making—film industry out in California somewhere. And had a nice talk. Small world, huh Jim? But that was funny. He was—that was funny. I could tell you another story about another non-combatant. A dentist. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Did I tell you about that? We had this guy and we were in Vũng Tàu. And we hung around there and, you know, we were macho, we were tough. Most of these people were doctors and dentists and recreation R and R people. And we were the combat guys that were the small bunch. And this dentist liked to hang out with us. We had a bar. You know, he’d hang out with us. So, he was macho. He was a good kid. But a dentist. And he wanted to go on one of our missions. Said, “Okay.” You know, we were going toa take him into the middle of the swamp. But we did a lot of maintenance and stuff around there. And we had a radio jamming station there that was screwing with the Air Force cargo traffic in there. So, we got together 3 ships so �we decided that we are going to triangulate. You get a bearing, you get a bearing, you get a bearing and the middle segment, that’s where this bad guy would be. (01:14:23) Veteran: So, we did that. Well, he went with me. And he’s sitting over in the co-pilot’s seat and the gunner’s seat. Boy, he is probably peeking out. War hero, you know. So, we took off and we found this little—because it was a tile or stone structure. It was a hard—little hard hut. And that’s where they had their radio jamming equipment in there. So, now the race was on to get to see who was the first guy to get there to blow it away. Well, I won that race too. And because it was a hard target, I thought I would do a salvo, hoping I hit it, which I was pretty good. But if I didn’t hit it, that the other two ships would be there and they’d polish it off. But I wanted to get it. They had—the Army then was in a learning stage, so we had rocket pilots with shorter warheads. We had long warheads, short rocket pods, long rocket pods. If your warhead stuck out of the pod, when a rocket left the pod, these little folded fins would fling out. It would shear those fins off and then the rocket would go wherever it wanted to go. And we’d kill some people doing that back in research and development. Okay, well that’s not good. So, then they started coming out with longer pods. Well, you could fire a short rocket from a long pod. That’s okay. (01:16:14) Veteran: But my problem was I had long pods and then some short warheads. Stuff the ordinance we were disposing of or using on other stuff. But that’s what I was loaded up with was a shorter warheads. When a helicopter comes hovering by you, they blow gravel. And the gravel is going up in the pods and it was locking the warheads in the pods. Well, here I come over this target. I got an end of a loader and I am going to fire all my rockets at one shot. You know, to make…And we rolled in on the target like that and I am coming at a pretty steep dive. Not plunging far but pretty steep. Looking at that thing and I punched the rockets off and all the �rockets on my side left the tubes and went to the target. The rockets on his side stayed in the pod. Can you imagine the thrust? So, then we are going like this and we turn sideways. That should have torn the tail boom off but we turned sideways. The crew chief had a monkey strap. He went out there and pulled the release. And he was actually jumping up and down and stomping on the pod outside the helicopter. But the force of that thrust had kind of locked in there. Well, finally the pod came off and he damn near fell out of the helicopter but he had a strap. And that pod flew around and went into there. Well, it scared the crap out of all of us. You can imagine that. And the dentist is over there. He was holding on to the—he was holding on to the console like that. And he was just—he was out of it. His hands were white. He didn’t want to fly in helicopters no more. But that was funny. Scared the shit out of—well, it scared the shit out of me but it scared him too, you know. But there was humor in—sick humor—but any time you survive something, you feel okay, you know? (01:18:43) Interviewer: Okay. Now, when you were not flying, how did you spend your time? Veteran: Getting drunk. Sleeping. Cleaning equipment. Playing poker. Didn’t have much free time. Interviewer: Okay. Was the weather sometimes too bad to fly? Veteran: Yes. We flew anyway but it was—it got pretty dangerous. Some visibility. Monsoons. We lost a couple of ships in a thunderstorm. You know, the winds can get up to 600 knots. Destroy helicopters. You don’t fly in the thunderstorms. But we lost some—a couple of ships. There was also a clatter with a rock in it. That’s a mountain you don’t see because…And I got into areas like that and didn’t know if I was going to kiss a mountain or not. But I, you know, came out. I was flying out to this little valley and I saw something sparkling. And I thought it �was sunlight on the windshield of a vehicle. I looked down there and I was curious what was a vehicle doing down there. (01:20:07) Veteran: It was a quad 50. And the aircraft went out of Korea. Those suckers will shoot to 60007000 feet. There I was in this valley. Two mouths on both sides. And clouds over the top. You better believe I punched into them clouds, not knowing if I’d kiss a rock or not but the quad 50 wasn’t going to get me. Or hopefully it wouldn’t get me. But weather was a cutter and we lost guys. A lot of people were killed in aviation accidents in combat because of what you’d call pilot error. For crying out loud, your margin for error is like that. But if you screw up, you kill people. you kill yourself. Interviewer: Okay. Now, you had trained originally as a medic. Did you use your medic training in Vietnam? Veteran: Maybe a self-bandage on a scratch. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: We got scratched all the time. I must have been shot 50 times. But no Purple Heart, just a scratch or cut. Like, you know, like that. I got shot through the hand. That required some stitches and stuff. But we got guys that—who’d get scratched. We had sometimes a severe onset of diarrhea. I knew what to do and how to help them out. Get them some fluids and take care of them. But no. I wasn’t a… Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: I had been—I went and got this…You know, that Medal of Honor thing, I went and got this ARVN Ranger Paratrooper. He had broken femurs, both of them. And bleeding badly but I �didn’t have time to treat him. My—I had to get him out of there. And so, I threw him over my shoulders and ran 200 meters to get him out. And before we got there, the crew chief, door gunner came back throw him up on the—because he was in deep trouble. But he lived. He survived. I don’t know how well he healed ans... (01:22:39) Interviewer: Now, you mentioned a Medal of Honor. Have you been nominated for that? Veteran: I was decorated for picking up this paratrooper. And they gave me an Air Medal, which is nice. It’s like a Bronze Star for valor. And I didn’t know I was going to get it. I didn’t go in there for the medal, I went in there to get this guy out. And a couple of weeks later, this—I got a call to go to this decoration ceremony. They gave me an Air Medal. Hell, I had 24 Air Medals, you know. But it was nice. You know, thoughtful. And…Oh, about the last 25 years, a bunch of people who knew me and saw this decoration, including Major-General Eisenhower, they thought that was a pretty weak deal, you know. So, they wanted to see if I could get the Medal of Honor. And they made a petition. They wrote up a citation. They did all this stuff. Fortunately, all this was documented by the other decoration. But the guy that wrote it up—I don’t know who wrote it up. But the guy who wrote it up left out the crocodiles and the automatic weapons fire, the fact that I had holes shot in my blouse and my trousers. You know, and that I had to run 200 meters to get this guy. They left all that out. They just—that you know, he did a good job, he saved this paratrooper’s life. You know. (01:24:19) Veteran: Some difficult flying and some danger. But anyway, that put all that together the day before 9/11. That’s, what…18 years ago. General Eisenhower and Sergeant McCarthy and Sergeant Duke and Specialist Larry Carlisle. My co-pilot was alive then. And he submitted a sworn affidavit about the crocodiles and the little holes and the incredible flying getting out of that little bitty hole so we could even get close to him. 200 meters is a long ways through a �mangrove swamp. But I didn’t—I was walking on water. I didn’t—I was moving out. I was physically fit then. Interviewer: Okay. So… Veteran: But they put all that together and they sent it to Senator Inhofe who—a Republican Senator. And Jim Inhofe had given me 51 decorations before that at a ballpark. Baseball. This is in the vogue and pony show time. He’s a veteran. He’s an advocate. What most politicians are. They want the veteran vote. But Jim. It was sent to Jim, to his chief of staff and to him. Never heard anything back. Nothing. After about 3 or 4 years, I inquired. They didn’t know what was going on. Then I inquired again and it was supposed to be over here at Department of the Army or Department of Defense. Some damn place. Never heard from them again. So, General Eisenhower—he’s a friend. He got a little bit ticked off. So, he’s taken it on himself to write letters, put together things. And they have also now submitted through a North Carolina Congresswoman. (01:26:32) Veteran: She’s an advocate for veterans and of course she wants veterans vote. She takes care of the veterans. And so, they are hoping that she will. She’s a Senator. And if they get this damn thing out of the trash can, they either approve it or disapprove it. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: I don’t care if they approve it or disapprove it. Of course, I want it approved but if they disapprove it, I saved a life and I got decorated and I am okay. Interviewer: Okay. �Veteran: I’d like it for my granddaughter and my kids and my great-grandchildren. By the way, we are expecting another great grandchild. I just found that out. But I’d love for my family to have something to hold onto. I cherish my grandfather’s and my great-grandfather’s. They were Comanches and stuff. But I honored them as men that stood up for what they believed in. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And I’d like for my little kids to think that of me. One reason why Jim is I alienated my children and my loved ones, my family, because of really, really, bad PTSD. I ran off everybody that loved me. I’ve come around now and I am doing much better. But for 40 years, it was bad news. Broken glass—I had a hard life. Interviewer: Alright. Now, let’s circle back a little bit. First of all, explain about the crocodiles. Veteran: What? Interviewer: The Crocodiles. (01:28:02) Veteran: Oh, the crocodiles. Oh my God…When I went to get this guy, I found what you call a high-speed trail. And it went through an abandoned village. And it was on a river. So, I ran down that trail. I was hooking them, which was better than coming back. But down this high-speed trail, I got to the river, I had to turn right and go about 40 meters down the river. And this paratrooper was—had both legs broken. Femurs. Blood bleeding through his. His risers had fallen across a big old tree stump. And his canopy was bouncing off the river. And I was afraid if that thing filled with water, that would drag him to his death. You know. So, I went slushing out there through the mud. Ankle deep—knee deep, which is hard walking. And I got it. And just as I got him, bullets start flushing water and mud up around me. Bad guys were shooting at me �from across the river. There I am, wide open. Kill zone. So, I took this paratrooper over my back. And I get back to the shore, to the bank. Well, I can’t run down the bank to get to that pass—that high-speed trail because they will have blown me down before I got there. So, I plunged right into the mangroves. And they have a Crocodylus porosus. They call them ‘salties.’ ‘Maneaters.’ ‘Sinkhole crocodiles.’ These are the big boys that you see in Australia. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: Ran right through the middle of them. Everywhere. They would have killed me probably or eaten me—both of us—but the village was not abandoned. It wasn’t abandoned. They had an ambush set up there. I ran right through that ambush and they had discipline, they held their fire. But when these guys across the river opened up on me, then they opened up on me. And they were close. (01:30:22) Veteran: Had leaves, limbs, things falling down on me while I am running. But that spooked the crocodiles. So, I didn’t get—I wasn’t made into lunch. Got back to the chopper and all there waiting was my aircraft commander and co-pilot. We alternated. And all they was—they were waiting on me. He didn’t take-off to leave me. And my crew chief—we put that pitiful ARVN solider…Never made a sound. All while I was running with him. When I laid him on the deck, he started to scream. Like he had a lot of shock or something but it allowed him to—but he started to scream. You know…Crew chief was helping. But we saved him. We did. Well, that’s a biggie. Any time you save a human life, that is kind of a biggie. But with the special forces’ advisors, what we were really happy about was I sprung this damn ambush that their guys were going to walk into. And they would have sustained serious casualties. You know. Boys would have been killed in action, but that would have been a bummer if those rangers had of walked into that village. It was a horseshoe ambush. They would have been fish in a barrel. But I sprang �it so they dealt with it a little differently. But I think that’s the big thing that they were the Medal of Honor campaigning was. I wasn’t heroic. I didn’t know it was going to be that bad. If I had known it, I’d have probably left town, you know. (01:32:11) Interviewer: Alright. Okay. Let’s kind of wind—go back in your story. So, you kind of gotten you through your first tour in Vietnam, where you talked about that and you come back home to the states. What assignments do you get when you get home? Veteran: What did I do? Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: First tour. I went to Fort Eustis, Virginia. And they had a job there as the Secretary of the Aviation Administration. It was a major’s job. I was a second-lieutenant but I had, you know, I had years of…So, they gave me that job. It was at Felker Army Airfield. And Colonel Hill and Major Moffatt and a couple of really wonderful guys. One of my co-pilots from Seawolf was there. So, I stayed there a little while. And then, I wanted to move my wife and my children to closer to their family. They were in Georgia. So, I asked for and got a transport to Fort Stewart, Georgia. Camp Swampy. As bad as Vietnam. But I went there and I became part of a—I can’t remember. I think it was 267th aviation battalion. And we trained pathfinders how to get helicopters in to LZs and stuff. So, I did that. And made first-lieutenant. And I was—I was always screwed up. The PTSD was getting me. I was not an officer gentleman. I was drinking. Fist fighting. Wild as a hare. (01:34:07) Veteran: So, I decided I better go back to Vietnam. And I had a guilt. Unreasonable guilt. My friends died and I chickened out. So, I went to Cobra school and then I went to Vietnam. And wasn’t there too long. Got—broke my back. Med-evaced to Camp Sakai, Japan. Told I would �never walk again. And I was told that I would never walk again, I felt like I had paid my debt for killing children. I felt like I had paid my debt. But I was able to—I was able to walk again. And I’ve come light years because of people who care about Vietnam War. People like you. What was it all about? What did it do to our young men and women? And my discipline now is psychology. I counsel veterans. I do really well at it. I helped a lot of them. Had a few commit suicide. And that is always sad. My little brother committed suicide. But I think what you’re doing, Jim, is terribly important. As a historian. You know, who was it? Henry Steele Commager said, “If you don’t remember history, you can relive it.” Well, we are reliving that now. Interviewer: Yeah. Now, did the back injury, did that end your military career? When you broke your back, did that end your military career? (01:36:02) Veteran: No, it didn’t. It screwed it up. It wasn’t a broken back, it was compressions. I tore a bunch of certain muscles. And a lot of pressure on the sciatic nerve. I had a big tumor about that big. The tumor dissolved and my feeling came back. And I really had it back to where I could walk, where I could run, where I could stand so I was okay. But I had residuals. I think it what caused me to get out was PTSD. I wasn’t happy. I was mercurial. I was the best officer you’d ever, ever find and I was the sorriest you’d ever, ever find. And you can’t be that way. So, I had a lot of accolade. I was a battalion commander. I was a captain. I was Mamie Eisenhower’s escort officer. Vice President Agnew’s escort officer. Had a washtub full of medals. I was a good—on the surface, a good boy. But beneath it, I was falling apart. Interviewer: Okay. So, explain what you were doing with Vice President Agnew? Veteran: Finding out where toilets were and opening doors. I was pretty low-level peon. But I was a captain. And his wife was real sweet. And we would go into these—when they come to a �military base like that, I remember giving him the technical aspects of a facsimile simulator. You know what that is? The tube that rotated. It had a nacelle on it and that’s the way you transmitted faxes, back in the old days. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: So, I showed him how the thing worked and he was interested. As far as I knew, he was a good guy. He was a crook but they all were. But he was an honest crook. If you know what that—what I mean. If you’d ask him, he’d say, “Yep.” You know? His little wife was very sweet. I hate to say this about Mamie Eisenhower, she was precious, but she was a precious little drunk. I guess that’s because of all her life…But she drank a little bit too much. She was precious. My main thing for her was finding the bathrooms and looking out for her. (01:38:39) Interviewer: Okay. Now, is this what you were doing after you got back from Vietnam? Veteran: Pardon me? Interviewer: Were you doing this after you finished in Vietnam? Veteran: Yes. Yes. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: Yes, this was after Vietnam. Interviewer: Okay. When did you actually leave the service? Veteran: When did I actually leave? Interviewer: Yeah. �Veteran: April 15th, 1973. And I resigned my commission April the 15th, 1975. So, I was essentially a soldier for…What? Interviewer: Well, ’61 to— Veteran: 14-15 years. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: But I was angry. When I got out, they had a reduction in force. All the enlisted men wanted out and they got out. So, they were now top heavy in middle management or company grade officers. So, they start releasing them. Involuntarily. They’d RIF them: Reduction In Force, they call it. So, they let out all these 1000s of captains and I was in there, still in there. And when they RIFed me, they came down with a RIF order. I was the only guy on it. I was a, you know, bottom of the pile. But hell, I was an infantryman, I was double rated, I was blah blah. Cobra qualified and all that. But they RIFed me. Paid me $15,000. Paid me, threw me at the gate. And I was angry. And about…Oh, it wasn’t long but maybe a year, they’d screwed up. What the government usually does. They over RIFed. They threw out too many “helicopter pilots.” Do you know what it costs to train a helicopter pilot? They have to have 1500-2000 hours before they’re worth a damn. Do you know what it takes to train a Cobra pilot? (01:40:36) Veteran: A test pilot? I was all these things. So, I was in—I was living in Hurst, Texas. And got a call from Fort Hood. They wanted to bring me back on as a Cobra pilot for the cav outfits that were there. You know, armored people. I think it was 4th infantry…I am sure. 4th—but they wanted me there as a Cobra pilot to…Told me they’d make me a major, because I was almost a major when I got out. And I said, “Well, how long?” And they said, “Well, we’ll guarantee you 6-months.” I said, “No.” I said, “I need 6 years and retirement or you can forget it.” And I said, �“When all the foreigns and all the women that you’ve insulted and everything, you can’t recruit anybody.” I said, “I might go then but not until then.” I was a smart ass. But I cut my nose off to spite my face. I probably would have—I’d have gone back on active duty the way things turned out. You know, the Mid East Wars. I probably would have been sticking around as a Cobra pilot as an aviation commander for probably a pretty good while. If I had behaved myself. But I was not a good boy then. Today, I’d make a wonderful commander. I’ve been an old geezer. Been smart, been practical. You know, been… (01:42:20) Interviewer: Yep. Veteran: Been good. Been a good guy but back then, I was a little bit dangerous. Interviewer: Yeah. And you went down further and then—and you went down more after that and then eventually got yourself all the way back up again. Veteran: I fell apart in 1984. Ended up in the fetal position on the floor of a V hospital. I lost it all. I lost it all. But I screwed up with people up until 1984. Divorced wives and quit jobs and, you know. But I started coming back in 1984. And in 1990, I was doing better. And the late ‘90s, I was doing much better. Meantime, I went to graduate school. Wrote a book. Had tried my very best to be a good guy. And I became one. I think I did. Interviewer: Okay. Say a little about the book. It’s an unusual book. Veteran: Oh, this book? Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: Oh, it’s a…It’s a compression of thought. It’s in poetry. It has a Christian scripture. A secular wisdom scripture. A poem and then a prose epilogue explaining what the PTSD—what �that’s about. Some sins I bare are always there for anyone to see. The few who care will often stare and ask how they came to be. This scar you see below my knee came from a bursting shell. This one here beside my ear, a sniper shell placed well. Though there’s a number I know that I can’t show because it’s hidden so deep inside. I guess it’s true it has something to do with all my friends that have died. But nevertheless, I must confess this scar burns me with strife. I ask and cry, I still wonder why we were wasting such precious life. This scar I keep buried very deep and it’s not from a bullet hole. But it will always seep and trouble my sleep because it stretches across my soul. (01:44:55) Veteran: Okay, that is a poem. You go to the epilogue and it talks about the physiology of a gunshot wound or shrapnel wound. You got a hole punched in you. You start to bleed. Thrombin is active, you coagulate. Stop the bleeding. Here comes the white blood cells. And you start healing. If you got blood running down your arm or your leg or your face, here comes your buddy to help you. Here comes the doctors, the hospital. You know, you got external help. But I’ll tell you this: when you get scarred across your soul, you’re often by yourself. Often, you try to hide it. Big boys don’t cry. You know? And it gets worse and worse. And it never, ever heals. You have to learn how to cope with it. Have to deal with it. So, that’s what it’s like. It’s a couple of sayings, a poem, and then an epilogue. And it goes through quite a few of them. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: Talks about a corpsman. Talks about a chaplain that got killed in the battlefield. Talks about Army nurses that were there. Little children starving. Killing children. Mortar attacks, artillery barrages. So, it’s quite a…It’s my picture of this. Of what the war was. And I’ve been blessed. I have had grandmothers and wives and daughters and children and fathers that have �come up to me crying. Because they said their book told me who their father was. Or their son or their brother. (01:46:43) Veteran: They didn’t know who he was. They knew he was screwed up but they didn’t know what was going—but when they read my book, they saw him. And I gave them back to them. And of course, you need to help. You need support. When you need help the most, that is when you seem to alienate it or run it off. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: So, I learned that the hard way. I don’t want the youngsters today to learn it the hard way. Sit down, you have to heal yourself, we will help you with medication, if you need it, if you don’t need it, leave the medication alone. Leave the booze and the drugs alone. Listen to good counsel. Talk to groups. Visit with other people who have shared common experiences. Work your way out. And you’ll be able to hobble. You may not be able to run, but you’ll be able to walk the rest of your life. And that is what it is all about. Interviewer: Yeah. But it all makes for a pretty remarkable story. So, thank you very much for taking the time to share it. Veteran: Thank you, Jim. I appreciate what you are doing. It means something to the kids ahead of us. Interviewer: Right. Very good. (01:48:00) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_RamonE2278V Title A name given to the resource Ramon, Edward (Interview transcript and video), 2018 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018-11-01 Description An account of the resource Edward Ramon was born in 1942 in San Antonio, Texas, and graduated high school in May of 1960. Ramon received a scholarship to play football at Texarkana Junior College, but decided to join the Army in 1961. He completed his Advanced Individual Training at Fort Ord, California, and his Finance Training at Fort Benjamin Harrison, Indiana, before he trained as a medic at Fort Sam Houston, Texas. Ramon was involved in the Cuban Missile Crisis response in the early '60s and trained as a helicopter pilot after reenlistment. He was deployed to Vietnam in January, 1966, with the 1st Aviation Brigade, 101st Airborne and the 82nd Airborne Divisions. While he primarily flew gunships, he also participated in various rescue missions in Vietnam. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Ramon, Edward Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/f4f168f174ec0a2509ca38ec3349f174.mp4 87e575a98d1e9c4e47580a378dda9926 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/165e2cc92c22a4e45adc42cf2555f933.pdf 79719d538aaf2b239cb846af93a9f7c8 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Matthew Oudbier Interview Length: (2:24.12) Interviewed by: James Smither Transcribed by: Chloe Dingens Interviewer: We're talking today with Matthew Oudbeir of Allendale, Michigan and the interviewer is James Smither of the Grand Valley State University Veteran’s History Project. Okay Matthew, start us off with some background on yourself and to begin with, where and when were you born? So, I was born in Bremerton, Washington. My dad was in the Marine Corps and so he was initially stationed out on Camp Pendleton in California and then it was assigned to leave marine security guard at, in Bremerton. So, my mother relocated up there. I was born and then shortly after they moved back down to Pendleton, but that's where I was born. Interviewer: Okay and then did you move around a lot when you grew up or did you stay in the San Diego area? (1.15) Not so much, we I mean we for the most part all I remember is Camp Pendleton, we lived on base housing for the most part. I think we lived out the uptown for a while, but my parents are from Grand Rapids, Michigan so after my dad had gotten out they moved back and I think I was about ten at the time we moved back and then I spent the rest of my time growing up in Grand Rapids. Interviewer: Okay then now what do you remember, or what sticks in your mind about the time growing up in Camp Pendleton? Just being a kid there. �So, my dad served during the Persian Gulf, so he had actually gone on deployment, so I mean there was a small period that I remember him being gone for a while and then just family watching the news. Kind of checking up what's going on there and then I remember the homecoming, actually I remember the before they left they had a family, a family day and they had lined up all the- all the weapons and had blank rounds in them and stuff and had some of the Humvees and the tanks out there so we could, the kids can you know check them out and stuff. But you know I- I don't think I really understood the, especially when we lived on base housing didn’t really understand the community that we lived in, that everyone there had a parent serving in the military in some capacity, and I don't think I really understood that it was just kind of being a kid and… (2.47) Interviewer: It's just what was there. Okay so then you're ten years old and you moved to Grand Rapids, and then what was that transition like? You know it wasn't difficult, I think. So we ended up staying with my dad's mom, my grandmother for the first couple months when- when we moved back in, while my parents were looking for housing and then I know my dad had kind of bounced around jobs for a while when he got out and eventually got a position at the post office which he has been working ever since. So, but for me it was kind of, kind of roll with it. I had three younger… or two younger brothers at the time who were in somewhat close proximity of age to me, so I was you know busy with them and you know just kind of being a kid, I guess. (3.38) Interviewer: Alright and so where'd you go to high school? �I bounced around high school's quite a bit. So, I initially went to East Kentwood for freshmen and sophomore year. Then I went to Creston for a year and then after that I went to Northview Alternative. My, at that point my- my decision was to join the Marine Corps so at that point I was kind of ready to finish school and I was actually in a position where East Kentwood had more credits, I'd earn more credits than I needed and so going to Northview alternative I'd only have to stay there for another semester and then I'd be able to graduate early so I was able to ship- ship off to boot camp you know before the summer, before I actually graduated. Interviewer: Okay and- and at what point did you decide that you wanted to go into the Marine Corps? (4.33) I think it was my- my sophomore year what I really kind of made that decision. You know I think it was a lot of things that kind of played into that my- my dad being in the Marine Corps. I think the year, the year prior to my sophomore year the September 11th attacks occurred, and I really, I guess I didn't see any other kind of options, there wasn't a whole lot I guess I had going for me at the time. I was not the, I mean I was a bright student but I was not I had a problem with authority and I guess joining the Marine Corps was maybe not the first conclusion you make, but I figured I- I could use that to kind of get myself straightened out in a way. Interviewer: You would kind of have to learn to deal with Authority at that point. Yes. Interviewer: Because you were going to get a lot of it, but you had a pretty good understanding on some level of what the Marine Corps was all about because you'd grown up with it. Yes. �(5.35) Interviewer: Okay, alright and do you remember how you learned about 9/11? So I was, I believe it was my freshman year. I was in, I want to say a history class if I'm not mistaken and someone came down the hall and said, you know, “turn on the TV,” and they turned on the TV and we sat there and watched what was kind of unfolding and no one really knew what was going on so, you know what you know I believe we finish out the day you know as- as kind of normal after that but it was kind of people were kind of confused on what was going on. Interviewer: Right. For the most part. Interviewer: Okay, alright so then so when do you actually you- you finish high school and so when you actually enter the Marine Corps? So that was in February 2004. I had, they had the Delayed Entry Program and I had signed up for that in my beginning of my senior year which I believe is where they will accept people in the Delayed Entry Program. So, I was signed up for that and I had let the recruiter know what was my plans were to graduate a semester early. So after December I had gotten all the credits I needed to graduate and then he told me that “well we're just gonna once we have an open slot for you we're gonna put you in there so you are kind of at a moment's notice at this point,” and then come February I got the- the call saying that they're gonna take me down to MEPs in Lansing and process me to- to enlist. Interviewer: Okay, now how much, in the year when you were going in, I mean how much kind of test taking and processing did you do before you actually went off to training? (7.25) �So, I mean there was the ASVAB that we had to take, and I took that in I want to say my- my junior year maybe, and I had done exceptionally well on there. And then like in the Delayed Entry Program they, because you have to do a… they want you to do an initial PFT so it's… Interviewer: Is it a physical? Yeah physical training test and it's like a half- a mile and a half run and sit ups and pull ups and so I had done that before I enlisted, before actually when I was in the Delayed Entry Program and in the Delayed Entry Program they kind of go through a, you know they tried to help training acts, kind of some of the- the basic things you're gonna need to know. You do a little marching, they do physical fitness activities some, a lot of organized sports or hiking stuff like that. I actually didn't participate a whole lot with that because I figured I was going to be joining and I'd be getting a load of that stuff so… Interviewer: Right. But they- they had some of that and I did participate with some. (8.33) Interviewer: Okay and then were you, before you go out there, were you given a chance to kind of express preference for what kind of training you would get or would that all come later? So yeah I was asked and I asked to join the infantry and they for some reasons said they didn't have any positions open for that because I had and I, I don't know if it was because I had a high ASVAB score that they didn't want to put me in there, or it was because they were actually full in infantry position I don't know if that's possible. But so, I ended up signing for a general field, which was command and control electrician. It's kind of a broad field and then I ended up getting assigned to a radio operator because I initially was going to sign in open contract, just so I could �you know they could put me where I needed to, kind of roll the dice. And see how that goes and my recruiter was like well you got to pick something or at least an area of specialty and stuff. So, that's what I end up doing and I come to find out I be a radio operator which is, in my opinion kind of the- the next best thing and in a way because you actually get to, there's more flexibility with the radio operator, every unit has radio operators, every unit needs them so you can be an infantry units, you can be an air units, you can be in whatever. (9.56) Interviewer: Okay, alright so now they take you, okay so where do you do your basic training? I did mine in San Diego and at the Recruit Depot there and that was 13 weeks and lots of fun. Interviewer: Okay now in the Vietnam era there was gonna the whole ritual surrounding actually arriving there, coming in in the middle of the night, and all of this kind of stuff. So, what happens when you go out there? When you first arrive, how does that work? I mean I believe it's not a whole lot different than- than it's been in the past, I mean we arrived and it was it was late at night and we get to the yellow footprints there the- the bus driver was really nice and then when we pulled up yellow footprints and they got blinding white lights shining on the- on the area and then the drill instructors come on and start barking orders, everyone get out on the footprints and then you kind of go through in-processing. You know the I think the- the first thing you do is get the haircut and then you go through and you get- get loaded in with equipment and stuff, so you get uniforms and then hygiene equipment all kinds of stuff. You just kind of you know corralled through this thing and then eventually you get into a receiving barracks and I think we're actually in receiving for like three days. Waiting and after that whole initial period it kind of really slows down and you're just kind of being marched from- �from chow to you know, breakfast to lunch to dinner and then I think you're doing cleaning and stuff in between just kind of to hold you over but you're not doing a whole lot in the receiving. (11.38) Interviewer: Okay and how much of this were you expecting when you went in? Well the initial stuff I was expecting the- the latter part of the receiving, not really, I mean I think a lot of us it was kind of we were all anticipating you know the- the boot camp and the receiving was not, I think the- the drill instructors that are in receiving are generally on their way out of being drill instructors they, they've done their time and they're kind of been started their last leg of their drill instructor tour. So, they're not as, you know hard-nosed as the- the drill instructors you're gonna get for your platoon. Interviewer: Okay alright so and then out were you waiting just to fill up the ranks of a training unit or? I'm not sure, I think they just have the receiving cycle, where you know I believe we also went through shots and medical screening and stuff like that. So, I think it's just that time to process you in and get everyone situated, and it may be… well I don't know if they're waiting on to fillfill everyone up, because I think everyone, we- I had came with was ended up being in the platoon that I was in after the most part. (12.55) Interviewer: Alright okay so know when training actually starts what does that consist of? So, there's the I mean so the Marine Corps does three phases of training. The- the first phase is they are just kind of breaking you down. A lot of it is getting used to the- the system they've got going on you know we do a lot of physical training, a lot of, what they call ITing, which is the I figure out the- the act what it stands for but essentially the drill instructors would take the group �and have them do push-ups until they scream for mercy. And there were some classes in there also, I think a lot of it was general Marine Corps history that kind of stuff we went over. A second phase we actually move, so that's in San Diego, and then the second phase we go up to Camp Pendleton and there's barracks there and that's where we get into our field training portion. So, a lot of classes on the rifle, on patrolling and maneuvering, we do the rifle range up there and then at the end of that is when we do our- our, the crucible or the final exercise for that. Which is the I think 72-hour movement I- I think they give us like two hours of sleep a night or something like that, if you're lucky and you could I think a meal and a half for the three days. And then ending with a, I want to say a 15-kilometer hike and I think at the top is where they that's where we got our- our I think MCMAT belts. I in the past they've… I know they've changed it around in the past that was kind of the very end you would do this, and you'd get your Eagle Globe and Anchor. For us by that time it was you get to the in the second phase and we're in the middle you MCMAT belt and then third phase is kind of refining, where they going over additional classes and stuff you're- you're focusing a lot on drill. And we get to gloss our boots at that time and we get to unbutton our, they had us button our top button on our- our blouse for most of the training and third phase we got to unbutton it so we actually look somewhat like Marines, and then at the very end graduation is where we get the Eagle Globe and Anchor. But yes, so that was- that was training for the most part. (15.47) Interviewer: Okay, now how would you characterize the group of people you were training along with? You know I'm not sure, I mean we hit a lot of people, there was people from all over. I mean we usually we come to find out that most people are from California or Texas and then there's �people from other places also. But I mean it seemed that, it seemed to me that most people were kind of like me and I- I looking back I would say probably you know lower, middle class kind of backgrounds that kind of thing. Interviewer: Were there many with military families? Not that I'm aware of. I mean we didn't… so there wasn't a whole lot of socializing. Interviewer: Okay. (16.32) So, I really didn't get to know a lot of people personally. I think we got like an hour at the end of the day to kind of square our things away and for the most part we weren't allowed to speak during that time and on Sundays we, I think it was a four-hour block that we were actually allowed to kind of… get the newspaper, use the bathroom at your leisure kind of thing. And so, and usually that’s what I did, I read the newspaper and I used the bathroom so… Interviewer: Okay, now did you have many people drop out? Or have problems along the way or did most of them go through okay? We had a few dropouts, I think there was, there was one guy that ran away during the first phase and then they actually found him during the last phase, and they brought him back. I believe he got actually home, and his father convinced him to go turn himself in and they bring you back to the platoon you- you were assigned to before and then they process you out from there. We had quite a few people get recycled to us. So, if you are you know say you get to third, the third phase or you get to the second phase they, they'll bump you back to the beginning of a phase if you… for medical reason, like if you had a medical injury. You'll go to the medical platoon until you get better and then they'll- they'll put you back in. And actually, we had a guy that I ended up going to comm school with, who had gotten cellulitis and they actually found him with that �on the last day or so of the second phase. So he was actually on his way up the Reaper which is the end hike and then he was, they- the medic found him or the corpsman found him with a limp and stopped him and checked it out and they're like, “oh you got to go- go back,” and he was pleading not to go back because he actually had to do second phase all over again. So, the- the whole exercise that he had done he had to do all over again with us. So… (18.40) Interviewer: Alright so now once you finish that, now what do they do with you? From there I, so, from there I think we got like our ten days of liberty we got to go home and… but after that we went to- I went to marine combat training. Which is if you are other than infantry, you'll go to marine combat training just like three weeks, 27 days of combat training if you're infantry then you go to a school of infantry SOI. And that's I believe a five-week course that they send you through, and it's basically more in-depth on infantry skills. So, you do a lot of bivouacking, a lot of patrolling, learning how to fire a variety of different weapon systems, that kind of thing. A lot of more classes and instructions and stuff. (19.35) Interviewer: Okay alright and then and that was that at Camp Pendleton or someplace else? That was that camp Pendleton. That was, they had the school of infantry and marine combat training relatively the same place out there, so we were out in the Hills Camp Pendleton doing exercise. I think we for the most part we- we'd go out for the week and do our training out there in the field, and then come back on the weekend for a couple days to kind of rest and refit. And then we go out again and it kind of was the cycle for those three weeks. Interviewer: Okay alright and then once you're done with that, now what? �(20.13) Yeah after yeah after that I went to Twentynine Palms for the field radio operators’ course and I'm not quite sure how long that was I want to say that was like a six-week course that I had gone through. And you're pretty much learning how to operate the radios, set up antennas, that kind of thing. Interviewer: So, where is Twentynine Palms? Twentynine Palms is in the Mojave Desert outside of Southern California, it's in Southern California. Outside of San Diego a ways, kind of between San Diego and Las Vegas. And pretty much in the middle of nowhere. One of the largest training areas, we didn't go out into the training area so much we were mostly at the schoolhouse, and they had a space designated for mostly setting up antennas and doing some communication stuff but... Interviewer: Okay and at this point, and so this is mid 2000s here, what… how sophisticated was the equipment you were using? I mean did it look like stuff they used in Vietnam or was it more better than that? (21.20) Yeah so, I think the… we later on I had gotten, we had gotten much more modern radio equipment. In the field, in the radio operators course we were working with prick-104s, prick19s for the most part that’s what we were using. They had for the- the 104 they had a- an encryption device that attached to it. I forget the name of that, but you had to load the crypto on it and then you’d set it up. Field phones that kind of thing. So, a lot of the stuff was- was kind of older and I'm assuming it- the… some of the stuff was kind of at least late Vietnam era equipment. The schoolhouse didn't get the best equipment I think either. But yeah it wasn't nothing modern, later on and we had certain we started getting much better equipment where the- �there wasn't- there wasn't an external and an encryption thing it was all built in, or it could cover a lot of different frequency wavelengths. The 104 was a high frequency radio and the 19 was a VHF radio and then we also had the prick 113 which is UHF so if you wanted to cover different spectrums depending on what your- how you’re trying to communicate you had to use a different radio for each one. (22.52) Interviewer: Okay alright and then what kinds of sort of applications were you learning? What could you, were you being taught to do particular kinds of things whether it's communicating with aircraft or artillery or other things? I think we covered radio messages because there's some standard messages field artillery is one of those things where they definitely have a standard message system that they used. And I think we- we touched on that, most of it was just learning how to put in the frequencies for the radios, set up the radios for communications. So, and we learned how to if you wanted to talk with the aircraft you wanted to use the UHF radio. If you're going to be talking with, in close proximity you use the VHF radio, usually for ground troops and stuff like that, for movement. And then if you want to talk for a long range then use the HF radios. And that was, that was kind of the extent of it. You know they- they, there was actually quite a bit on kind of numbers, and you know the- the frequency ranges and kind of the characteristics and capabilities of the equipment. Which ended up not being that important, but that's what they taught anyways. (24.08) Interviewer: Okay alright and then having finished this do you now get assigned to a unit? Or do you have more training? �Yeah, no I was- I ended up graduating first in the class. So, I had gotten a meritorious promotion to Lance Corporal and then I also got to pick, first pick a duty station. So, they get the list of all the duty stations and I get to take a pick, and I ended up picking a unit in Japan. And it's kind of all they gave us; was you go to Japan, you go to the east coast, you go to the west coast. At the last minute they actually gave me the option to go to Cuba, to Guantanamo Bay for a year and I passed it up. I had wanted to go to Japan, I thought that'd be a good time there. Interviewer: Alright and so that is where you went then? Yes. Interviewer: Okay and now what unit were you assigned to there? And when I got there, I was assigned to 1st Stinger Battery or 1st LAD (low altitude air defense) I think they're interchangeable for the most part. But so, it's a part of the Air Wing and they focus on intercepting low-flying aircraft and to shoot them down essentially. And I think I went there with five other guys that were in the radio operators’ course with me. We all got to the unit at the same time. Interviewer: Okay now where was the unit based? That was on Futenma on Okinawa. Interviewer: Okay, alright and now can you kind of describe what that base was like and what you were doing? (25.37) Yeah so, the so Futenma was the airbase so mostly air wings. So, on Japan they had Camp Butler I think is the system of camps that they have. Interviewer: Yeah. �On Okinawa and so down the road was Foster, and then they had Schwab up north, and they had a bunch of other places and it kind of depended on what you did. So, the Air Wing was on Futenma and they had the air- airstrip there. Foster was the logistics so if you were you know the service support guy you were on Foster and if you were infantry you were probably get with Schwab somewhere. But for- for us it kind of was a we ended up picking up a day-to-day routine with training and stuff. We, our barracks was on one side of the flight line and they had a bus system that would- that would kind of shuttle back and forth. We’d hop on the bus and we'd have to be back after PT in the morning our physical training in the morning. We generally every day do 3 to 5 mile run or something like that. And so, I was attached to the headquarters. It was a company sized unit, and I was attached to headquarters in the in the comm shop and they had two platoons of gunners. And I believe, you know 30 to 40 people are gunners in each of the platoons and they would attach radio operators to the platoons as needed. So, usually there'd be one or two radio operators assigned to a platoon and if they were gonna go out to do some sort of training or something like that they might attach one or two more. And I mean our day to day was you know maintenance on the radios, stocking the platoons with the radios that they needed, and things like that if they were doing training exercise. And then we do our own training and stuff when we were able, so, setting up antennas and… Interviewer: And would you sometimes go out with the platoons on their exercises or did you just stay in the headquarters? (27.41) Well we would go out usually for the most part, well so, the platoons went out and did some independent training, for the most part it was the- the company would do company-wide training. On Okinawa it's difficult to get, there's-there’s limited training areas and stuff so when they do �get a training area it's usually the whole company going, and it’d usually be for about a week or so that we'd go out. And that would you know maybe once every couple months we'd go out and do something like that. And you know we'd set up the headquarters radio command posts with radios and stuff we'd sit there and monitor radios and we set up a rotating watch. And because we had the field phones, we had all of, so all of our radios were remote access, so we'd have our wire running to our remote sets and then our antennas and the actual radio systems. You know sometimes a half-mile away and we'd have field phones running so we can communicate between the two. And then we'd be handling traffic from the gunners and they’d mostly do practice with spotting aircraft so someone would call in saying, “hey there's an aircraft flying this direction.” And they'd have to identify it and they'd call and report it and then engage or disengage or something like that. Interviewer: Okay now do you have a sense of what all of this was directed toward? Was there a likely enemy in mind? Is it the Chinese there or not really sure? (29:25) That was kind of a, one of the points that had kind of been in discussion especially with a lot of the officers and stuff was kind of the relevance of the Stingers. Mostly because in most theaters the US has air superiority so it's not like anyone's gonna be flying aircraft through. And then there was a number of other you know missile systems that could be employed to that effect also. So, and I believe they actually, they may have disbanded them altogether by now. I know there had been talk about that, you know, and I think it kind of goes back to kind of the you know the Cold War era. You know Russian enemy or Chinese enemy kind of the big powers and stuff were the US may not necessarily have air superiority. �Interviewer: Yeah so, it's really a traditional weapon system in some ways, or at least one geared toward a conventional war. Yes. Interviewer: Yeah okay now how long did you wind up staying in Okinawa? I was there for two years and that's generally how long a- a tour is gonna be in Okinawa if you are, if you, if you're married and are doing an unaccompanied tour than they do one-year tours. I did two years and while I was there, I think towards my last, in my second year I was ended up getting attached to the 31st MEU. So, I was assigned to one of the platoons and that platoon was, or there was a detachment made from one of the platoons and then I was attached to the… (31.12) Interviewer: Okay you said 31st MEU, what does MEU mean? Marine Expeditionary Unit so essentially, it's a helo deck carrier and then they have two other ships that go along with it and we pretty much toward the South Pacific, doing training. I think the, one of the- the notable things is, we were actually pulling into I believe Subic Bay in the Philippines; I think it's in the Philippines and we were supposed actually it was just I think it's supposed to be a Liberty port they were going in for and as we were pulling up we were inches away and we started backing up, there was a mudslide in Leyte. So, we moved went over there and we helped with relief efforts there and that was I think the- the most notable event that we participated in with that MEU. Interviewer: Okay and then when that was going on, the relief effort was going on, what were you doing? So what we ended up doing we were in charge of the landing zone, so they had the- the mud site area where they were digging for survivors and I believe there's a school that had, the whole �village I think was- was engulfed with mud and just outside of that area they had set up a landing zone in one of the- the villages right next to it and we were landing in helicopters for you know food and water and that kind of stuff. Actually there was a… one of the locals there was a retired navy, and owned a number of houses in the Philippines and he opened up his house which was just across from the landing zone that we had and allowed us to use that as the headquarters for the- the humanitarian mission. But we would be out in the field you know monitoring the radios, landing and helicopters I think we had space depending on the aircraft a 53's we can land one at a time. 46s we could land two at a time, that's kind of the space we had. Yeah that's what I was doing for the most part. (33.39) Interviewer: Okay now when you were on Okinawa did you get off the base very much and go anywhere? We did, at that time we could get off the base, right now I think they're pretty much not allowed to go anywhere in Okinawa. They had a Liberty card system at the time so when you get there you have a red card which means you have to be back by midnight and normally you have that for a year unless you're a corporal then you could be… there's all kinds of rules and it depends on the unit you're with, kind of what they allow. But I eventually got my gold card then I could go out 24 hours and that kind of remained, there was some, sometimes someone would do something on one of the bases and then they would pull everyone’s liberty cards so we had to stay and that usually lasted about a week or so and then they'd reissue cards. But yeah, I got to go out quite a bit mostly the areas outside of Futenma and Foster. I think my second year one of my buddies had gotten a car and so we were able to kind of travel around the island a bit more. �Interviewer: Okay now at times there's been a lot of tension between American military personnel at Okinawa and the locals. I mean were you aware of that at the time or was any of that going on? (34.59) I mean so areas right- right outside of base were- were very accommodating for the military mostly because they were businesses and they relied on military. Interviewer: Right. And you know I don't, I didn't feel any- any tension or anything with the locals. Now there were places you go, and they said no Americans can go no gaijin, but I didn't feel that was a tension thing I- I felt that was more kind on their want to preserve kind of what they got going on. And it wasn't that there was, they didn't want us there they just didn't want us at their place of business or whatever. But you know most people I you know spoke to especially the younger people going on the bars and stuff we talked to the locals and you know I never felt that there was any kind of animosity or anything. (36.08) Interviewer: I guess a lot of it may have been at times of all the problems where the American personnel does sort of misbehaving or getting drunk or other things like that. Rather than things being really directed to happen by the locals, so if you were nice, they were nice and. Yeah there were and at times were protests right outside of the base and something like that and that would usually be you know you know you know be for a day or two that would go on. You know, and I’d always… so I had heard that this was that a lot of the push to get the- the basis out was not necessarily from Okinawa itself but from mainland Japan. �Interviewer: Yeah. Not wanting the Americans there but the Okinawans actually preferred it, and I think it was a lot had to do with the economy and stuff because there was the US personnel brought all this money in and you know imagine, I can imagine them closing down all the bases there and then pretty much all the businesses right outside of the bases are gonna be have to shut down because they won't have any business. Interviewer: Alright okay so once you get through that that first or two years assignment, what do you get next? From there I get assigned to two- five and so by that time I had actually contacted my- my monitor which assigns where people go and I told him, well I want to go infantry because… and I want to go to the, a unit that's going to be deploying soon. You know I had hoped that I would have, would deploy and I got the 31st MEU and that’s somewhat of a deployment but you know Iraq was going on, there were people in Iraq. And that's kind of where I wanted to go so, I told the monitor I want to go to the next you know that's going to be deploying. So, I end up getting assigned to two- five which is in Camp Pendleton, San Mateo which is north of Camp Pendleton and I get there and you know they're pretty much on a deployment cycle; where they will deploy for seven months and they have I think about twelve months that they're back to rest, refit, and then get ready for another deployment it's kind of the cycle that they're on. And by that time, we were the- the build-up was just starting. So, actually we ended up deploying in 2000… the beginning of 2007 and that's I think we were kind of the, one of the initial units for deployment when they're trying to expand the- the areas. We ended up deploying to Ramadi and we took over an- an army units AO and then we actually got a smaller portion of what they were covering �and then other units’ kind of filled in the gaps. So, they were putting more units in that one space. (38.52) Interviewer: Alright is this part of what got referred to as “the surge” where the number of American ground troops was getting expanded? Yes. Interviewer: Alright now how do they, so I guess what sort of preparation do you get for going over to Iraq? Well this units gearing up to go, what's happening? So for us it was a lot of, we do so they- they for the battalion they do training phases and it's, I mean it was like that for the MEU too because we did training buildups for that where you work on individual training, and then you do unit level, and then you do company, and then battalion level, and then before you go on the MEU then you do a MEU exercise where it's everyone working together to train and qualify for the MEU. For- for two- five that was the same kind of thing, so individual training making sure you have your rifle qual, your- your PFTs up, and you're your individual, then you focusing on your- your squad or your company, training exercises and then eventually you'll start doing battalion exercises. And then we do culminating events in Twentynine Palms so we're going to go back to Twentynine Palms, yay. And do Mojave Viper which is a month-long exercise in the desert where they have mock villages and stuff like that and in that they also do kind of the, that kind of training where you start with platoon levels then company and then battalion level exercises within that month. (40.23) Interviewer: Okay and was this geared specifically for Iraq at that point? �It was yeah it was- it was, they had native speakers there in mock villages doing patrols and they, by that time they had I believe they were doing the like simulated explosions and stuff and they'd have makeup teams out there you know doing injuries stuff like that. So, they I mean they at that time they were trying to make it is it's realistic as possible to prepare specifically for Iraq. Interviewer: Okay now had your unit deployed to Iraq already? Had they been there? Yes, so the unit a lot of the guys had already been to Iraq in 2006 they were there so they were on the previous cycle and 2006 was a really intense time for Iraq. Especially in Ramadi where a lot of the heaviest fighting was. So, there was a number of guys that had had combat experience and kind of had gone through that day-to-day routine and yeah. So, there was there was, there was a lot of veterans, you know in the units that we are with. So, it was it was pretty veteran heavy going in. (41.49) Interviewer: Alright now how do they get you out to Iraq? We, so we think it was I want to say Anderson, which is in- just is it north of Pendleton we would bus up there and then we take a commercial flight over to - I think Bangor, Maine and then we hop on other flights into Kuwait, and then from Kuwait we bus to a receiving base there, and that's where we get our ammo and a lot of other stuff. I think they give us like three days for acclimatization for the weather and stuff and then from there we ended up we end up I think c-17 it was either c-17 or c-130 into Iraq. And I'm not sure which base we flew in, but we flew into one of those bases and then from there we take helicopters into whatever subbase were going into and stuff like that. Interviewer: Okay so then where do you wind up getting sent to? (42.57) �So we get, we get sent to Ramadi and we're pretty much a sign to the- the- the city itself so when I got there, so when I when I got there I was assigned to Headquarters Company I was, or headquarter… yeah headquarters company I was with the comm shop and weapons company each of the companies had radio operators assigned to them, weapons company being having the most radio systems because they have our mobile, they would have more radio operators, well one of the radio operators broke their arm the weekend before they deployed. So, they were down a man and I actually talked to my lieutenant I said I was- I was a corporal at the time and I talked to my lieutenant I said, “hey if there's a slot for one of the companies that's where I want to go.” And when we got into country, he- he asked me if I still wanted to go and I said yes so, I end up getting assigned to weapons company where I was the company radio operator. There was someone that was the company operator before me, but I took over his spot because I was senior. Interviewer: Right. So we get there and we're in charge of southern Ramadi so we got the it’s actually considered, I think it's in one of the poor sections of Ramadi, the south west and then the there's farmland to the south that’s kind of, you have city and the farmland is essentially how it is split up. (44.31) Interviewer: Alright okay now weapons company what kind of weapon systems do they have? So, weapons company: heavy machine guns so 50-cals, mark 19's which I actually don't think they even took out because using grenade, machine grenade launchers is probably not the- the thing they wanted to do. Interviewer: Right. �So, 50-cals for the most part. In a lot of ways, so they were in charge of the area operations, but they also ran a logistics through, to other companies and stuff because they had all the- the vehicles. Now when we got to Ramadi, we took over for an army unit, and they did, they didn't do any dismounted patrols, all their patrols were mounted patrol. Interviewer: Okay. And this was, so this was right before they… you know I guess the- the sheiks in the area decided, “hey we should stop fighting the Americans and kind of start cooperating.” And I think that happened about a month maybe a month and a half into our deployment is when that transition took place, because it actually when we got there- there was still quite a bit of fighting going on and then about a month and a half into it everything just kind of stopped. And so, we were- but when we got in, we were said we're gonna do dismounted patrols that way we can engage with the- the populace and stuff and have a stronger presence in the city. And we ended up, we also did, so the army units also had one main base and that was pretty much it and then we broke down all of our companies into platoons and had them occupy buildings. So, we occupied a CPO… Iron, I believe it was called, and in the southwest it was like a compound, building compound that we, the headquarters controlled and then down the road there was two other outposts that we also controlled for weapons company alone and then each of the other companies also did that, so there would be I think Falcon was another cop that they had and they broke out into other outposts or platoon would- would find an abandoned building and they pretty much set that up as a compound. So, they're more dispersed throughout the city, covering larger areas. (46.55) �Interviewer: Yeah and it was sort of part of the logic of the sort of strategy was to get into the community, make connections, show your presence and then stay there and not just stay hidden here vehicles or in the big bases. Yeah no we were doing daily patrols out in the community and stuff, some days we would actually get, we do…. So, we do clearing operations and if we did clearing operations so we'd go through and pretty much search you know entire sections of the city that we- we covered and if we were doing that we'd also coincide that with food and water supplies. So, we'd bring in food and water supplies so wherever handing out food and water to kind of get people to come out of their houses so we can go in there and search the houses, essentially is what we're doing and you know bags of flour and rice that kind of stuff we would be handing out. We’d coordinate with the community leaders and let them know what was going on so they can organize how they wanted to distribute the food and stuff because- so there wasn't like a mad rick rack for food. And a lot of it was like large bags of flour or stuff like that and they would know best how-to kind of distribute that to their village and stuff. (48.08) Interviewer: Alright now you mentioned at the beginning there was still a lot of fighting going on, I mean was that, were your people getting directly engaged and was there, were there casualties or? We do not have any casualties, I'm trying to, I think. I think we had I think we might have had one guy in the battalion that stepped out an IED and lost a leg, but I think that we had no, no deaths with the time we were there. You know with fighting and stuff there'd be fire fights you know it was kind of difficult, because and that was one of the things that was most difficult I think when there was fighting going on, is that a lot of the fighting was from it they'd shoot from �a distance and they'd move so it was hard to identify where firing was coming from. And when we were going in it was all about hearts and minds and so it was, if you can't identify the target then don't shoot in that direction and that's kind of what we, had been harped on us is you have to identify what you're shooting at before you start shooting. So, if you get shots and you look in that direction and you're looking where you think you hear it coming from you start trying to find it by that time they're- they're moving to another location and shooting from there, so you're kind of trying to figure out where this firing is coming from. So that was one of the difficult things, a lot of times you’d get pop shots going on a patrol you'd get a couple of shots and then you'd hear nothing at all after that and- and that was for the most part. And even after the, a lot of the fighting stopped and you know- you know once a week or so you'd get shots if you're doing a mounted convoy, you might get shots that you're the convoy from a distance and again you couldn't identify where a single shot’s coming from. And you just kind of look around and throw your hands up and say, oh I guess we’re just gonna keep moving. Interviewer: Okay what impression did you have of the Iraqi civilians in the area to the extent that you saw them? (50.24) The area we were at, a lot of poor people. You know, the-the further in the city there were a lot of nice buildings and stuff. The buildings we were at kind of bare bones you know single room kind of shack looking buildings. They’re all concrete buildings out in the- the- the rural area which it was kind of like here’s a city, here's a rural area there was some more makeshift stuff going on. But yeah mostly poor, so after we had started building up out there, we also started, that's when they started implementing the Iraqi army, Iraqi police and we had our “mitt and pit” teams for police training and the army training. And pretty much what the deal was- was stop �fighting the Americans and joined the police or the army and so it seemed that it was, it was a money thing. I had talked we had… so we had a MiTT team which is the military advising and training team, and we had a section on our, on cop iron that was for the Iraqi army where they would come in and do training and stuff. And I talked to some of those Iraqis and you know, we asked them, “so oh you know what you’d do…” They just joined the army, “but what’d you do before then?” It's like oh “we were placing IEDs on the road, you know a week ago.” And you know it just seemed that the- the thing was it wasn't about you know, they had some sort of hatred for anyone it was mostly a money thing, they would get paid to go put in IEDs. Now they're getting paid to be in the Iraqi army. So, and it was another thing with the Iraqi army and Iraqi police the so the Iraqi police were generally local from the area, and the Iraqi army was generally from, could be from all locations. All over Iraq and they- they relocate them and stuff. So, you'd get that Shia/ Sunni tension between, because a lot of times the- the local population would be one and they'd be importing via the Iraqi army, the opposite group. So, there were tensions between and I'm pretty sure there were shots fired between Iraqi army and Iraqi police on several occasions, that kind of thing going on. So, there's I mean when you have someone that you talked to and they're saying that they used to plant IEDs and you know there's a, and by that time I think there was already reports on friendly fire between Iraqi army, Iraqi police, and US forces so it's you know- you know you'd never kind of never let your guard down even when you're supposed to be on the same side kind of thing. (53.31) Interviewer: Now did you also have interpreters assigned to you that were…? We had, so the, there were interpreters with the unit and the- the MiTT team, MiTT teams they obviously had interpreters. I speak, I spoke every once in a while, to interpreters but for the most �part I didn't do a whole lot of engaging with the local population for the most part. We do, I was the company RO(radio operator) so if our company commander went on and needed to do a meeting with local sheikh or whatever we'd have an interpreter go with us and he would wander off, that's how our company commander was, he would wander off onto a patrol, and he’d just grabbed his stuff and say, “hey we're gonna, we need to do this meeting.” And he just start walking off and while we're like prepping for an actual patrol, because we're the military he would just kind of walk to wherever he's going and we would have to patrol around him because he would be walking and he'd be like, let's go this way now, and kind of divert where ever he wanted to go. (54:45) Interviewer: Okay how effective a commander was he? I mean I think- I think he was I think he was fine you know, maybe a little arrogant in that way. You know he, we would all be suited up and stuff flak and Kevlar and he would be walk out and he'd take his Kevlar of kind of wander around and, checking you know things out, and you know-- you know he seemed to be a great guy. I talked to him on several occasions he wasn't a you know a hard-ass or anything, but the same, at the same time it's kind of one of those things were you know I've always been kind of ‘lead by example’ kind of thing. It's like you want you guys to wear their flak and Kevlars, you should probably wear your flak and Kevlar when you're going out, and you know, luckily nothing happened. I mean at the time IEDs were out mostly targeting vehicles. You know it wasn't to the point where we were using you know metal detectors or anything like that, so it wasn't that serious in threat but you know those things had happened before and it was kind of one of those things like you know, you are the commander you should probably be in line you know with the patrol and stuff like that you know. Or at least �let the point man know you're gonna be diverting because our point man would be going forward and he'd have to keep turning around to make sure that he was going the direction the commander was going which was just a pain because we’d have to yell out, “hey point man we're turning left now.” Interviewer: Alright now what- what kind of living conditions did you have there? (56.30) So, we were occupying these pretty much blown up buildings, there was a lot of rubble, damage, they had rigged up lighting, electrical systems, and they were run on generators. The- the building I occupied, they had brought in you know beds, little twin sized beds that we slept on, if I got sleep. I was actually doing a lot, quite a lot because I was, I was the radio operator, so I automatically made me an electrician also, so anything that was a machine I had to do some work on. So, frequently the lighting system would get jacked up or someone want to put in new lighting so I'd have to grab lights and wire and try to rig something and I'm not the best with electricity I'm kind of afraid of electricity because it can hurt you and I got shocked a number times doing that. Yeah, we… and I it was me… we had a data guy with us because we were running Sipper and Nipper net which is the pretty much the Internet service out there. We had a satellite dish that we'd point and get, so we were able to get internet out there on a small scale anyways for- for operations stuff. So, we had a guy running that in case it went down and then we had people kind of come and go depending on what they did, we kind of were a transient space that we occupied. We had a head guy which is a human intelligence guy came out and was doing operations out of there for a while, we had a wrecker guy that stayed with us for quite a while, there, we had started getting more IED strikes on vehicles so the- the location we were at was best to have him operate out of and because we had actually, we were running all the �convoys so any logistics convoys we'd run. So, they had the wrecker there because he could jump, they can organize the logistics convoy and he could jump on there. Interviewer: Okay and how well-fortified was the compound? (58.51) It was pretty, I mean the compound was walled and then they you know as we were there, as we were building on what was there before us. So, there was already cement structures in some locations as we were there longer, they were building even more so we get more concrete barriers. We'd put those up these giant T barriers we had guard posts at different locations and they would you know the- the battalion XO would come by and say, “let's raise this roof,” and we'd have to take the roof off and throw more sandbags on it and make it taller you know so, it was pretty well fortified. While we were- while we were in the compound flak and Kevlar we can walk around pretty much at ease, for the most part. I did antennas and stuff so all my antennas were on the roof and if anything happened I'd go up there and I'm supposed to have a flak and Kevlar but most times I want because climbing a building and maneuvering antennas with the flak and Kevlar is really a pain butt. I think we I've gotten pop shots up there are several times I don't think anything landed close anyways, but I mean it was- it was nerve-racking because it was on the top of one of the biggest buildings in the in the area, so standing out thereyou know maneuvering this antenna which stretches another 30 feet in the air you know, you kind of saying please shoot me. Interviewer: Right, okay now did they have air conditioning on a base like this anywhere or was it all just... open? (1:00.00) �I- I think they did have a see unit set where they were getting- getting in. I know- I know the second tour in Iraq they had AC units I don't… I think we had to the AC unit I think they had the AC units by then. Interviewer: And where those just be in places where you had to have computer equipment or were they sleeping areas or…? The so the- the COC the command center they would have AC there. I don't recall if our room had AC, I think it did and the ACs would go a lot of times, so they have to be replaced often and because the dust, you know they just mal function, they break down. So, you'd have it for a while, bus and you’d have to try to figure something out. So, I think we ended up at least halfway through I think we ended up getting air conditioning units, I mean you know I didn't spend a whole lot of time in the- the living space. I mean a lot of people talk about downtime and stuff like that but I tried, I stayed busy I was up so I was the- the radio operator for the company, weapons company which had the ability to maneuver around the whole AO pretty easily because we had vehicles. So, I was running all, running on all the logistics convoys and those would occur every day, every other day. I do patrols with the, any company commander, any patrol’s company commander went on I was a part of that but I also was, did any wrecker runs any time there was an ID strike and they need to send a wrecker out there to recover the vehicle. I'd run those and then any time communications that they needed, someone needed support at one of the other out post I'd do a, have to jump, I'd pretty much go into the COC, “who's on patrol right now. Hey, call them tell them to swing by here and take me over to this other location.” And fix that and that was for our company but also for the other companies because I was senior than some of the other radio operators and in some of the other companies. I frequently get requests to �go over to other companies and help them with their communications. So, I would be doing that also, so I pretty much, if something was going on, I was trying to be involved in it. Interviewer: Okay so how much sleep did you get? (1:02.50) I didn't get a lot of sleep and then I mean on top of that when I did get sleep there was a field phone from the COC to my room in case communications went down in the COC because I'd also have to maintain those communications. I mean luckily I didn't have to stand radio watch in the COC they had the- the platoons did rotating shifts they would have a platoon that was patrolling, a platoon that was in a- in kind of work and party mode, and then you have another that was kind of on a, you know relaxed schedule. And they'd rotate through those so that they had those maintained but if it went down and a lot of times they'd call and say, “hey, the radios not working.” Well it’s like, “did you change the batteries?” And they'd say “no.” It's like, “well change the batteries and then gave me a call.” And they change the batteries and they’d call and say, “everything's fine.” But I mean I’d get calls like that; you know all hours of the night also so. (1:03.53) Interviewer: Okay the you mentioned the- the dust being a problem for the air conditioners, did it cause problems for other stuff too? Yeah, I mean radios is one of those things, clean connections and stuff like that. You know they'd be one of those things where I get- I get calls about radios and stuff and it's like well you need to clean them. You need to take them out and clean the port's we'd go through handsets quite a, quite often just because the dust and everything. Weapons would have to be cleaned on a regular basis, the m16. We were… so we had the M16A2 and they are not the best when- when �dirty. They have to be regularly cleaned, so that was another thing with the dust. You know and our base they had, they like a receive, a staging area for vehicles and they had what they call moon dust, was the very fine powder and it would be about a you know a half foot to a foot deep and you'd be trudging through this- this thin powder. That stuff gets everywhere and if the wind picks up and it blows it everywhere, and then you know in the off chance that it rains and then you're walking around and you know foot of mud and you know caking your boots and stuff like that. (1:05.17) Interviewer: Okay now over the course, so how long was that tour? That was seven months. Interviewer: Okay now over the course of that time did you feel like you had made progress or were accomplishing the mission? Or did it seem like you're just going in circles? It sort of seemed… it's hard to tell because you know, they by the time we left we had the- the Iraqi police and Iraqi army in the area. Where pretty much up and running I mean there are problems here and there definitely. We had also started working on public works projects and stuff like that, so employing people to clean the streets that kind of thing. So, I mean there was a progress in that regard, but at the same time it's hard to tell from where I was at anyways. You know by the time I was just in my routine. Interviewer: Right. You know trying to get things done. Interviewer: So, you're just there and doing your job and not worrying too much about bigger picture. �Yeah at that-that time in my career big picture was not on my- my radar for the most part. It was just yeah; I got a job to do and this is what I'm doing. Interviewer: Alright so now we get kind of late in 2007 that tour comes to an end. Are there any other particular events or incidents or things from that first tour that kind of stand out for you that you haven't talked about yet? (1:06.43) No, well so there was, you know I don't know the Battle of Donkey Island which was this island in the south of the city, and they had gotten reports, intelligence reports like 50 enemies occupying this- this reed covered island. Which it wasn't a big island, I don't even know if 50 people could possibly occupy the place, but they had worked on clearing the brush from there and then they did like a company push through the area. And I believe it was on like the fourth of July or the third of July, it was right around the fourth of July and it was I think like a hundred and forty degrees out and they decided to do this in the middle of the day. And we do this push across this- this you know farmland and they have vehicles kind of behind following up and we’re like on-line, you know trying to push out this area. No engagement at all and I think we lost more people, not we didn't lose them, but more people went down from heat exhaustion that day than anything. I mean but I mean it was they had, we had air on station so like that. We had you know a lot of support on this mission and I don't think anything really came of it for the most part. (1:08.15) Interviewer: So, some somebody somewhere was pulling your leg. Yeah, I guess I was like what is going on here? �Interviewer: That but okay alright so now late 2007 now you rotate back home and at this point do you have about one year left on your original enlistment? Or had you already decided to stay in or? Yeah so when I was in- in Iraq I talked my, my I'm trying to think… I ended up talking to my monitor at some point in time when I was in Iraq and I might have been, I might have had emailed him or was talking to a third party or something but I had been communicating to him because my enlistment was coming up. And actually, they were doing reenlistment bonuses at that point, so I was definitely going to reenlist because I think I got like $30,000 for reenlistment and again I told them you know, I want to get back here as soon as possible. This is while I was in Iraq still and so I want to go to the next unit that’s pulling. Actually, one of the ANGLICO, I think it was first ANGLICO was actually doing operations in our area for a week or so and they were actually staying in our building. And I had been talking to them so I talked to the monitor and I said, “hey well you know what's up with these guys, can I go here?” He said, “yeah it's like well which one you want to go to?” Because they have first, second, third and fourth ANGLICO, I think and they’re on different locations and he said that first ANGLICO was going to be deploying again soon. They’re pretty much on a, an on/ off deployment cycle so they go for seven months, they're back for seven months, they go, and they kind of going back and forth that way. It's like, well that's where I want to go and so I had gotten orders there while I was in Iraq to go there. So, I got back and was with two five for maybe a couple more months and then I move it first ANGLICO was actually just down the road so. Interviewer: Okay so back at Camp Pendleton? Yeah. Interviewer: Okay now explain what ANGLICO is. �(1:10.32) So, Air Naval Gunfire Liaison Company. Interviewer: Okay. They do fire support so surface fires and air support mostly there, I think 50% of the unit is officers and we get pilots, no blows which are naval gun officers in some sort, and artillery officers, and infantry officers, and they run teams and they do small teams that they're primarily working with foreign militaries or units that do not have- that need the, our capabilities or the US capabilities that don't have them. Or like Special Forces units, US Special Forces units that need a specialized air support. They need someone dedicated for air sport because that's all we do so and we work and they have small teams so generally four or five main teams and they have two or three of them assigned to a section, and then like two or three of those assigned to a platoon, and then three- two of those in the company, in the headquarters company. And I got there I was assigned to a, a fire team or a fire power control team which was a, we had five-man teams by then. So, it's two forward observers or two scout observers, radio operator and a- an officer of some sort. So, four people actually and our officer was a FAT pilot. Yeah and we do we help provide fire support so that's all we kind of train on. Interviewer: Now then, when you join in with Camp Pendleton are you kind of gearing up for the next rotation over to Iraq? (1:12.39) Yeah when I get there, they're already kind of in the stages of a preparation. They had already, they already knew where they were going to be going, or that they're gonna be going because they get all the units get detached to other units throughout the area. So, there- there's no like central like everyone's in this area. They're all over, so Iraq and Iraq it’d be all over Iraq �disbursed and they don't run a, a traditional workup or training plan for Iraq like the infantry battalions do with Mojave Viper and kind of that kind of thing. They do whatever training with who they're going to be working with. I'm trying to think, I'm not sure what we did for… oh yeah, I'm not sure what we did for our workup, we might have gone to Twentynine Palms for, for some sort of exercise, but I don't remember going with them. We had to have done something though. Interviewer: Alright about how long did you have between deployments? (1:14.02) I think it was a year no- no so October I got back and then I went back in March, so October, November, December, January, February, March; five months. Interviewer: Okay yes so not- not too long a time necessarily to just hang around and have that much of a routine necessarily well you’re there. Alright, now why had you been eager to go back as soon as possible? There was, I mean that's why I joined for the most part, so that's why I wanted to do, and you know with, with a deployment there's, it kind of simplifies things. I mean when you're back you got bills and you've got family and friends you're dealing with. In Iraq or even Afghanistan, you just worry about the mission and you know it, things are a little clearer in that way. And you're just busy and you know I enjoy doing that, I was doing my job. I was doing what I had, I signed up to do. Interviewer: So okay now were you married at this time or? No- no. (1:15.21) Interviewer: Okay you probably ought to know what year you got married. �Well I had, a I'm actually, I was married twice so. Interviewer: Okay, alright. There was another marriage in there. Interviewer: Alright and so you've got the better name of you but still there was there, was enough life intervening when your back home that you notice that kind of thing okay. Alright so now going back over then, second time so now what year is that 08 you're going over? Yes. Interviewer: Okay is it the same process as before or do you do something different? No, the in process is pretty much the same. We ended up flying into Kuwait, we stayed there, we get our ammunition, and stuff like that. You know what was the big difference was, I was we were instead of being in Ramadi we were in northern, northwest Iraq so I ended up… our firepower control team was assigned to an Iraqi army unit. I think a battalion north of Al Qayn, which was I think was like 40 kilometers north and it was just kind of in the middle of nowhere they built this kind of base out there and our, their mission was to control traffic or stop AlQaeda from moving from, between Syria and Iraq. So, we were pretty much doing patrols in open desert you know nothing for miles and miles. So, we were doing all, everything was mounted we would drive out and a lot of times we would do two or three day patrols out into the desert. And we'd be attached with, so we, there was a MiTT-team which was helping advise andand train the Iraqi army and then there's us and we were attached to the Iraqi army to provide air support for the most part because there's no artillery out there or anything. It was all air support, so we’d get air on station at different times and we'd scope out places of possible interest before we went out into the area. �Interviewer: Okay and were you finding much? (1:14.43) No, no we would get tips on caches and things like that, so we found a number of weapons caches. A lot of them were really old weapons caches so I'm assuming that the people who told us about him probably put them there in the first place a long time ago and that's why they knew they were there. You know that would- that would happen frequently where we'd get tips on IEDs because that was another thing because we'd have to go down maybe once a month we'd go down to Al Qayn, which was, you know a 40 kilometer movement to get down there to the city so we can resupply, getting you know repairs on vehicles, and that kind of thing. And you know we'd have people that would, Iraqis that would point out IEDs and stuff and a lot of times I'd be like well how the heck did you know that that was there? It's like there was no indicator you know and it's not on the beaten path, it's not like you're wandering behind you- you know sitting in front of you. It's like off to the side somewhere that you wouldn’t know unless you actually place it there. So I mean we'd come into that quite a bit, you know we're pretty sure a lot of people that are spotting these actually had placed in there at some point or another and just knew that they were there, and I think the same was for the weapons caches for the most part. So yeah, we'd and we'd stop we'd drive right through the desert. We'd stop and talk to the locals a lot of bad winds out there so you know people would pile up their tents. There was camel trade so they had caravans that would go back and forth and we'd stop and there'd be hundreds of camels and moving by, and so we'd wait and we'd stop and talk to the whoever was running the caravan, you know and they'd always asked, “do you want to ride the camel?” it's like “no we don’t want to ride the camel but thank you.” But yeah not a whole lot going on out there. (1:19.45) �Interviewer: And what impression did you have of the Iraqi army that you were with? You know so the, some of the officers that had been around a while, some of the senior guys, they had been around for a long time and they were, you know most likely were fighting when they were, you know fighting Iran. So, they had been around a while. A lot of the new guys you know, not a whole, not a lot of discipline that's for sure. And that was one of the things, by that time they had- you had some guys you know had cell phones and they'd be sitting there and we were doing some training or something out and people would be on cell phones and stuff and it's like you know… Interviewer: It’s like teaching a class. (1:20.34) Yeah but, you know and some… but some of the senior guys and stuff they- they would be hesitant to take advice and stuff like that, it's like you know, they had been around the block and they don't need our advice kind of thing. You know some would be more accepting, but yeah, I mean I, on the lower levels I don't think a lot of them took it seriously. I think it was a paycheck for them and they were coming to get paid for the most part and they were trying to stay out of harm's way as much as possible. Interviewer: But at this stage there wasn't a whole lot of harm necessarily. Yeah no not- not where we, where we were at. Interviewer: Okay now aside from the Bedouins do you see any civilians or only in the town or? No not really, there was a few towns that we would go through mostly on our way to Al Qayn because it was a larger town, I think the they had a train station, a power plant right outside of there. But there's small villages and stuff we’d pass through along the way, so we'd see civilians, �but we weren't engaging with those because that was not part of the area that we were covering we were just transiting through. So, no real engagement with the Iraqis at this point. Interviewer: Now this time around did you have any more of a sense of so, the larger scope with a war or what was happening or were you again just kind of doing your job and not worrying about the rest of it? (1:22.09) No I mean I- I knew, I had been, I mean I had been following the news for- for the most part and- and I knew, I mean I knew it when the- the previous deployment we were doing the surge that this was part of the surge and that's kind of what we were. And I knew at the second deployment that we were at a point where a lot of the fighting had kind of just died off in that way. A lot of the, actually so a lot of it went from engaging in the city and stuff and just focusing on so IEDs and IED makers were the largest threat and they were getting better at making IEDs and making more powerful, which is why the military was starting to transition over to the MRAPs over the Humvees and we had Humvees at that time and I think they had just started implementing the- the mine the mine-resistant vehicles because they were making IEDs that could blow up Humvees and so you know. So I understood that that was, that was going on that the threats were kind of changing and it seemed everything that we were doing you know there was some sort of response to it and then we'd have to, it’s kind of back and forth they figure something out – to get past our defenses or you know– to hit us and then we figure out a way to prevent it and then they figure something new to get around that. So, I mean with I- I mean IEDs was always, has always been like a progressive thing where you know, they go from remote, they go from wire command detonation, to remote control detonation where they have cell phones or the Motorola base stations connected to these wireless phones that had like extremely �long distances they can do, and then we started implementing you know the Chameleon Defender systems which would block radio signals around the vehicles so it’d create a bubble so if they, you know press the button the radio signal wouldn’t get to the- the IED they're trying to detonate. But then they'd go back to, they you know try pressure plate ones again or they do a combination of remote and wire command, you know they were getting better at making homemade explosives so they were starting to add additional chemicals into their explosives to make them more powerful or they, you know depending on who they were targeting whether their personnel, IEDs, or you know for vehicles stuff like that. And this, by the time they’re also doing a lot of secondary stuff, so they'd have an initial blast and then they'd have secondary ones off to the side. So these were threats we were all aware of, where we were at, the you know the biggest threat was going into Al Qayn because it was you know became a large going, into a more urban area and there was quite a bit of traffic on the roads we were traveling. We were, our thing in Iraq anyways it was drive as fast as you can, and hopefully the blast will leave you behind. Or you will leave the blast behind kind of thing, so we were pushing you know 55- 60 miles an hour down roads to get we were going. In Afghanistan everything was like four or five miles an hour. Anytime you traveled anywhere it was really slow because you'd have IEDs were much bigger there and it was, you'd have EOD teams and route clearance teams in front of you which would do a snail's pace to get anywhere. (1:26.14) Interviewer: Alright, okay so with Iraq on some level in a conventional sense you sort of had the- the upper hand, but there was still an enemy out there. They were still active, there was still threats. Yes. �Interviewer: Okay alright and again with this- with this second tour again are there particular aspects of that standout for you or distinctive? No, I mean so I think there was a- a murder of some official while we were out there. So, we went to investigate, the Iraqi police went there and did their investigation, but we went to- to assist with that in some capacity. You know I don't remember a whole lot, I, actually no I think we were- we were doing- we were doing a patrol in the desert and we came across, because out on the outskirts towards the border they had like a border teams out there, and the border team was investigating some murder. And so, we’d get to this compound in the middle of the desert kind of area, and there were all these essentially police vehicles out there. So we stopped in to see what was going on and it ended up being a murder or something like that, but you know we were just kind of patrolling through and they, we come across this and you know the border team was taking care of it. (1:27.43) Interviewer: Alright and then how common was it for the vehicles in your convoys were to actually set off IEDs or hit them? Because we were operating in the middle of the desert, I mean there was essentially no, because there was no roads where we were going; we were like traveling open desert. There was no, there were some like tracks that had been made and I, you know that seemed to be at some sort of you know at least frequently traveled avenues that they had, but we weren't sticking to any of those we were just traveling the open desert. So, I mean there's no way someone could anticipate thethe route we were gonna be going. Interviewer: So, it's only the occasional trip into town that had an established route. �And we no, we didn't hit, we didn't hit- any have any ID strikes. I know we stopped on quite a few occasions and called EOD, we had found a few IEDs and had EOD come in and disarm and dispose but no IED strikes. (1:29.01) Interviewer: Alright so, okay now when then do you get home from that tour? That was October 2008 is when I was done there. Interviewer: Alright now at this point are you still looking to get another deployment or what are you gonna do next? Yeah so, I had already reenlisted so for me it was, I was planning, and I enjoyed being ANGLICO there much more relaxed, because these had all these officers. They were pretty much lax on kind of the- the menial tasks. If it wasn't something we needed to get done, then we're not gonna do it, we're not just gonna be cleaning for the sake of cleaning. Which some of the, like the infantry units is definitely they want to keep you busy. So, we didn't do busy work we, we trained. By that time, I picked up sergeant, so I was in charge of a, the communications for an, a SALT, which is a support and logistics team. So, we had three teams under us or three firepower control teams and then the headquarters for that. So, I was in charge of the communications and essentially, I was in charge of the team, I was essentially the senior enlisted guy in charge. Also, by the time I had kind of gotten a good grasp on the air and fire- fire support aspects of it and how to set everything up and coordinate everything. And then the and because I had a, the ability to actually get people to do what I wanted them to do in an effective way and the officers listened to me, quite a bit of officers and they took my opinion seriously and I actually kept a lot of things from them so I, I kept training going, I kept things going. I kept everyone on task, so I didn't get bothered by the officers for the most part I let them know what �was going on it's like this is what we're doing. So, the guy that was supposed to be in charge he pretty much said, “hey you just keep doing what you're doing and I'm just gonna sit back,” and that was fine with me because it's you know, I enjoyed taking the lead on that. (1:31.17) Interviewer: Yeah well it is something that an awful lot of officers will say, is that they ultimately depend on the senior NCOs to keep things running and know what's going on and the smart ones by and large will let them do that. So, you basically become one of those NCOs. Yeah so yeah I and I pretty much every morning I'd go in and brief the officers on what our, what we were planning for the day and I’d asked if there's anything that needed to be done or they had anything and then I would implement it into the training plan. And I'd give them training plans for the week and for the month of what we were planning on doing, so I'd set up training areas and I'd set up, you know depending on what we needed to work on. So, if we needed to work on you know land navigation, I might set up a land application course to send guys through. We might need to work on communication setting up radios antennas we might need to work on fire support missions we do that kind of thing and I'd set all the training up andand I you know we'd get input from the officers and they'd get tasking from headquarters and say, “hey these things need to get done.” So, we'd get them, a lot of times it'd be, you know some sort of online training thing that you had to do, or you know everyone needs to go into medical to get screened for shots or something like that. So, I would add that into the training schedule and make sure it all got done. Pretty much if you head things off, before, if you do things before, they tell you to do them then they just stop telling you to do things because they already know you have it done so. �Interviewer: So alright now were you doing that was this Camp Pendleton where you were based, or you go somewhere else? (1:32.56) Yeah this is Camp Pendleton I was, it was Los Flores which is like in the middle of Camp Pendleton along the coast there so we had nice access to the Pacific Ocean right there so we’d often do runs down in the morning to the Pacific Ocean and then do a swim, so we do a run, swim, and then run back and by that time I had, so we the- the section I was with we had been attached to the 11th MEU so we were getting ready for a deployment then. Because actually they weren’t, they didn't have a company. The last deployment we went on to Iraq was a companywide deployment to Iraq, so the whole company went out and detached to all these units. Interviewer: Right. They didn't have a company-wide deployment schedule in the future. They had a- brigade, which is I like a platoon sized unit which was like six teams and the headquarters and stuff like that that were gonna be attaching to units, but they didn't have the company-wide so they had to figure out what they were gonna do with the other companies. Because there was a thing with about relevancy for ANGLICO because this type of thing could be taught to other units, and other units could possibly take over this mission. The commander had to make sure that we remained relevant and we're participating a lot of, a lot of things and stayed busy so that people knew that you needed the unit, because they had been disbanded at one point. So, they wanted to not get disband again so they said, “hey we're gonna jump on the, were gonna send a detachment on the MEU.” So we were the first ANGLICO unit to go on a MEU since… forever, I don't… they had been on in the past but it'd been a long time since they sent the detachment on the MEU, and we detached, so we were part of the headquarters of MEU. And that was actually a great experience �because right off the bat, once we started training with MEU, we had been able to get, established communications really quickly when we got to shore for any operation. So, it became apparent that anytime anyone went to shore we had this an ANGLICO out to shore also because they would have communications for sure, and then they could go around helping other people get communications. Which is great because I'd go out there and I’d set up three or four different nets to talk to the ship so we, by that time we had satellite communications that we could do and I’d have a mobile set up, and then I’d get up and set up field expedient antennas and do HF shipto-shore communications. You know hundreds of miles away. (1:35.53) Interviewer: Okay so when do you ship out you then? You’re at Pendleton you train and get your assignment so now when do you head out? This I want to say was in October of 2009 is when I ended up because it was, I think we had Halloween and then… Interviewer: That’s on October 31st. Yeah so would have been just after November. Interviewer: Okay. And yeah, we again were… I think we were just scheduled to do the South Pacific tour again, but we ended up mostly hanging out in the Gulf of Aden at the, by the Horn of Africa and Yemen. They were doing operations from the ship into Yemen I believe and at, because there was nothing for us to do that's the- the ship operations they were doing operations, we ended up going to Djibouti and working with the French commandos that were stationed there and some of the French Foreign Legion. Our officer really great guy, Captain Comangeon, he didn't like sitting around doing nothing and wanted to stay relevant. So, while we were waiting there, he's �like, “well when we're doing…” Because we’d do these squares in the ocean, “it's like at one leg when we're close enough that we can attack at helicopter and get into the base on Djibouti.” Because there's a military, a US military base there. And so, he started doing air naval gunfire liaison company, we were- we liaison with people so we started, he started working with- talking to the US forces on that base about working with the French forces in the area. So we were able to set that up and then we were able to set up follow-on training for the battalion landing team because they were sitting around doing nothing, so they got to get like two-week training exercise in Djibouti also because we were able to set up that relationship there with the French. (1:38.06) Interviewer: Okay and what impression did you have on the French military? They are pretty good, arrogant for no reason. I don’t know, it was weird because like we- we have a lot of good, we had a lot of capabilities with us. We brought laser target designators which could guide you know bombs from aircraft. We had laser pointers, we had spotters, and range finders and all kinds of great equipment for you know getting bombs on to, on to targets and stuff like that, and the… and we were- we came- we were a very professional team. They, we were kind of a hand-picked group because we were gonna be the first MEU and we wanted to make a good impression, so we were all hand-picked. So, we were working with everyone ourour team were, they were all very mature, very responsible people for the most part. So we came in and we were very professional and you know very humble, like you know “hey we want to help out, and we want to work with you guys, and we want to learn from you guys,” and they were just like they go “oh were so much better than you guys,” and I was just like [Laughter] not really necessary but it wasn't, it wasn't that bad. We worked with the, so the commandos weren't that bad, so we work with them and we didn't really get that a whole lot from them. Then we �worked with their artillery, one of their artillery units and some of the other JTAG so we ended up doing like a combined arms exercise. We had a, there was an aircraft carrier that was going close by, and so pilots need to get certain qualifications. They need to drop bombs to stay current on some of their qualifications, and we were in a position where we had control of a range area and we could, we could do that for them. So, we got to a… we ended up working with the aircraft carrier which has you know dozens of aircraft they can drop bombs and we have our helicopter deck which has Harriers that can you know drop bombs also. So, we did like two or three days of just continuously destroying this range. We were doing like stacks and just flying aircraft in and doing controls for aircraft and stuff like that. And we were working with, we had the French come out with us, so they were you know doing that also because they had JTAGS which is, it's all part of a NATO thing. Kind of a… where there's like a NATO standard for air support and fire support kind of thing. But yeah- yeah, the French they were, I thought they were a little arrogant, but you know they had their wine and their cheese, which they actually did. You know I- I think it's funny because we, I've worked with a number of other militaries and they you know, a lot of especially a lot of other countries drinking is kind of they will bring alcohol on to field ops with them and… but the US is kind of taking a hands-off approach to alcohol. And its, they don't do any alcohol and stuff. So, it's kind of you know funny to see how they'll go out and they'll have, you know at the end of the day they'll crack open the beers and they'll have a good time. And we are just like no we're not, we're we are working it will after our seven months then we'll have a beer kind of thing. But you know… (1:42.09) Interviewer: Alright well they have their way. Alright and so how long did you spend out and in that area? �A month and a half we were out there. Interviewer: Alright and then from there then what? From there… I think that was the most… I know we stopped it a number of ports on the way in and the way out because they wanted to give us, because most of people on the ship didn't get off the ship we were lucky we were able to get of the ship for quite a while, so we were getting towards the end of the deployment. We ended up making our way back towards… or the other way to Hawaii, I think we stopped in Thailand, and maybe Singapore I, we I think we stopped in two places then we stopped in Hawaii and they did a tiger cruise on the way home where they, where family members can- can pick up the ship in Hawaii because they drop off a lot of people in Hawaii that are you know forward advance party so they prepared the- the place to unload equipment and stuff. So, yeah, I think that was for the most part. Interviewer: Okay, alright and then is it just back to Camp Pendleton at this point? (1:43.27) Yeah back to Camp Pendleton. Interviewer: Okay and then how long do you stay there this time? Until so I'm at Camp Pendleton until I think 2011 is when I redeployed to Afghanistan and this was a, this was not a company-wide it was most of the company, but not all of the company. There was another unit that had went to I think Iraq, another section of ANGLICO they went to Iraq, and there was another… we got back, and then they started doing rotations with the MEU so there was another group that went with MEU. And then the rest of the company went to Afghanistan and that was in May of 2012, so we got the summer of, in Afghanistan. Interviewer: Alright so what was your assignment then in Afghanistan? (1:44.17) �There, so we were assigned to the Georgian Army we were attached to the- the Georgians, held a section in… outside of I believe Sangin I think the Marines held Sangin and then to the west of Sangin was another area across the river that the Georgians, the Georgian Army occupied. And we were assigned to them, and actually we did a workup with them. So, instead of doing like they- they there's a special training plan for units going to Afghanistan, usually I think Bridgeport is where they'll go. And I had been to Bridgeport actually several times for training just kind of regular training kind of exercise stuff, but we trained with the- the Georgians and because they were in Georgia and we were in the US we met halfway we met in Germany which is somewhere halfway, but we ended up doing a training exercise with them in Hohenfels, Germany for the workup and then they went back to Georgia and then they deployed to Afghanistan, and then I think we were two weeks before… two or three weeks before they got there, so we switched over. There was an ANGLICO unit with the, I think 33rd Georgian battalion and then we switched with that ANGLICO so we're with the 33rd for like two weeks and then they swapped out with the 31st Georgian battalion and that was the unit that we had been in Germany with. (1:45.53) Interviewer: Okay, and what was that battalion’s assignment at that point? They were pretty much to secure the, keep the area secured. They were running patrols and stuff, the Georgian army. Eventually they wanted to, they expanded on the- they're- they’re AO they expanded West and they include I think it was like 20- 30 kilometers west they expanded to an area that was like known for IEDs that they wanted to clear out that area. So, but yeah, a lot of it was you know clearance kind of and just hold space for the most part. �Interviewer: Alright now by this time you you've seen a number of different militaries from different countries, what impression did you have of the Georgians? The Georgian's they were, they were stuck in Soviet times. Interviewer: Okay. (1:46.54) They were… you know I talk to a lot of guys; I talked to a lot of guys there and they were saying you know that Afghanistan for them was their training to fight Russia. Because the- the- the 2008 deal in South Ossetia had been not too long ago and there was a lot of hurt feelings on that. So, they seemed… and you know sometimes people would joke about those things, it didn't seem like they were joking for the most part, maybe I just didn't get their humor, but they seemed serious that they thought this was training for fighting Russia. You know Georgia is not a large country and they I think three battalions is the extent of their- their infantry so I don't know how well they'd fare; I mean South Ossetia was, it's a couple days. Interviewer: Yup and they might have to borrow tactics from the Afghans at that point, rather than be like the Russians. (1:47.53) Yeah, and but they were- they were a lot of their tactics and stuff were kind of soviet-era kind of conventional warfare’s, what they were looking at, you know the US had been in Iraq and Afghanistan for a while now, so we were kind of, I mean our whole mindset had changed at that point. So, we were trying to keep them on, on par with that. One of the biggest things was trying to convince them not to shoot at everything because that was a big problem, they would be trigger-happy and they'd just start firing away at anything that moved and it's kind of like, don't do that. You know not everyone that you see is an enemy, you know there was a, an old man that �was walking, because there was… we were- we were on COP Sherdvani, which was this outpost on the hill, on this hill and we had you know guard posts all around and it looked down and there's a river, I don't know maybe five- ten kilometers away and then to the north and south there was villagers that kind of spread up and down. Or actually nothing down, it was a desert down. Up is where all of villages spread north and there was an old man coming towards the gate and the- the Georgians were, started shooting at him because they said he was holding what looked to be an IED which, yes he was, he was actually trying to bring them something he had found which was like wires and stuff for making IEDs. We don't know if it was actually being used for anything or what it was, but you know so we had to you know bring the guy and get medical treatment and stuff like that and- and get him to further on care because didn't have facilities where we were at. But yeah so it was it was we had to kind of rein them in like you know this isn't the West, this is, you know you got to be careful what you're doing. (1:49.57) Interviewer: Okay and you had mentioned before that moving around in Afghanistan was a very slow process. Yeah so everywhere we went there was, there were a IEDs everywhere, you know I- I think 50% of the patrols we went on we probably hit, someone hit an IED and most times we went out we had EOD or route clearance that went ahead of us. Most- most was mounted SEF because we were, there it wasn't- there was villages that we you'd stop and you do dismounted, a few of the basis, so we had Sherdvani and there was a smaller base north of us, about five kilometers, and five kilometers north that was another base. Kind of like how it was in Afghanistan or in Iraq where they had them split up. And they would do ones that were, had a village nearby they would do my dismounted patrols and stuff and they'd have mine sweepers with them. And they'd �carry backpack chameleon things which help prevent from remote-control IEDs and stuff. But yeah so, we had, but we there was IED strikes all the time. The vehicles we were using were the M ramps were the mine-resistant vehicles so I mean usually the most damage would be blow off a wheel and someone would smack their head on a hard surface inside the vehicle, or an ammo can would come flying and knock them in the head, or some sort of concussion blast would you know cause an injury of some sort. I think we had; I was doing LZ operations when I was there for the most part. I was again doing communications right at the main gate communications with everyone and help fix equipment and- and- and stuff like that but then I, we’d would be running the- the landing zone so anything that was going in and out of the AO came through our landing zone, so any injuries would come to our landing zone, they get pushed out to one of the larger bases with medical facilities or supplies, anything coming in and out. We, we do supply runs every couple days so helicopters would come in drop off equipment and stuff like that. (1:52.21) Interviewer: And so, it was a lot of the movement by helicopter rather than on roads? Yes, every once, I think once a month maybe we had a very large convoy come through and it was great because we'd see them, and they'd be like thirty kilometers out and they'd be moving at three, four miles an hour and so slow. And like you'd see them there and because you're waiting for them to get here because they're gonna come with supplies like, I, you know and they’d have like a mobile PX that they’d bring with them so snacks and that kind of thing that you could buy, and you'd be like, “oh man I can't wait till they get there.” And you'd see them on the map for like two days traveling at the snail's pace and… Interviewer: Yeah alright how much did you see the Afghans themselves? (1:53.08) �Not a lot, we had, so we had an Iraqi army… or Interviewer: Afghan. Afghan army unit that was also on the base so, and I communicate, I would go talk to them because they had, they could get local food and stuff like that so we actually got a goat at one point and we talked to them and they’d go out and they do patrols and if you wanted something they could bring it back. So, we pooled together some money and we got a goat and they fixed it up for us. I ended up getting beans and rice… a bag of beans- a bag of beans and rice and some vegetables and stuff I’d get on a regular basis so I can cook something myself instead of eating MREs every single day. So, I would have some communications with them, but the local- the local people not so much communications with them. You know when we pushed west, we were in an area that was again heavily IED’d and so often the locals would know where everything was because they’d have to know so they can move around and stuff like that. And a lot of the people we were, that lived there were like farmers so it was I mean it was pretty rural- rural area and you know we would, I think we would engage with them for like intel purposes from time to time. You know I was mostly, like I said I was mostly doing the landing zones we’d get locals that were injured so we had several occasions where there was either a firefight sometime before then and you know 20- 30 minutes later you'd have a local coming with a pickup truck and say, “oh so-and-so was- was hurt or injured from fragmentation or from crossfire.” Or something like that and you know it's questionable whether they were in the crossfire or they were the people that were being shot at because they moved from one… like so the Marines in the area of operations adjacent to us, they'd be in a firefight and then because we’d have all the traffic that was you know going on in the area we were monitoring it and there'd be firefight going on and then 20 minutes later we'd have a local come by and say “oh yes someone you know they were �caught in a crossfire.” It's like well we don't you know, we can't tell it's you know we try to talk to the other unit and say, “hey can you identify anyone?” It's like you know you can't identify this guy as being you know your target. Or we get and there’s, we’d get small children sometimes with injuries of some sort. Sometimes they would be related to- to combat other times I think would just you know regular injuries health issues and stuff like that. And we do, we'd send them out. (1:56.18) Interviewer: Now would your teams that you were with, would you have anybody who functioned as a medic and would you get that kind of training? Yeah, we so, we had gotten in… so in, by the time… I had gone I mean in basic training you get medical; you know basic first aid. By the time I did my second Iraq deployment we had do, they had developed a, it was a combat response course where they go through specific training for combat trauma injuries and stuff like that. It's much more in-depth and they had, you know they had changed a lot of things from when they initially had been teaching us. So, tourniquets were now a good thing, in the past it had been pressure dressings and you don't want to put a tourniquet on unless it's necessary because if you put a tourniquet on, they're like “oh you're gonna lose the limb.” Now it was everyone was carrying tourniquets you have people carrying tourniquets for each limb, you know they'd have, you’d carry them up on here and they'd have ones in their cargo pockets you know in case, you know they hit an IED and then you could put a tourniquet on and then it was pretty much standard, it's like if someone is injured throw a tourniquet on it and you know, let the doctors deal with it when you get down the road for the most part. So, we had gotten more advanced combat training. We actually before Afghanistan we got to go to what's called the pig lab which is, they do, they sedate pigs and they do like gunshot �blasts and stuff on the pigs in different ways and then we have to treat those injuries and keep the pig alive so it's a sedated so it's not moving or I can't feel anything but they would do like a shotgun blast to the leg and then we’d have to do like tourniquets on the pig, you know stop the bleeding and that kind of thing. And you were pretty much tested on your ability to keep the pig alive for as long as possible, they’d do lacerations and different things like that. (1:58.28) Interviewer: So, you’re learning a fair amount of sort of wound treatment and so forth. But you guys would not normally have a navy corpsman with you? No, we… I’m trying to think if we had a corpsman with us because we- we would I know on the MEU we had a corpsman with us, and I want to say yes, we had a corpsman with us. Our- our section was attached with the corpsman. Because they wanted us to be self-sustaining so they wanted our- our section with ANGLICO so what, we had our headquarter section and then we had our teams and we wanted that whole entity to be able to go anywhere and be autonomous and not have to rely on the unit to support us. We wanted to be able to support the unit and not have to rely on them support us. So we had to go with everything that we needed so we would bring our own food, we could get our own… so we often we would get supplies, supplied through the unit we were supporting but we can also get supplied through our own avenues, which is great because we had two routes to work for supplies and getting things. So yes, we went with, we did go with our own corpsman and then when we got there, he ended up going into the, they had a small aid station and pretty much work directly for the aid station there, so treating injuries and stuff. A lot of like scorpion stings and bites and stuff like that, often that was kind of an excuse for them to get out and go to one of the main bases and go eat at a- a chow hole or something like that. �(2:00.12) Interviewer: Alright so was daily life there any better or worse than it had been in Iraq? No, I probably- I probably stayed as busy as I had, I mean I, I had more of a routine in Afghanistan than I did in Iraq for that first deployment. For the first deployment I was kind of running around with the chicken, like a chicken with my head cut off where I you know, I didn't know what was going on from day to day. There it was, we had set up a routine, so we were for the most part in the command center, we'd have a shift there running operations. So, supporting units with air, we get air on stations UAVs to kind of do overwatch of any patrols going on. If there was a fire fight that broke out, then we could call air on station quickly, we would, I, in the evenings I mean Afghanistan seemed to run on the- the- the enemy, they ran on a schedule. So, like in the morning you could count like between eight and nine you get a fire fight, or you get some sort of activity going on. Around eleven o'clock things would stop, it's lunchtime no one's fighting, no one's doing anything and that would go on for you know the day, because it was hot all day and then once the Sun started shutting down and it started getting cooler then things would pick up again, and then once the Sun went down then you'd start having people and place IEDs and we’d, so we'd have different aircraft, four different things scheduled like around that routine. So, like in the morning we'd have some sort of attack aircraft that's on schedule and we'd have them fly at a distance so they couldn't be heard or seen, and if something broke out, wewe'd fly them in. In the evening we'd have UAV support you know covering routes that we knew IEDs to be placed in and then we'd have like HIMARS or GMLARS which are long-range missile systems and we do; you know prosecute those targets like that. Or we’d have artillery within range that had I think they had… though they had guided artillery pieces that they were using at that time that we could use. But often we’d do, so we’d have that, and we'd have �illumination arounds so we might do illumination rounds and, so we can do like a BDA on the targets and stuff like that. So it was, but there was kind of a routine setup, and like you know in the mornings I would do you know, we'd switch things around a little bit but for a while as me in the mornings I would do landing zones, and then so I would sit there standby to run down to the to the LZ if there was some sort of casualty that we need to evacuate or something that, I can run down the LZ, aircraft would be inbound I secure the LZ land them. You know assess the- the injured and then relay that information, make sure they're getting treatment that kind of stuff. So, and then in the evenings then I do COC watch and I'd sit up there for a while. (2:03.32) Interviewer: So, was there, did you have much to shoot at? I didn't, well… Interviewer: Target. Yeah- yeah, I mean so you know, small arms fire, not for me because I was on the base. For thefor the most part I mean, I’d go on patrol every once in a while. But you know there's nothing that came to my attention for that, for the most part, but as far as like targets for you know IED in places and things like that or if other units were out getting a smallish fire, I mean that was you know IEDs almost every other day you’d find someone. Small arms fire we'd have ended up finding, yet again we come into a problem with identifying where the- the shootings coming from. Now it's a little bit easier because it wasn't a large urban area that people could hide at, but often it’d just be a couple shots from the distance and you’d get a report on the radio like, “oh shots fired.” It's like “which direction?” You know, “what's the distance?” Like, “well we don't know.” It's like, “well call us back when you know.” It's like, we'll put a UAV in the area and see if we can spot some things out. �(2:04.40) Interviewer: Now was it possible to spot people actually planting IEDs? Yeah- yeah, we’d do that like almost every other night. We, I mean I think it was like a couple weeks straight where it was like the same spot. They were, someone was out there trying to put an IED in for like a week straight, or like two weeks straight, and it was like every night we were like, it's like you would think they would stop putting an IED in right in the same location. Because we'd sit there and watch someone putting in an IED and then we'd hit that target with you know, usually it's the long-range missiles or something like that. And then you know, two hours later someone would go by and try to pick up the, you know they take the body away and they- they do that and then you'd have them, someone else go up there and try to take the IED that they were just trying to implant and try to put it back in and then we'd hit them again. So, it's yeah… Interviewer: So how were you observing this? We had UAVs; I mean we had pretty much we had, could have aerial surveillance. We also had a like an eye in the sky, so we had on- in middle of the base we had this giant camera a FLIR system which does, you know regular color images, black-and-white thermal, so all kinds of neat stuff and it has zoom capability and all that stuff. (2:06.12) Interviewer: So, you could see them at night? Yeah. Interviewer: But it didn’t register with them that you could see them at night? I don't know, I mean because like it would register, like we- they could tell if we had aircraft on station. So, like they knew that if- that if they heard the helicopters that they need to get away, �get out of there. And that's what they did and so we would have to, like if we were doing patrols, we'd have aircraft on station with the patrols going out, but we'd have to keep them at a distance. So, they couldn’t be, couldn’t be seen or heard, so they’d be in, have them in defilade you knowyou know quite a ways a away. So, because if they were on station then they wouldn’t attack so I mean that kind of registered and even with like fixed-wing aircraft; if they were flying too low in way that they could be seen or heard then there'd be no engagement with that. So, we would try to keep them out of the way so we can draw up the enemy and then we’d bring them in and so I don't know why, you know they would keep putting in the IEDs I mean it was like, it would happen- it was like two weeks straight where it was happening on a regular basis at this same location. And we, I mean we kept watching that location because it was where they kept putting them. (2:07.34) Interviewer: Now how long did you spend in Afghanistan? Seven months. Interviewer: Okay and over the course of that time did anything change? Or were things pretty much the same the whole time? No, well we- we did a massive expansion, so we like quadrupled the size of the area that we were covering. I mean most of that area was all desert, we were expanding to this road that was far to the ???? from Iran is where we had gotten, they’d have their identification on them from where they're from. And I think Iran was one of the big places that we were getting people. We were finding, so the people that we hit emplacing IEDs, a lot of times that's where they were from. And so, I don't think a lot of it was local people that were- were doing anything for the most part. I think it was just outsiders coming in and causing disruptions or that kind of thing. �(2:08.33) Interviewer: Alright now this was you last war and deployment, right? Yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Now had you at a certain point decided that it was your time to get out of the Marine Corps? Yeah, I decided, well so when I got back, I was pretty sure I was getting out. And I had extend for a, a month because when you get back from a deployment you have to have at least three months before you get out and I only had two month so I had to extend for a month so I can get out. And I had looked into trying out for the for the- the HUMINT team, the human intelligence team or counter-intel, so I had looked in that and I started the- the process through that. But at that point it was, their deployment cycles, I had gotten onto a pretty frequent deployment cycle by that time. Their deployment cycles were- were pretty much constant. They were always gone somewhere, you know a lot of cases I talked to guys and they- they said they'd get back from a deployment and then two weeks later they'd be back on a plane going to another, for another deployment somewhere. Mind you some of the deployments were short deployments, it was you know. But I had looked into that and but eventually you know, by that time I was also married and had at least one kid, so… yeah I figured it was and I had I mean, I had done a lot by then and- and I had you know, I figured after eight years if I do another enlistment I might as well do 20. And I really was actually kind of fed up with, you know, you got- you weigh the- the good times and the bad times. And I had a lot of great times but there was a lot of times where I was just like this thing, this blow. You know just the- the military bureaucracy kind of system that had going on and it seemed to me you know, I was- I was a sergeant and that I think is the best place to be. If I pick up staff, I'd be doing more of a desk kind of job at that time, and it, it �seemed that a lot of the- the guys that did stay in that's all they really had, you know. We had a lot of people, I got… it's funny, when I was in Iraq it was like anyone who was educated is probably left already by that time. You know the same thing I think I was thinking with the military was like anyone who's smart enough to do something outside of the military has gotten out and is doing that. Anyone left in is, you know, is- they- they're not getting out because they can't get out. They wouldn't be able to do anything else; just it was a lot of that. A lot of people stuck in their ways and… (2:11.20) Interviewer: Was there any encouragement to go and become an officer? No- not really, you know I actually, so when I was on the- the 11th MEU I had signed up for- I had put an application in for the MECEP- MECEP program which is the military to officer, the enlisted to officer program I put an application in for that. That did not go through, I mean they only have so many slots for that and so that was kind of my venture at doing that, but no one really was like, “oh you should go officer.” I mean at that point I was; you know I was out the door and most people kind of knew, I mean, and I had- I had told my officers. you know I said, “you know when we get back from this deployment I got three months.” It's like I'm not doing anything when I get back, it's like I worked my butt off for eight years and I, you know and I'm not gonna quit at the very end, but at the same time it's like, you guys don't, you know, you can handle, you- everyone is, you guys should be able to handle this now. You know I got things to worry about before I get out, so. And they were fine with that and they said, you know, “you do whatever you need to do.” So that was great. (2:12.34) �Interviewer: Okay, now what does the military sort of now do in terms of helping to transition people? You’re leaving the military, to go back to civilian life, whether its coming back from deployment or getting out entirely, do they provide anything for you? Yeah, so they had a weeklong, I think it was-it was either three days or a weeklong, either way They, you’re supposed to do that you can do it up to a year before you get out but you're, so you're supposed to be given an opportunity to go between a year and during your last year up to thirty days. I mean you can do it from any time, but they say you ideally you want to do at least 60 days before you get out. I think I did mine like, I don't know a month before I got out and that was with that deployment, I had just got back from a deployment and I kind of set it up that way. So, I can make, I'm- you know I wanted to make sure I got it done. And they go over a lot of things and they try to specialize it for what you're kind of interested in. If you're looking for a job, they're gonna focus more on your resume and interview skills, and then probably try and get you in touch with, you know people that can help find you a job. If you're trying to go back to school, then they can have people to help navigate the GI bill and you set up for that. If you're trying to open your own business they got people to help with that kind of thing, but yeah I think it was, and they- they say oh you know you could show up in your civilian clothes, you don'tthey try to make it relaxed and it's all ran by civilians and stuff like that, you know. I think I went in my uniform the entire time. I think, I- except for the day they do interviews they said don't wear your uniform so it's, I didn't wear my uniform because they told me not to. But I mean… Interviewer: Did they do anything in terms of helping or offer to help people who may have PTSD issues or other things like that? Or just general stuff, but adjusting to life, civilian life and how you have to behave now or anything like that? (2:14.46) �Not, I don't- I don’t remember any, a whole lot of that, you know. A lot of it was just on like your- your benefits and stuff, well big harping on putting in your- your if you have needed to make a VA claim. Putting that, getting like situated and stuff like that but not a lot with you know mental health and stuff like that. Pretty much it's, you know a lot of the, anything medical related was kind of more associated with your VA claim and they're saying you know if you don't have things documented make sure you go get them documented now or make sure you can identify that stuff and put them in, make sure they're in your record so you can do your claim. So you can get compensated for any injuries you have whether they're physical or mental health issues but I don't think there was a whole lot of, you know classes or anything on like adjusting or you know this is how you talk to your employer, you know you can't knife hand people kind of thing. (2:15.49) Interviewer: Alright, so now when do you actually get out? So, I got- I got so I had leaves saved up, so I got out sometime in- sometime in March I got out. I actually got, went, used tuition assistance and went and got my Class A license through a local school and they, so I took leave and did that so I was still getting paid and they're paying for the school at the same time and then I got out and I took the rest of my leave and it so, did terminal leave and then I actually stayed in San Diego until, because my wife was in the Navy so we stayed there until she got out which was another I don't know almost two years. Interviewer: Class A license? All commercial driver's license, I can drive the big semi-trucks. Interviewer: Alright, so is that what you wound up doing while you were there or? �No, well I got out, when I got out I pretty much immediately got an offer or someone was telling me, told me about- so the- the school I went through to get my license they had a placement and they had got word that the VA hospital in San Diego was looking for drivers that are veterans, and so I got a job at, in there… as a- a vehicle, a motor vehicle operator for the VA hospital there. A lot of driving buses and stuff like that. So not semi tracks but buses and so I could utilize my- my Class A license. (2:17.19) Interviewer: Okay, and then once your wife got out, then what did you wind up doing? We ended up moving back to Michigan and then I started working for the Rapid, driving the bus here and I started taking classes. I had actually, so while I was working for the VA hospitals, I was actually going to a local community college and got my EMT certification. Mostly because I was preparing for the move and I wanted to have options for jobs and stuff and because I had gotten an extensive- extensive, I got quite a bit of training in first aid and trauma. I figured EMT I could probably handle something like that but when I moved, I ended up getting a job driving for the bus, so I didn't need my EMT certification. (2:18.07) Interviewer: Alright and so now what have you basically decided to do with yourself? Go to college? Yeah- yeah, I started taking part-time classes when I got to Grand Rapids at Grand Valley and then I switched to full-time and then I changed my major to philosophy and that's what I've been doing. Actually, gonna be going to grad school for philosophy, my PhD and… Interviewer: You’ve also have been actively involved with the student veteran’s organization, what motivated you to do that? �Well so even when I was at, so I was at the VA hospital working as a driver I was also volunteering at the DAV. Helping coordinate transportation for veterans to get to their medical appointments and so, and then when I got to Grand Rapids, I was actually actively seeking out volunteer opportunities with veterans and I worked with Buddy to Buddy Program which is a peer mentoring program. And so I have tried to maintain, be active in the veterans community, you know mostly because I- I get veterans I you know, have that common experience but also because I know there's a lot of issues that veterans have and I've been fortunate; I don't have any mental health issues or anything like that. So, it's something I can- I can do, I can try to be that voice in some way or try to help out where I can so. Interviewer: What kinds of issues or problems do you see be fairly common among returning veterans of your own generation or even younger? (2:19.43) A, one of the big, I mean mental health issues I think is prevalent and I think it's also, also has to do with society in general just being more aware of mental health issues; that we can identify these things. But transitioning in general I think is one of the hardest things I think veterans are dealing with is how to go from the structured military life and you know, then going to this group of people that just don't identify with that. You know, a lot of people just seem out of place, you know with mental health issues you also get, a lot of times you get drinking and that kind of thing and that again may lead to some sort of spirals where people's life just kind of goes haywire. Interviewer: You’ve managed at least yourself. Yeah. �Interviewer: Kind of how to go along, how to deal with that. And now going off pursuing graduate school, philosophy, I mean do you want to become a university professor? Or do you not really know what you would do with it? (2:20.52) That's the yeah, I mean that's- that's the idea at least in- in the Marine Corps I got to teach and I got to lead and I feel I can, I enjoyed doing that, I mean I think that was one of the best parts of you know, having a group of Marines that don't know something and then teach them how to do that thing. I think that was, that was probably one of the best experiences I had, and I enjoyed it and so I think teaching philosophy in the same way; teaching something to someone that doesn't know would be a great experience. But also just the research aspect of looking into kind of some of the bigger questions, you know I'm mostly interested in political philosophy myself right now but I also have like some of these issues related to the conflict in combat that- that weigh on me as far as you know why some people are affected by combat and other people are not or, or trauma. And you know when you know, kind of when is it right to go to war when is it you know when can I kill people when can I not kill people, or when should I, when shouldn't I? That kind of thing, I mean I think those are questions a lot of veterans grapple with and you know a society is, we I think we're gotten to this point where people get back from war and we've- we've taken this about-face from the Vietnam era where you know, they weren't given their just respect for what they did and now people are getting back and it's like everything you did was great and you're infallible and you- you can't, you know you didn't do anything wrong. And I don't think a lot of veterans feel that way like, you know you can't just, you know say “I did nothing wrong and that's the truth.” I mean maybe what I did was wrong you know, I don't, but we're not having that kind of conversation. �(2:22.48) Interviewer: Now to sort of thank you for your service, which might have been a good thing to say to some of the Vietnam guys, but a lot of younger ones are not always sure what to do with that. Yeah. Interviewer: But you’ve sort of moved on now, to the big picture and really thinking about that on a level that maybe you hadn’t so much when you were on your first deployment. You found out these larger questions, you’re engaging. I want to kind of close this, but just asking; what do you think you wound up taking out of the Marine Corps experience? What did that do for you or how did that affect you? (2:23.17) I mean the biggest thing for me was like there's a lot of things I can do and even when you think you can't do things, like you cannot imagine the- the- the physical, the mental strain that you can you can go through. You know personally I mean I think one of the reasons I joined the military in the first place, the Marine Corps, was because I wanted to test myself and I think I did just that. I mean when I'm struggling with something mentally or physically nowadays I kind of look back and like, it's like, I've done this and so much more already. I mean there's- there's a lot of, there's very little I- I don't think that I can't do. I'm you know, I can do more than I think I can, and I think that's, I mean that's, I think about what it's given me, you know. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_OudbierM2130V Title A name given to the resource Oudbier, Matthew (Interview transcript and video), 2017 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2017-06-15 Description An account of the resource Matthew Oudbier was born in Bremerton, Washington and grew up in a Marine Corps family. He entered the Delayed Entry Program in 2004 and went to Twentynine Palms, California, for its field radio operators course. Oudbier was then assigned to 1st Stinger Battery or 1st LAD in Futenma on Okinawa, Japan, before being deployed to Ramadi, Iraq, in 2007 where he was his company's radio operator and participated in heavy training. After reenlistment, Oudbier became first ANGLICO, returned to Iraq in 2008, and joined a support/logistics team. He also reenlisted for tours in the Gulf of Aden in 2009 and Sangin, Afghanistan in 2011 where he was assigned to the Georgian Army. After leaving the service, Oudbier got his Class A license and worked at the VA hospital in San Diego before moving back to Grand Rapids, Michigan. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Oudbier, Matthew Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Iraq War, 2003-2011--Personal narratives, American United States. Marine Corps Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/788c4a6eaac2fc8b1fd963536ce91576.mp4 476906d41b6706e6d5a1a82bf6021018 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/37ab8a9f6851cd98d70af126b0385406.pdf 14d2f167cdb3733f329916b6affb0f3c PDF Text Text Northrup, Mark Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Interview Name of War: N/A Interviewee’s Name: Mark Northrup Length of Interview: (1:09:06) Interviewed by: James Smither Transcribed by: Chelsea Chandler Interviewer: “Okay, so, Mark, begin with a little bit of background on yourself, and to start with, where and when were you born?” I was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 1957. November. Interviewer: “Okay, and did you grow up there?” So predominantly my father was an Air Force officer, so I grew up as a—What we call a military brat quite often. My father retired out of the Air Force when I was about twelve years old. We were living in Colorado. He—We had done a tour in Naples, Italy, so my whole formative years were all around military officers, predominantly Air Force and Navy. (1:13) My father was obviously a very good pilot and officer. He flew B-17s during World War II. My older brother by ten years, Colonel Craig Northrup, went off to the Air Force Academy in 1966 and was commissioned out of the Air Force Academy in 19—I want to say 1970, so that would be 1970 he was commissioned. And my older brother flew C-141s—transports—and flew combat—the missions—into Vietnam as Saigon fell, so my formative years I had an opportunity to go to Navy ROTC. I chose instead to go to a liberal arts college in Minnesota. I always knew I wanted to be a military officer at some point in my career, so I turned down an ROTC scholarship and went on to a liberal arts school. (2:06) You have to remember in the late 70s it was not very appealing in the public eye, particularly living in a state like Minnesota, which is very liberal—There was, you know—In those days, you probably recall, there was a lot of disdain for the military and people that wore the uniform. There’s been a change in the culture and respect for those in the military. Maybe some of it was earned out of the Vietnam fallout, but I think nowadays there’s a genuine appreciation for those that serve. You know, when you and I were children, I mean, over half the adults—men were veterans. Nowadays it’s maybe seven percent and falling fast because the military is just a much more efficient and a smaller organization, and not as many people go into the service for one year, or they’re—We don’t have conscripts. We have people—We have professional soldiers and sailors and airmen, so they—You know, it’s changed a lot, so when I graduated from college, I knew I wanted to be a military officer. Interviewer: “Okay. Just to back up a little bit. When did you start college?” That would have been in 1975. I graduated from high school. Interviewer: “Okay, and what college did you go to?” �Northrup, Mark St. Olaf College in Minnesota. It’s a small, liberal arts college, predominantly Lutheran. I enjoyed the college, but obviously it’s not what I would categorize a bastion of militarism. When I announced to my college roommates I was interested in joining the service and going to an OCS program, quite frankly I was held in some disdain, but quite frankly I didn’t care because I had my father and brother to look up to and their service and to our country. Interviewer: “Okay, so how did you wind up choosing the Coast Guard?” Well, you know, I had a four-year OCS commitment with the Navy to be an ASW officer and a Surface Warfare Officer. Would have been a great career in the Navy, but the commitment was four years. And I did a little bit of research and found out the Coast Guard had a smaller organization, and the commitment would have been three years. (4:07) So I just thought that if this is something not a good fit for me, you know, a year could be a long time. Also, you have to admit that the mission of the Coast Guard is much different than the mission of the other armed services, so that appealed to me, particularly growing up in a state like Minnesota, which was maybe a little more altruistic. So it was an opportunity to maybe realize I could have an opportunity to do pollution and cleanups and search and rescue and those kind of missions. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, so what’s the process now to get you into the Coast Guard?” So I did an application, and I was selected to go to an OCS program in Yorktown, Virginia. It was a commissioned reserve officer. I went in November of 1980, and I was commissioned in March of 1981. It was a nineteen-week program. I was commissioned, and following the commission, my duty assignment was an old Coast Guard ice-breaking buoy tender out of Duluth, Minnesota. So I actually kind of had an opportunity to go back home and serve on a ship or a Cutter in my hometown. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, so let’s back up again. Describe the training program. What do you do at Yorktown?” Well, there were four elements: leadership, seamanship, history, and navigation. I didn’t have a problem with any one of those other than just trying to learn what it was to be a military officer. Nineteen weeks is a long time. Roughly half the class were prior enlisted. There was—At that time, there was really looking to pull high performers in the enlisted ranks to be officers, so the top half of the class was all the enlisted—ex-enlisted guys. And I fell right in the middle, so I was, I guess, probably pretty well on the top for my—For the regulars. The reserves that came in from the outside. Interviewer: “Okay. As far as you could tell, did the Coast Guard have a hard time recruiting people in those days, or were there plenty of people?” Not really. No, we—You know, the Coast Guard has always been held in some high regard within the community that serves and has maybe a little bit of a different reputation. (6:09) We never had a problem serving—Getting enough people to serve on our ships—quality people— and it still holds true to this day that the Coast Guard typically can be very, very selective. And I was very privileged that I got selected to be a Coast Guard officer. �Northrup, Mark Interviewer: “Okay. Now I remember once interviewing somebody who was Coast Guard enlisted, and he talked about some of the physical training that he got and the amount of being thrown into water and a lot of other stuff. I mean, did they—Did you do much training that was connected to that?” Yeah, I mean, we did some—You know, obviously, there was physical fitness training. I personally never had any problems. I was an athlete in high school, and when I went off to OCS, I was in fine shape already and actually found that the physical fitness side was probably the easiest part of OCS for me personally. But you could tell those that hadn’t maybe had that opportunity to be physically fit struggled more. I always felt kind of bad for them, but, you know, that’s the reality. When you had to—When you go off to indoctrination, it’s predicated that you need to get trained before you go or else you’re going to struggle. I mean, that’s—I think that holds true even today, particularly with the level of obesity we’re seeing in the current population, but in terms of the physical fitness, you know, swimming—I think I was number one in the class for swimming, running I was very at the top, so in terms of my athletic prowess and physical fitness, I didn’t find it to be a challenge. Interviewer: “Okay. Now did they do much to kind of—Exercises that kind of simulated rescues at sea or things like that?” Well, we did one tour on—We did an OCS cruise on an old Coast Guard Cutter called the Unimak. It was a World War II seagoing plane tender that was a hand down from the Navy. It was a tug—very, very large, two-hundred-foot tug—so we did deploy on that for ten days and went down into the Caribbean. Incidentally, we did a large marijuana bust—did a seizure—so from the standpoint of my first opportunity to go to sea with the Coast Guard, it was kind of exciting to be involved in a major drug bust. (8:14) So, yeah, but most of it was academics in the classroom. Celestial navigation, basic navigation, basic seamanship skills. It was more academic, book learning than it was hands-on, so to speak, except for the cruise we went on when we went down to the Caribbean. Interviewer: “Okay, so we kind of get you through that. Now pick up your story again.” So in April of 1981, I reported to duty on a Coast Guard Cutter in Duluth, Minnesota. It was a World War II ice-breaking buoy tender. It would be the least glamorous ship a person could serve on. It is a working ship. You know, you talk about Mike Rowe. In fact, Mike Rowe did a segment on Dirty Jobs for buoy tenders because, by virtue of the mission, working aids to navigation in a slow, black, kind of ugly, old, World War II tug is not glamorous work. It’s hard, laborious, arduous work for not just enlisted but for the officers, too. Lake Superior in those days—You know, we struggle with fog and heavy weather, and there’s more than one occasion where we touched bottom or, as we would say, kissed the bottom. By virtue of the fact of our mission working aids to navigation lighthouses, we did some other work with the University of Minnesota doing core samples throughout Lake Superior in regards to taconite tailings that have been dumped out of Silver Bay for the steel industry. We did several other missions for fisheries. We did some fish stocking programs, so it was a multi-mission kind of ship that we would relish any opportunity to service our community in addition to putting out our buoys and servicing the �Northrup, Mark aids to navigation. (10:11) You know, Jim, I—You know, people see lighthouses as glamorous, kind of cool places, you know, and I served in Alaska too on a buoy tender. And they are, but from my perspective, when I see a lighthouse, I see a cold, damp facility that needs extensive maintenance, that’s full of bird guano, and is labor-intensive and expensive to maintain. And quite frankly, there’s really nothing glamorous about bird guano and cold, damp, brick buildings, but when you’re on a boat and you’re looking to the shore and you see that wonderful light, it warms the heart. But my perspective, perhaps, is a little bit different, so some of that glamor or romance is—It leaves you when you—When you’re there, there’s no romance in it. Interviewer: “Yeah, it becomes something to clean rather than something—Okay. Now how big was the boat?” 180 feet. Interviewer: “Okay, and how large was the crew?” Sixty-five. We had a crew of seven officers and roughly fifty-five to sixty enlisted. Interviewer: “Okay, and what sort of reception do you get when you arrive?” Well, you know, this is common throughout the service. When you show up, you’re considered a butterbar. You’re right out of OCS. You’re recently commissioned. Whether you come from an OCS program or a ROTC program or you come from the Coast Guard Academy—And there is a learning period to understand you have—You maybe have authority over people, but you don’t have abilities. And there’s a learning curve for that young officer to understand that, you know, it’s a participative, leadership style. Yes, I have to make decisions. Yes, I have the education, but you and I are a team. We’re not adversarial, and when you have a situation where it’s adversarial, it’s very—It damages the crew, it damages the mission, and it damages the people, so I was always very aware to be considerate and thoughtful for my enlisted crew. (12:05) I was always blessed. I always had great, great people working for me. In fact, to this day, sometimes I still get reach out from some old crew member that reminds—Remembers some event, and he’ll reach out to me, which kind of warms the heart. But there was never anything adversarial with my crew. Interviewer: “Okay, so what kind of duties did you have when you started out? When you get the new guy, what does the new guy do?” Well, I mean, for the first couple months, you—as you would expect—draw out every ship’s infrastructure—the water, the piping—standing watches in the engine room and the bridge, working on the deck, learning all the deck gear, so that as an officer, you became multi-talented across all disciplines of the ship. Starting the mains of the engines, light off, running the deck gear, launching boats, navigating the ship, driving the ship. All those responsibilities the first few months. It takes roughly four months to qualify as I would call an underway OOD. Officer of the deck. I didn’t have any problem with that because I thought it was fun. You know, it’s—You know, drawing everything out on the ship, and then the more seasoned officers and the captain would hold a board and would review you. And you had to perform and be able to intellectually �Northrup, Mark spell it out and be articulate, and if you didn’t, you didn’t qualify. And if you didn’t qualify, you couldn’t stand watch. If you couldn’t stand watch, your life was miserable. If you weren’t qualified. So I had no problem. I was single, and I loved the ship. I stayed on the ship my first six months. It was my home, and I relished the opportunity to serve on a ship that had a great mission. And one of the advantages we had in Lake Superior and in the Great Lakes is the ships did not rust, so a ship that was built in 1945—In 1981 was pristine. (14:03) We had no rust, and the engines were near new even though we had to do maintenance on them. The point was, though, that if you don’t live in that—Work in the environment where there’s saltwater or you’re in dirty water, ships will last forever. I mean, as evidenced by, you know, several of the ships still serving on the Great Lakes, you know, are seventy, eighty years old still. Interviewer: “Okay, so it’s just—It’s really the absence of salt as much as anything else that makes a difference for that?” Salt, salt. You betcha. Interviewer: “Okay. Now what were the officers on that ship like?” Well, they were my brothers. You know, we drank, we partied, we sailed, we stayed up all night, we drove the ship, we broke ice, we worked buoys. You know, they were my brothers, they were my friends, and I’m still in touch with some of them from, you know, now approaching nearly forty years later. You know, they—There’s that brotherhood of a crew, particularly with the officers you’ve served with. I mean, you—You know, you might not think you went to war, but, you know, when you’re working really in harsh climates and often—as you can imagine—in the severe weather we worked and where our buoys—our aids to navigations—were, it was dangerous work. You know, I’m not going to deny it. There was a pucker factor, and more than once you realized that by the grace of God you lived. And because of those events, you gained that real sense of duty and loyalty to your peers and your brothers. Interviewer: “Sure. All right. Are there particular incidents from that six-month tour that kind of stand out in your mind?” Well, it almost took about four months for me to qualify. The tour on the ship—I stayed two and a half years. Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay, so two and a half years. Okay.” One event that I recall—I was third in command. My executive officer was—Took a vacation, so I was the acting executive officer. We came out of Duluth. It was November, and we came out of Duluth, got on Lake Carriers’ Association’s tracks, went northeast to the Keweenaw Peninsula where we staged aids to navigation buoys and sinkers. (16:04) We came—And we went down the track, and we turned right to go into the Keweenaw Waterway. Obviously, the nights were— The days were short, and when we made our right-hand turn to line up to go into the Keweenaw Waterway, the sea swell got to be maybe forty-five feet. The ship rolled to forty-five degrees. It hung there hard. I was driving the ship, the captain was on the bridge, and at the last minute the captain said, “Mark, do you have the inner bay lights?” And I said, “Captain, I don’t see the �Northrup, Mark outer bay lights.” Unless we come out of the surf then because the ship was rolling, and the swell was so severe. And at the last minute he said, “Mark, come right.” You know, basically saying, “We abort. Let’s go home.” And I’ll never get those words—I can—I live them every day, you know. “Helmsman, right full rudder, all ahead full.” And we aborted our approach into the Keweenaw Waterway and some really terrible storms. Incidentally, it was on the anniversary of the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald. You didn’t think about that at the moment, but in retrospect you begin to understand why that ship sank on that—Not on that particular night, but a few years earlier. Would have been six years earlier. So that’s a little bit sobering. I recall then about two weeks later we had a Christmas party for the crew in the basement of a Chinese restaurant in downtown Duluth, and the captain was a little bit stoic. He was—He rode my ass. He rode my ass hard, mostly because he knew if he did, I got stuff done for the ship. And he got up and gave a speech. I thought I was getting my ass handed to me, and he gave a speech to the crew and our wives and our families. And he talked about how the grace of God was with us that night, and we got to live for another day. So I have a few other events like that in my career, but that’s one that really stands out because—particularly as a young, junior officer with maybe only a year of active duty—you begin to really realize that, you know, the lives of your crew and of a ship—a national asset—is your responsibility and yours alone. And your decisions can make or break and save lives or kill people. (18:07) Interviewer: “Okay. Now while you were in Duluth, I mean, were there any—Did you actually rescue people, or…?” We had a couple of rescue events. One in particular—There’s a lighthouse that stands out in the middle of Lake Superior called Standard Rock. We were underway, and there was a floatplane reported overdue. I immediately started to do search and rescue techniques—drawing out a pattern—but as was the case, the lake was full in fog. And we were off Standard Rock because that was the last location of the plane. And the captain made the observation that the Standard Rock sound signal was not activated, and I said, “Well, captain, that’s fine, but we need to start a search pattern.” He said, “No. I think we need to reactivate the light, send a boat to the light, and get the sound signal fixed.” So I launched a motor cargo boat, was vectoring them in with the radar because obviously they couldn’t see, and he was about twenty yards off the light. And I immediately heard over the radio him backing hard and hitting something, which made no sense. These gentlemen had taken their floatplane, and they had tied it up to Standard Rock. And they had broken into the light, and their floatplane had been damaged. And one of the floats was punctured, and the plane sank right there at the lighthouse. And they were marooned, so to speak, in a lighthouse—in a cold, damp lighthouse—so we rescued them. And subsequently, you know, I don’t know how—what ever happened to the plane, but I do know that I had to be a—I had to provide a deposition because they claimed that we had damaged the plane, and it wasn’t of their own malfeasance. (20:03) So that was just one example of one event that always kind of stands out that, you know, search and rescue events typically are because people do dumb stuff, and— Not that they deserve it, but that would be a classic example. But they were pretty glad to see us coming out of the fog to rescue them. Interviewer: “Yeah, and the captain’s instinct was kind of accidentally pretty good.” Yes, yes. A little lesson learned. �Northrup, Mark Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Okay. Other things you want to bring in about the stay in Duluth before you move on?” I just—Duluth is just—It’s just a wonderful, old port town. I met my wife there. It will always be a special place for me for the obvious reason; my wife was from there. It’s a wonderful place. It’s cold, though, you know. We broke ice. We broke ice into the channel coming into Duluth. It has a wonderful Aerial Lift Bridge. It’s just a really cool town to drive a ship and break ice and work buoys. I can’t express it any other way. My parents came to see me right when I was courting my wife, and unfortunately it was a weekend. And the mid-channel marker had been run over in Duluth, and so we spent the whole weekend driving the ship back and forth with the grappling hooks, trying to find the buoy and rescue the buoy that had been driven into the mud. My parents were unsure with my girlfriend at the time—now my wife—and somebody came up and said, “What’s the Coast Guard doing out there?” And my father said, “Well, they’re looking for a buoy that got hit.” Well, they didn’t hear “buoy”. They heard “boy,” so obviously we weren’t looking for a boy that would have been run over and drowned and pushed into the mud. So we did recover the buoy, and we did rescue it. But it was obviously—As you can imagine, there was a—Some seamanship and line handling efforts to recover that buoy that had been driven into the mud. They call it a Morse Alpha because it blinks “alpha” in terms of the Morse code. It marks the middle of the channel. (22:13) Interviewer: “Okay. Now when you had enlisted, part of the reason why you picked the Coast Guard was you’d only have to be there for three years, and so you go through two and a half years in Duluth. That hitch is up, but you wind up staying in the Coast Guard quite a while.” Yeah, I realized I liked it. I liked the camaraderie, I liked the mission, the skipper liked me in spite of the fact he would—He was a real driver. He was a no-nonsense, hardnose, foulmouth, hard-drinking guy, and he could ride my you know what. And he was ex-enlisted. When he took command of the ship, I remember, he mustered the crew and gathered them all around and said, “Men, I looked at all your service records, and I want you to know here and now I am your old man.” I mean, you don’t call the captain “the old man” to his face obviously, but he was acknowledging the fact—“I am the oldest in the crew, I’m ex-enlisted, I know what you’re all about, and I’m going to be your—I’m going to be a good captain for this ship.” And, in fact, he was, so, you know, here there’s going to be a lesson learned about leadership and acknowledging who you are to your crew. He liked me, and I screened to have a command of a long range navigation station in Japan. Okinawa. I was assigned to be a—It was an electronics station—one million watt peak power—in Okinawa on the north side of the island, which basically I had twenty-five bored guys. We had commercial power. The aid had for the most part been automated, but the station was huge and required a lot of maintenance. And so my biggest challenge was to keep the men from getting too bored and getting into mischief, and one thing about men—When they’re all alone in an isolated place, they will do anything they can to entertain themselves like driving their motorcycles off cliffs and, you know, going to the local establishments—whatever it might be—so we made it a point to play sports every day and filled our time doing that. But yeah, that was an interesting tour. (24:25) I was a commanding officer of a LORAN station. I had really good food and chow, and because I did, I had an inspection and �Northrup, Mark tours. And the adjutant general was coming in about every three or four weeks to inspect me, so the station was always well-kept. And I had to really try to always make sure that we didn’t lose our edge. We had a couple other stations—three other stations—in our chain. There was Hokkaido, Marcus Island, which is just a small rock out in the middle of the ocean, and Iwo Jima, and I would talk to these guys on HF quite often. And we would share and commiserate, and I realized I had the best luck of the draw to get Okinawa because I had shore power, I had commissaries, I had the Marines, I had the Air Force, I had a local village. It was just really—It was almost like out of a movie set. I had a coral reef and a beach. I was required to go into the village and teach English to the schoolchildren, so it was just really a special kind of opportunity to represent my nation and to have a crew. Interviewer: “Okay. What kind of relationship was there between the civilian population and your people?” In Okinawa? Interviewer: “Yeah.” Remarkably good. As you probably know, the Marines in Okinawa, you know, by virtue of who they are and the bases there, they—There has been some shame there on our military, but, you know, being a small station with a—Located next to a small fishing village, there was really a tremendous amount of rapport I had with the village and the village elders. I would occasionally go to the base and buy a large bottle of cheap whiskey and deliver it to the village elders. Kind of made me a hero. (26:06) I didn’t have the heart to tell them it was two dollar rotgut, but they were just gracious, thoughtful people. The Japanese were very disciplined, very polite, and I had the great opportunity to teach their children English in the village school. We played baseball with them, so there was no animus with us and the locals. I mean, there was a couple occasions like my dog went into town and attacked one of the kids, and they poisoned the dog. And the dog came up to the station and died, and my crew was going to riot the city—the village—and burn it down, which, as you know, I stopped. But for the most part it was very, very amicable and very—They were just very gracious people. I have great respect for the Japanese. Interviewer: “Now how long were you out there?” A little over a year. A year. Interviewer: “Okay, and did you go to Japan proper at all or anywhere else in that area?” When I processed through, I spent a couple weeks in Honolulu on some training, meeting the staff, and then I flew on to Yokota, which is the Air Force base outside of Tokyo, which was where my headquarters for Japan was. We call it Far East Section Command, and that’s where my command was. Was in Yokota. I think I only went there a couple times, though. I was kind of on my own except when they wanted to get a good meal. They’d catch a flight and come down to see me in Okinawa. Interviewer: “All right. Now were you married yet?” �Northrup, Mark I got married and left a week later, so they always say, Jim, that the first year of your marriage is the worst. I wouldn’t know. I wasn’t around. Interviewer: “So what was your wife doing while you weren’t there?” She stayed in Duluth, continued to work, and then, you know, when I came home, it was kind of like starting all over again. And it worked out, but I won’t deny that first year—And that was before the time of the Internet and cell phones and emails. You know, it was still snail mail. You know, it was a different time then entirely. (28:01) I think we really forget about that, but yeah, there was a hardship there, and I often talk about this. Sometimes I think, as veterans, we forget the hardships we put our families through and the people we love. As a veteran, we’re in control because we’re out there. We get to make decisions, and we have some sense of control of our lives. But the loved ones we leave behind have no control, and they’re kind of passive. And they just have to kind of hope and pray that their loved one’s okay wherever they are, whether it’s on a ship or in the field or in combat. They don’t know, so I’ve always been very cognizant to the fact that our loved ones behind play a very important role in the success of any veteran and his experience or her experience. Interviewer: “Yeah, although, I suppose, in some ways this assignment was actually less dangerous than the one in Duluth in the sense that you probably weren’t going to sink.” Yeah, from that standpoint in terms of opportunity for death and destruction. Having said that, though, it was a million watt peak power. On a humid day, you could hold up a fluorescent lightbulb, and it would blink. It would blink naturally because there was so much RF in the air, . And, in fact, subsequently the Coast Guard has determined that LORAN station veterans have a higher incidence of cancer and were classified as atomic war veterans because of that. So if I come down with cancer—knock on wood—I would be classified as an atomic war veteran, be fully disabled, and I would get full treatment from the Veterans Administration. Fortunately, I don’t have cancer yet. Interviewer: “Good. All right, so you have that assignment. What’s next for you?” I went on to Seattle. I had a couple tours—two tours—Two out-years as a pollution officer on pollution response efforts out of Puget Sound. Then I did two years as a Vessel Traffic Systems Watch Officer where we control all the traffic coming and going out of Puget Sound and the Strait of Juan de Fuca. (30:05) That was really a better tour because I really enjoyed the fact that it’s basically air traffic control but for ships. You have to understand that Puget Sound has ferries going east and west, and you have freighters going north and south. You have a lot of fishing activities, a lot of recreational activities, lots of opportunities to have major collisions and accidents. We did have one major accident with the vessel Arco Anchorage. Went aground in Port Angeles and had a significant oil spill that I was involved on the cleanup, but that was just an enjoyable tour, mostly because I really liked working with the pilots because part of our qualification we had to memorize five hundred landmarks in Puget Sound and Strait of Juan de Fuca. So you really memorized the geography, you memorized everything you could, and the Vessel Traffic System had, I think—We had ten radars and maybe five radio repeaters, and then �Northrup, Mark I’d have all my watch standers in there. But the most enjoyable part I really liked was that we had to—every month—at least ride with the pilots at least once where you would go out and ride the freighters coming in with the port pilots. As you can imagine, when a ship comes into Strait of Juan de Fuca, large swells, you ride the pilot boat out, and they will set down the Jacob’s ladder. And you time them to swells, and the top of the swell—the first swell—you grab the Jacob’s ladder. And you pull it as hard as you can to make sure that they’ve secured it on the deck on the ship, and then at the top of the next swell you jump onto the Jacob’s ladder. And you better start scrambling because you know that boat’s going out from underneath you, and it’s going to come right back up and smash you if you don’t get up that Jacob’s ladder and get on deck of the ship. So I really enjoyed that part of it. It was just kind of exciting to go out there in all kinds of weather in day and night and jump on a big freighter and ride it with a really professional pilot into port. (32:00) Following that—four years in Seattle—I was asked to be— And this is kind of interesting. I was asked to—by the admiral staff in downtown Seattle—I apparently had caught the eye of the admiral and the admiral staff. They had asked me to come up to be his—In the Army what you call aide-de-camp. His liaison. Carry his bags and be his lieutenant or his O3, bag-carrying, speechwriter, right? And I was asked to be the admiral’s Aid, and I looked at the chief of staff. And I said, “No, thank you, sir.” And he was stunned. He said, “What’s the deal here, lieutenant?” I said, “Well, I’m—Captain, I’m going to Alaska, and I’m going to be the XO on a buoy tender. That’s my destiny.” And he said, “You don’t understand, lieutenant. That’s where we send lieutenants to lose their career because it’s so damn dangerous there.” And, of course, I thought, “Can’t happen to me. I’m going to Alaska. That’s my destiny, right? I’m going to make myself.” You know, so I went to Alaska as an exec on a buoy tender there once again. Interviewer: “Okay, so had you put in, basically, your request to do that already? So your assignment was coming up in Seattle. What do you do next? They wanted to pull you in to be the admiral’s Aid, but you keep your original assignment.” I want to go to Alaska. Interviewer: “Okay, so—” So I get to Alaska, and I have a ship in Alaska out of Ketchikan. Wonderful, wonderful fishing port. They call it the First City. It’s the rainiest city in North America. A lot of cruise ships go there, but they’re only there in the three months of summer when the sun shines. The other nine months of the year it’s just miserably cold, wet, and rainy, but from the standpoint of driving ships, it was exciting. It was an interesting and highly challenging assignment. As you can imagine, the inside passage with all the buoys and aids we had to work—not to mention that you have some significant tidal currents and tidal fluctuations and by virtue of the fact that our mission working in these really tight, restricted waters—was very, very dangerous. (34:07) And I think I communicated to you that we had a couple of really, very, very bad instances that we nearly lost the ship. And that was a tremendous personal, professional challenge because I sensed the—Really, the safety of the ship and my obligation for the crew balance that with my loyalty to the captain and to the mission. And that was a real hard thing for me to process because we were in harm’s way much more than I liked and thought appropriate. We crossed the Gulf of Alaska in December 1989 in a significant, major low. I was blessed not to ever get seasick, so I stood �Northrup, Mark watches on the bridge. And on one of those bridge watches, as we transited across the Gulf of Alaska, we had winds over ninety knots and sea states of over sixty. The ship was not seaworthy enough really to stand those kind of seas although she was a well-built ship. We dove the ship more than once into the swell, and at one swell the ship took water down the ship stack and flooded the engine room. And we nearly lost the ship, and that’s still—I still live that moment every day when the ship went dead, and we had water coming down the ship stack. Fortunately, our engineers were such—They were trained to restart the ship’s engines, and we managed to dewater the ship and proceed on to Kodiak. The ship was—The crew was very angry when we got to Kodiak because the captain was never visible during the whole transit. Was about a fourday transit, and we didn’t even really need to make the trip. It was a trip to join up with our other Coast Guard Cutters and have, basically, a party by virtue of the fact they called it a roundup. (36:09) But it was an opportunity to get the crews together and let them drink heavily. Truthfully. The attitude towards drinking has changed a lot in the subsequent years, but the crew was very, very angry when we tied up in Kodiak. Because we all knew we had kissed death and had not gone to the deep bottom, and I had to muster the crew and speak to the crew without the captain and reassure them that they were okay, they were God’s gift, and we would live to see another day. Interviewer: “So where was the captain in all this?” In the state room. In his cabin. And, incidentally, three months later he put the ship on the rocks, and I had to relieve the captain as the ship was sinking. And we almost lost the ship once again. Here, again, the ship was taking on water. We had a hole in the ship. We had put a seventy foot gash down the side of the ship. We were driving the ship at night where we shouldn’t have been. I was adamant not to be there, and the captain told me I was excitable instead of, “Lieutenant Northrup, go below. XO, go below.” And I laid below, Jim, and I just thought to myself, “Fuck the old man. If he wants to put his canoe on the rocks, I ain’t going to be there.” And you know what happened? It went bang, and the ship almost sank. We lost power. The ship was sideways in a very major channel with a max tidal current. When I got on the bridge, it was obviously dark, and ship—No power. And we’re sideways in the channel. The ship was on the verge of rolling over and sinking and killing the whole crew. We were that close. The captain checked out. He froze in his fear, and I can understand that. I’m not going to fault him for that. I—You know, fear is an unusual thing, and it does things to people. But, by virtue of the fact that I was second in command, I subsequently had to relieve him. (38:04) We got power back, drove the ship to a safe anchorage, did damage control, essentially saved the ship, and got back into port about three days later. Interviewer: “Well, how did you get out of that, I mean, initial situation? Because you described it at a point where the ship could have just rolled over right at that moment, and the captain wasn’t doing anything.” Well, we didn’t have power. You know, the engines—So we’re just basically a dead ship dead in the water sideways. Just a large ship in a small river current. Half flooded, but the engine room did not flood. They powered—They got the engines back online. They got the rudder back online. I didn’t know if I had a rudder. I sallied the rudder five degrees left, five degrees right. I could feel—I sallied a rudder, even though the ship was down by maybe ten feet by the bow. The �Northrup, Mark ship was totally awash forward, and then with some power I, you know—As you would expect, I had this part of the—our operation area fully memorized. I was very detailed, particularly about understanding our operation area, and I didn’t even need to look at a chart to understand where I had to drive the ship at that point. Even though she was half full of water, we still had propulsion, and we drove into a safe anchorage and let go of the anchor and proceeded to do damage control. Subsequently, you know, a few days later when we pulled into port in Ketchikan, I met a—The admiral had sent an old, weathered Coast Guard captain to meet the ship as the safety officer for the district, and he met the ship at the dock. You know, at this point I had basically already relieved the captain for cause, and when I met this old captain, he was a very weathered—I don’t even recall his name. I did call a lawyer before I spoke to him. But, as you know, in a safety investigation you can say anything, and nothing will be held against you. (40:00) Well, I told this old captain—I said, “You can go back. And you can tell the admiral either he relieves this son of a bitch, or I relieve my commission tomorrow. I don’t really give a flying what it is, but it has got to end. Either I resign my commission, or the captain’s relieved for good.” Now I hadn’t really thought this all out because the next day there was a one-line telex message from the admiral saying, “Lieutenant Northrup is now the captain of Coast Guard Cutter Plane Tree.” Now I never sought to be the commanding officer of a ship with a big hole in it, damaged, a dispirited crew—as you can imagine—and a captain that had just been fired, but that was my destiny. My destiny was to be the captain of a ship at that point in my career in my life. Interviewer: “Okay. I guess, when you were in a channel—So there was not—There were not high seas there. You had a current but not big waves?” Not big waves. No. Inside passage—I don’t know. Have you ever been to Alaska on a cruise ship? Interviewer: “No.” If you ever do, you’ll understand the inside passage—It’s just a—What you would call an archipelago of rivers and islands and channels. Very restricted waters. Interviewer: “Okay, and then you said seventy foot gash. How long was the Cutter?” 180 feet, so half the ship. Nearly half the ship was stripped open. Nobody was killed. Nobody was hurt except for a lot of egos and a lot of careers. Interviewer: “Okay. Now how long did you wind up commanding that ship?” They brought in another captain about two, three months later. I had to take the ship into the shipyard and get it dry-docked and had to do the—We had to get the repairs done to the ship. Interviewer: “So basically you were in charge while it was in dry dock?” Yeah. �Northrup, Mark Interviewer: “Another glamor assignment there.” Yeah. Interviewer: “All right. Did the—Did you then—Did the crew’s morale improve over time?” Oh, they were angry. Oh, they were violently angry. Come on now. You can imagine. Interviewer: “Yeah, but over time once the captain’s gone…?” Once the captain was gone, it was a relief off all of us, and then, you know, then I became—I had to be a witness to a—It wasn’t a court-martial. (42:10) The reason why we hadn’t done a court-martial is because it followed on the event of the grounding of the Exxon Valdez. I—We had just come back from ten weeks on the Exxon Valdez cleanup, and there was a lot of egg on the Coast Guard and the federal government’s face from the accident of the Exxon Valdez. So the district staff and the admiral chose not to court-martial the captain, but, rather, to hold it in a nonjudicial punishment. And I had to be the primary witness as you can imagine. I’m still very angry about all this, by the way. It never quite leaves me. It’s a point of humor sometimes, but it’s still there. Interviewer: “Yeah, well, it was a serious business, and he could have gotten you all killed. And by doing something that was stupid in the first place. So yeah, I mean, that’s something that I encounter periodically in talking with military officers who find themselves in parallel situations. People’s lives are at stake, and something happens there. Now to back up a little bit—So what do you recall about the Exxon Valdez part of your job? What were you doing at that time?” So it was the same ship. I was the exec. XO. It happened—The Exxon Valdez went aground on Thursday before Good Friday. I remember watching the message traffic come across our telexes, talking about the grounding of the Exxon Valdez and the spillage, and I just assumed we would deploy right away. The district office had shut down already for the weekend, and it wasn’t until the—Subsequently, the following Monday when everybody showed up to the district office. And there was a big, “Oh, shit.” When a ship has an accident, you have to first allow the owner and the carriers to assume responsibility because the federal government does not want to federalize an accident. (44:06) Because if you do, then you assume responsibility, so over the weekend the decision was made. And Exxon said, “Oh, we’ve got this, we’ve got this, we’ve got this.” Well, quite frankly, they didn’t have it because it was a huge spill. So we didn’t get underway until, I think, midday Monday, and then we got on scene. We were in Resurrection Bay outside of Seward, and we did cleanup operations for roughly, I think, about seven, eight weeks, working predominantly with fishing boats and some Russian trawlers. They came along to help us do the skimming operation, but the opportunity was lost once—And I don’t think people fully appreciate—Once the accident happened, that ship was so close to blowing up and burning. It was only by the grace of God and a very competent engineering officer—Because the captain was a—Hazelwood. He had three DUIs. He was a careless drunk—the captain of the Exxon Valdez—and the Coast Guard had some culpability in all this as far as I was concerned. We �Northrup, Mark didn’t have good resources on scene. It should have been a double-hulled tanker, but they had been given a waiver for a single-hulled. The captain was a notorious drunk and had several DUIs, so there was culpability, quite frankly, by the Coast Guard. But we were on scene. We did cleanup operation in Resurrection Bay. The opportunity really was already to do—To get in front of a cleanup. Had already occurred, though, because after four or five days of crude oil being in the water, you really can’t recover. You’re just recovering tar balls, and most of those tar balls are already up on shore. You know, in the first twenty-four hours, you could have maybe burned it., you could’ve used dispersants, you could’ve had better booming activities and pumping— suction pumping—early on, but by the fifth day all that opportunity had been lost. (46:03) And that attributed greatly to the tremendous environmental impact that that spill had all across south Alaska. It was tragic, and they’re still feeling the effects of that. One of my enduring memories is—There’s two, really, from the trip. One is we ran out of cigarettes, and we had to barter with another ship to get cigarettes. And the only thing they sent over were menthols, which was the captain’s brand. The other one was I remember in Seward walking down the pier, and the Exxon had dispatched. There were accountants, and they were walking down the pier, writing checks to boat owners for the value of their boats if they would sign a statement saying they would not sue. So they basically bought every boat they could in Seward Bay, and the fishermen were actually kind of happy because, you know, somebody came up and said, “We’ll pay off your mortgage.” But—“Oh, and your livelihood? We don’t know.” Interviewer: “So were they buying the boats to use in the—” No, they were just—wanted—They wanted to pay off their mortgages and make sure they signed a statement that they would not sue Exxon. Interviewer: “Oh, so they don’t want people—because they are fishermen—to sue them because you wipe out the fish, so you sue them.” Yeah. Just walk up, and, “We’ll pay off your boat.” Yeah, they bought a lot of boats, or they paid off a lot of mortgages for a lot fishermen. I’m sure those fishermen went south for the rest of the year. It was an interesting event. I wouldn’t want to do it again. I smelled enough crude oil in my days. I don’t want to smell anymore. Interviewer: “Yeah. What was the community in Ketchikan like?” Well, you know, Ketchikan was classified as the first city of Alaska. It’s the first city as you go in north. It’s in the bottom of the Panhandle. It’s a tourist town. I would liken it to Mackinaw. Oh, it’s just a lovely, little fishing town, you know. My first child was born there. My wife was there. (48:00) When I was around, it was a delightful place to live. It was just a neat place, but, you know, in the middle of winter I got to go off to Hawaii for three months while I left my wife behind in Ketchikan, Alaska. So… Interviewer: “So why were you in Hawaii for three months?” We had deployed the ship once to Pearl Harbor for Naval refresher training. Even though we were a small ship, we were still required to qualify for damage control and fire and basically �Northrup, Mark extensive training operations where they keep the ship—One point—the final exercise—you keep the ship going straight for forty-eight hours—no sleep—and drive the ship until the men just collapse to take you to that point of no return. And subsequently—You know, and actually that turned out to be very healthy for us because when the ship had an accident, we were fresh off coming out of Naval ref. training. And the crew was very trained to handle damage control in an accident with the ship because training—When it happens for real, you don’t really distinguish this is not a training event. This is just kind of like a training event. You’re just going to do it because you’ve been trained to it, so that’s why training becomes so critical, particularly in the military. Because if you trained the event, when the event happens, it’s just like training, and you don’t really process it, so to speak. So, yeah, Hawaii was a great place to go in the middle of winter, and I think my wife’s probably still holding it against me. Interviewer: “Now does Ketchikan actually get a lot of snow in the winter, or does the water temperature keep it a little warmer?” No, it—Well, it—You know, it’s the—The water temperature is always going to be thirty-two, thirty-three degrees, so you would get rain or snow and, you know, wet snow. Ketchikan—The one year we were there it rained three hundred inches, which is nearly an inch a day. I always had to keep two pairs of shoes on the ship—Boondockers—one above a heated duct, trying to dry one out, while the other ones were usually getting wet when I was on the bridge. (50:06) So from the standpoint of weather environment—You have to understand that buoy tenders are the least glamorous of all ships the Coast Guard has—particularly if you’re going to Alaska—so the junior officers that typically were—Or even the enlisted men—The ones we got typically weren’t the—what I would say the top of the class because the top of the class—What ship are you going to pick? You’re going to pick the high endurance Cutter out of Key West—hello— because why wouldn’t you? So typically the officers—The enlisted people I got were often— more often than not towards the bottom of their class, and that presented a unique leadership challenge. I wouldn’t say anything against them because they were all good guys, but they were—Or maybe not the—They weren’t the cream of the cream in terms of their assignment opportunities. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, so after that job, now what do you get?” Well, I was typecast in the Coast Guard because I had relieved a captain for cause—number one Academy graduate—and I was a reserve, regular officer now. Although my record—my performance record—was impeccable, the admiral wrote it—Had to rewrite it because I failed promotion. He reassured me he had my back, and he liked who I was and what I’d done and my courage under some significant events. But the promotion boards are a closed-door affair, and most of the officers in the Coast Guard are Academy officers. And they know everybody, and so at that point I was a marked man. So I failed promotion and had to get out. I took a study assignment on loan to the Army in Great Lakes as a staff officer, which, quite frankly, I didn’t really care for. Although there’s one funny story there. That’s right when Clinton became president. I worked for an old, crusty Army colonel, and I was the only Coast Guard officer on the staff. (52:01) And when Clinton came to the White House, it was clear that the attitude about force structure and the policy concerning gays was going to change in the service. So I worked for an old colonel, and I had to write papers that we would submit. It was headquarters �Northrup, Mark MEPCOM, which is the military processing command, so it was a joint command. And the message came down from the Assistant Secretary of Defense for us to write a position on gays in the military, so I told my colonel—You know, he’s an old codger. Old Vietnam veteran. I said, “Colonel, why do I really care if someone’s a homosexual in the service? If we don’t ask them, they’re not going to tell us.” And he said, “Lieutenant, that’s the most goddamn—idea I’ve ever heard in my career. Write it up. I’ll send it up.” So I wrote up this paper basically saying if we don’t ask you, they’re—We’re not—You don’t need to tell us. And a week later it came out of the Pentagon or out of the White House: “Don’t ask, don’t tell.” I’m not going to take credit for it, by the way, but stranger things had happened. So I don’t know if I was the one that actually penned the idea or not, but was just a—Kind of a—That was when the service was really in, I think, some significant transition from—Well, for one thing, early on in my career drugs and marijuana were a problem. I mean, when urine analysis came on board, it changed the services, and then there was an attitudinal shift, particularly in regards to smoking cigarettes and towards heavy drinking. And that was a—Clearly a cultural shift across all the services. You know, it’s rare you find people in the service that even smoke cigarettes now. Alcohol and alcohol abuse and drunken behavior at one time, I would say, was the standard. Is now the exception. So the services have changed immensely in the last couple decades for the better. (54:04) As a taxpayer, I think we get a much better value for a professional armed service that has some moderation in terms of some of their behavior. Interviewer: “Okay. You’re also in the service during a period when women start doing more kinds of things. Did you have women on any of the staffs with the bases you were in, or…?” Our OCS class had—We were a class of twenty-seven. I think we started with thirty-six. We had one woman in our class, which was probably, I think, the second OCS class that had women. I think that was the year 1976. I think, was the first year the Coast Guard had—Was the last year at the Coast Guard Academy that did not have women graduate. In fact, I worked for a captain. His class ring said, “LCWB.” Was the initials on the class ring, and that’s what the class agreed to. And they didn’t tell the staff that that stood for, “Last Class With Balls,” so all the Academy graduates from the year of 1975 or ‘76—Their class ring has, “LCWB.” Now how vulgar and disrespectful is that? But that was reflective of the time about women in the service. On my OCS cruise on the Coast Guard Cutter, Unimak, when we sailed down to the Caribbean, we had one OC. She was commissioned. She eventually became a pilot. She was the one person—One female onboard the ship. The crew obviously didn’t care because in those days women were considered bad luck on ships. (56:00) So I think most of us—being younger, college educated— were maybe a little more thoughtful. We had to really look out for her, but one day on the mess deck underway one of the crew members jumped up onto the mess deck table, dropped his trousers, pulled out his pecker, and danced it in her face. Now there is maybe a little piece of humor in that, but predominantly it was disrespectful and highly vulgar. And nothing came of that event. Nobody was held accountable. Those were different times about attitudes, particularly in regards to women in the service. You have a mixed emotion about that. Every time a Navy ship deploys with women, I think, seven percent of them come up pregnant and can’t make the deployment, so it does affect military readiness and our force structure. We have to kind of maybe calculate that in, but we have to understand we’re an inclusive service now. There are women serving across all branches and all responsibilities in our service. �Northrup, Mark Interviewer: “Yeah, there’s plenty of jobs they’re fully capable of doing. Well, when you had the assignments in Seattle where you were shore-based a lot of the time, were there women enlisted personnel or officers there at those places?” Oh, yeah. We had—Typically, you had more women officers in those kind of administrative assignments. Maritime—Marine Safety Office Inspectors. I would say maybe twenty percent. Maybe, maybe. Not a lot. There were a few. Interviewer: “Okay. Was the climate for them better than it had been on that ship early on?” Well, of course, when you’re in a large staff organization with lots of senior officers, there’s going to be a little more thought and respect towards policy and regulation. I never recall any events of any of the females on my shore stations ever having any difficulties. Not that I was aware of, anyway. Interviewer: “Okay. Now was that assignment at Great Lakes—Was that your last slot?” (58:04) Yeah. Interviewer: “All right. Are there other particular incidents or things that happened while you were serving with the Coast Guard that kind of stand out for you that you haven’t brought into the story yet?” Well, you know, I wanted to stay in. I, you know—I always thought my destiny was to be the captain of a ship, not realizing that I had been the captain of a ship. It was hard when I got out. I loved the service. I like the discipline, I like the camaraderie, I love the mission, I love ships and big things. How can I—How can you not? It was just a—Even when it was bad, it was still exciting and good because you were—I had an opportunity to be something bigger than yourself. I was uniquely privileged to have served my nation, and when people tell me, “Thank you for your service,” I stop them short, Jim. And I say, “Don’t thank me. I’m thanking you for giving me the privilege to have served my nation and served her proudly, and it was a unique privilege. And I was lucky to have been given that opportunity, so I am thanking you as a patriot for giving me that opportunity.” And that turns it on people because it’s not about me. My duty is about to my country and to my fellow patriots, so maybe that’s a little bit of a different perspective than you quite often hear. My country owes me nothing but life, liberty, and the opportunity for pursuit of happiness. They don’t owe me a check. They don’t owe me anything, and from my perspective maybe, as John Kennedy said, “Ask not what you can do for—Your country can do for you, but what can I do for my country?” And to sustain this lovely republic of free market and enterprise that we are so privileged to be patriots and citizens of. Interviewer: “All right. Now how do you think that your service sort of affected you or changed you, or what did you learn from it?” (1:00:02) �Northrup, Mark I think more than anything else it hardens a person certainly, and it also—You have an understanding for your moral compass, and your moral compass has to swing north irrespective of the outcomes. I had to deal with that more than once in my career. That it’s not about me and my career or my life. It’s about my duty to my crew and to my country, and when you go through that threshold, it changes you. It is a significant emotional event, and I think maybe that’s why being a veteran is really a special category of our citizens. But here again. I was privileged, and I think that when you dig down into most veterans, they’ll tell you the same thing irrespective of the fact that they saw their friends maybe get killed. And they had terrible assignments, and they had terrible officers. At the end of the day, deep down they are deeply proud and have—Tell you they were very privileged to have served their country. Interviewer: “That is something that I’ve observed, and even talking to Vietnam veterans who had a particularly bad time, on some level they’re still proud of something in there. Not all of them, but—And that’s true for the World War II guys, too, but okay, so—Now in this case, though, your career or your life’s journey—It suddenly now changes because now you’re out of the Coast Guard. You know, you’re married. You have kids. Okay. Now what do you do?” Well, I got out when I was thirty-seven years old, and I was, you know—Industry wasn’t really that interesting to me because I was already old. So I basically started a civilian career all over at age thirty-seven and quickly realized my leadership skills and ability to understand technical things easily transitioned to leadership in the manufacturing environment. So since 1994, I’ve been in manufacturing positions in predominantly automotive and electronics leading large teams because that—Being process driven, being disciplined, appreciation for training, understanding highly technical, capital, expensive equipment, running operations efficiently. (1:02:25) That all translates right into a manufacturing environment, so from that standpoint it was an easy fit to transition into being a—I went to work for Motorola building the analog flip phones. You probably remember those. Built those by the millions. Motorola’s a great company, and I was—I’ve done fairly well in manufacturing, but here, again, I—You know, I started late in my civilian career, so to speak, because my military career was something I had to put behind me. Take the uniform off and hang it up. It’s only been the last few years I’ve kind of maybe put it in some perspective. Sometimes I think the stories and the events I had lived through—I look back at that, and it’s almost like it was another person then because it’s kind of—It’s in the past, and I think it’s only been within recent years I’ve been able to put it in some perspective and maybe put a modicum of pride and realization that it was something really special. When I took the uniform off, I was very angry. Very angry. I internalized a lot of anger, and I think that’s not an unusual thing. But you can’t be a sorry sacksucker and feel sorry for yourself. You’ve got to get on with your life. You have a family to raise, you have mortgages to pay, you have other opportunities in the world that require your talents, but I think most of us when we leave the service, leave with a certain amount of disappointment—sorrow—because I think we all really liked it. And we like being part of something bigger than ourselves. Interviewer: “Okay, and how did you wind up in West Michigan?” I was living in Texas, I had a great job, I was on the road, my wife informed me she was not happy, and I had a buddy up here working for an automotive manufacturing company that called �Northrup, Mark me on a whim and who knew me from Motorola and said, “Mark, you’ve got to come up here. We need somebody with your drive and dedication and process discipline to join the team.” So I came to West Michigan, and for the first time in my life I actually lived in a place more than three years. (1:04:28) So at age—my late forties—I finally moved someplace and settled down and finally maybe put up some roots in my life. Because you’ve got to remember I grew up in a military family, I was in the military myself, I took jobs in manufacturing that moved me around, and it wasn’t until I got to West Michigan in 2002 that for once I settled down in my life. But, you know, life is opportunities. I’ve had a tremendous opportunity. In my journey, I never saw that I would get involved in government or politics, but by virtue of the fact of my—Maybe some of my abilities and experience I was tapped to be a mayor of a small city in West Michigan that has been a great joy. To be a mayor and to participate in some greatness again. It’s a different kind of greatness. Politics is different than government, and government is different than industry. They all are unique in their own ways, but they all require a certain level of dedication and looking out for each other. Interviewer: “And in this case, you know, as sort of mayor of Hudsonville, you’re looking at a place where there’s a lot of change, there’s a lot of growth, there’s expansion and building, and so you’ve got a complex system to take care of.” Yeah, but I—First of all, very careful. Don’t let me take credit for any of that. Interviewer: “No, but it’s going on, and someone has to be—” Yeah, I am the mayor. We have a very, very good department heads and team. We have a city manager who was educated at Michigan State. Is at my estimation probably the finest city manager in the state of Michigan. (1:06:06) As a mayor of the city, I chair the commission. That is a part-time job. My job is to be the voice for the commissioners to get them all to agree to some levels. I get to appoint the boards and the committees. I hold the week—The monthly city commission meetings. By the way, they’re precise and organized, and there’s no chitchat. It’s boom, boom, boom. Does that surprise you? And I think, you know, the team appreciates that. I always was a little bit—We have a—Like here, we have a public access TV. We film all our city meetings, and I never have the residents show up to city meetings. And obviously we work through some fairly controversial things as you can imagine, particularly spending money to build a new downtown in the city, and I can only count the number of times on one hand in four years I’ve had anybody call me or show up at a city commission meeting. And for the longest time I always thought, “Well, people are just really apathetic, and they’re too busy.” But I’ve kind of transitioned and begin to—Come to understand that the people where we live just trust us because we’re their neighbors, and as I often tell in giving a speech, these are the people we love. And that love is transparent. We have affection for the people we live with. Our neighbors. We don’t always agree—we know that—but we all have our—The best interest in the community at heart. I’m very fortunate I have great commissioners. We’re all very dedicated professionals and want to do what’s right for the community and build a better place for our families as evidenced by the fact Hudsonville is the fastest growing community in West Michigan. It has the finest and fastest growing school district in the state right now, which is unusual. We are at the right place at the right time. Our struggles are we don’t have room in our schools, we need to get our roads and our transportation systems fixed, but from that—And we need to build more housing �Northrup, Mark because housing is a premium. (1:08:11) We have full employment where we live. We can’t find people to fill all these jobs we have, so from the standpoint of that, it’s a challenge. But it’s a— I’d rather have this challenge than to have a challenge like maybe what happened to Troy or in Flint where the city is in disrepair, there aren’t jobs, people are leaving, you lose your tax base, your schools are closing. You know, it’s a lot funner being on this side than that side. Interviewer: “I’ll bet. All right. The whole thing makes for a pretty good story, and you tell it well. So thank you very much for coming in and sharing it to me.” I appreciate it. More importantly, I think it’s important that I acknowledge the fact of your passion for veterans and understanding, you know, our role in this great republic that we get to live in, so thank you, Jim, for your sincere interest and your historical reference point for what we bring to our country as veterans. (1:09:06) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_NorthrupM2294V Title A name given to the resource Northrup, Mark (Interview transcript and video), 2019 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2019-02-14 Description An account of the resource Mark Northrup was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 1957. He graduated high school in 1975 and attended St. Olaf College in Minnesota before opting to enlist into the Coast Guard for its Officer Candidate School. Northrup attended the OCS program in Yorktown, Virginia, before being commissioned in March of 1981. For his first assignment, he was sent to Duluth, Minnesota, to serve on an icebreaking buoy tender. Northrup also served tours in Okinawa, Japan, as a commanding officer of a long range navigation station, a pollution officer and Vessel Traffic Systems Watch Officer out of Puget Sound in Washington, and as an executive officer on a buoy tender out of Ketchikan, Alaska, where he bacame captain of his ship. Northrup left the service in 1994 and began a career in manufacturing, predominantly automotive, and electronics manufacturing. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Northrup, Mark B. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, james (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Other veterans & civilians--Personal narratives, American United States. Coast Guard Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/2f3edae64c93ab2bea7fdc88405ef00e.mp4 d8b6484e116dff8db510a1ae508231c1 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/42ba0b8120bfd3d9ecb0794bcf7473fc.pdf c6a70d3fafa8c22841629b6692ef386a PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Jerry Moyer Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Christopher Kroupa Interviewer: We are at the 2016 Ripcord Association Reunion in Springfield, Missouri. We’re talking now with Jerry Moyer of Bella Vista Arkansas and the interviewer is James Smither of the Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project. Okay Jerry, start us off with some background on yourself, and to begin with where and when were you born? Veteran: I was born right here in Springfield Missouri in 1948, October 13, Interviewer: Okay, did your family live in Springfield or in the area somewhere? Or… Veteran: Yes, lived over on the north side of town, Interviewer: Okay and did you grow up here? Veteran: I, I grew up till, I was here till I, let me think, about 1958, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: My dad died, and my mom remarried shortly after that and we moved to Omaha Nebraska, and that’s where I went to high school and that’s where I entered the service is up in Omaha, �Interviewer: Okay and did you graduate from high school? Veteran: Yes, Interviewer: Okay, when did you graduate? Veteran: 1966 was my year, Interviewer: Okay and what did you do after you got out, out of school? Veteran: I spent about a year working at a grocery store up there and, worked full-time, and didn’t have any rent or anything like that so I thought, I thought I was making good money, but I had a motorcycle and a GTO and I kept getting little tickets and I had four tickets in one month and the judge told me, I see you one more time I will do everything in my power to get your license, and this buddy I used to run with up there, we decided, you know we’ve been talking about going in the service lets go, go do it cause we don’t have a future here no more, it, it’s gonna happen, get another ticket and we went down to the recruiter, signed up and it was my buddies idea he said, (2:00) �Veteran: We wanna go Airborne Ranger, and yeah what the heck, go, go in on the buddy system and we did our physical and came back like three days later and he told me he said, I got good, called me in first, no called my buddy in first, and he, when he left he went out the door didn’t even come back to see me, but when I went in there the guy said, I got good news and bad news, bad news is we’re not gonna take your buddy he’s got a health issue, and the good news is we’re gonna take you and then he says, now do you still wanna go Airborne Ranger, and I said no I don’t think so and told him I had an uncle who worked for the phone company and have you got anything along them, and he said we got a wonderful pro-, we can get you climbing telephone poles stringing wire and I says that’s, that’s what I wanna do, I'm gonna go on, I'm gonna go ahead and go in and they kept their word on it I went to basic training at Fort Campbell Kentucky, the irony of that, that’s the home of the 101st, Interviewer: Alright now, before we get into that, to back up a little bit, so the physical that you took was actually a serious physical then? Veteran: Yes, Interviewer: Okay, cause some people suggest that what they got was, you know can you walk and breathe kind of thing, Veteran: Oh no no, they Interviewer: Not the one you did? �Veteran: They had doctors poking and prodding on us, Interviewer: Okay, alright and then, how much did you know about Vietnam at the point when you signed up? Veteran: Not a clue, not a clue, and matter of fact I didn’t even, you know I didn’t think there was any chance I’d be going off to some war somewhere, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: That, that, that’s how young and dumb I was, I didn’t realize that’s what the Army’s in the business for, but Interviewer: Alright, so you were just going as a thing to do and, Veteran: Get it out of the way, the draft was going on then, I said you got to do this anyway, Interviewer: Right, okay, so now when did you show up at Fort Campbell for basic training? (4:00) �Veteran: That would have been the early September and like I said we’d be out there, we thought they were trying to kill us but we would see these Airborne guys, well I mean we might march to the rifle range, these guys ran to the rifle range and might even do a circle around us, and I thought oh this is unreal what them guys, well they, I didn’t think that we had it so bad, but did our eight weeks of basic and, Interviewer: Okay, now before we move on from basic, just cover a little more for people who don’t know, what do you actually do in basic training? Veteran: You get a series of shots, just, it’s something they do and evacuation type things, and you learn how to march its simple as that sound, you gotta learn how to do it and you gotta learn who to salute and who not to salute and after about two or three weeks they let you handle a rifle, and you get to play with it for about a week and then they finally take you to a rifle range and you get to fire that weapon, and you know, things are going better then, when, it’s an eight week course and when you're in the fourth or fifth week they, they start to treat you a little nicer and they still call you trainee and they ain’t got a name for you, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And, but they do, they do start to treat you a little, and you learn the discipline, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: There a chain of command and you better respect it, and you learn how to clean that barracks and you can never clean it good enough for em, you, you’ll clean it twice and then they might let you off then, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, now how easy or hard was it for you to adjust to all of that? Veteran: I, me personally I didn’t have any trouble at all, I mean, I, I wasn’t one of the fastest runners, but I wasn’t definitely wasn’t the slowest and my locker, footlocker and bunk might not have been the best, but it wasn’t the worst, (6:03) Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I was, I was just kind of a middle-of-the-road person and it kept me out of trouble I mean, you know I learned real quick you don’t talk in the chow line in matter of fact we weren’t even allowed to talk when we were eating back then, but I adjusted pretty well, it didn’t bother me too much, I mean I can do the physical stuff, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, and as far as you , were the other guys you were training with other enlistees or were there draftees mixed in? Veteran: We had some of both, �Interviewer: Okay, alright so you kind of progressed through the training, you get into some weapons training, things like that and gradually and stuff kind of comes together, the drill instructors behave a little bit better, Veteran: Yup Interviewer: And then that’s an eight-week course? Veteran: Eight-week course, yeah Interviewer: Okay Veteran: And then there’s classroom activity all throughout all this stuff, and jus various military things that you need to know, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: You know booby traps, and you do a little, you get a little bit of schooling on everything, and its, again its associated with war, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, alright and what do you do then after basic? �Veteran: When you graduate from basic, they have a little ceremony a big parade field and now you're not a trainee no more, you're a real soldier, if you can pass basically, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: You're a solider, but they, they assign you where you're next duty station is and you get and MOS, an MOS is just, that’s your new job, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Your new title and if you go to that advanced, advanced infantry training school and pass you actually get that MOS, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And mine was 36 Charlie, that’s a signal, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: MOS, and my, my next duty station was Fort Gordon Georgia, and that’s, that’s the, they got WIC down there and they got the school for MPs, (8:00) �Veteran: But that’s where I learned to climb telephone poles and string wire and ride a little cable car, they had about eight poles set in a role that weren’t twenty feet apart, but you had to climb up that, set the little cable car on there and then you had to, from your gaffs, you had to get in that thing and not you know break your neck, and it wasn’t up that high probably I don’t think it was quite twenty feet but it’s at least fifteen feet, I mean it’d hurt you if you fell, but you go over to the next pole and you get out and get on the pole, grab your cable car and set it on the next, and when you go through the, that was, that’s how you pass that little course, Interviewer: Okay, and so you got through that alright? Veteran: Yeah, oh yeah Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Climbing didn’t bother me a bit, I, and I've never climbed, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: It, it, yeah �Interviewer: Just came naturally. All right, now eventually you wind up in Vietnam in an infantry unit, now you, but you, but did you finish that training course and then with that designation so were you, signals guy or? Veteran: Well I've got a signal MOS but then they sent me to Fort Leonard Wood for an advanced signal course, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And then, I think that only lasted about six weeks, but we went there and did that one and then we got our next orders to our duty station and mine was Germany, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I spent a year and a half in Germany, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: And I was attached to a mechanized infantry unit and I had that signal MOS the whole time except right at the end I got promoted to Buck Sergeant, well the slot that was available to me was an infantry slot so my MOS changed when I got them three stripes, and now Sergeant Moyer is, we had a bulletin board in our company area and I don’t, I don’t, I got to looking at it too but they had what they call a levy, have you heard this term? �(10:06) Interviewer: Yeah, when it’s a, they're recruiting or they're, reassigning people, Veteran: Reassigning, Interviewer: When they draw them out of one unit and, Veteran: Yeah, Interviewer: Put them in another, Veteran: They had the list, had the levy guys come down and say the levies came down and you'd go up there and be a whole bunch of names on there and I think it was from the whole battalion that you were attached too, and the levy usually meant you were going to Vietnam, it’s a new duty station, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I mean it could have been Korea but most of the time it was to Vietnam, well I know sooner than got these E-5 Sergeant stripes and my name popped up on there, and I had my wife �over there, and I had orders to leave, I don’t know in six weeks or something like that, but my wife was pregnant, they wouldn’t let her fly, so I got a deferment, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And when the baby came and I think they had to wait two months for, they didn’t want the baby flying until it was two months old, the two months came up, sent her home on an airplane and then I, I, I don’t know exactly how long after that but four or five months went by and I said they forgot me, lo and behold they haven’t forgot me, the orders came down again and I, that’s, requested a leave, 30-day leave, and when that leave was up and my eight to ten days travel time to get to my next duty station on the way to Vietnam, I only had ten months to go in the service and I kept thinking they're not gonna take me, they was happy to get me and I went, I went to Vietnam and I landed there, I had ten months to go, Interviewer: Okay, to back up a little, talk a little bit about the time you spent in Germany, (12:00) Interviewer: What unit were you with there, what were you doing, Veteran: I was assigned to the 4th Armored Division, and it was a little town called Crailsheim, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And we had two battalions on that post, there was a, our infantry, mechanized infantry unit and there was an artillery unit there that, and they were capable of firing, I don’t know what the proper term is, they could do a nuclear strike, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But its, not, not nothing big, its, I don’t even know how to say this, there were small nuclear weapons, Interviewer: Right, because there were, as in artil-, that could be fired out of artillery pieces, Veteran: Yes, Interviewer: Yes, okay Veteran: They, Interviewer: Tactical nuclear devices, Veteran: Whatever that word is, yeah that’s right and they, and they had our infantry battalion was, were there to protect them when we deployed and Germany was, was good duty, got to go on passes pretty regularly and go out on the economy and see the castles and, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And the food, the guest houses, all that, the food was just excellent over there, its, I'm sure it’s changed but you order a meal over there and you think they brought all this food for me and my wife and who else is gonna be eating with us, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Big plates of steamed potatoes, huge bowl of salad you know good gosh, and there, and they were almost acted offended if you didn’t eat it all, but, Interviewer: Alright, now when had you gotten married? Veteran: I got married in AIT in ’68, February and she stuck with me all these years, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I think we’re on number 48’s coming up, Interviewer: Alright, and so then she was able to go, now did she go with you to Germany or could she come out once you made Sergeant or how did that work? �Veteran: No I went to Germany alone, (14:01) Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And as soon as I got there, I checked into what I had to do to get off post privileges, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: You know to live off post, Interviewer: Right, Veteran: And they, they told me what I had to do, and I went down and found a place to rent and I rented it and they approved all this, and, and wrote home, hey get on a plane and get over here, we got a place to live, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So we, we lived, we was over there eighteen months, Interviewer: Okay, so when do you actually go to Vietnam then? �Veteran: Okay, we came home from Germany and I don’t know if you, there were riots going on all across the country, Interviewer: Its 1968, yes, Veteran: And I remember when I got on the plane here in Springfield Missouri, we was gonna stop at Kansas City and it was a night flight and I remember they came on the loudspeaker and they said if your destination is not Kansas City do not leave the terminal, there's the National Guard Forces out and it, and I remember flying into that airport, you can see fires burning, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But anyway okay I stayed in the airport and got on the next plane and went to Fort Lewis Washington, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And spent a couple weeks there, that’s the first time I ever had an M-16 in my hand and you know what a neat little rifle, we’d always have M-14s up to then, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, now by this time have they gotten the M-16 functioning well enough so you could use it without jamming or, �Veteran: Okay, I wanna skip a lot to tell you about that, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: When I left Vietnam, when they threw me on that medevac to take me home, or take me to the hospital, up until that time I never had a malfunction with my M-16, I thought it was a wonderful weapon, Interviewer: Okay, alright, (16:00) Interviewer: It got better over time, alright so we go back and some people didn’t have trouble to start with so, anyway so I was gonna go back here, so you got, so basically you're, you're at Fort Lewis, so do you, were they training you on the M-16 just to kill time or was there something they wanted to do for people going to Vietnam? Veteran: I don’t think it was just to kill time, Interviewer: Okay, �Veteran: I think they, I think they possibly realized there was a lot of soldiers that had had an M16 in their hand, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Because that’s when they was converting over from the M-14, Interviewer: Right, right Veteran: But we, we were there for two weeks, we did some training on booby traps and contraband that we were going to run into over there in Vietnam, and it just lasted three weeks or two weeks anyway, Interviewer: Okay so to some extent it was an organized program and not just, Veteran: Oh absolutely, Interviewer: What you're doing while you're waiting, Veteran: Oh absolutely, Interviewer: Okay and then what kind of plane do you fly on, was it commercial or military? �Veteran: When that was done, and they said go down get on the bus to go to the airport, it’s a commercial plane, and we landed in Hawaii and dropped a passenger or two off there and wasn’t there in Hawaii very long at all, but took off again and landed at Wake Island and dropped a couple of people off there and then they came on the speakers, says we’re gonna be here for about an hour if you wanna get off and there’s a monument over here somewhere if, you can read about the battle that was here and all that, and I did get off and Wake Island, I’ll tell you what if somebody had spit in the ocean I believe they’d have a tidal wave, they, there is no high point on that island, but anyway we, we got on the plane and we went to Guam, and then from there we went to Ton Son Nhut Air Force Base outside of Si-, Saigon, Interviewer: Saigon right, okay now at this point do you know what unit you're going to, or were you gonna find out after you get there? Veteran: I’ll tell you about my heart getting broke, (18:01) Veteran: We had a couple of weeks of training that was the surge training, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And when it was all over, they had a big parade field and across the parade field they had trucks and buses and all of them had emblems on them, or a cardboard sign in the window that says first cab or whatever, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And then they had a little tower, up there about ten or fifteen feet and it had a guy with a bullhorn, and he would call your name and tell you what units you're going to, and there was about a thousand of us, and there was one other guy there with my last name, and I remember the, they said Sergeant Moyer 101st Airborne, ain’t me, I ain’t never jumped out of no plane, it’s gonna be the other guy, well nobody stepped forward, and these drill sergeants, or sergeants you know how they are when nobody responds to them, it was Sergeant blah-blah-blah, serial number 101st Airborne, and I said my God that’s me, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And grabbed my duffle bag and I, I, I always remember this going across that parade field to that bus and I, I felt like a kid that had just seen his puppy ran over, I am, I am down in the dumps, what are they gonna do, hey this is the real thing, them guys are I mean I've heard of the 101st and I went to basic training, was all around them, I got over to the bus and I asked the driver I said, I told, I said driver they’ve made a mistake with me I've never jumped out of a plane in my life, and he promptly reassured me we’re not jumping, we just need infantry �replacements and I thought they ran over my other dog then, I, I was so down in the dumps that day it was just unreal, and (20:00) Interviewer: So at this point you didn’t really know what the 101st had been doing in Vietnam, Veteran: No, Interviewer: You were just thinking about jumping out of airplanes, and then being stuck being infantry, Veteran: Yean and, I'm, I'm, I have no idea what, what are they gonna use me for, I mean this driver said they're gonna you as an infantryman, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But, but I, and I do remember going up there and I don’t remember what movie it is about Vietnam, and it might be Hamburger Hill, but at the start of the movie they show some new guys coming into country and some old guys leaving, Interviewer: They do that in Platoon I know, �Veteran: Is it Platoon, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: Okay, but they talk about don’t go to the A Shau, I hope you don’t have to go to the A Shau, I remember these guys like what the hell is the A Shau, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And guess where I spent eight months, in the A Shau Valley, and I you know I realized what they were talking about, but I went up to Phu Bai, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And promptly got introduced to a night attack, it wasn’t serious, but you know there sirens are going off, the lights are all being shut off and there's a rocket attack and I can remember seeing, they told us later it was these 122 rockets, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: A rocket about six foot tall, and you can see them flying across the sky, you can see the, the sparks and stuff and I thought wow, is this what wars really like, you know I, I, I didn’t know what war was like, and I don’t have a gun now, they haven’t issued me a weapon right, I'm just �sitting in a barracks with a bunch of guys, we ain’t got nothing but our fists to fight with, but anyway went over to Camp Evans after that and got introduced to my first Sergeant, and he said the guys were out in the field but there's a stand down coming, I didn’t know exactly what a stand down was which he said they’ll be coming in a couple of days and we’ll, we’ll get you situated with your company, not your company your platoon, (22:02) Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And that’s when I met my guys, Interviewer: Okay, so what company were you assigned to? Veteran: I was assigned to Charlie company 2nd platoon, and I was actually 2nd squad, Interviewer: Okay, and then which battalion regiment? Veteran: 2nd battalion, 506 Infantry Division, Interviewer: Regiment, that’s the regiment, the 101st Airborne Division, Veteran: 101st Airborne Division, �Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: That’s right the regiment was 506, Interviewer: Yeah, you just wanna officially get all that down on the record Veteran: the 3rd Brigade, Interviewer: Right, okay so how long did you spend in Camp Evans before they got back in do you think? Veteran: It’s just two or three days, and a Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: And, and I was very pleased when the guys did come in and they, and again I was please but I thought here again I'm nervous, cause they said you're gonna be a squad leader, you're a Sergeant, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And they introduced me to my squad and I mean these, these rascals looked tough, but they were a good bunch of guys and I more or less said I'm green as a gourd, when it comes to what, what you guys are really doing out there help me out, and then we’ll go from there, and they did, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I mean I didn’t get bossy with them or you know, we’re gonna do this and that, no we’re not doing, I did not do that, I let them, I let them lead me, first few weeks, and you get the hang of what you do, it’s just repetitious you, you go searching out in the jungle it gets lunchtime you stop, and set up kind of a position that you could defend if something were to happen, you eat your food, put your rucksack back on, you go out looking some more and at night time you put your claymore mines out, come back in cook your food and write your letters and, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Then set up your guard shifts (24:00) Veteran: Every night you got pull guard and, in my squad, we pulled guard at least two times a night and most of the time three times a night because it’d be three men guard, guard positions and you, and you know dark, dark to daylight, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: There's a lot of hours in there, Interviewer: How many men in the squad? Veteran: Eight, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: Sometimes nine, mostly eight, somebody was always off on R and R or somebody was going home, eight, eight, eight or nine, Interviewer: Okay, and when do you, did you actually join these guys? Kind of what month or, Veteran: Oh its November just before Thanksgiving, Interviewer: Okay, so November ’69, okay Veteran: Yes, �Interviewer: Its actually when we were talking before about coming back and the riots and things like that, that would have been kind of summer of ’69 or early fall or somewhere in there, Veteran: When I, Interviewer: You were talking about being, flying from Springfield to Kansas City and staying at Fort… Veteran: Oh I see what you're getting, Interviewer: So that’s, I guess early, somewhere in the fall of ’69, Veteran: November, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: It probably would have been September, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: I'm just guessing at the month, Interviewer: Yeah, �Veteran: That, that I did that in, Interviewer: Okay, alright so anyway we’ve gotten ourselves to November of ’69, you’ve joined your unit, you're starting to go out into the field, and where were you operating? Veteran: We were operating in what they call I Corps, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I Corps is the northernmost part of South Vietnam it starts, the northern edge of it is the DMZ, and it goes south of a town called Da Nang and over to the Laotian border, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And all points in between, Interviewer: Right, and then specifically within that you mentioned going to the A Shau Valley so is that where you were operating? Veteran: That’s where I operated at, the A Shau Valley, I was wounded in my eighth month and the previous seven months were spent in the A Shau Valley, �Interviewer: Okay, so what, (26:00) Interviewer: What was going on there militarily or whatever at the time you got there, was there much enemy activity or was it quieter? Veteran: When I was over there, there was right at a hundred GI’s a month dying in all of Vietnam, and the first month I was over there I don’t remember experiencing anybody in our company dying, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But every now and then you'd hear about somebody, somebody got it over in bravo company or, and it, I was over there a couple of months before we, our company actually took any casualties, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We had to send home in a body bag, but you know I, I'm thinking how unlucky was that guy and all this and, and you know, and we did, we did a lot of searching and finding nothing, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And I’ve, I’ve jokingly and I hate to trivialize what I am saying, it was a big campout, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I mean I went for, oh I know there was times I went two weeks without firing my weapon, but when you did fire it you know things got exciting, most fire fights lasted less than ten minutes, five minutes, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, so these just be a handful or a couple of the, Veteran: Trail watchers is what we called them, they’ve got a camp down the trail a quarter mile or something and they're just the advanced warning if something goes wrong, shut that off, *Screen goes black* Interviewer: Alright so we have you at this point in, in Vietnam, you’ve shown up at the end, and you’ve gone out in the field at the end of the year in ’69, you say you’ve kind of got there before Thanksgiving where you, on Thanksgiving day do you remember if you were in the field or on a firebase or, Veteran: Absolutely remember where I was at that day, we were in the foothills, �(28:00) Veteran: West of Camp Evans, and the mountains were just beyond us, they sent out a helicopter on Thanksgiving day and they'd had these coolers had had cranberries in this one, mashed potatoes in this one, gravy in this one, turkey and dressing in this one, and they even sent some milk out and that was a very, very rare thing to have, I know, I know, as far as the food went I, I, I actually craved milk or something sweet, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Because we just didn’t have that and, but it was a very good meal and a couple hours later choppers came back out and picked up all that stuff, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And we’re back to eating c-rations again, Interviewer: Right, Veteran: But it was a good break, it, I mean I don’t know in the rear organized that or said they had to do this, or they did it just because it was the right thing to do, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: But they did do it and it was very nice Interviewer: Mm-hmm, alright it was something commonplace in the 1st Cavalry Division because they had lots of helicopters, it varied for a lot of other units and sometimes the food came in and already spoiled so you got lucky, Veteran: I, I guess I did, yeah Interviewer: Alright now who was your company commander when you join the unit, do you remember? Veteran: I believe his name, I'm gonna say Lamb, Interviewer: Mm-hmm because you had a picture of a Captain Lamb in your book so I expect that was, Veteran: I, I think he was our and I didn’t have enough rank to hob knob with them people, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, right, Veteran: So I didn’t, I didn’t break bread with them, and I mean I didn’t get to talk to them very often, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm, and do you remember who your platoon leader was? Veteran: No, Interviewer: Okay, (30:00) Interviewer: Cause they also came and went, Veteran: I think his, we called him Queenie and his name might have been Queen, but that’s, Interviewer: Okay, now had your unit been involved in the Hamburger Hill fight before you joined it? Veteran: I don’t know, Interviewer: Okay so they didn’t talk about that, Veteran: That’s 101st, that’s a 101st battle but, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: I don’t know if my actual battalion was involved in that or not, Interviewer: Alright, okay so you're out there, now my understanding is you spend some time in, in the A Shau and then some point early in 1970 you're back at Camp Evans or along the coast or up toward the DMZ, you're different people from that company have kind of mentioned different places, do you remember, because you talked about being in the foothills at Thanksgiving so you weren’t all the way on the A Shau at that point, Veteran: Right at the edge of it, Interviewer: Yeah so would you kind of go in and out or just stay there for a while and then get out or what do you recall about where you went? Veteran: Well this foothills thing, that, that was rare, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I mean, I, and, and the weather was different right there because we were in lower altitude, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And it was hot, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Most of the time, like I said we were in the A Shau, at nighttime, I ain't gonna say it gets cold but it does get cold, and when the rains come I mean it is cold, but as far as being back at Camp Evans I don’t know, every three or four weeks we get to go to Camp Evans for a threeday stand down, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And that was, I mean that was, that was a break you didn’t have to pull guard duty at night, you got to sleep all night, which you know that, that’s very unusual we got to sleep all night, but I never went to the DMZ, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Just basically, just twenty-five miles due west to Camp Evans was just where I was at, within a, Interviewer: Mm-hmm (32:00) �Veteran: I don’t a five-mile circle, Interviewer: Alright, now one of the things that happened with your particular company was that there's sort of several changes of commander, couple of them anyway while you're there, and a Captain Vazquez would have come in, Interviewer: Veteran: Mm-hmm Interviewer: At some point early in 1970, what impression did you have of him? Veteran: Like I said before I didn’t hob knob with these guys, they're more rank than I will, I wanna be associated with but we, we learned to respect Captain Vazquez, he was not gonna let us get in too big a jam, I mean we might get into a problem but he, he, we, you could tell this man here he knew what to do about it, he didn’t have to call for help he knew what to do, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And he can get us out of it, in fact Captain Vazquez he was a, he was a soldier’s soldier, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, right and did anything in terms of what you did in the field, did any practicality change the way you did anything or were things more subtle than that? �Veteran: When Captain Vazquez took over, probably the biggest change I remember that from what we normally did, we looked harder for the enemy, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: With Captain Vazquez, I mean the other, the other you know, might not have to do a lot of searching, and then do that for three or four days but maybe a helicopter pick you up and take you to the other side of the ridge, you do it again, but Vazquez we, we, we covered a lot of ground with that man, Interviewer: Mm-hmm and he talks about never wanting to use trails, is that what you recalled, did you have to cut your own way or? Veteran: I, I don’t remember that particular thing and I, and maybe somebody there with us does remember that, (34:00) Veteran: I do remember we did make a lot of trails, but I had never thought of it, you know he kept us off of established trails, I do remember we found trail markers when we were on trails, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And that, that was kind of a scary thing that, you know somebody put signs up saying something, Interviewer: So that’s basically to give the North Vietnamese directions for when they're using the trails? Veteran: Yeah, this trail here is good, this ones booby-trapped, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Yeah, I mean, and I don’t know exactly, but I do remember seeing these, these little chop marks in trees and there's the trail goes two different ways, Interviewer: Okay, did you have any Vietnamese with you, in your company? Did they have a Chieu Hoi or somebody? Veteran: We had a Chieu Hoi, our platoon had one and Hap was his name, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Or that’s all I ever know of him by, and he was quite, we, we trusted him, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: He, I do remember one of these trail markers he, he said no, no, no, no, I forget the language he used, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But he is talking Vietnamese we don’t want to go that way, and we didn’t, Interviewer: Okay so he seemed to know at least something about what was going on out there? Veteran: Oh absolutely he did, I mean, and I can understand that, I mean once the North Vietnamese soldiers came down there that, I mean they had a set of trail markers and it was good, it was good for anybody, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: In their outfits that came by this, so it, it wasn’t a real secretive thing, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: That the way, what these trail markers meant, �Interviewer: Okay, alright so you spend, so if you kind of go from November, December or January February March, (36:00) Interviewer: You're kind of doing pretty much the same thing? Veteran: Well during that period when the monsoons came, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: That was a, that was ugly, we, we got socked in and we’re just, the rain is just unde-, you can’t describe it, its I mean when the season started you know every day at two o’clock it’s raining, and a few days later it seems like it starts at noon, and then it just progresses over that first month until its, its literally raining all day long, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And that goes on for three or four weeks and then, then it tapers back down but up there in the mountains it was, normal time it was cold at night, I mean you, well during the monsoon season you, I, it’s a wonder we didn’t catch pneumonia out there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: Because we’re wet all the time and I don’t remember anybody ever catching pneumonia come to think of it, it, leaches were bad, I mean good gosh and when I was, before I went over to Vietnam I can remember swimming in a creek and you might get a little ole leach a half-inch or an inch long on you, and it’s all just, ehh, just, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Curls your skin to take his thing sucking blood out of you, and we get over there and they got these leaches that live on dry land, I mean you're going up the side of a mountain and these things are crawling on you and, and I don’t know what they do when they bite you, they, they did in the skin or something because most of the time you don’t feel them chewing on you, what you feel is when they're bloated and grotesque and they fall off of you and they roll down your pants leg, that’s what you feel, they're full, they’ve had enough but, and I, and I do remember this and this is probably kind of, (38:00) Veteran: A GI will find a way to goof off or have fun one way or another, and we had this mosquito repellent if a leech is on you, you squirt that on him and he would fall off but the repellant kind of burnt where the blood was, but we, we catch on of these leeches and we find a rock or something and put him right in the middle of it and put a circle of this insect repellant �around it and watch him try to get out of that and I mean it’s just silly stupid stuff, but it was entertaining, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We didn’t have much entertainment out there, Interviewer: Alright, now most of the time when you were in the field in this period, did you operate in individual platoons or have the whole company together or break down in squads, I mean was there a normal procedure? Veteran: In my outfit, we operated in company strength rarely, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I mean we might move into an area and the whole company is there, but this platoon goes over this way and this platoon goes, and when we were in platoons, when I was in platoon strength a lot, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But every now and then you could tell somebody from up above, Captain Vazquez or somebody’s called in, send a squad out here on an ambush, or we got a resupply day, Lieutenant �Campbell we need somebody to recon down this side of this mountain to the bottom across the river, go up the other side and turn around and come back and the next day is probably, that’s probably where we’re going, but really rarely operated in squad strength, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Mostly in platoon strength, Interviewer: And most of that time about how many men did you have in the platoon? Veteran: Twenty-five, that was probably, again we, we carried more than that but there was always somebody in, (40:02) Veteran: You know they’ve smashed their toe or something and they're, they're in the rear recovery, they're on R and R, so we were always short, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We never had full strength, I never remember, I said it, I don’t even know what full strength was, but I know we didn’t have enough men all the time, �Interviewer: Yeah, so a lot larger than what your company had, Veteran: Yeah, Interviewer: So okay, so you're like, now in, starting in the middle or March of 1970, that’s when they make their first effort to set up what will become Firebase Ripcord, Veteran: That’s true, Interviewer: And initially this Alpha Company goes in and then B Company actually tries, Veteran: And both of them had lots of problems, Interviewer: Yeah, and they both leave, and we get into April, now its C Company’s turn to go in, Veteran: Yeah, I mean this is like B Company got fired up and the next day they told us we’re going up there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And when, it’s one of the, there's a few things in Vietnam I will never forget, and, and I called them rotten SOB’s, they flew a chaplain out to have communion or whatever, some kind �of services for us before we left, I thought my God they're gonna get us killed, where are we going, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I know they said everybody go to the ammo dump, draw extra grenades and more ammo than you normally carry, and we did that, and I do remember virtually every man dropped a letter in the mail sack, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: As we was boarding them choppers, and consequently we, we’re up there and we are circling around their artillery going off down there, and then they brought us in and we spent that first night on the side of that mountain, (42:00) Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And then the next morning we walked up there and didn’t fire a shot, I mean it was, they'd left, and, and then he start of the helicopters coming in bringing concertina wire and you name it, just everything that, that hill needed to defend itself, �Interviewer: Alright, now do you remember if Captain Vazquez was with you on that very first night or did he come in the next day? Veteran: No I don’t remember this, Interviewer: Okay, alright, now what was, as the base is getting established and your company is still up there on top of that hill, what kind of work did you do? Veteran: My, well basically we were all told, we’ve got to make this defendable, and if you weren’t digging a fighting trench and a bunker to sleep in, you were out clearing trees and stuff down below rolling them up and just making a field of fire that they don’t have much to hide behind, and put more concertina wire up and, getting ammo boxes and building the front of your fighting trench up with them and the three top layers are full of grenades, and, and in your M-16 magazines and one of the boxes probably have a, the firing devices for the claymore mines, and gosh we must have had, there was four of us in that bunker and, and we must have had a dozen claymores out in front of us, because we weren’t packing them around, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We were just, you was just going up and getting them, keep setting them out and we dug a hole for a fifty-five-gallon drum that we had fougas out of, and we set two claymores behind it and put the can in there and fill it up with the, �(44:02) Veteran: JP4, that’s aviation fuel and I don’t remember what we, we mixed it up, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: With sawdust or something, Interviewer: Somebody, somebody suggested it was soap powder or, Veteran: Soap powder, I don’t remember, we did mix it with something to make it, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Coagulate a little bit, Interviewer: Right Veteran: And it becomes kind of, it stick to you a little bit better, but we put two claymores behind it and ran the cord back to a firing position, and that, that’s an impressive thing to see get set off, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: It, it would make me change my mind what, what I was wanting to do, Interviewer: Yeah it just a giant burst of flame, Veteran: Oh, Interviewer: Popping up right in front of you, yeah. How long do you think you spent on top of Ripcord? At least that first time, Veteran: Oh that first time, shoot, it’s probably about thirty days, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: We, and that was good duty, I mean, I mean you weren’t even out humping around, I mean the, the night time over in Vietnam its, there's a song, you curse the darkness and you pray for the light, and it didn’t matter if you was on Firebase Ripcord or you was out in the jungle in a small outfit, the darkness it just it, I will say this the darker it was, the safer you felt because I mean when its pitch black, in the jungle with that triple canopy you can’t move in it without making a lot of noise, so I mean that was the safety margin right there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: It’s in big moonlit night, I wrote letters home at two o’clock in the morning in the moonlight, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: and now that’s, that’s, that’s when you should be more alert because that’s, the enemy can move around and be reasonably quiet, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Yeah, Interviewer: Alright, so you're up there, now during that time, I mean did the enemy make any effort either to probe position or did they shoot anything at you while you were up there? (46:01) Veteran: Occasionally, not very much, we might take two or three mortar rounds one day and the probing part of it, they could have probed us every night I wouldn’t have known any different, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: But I'm sure they did probe us occasionally, but I don’t remember taking a small arms fire while we were there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: No RPGs, and your direct fire weapons, but they did mortar us ever, yeah, I mean every three or four days, accept right when the big battle started, now that’s a different story, all, all them things I said didn’t happen, Interviewer: Right, Veteran: Did happen, Interviewer: Yeah, okay but initially it, it’s fairly quiet and in some ways its, Veteran: Good duty Interviewer: Things were going the way they were supposed to, Veteran: Yup, Interviewer: And after that thirty days or whatever it is, now your company goes out in the field now? �Veteran: Then we do a, then we do a patrol and they rotated us, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Bravo Company or Alpha Company came in and they did what we were doing, see this would have been in April and in May, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And then June we went back, and we’re up on the hill, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And we, we got some more of this good duty, that’s what I called it, and I, I do remember this, I don’t remember if it’s our last night on Ripcord or our next to last night, there was a poker game going on, and it’s in one of the bunkers, and we jury-rigged these lights down underneath there, you know you couldn’t see them from outside, but there was, I don’t know four or five maybe even six men down there playing poker and I didn’t have enough money to play poker but it was entertainment, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: You get to watch them, and I do remember our Captain at that time, he, he was loaning people money, get them back in the game, he was taking IOU’s, (48:00) Veteran: And I can vaguely remember him saying something about this is a car payment, I'm gonna make a car payment this month, and this is Captain Hewitt, Interviewer: Because by this time Vazquez has been taken out of the field, Veteran: Yeah, Interviewer: Because he had been there too long already and now new Captain has come in to replace him, do you have much of an impression of Captain Hewitt or did you not know him well enough to know anything? Veteran: Well see we were out in the jungle before we came up on Ripcord, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And that’s where I first got in, in contact with him, and we did travel in company strength, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: A little more with him than we did with Vazquez, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But Captain, Captain Hewitt carried a, a pump shotgun and a 22 semi-automatic pistol, and right off the bat this is odd, you know what, what kind of a guy have we got, you’ve got impressions of a man that does something, I mean he’s going against the rules, you carry an M16 or a machine gun or a grenade launcher or something like that, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And here he’s got these and I, I can really feel we’re going on another rabbit hunt, we’re, we’re going off in general we’re looking for rabbits and, I'm gonna say my first impression of him, I was not real secure with him leading us, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But anyway in that poker game I know he won a lot of money and a lot of it was going be on payday stakes and that kind of stuff, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And then that, might have been the next day or the day after that, we went to the ridge line that 902’s on, and we landed, I'm guessing a half mile from it and we all went in there and we secured the area and did all that stuff, and then next day we headed towards 902, I mean I had no idea where our destination was, (50:00) Veteran: Or where they wanted us to go, I mean we got there and they said you know set up camp and that’s a, that would have been on the afternoon, wasn’t July 1st, it a day before that, Interviewer: Yeah June 30, Veteran: Yeah, we’re out there and Ripcord starts taking mortar shells, that firebase is, I mean this, this wasn’t probing this is, they’ve, they’ve been zeroing in guns for three months or two months and these tubes were, they were hitting Ripcord, and you know we said something’s going on, and we’re sitting there, a lot of us are watching it and a chinook helicopter came into Ripcord with a sling load of something, and they had heavy machine guns set up somewhere close because they shot this rascal down, they forced it down, didn’t, didn’t crash and burn right then, and they sent another chinook out there to sling it up and carry it out of there, well they did the same thing to it, they shot it down and you know we’re sitting there watching all this and go wow, you know something, somethings going on, this, this is unusual and it was somewhere right in there we could hear the sound of a mortar tube on the mountain that we’re on somewhere �down near the bottom of it and its, it’s a long ways to the bottom of it and one of these mortar tubes that’s firing on Ripcord just right down here and we, we, we’re talking this over you know we’re trying to course where it’s at, till we can get some directions to them to fire artillery down there, and I don’t remember if it was another sergeant or me and a, (52:00) Veteran: Just another squad member, but we, we gathered up a couple of LAW anti-tank missiles and we went over to that side of the hill which is really right where my, my position was and I fired one and he fired one and I’d be foolish to think that we knocked them out, but I do know this, they quit firing, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I don’t, I really don’t think we hit them, that, I mean we just randomly shot them and I mean this things got a range of like four-hundred meters and I mean we’re shooting this thing is, it’s going way over a quarter of a mile away down the side of that mountain, I mean you, you shoot it and you, you count to ten or fifteen before you hear the thing blow up down there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: But I've always said they didn’t like us up there pinpointing where their mortar position was, Interviewer: Right, Veteran: And now we’ve already spent a night there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And, Interviewer: So now this is July 1st that you're doing the shooting LAWS then, Veteran: Yes, this is July 1st when all this is going on and I've always kind of guessed they didn’t like us being up there pinpointing where they're at, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I mean all during the day there's jets coming in dropping bombs, the F-4, the fast movers, they're coming in and I, I seen some planes I’d never seen before come in there and drop ordnance, but we’d never spent two night in a row in the same place, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: Until then, and again Vazquez wouldn’t, I, I believe if the, if the Battalion Commander would have told him to sit there a second night, he would have moved us fifty yards nothing else, I mean we might still be right there close, but we would have moved, Interviewer: Mm-hmm (54:00) Veteran: But we did not move, and they, well they came up and got us that night, Interviewer: Okay, now did you dig new defensive positions or reuse the ones from the night before? Veteran: We didn’t move, we stayed right where we were, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I mean there was modifications made to them, make them, making them better, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: But now we’re, we’re right in the same place, we didn’t move, I mean we got a Captain there with us, we’ve got two Lieutenants there with us and, Interviewer: Did you have, well you had Bob Leibecke, Veteran: Yup, Interviewer: One of the platoons wasn’t there, Veteran: Jim Campbell, my platoon leader he was on R and R, Interviewer: Yeah but one whole platoon wasn’t there either, cause Sergeant Burkey Veteran: Burkey was on Ripcord, yes, I think he’s third platoon, Interviewer: Yeah so you got two platoons on there, Veteran: Yeah, Interviewer: And, Veteran: Under strength, �Interviewer: Yeah, yeah and then okay, so there wasn’t another Officer, but I know there was forward artillery forward observer was up there Veteran: Yeah that was a, three Officers, Interviewer: Yeah and you had, was one platoon led by a Sergeant, or now is, because Campbell wasn’t there, Veteran: Right, Interviewer: Right, okay so not very many men to start with, Veteran: Yeah and short one Lieutenant, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And, and what, where I was getting with on that I mean there, there's three Lieutenants there and who am I to say hey we’re really not staying here again, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I mean, I mean it wouldn’t have done any good anyway I don’t think, �Interviewer: Okay, well alright so now it gets to be nightfall and then what happens? Veteran: Well we set up our guard rotation like we’ve been doing for previous eight months that I've been there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And there were three men positions, there may have been a few four man positions but that was the most men at on position, (56:01) Veteran: And the average guard shift at my position was like an hour and fifteen minutes, and if you got three guys there you can see you're not gonna get sleep just a couple of hours, two and a half hours, and then you're gonna be woke up again and you’ll pull, you pulled about three hours, or three guard shifts in a night, and I remember the Platoon Sergeant came over and woke me up and it’s your turn, your guard shift, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: That’s okay that’s cool, and I got up and its, it’s a routine you, you grab your rifle and you grab your helmet and you move over by the claymore firing devices, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And, and we had a radio right there, and I'm listening on the radio and I hadn’t been up fifteen minutes through, its 3:15 now, and somebody on the hill and I couldn’t identify them said they had movement out in front of them, this is not unusual, there are animals all over Vietnam and we’ve had movement many many times, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But you pay attention to it, you don’t just disregard it and say it is an animal, and I'm listening to that okay, and somebody else is doing this too, they're saying yeah I've got movement out in front of me, and it, it perks your ears up a little bit well now I got movement out in front of me, and I got on the radio and I called the CP, I don’t know if it was Doc Cafferty or who it was I was talking to in the CP, but I said we’ve got three positions that’s got movement in front of them, we need to start waking people up and go at least a fifty percent alert, and I’ll get back with you, okay, minute or two passed and he came back and he says yeah start waking people up, I laid the, my mic down and, (56:00) Veteran: I started crawling back to where that Sergeant was and all hell broke loose as I started over there, in his position there were three men and two of them were killed, the third one is a �missing in action guy and I'm just speculating, when we got overrun and I, I'm just speculating again I think that position there is where they overrun us from, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But when they left, I think they may have drugged this man off, thinking it was one of their own if nothing else, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I, you know, I don’t know, and I know if you lose somebody in combat it’s a very demoralizing thing, and they may have been thinking along them lines I, I really don’t know, Interviewer: Yeah, they, they had a policy of trying to recover their bodies and part of it was they didn’t want us to know how many we killed, Veteran: And they were human beings, they, they worshiped, or they bowed down to God and yeah, they believed in the hereafter and all that, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So they tried to recover their bodies too, but you know all three of their men were wiped out right immediately, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: RPG or something, I don’t know it could have been a big satchel charge, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Something blew up right there in their, and then plus the Captain and his position was hit immediately, and this gets back to, I really think they were probing us, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: In the daylight, and I, I don’t, they probably couldn’t believe their good fortune when we stayed there the second day, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And they really got us probed because I mean they, they hit the CP and that, that just wasn’t a random shot, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And plus that one position they took it out and I don’t know who it was over there at that position, they did not die immediately, Ripcord was firing illumination for us, (1:00:00) Veteran: And when the lights were up and burning things got real quiet, and I mean you look around and you see these shadows moving from that parachute coming down, and that makes the shadows move, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I mean your eyes are just going back and forth you know what, is something moving there, and no its just a shadow, but they did not keep the illumination up continuously, they, they missed timed it a little bit, and sometimes the lights would go out, and when the, Interviewer: Okay, alright this tape is about up so we’re gonna pause right here and the, *Screen goes black* Interviewer: Now we’ve gotten you to the point of the beat, the beat, onset of the attack on hill 902, I guess early morning hours on July 2nd 1970, so the first blast is gone off in your sector, the hole you were just very close too, and you're talking about the, there's illuminations rounds �dropping and the enemy moving around someplace, so what do you do yourself after that blast, once the attack started? Veteran: I threw two hand grenades, that’s the first thing I did, I mean I, there's things you do in combat when, when, when somethings happening, every night when you go to bed you know where your pistol belt, you know where your grenades are, you know where your helmet is and you know where your rifle is, and okay I know there's a battle going on, I'm grabbing all these things and I'm throwing two grenades, just right out in front of me just kind of left and right one, and I blew a couple of claymore mines and now I've got my rifle and I'm trying to find a target when the lights are on, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And this man to my left, and I, I don’t know who it was but they, they were in agony (1:02:00) Veteran: And the medic was right there with me and, and there are satchel charges going off all over this hill just, you know I don’t know how many it was but dozens if not twenty-five or thirty of them, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: Real quick like went off and he said, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna go get him and I, I do remember telling him hold one a minute, let’s get this, let’s get this thing under control then you go help everybody, and this guy’s moaning over there, well he’s drawing satchel charges and these things are going off ten or fifteen feet from us, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And you could tell when one landed close to this man the intensity of his screams got really blood-curdling, anyway he says I've got to go help that man and he started to move and he was shot and he died at my feet, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And this, this thing with the lights going off and on, this went on for an hour, hour and a half I mean, untold satchel charges went off, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: If I was guessing I hate to say a thousand explosions were on that hill that night, but I don’t think I’d miss very many, very much, it was just lots of them, Interviewer: Now was there rifle fire too or just the satchel charges? �Veteran: I remember very little rifle fire, I mean these were smart soldiers, there was undoubtedly some, but at this point I mean, my ear drums were already broke, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Or I, when they tested me, I had one ear drum broken, the other one was just a, just a loud ringing, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And, but a gun fire you could still hear it even when your, you still hear something, Interviewer: Mm-hmm (1:04:00) Veteran: And I remember us, and I, I was disorientated a little bit about what was going on, to me I mean we’re invincible there ain't nobody gonna do this to us, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: There's enemy out in front wanting to do something to us and I'm gonna take care of them, the enemy is in front of me, I had no idea we was already overrun, and I still didn’t put two �and two together when a satchel charge hot my leg and I could feel it kind of bounce bounce bounce off my leg coming towards me and I'm laying out, and I'm, I mean I immediately started crawling forward just as fast as I could, and I'm hanging on to my helmet waiting for this thing to blow up, and it was a dud, it didn’t blow up, I scooted myself back I still didn’t put two and two together this came from behind me, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But just a few minutes later another one landed real close to me, I didn’t know it, and when it blew up it blew me over the side of the hill and I lost all my spare ammo at that point, I did keep my helmet and I kept my rifle and, and I remembered I just put a few magazine in my rifle so I had a full magazine, but when I quit rolling around, I, I remember looking back over my left shoulder and my fatigue pants were on fire, and I've always said I don’t know how close that satchel charge was to me to actually set my pants on fire but it had to be close, but anyway, all I could think about is they could see me, I mean I'm, I'm on fire, I got little flickering flames on my fatigue pants, and this is when, the scaredist I've ever been in my life was at this point right here, I took my hand and I started swatting these little flickering flames out, (1:06:01) Veteran: And I got them out, I put them out, but my hand could feel my leg but leg could not feel my hand, and I did not know how bad I was hurting, and I'm telling you its, just sends chills up my spine just thinking about that, but anyway I'm there with a full magazine, my legs fortunately �I wasn’t hurting very bad, but it was numb and lights, the flare popped up there and I'm gonna, I've got a soldier in front of me and I can remember, I can remember this man just plain as day he reminded me of a puppet, as I was going pop pop pop pop pop, I could see his shoulder jerk I can see a hip double up a little bit and, and I just go, pop pop pop pop and something said you don’t have any more ammo, an di quit shooting and I remember reaching around and feeling the dust cover on my M-16 and the bolt was closed, I thought I've got a bullet in the chamber, and I said right then and there somebody’s gonna have to be trying to pick me up or stick a bayonet in me before I shoot him again, and I know I've got at least one bullet left and come to find out that when morning came and, the battle, the battle ended shortly after that, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They left, they pulled out and left and I probably had thirty to forty-five minutes of darkness before daylight, and with my eardrums broke if anybody was saying anything I couldn’t hear it and this was the new emotion I went through, I thought I was the only man left alive on that hill, scaredist I've ever, this superseded that other scared thing I was at, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And, but I do know when daylight came, I, (1:08:00) �Veteran: I'm just kind of looking around and I seen a helmet, and that’s one of our, that’s one of our kind of helmets, and it was a machine gun off to my right, and there was three guys there and they, they seen me we did hi signs to each other and one of the assistant gunners started crawling towards me and he had two grenades and had had the pins pulled on them but he’s crawling towards me holding them grenades and I did, I've always said he looked just like John Wayne if he had had a bayonet in his mouth but he didn’t have the bayonet, but he crawled up to me and he said you know what, and I just pointed out and that’s, that’s the last place I seen any gooks is right there, and he threw both his hand grenades there and they blew up, guys were starting to stir then, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They picked me up and choppers were coming in and they carried me up to the hill and I never seen so many bodies in my life as there was, we passed, and they were mostly gooks, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: The enemy soldiers and I remember they threw me on the chopper, and they unloaded a few men and then they threw the wounded, the wounded went first and then the dead went on the next chopper and their third or fourth chopper, but they sent me, and the man named Mike Mueller, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: We were together, we got back to the rear and they started ripping our clothes off and dobbing us up with merthiolate, picking rocks and stuff out of us and then they sent us back to a tent that had just cots in it, and we spent the rest of the day there and the next morning which would be twenty-six hours after the battle we’re wondering about where do we get some food at, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And the nurse said, its right there's a tent right there that they, they serve food, (1:10:00) Veteran: And me and this other guy we, we, we could walk and Mike you coming with us and Mike said I, my leg is killing me, and he had shrapnel and all up and down from his ankle all the way up to his shoulder on that one side, and okay we’ll bring you back something, we went, did this and brought him back some food, well he didn’t feel like eating and got the nurse in there and he’s telling her how his leg hurts and she said can you two guys help him down to the x-ray tent which I swear is a block away and I, I, I said if we didn’t look like a mess hobbling down there with him and anyway we took him into the x-ray tent and they were working on him and doing what they have to do there, me and this other guy we’re looking at some of their x-ray pictures that are hanging up there, they brought some more out we’re looking at them and you see broken bones and what have you, well there was this one x-ray picture that showed a would channel that was probably fourteen inches long, sixteen inches long and there is a pristine �undeformed bullet right at the end of it, I, I said wow look at this, somebody had a bullet in them, and this guy came in and said hey that’s your buddy, he’s got a bullet in him, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And anyway, they gurnied him out there on the table and he said Sergeant Moyer can you go back to the tent and get my billfold and cigarettes, sure, I hobble up there, I get this stuff and I come back and he is gone, he’s on a helicopter going somewhere, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Well a couple of days later they sent me to Cam Ranh Bay to rest and relaxation, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Convalescent type deal and as I went through Da Nang, (1:12:01) Veteran: I ran into a Sergeant that was doing the flight manifests and I told him this same story and he said, I, give it to me I know what to do with that billfold that’s no big deal, and I thought about I don’t know this man from Adam, there's, there's like eighty bucks in this billfold and you know it’s got his ID card and a few other things, I said you know what the heck I'm gonna, I'm �gonna put some faith in my fellow man, I gave it to him and I didn’t talk to Mike for twenty-five years, it was about twenty-five years after the battle and I was talking to the man who wrote the book, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Keith Nolan, talked to him for an hour and a half, two hours an di got to asking him about who he interviewed, and Mike Mueller’s name came up and I says you’ve been talking to Mike Mueller and he said yeah he lives up in Alaska, and I said yeah that’s same, same Mike Mueller I know and he gave me his phone number and I remember calling Mike and you know this is Sergeant Moyer and Mike stuttered terrible, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: He, he was comical to be around, and after we introduced each other I said Mike did you get your billfold, and he said it caught up to him about six months later in a hospital and he said the money was in there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I said that’s a happy ending to a story right there, Interviewer: Alright now as for you, �Veteran: Yes, Interviewer: Okay so you got, you went through Da Nang, you went down to Cam Ranh Bay, Veteran: Yes, Interviewer: Okay and then did you just convalesce there, or did you go someplace else or? Veteran: No, when I left Da Nang and got to Cam Ranh Bay, well I had two months to go in the service, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I, you know they're gonna send me home, no they're not they're gonna send me to Cam Ranh Bay and, and recover and go back to my unit, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: The only thing was the recovery took two months, (1:14:01) �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And when I left Cam Ranh Bay, I only had like three or four days to go in the service and I got back to my unit, the company clerk gave me a clipboard and I had no idea, you know I've done, I had done this in the state sides and in Europe signed off a post, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: You go to the library, the barber shop, anybody you’ve done business with you sign off if you don’t owe them no money or anything like that and he handed me this and I said we’ve got some of these things on Camp Evans you know like a, well a barber shop, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And there was a, a massage parlor there and, and I had to go get signatures you know, of course you’ve gotta go through the supply room, the arms room, and I, I did all that, it didn’t take long but got to the arms room and I did have problems there, a man said you need to turn your rifle in, and I said I have no idea not a clue where my rifle is and, and I had to explain to him what happened when I was wounded, I said they didn’t, they didn’t give me a rifle to ride that chopper back home with, my rifle is on hill 902 is the last place I seen it, and he said well we gotta sit down and fill out some more paperwork, it is a combat loss, and but that, that’s all that that amounted to but he made me a little nervous, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: When he asked me for my rifle and he said we got a problem, but it was just had to do some paperwork, combat loss, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, alright so now you're pretty much back in one piece but you're also out of time so, Veteran: Still got one day to go, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: First Sergeant came to me and he says go to the arms room, check out a 45 and get some ammo for it and I want you to go down to the chopper pad, (1:16:00) Veteran: We’ve got these coolers and they're full of sirloin steaks, I don’t know a half dozen coolers, he said I want you to make sure they get out to Firebase O’Reilly, that’s where our company’s at, they're doing perimeter guard on it, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And they’ve got the barbecue grill thing set up out there and see that every man gets at least one and there should be enough for every man to get two, and I thought damn I’m going back out to the field, but I said I'm gonna get to see my guys, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: This is gonna be worth it, and this is probably around noon or one o’clock and chopper came in and we loaded them on there, we flew out there and we’re doing the barbecue and I'm going down to the bunker where my squad was and I'm talking to them and they're telling me about some of the things that happened right after 902, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And you know, you know how much time they got left to go and be glad when this is over and I said well I know what you're saying and I am glad that its over for me, well I, I lollygagged around talking to these guys and it got near five or six o’clock I don’t remember what the exact time was, but I went back up to the flight pad and I asked somebody up there, I said when’s the, when’s the next chopper gonna be out here, and he said tomorrow morning, I said you mean there's no more choppers coming out here tonight, he said no you're gonna spend the night out here, I said you gotta be kidding me, well anyway I went back down to where my guys were and I said yeah you're not gonna believe this I got to spend another night here, well they had a mad minute that night if you know what a mad minute is, that’s where they test the firing of all the different positions to make sure there's not something that’s not covered, I, I �think there’s somebody up there in a helicopter a long ways away but they can watch what’s going on, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And they can see if they need to adjust any of the positions and all that, (1:18:00) Veteran: But for one minute you get to fire your weapons, you don’t get to thrown grenades and you don’t get to blow your claymore mines but you, they want to see where the firings going to and it’s about one o’clock in the morning they pop the rad flare right up there and I mean that hill lit up and I got my 45 and I'm John Wayneing it just firing it all over the, till I'm out of bullets and, and that’s that, went to bed, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Pulled the shift guard and next morning I got on a chopper, went back to Evans got on a helicopter went to Da Nang, and got manifested on a flight, and we roll down the runway and we was just screaming and hollering and whoppy indeed, I mean we were happy that plane got off the ground and somebody said get this thing out over the ocean, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: Get it away from this country, and, and I know all the stops I had when I went over there, we were virtually non-stop going back, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: It, it, I mean it was a long flight, I was surprised the plane could go that far without refueling but, Interviewer: So where did you go to in the States? Veteran: Back to where I started, Fort Lewis Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And got that, you, that old steak dinner that everybody in Vietnam got, when we got there, we did some really, they were not very thorough physicals, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Checked our teeth and a few, if you get, it didn’t amount to a bunch, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And went back to the barracks and they said take your boots and tie the shoelaces together, throw them out in the middle of the floor and your fatigues and all that stuff and you can go home and yeah, I went home in my dress greens, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And a lot of guys, there were big piles of clothes and stuff there, (1:20:00) Veteran: Well I knew I’d be going deer hunting, I had a father-in-law hat loved to deer hunt and I know, so I went back there, and I found me two pairs of boots that were my size, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I put them in my, and I remember the last place we had to check out of was the Reenlistment Officer, the guy that wants you to sign on for another tour of this, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And that’s when I told him I said done, y’all taught me how to dance and then you took me to the dance and I want no more dancing and he kind of laughed and he said I understand �and, but then it was right then they said do not deviate from your plane leaving this place here whether you get on the green bus that’s going to the train station or the yellow bus that’s going to the airport or something, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: There was another color bus too, he says do not get off this bus, the protesters are right outside the gate, and I thought you know I, I was so ni-, I didn’t even realize that kind of stuff was going on, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I thought what in the hell are they protesting, what I mean we, we didn’t do anything wrong and, and that’s something else I want to put this on the end of this, one of the things I'm most proud of, there's a couple of things, my entire squad made it home, some of them shot up pretty bad but nobody died and the other thing is I do not remember anything we did that would be called an atrocity, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We did what soldiers did, and I, I've always kind of felt like this is, helped me with my, my own personal healing process of Vietnam, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm, alright, now at this point you've completed your enlistment, so you did, do you get discharged or do you have to go someplace else for that? Veteran: I'm done, Interviewer: Okay, you're out, Veteran: I left Fort Lewis I was done, Interviewer: Alright, so now that you're out what did you wind up doing? (1:22:00) Veteran: Well you know I had mustering out pay, I had a little bit of money not a lot and from September to middle part of December this money lasted, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And my father-in-law and, and his wife they're, they're getting kind of nervous about aren’t you actually gonna try to find a job, and alright I guess I gotta get a job, well I went down and I, and I was probably, it’s probably the first piece but I applied for unemployment and they said well you can get it for a while but not very long, you know okay, and then it didn’t amount �to much anyway, but I remembered what I told that Enlistment Officer when I signed up that I had an uncle that worked for the phone company, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I thought I might wanna do that, I went down to the local place here in Springfield, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: The phone office and I put in an application and they said can you come back in a, I think it was on a Friday, come back Monday and we’ll do some testing, and I did and this testing lasted two weeks and all of a sudden I'm getting paid for this, and I'm thinking now wait you know I haven’t even been hired and I'm getting a paycheck and, and I remember my clerk at that time at the phone company she asked if I was a Vietnam Vet and I said yeah I just, just really just came from Vietnam, and she says well we’re gonna apply you into an on-the-job training program the government will compensate you some money, and well hey I’ll bite this, go ahead and apply for it, well that lasted, well I didn’t get anything from that until six months after the phone company did hire me, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And at the end of the six months I got this check, �(1:24:00) Veteran: It looked like a, a tax refund check and I thought what in the hell is this all about, and oh I was just grinning at the number, what it was, it was like a hundred and twenty bucks a month but its six months’ worth of it, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Now I'm, I'm pretty poor back then, I mean we’re living payday to payday and I've just got this monster check and I went to work the following, and I asked this clerk about this, she said oh yeah that’s an on-the-job training, they're gonna supplement your income and every time we give you a raise that’s gonna to get docked a little bit, and you get this for two years, well okay the next six months it was a little less, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Next six months it was a little less and the next six, I think the last one it was fifty or sixty dollars a month, but it was a very neat deal, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Didn’t even know I was gonna get it and I got it and it, and that was tax free money, that’s, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Huge, it wasn’t, you didn’t have to list that as income, but, but I wound up spending thirty years with the phone company, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Kind of liked it, Interviewer: Now did you always stay in this area, kind of Missouri Arkansas, Veteran: Missouri, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: And southern Missouri, mostly I did get over to Boot Hill worked a little while over there and I got up to Kansas City and worked a little while up there, but always wound up back in the Springfield area, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And I was a lineman, a cable splicer, a repairman, and I was an installer, did a lot of different things, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I know now, I don’t know a lot of Vietnam vet don’t like to be around people, don’t like to be in an office with a lot of people around them and you know, and we just, we just didn’t like being in a crowd, that was, and me being with the phone company, (1:26:00) Veteran: Working by myself about you know, I, I did have to go up knock on a door to say hey I'm here to fox your phone and what have you, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Or if I was splicing, I'm, I'm out in the ditch putting the cable together, but that’s by myself, and I always said that I felt like this helped me adjust a little bit, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I did, I didn’t get any negative feedbacks is what I'm saying, �Interviewer: Right, alright I guess now kind of look back at the time you spent in, in the service and sort of as a whole not just Vietnam, what do you think you took out of it or how did it affect you positively or negatively? Veteran: Well I’ll say this for the military, they taught me how to live payday to payday, they taught me how to budget my money I mean when I was a private, it, its gotta last thirty days, ain't nobody gonna give you no money, and they taught me how to manage a paycheck, and that one of the best things that I think, of course I think I grew up faster than I wanted too, it’s you know I've never been responsible for other people, even when I was in Germany I didn’t feel like I was responsible for the guys, I was just the direct them with me, but in Vietnam I did feel responsible for them men, and you can’t help but worry about you know you get a new guy, you know how is he gonna fit in and is he gonna, is he gonna pull a bonehead and get somebody hurt, or what have you, and that’s a neat thing to, to experience that makes you nervous at first and when you, when you get these new people but, I’ll say this, 101st is an outstanding outfit, I think it’s the most prestigious outfit in all of military, Marines, Navy, whatever, and very proud to have had serve with them, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, and you brought all your men back, Veteran: All, you know when I went home, I still had my, but I found out later, (1:28:00) �Veteran: They all, they all made it home, then Lexi, boy they, there's a bunch of them shot up pretty bad, Interviewer: Alright well, it’s a good story and I appreciate you taking the time to tell it to me today, Veteran: Thank you Jim, (1:28:16) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_MoyerJ1962V Title A name given to the resource Moyer, Jerry (Interview transcript and video), 2016 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2016-10-06 Description An account of the resource Jerry Moyer was born in Springfield, Missouri, in 1948, moved to Omaha, Nebraska, in 1958 where he graduated high school. Moyer enlisted in the Army in 1967 before he could recieve a draft notice and underwent signals training and learned to string telephone wires. He was then sent to Germany where he was stationed with a mechanized infantry battalion of the 4th Armored Division in Crailsheim. When he was promoted to sergeant in 1969, Moyer's specialization was changed to infantry and he was evetually deployed to Vietnam, joining C Company, 2nd Battalion, 506th Regiment, 101 st Aiborne Division. His unit participated in the establishment of Firebase Ripcord and the defense of Hill 902 when Moyer was injured and sent to the rear. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Moyer, Jerry Dale Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/80f27b7ddc1af78de75257628d611299.mp4 e93fdaf5967418fcaa0a64fed443753a https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/6672d18c2d77438be1675ffc0808669a.pdf 89bd02d120fa5ad06f4f37e233372781 PDF Text Text Meyer, J.P. Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Interview Name of War: Vietnam War Interviewee’s Name: J.P. Meyer Length of Interview: (1:45:58) Interviewed by: James Smither Transcribed by: Chelsea Chandler Interviewer: “All right, J.P., start us out with some background on yourself, and to begin with, where and when were you born?” I was born January 5th, 1947 in Marshalltown, Iowa. Interviewer: “All right. Now did you grow up there, or did you move around?” I grew up on a dairy farm in a small community about twenty-five miles north of Marshalltown called Wellsburg, Iowa. Interviewer: “Okay, and what part of Iowa is that in?” Central part. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and did you finish high school?” I did. Interviewer: “When did you graduate?” 1965. Interviewer: “Okay, and then what did you do after you got out of high school?” I enrolled at South Dakota State University in pre-pharmacy. Interviewer: “Okay, and then how long did you stay there?” I was there until April of 1968. Interviewer: “Okay. Now did you complete your program there, or…?” I completed it after my active duty army time. (1:02) Interviewer: “Okay, and so how is it that you wound up in the army?” �Meyer, J.P. I dropped out of school, and I wanted to fly. I had taken flying lessons while I was at South Dakota State. So I actually went down to the Air National Guard unit in Sioux Falls and got on their wait list for pilot training. I was number 102 on the wait list, so it didn’t look very likely that I was going to go to Air Force pilot training. And they required four years of college. The army would allow you to go through the warrant officer flight training program if you had a certain number of semester hours of college credit, which I had, so I went down to the post office in Brookings, South Dakota on April 26th and enlisted in the army for the warrant officer flight training program. Interviewer: “All right. Now a lot of people probably don’t even know what a warrant officer is, so can you explain that?” Well, warrant officers are—I guess you would consider them technical type officers. They were in the supply field, logistics, and, of course, during the Vietnam War, most of the warrant officers were helicopter pilots. (2:10) Interviewer: “All right, and how do they compare with standard commissioned officers?” We were below the regular commissioned officers. There were—At the time, there were four grades of warrant officer. They’ve since expanded it as I understand it, but back then there was— The grades were W-1 through W-4. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and you could do this without going through all of the things involved in becoming an officer, but you still get your own things.” Yes, yes. Yeah, we went through a different type of program. Interviewer: “Okay, okay. Now when you signed up, how many years were you signing up for?” You know, I honestly don’t remember. We had our obligation after flight training, but I can’t remember exactly what it was. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, so now where do they send—Now do you do a regular army basic training first, or did they send you—” I went to basic training at Fort Polk, Louisiana in August. It was very hot, and from there—when we finished basic training—I went to Fort Wolters, Texas for primary helicopter school. Interviewer: “Okay, so the training at Fort Polk. That was standard army basic training?” Yes. Interviewer: “So what was that like other than hot?” �Meyer, J.P. It was miserable. It was—After I’d been to Fort Polk for about six weeks, I—You just—You’re so entrenched in basic training. You really don’t think about anything else. It was—It was hot and, like I said, pretty miserable. Interviewer: “Okay. Well, how did the instructors treat you?” Like a typical drill sergeant back in that day and age. They’d be in your face, screaming. You’d be standing at attention. They didn’t physically touch us or hurt us, but you were always thinking that they would if they had to. That’s kind of how—That’s what the environment was like back then. Interviewer: “Okay, and how much of the emphasis was just on drill and discipline?” (4:00) All of it. Basically, you did what the army told you to do, and they were, I guess, developing a mindset of what they were looking for in a soldier. Interviewer: “Okay. Now were you training alongside people who were draftees, or were they all enlistees? Or do you not know?” There was a mix. We had a lot of draftees. Interviewer: “Okay, and how did the other guys respond to the treatment?” We had a couple of guys that—We had one particular guy from Mississippi who was a little on the heavy side, and I know on one of our marches he just fell out. He couldn’t go anymore. But everybody was kind of in their own world and struggled to get through it. They—The environment just gives you a certain mindset like, “Okay, here’s what we’re going to do next.” And then you always look forward to getting through for the day, so you could get some rest. And, of course, the barracks were un-air-conditioned, and you’d wake up with your sheets wet in the morning from sweating all night. It was hot. Interviewer: “All right. Now how long did that last?” Eight weeks. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and then your next step from there?” From basic training I went to Fort Wolters, Texas. They took us by bus from Fort Polk, Louisiana to Fort Wolters. And we got to Fort Wolters, and the TAC officer as they were called got on the bus and was wearing a shiny helmet liner, carrying a—I think it was some kind of 40 mm round all polished up. And tapping it in his hand and being very nice. And saying, “Welcome, gentlemen to Fort Wolters, Texas. You’re here for your basic, primary helicopter training.” And then he just started screaming at us, and he says, “Now you have twenty seconds to get your you know what off this bus and get in formation.” (6:01) And we were in formation in the street, and it was hot in Texas during—in August and September. And we had one �Meyer, J.P. gentleman who was prior service as they say. Had medals on and had a—I think he was a staff sergeant actually. And the drill sergeant came by and ripped his medals off his shirt and ripped the stripes off his sleeve, and he says, “You’re now a warrant officer candidate, and you’re lower than whale shit on the bottom of the ocean.” So it was—The first four weeks of helicopter— primary helicopter school are—I guess you’d call it indoctrination. We didn’t fly. We went to class, and we were harassed a lot. Middle—Inspections in the middle of the night. Get out in the street. You’re standing out there in the dark at two o’clock in the morning in formation, and they’re going through and inspecting the troops. The TAC officer would, and then he’d tell you, “You’ve got five minutes to get back upstairs, change into your class A’s, and get back out here.” So we’d go change uniforms and come right back out and get inspected again. That lasted for the first four weeks, and then once we started flight training, we had to get crew rest. They were required to give us a certain number of hours of sleep before we could do anything else, and so the harassment wasn’t nearly as intense after that. Interviewer: “All right. Now the—So what are you actually learning in the first four weeks?” Well, you’re learning—In class we’re learning about the helicopter and how it’s built, how it operates. Learning basic flying information. Navigation, what air speed means, and things like that. And you learn a certain amount of—They went through the checklist, and we’d learn how to start the helicopter. We’d learn how to preflight it. Look for defects. (8:01) Interviewer: “So were you getting into helicopters but not flying them, or…?” No, we weren’t. We weren’t allowed on the flight line the first four weeks. We had one individual who was in our barracks, and, as I recall, his name was Jackie Wilson from Fort Worth. We had our helmets issued to us, and we had them up on the top of our lockers. And one day after class, Jackie got his helmet out, and everybody asked him, “What are you doing?” He says, “Well, I’m going flying.” And he went to the flight line, and he got in a TH-55. And he got it started. I think—as I recall—he had to have a maintenance man help him get it started. And he got it up to flying speed and picked it up to a hover. And, of course, he didn’t know how to fly a helicopter, but now he’s at a hover in a TH-55. And, from what I’m told, he—Actually, what he thought was—It started vibrating real bad, and there’s a condition called ground resonance in a TH-55. And the solution for that is to get it off the ground. Pick it up. He thought he was getting into ground resonance, so he picked it up to a hover. And now he’s at a hover, and obviously he doesn’t know how to fly a helicopter because he hasn’t been trained yet. And they say he got it back to the ground, and he bounced on one skid, bounced on the other skid, and then turned it on its side and destroyed it. He survived, and I think—as I recall—he got court martialed. So that was an interesting event in our first four weeks of pilot training at Fort Wolters. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now—So for the rest of you—Now did people wash out of those first four weeks, or did everyone get through?” Not that I recall. I think we all—We all made it through the first four weeks. �Meyer, J.P. Interviewer: “All right. Okay, so now they actually put you in a helicopter, and do you start flying right away at least with an instructor, or…?” Mm-hmm. Interviewer: “Okay, so how does that process work?” (10:00) Well, we all go out to the—We went out to the flight line. We each were assigned to an instructor, and my instructor was the flight commander. So I—A lot of the students flew to the stage field. We went from the main heliport in Fort Wolters to different stage fields for training for—to practice. And my—And many of the students were bused out. My instructor was the flight commander, so he and I got in a helicopter—and that was my first helicopter ride in the military—and flew from there to the stage field, which was north of Fort Wolters about—oh, I’m guessing—seven or eight or nine miles. Interviewer: “Okay. Were you using a TH-55 at that point?” I was in the Hiller OH-23. Interviewer: “Okay. Describe that as what—as a machine relative to the TH-55 or something else.” The Hiller is probably fifty percent larger than the TH-55. The TH-55 was a very small helicopter. The Hiller was—had a bubble like the old Bell helicopters. When I describe the helicopters that I flew back then, I ask people if they remember the old TV show, The Whirlybirds, because it had the big, glass bubble. It was a two-seat helicopter with a reciprocating engine. Had a tail boom that slanted up—the TH-55’s tail boom went straight back—and it was a two-bladed helicopter and vibrated a lot. My first impression when the instructor picked the helicopter up to a hover—I felt like I was trying to balance—And I wasn’t flying it, but the sensation I had was trying to stand on top of a basketball on a pogo stick. That’s what it felt like. So I—You know, your thought is, “How am I ever going to learn to fly this machine?” But we did. Interviewer: “Okay, so how does he go about teaching you?” We’d go out to a stage field that had—I think they each had four lanes, and you would hover down a lane. He’d teach you to hover first, and we did it off to the side of the lanes. (12:05) And you could tell students who—when a student was flying and when an instructor was flying because when the student—New students would take the controls. You’d see the helicopter start to drift in all different directions and back and side and forward, and all of a sudden it would go, “Whoop.” Right back to where it started. And you knew the instructor took the controls at that point. And you just basically did that over and over until you got the feel for how to fly a helicopter, and it kind of became a natural thing like when you try to learn to ride a bike. Interviewer: “All right, and so how long then were you doing that?” �Meyer, J.P. We were—Well, the entire primary helicopter phase lasted from—I guess we started flying in September, and we finished, as I recall, in late December. And we learned to hover, and then we would take off and fly traffic patterns. And, after a while, when the instructor felt like you were safe enough, he would get out, and you’d have your first solo. And I think I soloed a helicopter—I think I had nine hours of flight time. And I remember being at Downwind the first time I soloed, looking down and flying this machine that was shaking and thinking, “What in the hell are you doing up here, Meyer? You don’t know how to operate this machine.” But I got it back on the ground safely, and, after a while, it just became very natural. Interviewer: “All right, and in that level of training, did other people have accidents, or did everyone get through?” There were accidents. There were mid-air collisions. I was—We were on a night flight—a solo night flight—one time, and there was a student in a TH-55 that apparently was lost. (14:04) I was coming into Wolters main from the north, and they were talking about him on the radio. But they couldn’t get him to reorient himself, and then I saw a flash of light off to the east. And he had flown through some high tension wires, and the aircraft hit the ground and exploded. He was burned very badly. He survived the crash but died in the hospital. Interviewer: “Do you think you were better off because you had the commander train you? Was he—” No, all the instructors were extremely talented people. Good helicopter pilots, good instructor pilots. Some of them were a little more aggressive than others, and the—Excuse me. And the commander just flew to the stage field with me. He wasn’t my regular instructor. Interviewer: “Okay, okay. All right, so now when you complete that, now do you move on to more advanced helicopters?” When we completed our training at Fort Wolters, we moved to Fort Rucker, Alabama, and we started out in the Bell TH-13 in instrument training. We did our instrument training there at Shell field outside of Enterprise, Alabama, and then, once we finished instrument training, we moved on to tactical training. And that was done in Hueys. We learned to fly the Huey. Interviewer: “Now with the instrument training are you actually flying a helicopter and relying on instruments, or are you on the ground?” No, you’re in the helicopter under a hood, and flying just by reference to the instruments. You’re actually not qualified—As a student, we weren’t actually qualified in the TH-13. We just flew it with an instructor for instrument training, and all of that training was with an instructor. There was no solo time. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, but then you move on to the Huey. Now how is a Huey different from the other things you had flown?” �Meyer, J.P. It was a lot bigger, and it had—It was a much more modern helicopter. Had better instruments. (16:03) And it was fully instrumented in terms of flying in the clouds and just a lot bigger, heavier machine. And it had a turbine engine instead of reciprocating engine, and a reciprocating engine helicopter—Part of what you have to do when you fly it is manage the RPM, and you do that manually with a throttle that’s on the collective. In a Huey, it had a governor on the turbine engine, which would maintain a certain RPM, so you didn’t have to worry about twisting a throttle. You just pulled—You pulled pitch, and as you pulled pitch, the engine would develop more power to compensate for the increased power requirement. Interviewer: “All right, and—So how long now do you spend at Fort Rucker?” Well, we spent the rest of our training at Fort Rucker, and we graduated in May of 1970. Or— I’m sorry. ‘69. 1969. And then I went from flight training direct to Chinook transition. When I was at Fort Wolters, we had a Chinook fly over the field one day, and I was just fascinated with that helicopter. And I like big machinery. And so I went in to see my TAC officer, which is not something you typically did back then. You didn’t want to see your TAC officer. But I went in to see him and asked him how I could get into Chinooks. He said, “Well, Meyer, I’ll tell you what. Here’s how it works. You’re going to graduate from pilot training, you’re going to fly Hueys in Vietnam, and if you survive that year, you can come back and we’ll send you to Chinook transition if that’s what you want to do. And then we’ll send you back to Vietnam to fly Chinooks for a year.” And I said, “Well, some students get Chinook training right out of pilot training.” He said, “Oh, yeah, if you graduate first in your class, you might get a Chinook transition.” (18:02) So I said, “Thank you. That’s all I wanted to know.” And I started gunning, studying—I had a pilot’s license when I went to the army, so I basically knew how to fly. And I started studying under the covers at night with a flashlight in the barracks after lights out. And I graduated first in my class when we finished at Fort Rucker, and we got one Chinook allocation. So I took it, and what that did—The army decided not long before we graduated that if you got a certain transition—and Chinook was one of them—you had to sign up voluntary indefinite status, which means the army had you as long as they wanted you. But I thought the trade-off was worth it, so I—I had some of my classmates ask me, “Now what are you going to do, Meyer?” I said, “I’m going voluntary indefinite because I’m going to Chinook transition.” Because by then you’d heard about all the—We had heard about all the Hueys—Well, I knew when I went into helicopters that it was very risky, and it was an automatic ticket pretty much to going to Vietnam. Flying helicopters. So I thought flying Chinooks would be a lot safer than flying Hueys. Interviewer: “All right, so now do you go—then go on to Chinook training?” I went to Chinook transition and then went to Vietnam in August of 1969. Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay, so August of ‘69. So, I guess, when we were—I don’t know— originally recording your dates—And so you would’ve enlisted in ‘68 then?” I enlisted in ‘68. Yes. �Meyer, J.P. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Okay, so the Chinook transition—I mean, how long does that take, or how complicated was that?” (20:06) It was—As I recall it, it was a six-week transition. Six or seven weeks. Well, the Chinook’s a very large helicopter—has two engines, two rotor systems—and it’s not a conventional helicopter. It’s a tandem rotor helicopter, so it flies a little bit differently. In most respects, it’s easier to fly because you don’t have the anti-torque system to worry about. It had a stabilization system because the rotors are equal in size, so the back rotor wants to fly as fast as the front rotor. So without the stabilization system, it became very unstable and yaw, and it was a little bit tricky. Boeing made some design changes to it when they developed the B and C model, but the A model was pretty squirrely as we call it if the stabilization system was turned off. Interviewer: “All right. Now over the course of your training, you’ve been in Texas, you’ve been in Alabama, and where do they do the Chinook training?” Alabama. Fort Rucker. Interviewer: “Alabama. Okay. Now you’re in—You’re now, you know—You’re now down south. You’re in the area that is sort of still in the process of desegregating. I mean, did you notice a different way of life in those places, or did you just stay focused on what you were doing?” Not then. I noticed that after I got back from Vietnam and was stationed at Fort Rucker. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, but at this point it’s just all helicopters?” All concentrated on learning to fly helicopters and being in the military. Interviewer: “Okay. Now once you complete the Chinook training, do you get some time off before you go to Vietnam, or…?” (22:00) I had a month of leave before I left for Vietnam. Interviewer: “Okay. Did you just go back home at that point?” Mm-hmm. Went back home to Iowa. Interviewer: “All right. Now how did your family feel about your heading off to Vietnam?” Well, when I signed up, I didn’t ask my parents, and thinking back, when my son was my age when I signed up—Thinking about him doing that, I realized how much stress I created for my parents. My dad—Of course, I’d already signed up, so there wasn’t anything that anybody could do about it. But he was concerned. He said, “Don’t you know they’re shooting them—those helicopters down?” And I said, “Yeah, I know, but if your time is up, your time is up.” That was kind of my—I had a fatalistic attitude at that point, I guess. �Meyer, J.P. Interviewer: “All right, and as you’re preparing to go to Vietnam, how much did you know about what was going on over there?” During the month that I was home on leave, Khe Sanh was under siege, and I was glued to the TV watching those events daily. Interviewer: “Okay, because Khe Sanh was in 1968.” But it was—Well, maybe it was ‘68 when I was—before I entered. That may have been before I entered. Interviewer: “Yeah. Yeah, so you’re aware of that, and then ‘69 there was Hamburger Hill that summer and that sort of thing. But regardless, you’re watching—But you are. You’re watching the news at that point.” Yeah, realizing that I’m going to be over there in thirty days. Interviewer: “All right. Now how do they physically get you to Vietnam?” I got on a flight in Des Moines and flew to California—the Oakland Overseas Replacement Station—and got on a Stretch 8. DC-8. And we flew to—It was either Okinawa or Guam. I think it was Okinawa. To refuel. From California. (24:20) It was the first airplane ride I ever was on that had a movie, and the movie was Support Your Local Sheriff! with James Garner. I still remember that, and I’ve got that video at home. And we landed at—We landed in Saigon at Tan Son Nhut Air Force Base, and—I don’t know—I guess my thought was when we got off the airplane, there would be rockets landing and bullets flying. And it was just hot, and it stunk. And then we went through Overseas Replacement training with 101st Airborne Division. Interviewer: “Okay. Now did you do that down at Saigon, or did you get up to where the 101st was first?” We did that in Saigon. They had a training location there. They called it SERTS. Screaming Eagle Replacement Training. Interviewer: “All right, and what did that actually consist of?” Oh, indoctrination about the Viet Cong and the NVA. How they would set booby traps. I think we actually went on a mini patrol while we were there. They had a—They had wooden bleachers and had an instructor on a short stage out in front of us—probably twenty feet in front of us— and he was talking about how the Vietnam would sneak up on you and throw satchel charges and booby traps. (26:11) And then he kind of led up to it dramatically, and then he kicked a—In front of him against a wooden—Like a 2x6 or something. We couldn’t see it from our side, but there was a little detonator there. And he kicked that, and they would—They had grenade simulators, and he’d explode those. And it just scared the bejesus out of us. Pretty sudden. And I actually heard after I got—after I talked to some of the guys that I trained in helicopter training with— that we had two students from my class that were sitting in the front row, and the Viet Cong had �Meyer, J.P. snuck in there the night before and put live grenades—What he would do is he’d take a fake grenade, he’d pull the pin, and throw it out in front of—right in front of the students or the troops. And they’d snuck in and put live grenades in his box. So he pulled a pin on a live grenade and threw it out and killed one of my helicopter classmates. So that was the harsh reality of Vietnam from the start. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, so now once you go through that training, now what happens?” Well, we got together in a group, and we got our assignments. And when they called my name, they said, “Meyer, you’re going up to Charlie Company 159th Aviation Battalion in I Corps.” (28:16) And I said, “101st? They don’t have helicopters.” And there was a—There was a guy—a group of guys that were going home, and somebody overheard me say that. He says, “Yes, they do. I just came from there.” So I went up to Phu Bai and joined the Charlie Company. The 159th. Interviewer: “Okay. How do they get you to Phu Bai? As I recall, we got there in a C-130. Interviewer: “Yeah, so military transport plane. Okay, and then what kind of reception do you get when you join your unit?” You get welcomed to the unit, and here’s your room. They put me in a room that was vacant, and there was a set of fatigues in the closet. The fatigues were—had the name Dives on it, and I said, “Who’s Dives?” And the guy that checked me in said, “You don’t have to worry about that.” And he took the fatigues out. Well, Tom Dives had been killed in a midair collision just—I think just a couple of weeks before I got there. So they moved me into his room because it was empty. Interviewer: “So did you have private rooms in the barracks?” We each had a roommate. We were two to a hooch we called it. The buildings were plywood. There were, I think, four rooms on each side of each building, so there were sixteen pilots in one building. And we had a total of thirty-two pilots as I recall, so we had two buildings in the—what we called the officers’ area. (30:01) We had a little officers’ club and the two barracks, and then our commander had his own barracks building. Interviewer: “Okay, and so there’s four companies in the battalion. Is that right?” There’s three—There’s four companies. There were three Chinook companies in the 159th Battalion and a crane company that was located in Da Nang. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, so—But your three companies were basically together?” All at Phu Bai. Interviewer: “Yeah, all at Phu Bai. Okay, and then how many aircraft—” �Meyer, J.P. I’m sorry. The Charlie Company was at Phu Bai. Alpha and Bravo Companies were at Camp Eagle. Interviewer: “Okay, so you were at the Phu Bai airport, and they were at Camp—Because Camp Eagle is near Phu Bai, but it’s not the same.” Correct. Yeah, not the same location. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. All right, so you’ve got your own—Again, how many aircraft did you have?” Sixteen. Interviewer: “Okay, so sixteen, and would you—And then, with the thirty-two pilots then, if all sixteen were flying, all of you would be flying.” Technically, we could man all the aircraft. Interviewer: “Yeah, because you had to have a pilot and a copilot for each one.” Yes. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now how quickly do you start flying?” As I recall, we were flying within a week. Interviewer: “And how do they work in the new guys?” You flew with an experienced aircraft commander initially. You were called a peter pilot, and you had to have a certain number of hours before you would qualify to be an aircraft commander. I can’t remember what—I think it was a hundred. Can’t remember exactly what that hour requirement was. But if you—We became short on aircraft commanders to man the aircraft for the missions, so if you had a certain amount of experience and were considered safe to do so, you were named first pilot. (32:09) So you flew—You were technically the aircraft commander, but you weren’t logging aircraft commander time because you didn’t have enough time to do that, so you were logging first pilot time with a copilot. Interviewer: “Okay. Now when you’re starting out with the aircraft commander, they’re going to gradually give you more responsibility where—so you’d start to do more of the actual flying in that period. Now under normal circumstances, what does a copilot actually do?” Monitor the systems. Monitor the rotor RPM and the gauges and do a certain amount of flying. And as you spent more time there, you flew more and more. You typically didn’t talk on the radio. That was the aircraft commander’s job. We all had nicknames, and I got my nickname—it �Meyer, J.P. was Lurch—one day when my aircraft commander was busy talking to the crew and one of the other aircraft was asking my aircraft commander a question or something about something. And I answered on the radio, and apparently my voice was very deep. And the other aircraft commander said, “Who is that? It sounds like Lurch.” And that’s how I got my nickname. Interviewer: “And you’re referring to the character in The Addams Family TV series?” Yes, yes. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now so when do you actually start flying in Vietnam? What month was it when you were doing that?” Well, I started flying in August of ‘69. Interviewer: “Okay. Now was there a lot of stuff going on at that point, or were things quieting down?” (34:11) At that point in time, as I recall, we were doing a lot of missions out into the A Shau Valley, and Firebase Rendezvous was the main firebase in the A Shau Valley that we resupplied. And then we resupplied Birmingham and Berchtesgaden as I recall. There were two firebases before we would get out to the A Shau. Interviewer: “Yeah, because you have them in the chain of hills that separates the A Shau from the coastal plain, and that’s where those bases were. But Rendezvous was in it. Now was it dangerous to fly into the A Shau?” It didn’t feel like it at the time honestly. There weren’t—When they sent Chinooks out on what they considered dangerous missions, they would send two Cobra gunships with us, and I don’t recall ever needing escort for that first six months I was there. Interviewer: “Okay. Well, I think—So, well, August would be after Hamburger Hill when a lot of the NVA had kind of pulled out or pulled back for the time being.” Yeah, the A Shau was—After Hamburger Hill, the A Shau seemed pretty quiet. Interviewer: “Okay. Now was there a point when the monsoon sets in and they have to pull out of there?” Yes, I think that they pulled out in late ‘69. I think we pulled everything out of the A Shau Valley and operated pretty much along the coastal mountains for the monsoon season. (36:00) Interviewer: “Okay. Now how much trouble does the weather create for a Chinook, or are there conditions where you can’t operate?” Well, it was a fully instrumented helicopter, and we flew in the weather in Vietnam in the Chinook mostly to drop flares for the infantry at night. I remember one particular night where it �Meyer, J.P. was low clouds, drizzly, and rainy that we had a flare mission, and I took off out of Liftmaster and was in the clouds within five or six hundred feet and pretty much spent the whole time in the clouds flying. And there was a radar controller that would guide us out to the drop zone, and then we’d set up a racetrack pattern and drop. And then the infantry radio man on the ground would adjust that drop zone based on where the light was within—One of the things that really was striking was the first time I went on a flare mission at night in the clouds, we dropped the flares, and when the flare ignited, the flare would drop. And a parachute would come out, and then it would float down and provide I don’t know how many thousand candlepower of light in each one. The whole cockpit lit up. The clouds lit up like it was daytime. And then they’d go out, and it’d be dark again. And we’d stay up there—Oh, I don’t know how many flare—We had a crate in the back with all the flares in it, and we’d stay up there until the flares were gone and then go back. Interviewer: “Okay, and then what kinds of supplies would you carry?” We carried mostly ammunition, food and water, and fuel in sling loads. Most of our flights were sling loads. (38:04) Interviewer: “So they’re hanging below the aircraft rather than inside it.” Correct. In nets. And then when an artillery battery would move, we would move them. We’d go up to the hill where they’re located, pick the tubes up, take them to the new location, and drop them off. And we called it an arty move, and most of our unit—If we were assigned an arty move, most of our unit would work on that one mission together until the entire battery was moved. And then we’d go off and do other missions. Interviewer: “All right. Was there cargo that was harder to transport than others?” It was usually based on weight. A 155 Howitzer is a lot heavier than a 105. Some of our other missions would involve going and getting—recovering down helicopters, and the Cobra was a very heavy helicopter. We had to be quite low on fuel to pick up a Cobra. I remember distinctly a Cobra that was shot down and sitting on a sandbar in a river with high ridgelines on each side. And we were resupplying a firebase and flying over that site, and there was a lot of talk on the radio about, “How are we going to get that Cobra out of there?” And I was flying—Some of the Chinooks were more powerful than others, I guess. I’m not sure why, but we had—And they— And our—Some of our aircraft had been upgraded to what were called Super C’s where they had bigger engines, and I was flying a Super C that day. And I told everybody on the radio—I said, “I think I’ve got—I’m down to a fuel load where I think I can pick that Cobra up.” I said, “I’m going to go down and give it a try.” So I went down, and the riggers were down there. (40:00) And I went down and hovered over the Cobra and picked it up. And I got it off the ground, and I got it off high enough. But the crew chief thought it was safe to go, so we took off. And I took off down the river to gain airspeed, and I started climbing. And I climbed, and I climbed, and I climbed. And I’m looking up at these ridgelines like, “Golly, we’ve got a ways to go yet.” And then you’re thinking about, “I wonder how many NVA can see us flying slowly, climbing with this Cobra slung underneath us.” But we retrieved it, and it was one of those memorable moments in flying in Vietnam because when we got back to Camp Evans with the Cobra—And �Meyer, J.P. we had—We must’ve had a hundred foot sling on it. So we’re hovering a hundred feet in the air, setting this thing down very gently, and set it down and release the sling. And the maintenance and the pilots from the Cobra company were down there, and they were just cheering and waving because we brought their Cobra back to them. Interviewer: “All right. Now you said that the first several months you’re there were fairly quiet in terms of having to deal with enemy. Do things get more intense later on?” One thing I—Things seemed to escalate slowly during the monsoon season. One thing that—So the things we were worried about in the monsoon season were getting up to the firebases in the clouds. We had guys that actually hovered up the side of mountains to get up to firebases to resupply. We had other guys who got to the firebase with the low clouds, but when they got right over the firebase went into the clouds. And that’s a pretty urgent situation because you really can’t start letting down because you don’t know what you’re letting down into. (42:06) So you have to take off—You have to accelerate in the clouds and come back around and get radar vectors or whatever you might get to get out of the clouds and then try again to get back up to the firebase. But as long as you maintained visual with the ground or basically the trees out in front of you, you could actually hover up the side of a mountain. If you had enough clearance so that your sling load didn’t drag through the trees, you could get up to the firebase and resupply them because we’re the only—We were their only lifeline for food, water, ammunition. The other thing that was happening occasionally—and I only know of a couple instances—was that the NVA would get on the radio, and they would intercept you on the radio assuming you—They would imitate the ground control—the GCA approach controller—and they’d start radar vectoring you. And they actually radar vectored a Cobra into the mountains on one occasion. And I was out there flying on a flare mission one night, and we were being vectored back to Phu Bai. And the controller had us going west for some reason, and I told my copilot. I said, “If we go west for one more minute—” I said, “We’re turning around and heading for the coast and letting down under the water.” Because I wasn’t sure who I was talking to, and then he turned us back. And it was actually one of our guys, and he vectored us back into Phu Bai. But that’s—As I recall, that’s about the time that things started to change in terms of hostile activity in I Corps for us. Interviewer: “Okay, and now for the ground units and so forth, I mean, there up until about March of 1970, they’re mostly kind of in the lowlands or in the foothills and not going farther inland too much. There were some missions up to the DMZ and things like that. Now did you also support like the ARVN 1st Division or the Marines?” (44:24) We did. We’d haul—When we hauled the ARVNs—Some of those flights were interesting because they would take animals with them. I know we had one load where we were carrying ammo for them, and they had ducks in the net. And the—When they—Ammo crates—We’d pick the load up in the net, and that pushed the ammo crates together. And some of the ducks were down in between the crates and, of course, got smashed. They probably ate them first when they got to the firebase. And I had a load of ARVNs that I picked up inside the aircraft one day, and we took off. And we’re headed out to a firebase, and I look down at the—The Chinook had a little—The cockpit was separate from the back, and there was a little companionway we called it that you went through to get into the seat. And I look down, and there was a pig standing in the �Meyer, J.P. companionway. And I said over the intercom—I says, “Chief, get that damn pig out of the cockpit, will you?” He was just standing there looking at the instruments. Interviewer: “Yeah, well, soldiers brought their own food with them.” Yeah. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now in March of 1970, the 101st makes their first effort to set up what would become Firebase Ripcord, and that mission aborted. And then they try a second one the first of April, and then eventually the middle of April they start. Now how much were you involved with that stuff?” (46:05) I remember the insert into Ripcord vaguely. It was just another firebase insert. We’d take a dozer up there. We carried what was called a mini dozer. It was a very heavy load. We would take the body of the dozer up there, and then we would take the tracks and the blades separately. And then the troops would assemble the dozer up on the hill, and then they would use the bulldozer to doze off the top of the hill and create the setting or the ground for the firebase. And then we’d pull the dozer off and bring in the artillery and all their supplies and do an arty move. And then it was—After that, up until it was evacuated, it was a matter of resupplying Ripcord, and initially we could fly in there, and they—Ripcord was a two-tiered firebase. They had an upper on the hill where the guns were, and they had a lower area that was called a log pad. And the log pad was just to the north, northeast of the hill proper, and that’s where we’d drop our loads. And then they had a little trail between the two where they’d take their supplies up to the hill. So we would come in in the lower log pad, and it was just a routine resupply for the first, I guess, couple of months that we were resupplying Ripcord. And then it got hot. Interviewer: “Okay. Now before it got hot at Ripcord, had you had other situations or places where you were taking enemy fire or getting shot at?” I got shot at four times that I know of in Vietnam. (48:00) We were on a routine supply back in the fall of ‘69 out to Rendezvous in the A Shau Valley, and the crew chief came up in the cockpit one day with a AK-47 round in his hand. And we looked at it and said, “Where’d you get that?” And he said, “I looked up—” And he said, “There was a hole in the soundproofing.” He said, “It must have come through the cargo hold.” And it was lodged in the soundproofing overhead, and he took it out. And then the second time I got shot at, I was on a flare mission over the A Shau. We were dropping flares over Firebase Henderson, I believe, on the east side of the A Shau Valley, and when we briefed for the mission, part of the briefing indicated that there was a 37 mm in aircraft sight on the west side of the valley across from Henderson. And we were at eleven thousand feet with the lights out, and we’d been up there dropping flares for probably forty to forty-five minutes. And the crew chief or my right door gunner—As I was turning in the racetrack pattern right after a drop, he said, “We’re taking fire. We’re taking—” And he got real excited. He said, “We’re taking fire, sir. We’re taking fire. It’s coming up through the rotor system.” And I started jinking—you know, getting away—to the left. And I said, “Okay, they know we’re up here.” I said, “We’re going to depart and let the C-130 come in and drop from high altitude.” And the pathfinder on the ground was just begging for—He says, “We’ve got to have light. We’re in hand-to-hand combat down here, and we don’t know the good guys from the �Meyer, J.P. bad guys. And we’re trying to clear these bunkers.” And I—I said, “Okay.” I said, “They didn’t get that close.” (50:00) So I turned around, and I went back in. And about my third pass, I saw— It was flak in front of flashbulbs just like getting your picture taken, and it was level at our altitude. And I turned, made a sharp bank, and got out. I said, “All right, we’ve got to leave now. We’re going to get hit.” So we had to leave the area. That was the second time I got shot at. The third time I got shot at was on what was known as Operation Lifesaver. The general— commanding general—apparently wanted an emergency landing zone in every thousand meter grid square in I Corps that were in our area of operation. So our mission was to pick up combat engineers and take them out to an area that had been selected as an emergency landing zone on a hilltop and drop them off in the morning. They would clear trees, blow stumps, and create a landing zone big enough ideally for at least a Huey, and then we’d go pick them up in the afternoon. Sometimes when we dropped them off, we could get the back wheels on the ground and hover the front end, and then they could lower the ramp and just get off in the LZ. Other times we had a seventy foot cable ladder that they would go down off the ramp. Well, in this case, we couldn’t land. They had to go down the cable ladder. And when we were on our way out there, the pathfinder who—They put a security force on the ground before we would go in. The pathfinder asked—He says, “Where are you guys?” I said, “Well, we’re en route. We’re about five minutes out.” (52:02) And we were pretty high to stay out of small arms range. We were probably flying at four or five thousand feet, and I asked him—I said, “Is the area cold?” “Yep,” he said. “The infantry got on the ground. Not a shot fired.” I said, “Okay.” And I looked over to my copilot. I said, “Jeff, they’re going to get somebody killed in this mission one of these days.” And so I was the company instructor pilot by that time, and I was giving—My copilot was Jeff Brockmeyer, and he was upgrading to aircraft commander. So I was giving him an aircraft commander check, and I told him when we started—I said, “Jeff, I know you know how to fly the aircraft.” I said, “You run the mission. I’ll fly the aircraft. If you have any questions, just ask me.” So I was flying, and I came into the LZ at a high hover. And the—I dropped off the sling load, and the sling load was dynamite, gasoline, chainsaws. To clear the area. And right after we dropped off the sling load, all hell broke loose. I heard a lot of popping. It sounded like—What I recall—The sound of being on a basic training firing range with all the—Everybody shooting. And everything happened very fast, and about that time a round went through the cockpit, plexiglass flying. And Jeff, my copilot, threw his hands up in his face. I thought he was hit, and the crew chief said, “We’ve got people hit back here. We’ve got oil all over the place.” Well, I instinctively—When that happened, they hadn’t put out the ladder yet. Thank goodness. And there was nobody—So there was nobody on the ladder. But I instinctively pulled off the hill, started going down the ridgeline down towards the valley, and our caution panel lit up like a Christmas tree. (54:06) And I saw the oil transmission pressure caution light come on, so—And Jeff was talking to the Cobra gunship pilots on the radio, and I was—I saw the transmission oil pressure light, so I—There’s five transmissions in a Chinook, and there’s a selector that will tell you what the pressure is in each one individually. When I got to the main transmission, the pressure gauge went all the way to zero, and I said, “Jeff, they’ve got the C-Box. We’re going to have to set it down.” And I’m going down there towards the—I’m looking for a place to go, and I’m looking down in the river bottom, and there’s no place to go down there. And about that time Jeff was talking on the radio, and he switched over to intercom. Apparently, the Cobra pilots were looking at me—at the angle that we were going and saying, “Are you going to make it? Are you going to make it?” And Jeff says, “Are we going to make it?” And I said, “Hell yes, we’re going to make it.” And I pulled back on the cyclic and did what we call a cyclic climb and �Meyer, J.P. pitched the nose up, and now I’m looking at the next ridgeline. And there’s a break in the trees. I said, “We’re going in right up there.” (56:01) I said, “Get the 60s off the mounts, put them at two and ten o’clock position, get somebody off the tail.” And I said, “We’re going in up there, and I don’t know what we’re going into. Get ready to duke it out with whoever’s there because we’ve got to land.” So I got up, coasted to a stop, and that was ironically a previous Operation Lifesaver landing zone. And it wasn’t quite at the top of the hill, so I set the Chinook down. And it started to roll, and I picked it back up. And I hovered up the hill a little ways, and there was a—about a two foot or three foot tree stump. And I planted the front end on the tree stump and let it—And slowly let it down and it settle, and everything was stable. And we just pulled everything to stop, and, you know, we’ve got guys screaming in the back. We had sixteen people on that aircraft. Five crew members and eleven combat engineers. Out of the eleven combat engineers, nine of them were shot. My left door gunner had a round in the hip, and the Huey came in and landed behind us and took nine out of the eleven—We had two wounded guys that stayed on the hill because the Huey couldn’t take everybody, but he took the most critical ones. Two of those combat engineers ended up dying as I was told later, and they had a ready reaction force that would come out and rescue downed helicopter crews. And they activated the ready— the rescue force, and we could hear the Hueys orbiting way off in the distance. You can hear a Huey from a long ways, and, you know, my thought was, “Why aren’t they coming to get us?” (58:00) Well, we weren’t on the hill more than about five minutes after the Huey had come in and took our wounded guys, and we heard this—It was an artillery shell coming in, and it sounded just like in the movies. Comes whistling in, and there’s a big explosion. And the ground shakes, and I asked my—One of our door gunners had been in infantry troop. He—And I said, “What the hell was that?” He said, “That’s our artillery.” There was a fire mission going from somewhere east of us. They were firing at what I didn’t know at the time. But was a North Vietnamese regimental base camp area. Was based at the base of this hill not far from Ripcord. So finally the Hueys came in. The Cobras stayed with us. We couldn’t talk to them because they shot out all our radios, and our survival radio didn’t work. But they kept making—They weren’t shooting, but they were making gun runs. And they stayed with us, and the Huey finally came in. And the infantry was very impressive. I’ll never forget that. They came in, and they got off the Huey. They huddled up just like a football team, and the lieutenant said, “All right, you guys here, you guys there.” And he designed the perimeter. He said—And it’s just like, “Okay. Break.” And they all spread out and did their thing, and then he came up to me. And he said, “Who’s the aircraft commander?” I said, “I am.” He said, “Well, sir, you picked an interesting place to go down.” I said, “Why is that?” He said—He pulled out his map. He said, “We’re on the top of this hill right here.” He said, “All around the base of this hill is a North Vietnamese regimental base camp area.” And I said, “That’s very interesting. How soon are we going to get off this hill?” So the Huey that had taken the wounded guys to the hospital came back and picked us up. (1:00:02) We were on the hill for an hour and ten minutes. The—We had radioed back once the infantry got on the ground. We had radioed back to the—our company. The crew chief went up and inspected the damage and thought if we—They hit the return oil line from the main transmission, and he said, “If you send the line out in some oil, we’ll—We can fix it right here and fly it out of here.” And our commander radioed back. He said, “No, you guys have had enough for one day. We’re getting you off the hill.” So they evacuated us, and Jeff and I were sitting in my hooch having a beer at about three in the afternoon. And somebody came racing in and said, “502 was shot down, and it crashed.” I said, “No, it didn’t.” I said, “We were in it. It’s just—It’s sitting out there.” “No, no. The maintenance crew went out, and they recovered the �Meyer, J.P. aircraft. And they crashed.” So the maintenance—So what happened was the commander sent two maintenance pilots and two maintenance technicians out to the hill with a line and the oil, and they fixed it. And they cranked it up and did a hover check. Everything checked out, so they took off and headed direct for home. And I had told Jeff—I said, “If we get this thing fixed—” I said, “We’re going from here to Ripcord because it’s only about three or four minutes. And set it down and check it out.” Well, they took off, climbed altitude, and headed for Phu Bai. After they were at altitude, the oil that had leaked out of the transmission had streamed down by the engines, and it caught fire. So the whole back end of the aircraft was on fire, and they made an emergency landing. They crash-landed on a sandbar at a place called Three Forks, which is south of Ripcord a ways, and the—They hit the sandbar so hard that the front—the cockpit broke off at the cockpit slice and went into the river. (1:02:15) Underwater with the two pilots in it. The two maintenance technicians were thrown out the opening that was created when the cockpit was gone, and they were in the river. They had made a mayday call when they went down, and another Chinook went in and picked them up. They all survived and relatively uninjured. They had some burns because by the time they got on the ground, the pilots told me that the flames were lapping up in the cockpit. But they survived. But the aircraft never made it back. It burned right on the sandbar. That was the third time I got shot at. The fourth time I got shot at was—I was actually giving a new pilot an in-country orientation ride. So when a new pilot came in, you’d get in the aircraft with somebody—usually the company instructor pilot—and then just basically tour the area. “Here’s our area of operation.” And we were up west of Quảng Trị by a place called Firebase—I’m blanking on the name, but we were just south of the DMZ, and I said, “Well, I’ll show you a little further west.” Which we really didn’t have anybody out there, but I was basically pointed towards Khe Sanh. And I made a turn to go back to the south, and I could hear the—We started taking fire. I could hear bullets. Well, there was—Apparently, there was a .50 caliber machine gun in a culvert in one area, and he would roll it out and shoot at helicopters and then roll it back into the culvert. (1:04:00) And Cobras finally got him, but he shot at us. And you could hear rounds going by the aircraft, and we exited the area. Fortunately, they didn’t hit us. Interviewer: “Okay. Now were you flying to Ripcord in July of 1970 when things got interesting?” Yes. Interviewer: “So talk about that phase.” That was pretty exciting. My technique for getting in and out of Ripcord when it was really under siege and being mortared regularly was to fly directly at the mountain with a sling load, do a cyclic climb, and time it so that you slowed down and basically came to a stop right over the lower log pad. And set your load down, release it, and get out. And it wasn’t uncommon for us to be leaving the firebase and hearing mortars land behind us because when we hovered in to drop off a load, we created a lot of dust. And the NVA could see the dust. They’d put the mortars in the tubes, and we’d be gone by the time the mortars came down and hit the firebase. But at least three or four times when I brought loads in there, it was—I could hear mortars landing. �Meyer, J.P. Interviewer: “Okay. Did you always put the loads on the log pads, or did you ever put them anywhere else on the base?” No, we were told back during that time, “If you put your nose up on top of the hill, you’re probably going to get shot.” So we stayed below the—Basically use the top of the hill to screen us from small arms fire on the lower log pad. Interviewer: “All right, but now eventually a Chinook does get shot down over Ripcord, and they’re over the artillery positions at the time they’re doing that. And I was told they were actually trying to put some of the artillery rounds closer to where the guns were.” That must’ve been their—What they were probably doing is trying to put the load right next to the guns, so that they didn’t have to go down to the lower log pad... Interviewer: “Right. On top of the ammo bunker pretty much.” ... and haul them up there. So they were going to put them right in the ammo bunker, and they got shot. (1:06:06) And the Chinook crashed on top of the ammo bunker and basically blew the entire supply of ammunition up over—It cooked off over time, and I talked to one of the infantry lieutenants who was quite a ways from Ripcord. And he said there was shrapnel and debris landing in the trees around them as that was cooking off. I personally was actually in Saigon that day picking up a brand new Chinook with one of our maintenance pilots. We were on our way back, and when we got back late in the afternoon, the routine for bringing in a new aircraft was to a fly-by over the company area, a high speed pass, and then come in and land. Well, we made a high speed pass over the company, and I look down. And almost all the Chinooks were gone, and I called the company ops. I said, “What’s going on?” Guy said—He said, “Well, they’re— Ripcord—” He told me that they’d had a—The ammo supply at Ripcord was blown up, and they’re up there doing an attack emergency resupply. So they resupplied them at that point, but that’s when things got really hot. Interviewer: “Okay, and then did you go to Ripcord again before the day they evacuated?” I went in and out of there several times before—Yeah, while it was—I call it—under siege, I guess. Interviewer: “Yeah, well, it was under siege.” It was under siege because we were the only resupply line they had. The Hueys could get in there and haul troops in, but they couldn’t haul very much ammo. And they didn’t haul ammo. Interviewer: “Yeah, and at this point, I mean, the 105 battery is not operational, so there’s just the 155s up there. But were you bringing out 105 ammunition in expectation that they would put another battery there?” �Meyer, J.P. I honestly don’t know. We were carrying high explosive artillery rounds. (1:08:00) We usually would call in to the pathfinder and say, “We’ve got a load of 105 HE.” But I don’t recall what I was calling in at the time. Interviewer: “Yeah, because there was thought of bringing in another battery to replace the one that had been knocked out.” Because the guns were destroyed. Interviewer: “Yeah, the—Yeah. So anyway—Okay, and then now we get to—sort of the 23rd of July when they actually evacuate the firebase. And what do you remember about that day?” We had a briefing the night before in our ops. They called all the pilots in and briefed us and told us what we were going to be doing the next day. And one of the things they said was—I don’t actually—I assume they did, but they told us that the first load going in there was going to be a bulldozer. And if you got shot down on the hill, get out of the aircraft because they’re going to bulldoze it off the side of the hill. And then they asked for volunteers, and I was sitting in the back. And, of course, my hand went up, and the ops officer said, “Meyer, put your hand down. You’re going home.” I was—The next day was my last flying day in Vietnam. So they took volunteers—crews—and then the ops officer came up to me afterwards. And he said, “We’re going to need you to be on standby.” So he said I’m—“We’re going to have you in the revetment with the APU running, listening to the radios, and if we call you, you’re going to need launch.” So we did just that. They—Our company launched, and the other companies launched and went out and extracted the tubes off of Ripcord. And we were listening to it on the radio, and about— There was a lot of aircraft getting hit going in and out of there. Some of them disabled and had to go back and land, and towards the end of the mission, they—The ops officer called and said, “We need you to launch.” And I thought, “God, this isn’t going to be good.” I don’t know. I just had the sense that if I go up there today, I’m not coming back. (1:10:01) So we cranked up, taxied out to the end of the take-off—where the take-off pad was—and we were ready to take off. Called for clearance to take off, and the ops officer called. And he said, “They’re done. Taxi back in and shut it down.” That was quite a relief. So I wasn’t actually in on the extraction. Interviewer: “Okay, and you were in all of the stuff before it.” Yeah. Interviewer: “Yeah. All right. Okay, so at this point now do they pack you up and send you back to the States, or what do you do next?” We packed up, had a little going away party in the officers’ club, packed all my stuff, got on a C130 at Phu Bai, and flew down to… Interviewer: “Cam Ranh Bay?” �Meyer, J.P. Cam Ranh Bay, Cam Ranh Bay. And spent the night there. A group of us commandeered a deuce and a half and went down to one of the—actually one of the local off base restaurants and had Vietnamese food. And then left on a Freedom Bird as they called them the next day. Interviewer: “Okay. Some—To kind of back up a little bit to sort of life in Vietnam, what was daily life like when you weren’t flying?” We played a lot of poker, drank a lot of beer. People asked me what I did in Vietnam. I said, “Well, I flew all day one day, and I drank all day the next.” I didn’t actually do that, but… Interviewer: “Yeah. Did they—Did you ever go off base?” I went off base one time into Huế on a tour. We toured Huế—The citadel I guess they called it. That was an interesting tour to—The Tet Offensive had done a lot of damage, and there was just—The walls were marked with bullet—Yeah, bullet marks all over the place, and—But that’s the only time I recall—other than R&R—getting off base. (1:12:22) Interviewer: “Okay, and where did you go on R&R?” I went to Hawaii. Interviewer: “Okay, so were you married at the time, or…?” I was married. Had my oldest son. I left for Vietnam one or two days before his first birthday. That was pretty hard. And then my wife was pregnant when I left, and my second son was born—I left in—It was—I entered Vietnam in August. He was born in November. I didn’t see him until he was—What was he? Nine months old. But I went on R&R and met my wife in Hawaii, spent a week there, and then went back to Vietnam. Interviewer: “Okay, so what’s it like having to go back to Vietnam?” Pretty depressing. When you’re back out of the—out of the combat environment, out of the stress, out of the risk, you feel safe, and it was relaxing. Interviewer: “Okay. Now there’s lots of kind of stereotypes about Vietnam and life in Vietnam and that kind of thing, and one of them is—particularly on the bases—there were a lot of issues with drug use and race relations and so forth. Did you observe any of that yourself, or…?” Not in our company. We had—I think we had two different—They called them shakedown inspections where the officers would go down and go through the enlisted barracks looking for drugs. And I remember one of those for sure. I can’t remember, but I think we might have done that a second time. But we didn’t find anything. That was the only experience with that concept the whole time I was there. (1:14:14) �Meyer, J.P. Interviewer: “And, I guess—And so your company was kind of in its own sort of selfcontained area pretty much. Yeah, so you’re not really seeing sort of large numbers of other base personnel and things like that. Did you have any Vietnamese civilians working on the base?” We had—The maids would come in and clean our rooms, make our beds, and do laundry for us. But they were there only during the day. They were moved off base at nighttime, I think. Apparently, they caught one guy walking off distances in our company area and got him off the base. We got rocketed when I first got to Vietnam. We got rocketed at night every so often, and I think what they were aiming for—There was an antenna field just to the north of where we were living, and I think they were aiming for that antenna field. But you could hear the rockets come in, and you’d scramble to get in the bunker. We’d go in the bunker, and it was kind of frightening because you never knew while you were running to the bunker if the next rocket was going to land right next to you. We did have a rocket hit one of our bunkers, and we had some pilots in there. They weren’t injured, but it was—It was a good thing they were in the bunker. Interviewer: “Right. Now did that rocketing—Did that stop at a certain point?” Seems to me that it stopped about the time the monsoon season started. We would sit out on our—We had a deck off the back of our officers’ club on the south side of the building, and we would sit out there at night and watch Cobras working in the lowlands. (1:16:09) You could see their tracers coming down., and you could see—They called them Dusters. I don’t know whether they were Quad-50s or what they were, but we called them Dusters. And you could see their tracers going out, firing, but that—a lot of that activity seemed to stop about the time the monsoon season started. And during the monsoon season, there were times when we didn’t fly for up to a week at a time, and we had one—We had one storm that dropped twenty-three inches of rain in twenty-four hours. Interviewer: “Okay, so once you get back from Vietnam, what do you do next?” I—When I was in—I got my assignment out of Vietnam. I was assigned to Fort Benning, Georgia because I had taken a direct commission. The army was short on commissioned officers. They were offering direct commissions if you had—if you were a chief warrant officer grade 2, which I was, and if you had a certain number of semester hours of college credit. So I qualified, and so the—I don’t know. We were kind of ornery as warrant officers, and I was actually going on R&R when that notice came out. And my roommate—who was the admin officer—called me, and he—And I was in the officers’ club at the crane unit in Da Nang waiting for my flight to Hawaii the next day, and he—I’m in the officers’ club, and I get a phone call. And I went, “Uhoh. Somebody died or something.” Because you never got a phone call in Vietnam. (1:18:06) And it was my roommate, and he told me that the army was offering direct commissions if you had the qualifications. And he said—I think there were—I don’t know—four or five or six of us that qualified, and I said, “What are they offering?” He says, “Second lieutenant.” I said, “What branch?” He said, “Infantry, artillery, armor, and signal.” I said, “So what do you think we ought to do?” He says, “Well, we’re all going to—We’re all going to apply.” He said, “We can always turn it down if it comes—when it comes back, so we’re all going to apply.” I said—He said, “Do you want to apply?” I said, “Well, I guess so.” He said, “What branch?” I said, “Signal.” He said, �Meyer, J.P. “Okay.” I said, “What do we have to do?” He said, “We’ve got to sign a postcard and send it back to DA.” Department Of the Army. I said, “Okay, well, sign a postcard for me and send it back.” So we did. When I got back from R&R, on the bulletin board in the officers’ club—It— Like I said, we were kind of ornery. Somebody—One of the warrant officers had put up a little notice: “Send in your picture postcard and ten C-ration box tops for direct commission to second lieutenant.” And so in July—I was due to go home in August. In July, the commissions came down, and I was being commissioned second lieutenant infantry. So I decided since I was so close to going home—And one of the questions I had from my admin officer—my roommate— was, “Hey, they’re going to commission us to second lieutenants and send us to the field as grunts.” (1:20:07) He said, “No, they can’t do that. We’re not qualified.” He said, “We’re going to be pilots.” I said, “Okay.” So I took the direct commission. Well, because I was infantry, they were going to send me to Fort Benning, Georgia. I don’t want to go to Fort Benning, Georgia. I wanted to go to Fort Rucker and be a flight instructor. So I went to Fort Rucker. I actually got my orders changed and went to Fort Rucker. Interviewer: “How did you get your orders changed?” I don’t recall exactly, but I’m sure I sent in a request. A Twix as we called them. It’s like a fax nowadays. Sent a Twix back to DA, and they changed my orders. So I went to Fort Rucker from Vietnam. I got back in—Would have been August because we were there exactly a year. And was assigned to the Student Battalion in the administrative office. And basically my job—my primary job—was to coordinate the graduation parties and to make sure that the colonels all got seated by date of rank, and you didn’t seat one colonel whose wife didn’t like the other colonel’s wife next to each other. And that was my job in the—I was in S1 I believe it’s called. So I was there for six months. After I was there—They told me, “We’re going to put you in here for six months, and then if you want to go fly, you can.” So once I was there for six months, I requested reassignment to the—to Shell Army Heliport where we did instrument training in the TH-13, and that’s what I did for the rest of my tour. Interviewer: “Okay, so how long did you wind up doing that?” From—Would have been early 1970 to 1972 when I got off active duty. (1:22:09) Interviewer: “Well, it wouldn’t be early 1970 because—” I’m sorry. Late 1970. Early 1971. Because I would have been in the Battalion for six months, from—Yeah, you’re right. From August to six months later, which would have been early ‘71. And then I went to Shell Field and was an instructor. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now at this point do you—What do you do next? I mean, do you stay in the military in some fashion, or…?” Let me answer a question you asked early on. When I was assigned to Shell, we lived on an acreage that we found out in the country on a dirt road rented to us by a couple of bachelor peanut farmers in a little farmhouse. Tiny house. You asked about—You were implying discrimination. When we left—When I got reassigned after my tour was done, the landlord came �Meyer, J.P. to me and said, “Now, you know, if you’ve got any buddies that want to live out here in the quiet country—” He said, “You let them know and steer them towards me, and we’ll rent them this house when you leave.” And they said, “But, you know, we don’t want—” And he wouldn’t say, “We don’t want any black people out here.” But he implied that. I said, “Yeah, I know what you’re talking about.” I was from the Midwest, and we didn’t—There just wasn’t the prejudice in the Midwest there was in the South. And so I said, “Yeah, I know what you mean.” And then I had another experience. (1:24:04) We had a—One of our instructor pilots was African American and a very nice gentleman, and I think—As I recall, his name was Danny Johnson. Had a nice family. Good people. And he would call to rent. He was living on base. He wanted to live off base. He would call to rent, and they’d say, “Oh, you bet. We’ve got this apartment. It’s great. Come on out and take a look at it.” He said, “I’d go up and knock on the door, and they’d open the door. And they said, ‘You know, we just rented that thirty minutes ago.’” He had a heck of a time finding housing as a black person. So when we—I finished my tour. My family and I moved back to Iowa, and I had wanted to go back to—Initially when I left high school, I enrolled at South Dakota State in pre-pharmacy, and I wanted to finish pharmacy school. So I did two things. I joined a Guard unit because I wanted to keep my military experience going, and there happened to be a Chinook unit in Davenport, Iowa. So I joined the Chinook unit. And we lived in Marshalltown, Iowa, and just a week or so after I got out—My dad was a farmer. He had a heart attack. So we lived in Marshalltown, and I helped a neighbor of ours farm our farm for that year while I went to junior college. And—a kind of a catch up year—I took courses that were required for pharmacy school. And then I had—I was in the Iowa Army National Guard, and we went to summer camp at Fort Ripley, Minnesota. (1:26:04) And I was—My job that summer at Fort Ripley was to do instrument flight instruction in a Huey. So we basically would get in a Huey—I’d get in a Huey with two students every morning, and we’d fly around Minnesota. Well, on one of those days, I actually flew a Huey from Fort Ripley down to Brookings, South Dakota and met with the dean of pharmacy, and I had been in school there before. And I told him I wanted to come back and finish, and he said, “Well, if your grades are decent—” I didn’t have a very good Grade Point Average when I left, and he said, “If your grades are decent—” He said, “I’ll consider putting you in the class.” So when I finished summer camp, finished at Marshalltown Community College with a 4.0 Grade Point Average, and called the dean, he said, “I’ll put you in the class.” Because at the time, pharmacy school was two years of pre-pharmacy and three years of pharmacy school. So I had finished my requirements for the first two years, and he put me in the class for pharmacy school. So we moved from Marshalltown to Brookings, South Dakota, and I finished pharmacy school and graduated in 1976. Interviewer: “All right, and then you go to work as a pharmacist at that point?” I did. We moved down to Vermillion, South Dakota where the medical school was because when I was in pharmacy school my last—my next to last year—I was a second year pharmacy second semester pharmacy student, and I took a course in pathology. And it was very interesting to me, so I went to see the pathology professor and said, “You know, I might be interested in applying to medical school.” (1:28:00) But I thought, “Well, it’s going to be a long shot because of my Grade Point Average and my age.” I was twenty-seven or twenty-eight years old, and I sat there and talked to him for half an hour. And age kept coming up, and he said probably some of the best advice I ever got as a student. He said, “Well, Meyer, let me ask you. How old are you?” I said—I think I was twenty-seven. He said, “All right, so you’ve got a year and a half of �Meyer, J.P. pharmacy school left. You’ll be twenty-eight, almost twenty-nine. Let’s say it takes you a couple of years to get into medical school. You’ll be thirty-one. Four years of medical school, you’ll be thirty-five. Two years of—A year of internship, thirty-six. Couple years of internal medicine residency, thirty-eight. You’ll be thirty-eight years old. You could be a board-certified internist—internal medicine specialist.” I said, “Oh my gosh, that’s eleven years from now.” He leaned back in his chair, put his hands behind his head, and he said, “Let me ask you something, Meyer.” I said, “Yeah, what’s that, Dr. Johnson?” “How old are you going to be in eleven years from now if you don’t do it?” I said, “That’s a very good point, Dr. Johnson.” So I moved down to—So the point is I moved to Vermillion. That’s where the medical school was. I didn’t have a very good Grade Point Average although I did very well in pharmacy school. I maintained about a 3.75. I went down and started applying to medical school, worked in a retail drugstore as a pharmacist. One of our customers was the dean of admissions for the medical school. He knew who I was. He knew what I was—I would go see him and talk to him about what I wanted to do. And I took the Medical College Admission Test because it’d been so long since I had had Biochemistry, for instance. My scores weren’t very good, so I took a prep course for the Medical College Admission Test and increased my scores and kept applying to medical school (1:30:15) I applied four years in a row. The third year—The second year I applied the dean told me—He said, “You didn’t make the list.” But he said, “You moved up significantly in the applicant pool.” Because of my better MCAT scores. So I said, “Well, I’m going to apply again.” And he said, “I’d recommend you do so.” So I did. The third year I applied I was on the alternate list. I was thirteenth alternate. I went to see the dean, and I said, “What are my chances?” He said, “Well— ” He said, “You’re on the alternate list.” But he said, “To be honest with you, we never take in over seven alternates.” I said, “Well, all right, I’m on the alternate list. I think I’m going to apply one more year.” And he said, “I would if I were you.” So, in the meantime—I applied that fourth year—I was a registered pharmacist in a small town in South Dakota, not making very much money, counting pills and typing labels. And I wanted to get out of the Army Guard and into the Air Force Reserve, so I found an Air Force Reserve unit at Selfridge Air National Guard Base in Michigan that was looking for pilots that had heavy helicopter time because they had H-3s. And they took me on, so I moved to Michigan. And I actually worked full-time for the Air Force Reserve for that year while I was waiting to get into medical school. I didn’t tell them I had applied to medical school because I just thought, “Well, they don’t need to know that.” So I worked out there, and they were wanting me to take a full-time job as a flight instructor. (1:32:01) So I finally did. Chief of safety flight instructor in H-3. Well, they sent me off to— Because I had transitioned from the Army Guard to the Air Force Reserve, they sent me to water survival training, land survival training, and an aviation safety officer course, which was taught at the Air Force Base outside of San Bernardino, California. So I went out there. I was out there. It was my last week of class, and the phone rang. And again, that’s the only time my phone rang ever in the BOQ I was staying in. And I answered it, and it was the secretary from the medical school. And said, “We’re going to accept you to medical school. Where are you? We need to send you some paperwork to have notarized and sent back to us.” So I signed it and sent it back, accepted a position in—Medical school started in August of 1980, and for my training that I had gone through in the Air Force Reserve, I was obligated until September of 1980. So I had a problem. So I went back, and I talked to my boss. And I said, “Hey. I’m—Before I came out here a long time ago, I applied to medical school, and I just found out last week I got accepted.” And he says, “What are you going to do?” I said, “Well, I applied so many years in a row. I need to do this.” So I sent a letter to AFRS headquarters requesting release from my obligation, and they �Meyer, J.P. denied it. In the meantime, I wanted to stay in the military, so I had found a position in the 185th Tactical Fighter Group in Sioux City in the Iowa Air National Guard in the command post because they—It required a rated officer. But you didn’t have to be A-7 qualified. We had A-7s at the time. So I wrote a letter back, and I said, “Look. I’ve already got a position in an Iowa Air National Guard unit, and I think the Air Force would be better off gaining a flight surgeon or a physician flight surgeon as opposed to another pilot.” And they agreed with me, and they let me out of my commitment. (1:34:03) So I moved back to Vermillion and started medical school in 19—in August of—Well, July of 1980. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and did you get through that successfully?” I finished medical school in 1984. Stayed in the Guard the whole time. After medical school, I moved to Michigan. I did an internship in Detroit, and then, during my internship, I applied to go back on active duty in the Navy and the Air Force. And my goal in the Navy was to become what was called a dual designator to fly as a pilot in Navy jets and be a flight surgeon at the same time, and the Navy had that program. The Air Force didn’t. So as my internship went along, the Navy didn’t get the paperwork done. The Air Force did. So I took the Air Force route and went to flight surgeon training and was assigned to Vance Air Force Base in Enid, Oklahoma, and after my internship—So we moved to Enid in—Well, it would’ve been July of 1984. I went on active duty until—It was a three year commitment, so ‘84 to ‘87 I was on active duty in the Air Force. Interviewer: “Okay, and what did your job consist of?” We had a clinic on the base. It was clinic medicine, and our job as flight surgeons was to take care of the rated personnel. And the rated personnel consisted of student pilots, flight instructors, and air traffic controllers. So we saw a young, healthy population. It wasn’t especially challenging, so what I did was I took a job part-time in the local—one of the hospital’s local emergency rooms as an emergency room physician. (1:36:00) So I moonlighted in the emergency room while I was in the Air Force, and one of my objectives was to keep my skills up because you do flight medicine for three years, and now, you know, taking care of a heart attack is way back in the distance. So I was an emergency room physician. Well, when I finished the Air Force obligation in ‘87, I—The local medical staff wanted me to take over the emergency room at the other hospital in town, which was expanding and building a new emergency room and building on to the hospital, so I agreed to do that. So I became a full-time emergency room physician in Enid, and I transferred—Once I got off active duty, I rejoined the Iowa Air National Guard as a flight surgeon in Sioux City. So I would attend drills in Sioux City, and I worked fulltime in Enid. Interviewer: “And how would you get back and forth?” I had my own airplane at the time, so I’d commute back and forth to— Interviewer: “Long drive, not so long flight.” �Meyer, J.P. Correct, and actually there were times when the pilots from Sioux City—There was a low level route that they would fly that went down into Kansas. Well, there was—Occasionally, they would actually come down to Enid to the Air Force base and pick me up in an A-7, and we’d fly the low level route back to Sioux City. And then Sunday afternoon be in a Guard drill. We’d repeat the process, and they’d drop me off back in Enid, which was a lot of fun for me. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now you would have been in the Air National Guard in the period of the Gulf War in ‘91. Did that have any ripple effects that got to your unit, or did things just stay normal?” We had—I don’t know if I’d call it a request or an offer for volunteers, and we did have some people from our medical unit that volunteered for the Gulf War. And they were sent to—I know one of our physicians was sent to Florida to backfill a physician’s position that was deployed to the Gulf War. (1:38:10) So no one went to the Gulf, but they—We had a few people that went to different places in the United States. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and then how long did you stay with the Air National Guard?” I was the—I started out as the chief flight surgeon in the 185th Tactical clinic, and then I became the clinic commander. And then my next assignment was as the State Air Surgeon for the state of Iowa. So I switched from going to Sioux City. I went to Des Moines for drill, and I was the State Air Surgeon for the Iowa Air National Guard. Interviewer: “Okay. Now when did you complete that assignment?” When I retired in January of 2000. Interviewer: “All right. Now you had been working in Enid, Oklahoma. You now live in Grand Island, Nebraska. How did that come about?” Well, I was working as the emergency room physician. I ran the emergency room, and I would hire other physicians to be the emergency room physician when I was not there. And I had a partner who was a medical school classmate of mine, and he and I basically took most of the hours. And then we’d use residents from Oklahoma City to fill in the rest, and I did that until 1992. In late ‘91, the administrator at the hospital came down and was talking to me, and he said, “You know, you’re one of two physicians on our medical staff who do not have post-graduate medical education.” Basically, I’d had just an internship and experience. And he said, “And the other one is retiring.” So I thought, “Well, all right. I probably need to go and do my specialty training.” So my thought at the time—Because of my pharmacy background, I had—Really, when I left medical school, I wanted to do anesthesia residency, and the internship I did was a lead-in to that. And then, during my internship, I decided to change course and go to the—back to the military for a while. (1:40:08) So I—My choices were to do anesthesiology or do emergency medicine. The University of Oklahoma had an emergency medicine program. The University of Kansas-Wichita had an anesthesiology program, and they were—Well, University of Wichita was a little further than Oklahoma City from Enid but not much. So my thought at the �Meyer, J.P. time was, “Well, I’m already doing emergency medicine. I’m not sure I want to go and train for two years to do something I’m already doing.” An my primary interest had always been anesthesiology. So I applied to the University of Kansas and completed the residency program at the University of Kansas-Wichita hospitals, and that program ran from 1992 to 1995. In 1995, we moved to Woodward, Oklahoma—small town in western Oklahoma—and I was the only anesthesiologist there. We had a nurse anesthesthetist who was a nurse that does anesthesia, and we had—It was a fairly—We had a new, young—couple of new, young surgeons, and it was a fairly busy place. But I grew up in the Midwest around cornfields and beanfields, and now I was in an environment that looked like west Texas with wind and dry and tumbleweeds. And if you didn’t ride horses or chase rattlesnakes, there wasn’t a whole lot to do in Woodward, Oklahoma, so—And I was being—I was on call 24/7, and basically I got tired of the routine. And I told my wife. I said, “I’m moving back to the Midwest. I hope you’re going with me.” So we moved to— I had a classmate who was from Grand Island where I live now, and his father and his group—an orthopedic group—had plans to build their own ambulatory surgery center. (1:42:19) So Dr. Albers was calling me and telling me and encouraging me to come up. Well, I wanted to leave Oklahoma, so I actually interviewed in—at a couple hospitals in Iowa and one in Topeka, and I knew of the opportunity in Grand Island and ultimately decided to move to Grand Island. And we’ve lived there ever since. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Okay, so to look back on the whole thing, I mean, obviously, a lot—You know, the standard question that I ask is sort of how do you think your time in the service affected you, or what did you take out of it? And you said a lot about that already, but I just want to sort of—Just for yourself as a person, how do you think that this affected you?” Well, I got out of the service—You know, I guess I’d have to say I got out of the service what I wanted. Flight training and experience. Because of the course I took in flight training, in the Air Force Reserve, in medical school, in the flight surgeon—I mean, I had a terrific time in the military. I had a lot of opportunity. I got to do a lot of really neat things. I rode in the backseat of an A-7 all the way from Sioux City, Iowa to Sint-Truiden, Belgium on a deployment for summer camp one year. I—It was just a really—It was a good time. Got a lot of flying experience and enjoyed it. On the downside, it took a toll on my personal life. After Vietnam, I got divorced from my boys’ mother and eventually was remarried to my current wife, and we raised her two boys. My two boys finished college and are very successful. One’s an insurance executive. One is actually a physician anesthesiologist pain doctor just like myself who now lives in Kansas. (1:44:05) We raised my wife’s two boys. One of them finished his degree at the University of Nebraska in psychology, and he actually works for us in the office. Does—Helps do billing. Her oldest son just finished his undergraduate degree, and he’s applying to PA school. And then we had a daughter who was born in 1996, and she now is at the—Oklahoma State University in their professional pilot program. I steered her towards aviation, but I told her—I said, “I want you to do this for you. I don’t—You know, don’t do it for me. Just—This is something you seem to enjoy and be interested in.” And I said, “You can actually go to college and get a degree in aviation and learn to fly.” And I said, “There’s a pilot shortage going on, and I think it’s going to run for at least ten years. And the sky’s the limit.” I said, “You’ll—” And I—We talked when she’s been home, and I said, “You know, Elizabeth, you have the world by the tail if you play your cards right.” And she just smiles and says, “Yeah, I know.” So it took a toll on, you know, �Meyer, J.P. my personal life like I think it did for so many Vietnam vets. It’s just what life was like at the time. It’s how things were. Lot of stress. Interviewer: “All right, and you basically kind of over time learned to manage it or deal— Or things quiet down over time, or…?” Yeah, they have. I think there are times when a certain situation is difficult for me. Interviewer: “Yeah, I mean, you saw a lot difficult stuff and went through some very, very scary things, and those do leave a mark. But you’ve had certainly a very impressive career and makes for very good stories, so thank you very much for taking the time to share today.” You’re welcome. (1:45:58) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_MeyerJ2282V Title A name given to the resource Meyer, J. Paul (Interview transcript and video), 2018 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018-11-03 Description An account of the resource J.P. Meyer was born in Marshalltown, Iowa, in 1947. He graduated high school in 1965 and attended a pre-pharmacy program at South Dakota State University before dropping out in 1968 to enlist in the Army's warrant officer flight training program. Meyer underwent Basic Training at Fort Polk, Louisiana, and then transfered to Fort Wolters, Texas, for primary helicopter school as well as Fort Rucker, Alabama, for instrument and tactical training. When he was deployed to Vietnam, Meyer joined Charlie Company, 159th Aviation Battalion, 101st Airborne in Phu Bai. His unit participated in the establishment, siege, and eventual evacuation of Firebase Ripcord in 1970. After working an administration job back in the U.S. for the remainder of his tour, he joined a Chinook unit in the Iowa Army National Guard and later graduated with a pharmaceutical degree. From there, he continued his medical studies at vance Air Force Base in Enid, Oklahoma. Meyer eventually became the State Air Surgeon and began going to Des Moines, Iowa, for drill. Meyer finally completed this assignment when he retired in January of 2000. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Meyer, J. Paul Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American United States. Army. Air Force Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/1079737e4584080c01160dda19cba33a.mp4 580d020f740d6cd580ab039cbe40cdf7 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/dbe32ac8dedef2368393013fd2526cd4.pdf 672d1136303b0052bff502e082676d0d PDF Text Text Mackey, Michael Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Interview Name of War: Vietnam War Interviewee’s Name: Michael Mackey Length of Interview: (55:31) Interviewed by: James Smither Transcribed by: Chelsea Chandler Interviewer: “Okay, Mike. Begin at the beginning. Where and when were you born?” Third of February, 1948. Crawfordsville, Indiana. Interviewer: “All right. Now did you grow up there, or did you move around?” No. My dad was in the military. We moved to Japan when I was five years old, and we stayed there for two years. Interviewer: “So what do you remember about living in Japan?” Colors. I remember a lot of colors. It was right after the war, and I remember the communists marching and demonstrating. And, as a little kid, I just remember bright colors. And I remember my maid vaguely who stayed with us and just little things. That’s pretty—You know. Interviewer: “Right. Okay, and so where did you wind up going to high school?” (1:00) I went to high school really in two places. I went to Wai’anae High School in Hawaii, and then from Wai’anae we moved to Plum Branch, South Carolina. My dad got transferred to Fort Jackson, and then I graduated from Airport High School in West Columbia, South Carolina. Interviewer: “Okay, and when did you graduate from high school?” 1966. Interviewer: “Okay, and what did you do after you got out of high school?” I’m trying to—I worked in a sign company. Colonial—houseman—Heights. Building signs for about eight, ten months, I think, before the army started getting close. Interviewer: “Okay, so Vietnam was going on. There was a draft going on.” Yes. Right. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now how much did you know about Vietnam at that point?” �Mackey, Michael Just what I’d seen on TV. I remember—I remember helicopters a lot because they were on TV every night, and that’s the main thing I remembered about Vietnam. It was just starting to really get hot in that timeframe. Interviewer: “Yeah. All right, so at that point do you decide to enlist before—Or do you get a draft notice? Or what happens?” (2:05) No. My dad—He was career military. He had been in—stayed in for thirty-three years. Did all— He did World War II, Korea, and Vietnam. And he had told me that I need to talk to a recruiter and start taking tests for schools that the army had to offer. So I took all the tests that I could think of to take. I hoped to be like a rocket repairman or something where I wouldn’t have to go to Vietnam. That’s what my endgame was. And didn’t work out that way. And he had called me one day, and he said, “Mike, you’d better go down and join something.” “In the next few days,” he said, “you’re fixing to get your draft notice.” So I went and talked to the recruiter, and I said, “What kind of a school can you give me?” And he said, “Only thing I can give you right now is a rotary-wing flight.” And I said, “Oh, no. I don’t want to do that.” I said, “I’ve seen the helicopters on TV. I know they’re getting shot down. People getting killed. I don’t want to do that.” He said, “Well, that’s the only school I can give you.” Long story short, I took it because he offered me a four-month delayed entry, which was like an eternity to an eighteen, nineteenyear-old kid. “Four more months? Oh, yeah, I can do that.” Interviewer: “All right, so when do you report for duty?” It was in the summer of ‘67. Interviewer: “Okay, and where did you go?” I went to Fort Jackson thinking that’s where I would do my basic training because that’s what they had told me. They lied. I got to Fort Jackson. Got checked in. They put me on a bus and sent me to the airport and put me on a plane to Fort Polk, Louisiana. And ended up there for basic. Interviewer: “All right, so what was basic training at Fort Polk like?” Hell. Hot and nothing to do off the base. Of course, we never got to go off the base to begin with. And scary. Any kid that tells you it wasn’t scary—Basic training was scary. When you get off that cattle truck, and you have six drill sergeants yelling at you… Interviewer: “Yeah. Were you expecting that?” Sort of because my dad had told me kind of what to expect, but it’s never—Hearing what to expect and being in the middle of it is two different things. But it was—It was scary. (4:06) Interviewer: “Okay. Were you in good physical shape when you went in?” Oh, yeah, yeah. �Mackey, Michael Interviewer: “Okay, so you could handle the physical stuff?” I could handle physical stuff. I actually gained weight in basic training like I guess most people do. It’s mostly muscle. Interviewer: “You build up your muscle. Yeah. Okay. Now the guys who were there along with you…Did you have a sense of where they were from, or if they were drafted?” Oh, yes. Yeah. And everybody, from poor farm boys to people that were going to be going to flight school and people who were going to go to OCS—They’re all bunched together in Fort Polk. That’s where they sent all of us who were going to warrant officer flight school. We all went through basic at Fort Polk, Louisiana. Interviewer: “Okay. Okay, so a lot of the guys that you trained with there went with you then through flight training?” Well, we all went there. Yeah, but we all kind of went different ways there. In different classes. Interviewer: “Right. Okay. But do you think you were in a unit that was geared specifically toward people who were going to go to the flight school, or…?” No, I don’t really—I don’t really think that was their purpose. I can’t really figure out what their purpose was to send us all to Fort Polk because there was really nothing different about it—its basic than any other base. Like I think— Interviewer: “Yeah. Well, sometimes they would group people with potentially similar MOSs or similar backgrounds together just—Because they did that.” Right, but—This is just my opinion. But what warrant officer flight school did—They gave us a Class 2 flight physical before entering the service to see if we were viable. When you get to basic training, they give you a Class 1, which is a little bit more serious. They dilate your eyes and all this stuff. And several people in basic flunked the exam. The physical. So they ended up going to what they call Tiger Land, which is AI—infantry AIT at Fort Polk. So I think that’s their purpose. If they flunk you out, or you didn’t pass your physical, they just moved you over here, and now you’re an infantry guy. Interviewer: “All right. Or, at least, that certainly happened to some people.” It happened to several people. Interviewer: “Okay. Now how easy or hard was it for you to adjust to life in the army for real?” That’s a good question. Boy. (6:00) Maybe—Maybe not that bad because my dad had been—All I knew was military from him, but I—It was not horribly difficult. It’s a big adjustment for probably anybody to do that. �Mackey, Michael Interviewer: “Okay, and do you think you held up better than some of the other guys, or…?” Yeah. Well, some of the other guys. Sure. We had crazy people there. Yeah, one guy tried to commit suicide several times. Interviewer: “And how did the instructors treat you?” I would say—I really didn’t think badly. I mean, I don’t remember ever getting singled out, but that was my whole thing. My dad just taught me to kind of don’t show—Don’t stand out. Just kind of be in the middle, and I kind of did that. I just stayed in the middle. I didn’t want to be too good or too bad. Interviewer: “All right, so how long did that last?” The feeling, or the…? Interviewer: “No, the actual—the basic training.” Two months. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and then is your next stop now starting the flight training?” Our next stop—And this is about—It ended up being about Christmastime. We reported to Fort Wolters, Texas for primary flight school. And once we did preflight—You go through preflight for a month. But we reported there right before Christmas. And we were there about a week, and they turned us around and sent us home on leave because it was Christmas. So we went home and then came back. And my—When I got back from leave to Fort Wolters, Texas, my preflight class was scheduled to be a couple weeks away, so I had time—I would have had time to get my uniforms ready, and—They’re really picky. They moved me up, so I started like two days after I got back. None of my stuff was ready, so I’m ironing clothes, sewing patches. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now—So this preflight training—This is also—You’re becoming—I guess we ought to explain a little bit for an outside audience. You’re becoming a warrant officer. What is a warrant officer?” (8:10) You’re becoming—Yeah. A warrant officer is kind of an inbetween rank. You’re a specialist when you finish whatever warrant you’re in. You’re a specialist in that field. I mean, nobody expects you to do other things. You’re—This is what you’re trained to do. Like in my case, it’s a pilot. You might be an ordnance warrant. There’s all kind of different warrants, but all you’re expected to do is what you’re trained to do. You’re between an officer and an enlisted man, so it’s a great rank. Nobody really knows what to do with you, so you just do your job. Interviewer: “All right. Now the first weeks of this training...What’s the focus?” �Mackey, Michael The first month of the training, I think, is basically warrant—shadowing people because it’s all— It’s like OCS. It just—On you all the time. It was probably worse than basic as far as inspections and messing with you and just trying to get you to—See if they could make you quit. I think that was the whole purpose. Just to see if they can wash you out. Interviewer: “And what proportion of the class do you think washed out?” At that point, I think maybe—It wasn’t a great, great proportion. I think maybe five or ten percent at the most. It wasn’t a lot. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now are they starting to actually teach you things about flying or aircraft?” Yeah, you’re still—You’re going through ground school. Learning about weather. You’re learning about being an officer. Just learning basic things. And then after that’s over, they, of course, start flight school, which—Then it gets harder. Interviewer: “Okay. Now, with the flight school, did they just go ahead—and they put you into a helicopter with an instructor—and get started?” Yeah, pretty much. You got a half—Split them in half. One half of the day is the ground school where you’re learning about flying and all kinds of other things, and then the second half is actually flying. And they stick you with an instructor, and you find out how uncoordinated you are. Interviewer: “Yeah. All right. What kind of aircraft did you start out in?” (10:20) OH-13. The Korean Bubble. If you ever watch M*A*S*H, that’s what it was. Interviewer: “All right, and how easy or hard was that to fly?” Initially, it was crazy. I had a judge tell me one time—He says, “Flying a helicopter is like sitting on a beach ball in a swimming pool.” And that’s what it felt like at first. Interviewer: “All right, and how did the process work? I mean, what kind of stuff were you—I mean, did you start with taking off, or does the instructor take off and then start having you do things in flight?” Now, basically, I think you start out trying to learn to hover. He would sit there and hover the helicopter, and he’d explain what each control did. And as he explained what each control did, he’d say, “Okay. Now you’ve got the cyclic, which is the stick.” And he’d tell you what it did, and you’d hold it. And then, “Oh, that’s not too bad. I can hold the stick.” Then he’d add something. “Okay. Now this is the collective. This is what it does. Now get a hold of it.” So now you’ve got two things. Then he’d say, “These are the pedals. You’ve got the pedals.” And, all of a sudden, you’re all over the place. You just—It’s crazy. �Mackey, Michael Interviewer: “All right. Now how dangerous was the training?” Pretty dangerous. Pretty dangerous. We had one kid in our class—he wasn’t in my flight, but he was in my class—that his first solo, his engine quit. And in a helicopter when the engine quits, the procedure is to lower the collective and take the load off the blades. He pulled the collective. The blades stopped. (12:02) And he died. Interviewer: “All right. Did you have any close calls yourself or scary moments?” Yeah, maybe scary moments, but it was self-induced. I was chasing a hawk one time while I was flying solo, and I shouldn’t have been. I got too close to him, and it almost went through the blades. Did stupid stuff in confined areas. I’d try to take off backwards, and I did— Interviewer: “How old were you at this point?” I think I was nineteen. Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay. That may explain a lot.” Yeah. Interviewer: “But yeah, that was characteristic, I guess, of a lot of the warrant officers who were all pretty young.” Right. We all did the same. We all did the same. We were all crazy. It’s like a kid getting a really nice sports car, you know. Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay, and so—Well, you get through that in one piece. Once you survive that, then what do they do with you?” Yep. Well, then, after you solo, pretty much it’s just a learning curve. Getting better and better and better. You’re practicing engine failures. They actually let you go out by yourself and fly around most of the time, and you fly with an instructor just very little. And just basically honing your skills pretty much. Interviewer: “Right, and then once you complete that training at Fort Wolters, what do you do next?” I went to Savannah to Hunter Army Airfield. We had a choice when I went through. You could go to Fort Rucker, Alabama, or you’d go to Savannah, Georgia. Savannah was close to my home, and so I went to Savannah. And in Savannah we started out flying Hueys instead of—Fort Rucker—They went to OH-13s just like I was flying in basic, but we flew Hueys in Savannah starting from the beginning. Interviewer: “Okay, and did you like flying a Huey better than—” �Mackey, Michael Oh, lord, yes. You didn’t have to worry about a throttle control. It was much smoother. Much more powerful. And we were flying instrument training, which was very, very mentally challenging. I mean, you’re flying under a hood. You can’t see outside. You’re just looking at the instrument panels and trying to fly. So it made it a lot easier for that. (14:14) Interviewer: “Okay. Did that turn out to be very helpful when you got to Vietnam?” Yeah. Helpful and harmful. They teach you just enough. In flight school, they’d give us what they called a tactical instrument ticket. Was just enough to keep you out of trouble but just enough to get you in trouble, too. It wasn’t—They could’ve went a little further and helped us a lot, but they didn’t. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. So how long did you stay in Savannah?” It was four months. Interviewer: “Okay, so when do you complete that course?” Seems to me like it was in November of ‘68. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and then once you’ve done that, what do they do with you?” Well, in my case, everybody in my flight school class went to Vietnam immediately. My dad was in Vietnam when I finished flight school. Interviewer: “What was he doing at that point?” My dad was an admin sergeant major with thirty something years in the military, so he was in a very safe place in Saigon. He was pushing paper and getting orders and stuff. And he had volunteered to go to Vietnam to keep me from going when I got out of flight school. Interviewer: “Okay, so because he’s in Vietnam—you have a family member there—you can’t go?” I can if I volunteer, but I didn’t. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, so what did you do instead?” They sent me to Germany. I got to Germany, and it took me about a month to feel like I was just a fish out of water. I’m thinking about all my friends who are in Vietnam. I think I’d been in Germany maybe three months, and my roommate from Vietnam, one of my best friends, got his jaw blown off in a Cobra. (16:01) And I got to feeling so guilty. I actually volunteered to go to Vietnam. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now where were you in Germany?” �Mackey, Michael Würzburg. Interviewer: “Okay, and what was your job there?” We flew around a colonel—Air Defense Artillery colonel—to different Air Defense sites. It was a great job as far as aviation jobs are concerned. We had three pilots and three aircraft. Interviewer: “Yeah. And what’s daily life like in a place like that?” For me, it was very boring. I mean, I was so young. Everybody else was kind of old. There were only, like I said, three pilots, and two of them were married. And I’m single by myself, and it was—That’s very boring for me. Interviewer: “Okay, and to a certain extent, you’re kind of stuck on a base waiting for the colonel to decide what you’re going to do?” Yeah, pretty much, and it’s—I just wasn’t ready to be there, and I had—Like I said, I was so concerned about my friends that I just felt so guilty. Interviewer: “Right. Okay. So when do you get to Vietnam?” I get to Vietnam in August of 1969. Interviewer: “All right, and then what’s the process for getting you to Vietnam? Did you go home first, and then…?” Yeah, I went home on leave from Germany, and then I went from—From leave I went to Fort Rucker to go through CH-47 transition, which I think was six weeks or somewhere around— month to six weeks—and then to Vietnam. Interviewer: “Okay, okay. CH-47. Now is that the Chinook?” Yes, Chinook. Interviewer: “Okay. Now explain how that’s different from a Huey.” Well, it’s a multi-engine, heavy lift helicopter. Multi-engine. Huey’s got one engine. If it gets shot out, you’re going down. Chinook’s got two. If it gets one engine shot out, you’re not going down. You can fly it home. It’s basically a safer aircraft. Interviewer: “Okay, and harder to fly?” Not really. Probably easier to fly. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now how did you wind up doing that?” (18:06) �Mackey, Michael I felt like when I volunteered to go to Vietnam, it’d be the safest course. And the warrant officer—We had a W-3 in Germany, and he advised me a little bit. And he said, “You should probably try to get a Chinook transition because—” Interviewer: “Okay. All right, so you’ve applied for that. You do that training.” Right. Interviewer: “Okay, and then in August of ‘69, now you make it to Vietnam. So from the States how do they get you to Vietnam?” Freedom Bird or just a commercial airliner they’d chartered. Interviewer: “And where did you fly out of?” I flew out of Oakland. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and where did you land in Vietnam?” Saigon. Interviewer: “Okay, so Tan Son Nhut? Tan Son Nhut. Yeah, Tan Son Nhut. Interviewer: “Okay. Okay, and what did they do with you once you land?” Well, we landed in the evening, of course. At night. I think that’s probably when they all did. But they put you in a bus, and they take you to the 93 Placement detachment or depot. Whatever it was. And the thing I remember about getting on the bus is the screen. They had chicken wire all along the windows, and I couldn’t figure out what that was for. Well, they told us before we left on the bus that it was to keep hand grenades from getting thrown into the bus. That made sense. Interviewer: “Okay. Yeah, and a lot of guys have had that—And that’s one of the most common things to pop up in these stories. But yeah, okay. What was your first impression of Vietnam when you got there?” Stink. The smell and the heat just overwhelmed you. Interviewer: “All right. Okay, so now you go the replacement depot, and how long do you spend there?” We were there for—If you go into the 101st, which I was, you were there for—I think it’s four days. They send you to a little, short course to teach you some things about Vietnam. Things you can expect before they send you to your unit. �Mackey, Michael Interviewer: “Okay, so what kinds of things were on the program?” Well, they showed you how sappers could get through the wire and get into your perimeter, and they showed you booby traps. And, you know, stuff, as a pilot, I’m probably not going to see. (20:07) But I guess if I got shot down, maybe I might see it. But still. It’s just stuff that was probably good for the people around me on the ground, but it wasn’t that helpful for us. Interviewer: “Yeah. Yeah, and otherwise get you used to the climate a little bit and just—” Yeah. Funny, funny story—and I don’t know if anybody else has told you—is they give you this sleeping shirt when you get there, and it’s like—It might be a hundred and teens outside, and you’re just sweating your butt off. And they give you this long sleeve shirt to sleep in. And I’m sitting there, thinking, “Are you guys insane? I mean, I’m not going to wear this damn thing.” I gave mine away when I got to my unit. And then the monsoons came, and then I wished I had it back. Interviewer: “All right. Okay, so once you complete that, now what happens?” Now they put us on a C-130, and they fly us from Tan Son Nhut up to Phu Bai where the 101st headquarters is at. And they had a—I think it was a Jeep waiting for us. I think there were—me and one other guy—two pilots that were going to the same company, and they picked us up. Interviewer: Okay. All right, and which company is that?” Charlie Company. Playtex. Interviewer: “Of what unit?” 159th Assault Support Helicopter Battalion. Interviewer: “All right. Okay, and what kind of reception do you get when you join the unit?” Hardly any. Seriously. Just come in, and they tell you where you’re going to sleep tonight. And that’s about it. Interviewer: “Okay, and then when you’re first there, what kind duties or training do you get?” They throw you right into the mix. Best I can remember. You start out on the flight schedule. They’ll put you with an experienced aircraft commander, and you start flying. Start flying missions the first day or two you’re there. (22:02) Interviewer: “Okay, and what kinds of missions were they flying when you started?” We were flying resupply missions—mostly to artillery bases—resupplying ammo, food, anything. Hauling bulldozers. Heavy lift stuff. �Mackey, Michael Interviewer: “Okay. Were you going to the A Shau Valley at that point?” We were going out to the edge, not into it. But we were right at the—still at the edge of it. Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay. All right. Now when you’re first flying as a co-pilot, what kinds of jobs do you have, or what are you doing while the other guy’s actually flying the aircraft? Well, basically, the aircraft commander’s in control of the missions, and the way most of them worked is he’d fly a load, I’d fly a load, he’d fly a load, I’d fly a load. And as you got further along and the more experienced, they’d actually let you start running the missions to see if you could do it. Yeah. Interviewer: “All right, and then at a certain point—I mean, how long does it take for you to become an aircraft commander?” About three months usually. Somewhere in that area. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now in the—kind of the west—In the first few months of flying there, was it particularly dangerous, or was it quiet?” It was pretty dangerous. We were up on the demilitarized zone and flying into some very bad terrain, very bad area where a lot of North Vietnamese regulars were. There wasn’t Viet Cong. It was regular army people. Interviewer: “All right, and how quickly did you start getting shot at?” Oh, I remember the first time I got hit. I hadn’t been there but maybe three weeks or a month, and we got hit with a .51 caliber machine gun on the DMZ. And it hit us in the fuel cell, and we started spraying fuel everywhere. Interviewer: “Okay, so what does the pilot do when that happens?” (24:05) We landed at a Special Forces base, which was right up on the DMZ, and we shut down there and checked everything out. I think they plugged the hole with bubblegum or something just to keep it from spewing out and going through the exhaust of the engine and catching fire. Interviewer: “Okay. Now were you still a co-pilot at that point?” Yes, yes. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Okay, so you’re going up along the DMZ as well as kind of up to the hills.” �Mackey, Michael And around Khe Sanh, too. We were working out in that area at that point. I was up—We were pretty close to Khe Sanh when we got hit. Interviewer: “Okay, and then how does weather affect what you do?” Oh, really horribly. Monsoons in I Corps were really, really bad, and the weather—We’d get down to maybe a 100, 150 foot ceiling, which means you can go up about 150 feet before you put your blades in the clouds. And we were actually running missions and that where we would basically hover around, carrying loads to places. When you couldn’t get any altitude or air speed, you’re just hovering around. Interviewer: “And would you be—sometimes just be in the middle of a cloud, hovering above something, and…?” Well, when Ripcord happened, we actually did that kind of thing. We—They were so—They put them in, and then they got socked in almost immediately. Had no—They were running out of everything and begging for us to bring stuff to them any way we could, and we started shooting approaches to the—about the middle of the mountain. The clouds had come down to about the middle of the mountain. We’re shooting approach down to where we could still see, and then try to hover up to the clouds. Just trying to see a little bit of ground as you could. Hover up to the clouds to get stuff to them. Interviewer: “Could people on the ground guide you at all or help?” Sometimes they can guide you by sound if they hear you coming, and they tell you, “Come a little bit to the right. A little bit to the left.” But basically, no, they can’t really help other than that. (26:09) Interviewer: “And there wasn’t any kind of signal system, or…?” No, not for that. This was just improvisation. We—I forget who did it first. One of our—I think it was John Wagner. He was a—my roommate, and I think he was the first one to try it and did it. And he told us, and then, of course, we all try it. Interviewer: “All right, and, I guess—Now the way, I guess, the sequence works, I guess, is that when you first arrive, it’s still the dry season, so you can still operate.” When I first got there, yeah. Interviewer: “Yeah, and then the monsoon comes in late in the year and extends into the…” It extends into March or somewhere around there. Interviewer: “March. Yeah. Yeah, and the first attempt to actually establish the Ripcord base was in March.” �Mackey, Michael Right. Interviewer: “And that actually was aborted. Now were you part of that effort, or were you…?” No, not the initial effort, but initially I think they were trying to put infantry in, and they couldn’t get them in. We’re usually second. Once the infantry gets in and secures the base, then we bring the artillery in. Interviewer: “Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. Okay, and so they hadn’t gotten that far in the sequence.” Not initially, no. Interviewer: “Yeah. Now April 1st they try again, and this time they’re landing on the hilltop that becomes Ripcord. And they get some infantry in. Right. Interviewer: “Now were you on standby for that as well?” Yeah, then we got—Well, then we started bringing in the artillery pieces. Interviewer: “Yeah, well, the—April 1st, when they went—They left the hill. They couldn’t—They were under enough fire that they called that off. So the middle of April, I guess—about the twelfth or something like that—” I guess. It’s hard to—I don’t remember a whole—when they first put them in Interviewer: “Yeah, but what you remember is when they’re actually building the base.” Right. Yeah. Interviewer: “So now you’re bringing stuff in.” Yeah, we’re bringing stuff in. Bulldozers. We’re bringing in artillery pieces and resupplies. All kind of heavy stuff they need. Interviewer: “All right. Were there some loads that were harder to manage than others?” Yeah. Conex containers. Big, square, steel boxes. They tended to want to flop around in the wind, and you don’t want them flying too far back up behind you because they can go through your blades. (28:09) They were hard to carry. You had to go pretty slow with them. Not relative to Ripcord, but downed aircraft—Cobras—were very hard to haul. They wanted to fly. �Mackey, Michael Interviewer: “So the—I mean, the rotors would go, or…?” The way it was—The way they were streamlined, for some reason, they’d just get lift. And they’d want to fly. Interviewer: “So they’d kind of being going up—” Yeah, they’d be rising up. And I was hauling one one time, and I—We have a cargo mirror, and I looked up in it. And I’d seen the tail boom of the Cobra up here, so we had to slow down a lot. But they were very difficult to haul. Interviewer: “Okay. Now what are some of the most challenging missions in terms of things to pick up or drop off?” Bulldozers. You had to get really, really low on fuel to pick them up and carry them because they’re so heavy. We carried other downed Chinooks with a Chinook, and you’d have to get really low on fuel. We had some radio relay stations around Khe Sanh that were very, very bad places to go, so we’d haul a double load. Instead of eight thousand, we’d carry sixteen thousand pounds. Interviewer: “Okay. Now why were the relay stations bad places?” They were just out in the boonies. We had no support out there. Just a small team on top of a mountain that would relay radio signals. Interviewer: “Yeah, yeah, so there wasn’t a whole lot of room to land or anything?” There wasn’t a whole lot of room to land, and there’s a lot of really bad guys there. And we didn’t like to go but once if we had to. Just drop one load off instead of going back a second time. Interviewer: “Yeah, but there were things that they needed a Chinook for instead of Hueys?” Well, yeah, because we could get so much more in. So much quickly. (30:01) I mean, I don’t know how much a Huey can sling load, but, you know, we could carry sixteen thousand pounds. That’s a lot. Interviewer: “Okay. Now when the weather was okay, how much flying would you do in a day?” I’d say, on average, ten hours a day when the weather was good. I had one day I flew twentyseven straight hours. Interviewer: “All right. How long typically does a mission take?” �Mackey, Michael We broke—Our missions were funny. We had sorties. We’d get a sheet every morning that told us how many sorties we’d got. We’ve got to pick this thing up here. Take it here. That’s a mission. Pick this up here. Take it here. That’s a mission. Probably a hundred if you counted them that way. A hundred missions a day. Interviewer: “Okay, because there’s the different stops that you’re making.” Different—Yeah, just—Everything’s a mission. Interviewer: “Yeah. Yeah, so you’re within a relatively defined geographical area.” Absolutely. We’d know—After you’d been there three months, you know every hilltop, every grid square, everything. I mean, it’s just in your head. You don’t have a—We didn’t even have a map. Interviewer: “Okay. Now to what extent did the latter part of Ripcord kind of stand out in your experience?” Terror. Just pure—Scared every time we had to go in there. Interviewer: “Yeah. Did it get bad in terms of starting to take fire before the siege started, or is it really at the beginning of July when things get ugly?” Well, even really before that we took fire just about every time we went to Ripcord. We’d alter our routes in and out and airspeed and altitudes and the way we came in, just trying to confuse people. We got to the point we were doing what we call a high overhead approach. You’d fly over Ripcord at fifteen hundred feet over it, and you’d start a standard rate turn, either right or left. It didn’t matter. And start a descent of fifteen hundred feet a minute, and you’d do a 360 right over the top of the firebase. And when you finish the 360, you’re just about where you wanted to be. And just get the load and went. (32:05) Interviewer: “All right, and would you actually land on the firebase, or would you just unhook the load and…?” No. The load would hit the ground, we’d punch it off, and back up in the air. Interviewer: “All right. Now what were the biggest dangers there?” Rockets and mortars because they would hit the pad quite frequently. Actually, sometimes quad 50 machine guns. Quad-51s. Interviewer: “They had those?” Oh, yeah. �Mackey, Michael Interviewer: “Because I knew they had the .51 caliber anti-aircraft guns, but I didn’t realize they had the quads.” They had the quad 50s. Quad-51s. I’m sorry. Interviewer: “Yeah. Yeah, because the Americans had quad 50s.” Yeah. Interviewer: “But—Yeah, and then did they have heavier anti-aircraft guns, too?” They did, but I’m not sure they were around Ripcord. They had 37 mm’s and 40 mm’s, but I don’t remember them being around Ripcord with them. They could have been. I just don’t remember. Interviewer: “Yeah. Yeah, I think it was also like a 14.7 mm machine gun, so they had the equivalent of a .50-cal.” Yeah. Interviewer: “Yeah, so I guess that’s the—” A 51. Interviewer: “Yeah, that’s 51. Okay, so you’ve got those. All right. Yeah, and were there altitudes or levels where you could fly that was—Would you just get high enough they couldn’t hit you, or...? No. No, you could stay out of small arms fire. Fifteen hundred feet’s what they figured, but—So a 51 can reach out and get you. A 37, a 40. So yeah, I mean, you weren’t ever really out of the range of stuff. Interviewer: “All right. Now as they got toward the end, I mean, you had a Chinook from another unit actually crash on the base on the eighteenth of July. How did you hear about that, or what did you learn about it?” I was right in front of him. Interviewer: “Okay, so what did you do that day, or…?” We had shot an approach on Ripcord, and the pathfinder had told us—We always called a pathfinder. Get a situation report. Is the LZ hot, or—Of course, they say no whether it is or not because they want the stuff. So I went in, and I dropped my load off. And I took some 51 fire going in. And I came out the other side, and I heard the Pachyderm bird calling that he was coming into Ripcord. The pathfinder told him the same thing—that it was not hot—and I went up on my VHF—on their VHF frequency, and I told them, “I just left there, and I did take some �Mackey, Michael fire going in.” And he went on anyway. Well, we all would’ve done it anyway. It’s no big deal. (34:11) But he got shot down. So that’s how I knew about that one. Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay. All right, and then that—basically that crashed on top of the [?] bunker, and the whole 105 mm battery kind of went up.” That’s the day I flew twenty-seven straight hours. Interviewer: “Okay, so what were the—What were your other missions now? Once that happened, what were you doing?” Resupplying all the firebases around Ripcord to support them because they had no way to fire anymore, and they were just kind of a sitting duck. So all—I remember Gladiator and Henderson, I think, were two of the ones that we resupplied all night long. Interviewer: “Okay. Yeah. All right, and then, of course, a few days later they give up, and they decide to evacuate the firebase. So what do you recall about that?” Yeah. I’m getting short then. I don’t have much time left in country, and I’m really not supposed to be flying anymore because about the last thirty days we just would fly bus runs and easy missions that weren’t dangerous so that we could get home. And they were short of aircraft commanders, and I remember them telling me I was going to have to fly again. And I remember the briefing that evening and them telling us what we’re going to do. And it was—It was pretty scary. Interviewer: “So what happens to you?” We went in—I forget what number ship I was—and to pick up a 155 Howitzer and evacuate it. I was either three or five. Somewhere in the middle. There were like—I don’t want to say seventeen, eighteen. I don’t remember how many ships there were, but I was in the middle sort of. I went in there, and I remember—Just as I settled over the load, I remember three explosions right in front of me, and then the gun or the crew chief said they were three right behind us, which they’ve got you bracketed. And just as I picked the load up and pulled off, they said three came right down where we were. (36:06) And I smoked back then, and I think I smoked a pack of cigarettes in fifteen minutes. And that was my last official flight in Vietnam other than I might have flown a bus run to a hangar or something after that but nothing dangerous after that. Interviewer: “All right. Now when you got to Vietnam, was your father still there?” No, because it had worked out with a transition and everything. I was going over as he was coming back. And then as I was coming back, my brother was going over. Interviewer: “All right. Now you’re coming back at this point. How much time do you have left on your enlistment?” I have—I took a direct commission, so I have probably two years. �Mackey, Michael Interviewer: “Okay, so at what point did you get the direct commission?” I got it in Vietnam about mid-tour. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, so now you’re a commissioned officer. So you moved up to the next level.” Right. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and then when you come back, where do they send you next?” Fort Rucker, Alabama. Interviewer: “Okay, and what do you—Now you had mentioned getting armor training at some point.” Oh, yeah, I went through the armor basic course en route to Fort Rucker. Interviewer: “Okay, so why were they having you do that?” I was an armor—They gave me a commission in armor, which is tanks. So my thinking—I didn’t have to go to that. I requested it because I figured if I was going to stay in, I needed to have that because Vietnam was ending. They’re going to have a big reduction in force. I knew that. And I figured that if I wasn’t at least basic course qualified in armor, I would get rifted, which is, a reduction, of course, and removed from the service. So I did that and went to that first. Interviewer: “Okay, so what did you actually do during those two months?” (38:06) You learned to be a tanker, which was interesting, and it was very cold. This was—I don’t know what—Maybe it was September, October. Interviewer: “Was that at Fort Knox?” Yeah, Fort Knox, Kentucky, and it was—With the wind chill—And we played night defensive position and in tanks. Tanks didn’t have heaters, and it was like minus twelve degrees with the wind chill. And I’d just got back from Vietnam and 120 degrees or whatever it was. I about froze to death. But the tanks were fun. The tanks were a lot of fun. I was amazed with their accuracy. Interviewer: “Okay, and what kind of tanks were you in?” A M60. Interviewer: “Okay. Yeah, those ones were kind of too big for Vietnam.” �Mackey, Michael Yeah. Well, yeah, they were too big for Vietnam, and they were kind of too outdated for nowadays. But they were still fun. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, but did you do that just because you had to have a specialization as an army officer, or…?” Yes, it was pretty much that because the reason that they gave warrant officers direct commissions was because the people with the branches in the department of the army knew there was a reduction of force coming. And they wanted to keep their branch qualified people. So if they gave warrant officers a bunch of direct commissions, when the quota came down, they’d rift them. Interviewer: “All right, but while you train in armor, they don’t assign you to armor. They send you to Fort Rucker. You’re back with aviation. Okay, and what’s your first job at Fort Rucker?” First job at Fort Rucker is the S1 of the Student Aviation Battalion. Student Aviation Battalion is the battalion that trains all the student aviators. Warrant officers, candidates, and officers are all under Sixth Battalion. Interviewer: “Okay, and were you doing actual training or just administrative work?” (40:01) Administrative work. I was an admin. Pencil pusher. Interviewer: “All right, and did you like that job, or did you want to get out of it?” I liked it pretty good. Yeah, except we had to go to every graduation party, and it just got to be— Every week I was going to two or three parties. Interviewer: “Did you still get to fly at all?” Yeah. You still have to fly. You have to maintain—I think it was eighty hours a year to maintain your qualifications. Interviewer: “Okay, and how long did you do that?” I was probably doing that for a year. Little over a year. Interviewer: “Okay, and then did you get a new assignment after that?” Yeah, Army Community Services. I was the Army Emergency Relief officer. Interviewer: “What do they do?” �Mackey, Michael It’s like a loan or a grant company for GIs who are in financial trouble, and I make the determination whether they get the money or not. And back in that time frame it was pretty important because nobody got paid anything. It was just a struggle for enlisted people to—just to survive. And so—And we were kind of a direct liaison between Fort Rucker and the communities around there, which was also pretty important at that time. Interviewer: “Okay. Okay, so what groups or institutions in the community did you deal with?” I just dealt primarily with the military part of it. We had other sections that dealt with the community. But I actually didn’t have to wear a uniform. I wore a coat and tie to this job. And occasionally I had to do a briefing for incoming wives or something to tell them what was available on a post. Things like that. And we worked directly for the post commander. Two star general. Interviewer: “Okay, okay. All right. Now did you live on the base or off the base?” Off. Interviewer: “Okay, and did you have a family at this point, or were you still single?” Yeah, I had a wife and a little daughter. (42:01) Interviewer: “All right. Now somewhere along the line you had reenlisted? Or did that come along with becoming the officer? You just had to extend, or…?” No. No, what happens with the army back then was when you first take commission, you have a certain obligation that you promise to fulfill. But you can make an agreement with the army. It’s called a voluntary indefinite, which—I volunteer to stay as long as I want to, and you volunteer to keep me as long as you want to. So I can stay basically until they decide they don’t want me anymore or I don’t want to be there. So that’s what I was. Voluntary indefinite. Interviewer: “All right, and so how was it that you wound up leaving the army?” I got tired of it. They—I forget what year they changed to the—They call it the volunteer army. Interviewer: “About ‘73, ‘74.” Yeah, somewhere in the mid ‘70s. Somewhere around there. And they just started getting some really, really bad people. They were taking anybody. And then I also came down on orders to Germany. Took me out of aviation and put me in a tank company in Germany, which is—even for experienced armor officers—is a killing ground. I mean, they just chew you up, spit you out, and— Interviewer: “Why was that bad?” �Mackey, Michael Well, they put you in the field, and so many of those guys that were—They got relieved out there of their commands in armor. And plus, I didn’t want to be in—I wanted to fly. I didn’t want to ride around the tank in the cold. So I had to make a decision. I’d been in close to nine years, and I felt in my head if I stayed ten, I had to stay the other ten, which is maybe stupid. But I still thought that, so I just quit. Interviewer: “Okay, so the—You know, there’s a, you know, fair amount out there about sort of the decline in morale in parts of the military and stuff after Vietnam or at the end and sometimes problems with the all-volunteer army. You know, but sometimes, I mean, aviation units might at least still get better people than other places. But was it still a—But you were even seeing that in your area?” Yeah, even in aviation it was starting to get that way. (44:22) My last year in the army I was in a medevac company. Medevac detachment. And we had a Medical Service Corps major that liked to go out in the desert in El Paso and play army. And we had an active mission. We had MAST, which was Military Assistance to Field Unit Traffic—I think what’s they called it—where we supported the civilian community as well as military. So we would have a first up where you slept on the airfield, and if a mission came up, you had to go out on it. And we had a second up that would go in and fill in for the first up if he went up. So you’d have first up, second up, and then a day off basically. And this major liked to take us all out in the field for a week. And we’d go out and set a tent up, and about two o'clock in the morning, he’d wake us up and tell us to pack up. And we’re going to move and set up camp somewhere else. And we did that, and I just… Interviewer: “It got a little—Okay. Couple of other kind of general Vietnam questions. There’s a lot of stereotypes about what went on in Vietnam and so forth we kind of take for granted, and one of them has to do with drug use. Did you see any evidence of that while you were over there?” Very little. Aviation units—We didn’t—There was some marijuana smoking. I’m sure of that, but other than that, no, we didn’t really—We didn’t really see it. Interviewer: “Yeah, and another one has to do with race relations.” Saw that, saw that. Interviewer: “Okay, and how did that play out with what you saw?” (46:02) Well, we had a lot of—In 101st, we had a lot of fraggings. They had little, outdoor movie theaters back at the base camps where you’d—Guys could set up—watch a movie. There were people rolling hand grenades down there fragging people. I actually had—Officer of the guard— One night—It was either New Year’s Eve or Fourth of July or something, and the lieutenant that ran the perimeter told me—said, “Now at midnight I don’t want anybody shooting off star clusters or anything, and if they do, I want you to go take care of it.” Well, about midnight this Duster—40 mm track vehicle—started shooting off star clusters. So I went over there like I was told. And I was beating on the back of this thing, and he finally lowered the ramp. But smoke— �Mackey, Michael marijuana smoke—came out like crazy. And these two black guys came out and locked and loaded their M16s, and I said—I don’t remember—something to the effect of, “This is Lieutenant Mackey, and you need to not be firing them star clusters. And they said, “Lieutenant, you better find your ass away from here.” And that’s what I did. Too many officers died of friendly fire. I didn’t want to be one of them. Interviewer: “All right, but, I guess, for the most part, your—the aviation unit itself didn’t have that sort of issue.” No, no. No, we didn’t—We didn’t have—I don’t remember that we had too many black people, but any of them that we had were—There was no problem. We never had any kind of a— incidents. Interviewer: “Yeah. There were other guys who were sent to the rear from other places.” Yeah, the—Usually, the people on the perimeter were the dregs that other companies didn’t want. They’d just send them out there, so you’re dealing with bad people, both black and white. But it didn’t matter. Yeah. Interviewer: “Yeah. All right. Now once you leave the army, now what do you do?” (48:04) Let’s see. I opened an Indian jewelry company with my roommate who was a West Point graduate. We did that for a while and part-time I was working security for Concerts West. I ran security for them in El Paso for rock concerts. And then I got in the car business, and that’s where I stayed for many more years. Interviewer: “Yeah. How did you wind up in El Paso?” Fort Bliss, Texas is where I got out, and that’s El Paso, so… Interviewer: “Oh, okay, so after Fort Rucker, you’re in Fort Bliss.” Yeah, I went to—Well, I went to Korea. I didn’t—We didn’t get to that part yet. Interviewer: “Korea! Yes, tell me about Korea. You hadn’t mentioned Korea before.” Well, I went from Fort Rucker to Korea. And I liked Korea. Interviewer: “Okay, okay. What was you job there?” I was the operations officer for a Chinook company. Interviewer: “Okay, and where were they based?” In Camp Humphreys. �Mackey, Michael Interviewer: “Okay, which is near anything in Korea? Was it near the DMZ, or…?” Anjeong-ri. Or Osan’s close by. Pyongtaek. Interviewer: “Okay. How far were you from the DMZ?” Probably seventy miles, eighty miles. Interviewer: “Okay, so you’re someplace south of that.” Yeah, yeah, I’m not on DMZ. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, all right. Yeah, and so how are you spending your time there?” Badly. Interviewer: “Okay, so there wasn’t a whole lot of stress there at that point, or…?” No, there was no stress. I was just behaving badly. Interviewer: “All right. Okay. How long were you there?” A year. Interviewer: “Okay, so when was that?” ‘73 to seventy—No, ‘72 to ‘73. I’m sorry. Interviewer: “All right. Okay, so you tried on some different places at different points. In Germany and Korea and so forth and in Texas. Okay, so the last assignment was in El Paso. Yeah, and so that’s when you were doing all of that with the medevac—” Yeah, in El Paso. Yeah. Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay. All right, so the car business. All right, so as car dealer, seller, repairer…?” (50:12) Seller for several years. I did several different things in the car business. I was a used car manager, finance manager. I owned my own little car lot for a while. I was a wholesale manager for a large multi-dealership. Multi-franchise dealership. Interviewer: “Okay, and how do you wind up in South Carolina?” I left El Paso. I partied a lot in El Paso. And I don’t if that was from Vietnam or not, but I was having fun, I thought. There’s a bar I used to go in all the time that Bandidos bikers used to hang �Mackey, Michael out in, and I knew most of them. We were fine. But one of them I didn’t like, and he didn’t like me. And one night we—He had a lot too much to drink, and I had maybe too much to drink. And he came around threatening people at the bar, and I decided when he got to me, I was going to hit him with a long neck Bud. And I did. Well, the next day one of my other friends in the Bandidos told me I better get out of town because he planned to kill me. So I left. I mean—And it just so happened I had a friend who had a friend who was the ferrying aircraft for a living, and he was ferrying one to Myrtle Beach from El Paso. And I told him, “Well, I’ll fly co-pilot for you and help you fly and navigate.” And he said, “Fine. Come on.” And he dropped me off in Columbia, and that’s how I got back there. Interviewer: “Okay, okay. All right, so what year was that?” That was 1980. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and so what kind of career then did you have after that, or did you stay with cars, or…?” Yes, sadly. Interviewer: “All right, so how do you think they—You suggested a little bit. Do you think—I mean, have you been diagnosed with PTSD or anything like that?” Oh, yeah. Interviewer: “And when did you kind of…” Find that out? Interviewer: “Find that out. Yeah.” (52:01) I actually—I’d never—I didn’t know the VA could do anything for us because they never told us anything. That we could look for help. Well, one day I had a—I forget what—Back of my hand I had something just start popping open. It scared me. I thought it was skin cancer, and it turned out to be that. But it was not a bad one. And I had no insurance. I didn’t know what the hell I was going to do, so I figured I might as well go to the VA and see if they can help me. And I go out there, and I get a very nice, old doctor. And he told me all the things that they could do for me. He looked at that, and he set me up with the cancer people and set me up with a psychiatric evaluation or something where I went and I actually talked to a lieutenant colonel in the army who had been—Prior service in—Oh, he was a lieutenant colonel in the army with prior service in the Marine Corps as a machine gunner in Vietnam. So I was talking to him. Just—We were having a discussion, and he was asking me questions. Kind of like you asking me questions. And he said, “You know, you have PTSD.” And I said, “No, I don’t.” And he said, “Yeah, you do.” I said, “No, I don’t.” So they set me up with a shrink, and I went to this shrink for—VA shrink for probably ten years. And she finally just wrote a letter and said, “Yeah, you’re screwed up.” But I don’t know. I guess they based a lot of—I changed. I must have worked for thirty different people after I got out of the military. I just was everywhere. Somebody pissed me off, I quit. I �Mackey, Michael didn’t care if I was making a hundred grand a year, I’m not going to—If I think I’m right, I’m going to leave. Interviewer: “Yeah. All right. Now did any of the therapy or anything like that eventually, you know, help you get control of stuff or cope with things better, or…?” Maybe a little. I think talking to her helped a little bit, but—And just, I guess, maybe acknowledging the fact that maybe I did because I really didn’t believe I did. I mean, I just— Interviewer: “Well, there’s different kinds. I mean, there’s the reflex stuff where you respond to noises or you don’t want to—You always want to have your back to a wall and know where the door is. There’s those kinds of things. And then there’s just other things that are more a question of the moral injury or just the feelings about what you saw and went through and things like that. They work in a lot of different ways.” (54:17) Yeah. Yeah, I used to have bad nightmares. I mean—And it wasn’t—I feel guilty about having them because the guys that are actually here—They were on the ground here, and I just—I’m in awe of them. I mean, I’m just in total awe. I couldn’t have done what they did. No kind of way. Interviewer: “Hard to tell until you’re in it as far as I can tell.” Well, maybe that’s true, but man, they—I almost sometimes feel guilty about being here. Interviewer: “Well, I don’t think they’d agree with you.” That’s what they keep telling me. Interviewer: “You had a job to do, and so did they. And yours at times was really dangerous and really scary. You just got to sleep in better conditions than they did.” Right, and I can run away faster. Interviewer: “Yeah.” But yeah, I—I just—And coming to these has been very helpful. I go to Vietnam Helicopter Pilots Association reunions. It’s not the same as talking to these guys. I’d rather talk to these guys because I know what the helicopter pilots went through because I was there. But to talk to the guys who were down there, who were supporting, it’s much more interesting. Interviewer: “Yeah. All right, well, this actually—I think actually this is a good place probably to kind of close out, and I just want to say thank you for taking the time to talk to me today.” Great. I enjoyed it. (55:31) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_MackeyM2283V Title A name given to the resource Mackey, Michael (Interview transcript and video), 2018 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2018-11-03 Description An account of the resource Michael Mackey was born in Crawfordsville, Indiana in 1948. Mackey graduated high school in 1966 and began working for a sign company when he recieved his draft notice. Taking his father's advice, he visited an Army recruiter and agreed to a delayed entry into the Army's flight school. He attended Basic Training at Fort Polk, Louisiana, before reporting to Fort Wolters, Texas, for primary flight school and training as a Warrant Officer as well as Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah, Georgia, where he learned to fly Huey helicopters. Mackey was then deployed to Würzburg, Germany, before volunteering to be sent to Vietnam in 1969 where he was attached to Charlie Company, 159th Assault Support Helicopter Battalion, 101st Airborne. His unit participated in the siege on Firebase Ripcord before ending his tour in Vietnam and attending a Basic Armor course in Fort Knox, Kentucky. Afterwards, he became an S1 of the Student Aviation Battalion and then acquired a job as an Army Emergency Relief officer for Army Community Services. Mackey also saw service in Korea as an Operations Officer, Germany as a member of a tank company, and at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas, as part of a medevac company. After nine years in the service, Mackey was finally discharged from the Army. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Mackey, Michael A. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/d51fff9d26891ff91bb215d3ae533b73.mp4 b3d023ad7ff143bfdb9e08e0a0f0eaec https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/825bae5642acd6952dc9e4882d16b2c9.pdf bd53195b8b7fe23ec394618a6495ddcf PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Melchior Lux Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Sarah Schneider (0:30) We’re talking today with Melchior Lux of Warren Michigan. He goes by “Mike” so that’ll be what we’ll be calling him. The interviewer today is James Smither of the Grand Valley State University Veteran’s Project. Ok, uh Mike give us a little bit of background, um where and when were you born? (0:47) I was born in 1935 in Filipowa, that used to be part of Backi Gracac, it’s Serbia now. (1:00) Ok, Serbia. So what country was it part of when you were born? (1:04) It was…When I was born, it was probably Hungarian. The Hungarians, they move back and forth. (1:15) Ok, but in Serbia were you in Yugoslavia? (1:17) Yugoslavia, yeah, yeah. (1:19) Ok, what year were you born? (1:20) 1935. (1:22) Ok, uh so you were born there and tell me a little about your family background. (1:27) My family. Well my father had his own business. He…he was in the hemp business, my mother and so was also my brother. My brother worked for my father. (1:42) Ok, how old was your brother when you were born. (1:45) 10. �(1:47) Ok, so the Hemp business. So you made rope? (1:50) Hemp. They made from the raw material, they made it. They worked it so they can make, so they could spin ropes. So that’s uh … they had not machines, everything was done by hand. (2:10) Ok, and what language were you speaking as a kid? (2:11) German. (2:13) Ok, so describe the town that you grew up in a little bit. What was that like? (2:18) The town was just a, it was mostly farmers and people that worked for the farmers. There was no other industry. (2:30) Ok, and what ethnic group were they from? (2:33) They were German, all German. 100%, the whole town was 100% German. It was one of the, I don’t know if there were any other towns that were 100% German. Most the towns were, the majority were Germans. They had Hungarians and Serbs. Usually the Serbs used to work for the farmers. And that’s where a lot of heat came in after…in the Second World War. (3:09) Ok, now back up a little bit. Do you know how long the German population had been in that area? (3:16) I’d say about 200 years. (3:19) Ok, because there’s a period in time in the 18th century when the Austrians were pushing the Ottoman-Turkish Empire back. And then how did the German population get there, or why did they go? (3:30) Pardon me? �(3:31) Why did the Germans move there? (3:33) They got promised like parcels of rent if they go there, if they worked rent or cultivated. And that’s how that all started. (3:47) So the area that you’re in is, ethnically, you have all these different groups and all these different places? (3:53) You have different towns have different ethnic background. Like, we had a town that’s like two kilometers – I don’t know if it’s Southwest, East or North – they were mostly… those were people who came out of Czechoslovakia. They spoke a different language; they spoke more like Serbian. And then you had another town, they had people from Ukraine, from Russia. But, the majority in the area was mostly Germans or Serbs. (4:32) Ok, alright, so you’re born in 1935 um then in 1941 the Germans invade. (4:40) They came in, yeah. They didn’t invade, they just marched in. (4:44) Yeah, legally it’s still an invasion. (4:47) Yeah. Most of like our people walk with the Germans naturally because we were German. (4:55) Ok, now while you were, I mean I’m not sure how much you were aware of it I guess, while the government was Yugoslavia, the Yugoslavian government was dominated by the Serbs. How did the Yugoslavian government treat the Germans in the country? (5:10) I couldn’t really tell. I was too little. But, like I told you before, we were actually like the city hall was run by Hungary because Hungary and Germany they were allies at that time [after the Germans took over Yugoslavia], so our city hall was actually run by the Hungarian �government. Like the police, they were Hungarians. Everybody was scared of them. I remember that as a kid, and through later when I grew up and my folks talked about it. (5:49) Ok, now could the Hungarians speak German. (5:53) I… everyone thought the official language in the city hall was like Hungarian at that time. But, like the schools, was, we had German, but we had, it was mandatory that you take – I don’t know if it was one hour or two hours – we had to speak Hungarian, we learned Hungarian words. (6:18) Ok, so during that period, sort of during 1941, 42, 43, 44 while you were still living in that town what was your daily life like? (6:30) What the daily life? Kids were on their own because it was a poor area. All the grown-ups had to work. We went to school, after school we played, when it was time for dinner you went home because you know dinner was like at 5 or 6 o’clock, you had to be home. (6:59) Ok, now did you have enough food? (7:01) We had more food than we could uh, I told you there was like the breadbasket of Yugoslavia. That area where I come from. (7:14) Ok, because in sometimes the Germans might come and take a lot of the food away or the Hungarians might. (7:20) Not, not, not that time. That was all after the war was over. Then, well we had food, they put us in the concentration camps and that’s when everything stopped. (7:37) Ok, alright, now during the time then where you’re still living at home when the Germans came through, do you remember seeing any kind of Nazi things like Swastika flags? �(7:50) Oh, yeah everybody had Swastika flags on their house. That’s, I told you, there was, but there was mostly the rich people were against Hitler and the people, like my folks, the average guy was for Hitler. Because, you know, it was better when he was in power that time. (8:18) In what way was it better? (8:20) Well, I guess economically. We had no idea, that is the propaganda machine, we all liked Hitler as a kid. We all tried to join the Hitler Youth. You couldn’t join that until you were 10, but we couldn’t wait until we were 10. We just never made it, I never made it ‘til I was 10. (8:47) Ok, and why was the Hitler Youth attractive? (8:52) Well, I guess… (8:53) Like, the uniforms or (8:56) Naturally the uniforms. We all got wooden guns. You know, like a carbine, like a rifle. When the Americans used to fly down to Romania to bomb the oil fields, the whole sky was like silver. Us kids used to go in the ditch and shoot, pretend to shoot the planes down. (9:26) You saw yourselves as Germans? (9:29) Yeah. (9:30) And so, now you’re part of Germany, you’re allied with Germany so at that point as a kid that was sort of natural. (9:38) Right, exactly. That was the only language I ever spoke was German. (9:45) Ok, now in your area was there any kind of Partisan activity? �(9:52) Very little, but there was yeah. In fact we had like places we could only go so far because, you know, when you go out of town we know points that was the end because I told you like two kilometers away them people were for Tito, you know, and there were a lot of parties and activities they used to captures kids and sometimes burn like a swastika in their face or in their back. That happened. I didn’t see it, but, you know, we were told. (10:35) Alright, now if you think back in that period before your family had to move out are there other particular memories that stay with you? (10:50) Not really, because, like I said, we grew up, all the kids, you grew up independent. You know, you had basically, you know right from wrong, we were taught right from wrong. You didn’t do anything bad because, you know, that just didn’t happen. (11:14) Ok, did you have brothers and sisters who were close to your own age? (11:17) No. My brother is 10 years older. He was in the German army. My sister was 9 years older. She had to go to work. (11:29) So, you really were by yourself? (11:31) I was by… my father had his shop in the back, there was a building. So, if I did need somebody, I would go to him, which I didn’t need to really. We just grew up and you got up in the morning, you washed your face, put your own food on the table, ate, got dressed, and went to school. (11:57) Ok, alright. Now I guess at the end of 1944 things changed a little. (12:03) Changed, once the Germans were out in October 1944, the Partisans came into town. And then the rations started, like you got one box of matches for a month and the food was never �rationed because everyone had plenty food. And they took all the radios away, the bicycles, the jewelry. In the beginning it wasn’t so much, but after a month, like in the beginning of October they came in, by the end of October they used to go in houses and just take what they want. (12:58) Ok, now the Partisans were they Croatian? Were they Serbs? (13:04) The Partisans mostly were people like Serbs that used to work for the farmers and now they were not the helper, now they were they were the boss. So, that’s how it basically worked, but, and then they also, well, half the town retreated with the Germans that fled back to Germany. We were on the wagon already, but my sister didn’t want to go, she made a lot of fuss, so my mother pulled out. My father was in the German army, so was my brother. (13:48) Ok, at what point did your father have to join the German army? (13:52) The beginning of ’44. Everybody had to join if you wanted to go out and hunt. They, actually, they got a rifle and they got five…first they wore like guarding to town, because we had like five factories that worked hemp and they started burning. And you know, the Partisans used to come there and tried to light them up. So, they, first they wore like, uh, just like guards. (14:28) Yeah, like police or security guards? (14:30) Yeah and then in the middle of ’44, he had to join the German army just before they retreated. (14:40) Ok, so he retreated along with them, then? (14:43) Well he was in the army. He got us, actually, he got us a wagon so we could go. His commander gave him some, he probably lied to him, he gave him a wagon and told him, “Make sure that your kids and your wife flee.” And we were, it was just like the 49ers go out west. �That’s how they said like maybe 20 – 30 wagons and they all stayed together. They had one leader, I guess. (15:21) But in the end you didn’t go … (15:23) We didn’t go, so that’s … then it got bad and they used to uh, my mother and my sister, they used uh to go to work – everybody that was able to work – the Partisans would come and they had to do, I don’t know exactly, they just took them out of town. Like my mother was in … there was a German airfield where they had to go flatten it out because it got, they used a plough and they had to level the ground off again. And my sister, I don’t know where she had to work, they used to come home at night and right after Christmas they got a certain age group and they told them that they had to come and form at the city hall and then they told them to go home and bring fifteen days’ worth of food and clothes and then they took them and I don’t know where they went. They ended up in Russia, of course we didn’t know it at that time. My sister was like five years in Russia. (16:45) In Russia? (16:47) As a prisoner, yeah. There was like, Tito promised Russia for his work heads [camps?] he had to send workers. So that was the where there was a certain age group. Like my cousin she had two little babies, she had to leave them behind. (17:13) Did they target ethnic Germans? (17:16) That’s all there was, was Germans, yeah ethnic Germans. Matter of fact, if you had … There were some Germans who had a slavish [Slavic] name and they had it a little better, but that was only a few families. But, basically all the Germans in a certain age group, a certain percentage, they just took out and shipped them to Russia. �(17:50) Now, did you stay with your mother? (17:53) I stayed with my mother then, and then a few weeks later my mother had to go. They picked her up of course we didn’t know where she was, she just never came back home. She ended up in a hard labor camp and so I was sleeping by myself in the house and I saw the neighbors and I had my aunt she lived right next door to me. But, mostly I was by school friends their parents, ate there and then by night I had to go home and sleep by myself. That’s the scary part, that what I remember. (18:40) Now how long did that go on? (18:42) That went on for like two months. Then, on Good Friday ’45, I was in March. They came and started in one end of the town and went house to house, like three Partisans or two Partisans, and they came in if there was somebody in the house they could take whatever they want of course you couldn’t take that and you have five minutes to leave. They started on the North end and I lived on the South end. And, because there was a great big meadow, I could view houses from my house and we all, the whole town, got put in the meadow with whatever you took along. They kept us there all afternoon and then at night they put us two streets before the railroad station. They put I don’t know how many people in each house, whatever it took and then the following Saturday we were put in cattle wagons and we got shipped out to, it was a town we called it a concentration camp, it was a town. You had like a regular bedroom, you had like maybe ten people that are sleeping on the floor. They put straw in there and that’s how it was and then you had one … there was one house there was like a kitchen and that’s where you picked up your food and you got a coffee cup full of ground cole [cabbage] and water soup without salt, without grease. And I went there with my aunt and my aunt had two little babies so I basically as a ten year old, I actually was nine and a half, and I had to help her. �(21:28) I think before you had mentioned that you had an aunt with two babies that you said had to go away? (21:34) Pardon me? (21:35) Didn’t she … Did you have an aunt who was taken away along with your sister? Or was that a different person? (21:40) No, that was the two babies’ mother that got taken away. She was also in Russia, but she died. (21:49) Ok, so the babies are left with what is really their grandmother? (21:51) With their grandmother, yes. (21:53) That was your aunt? (21:55) That was my aunt, yeah. And when they took us in the concentration camp I just, well they took everybody you had no choice. (22:07) Was this camp still in Yugoslavia? (22:08) Yes. (22:12) Were there Partisans guarding you? (22:14) Yes, there were Partisans guarding the whole town. Each street they had soldiers; you know big guns. That was day and night. There was no wire, but we used to sneak out at night and go begging but that’s because the food was so bad. (22:38) So, when you went begging where would you go? �(22:40) We went to a city that was basically inhabited by Serbs and Hungarians and we’d sneak out at like twelve o’clock at night because we know when the guards change and so on. We’d walk, we’d go out of town and there were piles of straw from farmers and we’d crawl in their until it got daylight and then we’d walk like 15 km, or like 10 miles something like that it’s a little less than 10 miles. (23:22) Ok, and then when you would beg would you try to go to Hungarian families? (23:25) No, we’d go from house to house. The Hungarians were not too fond of the Germans but the Serbs, the Serbian people, were good. I mean not everyone gave you something, but most people gave you a little bit. (23:48) Now, did you have the sense that most of the Serbs didn’t like the Partisans either? (23:53) No, I wouldn’t know. I would not know because most of the Partisans came from … it just was there were guys that used to be workers for the farms, there were stories going around, they were really bad. (24:14) So, it’s just a very difficult time and a very confusing time. (24:20) But it was, we didn’t know. You know, as a kid you don’t know. Besides being hungry, we all were hungry that’s why you went begging. Especially for my aunt who helped the little kids. I mean, I called them little one was a year and a half the other was like three. So, every little bit helped but I just stuck along. (24:57) Now the Partisans, so they weren’t like taking roll every day? They weren’t counting all the people every day? (25:03) No, no, no. �(25:05) They just didn’t want you to leave? (25:06) Matter of fact when we used to go back a lot of times they intercepted us so once they had officers they had fifteen, twenty, intercepted. We used to go begging in groups of three or four. You know, you get out all alone you know and then you meet each other at a certain point, but when they used to intercept us, and then they made us sing Hitler songs. They all, most of them could speak some German probably and then they beat us up. That was their sport. (25:46) Ok, but they weren’t lining you up and shooting you or things like that? (25:49) No, no, no. (25:50) They just brought you back. (25:52) They did only occasionally there was like probably what we thought what old people maybe like twenty, twenty-five years old. When they caught them, they used to beat them up so bad. I remember we got … once they put us in a cellar in a farmhouse there were thirty-nine people in there and they put a hot kettle of oil in there. That was their thing. And they’d get fumes and they’d lock up the basement - we call it cellar basement is what you got here - then in the morning they let you out because once you get fresh air again, you almost fall over. Then the older people, they had look in the sun for us kids, we were supposed to look in the sun too but they didn’t beat us up, but they beat them. I’ve seen them when they beat people so bad. If you look in the sun and you close your eyes, you can’t close your eyes they were watching. That didn’t happen daily, that just happened at one experience I had. And a lot of times they intercepted us just before you get into town, they took you to the main building. They had a big cellar they’d lock us in sometimes for two, three days. You know, and then they’d come up once they figured we were in for long enough they’d let us out and we’d go out the front door and �back the back door because we knew where all the knapsacks were from when they took food away from other people and you’d steal it and run and run to church. There was the church across the street. You’d hide in there for a while and then when you’d think it was time … it was like a game. (28:12) Now, most of the time did you not get caught? (28:17) Most of the time, I didn’t get caught. (28:21) Now how long did you have to stay in that camp? (28:24) I was like, I was there from like March to the 22nd of December ’46. In the meantime, after about a year my mother escaped a hard labor camp and she came to our camp, but she was with me and she wasn’t with me. Somehow there was another camp within the camp where they had people who were able to work. I can see that out of her statement that, like I said, she worked in that camp, she had to go to work. (29:13) But would you ever get to see her or spend any time with her? (29:16) I’d see her like sometimes in the morning really quick and sometimes at night and then I don’t know where she went. (29:28) So, mostly you’re still living with your aunt at this point? (29:30) Yeah, I always lived with my aunt until my mother somehow there was maybe sixty to one hundred people, they had to pay to a guy to take you across the border. We went from, we escaped there and went to Hungary. And when we crossed the border there was a daily thing where they, the Partisans, opened up with the machine guns and would just shoot. There was �always a lot of dead people. We’d seen them, everyday they came with the wagons and you’d see the legs hanging. I used to live on the main street by the cemetery, close to the cemetery. (30:24) So, was your town close to the Hungarian border? (30:28) The camp was, yeah. Actually, what was our town was supposed to be the concentration camp. Originally, they brought people from other towns into our town. And then I don’t know who made the decision to put the concentration camp closer to the Hungarian border. That was our luck, because if they would’ve had it in our town and if we would’ve gotten the food that they had there, we all would have died. They had daily eighty, sixty people die from malnutrition. (31:15) So, your mother did she have to bribe, is she paying someone to smuggle? (31:21) She was paying, yeah. I don’t know where she got the money. They usually had jewelry, or whatever they had left. Whatever or however she got it, I don’t know. (31:34) Now, do you remember yourself getting out of the country? (31:39) Yeah. (31:39) What happened, what did you do it during the day or at night? (31:41) At night. Yeah, I know when we crossed the border. When they started shooting. We all got scared and I found my mother again and of course she would scream, and you’re scared. And then we went in Hungary, well we didn’t know where to go we just kept walking. And we found, they had isolated houses like between towns. Most of those were from farms. And there was light, and we went in there and through sheer luck there was a man that was actually from our town. He was the help. There was a cow and a calf. And he got us organized to go live with some �Hungarian people for a week or so, my mother helped out because the farmer’s wife was sick. And we got a little money and then eventually we started heading towards Germany. So, we hopped a train, got to the train. We had a little money and you run out you had to get off and kept walking, so you walked on to the next station. You basically walked close to the railroad tracks because you knew that they went north. (33:27) Now did you, Hungary at that point doesn’t have a border with Germany. Did you go into Austria? (33:33) Hungary had a border. Hungary had a border with Yugoslavia. Hungary had a border with Austria. Yeah, we walked basically all of Hungary. I mean, we hopped trains, we walked. Matter of fact when we crossed the border from Austria there was somehow, we got together with another group and we were almost on the border and the Hungarian police started shooting. No … I think it was the Hungarians, they started shouting for us to stop. They thought we were Russian soldiers. Hungary was occupied by the Russians too and the Russian soldiers used to go try to find women. I just know this from my mother, I couldn’t say that. And the Hungarians thought that we were Russian. So, when they started shooting, they had to take us back, so they took us back into town and they fed us really good and they treated us, the port police. And at four o’clock in the morning they ordered us to get ready and took us to the Austrian border. And so, it was the same thing. We walked basically through Austria, hopped trains, and you know you get kicked off and we ended up in Vienna. And there was like a little camp where people that was sort of like organized for people that were fleeing through. They’d get like a day or two break. And we were there and from there we went to go North, we went to Linz, that’s in Austria also and we were there like two weeks I think, and my mother got, that’s when my mother got interviewed. She gave like a statement of what happened to her. �(36:06) Ok, and so the document that you showed me before the interview, that was her testimony? [a translated version of this document is attached to this file] (36:10) Yes, that’s her testimony of what happened to her. (36:14) Was she applying for refugee status? (36:17) No. (36:18) That was just for being allowed into Germany? (36:21) We crossed a border every time, except when we got to see in Austria like when we got out of Vienna, that was a Russian zone. So, we walked in the Russian zone. In order to go in like Linz is a city in Austria that’s across the Danube, that was the American zone. My mother had a picture, like a group picture, and the Russians gave us a passport to get across, but the Americans didn’t want us so we … there was always like a group, like 10 – 20 people when I’m talking because that’s how we, nobody went individual. So, when we got across the, we walked across the Danube on the bridge. When we got there, on the American side, but they didn’t want to let us through. And there was a trick as a kid you had to cry and so they felt sorry for us, so they let my mother and myself go through, but the next group they didn’t let go through. They had to go back, so the Russians took them actually. Then people were two weeks earlier in Germany than we were. (37:52) We went to Linz, like I said, we stayed there a couple weeks. Then we went to Passau, that’s a city in Germany. I had an uncle that lived close to that area, we had a destination where we’d go. So, when we crossed the border from Austria into Germany, we laid there all night in the woods until it got daylight and then we’d cross the border. And when we went, it was a rainy day when we went. And the first guy we’d seen with a bicycle had a tarp over his head was a border police. We asked him for directions to the railroad station. When he found out �where we came from, he tried to put us back. There was, I cried again and he let us go and we found the railroad station and when we walked up the steps, my mother – there were people already from our hometown – she just happened to run into a person, she said “Your mother and father are in the main waiting room.” My grandmother and my father were going to go to the Red Cross in Passau to look for us. Nobody know from nobody where anybody is. That’s how I met my father after two, after he was about two years. My grandmother she fled, she retreated with the German army. We had no idea where she was and she, they all went to my uncle. And so then my brother when he got released from the army that’s how we found each other. (40:01) Now, but your sister was still off? (40:07) We had no idea where my sister was. We didn’t find that out until 1948. They were finally able to write, but we had no idea when she comes. Then at the end of 1949, I think, Russia agreed to let most of them go, but there was a lot of them that perished. (40:35) Now once you and your mother have made it to Passau and you now have met back with your father and your grandmother, what does your family do at that point? (40:45) Well, there is nothing… we had … well my father was just released from a Russian prison. He was a Russian prisoner. He was released and he stayed with my grandmother. And when we came, we had to look for someplace to live. So, the German government made everybody give up a room. So, we lived by a farmer. He gave us our bedroom, living room, and dining room. There was only one room, that’s how we slept was kitchen, bedroom, bathroom, I mean, whatever. (41:37) And did you work on the farm? Or did your father work there? �(41:41) No. My father couldn’t work no more after the war. There was actually no work and we stayed there, we got there in ’47 and we stayed there until ’49. And then there were so many people from different countries, from Czechoslovakia, from Poland. (42:11) Right, because a lot of ethnic Germans were kicked out of those countries. (42:14) So, there were so many down that were in Bulgaria and they gave us an option if we would move to the western part of Germany, they gave us a house, for nothing basically. But my sister brought, my sister met her husband in Russia. He came, so she brought her boyfriend along, but of course they got married, but they decided we’d take that offer. So, we went to the western part of Germany. And there was no work either, there was a poor country and a poorer area than we what we left. So, we were there for two years and then we left. (43:07) And what area was that? Or what town? (43:09) In the Eifel, by Bitburg. I don’t know if you’ve heard of it. Bitburg was in the news. And I know my brother he worked on that airport, the big building, a big airport. The U.S. did that. And so, we lived there and then there was, uh, my brother ended up in Augsburg, in between Munich and Augsburg. There was a, what they did, the German government, gave people like us the option to build houses for 1% interest with a 99-year mortgage. And that’s how my mother, my parents, my grandparents, of course my grandparents went with us too, to Bitburg, and everybody put their money together and they ended up building a house by Augsburg. My brother did that with his wife and his in-laws. Then we went from Bitburg to Augsburg. (44:32) Now, during this time when you’re in these different places in Germany did you go back to school? (44:39) I was done in school when I left Passau. �(44:43) Ok, so you went to school in Passau? (44:46) Yeah, and then … well I got out of school in ’48 and all I had to do was go to grade school, I mean it’s like a grade school. I had to go with the farmers. Then there was also in Passau the American army created a center for kids who couldn’t find apprenticeship, because to find apprenticeship you had to have connections. They created a center for kids that volunteered to come there if your education was as far as middle grade, so I was there they paid us the fee for the railroad. They gave us the free card. That was a good experience actually. (45:43) Alright, and did you get to know any of the Americans there? (45:48) No, it was just created by the American Army. It was like a free thing, that was the first time I’d seen a baseball bat and a glove. We didn’t know what to do with it, they tried to teach us but none of us had any interest. We played soccer. (46:10) And when you were in Bitburg did you work at all? (46:13) No. I did actually I worked for a farmer for nothing, just for the food. And he was in the woods at times and he used to track deers and wild boars. That’s the reason I worked for him, because he took me along. So, we used to track wild boars and deers. For the one week the American army would come and the next week the French and Austrians would come and they gave us like eight bucks a day. There was lots, a lot of money for me … yeah and that’s all. Then when I came back from Bitburg to Augsburg, we had each house had to put 1200 hours’ worth of labor into the … you had to either work in the house or in the hut. I was the guy who got appointed to that, because my brother was still in Bitburg and I came with my mother and stayed with my brother. So, I did the work for basically us and my brother got credit for like I used to �lay floors, wooden floors. I used to lay wooden floors, paint, stain, whatever there was. Like I said, you got credit. So, many hours you got actually compensated. (48:08) So, at this point are you kind of supporting your family? (48:12) Pardon me? (48:13) Are you supporting your family at this point? (48:16) Not … well my, in a way I did without realizing it. I had nothing better, I had no … and then like three months later I got an apprenticeship. Of course I was looking, we always were looking for, to find something. So, I had finally gotten an apprenticeship and then I worked. (48:40) And what kind of work? (48:43) I was like uh, in the steel trade. You know, it’s like tool die. I would work anything, over there you did anything and what we did, well you start at seven and you work ‘til five and then the workers go home and you have to clean the machines and sweep the floor. So, I used to leave the house at like six and come home six, seven at night every day with the bicycle. I was riding like every day like fifteen kilometers you go with the bicycle and there was not a ten-speed bike, it was just a regular bike. (49:33) Now as time is passing, could you begin to see the German economy doing better? Were there more jobs, or was it still pretty bad? (49:43) Actually, when I was there it was ok, but it wasn’t too good. And I … like I said I started an apprenticeship late. I started three years later than the average guy through moving and stuff. So, I really had no money. I was like eighteen, nineteen. I got like a dollar and a half each week �the first year and two dollars the second and three dollars the third. A week. And that’s it, but that was common. (50:26) Now, did the government provide any support for your family? (50:31) Yes, my father couldn’t work. He got just like, he got like 120 marks a month. Which was, well not enough to live but something. You had to … everybody, nobody got more, they all got the same. (50:53) Um, but did you complete the apprenticeship and get a job? (50:57) I did my apprenticeship and then I went to work for a company that did like caterpillars. They built buildings, they built bridges. It was all in the steel work, but when I graduated you couldn’t work as a journeyman until you had your journeymen’s card. You had to go through a test. I graduated in July and then the next test was not until October. And the place I worked, my hourly wage would up a mark and eight pennies. So, I started at a shop in this steel firm there for two mark and fifty cents, I started as a welder. So, I worked as a welder until I got my journeymen’s card and then I was a welder, mechanic, whatever. (52:04) Ok, now how is it then that you wound up coming to the United States? (53:08) Well that was a funny thing. I went, I had a cousin that was the Uncle we met in Passau, they moved to the US and my cousin was in the American, he came back as a GI, as a soldier and he came to visit us, came to visit his grandma. So, he said when I get done with my apprenticeship to come to US and well that didn’t appeal to me really. But I went to Munich to some party and I came home and I had a bit too much to drink and so the next day my mother got me out of bed and “I want to stay in bed.” She said. I went drinking and she came with a broom stick and got me out. So, instead of going to work, I drove, I hopped a train to go back to Munich �and I had to kill the day so I decided, I found the American Consulate so I went there and filled out some paper. And I wrote my cousin a letter that day if he would sponsor me, not with the intentions of coming and five months later, well a few months later they start doing background checks on me and people would ask me what happened. I said, “I don’t know.” And then I found out what that was and that started the yeah, I’m going to America. Well, when the time came I really didn’t want to go because I had friends there and we had a good time, but since I had a big mouth I had to. So, I came back, I mean I did go to America. (54:27) So, what year did you get to America? (54:30) In ’56. I couldn’t speak one work of English. And I started working for General Motors as a tool and die maker and I just never liked it. I couldn’t speak the language, so I decided to quit and my supervisor says “No, you don’t quit, you take a leave of absence.” Which I didn’t want to do but I finally agreed. So, after eight months I went back home. Well, then times were better in Germany, but I ran out of money, so I came back. Then, I got married and a year later, I told my wife if you marry me we’re going to move back to Germany so we went back to Germany in ’61 and things were not the same. Germany’s economy was in a boom, the people all had cars now, they all had televisions, nobody socialized no more. So, the whole system changed. In the beginning when nobody had a television, we all met in a beer garden. They had a place where you played cards and we always had a good time and that was all gone. (56:09) Now, was your wife American or German? (56:12) American, but she was of German descent. Her parents were German. (56:18) So, would you talk to each other in German most of the time? �(56:21) That we did when my oldest daughter, she was that time like a year and a half. So, my wife could speak that good, she spoke very good German. So, we spoke German, so the little one could speak German when we get there. So, when we came back from Germany a lot of the neighbor kids would laugh at that and she would come home and cry and the kids make fun of her. So, that’s when we decided to speak English. (56:57) Ok, and then did you wind up staying as a tool and die maker? (57:02) Yeah, I worked 36 years for General Motors. (57:07) Alright, well that makes for a really a very interesting story. Are there other things when you think about the time you were living in Europe, whether in Germany or before that, are there other things that stand out in your memory that you haven’t talked about yet? (57:23) Not really, I mean the hop from place to place was really not always exciting. (57:36) Alright, well you’ve had a lot of experiences that a lot of people would have never even thought would have happened. (57:42) Well, that’s a good thing. (57:44) Alright, well thank you very much for taking the time to share your story today. (57:48) Thank you. �Translation of affidavit given by Magdalena Lux when requesting permission to enter Germany with her son, Melchior Lux. Translated by Sarah Schneider Factual Report from Magdalena Lux Maiden name Haus, born on April 26th, 1907 in Backi Gracac, Mother of Melchior Lux, born September 8th, 1935 in Backi Gracac, Bresowatzer street 17, currently traveling through Linz. On the 21st of October in 1944 the first soldiers came to our town Backi Gracac. They did not bother us the first day. On the 26th of October in 1944 the Russians came to our town. I cannot say anything about them, because they only invaded our town and did not do anything to anyone. Afterwards the soldiers began to raid. At first, they took clothes, linen, jewelry, furniture, and gold. On November 1st, 1944 the Partisans announced that all locals who own radios, bicycles, and military items must be turned over to them. Those who did not comply were shot. After November 1st, 1944 those who were fit to work had to work every day in Odzaci at the city’s airfield in order to make it level. It was ploughed down during the evacuation of the Germans. On November 2nd, 1944 (All Souls’ Day) we did not go to work, instead we went to church. We were also not asked by the soldiers to go to work either. While we were in the church, the Russians came to the church to collect the workers who worked in Odzaci. The largest group of the workers were in the church, the Russians chose to surround the church and shoot. After that we left the church. On November 11th, 1944 Mrs. Eichinger, born Eichinger, born in 1905 was shot by the soldiers in front of the vicarage. It was announced before, that the previously mentioned person would be shot and that the citizens must attend the execution. According to the testimony of my relatives, who drove the woman who was shot to the cemetery, Mrs. Eichinger had survived. When they told this to the soldiers, he was slapped, beaten with the butt of the weapon and commanded to bury her. Before he laid her in the grave, he wanted to wrap her in a cloth, which the soldiers prevented him from doing. On November 25th it was announced, that all the men between sixteen and 60 years old needed to report to the municipal office. From these men 85 were locked in the church and 240 drove to Odzaci, from where we learned nothing more. The previous year in the fall, an airport in Odzaci began running, at which one found many human corpses. We assumed that these were the corpses from Backi Gracac. �After November 25th, 1944 we had to go to Sombor to the airport for work. We did not receive food or compensation for the work. On the 27th and 28th of December in 1944 two carriages left our town for Russia. From our town 320 girls and women and 80 men were sent to Russia through these carriages. So, women were sent to Russia and would be forcibly separated from their infants and the children had to leave home without regard of who would take them. In January 1945 every day we had to go to the field through the cold and snow in order to break corn, corn leaves to cut, and so on. A group of us had to go to the hemp factory for work. Here, children as young as seven and men as old as seventy would work. In the factory we would receive taskwork. One person had to produce one cubic meter of Hemp. We were always told that those who could not complete his work were sent to Siberia. In February 1945 all children between the ages of 13 and 17 and their mothers had to go to Sombor with brooms in order to sweep the streets. None of them returned. On March 11th, 1945 the soldiers announced that all that are fit for work had to report. When we, around 500 people, reported we traveled to Sombor. From this, I was assigned to Uprova centralnog logora with 16 women from Backi Gracac. There we had to organize the Russian and partisan soldiers’ bathrooms, rooms, and beds. We stayed here for three weeks. Our bedding here was a small space where we had to sleep on the floor, other than that we were allowed scattered straw. For food they gave us water soup in the morning. In the middle of the day and the evening we were given soup with 20 dkg of corn bread. On April 8th, 1945 we all had to line up. There was something around 1,000 people in the courtyard. There the soldiers shot around us and threatened us: those who did not hand over all of their money and jewelry would be shot. This lasted almost the entire day. Almost all of us were desperate from fear. The men, of whom they could find with no money, they beat so extensively, that skin from their head hung down. On April 10th, 1945 nearly 500 men had to go to Osijek in order to build the city railroad track. The men worked for 5 weeks. From the 500 men, only 150 men returned. Those who returned told how they had to endure inhumane treatment and were beaten so terribly and that’s how many of those who passed died. The rest of those who died were shot. Other statements from those who returned were also terrible. On May 5th, 1945 I arrived in Novi Sivac with 500 people. We had to walk the entire way, around 30 km. Once we arrived in Sivac, we had to travel again, around 20 km, to a federal estate. When we arrived, we would be given work and would work for 2 days in the fields. In the night we would sleep under the trees. There was no space available for us and the soldiers who accompanied us, we headed back to Sivac by foot. During these four days we did not receive anything to eat. �When we arrived in Sivac we were received by the camp commandor, a Jew, who went down every row and hit each person in the face with a riding whip. He then put us to work. In Sivac we had to clean and furnish houses for the Greeks. 5,000 Greeks were coming from Germany to Sivac. When the work was finished, we were to store the extra stock and the next day we would sell it to the farmers. We worked by the farmers on the fields. Everyday the camp commander would drive on the fields to see if we were actually working. He stayed wherever we worked and let us come to the car. We had to stand still in front of the car and he would hit us in the face with a riding whip. After he would say that was not all, because we Schwabiens did not deserve any better. Those who did not work diligently, would receive beatings and it was always like that for us. You all came to a camp where poisonous blows are. They must sting and bite you until you’re dead. And a group of you came to a camp where wild and hungry animals who tear and eat at you until you are all dead. For you, there is no mercy. At the end of May, the partisans forced captive Ustasas [collaborators] through the city. The captives must remain in front of the apartment of the camp commander. Then he came outside and shot three of the Ustasas dead, is what I saw with my eyes. After, the partisans forced the Ustasas towards Veprovac. Two Ustasas received the company of a Partisan. The colonists in Sivac, children and women chased the group, they beat them and threw stones at the Ustasas. In the camp in Sivac we were housed in a space with around 80 people. We had to sleep on the floor. We could not spread any straw and received no blankets. We had to share 3kg of beans or berries among 500 people daily and 1kg of flour for the preparation of the meal. We did not receive salt or fat. We did not receive any medical attention. We had to work on Sundays and holidays. We could not go to church because it was closed. The cemetery was destroyed. All crosses and monuments were knocked over and the wooden cross was burnt. In the camp we were full of vermin. We could not get water to wash and clean ourselves. On the 27th of July 1945 we arrived at a camp in Sentivan. There we had to go to the Hemp Factory to get work. By this work we were always forced and constantly beaten. I would once be beaten at work, only because I wanted to wipe my nose. Since I had diarrhea and was often on the side, I came away with only 7 sticks. From this I had two teeth knocked out and my nose was broken. My facial skin had burst. The meals were the same as they were in Sivac. There was also no medical treatment. The church was closed, the cemetery was destroyed like it was in Sivac. On October 12th, 1945 I arrived in camp Gakovo. In Gakovo we were housed in private housing. When we arrived, there were already camp inmates there. We would be housed in those spaces of the camp inmates who died. There were no more windows or doors. The rooms were full of vermin – what we were already used to from the other camps. In the morning there was ¼ l of water soup, at lunch tainted barely soup that one, despite their giant hunger, could not eat. Most of the camp inmates who ate the soup, died of the consequences. In the evening there was alternate pea – or bean soup. Often one found no beans or peas in the soup. The food would be prepared without salt or fat. The medical treatment was very poor. It was a camp inmate who �was appointed as the doctor, who was very comfortable and who was not even examined. In any case there were no drugs. We could not visit the church and the cemetery. Now and then on big holidays we tried stealthy ways to get into the church. The majority of the time we would be caught by Partisans, driven to the commander’s office and on the entire way beaten with the gunstock. At the commander’s office they beat us women with the bull’s pizzle on the naked bottom. After we would be locked in a basement for three days, where we received no food but only beatings. At Grakovo 100 parentless children came to the school Kanjiza and would be raised in communism. One day 80 young boys without parents came from away from here. Where they came from, we never learned. Three women from Filipovo – Theresia Hönisch, born Harer, year 1912; Anna Pertschi, born Gilich, year 1907, country women; Anna Hog, born Flatt, 48 years old – who all had young children, which before the hunger wailed, that they must die, they had decided, to go begging. On the way they would be caught by the Partisans and were battered in such a way, that Hönisch’s spleen would break, and she would die as a result of this. Pertschi would lose her kidney and in a day she is also dead. Hog dies also due to the beatings in the prison. After Gakovo came also a large number of soldiers that were returning from Russian confinement to the camp. They were so beaten every day, that many of them died. Many of them had their eyes knocked out from the beatings. After the beatings they would be kept in the cellar. But before they came to the cellar, they must stand on the stairs where they got a blow or a bump with a riffle so that they would fall headfirst down the stairs. Due to this, the majority of them would break ribs, legs, arms, etc. When one of them did not fall down the stairs as the Partisans meant, they must again come to the stairs and begin again. While the unfortunate drop down the stairs the Partisans laugh and it makes them jolly. Us women in camp Gakovo must go out in the fields and cut brushwood as well as corn stalks and pull the corn stubs out of the ground. Afterwards must we go back to the town – and in fact 4 women – and fetch a wagon. That we load up with brushwood or corn stalks and the corn stubs and then pull the full wagon home. By this opportunity made it the Partisans great joy to hit and abuse us. We had to pull the wagon there and back about 15 km. In Gakovo in January and February 1948 died 60 to 80 people, once even 120, daily. The people died due to scurvy, dysentery and Typhus, frostbite and mistreatment. The number of camp inmates in Gakovo is unknown to me. The dead were carried out of the houses onto the street. Every afternoon a manure wagon or wheelbarrow would drove there and collected the bodies. These were thrown like a piece of wood onto the wagon and were brought to a mass grave. In a mass grave there were 400 to 600 people. �While I was in Gakovo, 6 women jumped from torment and hunger into a fire and one hanged herself. The cellar was the housing that I was in, would often be used as a prison if the cellar of the Partisan housing was over filled. Next to the cellar was a boiler house. Once, the Partisans poured from a kettle boiling hot water on 37 caged men, women, and children in the cellar. From this scalded 5 women and 7 children so badly, that they died from this mistreatment. On December 20th, 1946 I had decided to go through with my child, what I indeed also succeeded. I went with only 100 people over the border of Hungary from where I came to Linz. I testify, that the above statement fully in accordance with the truth and I am always ready to repeat my statements. I testify the accuracy through my subsequent signature. Linz, February 25th, 1947. Magdalena Lux. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_LuxM2285V Title A name given to the resource Lux, Melchior (Interview transcript and video), 2016 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2016-05-28 Description An account of the resource Melchior Lux was born in 1935 in Filipowa, an ethnic German community in Yugoslavia, in 1935. When the German military invaded in 1941, Lux and the Germanic townspeople welcomed the incoming soldiers. His brother joined the German Army and, later, his father was forced into the service in early 1944. When the Germans evacuated in October of 1944, along with his brother and father, Serbian partisans took over, instating rations on supplies, but not food. Lux's mother was forced to undergo manual labor for the partisans and his sister was sent to Russia as a forced laborer. The partisans frequently tortured, beat, and abused their German prisoners and local townspeople. Lux remained imprisoned in the town until December of 1946 when his mother paid a guide to help them escape and flee to Hungary. In the Soviet Zone of Occupation, he acquired a passport and was eventually permitted into the American Zone, settling into Passau where his uncle lived. He worked as a welder until he earned his Journeyman's Card and filed paperwork for emigration to the United States, leaving Germany in 1956. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Lux, Melchior Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Other veterans & civilians--Personal narratives, Yugoslavian Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/86f4d580e4e830c5b8822253f8faa4a2.mp4 5784e6915f881da3b343c938b8534862 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/5a9ba0bc02c99fd8f7300cd838e14a83.pdf f53e68999406fdc6a6a72086035d7ba8 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Robert Layton Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Grace Balog Interviewer: We are talking today with Bob Layton of University Heights, Ohio. The interviewer is James Smither of the Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project. Okay Bob, start us off with some background on yourself and to begin with, where and when were you born? Veteran: I was born in Madison, Indiana on August 24th, 1946. Interviewer: Okay. Did you grow up there or did you move around? Veteran: Lived there until, I think, 12 years old. My father worked for a military—government facility there at Jefferson Proving Ground. He was laid off in 1957. We had to move to Ohio. He worked in Dayton, Ohio. I grew up in a small town west of Dayton, Ohio. Eaton, Ohio, a town of 5000 people. Interviewer: Okay. And, did you finish high school there? Veteran: Graduated high school in 1964, yes. Interviewer: Okay. And what did you do after you finished high school? Veteran: Well, my freshman year in fact, I went—freshman year of college, I spent at the University of Arizona, where I thought I was going to be an architect but they quickly disabused �me of that notion. And I didn’t see the sense in staying in Arizona, paying out of state tuition, so I transferred to Ohio University. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, and then was that a school that had a required ROTC program in it? Veteran: It did not. It did not. Interestingly, I think, the reason I ended up in ROTC was the University of Arizona, which did require ROTC and so, in the fall of…what? Fall of ’66, I heard at Ohio University—I was reading about this thing called Vietnam and I just had the sense that another 2 or 3 years, it might still be happening and if I was going to go in the service, I might as well go as an officer rather than wait to be drafted. So, had I gone to Ohio University as a freshman, I am guessing I would not have gone into ROTC. But the fact that I went to Arizona, they changed my life in that regard. (00:02:05) Interviewer: Okay. And now, what did ROTC training actually consist of in those days? Veteran: Oh crap—what do I remember…It was a lot of classroom work. Military histories and that kind of stuff. There was drill once a week. There was a 6 or 8-week sort of basic training between junior and senior years. And that was, you know, as much as I remember. Interviewer: Okay. Now, what did they do for the basic training? Did you actually go to the basic training base or did they just— Veteran: Yeah, I went to a place called Indiantown Gap, Pennsylvania, which I think was an old World War 2 camp, really. And I, it was—I don’t remember… later in life I commanded a basic training company for a while and in comparing the two, it was kind of basic training. But again, there was an emphasis there on leadership skills, so each day, a new cadet was the acting platoon leader or he was acting squad leader, something like that. So, we are moved in and out of �leadership positions and graded on those days when we were in leadership positions. And it was marksmanship…I guess the major thing I remember is the marksmanship training, the 82nd Airborne were the cadre for that. A lot of them had either served in Vietnam already or had been in the Caribbean, or the 82nd Airborne excursion down into… Interviewer: Dominican Republic. Veteran: Dominican Republic, yeah. So, you saw these crack troopers with their airborne wings and CIB above it. Good-looking troops. Interviewer: Okay. Was there much of an anti-war movement going on at Ohio U in those days? Veteran: Well, of course there was, yeah. Of course there was. Ohio U is a pretty liberal school. I don’t think it was beyond the average. I mean, but there was a, you know, strong anti-war movement and teach-ins and that sort of thing. And I remember Dean Rusk coming to speak on campus and a huge walk-out was staged. That sort of thing. (00:04:26) Interviewer: Okay. Now, how—did any of that kind of touch on you as an ROTC cadet? I mean, did people treat you differently? Or…were you…did you just feel a little bit outside of things? Veteran: I don’t think—I mean, within my circle of friends, no. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And my circle of friends includes some anti-war people. A friend of mine became a conscientious objector. But I—but that’s what a university is supposed to be: you have divergent views and divergent interests and people and you mix together and try to—try to coexist with �that. You know, if I get political, it’s what we have today: one seems to be on one side of the fence or the other, nothing in the middle. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: Yeah, I didn’t have—I didn’t have any trouble in that regard, being in the ROTC. Interviewer: Alright. Now, when did you graduate from college? Veteran: March, 1969. Interviewer: Okay. So, you were in school and then in 1968—would summer of ’68 be when you had your summer training then? Veteran: Actually, I had mine in ’67. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, but you’re in school in ’68 so what did you—what went on on your campus in ’68? Because you had various assassinations and all that kind of thing. Veteran: I think—the assassination of King and then the assassination of Kennedy had profound impact on the campus at Ohio University. I don’t recall classes being cancelled or anything but I know that there were, you know, there were just gatherings and activities and…I mean, and rightly so. Rightly so. I mean, that was also—I remember watching Johnson’s…Johnson’s address to the nation when he said I will not run again. I mean there was a lot of activity, a lot of political activity going on at that time. It was impossible to ignore it. Absolutely. (00:06:36) Interviewer: Alright. Okay, so now you get into ’69 and now you graduate and so now it’s time for you to report for duty. Veteran: Right. �Interviewer: So, what happens next? You graduate from school, now what? Veteran: I graduated and I had—I received a commission and orders at the same time. And two weeks later, I reported to Fort Benning, Georgia for the infantry officer’s basic course. Interviewer: Okay. And what does that consist of? Veteran: Well, first let me note, a little historical note, when I reported to Fort Benning on the appointed day, the guards at the gate told me that the post was closed for the day. You can come back tomorrow. I had assumed Vietnam had surrendered because they knew I was on the way, right? But it turned out, interestingly enough, my first day in the Army it was the official day of mourning for Dwight Eisenhower, who had died just a few days previously. So, in fact, literally my first day in the Army, I was sent home. But the next day, you know, the war continued. So, the infantry officer basic course, again a lot of leadership skills and a lot of tactics, a lot of map and compass land navigation, familiarization with a lot of different weapons systems, probably classes on such things as logistics, military law, stuff like that which is—I have long since forgotten. But it was—and it, and really, it was—for me it was the transition you know again, from a fairly liberal campus to suddenly now we are in the Army fulltime and there’s no doubt, you know, what’s ahead of me and so it was…There was a mind change going on there also, you know, getting—getting geared up for what was going to be going on. That was just what I was going through personally. Getting geared up for the fact we are in the Army and we are headed for Vietnam. (00:08:43) Interviewer: Okay. Is this where really sort of heavy-duty discipline sets in as opposed to ROTC? Or had you learned the way the Army did things already? �Veteran: Not totally. Not totally. There was…But you know, it was not, it was training but it was not training in the sense of—it was called infantry officer basic course but it was not basic in the training sense. We were officers so you know, we were treated with a certain amount of respect, they say the old OCS candidates didn’t have. We’d have classes in what was called Building 4, affectionately known as Bedroom 4. And during the breaks, the officers would go out and get a cup of coffee. And while we were getting our coffee, we’d see the OCS candidates braced against the wall—that was their break. So, you know, as an officer we—you know, we had—we didn’t have the discipline those guys went through. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: At all. Interviewer: Alright. So, how long did you spend in the basic course? Veteran: I think it was 9 weeks. Interviewer: Okay. And what did they do with you once you are through with that? Veteran: Well, when I was there, I volunteered for jump school and ranger training. So, I graduated from the basic course and I think I had a couple weeks of down time and then went to jump school which was 3 weeks. Interviewer: Was that at Fort Benning or…? (00:10:12) Veteran: At Fort Benning, yeah. Interviewer: Alright. Alright, now parachuting was kind of going out of vogue at that point. I mean, I guess you did—I guess rangers still did it. Unless— �Veteran: I think the Army always wanted it. Yes, it still was out of—certainly we did not have airborne units jumping in Vietnam. I think for the Army though, I don’t think it would ever go out of vogue because it’s sort of a confidence building thing and it sort of shows that you know, here’s a guy that’s a hard charger. And so, I think, I—my personal belief is that the Army will probably always have a parachute unit because they want that kind of personnel. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: Personality. And for me it was, it was—I loved it. It was fun. It really was. Interviewer: Alright. So, how did they work you up to jumping out of an airplane? Veteran: I think the…I think the—I think the cadre jump school were the best psychiatrists or psychologists in the world because they spent two weeks—first of all, there was two weeks of intense training but it was two weeks of very purposeful training. There was no harassment for the sake of harassment, because in the third week, you’re going to be 1,200 feet above the ground jumping out of an airplane. So, there was no screwing around with you just to do that. Everything was for a purpose. And if you’re not paying attention, they are on you right away because, you know, there’s no fooling around here. And they were great at just building your confidence and building your desire. I mean, by the time I got in the airplane to jump, literally I would have pushed my mother out of the way to get out the door. I wanted to jump and I think— I don’t think I was alone in that. They fire you up to go. And they are very good at it. And I enjoyed going. I enjoyed doing the—I did not find jump school to be that difficult physically. And I did enjoy jumping. Interviewer: Yep. Okay. So, that’s sort of like 3 weeks. And now ranger school comes after that but that’s a little bit different. (00:12:30) �Veteran: Ranger school is hell. Yeah, I had, again I had another couple of weeks off, whatever. And then I went through ranger class 70-2 in the year of 1970 which I think we started in September of ’69. Ranger training was the best thing I ever did. It wasn’t by any means fun but it was the best thing I ever did because of the training that I received while in ranger school. They—it is…It is fully geared for small unit combat leaders. And that’s all you do for 9 weeks. And there is harassment there and that’s purposeful. There’s harassment in the sense that when you are in the field training, you get one meal, one C ration a day. And your day goes anywhere from 18 to 19-20 hours. That will continue for 2-3 weeks sometimes. And the idea is really, it is just to—to put you under pressure, to see how you react under pressure. As they would say, they can’t shoot at you so the best thing they can do to find out what you’re made of is just not feed you or not let you sleep, see how you deal with tension, and how you deal with stress. Can you function? And it was constantly patrolling, constantly out in the field, map and compass. And so, you learn to navigate over land which is something that came in very handy in Vietnam. And you learn…You learn that you have a lot more in you than you would have ever thought. You know, at the point you think you want to quit, no you got another three days in you easily. You don’t know that, but they’ll get it out of you. And it was—it was absolutely the best training in the world. And the—frankly, I knew officers who did not go to ranger school and I never understood why they didn’t, because I would have—I would have felt…I did not think that the infantry officer basic course, while on paper I graduated from that, qualified me to lead a platoon in Vietnam. I didn’t think so. Okay? I felt that I needed everything I could get and I wanted that ranger training. (00:15:03) Interviewer: Okay. Now, what kind of terrain were you in for ranger training? �Veteran: Depended—well, there are three phases when I went through. Well, there was a phase at Fort Benning, Georgia. Camp Darby, where we did a lot of the preliminary—we did a lot of PT in Darby. There was a lot of—every morning was an obstacle course through—where we had a low crawl through freshly watered-down Georgia clay, which was just as slick as oil. And after that, when you got enough of the stuff on your hands, then you start doing those ladders. And you can’t hang onto them, right, and then you fall into the water and then you keep going. And we had a lot of—we had the I guess what we would call the orient training courses where you start out with a map and a compass and you have to find the stake in the woods 3000 meters that way and then there would be instructions that say go find this other thing. So, we had the nav— the land navigation courses. And you did that with your ranger buddy at night, which was an interesting…interesting course. And there were other classes at Camp Darby. We were pulled together one time administratively because of some order that was issued, some very high-level command that was supposed to go to all of the officers in the Army and so they even broke us out. I think it was the only break we had from ranger training where we actually, you know, not just hard charging ahead. And I remember…Well, I’ll tell you. My ranger school started—it started maybe 3 or 4 days after Armstrong landed on the moon, because I remember watching the moon landing in my motel room. And when we had this get together for this Army whatever sort of thing it was for all the officers, we got an update on what was going on with the guys going back to the moon or not to... But we—so, Camp Darby was really a lot of almost preliminary stuff. We went to Dahlonega, Georgia—northern Georgia for a lot of—we did mountaineering there, a lot of repelling and that sort of stuff. And a lot of patrol. Just patrol, patrol, patrol through northern Georgia. Up the hills, down the hills, along the ridgelines. And we completed that. You come back to Fort Benning, you get about an 8-hour break and then we �were down at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida for the jungle phase of ranger school. And again, more patrols. More patrols. We did a riverine assault, I think they called it, where we actually were loaded onto Navy landing craft and did an assault on the—to the beaches. And then one day, we were called together. And they started calling out names. And if your name was called, it turned out, you went over there, it turned out you didn’t pass. And those guys—those guys had just gone through the 9 weeks of hell and they didn’t have the grades to get the ranger tab. And they found out on the next to the last day they didn’t graduate from ranger school, which…just one of the toughest cuts you ever see in your life. And the rest of us then had one more day of ranger school and it was all what they called administrative. There was no patrolling for grades anymore. And so, we were—we were getting ready to go back out and I was a cigarette smoker at the time and I was out of smokes. And my ranger buddy—you go through ranger school with a ranger buddy and the two of you are supposed to be closer than husband and wife for that 9-week period. You each depend on the other to keep going. And I was out of cigarettes and I saw Joe throwing a couple packs of cigarettes in his rucksack. And I said, “Joe, I am out of cigarettes. Let me have a pack to get me through this.” And he said, “No, I need these.” And I said, “Joe, we only got one more day. What’s this all about?” He says, “They’re lying to us, Bob. They’re not going to let us out of here.” So, I think I finally got a couple of smokes from him. But I remember that: “They’re lying to us.” (00:19:56) Interviewer: Alright. Well, I take it in the end they were not lying to you? Veteran: No, we graduated the next day. They brought us in, we had a graduation ceremony out on some abandoned runway up at Eglin Air Force Base. And they came by with a safety pin and ranger tab and put it on your shoulder. And then we had…We had like this picnic. Barbeque, all that kind of stuff. Beer. And we spent the night at that, on that airstrip in those, you know, �Quonset huts. And I remember, I don’t know, it was maybe 3 or 4 in the afternoon or whatever. The sun is kind of starting to set. And I remember walking to this Quonset hut and you see the sun filtering through those windows and you see the dust floating. You know what I am talking about? And we are all so exhausted that literally you hit that bunk and you are asleep in no time. And I would see guys, and it was almost like walking into a morgue because guys had gone and you know, fallen asleep before I got there and they just however they hit, that’s how they lay. You know? It was an eerie feeling, you know? And 5 seconds later, I was one of them, you know? So, we spent the night then at Eglin and then the next day, they took us back to Fort Benning. We processed out but we had to spend a second night at Fort Benning. And one of the things we were told was that literally they wanted us to get two good nights of sleep before we left the post because they didn’t want us driving down the road and falling asleep and killing ourselves or someone. So, the second night at Fort Benning. I had some leave. I went home. And then I was assigned. My assignment was Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri. I went out there and go there I guess in October of 1969. And I was assigned as a training officer for a basic training company. And maybe three weeks after I was there, the company commander, who was a first lieutenant, his tour was up. He was out of the Army and they had no officers. And so, as the second lieutenant, I became the commanding officer of Echo company, 5th battalion through training brigade. And I was the smartest company commander on the post because when they said I was in command, I got the drill sergeants together and I said, “You guys know what you’re doing. You’ve been doing it for a long time. Keep doing it and I will stay out of your way.” And that made all the sense in the world to me and so that’s what I did for the next…I guess until the end of January 1970, when I had to—I left there and had my orders to Vietnam. (00:23:04) �Interviewer: Alright. And so now—now, do you get…Do they give you another leave? Or, because— Veteran: Yeah, I had 30 days leave. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Before going to Vietnam. Interviewer: And then when they sent you to Vietnam, how did they get you to Vietnam? Veteran: The Via Panama. I went to—I was assigned to the jungle operations school down in…was it Fort Howard, I think? In Panama. Which was kind of nice because first of all, Fort Leonard Wood in the winter was called Little Korea, and with reason. And I really think, I mean after ranger school, there was nothing that I really learned in jungle ops. But I think—I really think it might be just acclimation. But I got there and found maybe 10 or 12 guys that I had gone through jump school and ranger school with and so we kind of partied it up for 2 weeks in Panama and drank every night and got up the next morning and went through the training and then drank again every night. We weren’t the most serious students at the time, I must admit. But again, there was nothing new for us to learn down there and so…But it was good to see those guys again. (00:24:12) Interviewer: Right Veteran: So, I went there for 2 weeks. Then to Travis Air Base in San Francisco and then to Vietnam. Interviewer: Okay. And did they put you on a military aircraft or charter? Veteran: American Airlines. �Interviewer: Okay. Alright. Remember where you stopped on the way over? Veteran: Hawaii. Interviewer: Okay. And did you get off or…? Veteran: Go surfing? No. We got off—while they refueled us—we got off the plane. I think technically I could say I was—have been in Hawaii but I didn’t touch the ground I guess, just standing on the tarmac for some air while they refueled. Interviewer: Alright. Okay. Alright, and then where do you land in Vietnam? Veteran: Tan Son Nhut. Interviewer: Okay. And what’s you first impression of Vietnam when you get there? Veteran: My first impression was…The door opened and I saw these guys behind a wall. They are screaming and yelling because the bird I took in was the bird they were going to take out. And they were very, very happy to see their freedom bird. I think…And I think to me there was, again there was—getting off that plane, there was a reality that sets in because there’s no way out of this now, until the end of your tour. You know? And there’s no dodging what’s going to be coming next. So, there was a harsh—to me there was a harsh reality that okay, you’re here now. You know? And all the games are over. Interviewer: Okay. So, when did you actually arrive in Vietnam? (00:25:49) Veteran: It was the end of March. I am not sure of the exact of the day. It was the end of March, 1970. Interviewer: Alright. Now, did you have orders for a unit yet? Or were you going to go find them? �Veteran: No. No. I was—we were given…we were given 3 options or 3 choices. And then, of course this being the Army, none guaranteed. And I was somewhat of a mercenary at heart, I guess. My first choice was 173rd Airborne Brigade because they were still in jump status. And I figured if I am going to be there, at least get the extra money. My second choice was 101st Airborne Division. My third choice was the Cav. And I went to the 101st. (00:26:33) Interviewer: Alight. And how long did it take to sort that out? Veteran: I think just a day or two. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, now where was the 101st at that time? Veteran: North—I Corps. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I flew into Phu Bai. Interviewer: Did they still have a base back a Bien Hoa that you were allowed to go through or do you just go up to Phu Bai? Veteran: The 101st? No, I went straight to Phu Bai. Interviewer: Okay. And once you got there, did they give you any kind of orientation before putting you through? Veteran: Yeah, there was. I think it was 4 or 5 days, something like that. It was called Screaming Eagle Replacement Training—SERTs. Interviewer: Yeah. �Veteran: And that was…I really don’t remember a whole lot about the actual training we had there. I remember—I remember a conversation I had with a chopper pilot when I was going through SERTs. And I, again I, you know…He probably sensed that there was a second lieutenant that was shaky on his feet. This guy was coming back from his second tour. He was a Huey pilot. And I remember we had a conversation one day and it was a really good conversation. Very reassuring. He—because he told me, he said—he said, “I don’t think you can get yourself into a situation” he said, “As long as we have communication back and forth, I don’t think you can get yourself into a situation where we can’t work something out for you.” And I remember…That’s probably the major thing I remember from SERTs, is just…You know, you just sort of get a feeling of confidence again that you know, okay this is doable. You know, other people have done it. It was—it was just a very reassuring conversation I remember having with this guy. I don’t remember his name or anything but it was a good conversation. It helped me. (00:28:12) Interviewer: Okay. Alright, you go through that. Now, what unit are you assigned to? Veteran: Bravo Company 2nd Battalion 501st infantry. Interviewer: Alright. And where were they at the time you joined them? Veteran: They were maybe a mile south of a firebase called Ripcord. Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: A place we called Reup Hill because it was…it was a very active area. And a lot of people were re-enlisting. I shouldn’t say a lot. There were people who were re-enlisting to get out of the field because it was a very hot area. And there was a section there called Reup Hill that �had been a source of contention, let’s just say, once or twice between the U.S. and the North Vietnamese. Interviewer: Alright. And so, how do they get you out to the unit? Veteran: Chopper. Interviewer: Okay. Do you remember anything about that particular ride? Veteran: No. I remember I…I flew out with a light colonel, a lieutenant colonel. I am not—I don’t remember who it was. We went to a firebase. I don’t know if it was Ripcord or not. And I was there for just a few minutes and then there was another chopper that took me out. Out to where Bravo Company was. I landed, introduced myself to the company commander. My platoon sergeant came over with the squad leaders and met them. I remember one of my guys, one of the guys in my platoon saying that they had—well, they had been waiting and they had killed a trail watcher and he was over by the side of the LZ. And he had asked me if I wanted to go see him? And I remember just declining because I remember just thinking to myself, well there will probably be a few more of these in the future so I will just wait until it happens. But that’s, you know. So, I was on the ground. You know? (00:30:10) Interviewer: Alright. Now, were you—was the man you were replacing, was he still there? Or…? Veteran: No, he was now the company executive officer. Interviewer: Okay. And so, was he back in the base camp then? Veteran: He was back in Phu Bai, yep. Interviewer: Okay. �Veteran: I met him, in the course of things though, yes. Interviewer: Alright. And who was your company commander? Veteran: Full name Robert Stanton. Interviewer: Okay. And were you with him long or did he rotate out? Veteran: For about 3 months. 3 months, 4 months. Interviewer: Alright. And I guess, what kind of…What did you do? You joined your company, your platoon basically, what did you do or how did you approach them when you joined them? Veteran: Well, I joined the company. It was probably mid to late afternoon. We were getting ready to leave the LZ. My first conversations with the 3 squad leaders, I said—introduced myself to them, told them who I was. And I had had, when I was at Fort Leonard Wood, I’d had some bad experiences with NCOs. And so, I…And I told these guys that the only thing I expected of them really was be truthful with me. Because I had some bad experiences with NCOs before. They were lying to me and bad things happened. And I said, “You know, I am not here to make a career off your back or anything like that. But, you know, we just have to be truthful with one another and we will start everything from there.” That was my first relationship with those guys. Interviewer: Alright. And so now you head off the firebase. You go out and settle in for the night— Veteran: Oh, off the landing zone. Interviewer: Okay, so it’s an LZ not a firebase? Veteran: Yeah. �Interviewer: Okay. And then you make a night—make a night decision somewhere? (00:32:08) Veteran: We set up—we had, when I had landed it was—the company, the whole company was there. My platoon and the company CP, command post, moved off the landing zone in one direction. 2nd and 3rd platoons went another direction. We set up a night position and the commanding officer told me that I needed to send a squad back down the trail. We had moved on to set up a night ambush position. And the platoon sergeant told me that this duty rotated among the three squads and it was—the first squad was up for—I think it was the first squad. Frankly, I think it was. But the squad was up to go out. And they went out. We set up the—you know, the rest of us set up the DP. And the next morning, the squad was hit. And it was wiped out. 4 of them were killed outright and the rest were wounded. And that was my first morning in the field… (00:33:38) Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: …In Vietnam. Interviewer: Alright. Now, did you get the wounded men out alive? Or…? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: One of them, I didn’t know it at the time, one of them was a paraplegic. He came back to his home in Cincinnati, Ohio. My home is a suburb of Cleveland, Ohio. And he died in the mid ‘80s. And his family was able to…They got his—his death was attributed to Vietnam, to what he had suffered in Vietnam, so. And I think it was 1990 I opened the Cleveland paper and I �read this story about a guy from Cincinnati whose name had been added to the wall. And they talked about the fact that he had been with the 101st Airborne Division, you know, the squad that was ambushed in April 1970. And I thought he had to be one. He had to be, right? I didn’t know it—I didn’t know any of them. Interviewer: Right. (00:34:58) Veteran: I clipped that article and kept it and when I went—2003, I went to a reunion, my first reunion with Bravo company. And my platoon medic was there and I showed it to him. He said “Yeah, that was your guy.” That was us—one of ours. And you know, while I know that’s just the way the cookie crumbles, I guess, I wished to hell I had known he was there. I could have gone to see him, you know? You know I mean, I don’t know, maybe he would have said “Screw you, you got me all fired up, get out of my house.” Or maybe we…I don’t know. But I would have—I certainly would have gone down to see him. But yeah, so we got—we got the wounded out. Interviewer: So, how many men were in your platoon? Veteran: Each squad was probably about 5-6 people. I had 3 squads so after that first day, I never got that squad back. I went through—I went through several months in Vietnam as a platoon leader and basically leaded a reinforced squad…12, 14 men. That was—I never got that squad back. (00:36:16) Interviewer: So, you’re not taking very many replacements at that point? Veteran: We were not. We were not. I left the platoon in October and the last operation I went out on, somewhere the floodgates opened because my room—my last operation, my platoon size mostly doubled. And it’s—I mean, when you’re that small, you’re very, very quiet. You’re �very—you become a very cohesive unit. And suddenly, we are twice as big. And it sounded like a circus going through the jungles, as far as I was concerned. I couldn’t believe the noise. But yeah, we didn’t get any replacements all through the—from April through the end of September. Maybe one or two but you know, nothing—again, I never got that squad back. I only had two squads. Interviewer: Alright. Now, was the rest of the company in similar shape? Or do they have at least a little bit bigger platoons? Veteran: They have bigger platoons but they weren’t getting replacements that much either. Interviewer: Yeah. Alright. So, that’s sort of your welcome to life in the field at that point. So, that’s March, or thereabouts, 1970? Veteran: First of April. Interviewer: First of April, okay. And by this time, they are trying to establish—I mean Ripcord doesn’t get established on a regular basis for another week or so after that. And then there is a base there and your battalion is kind of in and out in that general area. So, now kind of take us through now the next couple of months. What’s going on? What are you seeing? Veteran: We went—I think we left the Ripcord area for a while and then came back. But when we were in Ripcord, it was just a constant skirmishing. Not on a daily basis, but two or three contacts a week where a trail watcher or someone, we would have contact with. Quick contact with. I lost…I lost eight guys total over there. The fifth guy was probably two weeks after that first squad was ambushed. We were moving along the trail and came on an LZ and it turns out there was a trail watcher on the other side there. This by example. We start moving across and he �opens up on us. You know, this was the sort of thing that would happen. And I lost a guy there. It was just pretty constant skirmishing. Nothing—no major pitched battles. But just constantly bumping heads with the NVA. All around that Ripcord area. I don’t think we were alone in that. I think a lot of units were having the same experiences. Because they were patrolling heavily too. They were, I think, they were trying to figure out how many of us were out there just as much as we were trying to figure out how many of them were out there. (00:39:54) Interviewer: Okay. Now, in these months, sort of kind of April/May/June, is your platoon normally by itself or are you more commonly— Veteran: For the most part, yes. We were. Yeah. I don’t think we had that many company-sized operations at that time. And again, when you’re—when you have 12 or 14 people, it makes you…You become a very cohesive unit. I wouldn’t—I wouldn’t recommend going to war with 12 or 14 people but if you do it, you quickly find out how tight you can be. (00:40:33) Interviewer: Now, how long did they keep you out in the field? Veteran: God, weeks. 3, 4, 5 weeks at a time. I remember once we didn’t get fresh uniforms. You know? But you just, you know, you…You know, you don’t go back and sleep at night, you don’t go back for a shower at night, you don’t get warm breakfast in the morning. It’s just—those operations were anywhere from 4 to 6 weeks. Interviewer: Okay. And what—did you have kind of the standard operating procedure if you are moving from one area to another? What do you do or not do? Veteran: Well, you start each day with a stand down. You know, early in the morning. And that can go for, you know, 20 minutes—whatever it takes. What you’re looking for: you want the first light to pass, so you don’t get hit at first light. So, you start with a stand down at first light. �You end the day with a stand down at last light. And in between those two things that you always do, there was no pattern because I didn’t want a pattern. Some days after first light, we’d eat. Some days after first light, we were moving. I don’t ever want to get caught in a routine because someone might pick up on my routine and do a swarm. Sometimes at night, you’re moving to an NDP at 6 o’clock at night and you eat and you stay there tonight. Other nights, you are moving— you’ll sit down and you’ll, you know, eat at 4, 5, 6 o’clock and maybe 10-15 minutes before last light, you move to another position before you find an NDP. You never want to set a pattern. So, when you asked me what went on—there is no pattern. You know? But you don’t…You just don’t want to…But you don’t want to stay in one place too long. Other than obviously at night, you’re going to stay there. But you’d hear about—I don’t know if it happened a lot with those platoons, but you would hear about officers who would call in fake positions. And they would stay in one spot because they thought that was safe. Well, I think that was the most dangerous thing in the world you could do. There was no way in hell I would have ever done that to my men. You know, you just—you always assume the worst. And that’s how you operate. (00:43:14) Interviewer: Okay. Would you move on trails or off them? Veteran: Both. But many times with ridge land, there’s only one way to go and that is the trail. You know? But there were times, actually, there were times when I would take my platoon off the ridge line, down along the side and move through an area. You know, sometimes you would. If you do that, you want to keep at least one guy or two on the top as long as the flank position. But yeah actually, there were times when I’d move on the side of the hill. Interviewer: And did you have rules about day and night noise discipline, light discipline, that kind of thing? �Veteran: Yeah. Yeah. Basically…I think the thing that—the noise that used to grate on me the most was a zipper liner closing. You know? Because it’s so foreign to the jungle. You know, you don’t want any noise that’s foreign to the jungle. I had guys that one time got a fucking radio. That’s what it was, a fucking—well, he didn’t have it long. I mean, you don’t play a radio out in the middle of the jungle in my platoon. You know? Who are you? You know? Yeah, so…Smoking at night, I will admit to you that we did some of that. You know, you’re not supposed to but we did some of that. But you’d, you know, get a little poncho over your head or something like that to light the cigarette or whatever. But you know, not too much of that. (00:44:39) Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: But every once in a while, you know, you just… Interviewer: Alright. And how did you get your food? Fresh water? That kind of thing. Veteran: Well, mostly helicopter supply. If we found streams, we obviously—we used them. But most of our water and obviously the food came in every 4 days on log birds. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. Veteran: And they were their own problem because that’s when you were exposed. Everyone in the unit knew where you were because that—the chopper was there. And now, so again you know, you got a 19-year old, 20-year old kid. I was the old guy; I was 24 years old. You got a 19-20-year old kid and he’s got a letter from home. What’s he going to do with it? He wants to read it. What do I want to do? I want to get his ass moving out of this visibility where everyone in the world knows where we are. And we will stop 10 minutes down the road, 15 minutes down the—whatever, read it then. You know? It’s a matter of trying to…It was controlled paranoia, I �think that’s what it is, okay? You just, you know you—you don’t relax. You don’t relax. And honestly you know, if I couldn’t see behind the tree, my assumption was always there’s something bad behind the tree. And that’s kind of what you do. (00:46:15) Interviewer: Alright. Now did you have kind of sort of the same core group of guys in for the next several months? Veteran: Yeah kind of, in a way. Interviewer: Or you’d maybe have one guy out and one guy in once in a while? Veteran: Get once? I am sorry? Interviewer: One guy out and one guy in? So, you’d stay about the same level in the beginning? Veteran: Yeah. Yeah, in terms of total numbers, yeah. Yeah, I had two squad leaders. You know, that—I did, my two squad leaders were there for quite a while. I had a platoon sergeant when I got there. He was what we called a shake and bake. Went through NCO school. Graduated at the top of his class. He was an E-6, and I think only the top 1-2%, whatever it is in NCO school, became an E-6. And he had actually been with the 5th Mech Division, which was north of us in I Corps and they had been sent home and he didn’t have enough time in, so he was sent to the 101st. So, he was my first platoon sergeant. And he was—he was an excellent platoon sergeant. And he left I guess in July. And then I got a—we called a hard stripe E-6, you know the kind that come through the ranks. So, I was very, very fortunate I had two excellent platoon sergeants. And that goes a long way to help run a platoon. �Interviewer: Alright. Now, your battalion gets involved, or engaged, in some of the stuff going on around Ripcord as things get more intense. So, I guess what kind of, just in general, we are kind of following your time in Vietnam. So, you’re doing patrolling in and out of the Ripcord area. Operations for a while. Ripcord itself really starts to heat up in July, when the actual base comes under siege and so forth. What is your battalion doing around that time? (00:48:03) Veteran: Well, we were in the Ripcord area. We were probably, if I can get my directions correct here, a little south of Ripcord, I guess. And we had some—we had some significant contacts there. I remember at one point, there was this huge mountain called Coc Muen. I am trying to remember my directions. I think it was south of Ripcord. Interviewer: Yeah, it was south and west. Veteran: South and west, yeah. I set up there. This was one time when we—we did stay in one spot for two days. I was attached with—I was attached to the recon platoon, the Italian recon platoon. And we were…We were up on Coc Muen for a couple of days. And we moved off and we had a trail watcher following us. And one of my guys spotted him because recon platoon…I think recon platoon was on the point. We were following them. But the decision was made that we would get—that we’d go back and get this trail watcher and kill him. And they sent their— the recon platoon had sent a sniper team back. And the guy was on a little—he was above us, a little ridgeline. And I went back with them. And he missed the kill. He hit the guy in the hip. And the problem was, you know again, I couldn’t see up there to know what was up there. Because this guy was up there. He’s moaning, he was hit. And I couldn’t get a chopper out to recon that area for us. And so, I don’t know is this guy by himself? Or does he have a squad up there that is now using him as bait? Because my instinct is well, go get the guy. You know, grab a medic, �let’s go. But I can’t risk this. And we stayed there for I don’t know how long, just listening to this man die. And that was a bitter, bitter feeling. Just unable to do anything for this guy. (00:51:02) Interviewer: Wasn’t staying there also kind of dangerous? I mean, there had been a gunshot. Or, was the sniper shot quiet? Veteran: Well, it could have been dangerous. I wasn’t going to walk away from it, I guess. It could have been but I just remember…So, we set up that night and my platoon would always put out booby traps, mechanical ambushes, where we just left. And we had a joint CP with the recon platoon leader and his CP and mine. And…And someone, somewhere along the way said he thought he saw more trail watchers on the way we come in. And I remember the sniper came into the CP and he wanted to go back out and try to get them this time. And this was getting toward dusk. And he wanted to go through my position, my part of the perimeter. And I, you know, of course I knew what was out there and I told him. I said, “Check with my people before you leave this perimeter because we will have booby traps out there.” And I think it went in one ear and out the other. And the next thing we heard were the claymores going off. And this sniper and his spotter I found where they had just blown right through the perimeter, right into the claymores. But by that time, you know, it was almost dark. The spotter was killed instantly. The sniper was badly, badly wounded. And by the time we got the med evac out there, it was dark. We brought in those strobe lights. And he died on the way in. The—our sniper. And I just…I mean, just a tough day. So, now we have made contact with the NVA and you know, the battles there, but other things happen, you know? And—I mean that movie that came out about a year or two ago about the sniper in Iraq and—there’s no way in hell I am going to go see that movie. You know, there just is no way in hell I am going to. I just—I am not going to deal with…I mean, right now �is maybe the 4th or 5th time I have talked to people about this thing. It’s just a horrendous day. You know? I mean, we let the guy up there die and then the guy who walks into a booby trap. Just miserable, miserable day. So, in addition to again, sort of bumping heads with the NVA around Ripcord, you know these other things are going on which are just difficult. (00:54:10) Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Now, I think your battalion got involved in a couple places around Ripcord, I think— Veteran: We did, yeah. We went, on the 14th of July, we went after—we went after Hill 1000. The 506th had tried to go up with I guess the…Get my map straight here. They tried to go up the west side of Hill 1000 a couple weeks earlier and almost got to the top. But they couldn’t stay there. We tried to go up the east side. We had gone back to resupply. This was after the incident with the sniper. We went back to Phu Bai for about a day, resupplied, came back out, again landed up on Coc Muen, then moved down. Moved down toward Hill 1000 and went after it the second day. We moved out with recon platoon on the point, Bravo company 2nd in the movement. And hit a bunker complex on Hill 1000. And it would be—I saw the NVA were going up with RPGs into the trees so you get that spreading effect of the shrapnel. And pretty much shoot up the recon platoon. There was a guy who, I didn’t know his name, I think I might have known it at one time, lost his hand in that explosion down in there. And it was amazing—in the middle of that fire fight, I think he was in shock. But I think he was also lucid enough to know that he couldn’t stay there because he was going to bleed to death. And I remember watching this guy: he got up and he walked out of that fire fight just as you’d walk to the grocery �store to buy a loaf of bread. And he was holding…And I mean, rounds are going everywhere. And he was—he was unscathed after losing his hand. He walked right out of the battle. Damndest thing I have ever saw in my life. But we pulled back. We got recon out of there. We pulled back, brought in artillery—I am sorry, brought in an air part with another—brought in the fast movement, the 105s. And I think just bombed the hell out of those bunkers. I remember literally the ground shaking. And the concussion was knocking branches off trees that were flopping down on us. One of my guys actually got cut in the face with tree particles flying around. And I—he was a good soldier. And he looked as white as those sheets. And I was trying to buck him up and I remember I just told him, I said, “Listen, I’ll put you in for a purple heart.” Better day, kind of trying to joke with him about it. So, the jets finished their work. And we went after the bunkers again, this time Bravo was the pointer. The 2nd platoon was leading us, my platoon was right behind Bravo. And they got about the same point recon did and once again, an RPG initiated the contact. And they got the same thing, you know. They got many guys wounded. A lot of people fired up there. And I took—I took my platoon down through to relieve them and we managed to get them out of there. And we withdrew. I think we had—I think we had over 20 guys wounded that day. But when I got back to the company position, I found that this guy that had been—that had hit with that tree bark and I told him I’d give him a purple heart, he was dead. He had apparently been helping evacuate some wounded guys onto med evacs and apparently a stray round came out of nowhere and went right through him. And that was the last guy I lost. He was the 8th that I lost. And we set up that night and I thought, well, we will go again tomorrow. I really thought we would go again tomorrow. And I figured well okay, let’s see…I think I know who is going to be on point tomorrow, right? And, we didn’t. We withdrew from Hill 1000. And I—as I think about Ripcord and I think about that battle, I feel—then again, �I am not a great military tactician by any stretch. But I think that really…That was a foreshadowing of leaving Ripcord. I think…I think Hill 1000 was…I think we had to have Hill 1000 if we wanted to keep Ripcord. It was just—the NVA were just using it as a launching pad for a lot of stuff onto Ripcord. And it was higher than Ripcord. And I think—I think in retrospect, that was the foreshadowing of the withdrawment. This was the—this was the 14th and we withdrew I think it was the 23rd of July. And yeah, we withdrew from that battle. (01:00:53) Interviewer: But did you come back to the Ripcord area before the evacuation? Or were you now just in other places? Veteran: We went south and constructed a firebase called Brick. And really, that was…That was sort of the—Ripcord was the last real significant contacts I had in Vietnam. The next several months, every once in a while, something would happen but it was not heavy-duty. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, so we have gotten to the point in your story where you talked about having left the Ripcord area and you no longer had a lot of intense activity in your remaining months in the field. But you had some larger comment about what you saw going on there? Veteran: Yeah. I think…This was an army that was withdrawing. The only war left in Vietnam was I Corps. I am pretty sure of that. And the only unit fighting in I Corps was 101st airborne division. And these guys knew it. I mean you know, by 19-20 years old, maybe they weren’t the most sophisticated people in the world but they knew that everyone else was leaving and they were left to fight a war that the country was withdrawing from. And it was not easy duty for them. It was not…It was not—it was not a time filled with glory and all of those things. And as I think back about it, I think one of the things that really impresses me is, and what I think is �overlooked a lot, is the courage these guys had. You know, it’s easy to talk about the courage of the Army of ’65, ’66, ’67. But by 1970, we tend to want to start thinking about the Army in Vietnam with drug problems and race issues and lack of discipline and certainly that was there, to one extent or another. It was not there in the field at Ripcord. It was not there when we went into battle and there were guys who didn’t want to go but their buddies going and they’re going to go with them. And there was courage. There was a courage that these guys exhibited that I think is undervalued. And it needs to be acknowledged. And so, my point there is, you know this was not—these guys did what they had to do and they tried to take care of themselves and each other as best they could. And they—and it was a crappy mission. I think if Ripcord had been 1968, the 101st would have piled on every asset they had and would have borrowed assets if they had needed them and we would have established Ripcord and did what we had to do. But it was not 1968, it was 1970. The political situation was different. But the courage of these men was still there. (01:04:23) Interviewer: Yeah. One of the stereotypes is—and it’s something that some people in higher levels of the command certainly thought that in 1971 or so, was that—and if the Army couldn’t fight or was in crisis or whatever. But you still see here at this point, and this is consistent with what I’ve gotten from an awful lot of people who were there, was that the soldiers in the field would still fight and they could still be effective and part of it was because they had to be to get out of there alive. But that could still function and that most guys were still actually doing their jobs. Veteran: Yes. Yes. Interviewer: Now, you have—now with officers, it’s a standard thing to rotate them in different assignments. So, what happened to you and your assignment? I mean, did �you…Now, you have mentioned something about when you were supposed to rotate out, when you really did rotate out. Talk a little bit about that and how that worked. Veteran: Yeah. Well, after Ripcord, after July, I had been there 4 months and 4 months seemed to be the standard for an officer to serve in the field. And I recall we were—we were in Phu Bai on a stand down and I was told…And jeez, I don’t know who could have—Sometime in the end of July, my company commander Captain Stanton left and a Captain named Joe Swazzle— Schwazzle or Swazzle? Replaced him. And I was—someone came to me and said that they were looking for a rear job for me because I had completed my 4 months in the field. And again, there was 4 months with no replacements coming through and I simply remember asking, “Who takes the platoon?” Because if nothing else, I’d like to meet my replacement and sort of orient him or whatever. And I was told they had no officers, that they would simply assign the task to the platoon sergeant. He was certainly a very, very capable man but he was not being paid to be a platoon leader. He was a platoon sergeant. Actually, he wasn’t even a platoon sergeant, he was an E-6. Technically, he should have been a squad leader but the Vietnam of the day, he was a platoon sergeant. And so, I simply, I said “You know, when you have a replacement, I will leave the field. Otherwise, I will stay in my platoon.” And as it turns out, one of the things you, I—the reason, or at least I did early on for me on my tours, you get there and they ask well, when do you want to go on R and R and where you want to go and you get that paperwork out of the way. And my R and R was scheduled for after 7 months and as it turns out, that’s when they got a replacement platoon leader for me. So, I had the platoon for 7 months. Went on R and R to Australia. Came back and found that I had been assigned to the battalion staff as the S-2, the intelligence officer. And…And that was a strange job in a way. I remember at first, I didn’t—I just, I couldn’t…I don’t think we generated that. I wasn’t interrogating prisoners or any of that �kind of stuff. It was just—my job…I don’t know. I don’t know that I really did it particularly well because I didn’t understand what they wanted of me. And no one was very forthcoming with what I should have been doing. And I have, you know, when officers would come—the brigade commander or the assistant division commander or division commander would come in, and one of them—at least one of them showed up every day for briefing because the world was on forward firebase. And so, we’d have a briefing for them and it would always start with the S-2 in terms of talking about any activity that happened in the last day or two, contacts or this that, what are the disposition of the units. And then the operations officer, the S-3, would talk about what are plans for the future and then the battalion commander would sort of wrap things up and whatever discussion ensued took place. And there was a young secretary and I was always quietly off to the side. But I will say that I have—while I think I did my job as a platoon leader as best I could, I mean there are things I certainly would change, but I just—I never felt that I did a great job as the S-2 because I never fully understood what I should have been doing. And I will say there have been times when I look back on that and I wonder about it. You know, that’s an area where I really should have tried to improve myself but I am not sure what I would have done. (01:09:29) Interviewer: You weren’t getting guidance from the battalion commander or XO or anybody else? Veteran: No. No, or even brigade S-2. You know? And I tried to reach out to him a couple times. I mean, no one said you are doing anything wrong. You know, no one said, you know, “Jeez, you’re the crappiest S-2 I’ve ever seen in my life.” But it just seemed to me that, you know, I should be—there should be more that I was doing. I don’t know. I did in that period…Probably in March of ’71…No later than March ’70. We had a combined operation with the 1st ARVN �division. And I was assigned to the 1st ARVN as a liaison officer with the battalion, which I found an interesting couple weeks in the field with the ARVN. I mean, they operate in totally different ways than we did. You know, sit out and build fires at night and each officer had his own little bat boy who would hang—strong his hammock for him and everything. It was going to war the riviera style, if you will. So, I did do that but the…Yeah, the stint as the…As the battalion intelligence officer—I just never really felt that I got a good handle on that. (01:11:00) Interviewer: Okay. I want to jump back for a minute to the R and R in Australia. What was it like to go to Australia after having been in Vietnam all that time? Veteran: I had a meltdown. I learned…Which, years later in my life, I heard the term “survivor’s guilt” and immediately I understood it. I mean you know, I got to sit in the—you know, the first couple days I did what any G.I. does on R and R, right? You know, find some booze, find a woman. And about the 3rd day, I just had this horrendous, horrendous guilt feeling crashing down on me because here I was in a bar, drinking and having fun and you know, with women, and my platoon was back there in the monsoon now. You know, it was October, it was monsoon month. And it’s cold and it’s wet and it’s, you know…And I literally—literally drank the last half of my R and R. And that’s all I did. Either in my room or there was a bar on the ground floor of the hotel and I would just go there and…because I…And I knew, you know, I knew I was going to go back to Vietnam and get killed because I had abandoned my platoon, you know? Deserters get killed there. And I must have heard…I must have heard on the jukebox in that bar “The Boxer.” Simon and Garfunkel. There was someone in that bar that played that song about 1000 times a day. I mean I just—I remember drinking, being drunk as hell, and hearing “The Boxer.” And that was my last couple days of my R and R. I just—I couldn’t deal with, you know, I just really…So, my R and R was not…a great deal. (01:13:13) �Interviewer: Did you have any impression of the Australians or how they treated the Americans there? Veteran: The 2—my first couple of days there, yeah, they were great to us. Which I will say really surprised me because I thought well, God by this time, they are going to be as sick of G.I.s as any Army town around the United States, you know? But they were very, very friendly as far as I can remember. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: But I just couldn’t handle it. Interviewer: So, was it almost a relief to go back to Vietnam at that point? Veteran: Except I really thought I was going to get killed. So, I am not sure if it was a relief or not. I don’t know what it was. I just know that it was a horrible time. Interviewer: Alright. Now, were you still there when the South Vietnamese conducted their operation in the Laos? Veteran: The Lam Son 719. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: That was—I remember I was leaving as that was starting. (01:14:09) Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Bravo company had a big part in that. It was the 2501 rather that had a big part in that, because apparently, we provided a lot of the security up to the border. And I would think…I �would think that the Bravo S-2 probably had a lot to do at that point, you know? But it wasn’t me. You know? Interviewer: Alright, so you’re on your way out? Veteran: I was on my way out, yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Now, what—as you…Now, how did they get you out of Vietnam? Or, what is the process? Your year runs out, do you just wait for orders? Or…? Veteran: Well, actually what happened was yeah, I—they finally—I was sent back to Phu Bai to process out. And everyone knows his deros date—the day I am going to leave. And I didn’t get any orders. And I wouldn’t know the day and then no orders. And finally, I went to the battalion and someone says, “You’re not supposed to leave for 2 weeks” and “because you got here March of…” whatever, you know. And I said, “Yeah, but I went to Panama and that counts as 2 weeks overseas duty.” “Oh really? Don’t worry sir, we will have orders for you this afternoon.” And they did. You know, they did come up. But if I hadn’t walked in there, they didn’t realize that I had 2 weeks in Panama first and that was supposed to count as part of the overseas duty. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: So yeah, so that’s—you know, I sort of got myself out of it, in a sense. (01:15:33) Interviewer: Okay. Alright. Now— Veteran: Went to Da Nang and flew to Fort Washing—Fort Lewis, Washington. Interviewer: Okay. Now, did you still have time left to serve on your enlistment or were you done? Veteran: I was done. �Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: ROTC was 2 years active duty commitment and… Interviewer: I guess you had trained long enough before you got to Vietnam at that… Veteran: Yeah, that and the time at Fort Leonard Wood. My active duty was—on my DD214, it was a year and 11 months and like 15 days or something. I got 2 weeks of vacation pay for…so I got that. Interviewer: Alright. Now, did the Army make any effort to encourage you to stay in? (01:16:11) Veteran: Yeah. They—I was informally…Officers in Vietnam—my, probably the one that impressed me the most was my company first sergeant, wanted me to stay in. And I think any time an NCO says to a lieutenant…You know, you give that consideration. I mean, you know, because I respected the hell out of him and the fact that he thought I should stay in the Army meant a lot to me. My last company commander wanted me to. And there were a couple other guys. I had a long talk with an officer—well, a long talk? I had a talk with him. He was a West Pointer. I can’t remember his name. he had been with a mech unit somewhere in the south and they went home and he came up to 101st. And I remember I had a discussion with him one time. Because he was in for the long haul. He wanted a career in the Army and he was the guy that thought I should stay in. And I—and I said, “Well, why do this?” Because the Army was a mess then. I mean it was, you know, it was getting to be a mess. And he—and I was so impressed with his answer. He told me, he said, “Look,” he said “that’s—anyone can be an officer when the going is easy.” He said, “Now is when the Army needs us.” You know? And I was impressed with his, you know, he was going to stay in. You know? I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t, it wasn’t in �me but I admired him because he was, you know. He knew that it was going to be tough. He knew that it was a bad Army at that time but he also knew that the bad Army needed good officers and he was going to—he was going to ride it out. And I admired that in him but I—you know, it just wasn’t in me to be a career officer. (01:18:06) Interviewer: So, what had you seen at that point that led you to think it was a bad Army? Veteran: Well, I—because of the stuff that was going on in the rear, with the drug issues and that kind of stuff, the racial issues. I wasn’t in the rear that much, but I knew of it. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: And I knew those problems were there. And it was also an Army that was—that you know, that the country didn’t give a damn about at that point either. There was—I don’t think there was anything easy about the Army in the ‘70s. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: You know? And…But, you know, this guy was—he was sticking it out. I think, you know, people like that deserve a lot of credit. Interviewer: Alright, so you come back now. What do you do once you get out? Veteran: Initially, I had another…I had another one of those…I was released in Fort Lewis. And you know, there must have been a group of 20 or so of us. And we were taken to a bus station on post and there was a ticket booth to Seattle/Tacoma international and there was a ticket booth to the city of Seattle. And there was this mad dash for the airport and I remember standing there and looking at the two of them and I realized I couldn’t go home. I wasn’t ready to. You know? I needed to process a lot of this stuff, so I went to Seattle. I got a room there at a YMCA. It had a �bed and a lavatory and a layout 2-4 to a room. And all the showers and the toilets down the hall. And I stayed in Seattle for about a week. And I just walked the streets. Get up in the morning, go out and get some coffee, read the newspaper, walks. Just to get it back. You know? I mean you think about it: they—you know, even the guy who’s drafted and gets some basic AIT, he’s trained to go. You get nothing to come back. You know? And I think that, you know. And that’s one of the feelings I look back on, in all my military time, I think that is one of the failings of the Army. You know, I was in an airplane for 12 hours or so. We didn’t need 12 hours of orientation to come back but it could have been something, you know? I knew if I went home, I wouldn’t be able to handle it right away. You know, my mom would be, “Oh, good to see you” and letting the family know and all that. Not that I didn’t want to see them, I just wasn’t ready. Not yet. I remember walking to a little mom and pop place one night, you know the linoleum floor type place, for dinner. And I was sitting at the table and there’s a couple over there and they get up to leave and I remember the guy reaches in his pocket and puts—leaves change on the table and walks away. And I am not kidding you one second, it took me 2 or 3 minutes to remember tip. I couldn’t remember. Why the hell is this guy walking away leaving money? You know I—and finally, I got it back. So, I…You know, I—that was nothing that was planned. It’s just when I hit that spot, you know, this way or that way, I just—something in my gut just said you don’t go home right now. You know, you got to sort this out. So, then I went home. And I was still, you know, trying to adjust to the world, I guess. I was in the states for 3 months and I packed a rucksack and went to Europe. And I spent 7 months hitchhiking through Europe. Just, again, processing. Processing, processing. Came back from Europe. One of the things that had happened back in the late ‘60s at Ohio University, I had a degree in Business Administration but I knew I really didn’t want to—I wasn’t cut out for the corporate world. And I think a lot of that �social upheaval at that time in the ‘60s…I got really interested in that: what’s going on there, how does you get—how does the nation deal with it, what office shoulders it. It led me to a career in urban planning and so I came back—after I came back from Europe, I went to the University of Akron and got a degree in Urban Planning. And went to work for a 5-county regional transportation planning organization in the Cleveland area. And my—I think the thing that mostly interested me in business I know, in the business curriculum, was economics. The thing that interested me a lot in going through the planning programs was urban economics. So, I gravitated into a lot of work in urban economics. I ended up getting a second Master’s degree in Econ, and I worked—I guess I worked 32 years there in the field of urban economics. A lot of analysis, a lot of demographic work also. Which I found very—I enjoyed. I really did. It was very, very interesting to me. I never had the sense…I never went to work a day in my life. I was never got up and said, “Damn,” you know, “I got to…” I enjoyed it. You know? And I think I was extremely fortunate in that regard. (01:23:27) Interviewer: Alright. Now, to look back at the time that you spent in the Army, how do you think that affected you overall? Positive? Negatively? Veteran: Well, I think there’s no question it was a positive. I mean, I am sure there was some negatives here and there. I think…I think people—we should serve our country. First of all, just flat ass, we should serve our country. I think—and again, in a sense, I served my country in Vietnam. I feel I served my country in a career in public planning. I am now retired. I serve my country 2 days a week with Habitat for Humanity, building houses for people. I don’t see anything wrong with a life spent like that. I have nothing against, you know, the guy that took the career in finance and went to work for Merrill Lynch and made his billions. That’s part of this also, you know. But this was my way. I think…I think had I—well, I never would have �avoided the service, I never would have gone to Canada. I know that. But let’s say I had a bum knee from football or something like that—was medically ineligible for service. I think that would have bothered me a lot. My father served in World War 2. All of my uncles served in World War 2. I sort of—and frankly, had there not been a war, I would have been in the Army. I mean, I would have gone in the military. Because that—I sort of…I mean, we didn’t, you know. There wasn’t a big flag waving at home or anything like that but I knew they were all there. And I would have been in the military, war or not. So, I look back on—and I look back with pride on my military time. I do. Interviewer: Alright. Well, it makes for a good story so thank you very much for taking the time to share it today. Veteran: Thank you. (01:25:35) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_LaytonR2159V Title A name given to the resource Layton, Robert (Interview transcript and video), 2017 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2017-10-03 Description An account of the resource Robert Layton was born in Madison, Indiana on August 24th, 1946 and graduated high school in 1964. He briefly attendd the Univeristy of Arizona before transferring to to Ohio University where he participated in the ROTC program in 1966. Layton underwent Basic Training at Indiantown Gap, Pennsylvania, in 1967, and graduated college in 1969. He then attended his infantry officer's traiing course at Fort Benning, Georgia, and completed both jump school and ranger training. His first assignment as an officer was to Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, in 1969 before he was deployed to Vietnam with the B Company, 2nd Battalion, 501st Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division. His unit articipated in combat at Firebase Ripcord as well as Hill 1000 before Layton was reassigned as an S-2 Intelligence Officer. After two years of deployment, he left the service and completed his Master's degree in Urban Planning and, later, in Economics. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Layton, Robert Wayne Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/f434e7d5d514753cb2c0731c7e1fed99.mp4 cda1ac3fdf8c207719926c2efaa20d05 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/1cbbe08e56257676fcb2bfe6c06f5687.pdf 71392e06cbc6493cffd4dc86a438095f PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Interview length: 1:53:02 James: We're talking today with Kent Laudeman of Niles Michigan. The interviewer is James Smither of the Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project. But if you can start us off with some background on yourself, and to begin with where and when were you born. Kent: I was born in 1943 in Bremen Indiana, it's about 25 miles south of South Bend. James: Okay, and did you grow up there? Kent: I grew up there until I went to college and then kind of left that particular area to Western Michigan University. James: Okay, what did your family do for a living when you were growing up there? Kent: My dad was a farmer and I grew up on a farm, and my mother did some office work for Monsanto . James: Okay alright, and when did you finish high school? Kent: In 1961? �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: Okay and then you went to Western Michigan University from there? Kent: I went to Indiana Central College for two years and then transferred it up to Western Michigan University and was there for a total of seven years. I avoided the draft for a long long time. James: It was that, that was the year you could still go with graduate school to keep you out? Kent: It was 65 I mean I was I was doing a college deferment from 61 to 65. James: Mm-hmm. Kent: And then 65 to 68 three years of graduate work and continued that deferment. James: Alright. Kent: Till Uncle Sam caught on. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: I guess my impression was that in a lot of cases the Graduate School deferment had already gone away, or did you start early enough that? [0:00 - 1:35] Kent: Well the draft ended in 75 so I was still 66, 67, 68. James: Yeah, but I think and I think and that my impression wasn't that figure yet that the graduate school deferment had already gone away. You couldn't just hide in graduate school necessarily. Kent: No, I could until they caught up with me in 68 and didn't let me defer any more because I wasn't married. I wasn't working at an okay situation. James: So you managed to kind of get there under the radar? Kent: Right. James: Okay, so what were you studying in graduate school? Kent: Undergraduate work was elementary education because I thought I wanted to be a teacher and a principal, and then I got into counseling and Student Personnel Services. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: Alright so what kind of impression or understandings did you have of the Vietnam War while you were in college? Kent: Well interesting that's probably why I pursued the deferment. Nobody in my family had ever been in the service so I had no experience to fall back on and that wasn't really a pleasant time with Kent State Jackson State and so forth is the culture was such that you were kind of for or against it okay. James: Alright yeah so it's all sort of kind of going on. Kent: Yeah. James: Alright so but then you eventually you get a notice. Kent: I was drafted so I changed from one induction Center which was Indiana up to Michigan. Deferred for a little bit more, got a delayed entry plan because I was writing a thesis for a specialist degree at that particular time. That bought me another three months it got me into late August and September. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: But of what year? Kent: Of 1968. James: Okay alright, and so at this point are you going in as enlisted? [1:34 - 3:27] Kent: So I was drafted as enlisted. I had checked and thought maybe I could get into Social Work or something like that with the counseling background, but the recruiters said no we really don't need that kind of person. So, I was drafted got in did basic and advanced training at Fort Dix New Jersey. James: Okay. Kent: 11 Bravo infantry. James: Okay so you said go Fort Dix for basic what was that like, but what happened there. Kent: Well I was lucky enough to be put in a company and a platoon that had mostly college students in it. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: mm-hmm Kent: Which was just exceptional. I mean they kind of said we were all loafing, but when it came time to take the APFT the physical fitness test we always came through. We we knew when we had to show up as were about it. Otherwise okay, we were playing the game and going through all of the drill and and everything like that and being a good soldier. Okay but but not being overly good as far as a soldier is concerned. James: Okay what impression did you have of the drill instructors? Or did you know anything about what their backgrounds were? Kent: Smoky hats were pretty much pushers. NCO’s, good physical shape, gun ho. I mean what we pretty much experienced I think given my fireman background discipline hard work and so forth. It didn't hit me in terms of the discipline and regimentation like it did some college graduates. James: Okay so you adapted to army life relatively easy. Kent: Right. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: Okay now did some of the other guys you were with have a lot more trouble? Kent: Oh yes. James: What kinds of things went on with them? [3:28 - 5:15] Kent: Some of it was just the pressure and the stress of the constant pushing encouragement to do better, excel be all you can be when they kind of knew what they could be. And because they were drafted didn't want to be maybe and we're just there because they were drafted. Okay and pushing through the two years or the three years whatever they had been required to sign up for. James: But were they basically accepting of their fate on some level and “Okay I'm-” Kent: Pretty much so. James: “-gonna get through it.” Kent: Pretty much so yes. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: Alright how long did basic last? Kent: Ooh... Eight weeks and then another eight weeks for advanced infantry training. James: Okay now to what extent was the advanced training geared toward Vietnam? Kent: It's always lingering in the back of your mind. I mean this is the height from 65 to 75 so 68 late 68 69 that was there the NCOs had pushed us said, “you know if you don't do well you're gonna probably end up there.” So you know they used it in a motivating kind of way but really none of the training for basic RIT other was standard training. I mean it was not in preparation for Vietnam it was standard training. James: Alright so you could go anywhere essentially? Kent: Go anywhere. James: Okay that was another eight weeks? �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: So I finished the AIT and then you get sent on for MOS training in a particular school, they sent me to Fort Gordon, Georgia to be an auto den person, which is typist and message trafficking and so forth. And so I went down there and that happened to be also where social workers in the army went. There were gonna be officers so I scampered over there then gently inquired and said, “You know what's the chances of getting transferred out of auto den training to being in Social Work given my particular background,” and nobody would listen to me, but in basic I put all the paperwork in for a correct Commission. James: Okay. [5:16 - 7:34] Kent: And that came through once I got I finished auto den training. James: So what did auto den training consist of. Kent: Basically teletype that kind of messaging. Okay ticker tape cards if you think about what we were doing in terms of Technology and communication at that particular time. James: Computer cards? �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: Computer cards. So you know sometimes maybe when you went through registration you got a stack of cards, well that's similar to what was happening as far as auto den training was concerned. James: Okay all right, but then okay so at this point it's possible then for someone like yourself who's got a college degree or some kind of specialized background to receive a direct Commission to do for certain kinds of jobs? Kent: I put everything in okay, now whether I would get it or not, I don't know. My wife was expecting our first son at that time she was back in Bremen with my parents. So, after I finished auto den school I was put into a holding company and was put in charge of a platoon, as far as that company is concerned, so was just kind of doing general- James: Right. Kent: -NCO specialists kinds of duties and so forth. James: Alright, but then the Commission actually does come through. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: So, at the end of June I was commissioned a second lieutenant in the adjutant-general corps. James: Alright and so now what happens to you? Kent: And now I got sent to Fort Ben Harrison for a basic officer training, and went through that program by that time I had almost a year of enlisted training. James: Mm-hmm Kent: So I was in pretty good shape for that physically speaking. Mentally speaking training as far as first aid CPR all of that kind of good stuff- James: Okay. [7:35 - 9:34] Kent: -that you generally get in officer basic school. James: Okay I guess one usually thinks of Officer Basic as being in places like Fort Benning and and so forth. Harrison's like a finance Institute. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: So the adjutant general school is there and finance was there. James: Okay. So, do you think you've got a somewhat less physically intense officer training than you would get if you were doing infantry or anything? Kent: Why... I think it was probably more akin to my background and therefore felt more comfortable with it. I don't- I'm not really a combat person as we'll see and got into Civil Affairs. So to me, it was like going back to school yeah I mean- James: Great. Kent: -I enjoyed it. You were in the barracks, you had a room by yourself, you were treated like a junior officer, I enjoyed it. I could have stayed there for the same time I spent in college. James: Alright, and what were you actually learning there. Kent: Doing different kinds of things that person. Pretty much adjutant-general kind of stuff which would be paperwork, which would be awards, which would be personnel actions, things of that nature from an administrative perspective. So that was very comfortable �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: Okay so this is specifically officer training for adjutants. Kent: You still had weapons qualification and some general training- James: Mm-hmm Kent: -but that was just kind of redundant and repetitive of what I had earlier as an enlisted person. James: Right. Okay, and how long were you there. Kent: Ooh... Probably about 12 weeks, and from there I went to be a second lieutenant at the Athey station in Little Rock Arkansas, and that's the Armed Forces entrance and induction station. James: Okay. [9:35 - 11:16] Kent: So now I got to see where I came through in Detroit and what got me there. And I was the psychological examiner at the Athey station in Little Rock Arkansas. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: Alright so what does that job actually consist of? Kent: So anybody that was being drafted or was being that that was volunteering came through the Armed Forces entrance and examination station. And part of that was the ASFA, the battery in terms of aptitude and maybe the identification of what was going to be best for you in a draft kind of way. Or, if you were enlisted you were kind of talked into a particular MOS, so we did the aptitude part of that, and if somebody was struggling with that then I had to do a reading test and interview and determine whether the person was fit or not for it as far as being drafted or volunteering for the service. James: Alright and how long were you there? Kent: I was there almost a year? James: Okay, now did you like that job or…? Kent: I did like that job, and we were the little of the Little Rock Air Force Station. Which was outside of town. I ran and I knew the dictionary of Occupational titles as far as titles were concerned. But, one of the fellows that I didn't approve for being a volunteer was somebody that came out of the Ozarks and could not read and desperately wanted to be in. So, we went �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock through that his occupation was really chicken catcher. So he at night would go in and take the chickens off the roost put him into the cage and some of those 18 wheelers you saw with multiple chicken cages was indeed he was doing that, that was in the dictionary of Occupational titles. And I said “I just can't let you join the service because your lack of reading skills and what the service was looking for and so forth,’ and at that time there was a marine captain who had recruited this particular individual and he locked my heels at the door one day and said, “You know how dare you lieutenant not accept my recruit,” and I stood by it I still said, “You know this was not doing the individual any good and was not gonna do this service any good and so forth.” That led to when I left my first Arcom medal at that particular place so I had a good group of couple college students who were working with me as far as the testing is concerned. The interviewing is concerned, and everything like that. I enjoyed it because it kind of tied in some of my counseling my assessment kind of things that I had learned while I was in graduate school and so forth I would have stayed there. James: Alright so what did you get to do next. Kent: Well then I got sent to Vietnam okay, and therefore I went down to Fort Polk for RVN training for about a week. [11:17 - 14:27] [Unintelligible] �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: Excuse me? James: What did that consist of? Kent: Well that consisted of more what you could expect to find as far as being in Vietnam and that would be things like booby traps, watching for booby traps, living in a jungle kind of situation, and so forth. What's a triple canopy like it's also Louisiana probably hot humid fit that particular scenario best and that's where the RVN training was at. James: Did they try to teach you anything about the culture the place or the people or anything and.. Kent: They don't remember anything about culture to tell you the truth. James: Because they trained the combat infantry or a lot of it geared toward that. Kent: So that was definitely military oriented squad work self-defense, Unit defense, unit aggression, and so forth. Okay, it's strictly military in this case. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: Did they march you out into a swamp or field someplace? Kent: You know we were waiver lieutenants going through that particular training so yeah, we went out as a unit. But, nothing like basic training and AIT for another person so forth. James: Alright, now is it on to Vietnam from there? Kent: On to Vietnam for a year. Arrived in August and left in June arrived in August of 70 and left in June of 71. James: Okay, how did they get them out to Vietnam? Kent: Well you know, I was an individual replacement so I didn't go as a part of the unit. James: Right. Kent: …. That’s a good question, I don't remember all together a little bit... a long flight. James: Most people had to report to someplace on the West coast some, one Depot or another. [14:28 - 16:04] �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: I went out of the East Coast came into Tan Son Nhut and Long Binh. Long Binh was the fabricated metal roof shelters that everybody came in to etc. and went through a brief orientation there, but no training. And then went from there to the 1st Signal Brigade which was actually located in the Saigon itself. James: So actually in the city as opposed to... Kent: In the city. James: Alright, what kind of facility or compounded did you have? Kent: It was in a compound, walled compound, right in the middle of things. We did have a high walled fence that went around it and a set of buildings inside. We ate our meals outside, probably about 150 200 yards, because it served not only that compound but a couple other compounds in that area. I remember it being on a major roadway between Tan Son Nhut and Cholon PX. Why do I remember that? Because it went by the fish market, okay, which had that very distinct kind of smell to it that I'll remember to this day. James: And Cholon it's a neighborhood in Saigon proper? �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: It it's as you go towards downtown Saigon, right downtown Saigon okay. James: Alright now what did your duties consist of there? Kent: Adjutant, so basically I was doing awards, assignments, the support. I was in charge of the hiring of our Vietnamese that worked within the compound papasans mamasans and so forth. James: Alright, now what did they give you. Any kind of orientation or training for that, or did they just say here you go. Kent: I did have a major that I reported to so he was my training and kind of a mentor in this case. Commander was a colonel 1st Signal Brigade in this case had the billboard antennas scattered throughout the country, and did the long haul communication from country outside of country or outside of country inside. James: Now, did you have experience enlisted men working under you who knew what they were doing? [16:05 - 18:31] �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: I had enlisted in the assignment section and in the awards section on the same building and I had a Chief Warrant Officer 3 that was in the personnel assignment that reported to me and the major at the same time. James: Alright, and what kind of living quarters did you have? Kent: We lived in what I call it not a barracks. It was a two-story building standard kind of what you might find in the Saigon area. I remember the first couple of nights there they gave me a mosquito netting which was terribly hot. And then sometime later I got an individual room that had an overhead fan and while that was great because it kept the mosquitoes off you and gave a little bit of air movement so my quarters were pretty good. There was an officer's room where you could go in the evening and there was an NCO club we didn't go to but the NCOs could go to. Wasn't a whole lot to do within the compound other than work. I mean at best you maybe had a half day off during the week to get your laundry done or something of that nature. The best trips were outside of their to Tan Son Nhut for a breakfast on a Sunday morning or something like that and probably had the best Western omelet that I could think of at an Air Force mess. James: Alright, and would you go into Saigon proper much?. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: I had to go to the Cholon PX to pick up the piastre to pay for the mamasan's the papasans and so forth. So once a week I was going down there. James: Where were you allowed or able to go to restaurants or other things like that? Kent: I did some of that I signed up for a Vietnamese class but I didn't have the time to pursue it beyond that picked up a few things I had to go along with that and outside the compound yeah there were some restaurants where you could get a Vietnamese kind of meal and go from there I did make some trip into VungTau and other areas because we had small detachments that supported the billboards that were located in the different provinces but I didn't get up to I Corps didn't get up to second Corps did get down to the Delta a couple times. James: okay and when you did travel around how did you travel. Kent: Basically by Jeep except I made a pay run was in a lush two seater low flying craft we skimmed over the treetops etc. James: Alright did you have a sense that it was relatively safe to drive around the areas that you were in. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock [18:32 - 21:23] Kent: Pretty safe because I was always out during the daytime never out during the nighttime we could hear the bombs being dropped as far as the b-52s were concerned I mean yeah the windows would rattle a little bit etc. but I mean other than somebody's shooting over the wall or through the razor wire felt pretty secure in terms of where we're at so I was very fortunate. James: Okay now did you have were there rules about sort of where you could go and not go in Saigon or what kinds of things you could do or not do? Kent: Safety was always emphasized always going out with another person at that time we had the Jeeps with the open doors nothing like what we had in Saudi Arabia or anything like that traffic was always an issue bicycles cyclos and so forth so you had to be careful in that sense there were the opportunist that would kind of fake an accident if you weren't careful which then brought the MPS and an investigation and some things like that so you always traveled with somebody else as far as the vehicle is concerned okay. James: Mm-hmm, alright. And we're there because the amount of the enlisted were there issues involving things like drug use or. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: I didn't notice it that much and I don't think I noticed that that much among the combat troops but certainly in the support sectors were people who were behind in a safe area bored and being rampant heat being high and everything like that is where I saw some of the drugs begin to make their encroachment in terms of soldier boredom and so forth. We were pretty much a male organization at that particular time so didn't see some of the things that we encountered as far as Desert Storm is concerned okay. James: But there would have been prostitution and so forth. Kent: Yeah- James: -in the city and that kind of thing. Kent: Yes, right outside the gate to the compound. James: Now was your compound sort of just for a single brigade or…? Kent: Just for the First Signal Brigade. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: Okay and so you may have had a little bit more select group than you'd have in some of the bigger bases or…? Kent: I think probably so certainly as far as Long Binh was huge. [21:24 - 23:56] James: Okay alright. Now, did you have any kind of sense from where you were about how the larger world was going? I mean were we successful as far as you could tell? Kent: Well we didn't have access to CNN or anything like that that we had in Desert Storm. I mean it's pretty much mail communication that we had at that particular time. I don't even remember calling home when I was in Saigon and Vietnam. James: But there were- but I guess from where you were there might be people who actually have some idea what was actually happening in the war at the top? Kent: Stars and Stripes was the primary means of communication. James: Okay and you would have been there I guess when the Cambodian incursion was going on? �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: 70, 71, so that was after Tet Offensive. Yes 68. James: But Cambodia was set was mid nineteen seventy so. Kent: Yeah. James: I mean if there after that had happened. Kent: The Ho Chi Minh Trail one, never knew where that went. Yeah, I mean it was supposed to be in Vietnam but no it crossed the border and got in Laos got into Cambodia etc. So we heard those kinds of stories but really didn't see anything in print. James: Because I guess that was the big news item of 1970 was American and South Vietnamese actually going into Cambodia to try to chase out the North Vietnamese bases. But, so basically that kind of stuff news from the fighting or whatever was not really- Kent: Other than what you picked up to the Stars and Stripes or something like that. James: -Circulated where you were. Alright. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: Well we were yeah we were aware of the body count, I mean Vietnam was the body count was in terms of success okay. So yes aware of that particular measurement as far as success lack of success so forth. [23:57 - 25:49] James: And then did you have any- this is also a period of Vietnamization that is the Americans were trying to kind of turn more to let South Vietnamese, and did that- was that anything that you noticed? Kent: My awareness where the montagnards were terribly helpful to us in terms of the higher elevations etc. Certainly up in I Corps and II Corps. Vietnamization we're- we're aware of the politics that was help happening as far as the Saigon government is concerned sometimes successful sometimes not successful, I think we can say the same thing that's- that's happening in Afghanistan right now. I mean depending on who you talk to what successful was working well and you could talk to somebody a day later and say, “you know motivation was slow couldn't depend on it,” in spite of what we were doing in terms of training and everything like that. James: Mm-hmm. Did you have any sense that that sooner or later this whole thing was gonna go bust, or did you think that situation would kind of go on indefinitely? �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: I think most of those who went to Vietnam felt that we went there with a purpose. We didn't go to Canada or anything like that, we were ordered to go there went there with the intent of doing the best job that we could possibly do, and felt certainly as you interacted with the Vietnamese the papasans the mamasans and so forth okay that we were there protecting the people in terms of North Vietnam and so forth. I mean the black pajamas yeah, we were familiar with that, we didn't really encounter that we're aware that some of that was going on and so forth okay. My Lai was not prominent I really learned about My Lai when I came back then- then when I was there. James: Alright so basically for you it was simply an assignment you were in the army. You went there, you did your job, you put in your- you do a full 12 months there? Kent: Did a full 12 months. James: Alright did you get an R&R at any point while you were there? Kent: I had an R&R; but didn't have my wife come over. I went to Australia and actually took a train up to the Blue Mountains. Stayed with a family, saw Sydney. So it was positive for me okay. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: Totally different experience for a while. Kent: Yes. James: Alright so now when you come back then from Vietnam… [25:50 - 28:29] Kent: Then I experienced the culture in terms of what's going on back here and so forth. Literally said, “I wanted nothing to do with this,” had my opportunity to go from a first lieutenant to a captain. No, the culture was such was negative, not supportive. Higher education certainly wasn't supportive of it okay. Came back and got a job with Indiana University at South Bend in 71. James: So did you leave the military entirely? Kent: I left it entirely. James: Okay. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: Hung my- hung my uniform up. I mean I had the experience coming back through Oakland and that's what it really began to hit me. James: So what did you see there? What happens when you get back? Did you land at the military base and then go to the airport or…? Kent: So I was- came, landed in Oakland. Was put in a very small room. I just remember is almost the size of a closet, and you gonna be wondering, you know, when you've got to leave this place. It was not the place to leave at that particular time because of the culture the anger and everything like that. So, I just stayed at Oakland base until I caught a plane. I caught a plane back came through Chicago. I ended up in in Traverse City because that's where my wife was with her mother and father at that particular time. She moved from Bremen Indiana up to that area. I was terribly tanned, terribly dark had a mustache. If you would have hung a number on the front of me you know, you would have guessed I was a criminal someplace. James: Alright now were you in civilian clothes at this point? Kent: I was in civilian clothes and I remember looking at my son and he broke out crying because he didn't know who the hell this stranger was etc. Okay, so that kind of added to my �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock feelings of kind of alienation and discomfort I guess, and coming back and deciding, “I didn't want to have anything to do with the military.” James: Alright so then you said you took a job? [28:30 - 30:36] Kent: IU South Bend with the Division of Education because I had that educational kind of background. Alton ruff, the director of the division of education at that time, came from my particular area. It was kind of the networking that got me started there I absolutely loved it. I think I made $12,000 a year, realized it was gonna be difficult to support a family of two at that particular time, and said okay. About a year later I need to look at a second job and look at a USAR Center or I could go back in as an instructor at Kingsbury Indiana near the Laporte. So, about a year later, I did get back in as a USAR Instructor for Kingsbury. James: They are on reserve? �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: Yep. James: Alright. Kent: So, we got back into the reserves for economical purposes and I was doing again something that I enjoyed doing something was teaching. James: Alright now was this a job switch or just a second job added on? Kent: Well kind of instructor, kind of like adjutant-general working with people. James: Was that a full-time job though I guess? Kent: No that was an army reserve, because my full-time job was with IU South Bend. James: Okay, so you still had it so you’ll be here while you're reservist, like the other ones. It's sort of the weekend a version of the weekend work other thing. Kent: Yep. Stayed there for one year and then heard about the Civil Affairs Unit in Kalamazoo Michigan and made the transfer. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: Alright, now explain a little bit what that particular unit is. [30:37 - 32:12] Kent: Civil Affairs is, if you remember World War two, they provided the liaison the connecting link with the military with the government with finance with education etc. I mean they were the link between the military and we now call it host nation okay. So I saw a health team, I saw a law enforcement team, I saw an education team, I saw an economics kind of team. I said, “wow,” and about 40% were officers that particular company was commanded by a lieutenant colonel so there was about 42% officers, senior enlisted and even the senior listed were well educated and semi-professional professional people so, I saw a networking opportunity. I just absolutely loved the unit okay. I mean I could see a veterinarian if the- if our dog was having a problem. I can go talk to the captain. I can talk to the commander, excuse me, the- the director of police forces in Western Michigan (okay) at Kalamazoo. I mean this was a neat unit okay. So I loved it and worked myself up to in 90. In 90 I became the company commander and served my three years there and I remember in November going down and now I have to look for another position because I had homesteaded there for a long time okay. Where most people move around from one unit to another unit to advance more quickly and everything like that. So I managed to stay there through a number of different positions. Finally had to leave and heard �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock about the 21st TACOM, TACOM down in Indianapolis Indiana and they were aligned with a 21st in Germany at Kaiserslautern. So their annual training would be to fall in in Germany. Whoa said, “this is a great chance to travel and everything like that,” okay. For two years event two summers two weeks of annual training in the summer and so forth. So I became their director assistant chief of staff for host nation support the21st TACOM. I went in and interviewed in November just a little bit before Thanksgiving and I remember on December 2nd or something like that they gave me a call. I was sitting at my desk at IU South Bend and they said, “oh by the way what is your interest in getting into the unit because we're going to be mobilized for the Gulf War.” I said, “well I interviewed I said I was interested if you get mobilized I will go with the unit,” and I did on December 4th. They were mobilized in 1990. James: Ok I just want to back up a little bit. When you were talking about being with a civil affairs unit I think you were mentioning dates in the 90’s. So you would have met dates in the eighties or 70’s so when I got back in 70. Kent: So 72 to 90 I was in the field civil affairs company. James: Ok now during the time when you were with the civil affairs company did they ever send you any place, or did you do training in any place? �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: That's an interesting question. Yes, I think our first training was to an Indian Reservation in northern Michigan and we were staying in a school that was our housing facility. And then working on the reservation and doing different things with Indians. I mean it could be a construction kind of thing. It could be a- an educational kind of thing and so forth and absolutely loved it again ok. I mean how can you go wrong with something like this. Now, also during that time the 315th SIL Affairs company was aligned to support reforger kinds of activities and events return of forces to Germany and during that time. Even before I got into the taycom I had spent two weeks of annual training in Belgium and the Netherlands and in Germany which then supported my going with the taycom which was also totally co-located with the unit and Kaiserslautern so again thoroughly. I mean how can you get better two weeks of training. So when I was working at IUSB I was either traveling for weekend training to Kalamazoo and when I changed to Indianapolis I just went south the other direction and was still doing a similar kind of thing in terms of civil affairs work. [32:13 - 37:17] James: Right okay, but basically during this, that extended period, you're just never mobilized or anything like that because they didn't have any actual Wars going on. Kent: That's right. James: At that particular point but then…? �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: But during the Gulf War I met some of my peers out of the 315th that were mobilized, and over in Gulf War. In fact I ran across them in Kuwait City because they were brought in via another route and I was then working with a 21st taycom, and Nicholas Batch Lieutenant Colonel Nicholas Batch it was a law professor at Western Michigan. A great friend of mine that I stayed in contact with, and I met him over at the airport in Kuwait because he was there with the 415 not to 315 415 civil affairs company. James: Alright just back around your story here. So essentially, so you join your new unit and “oh by the way we're being mobilized.” So it's the end of 1990 and find that out okay. I kind of pick up the story then from there so… Kent: So we were mobilized on the 4th of December. Spent two weeks of training at home station again Went through weapons qualification,, got a well started personnel records were updated Did our CPR first aid training, got equipment issued to you, n-b-c equipment. Got all the training as far as masking and everything like that. so that you were prepared for that. We didn't take a lot of equipment with us other than personal equipment okay, and we were in- had an advance party go over two weeks in advance of Christmas and we basically arrived about a day before Christmas, the 25th of December. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: Alright and how do they get you out there? Kent: We went from there to Ohio, from Ohio and out to Fort Dix, the East Coast East Coast up through Iceland, dropped in to Spain, and from Spain then into Saudi Arabia. James: Okay. Kent: I see 130. James: Alright, so military alright, and then what's your first impression then of Saudi Arabia when you get there? [37:18 - 39:45] Kent: Hot. We landed at night at Dharan air base, which is probably about 15 kilometers from where the 21st TACOM was working out of at that particular time. We were put- they had some makeshift accommodations. Actually, they had brought in some trailers so they had- they had five lieutenant colonels in one trailer and there was a restroom in the middle and three on one in and two of the other and I said, “ well this is kind of crowded on this and I wonder why there's three of us here and as vs 2 there.” Well I found out the day after Christmas that I was going to �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock go full.. So you know I was kind of the excess person with all the other Lieutenant Colonels on that end of the trailer. After that, the trailer was traded for Khobar towers. Which is a high-rise complex that most of the unit went into after that, and then they started putting some Kuwaiti refugees into the trailer complex that we had so, I didn't have bad accommodations again I wasn't living in a tent okay. James: So were you there when the Iraqis were launching Scud missiles? Kent: So by that time I was up at KKMC: King Khalid Military City, off of what we call Tapline Road that kind of ran from east to west also known as MSR main supply route Dodge. It was the road that was used to really build King Khalid Military City. King Khalid is an interesting complex and it sits right out in the middle of the desert about 40 klicks south of Hafra-bat, which was the main city in that particular area. Now the US engineers have the ingenuity starting in about 1974, the Saudi started looking to develop some military complexes and King Khalad Military City was one of three, the other one was in Tabuk which is toward Jordan in the north western part of Saudi Arabia, and one was way down south and then this one KKMC, King Khalid Military City. King Khalid Military City had the second largest cement plant in the world. It's in the shape of a hexagon, an elaborate structure, that was designed to support at least a brigade from the Saudis. Actually, some would say it would hold up to three brigades. In the shape of a hexagon underground parking, okay, had actually a hotel complex that was about four stories �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock stories high and we were in some barracks that were four to five stories high and much like a college dorm and we had three of us to a room again. It was in the shape of figure eight, little courtyards in the middle of that, and several of those. So the Saudi army was in that until we deployed and they went to the field because now in August, when the Iraqis invaded Kuwait, that now brought a brigade from Tabuk and a brigade from down south to be on the front line with Iraq at that time. And it also took the brigade out of KKMC and put ‘em on the front line so the barracks was empty, and that's how we managed to get in there on the day after Christmas. James: And now what- what is your unit expecting to do? [39:46 - 43:43] Kent: So we’re the liaison okay. I was assistant chief of staff northern province for host nation support. So I would liaison with General Pagones, who was the commander, then the 22nd Support Command we went from the 21st to the 22nd in country. Okay he was a two-star in charge of that he was promoted to a three-star Lieutenant General by Schwarzkopf January so that he could compete and work with the two corps commanders, which was the 18thAairborne and the 7th Corps. So by that by the time that we got there in December pretty much the 18th Airborne was in and he was on the verge of being promoted at that particular time. The air war started what January 16th and we were in the midst of moving the 7th Corps and at that point, �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock ok, and his main headquarters was out of Dahran. The major port was Demam, an excellent deepwater port etc. and General Pagones said, “you know I was there a couple of weeks after Iraq invaded on the 2nd of August,” and he told the story of operating out of the back end of a car ready. Actually cash in his trunk, because he had about seven guys working with him, and they brought the 18th airborne in before they brought the support. So he was well behind the power curve in terms of support, so I was his forward up at KKMC for a host nation support. The main was still back at Dahran and I went up there with myself and two other people. We eventually had some more civil affairs support from the 304th. See, a group and my cell got up to 17 people in working all host nation issue. So what's the host nation issue? Well if you want to come up with a logistics base in the desert you had to ask for that land you just getting couldn't go out and start parking there and start developing your support base. So we got into all kinds of things firing ranges, log bases, Concord support centers. Actually using the main supply routes etc. and back to KKMC. KKMC is about 18 square miles had its own airport brigade-size well-developed was called the Emerald City because it had a fountain right in the center of it okay. Had a hotel there, had five Mosques there, had three swimming pools there, and had eight wells. Now the well our engineers could go down 200 feet and tap a well. The well at KKMC was 2,000 feet deep huge, about eight inch diameter et cetera. So that's where the water came from to support the 18th Airborne Corps the 7th Corps et cetera it was the logistics hub with log base Bravo at KKMC. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: Now did you have Saudi counterparts to go? Kent: Yes, oh yes. Two-star General Al-Kemy. General Al-Kemy was the commander one star brigadier-general Shaheri was the operations guy one star Abdul Momen was the cut of the s-1 equivalent so we had the s3 the s4 the commander and the s-1 that was my liaison. James: Alright, and what were these people like to work with? [43:44 - 47:50] Kent: Great, and most have been to school in the u.s. Most spoke English, but all of our requests for host nations. Host nation support we did about 600 during the period of time that were- though had to be written in Arabic okay. So, we got the request in English we converted it to Arabic that was then converted it's submitted to the liaison it then went from alchemy to Abdu Momen and somebody that had to approve it came back to us in Arabic we then transfer transferred it into English and then got back to the unit that was making the request so there's a story there when we first went we had access to a linguist from Special Forces it was there that lasted about two weeks then I got a good captain that could speak and write Arabic from the 304th civil affairs group that lasted about two weeks and Pagones says Laudeman I need this captain because he needs to write with the Egyptian Het-Battalion and a Het-Battalion is �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock something can transport an m1 tank from the port up and that was the pressure so to make sure that that head got down to the port one day run picked up made another run back another day and then was down for maintenance we put with it captain from the 304th C.A group that was a linguist that could work with the Egyptians to make sure that that happens so there went my linguist again okay now I got into a situation where I heard about sergeant Morris Kent Morris he was a sergeant e5 he was working with a transportation company and the company needed a four-wheel Jeep Cherokee that I had access to and I needed a linguist so it's probably the best trade I ever made in my life I got the linguist we started submitting requests to the Saudis again all right the things you get in to a host nation and support okay. James: Did you get to keep this one? Kent: I kept them and we actually put him one of their signs because I had managed to then hire a third country national from the Sudan that we got cleared and I could put in the office to do the translation and conversion from the English to the Arabic and submission than the Arabic back to the English again. James: Alright, now did the- did you have any problems with the Saudis or were they generally helpful? �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: Saudis Ramadan started during this period of time Ramadan is one month of basically fasting from daylight to sundown and that created some problems for us and because the Saudis generally would then would spend the evenings with their families and festivities and of course they got hungry they got a little bit disenchanted during the daytime etc okay were not as easy to work with their Sunday was technically on Friday so we had to work around that they also had the five prayer periods during the day we had to work around that we couldn't go over and talk to our counterparts during that particular time or if we do we do well enough to cool our heels in the office for a period of time because they went to the prayer session etc . so yeah there were some some adjustments we had to make one of my favorite sayings was inshallah God willing so Jonas had a stand up brief in the morning about thirty minutes where all that just an assistant Chiefs of Staff would indicate what they're working on for the particular day what the problems were that they saw and so forth very quick he sat down the rest of the stood up half-hour meeting in the morning and then we had a major sit down during the evening about an hour and a half PowerPoint slides out the wazoo I had my own and many times during that briefing I'd say inshallah God willing we will get an answer back and be able to help you out in terms of what the request was and so forth. James: Alright but I guess the Saudis as far as you could tell right so happy to have us there [47:51 - 52:23] �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: they were happy to have us on their time frame though not necessarily the army timeframe the army timeframe wanted it done right away so one of those was one of the stories was General Pargonas says Laudeman I heard that the Saudis had some trucks for us that we might be able to use because we were short of transportation assets and one of my stories the letters of the that I sent to you was yeah he heard about that so I said a Lottermen I want you to go over and check with the general Sharia and I hear there's some trucks that might be available to help us out because we were short I mean we had the Egyptian Ha-Battalion then we sent the linguist with to make sure that they were working in a regular kind of way getting all the tanks and tracks up and everything like that so I said sir follow up on it so I went over the next day I talked to general shahuri and he says yeah I got some trucks throughout the desert for you and he wrote me out an order he put it in the envelope and put a wax seal on it okay so I couldn't see what it was in it was in Arabic anyhow he did that on the morning so that day we left and headed to the desert I took Kent Morris with me he was my linguist and we thought we knew where we were going we’re gonna go about 20 klicks this way turn left go another clicks 20 klicks see beside the road there was this tire that was in the sand at that point we were supposed to turn right and go another couple clicks well we did that to the best of our knowledge we came upon a Syrian camp interesting the Syrians were some of the support forces that were part of the coalition forces there and we asked about a truck parked in the desert we were told there's 800 trucks here well you would think that you could be able to see �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock that you know the desert was flat except for a curb down you lost sight of it okay we didn't think it'd be that hard so the Syrians said you know go couple clicks this way and and see if you can I think it's located there I think we ran across or something well we went two clicks and there was an Egyptian unit there because there were Egyptian forces there too helping us out okay they said well no we think it's over this way about to more Clicks so we went a couple more clicks finally we ran into a compound and we were looking for a Colonel Nasser at that time now Colonel Nasser is like Colonel Bob I mean the names you know they never used last name they used first name so Colonel Nasser we went through barbed wire Concertina and there was a single building sitting there probably about a 10 feet by 10 feet and with a couple of vehicles parked outside and Constantine around the outside and there was a guard so he let us in we parked and we went in we went to the basement here's Colonel Nasser he was watching TV and happened to be a cartoon now there are two channels a religious channel and a cartoon channel but he was watching the cartoon channel at that particular time he took the envelope and gave us some shy some green coffee okay or tea had to start out with that first looked at it and he called the captain of Gandhi and said picked it up on his phone and said captain Gandhi come up here I want you to meet a couple of guys he came up there in about 20 minutes had some more tea okay Galla, Shy and so forth and he says I'm gonna take you to the truck park so we went another three kilometers into the desert and we saw some tanker trucks first and said we're getting close and beyond the tanker trucks there was this big high burn that they had wall dirt up around common defensive kind of perimeter etc and inside he took us in there and �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock sure enough there was this truck farm okay so we struck a deal to get 490 trucks some were we were really looking for 18-wheelers flatbeds. James: Mm-hmm. [52:24 - 56:33] Kent: to haul heavy equipment we got about 90 of those with sides about another 90 with outsides and another a hundred and eighty or so which were straight trucks they were actually called circus trucks because they were painted all different colors and had sides all around and said okay we'll take the 480 trucks and he said oh by the way a hundred eighty these trucks come with drivers so you're going to need to come back tomorrow with your transportation people and pick up the trucks but bring along somebody else that can be the commander of the one hundred and eighty drivers that have their own trucks and we did that the next day. James: Where did you find the people to drive the trucks? Kent: well it came from the transportation companies that were located in and around KKMC because hey we were about 25,000 Strong both the Dahran, Demam and up there okay by that time and we brought a company commander that was going to take charge of this 180 trucks �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock with drivers all third country nationals he picked them up he took him back about a month later I saw him and he says can't don't ever do this to me again and here are the issues they came with their own little stoves prayer rugs and so forth okay and the first thing he learned is that he had to support them with meals well he had this morning support he had to sort out any MREs with pork in it that makes perfect sense okay but he said you know we worked through that but one day I didn't get them the necessary oil that they they needed and all of a sudden they pulled their own oil plugs and drained everything out in the sand and couldn't couldn't do anything couldn't make the well a mail delivery couldn't make the water delivery couldn't move some of the small ammunition that we had on pallets and so forth I mean he came to a dead stop until they got oil and that's just the way it worked so he got his trucks but he also got a headache of problems at the same time. James: Alright now as all of this stuff is kind of going on are you kind of paying attention to any of the build-up toward having an actual war. Kent: oh yes so we had access to CNN unlike Vietnam I mean we could actually see what was being reported back stateside etc so we could tune in we were very on top of it we had the Stars and Stripes and we also had access to a Saudi paper that was in English okay so we can see what the Saudis were saying at the same time I was surprised because the Saudi headquarters asked for CNN if they could have access to CNN and we sent over a female signal sergeant to �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock install it which was kind of a no-no I mean females driving trucks wearing t-shirts in Saudi Arabia etc was a no-no culturally speaking but again the officers etc over there were pretty much accepting because they'd been stateside they speak English and so forth all right so yes we had more access to what was happening certainly in the Gulf War we know when the air war was starting and we knew what was happening with the air war we know when the blues brothers were being dropped we know when the daisy cutter' is being dropped and the thing that we started watching in those hour-and-a-half briefings at night was the available of heat rounds for artillery those rounds were important because they were going to penetrate the t-62s the 72s the 52 s etc. and we're ready to go we could see that nightly but as that got up then we knew that we're going to be close to the launch of the ground war on February 24th. [56:34 - 60:44] James: Alright and now wet as the ground war starts or the immediate build-up mean what happens with you or what are you doing? Kent: we're still filling all these requests whatever the requests might be all right and we saw request for barrier material I mean we had this big cement plant and there were slabs of cement there left from the construction and everything like that but the Saudis weren't willing to give that up okay and in spite of the thing you would think that with sand you could take an entrenching �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock tool dig a foxhole it was very hard underneath that sand so we were engaged in getting Saudi equipment back holds bulldozers anything like that that would help the units that were located either within KKMC itself or even on the outside of that I mean everybody was fearing a threat at that particular time and I wanted to do as much barrier developing as they possibly could so we were engaged in all that stuff. James: In your story now to the point where the attack or the… Kent: So we could see the ground war was imminent and we had the briefing that we could follow and see what Schwarzkopf and other commanders down at Riyadh were kind of thinking we got good feedback on the air war that had started on what January 16th we knew that they were bombing deep and now we could see those targets beginning to come closer and closer and so forth okay and we were starting to get some inclinations that there were some desertions that were happening okay about 35 Iraqis were showing up here and there now that led to another issue in EPW camps and all of a sudden we had the 800 MP brigade show up which then brought okay I need land I equipment for a wall I need razor well I need tenting I need cooking stuff I need hygiene stuff I mean that just started a whole doubt huge of needs that we turned to the Saudis to try to help them out because they didn't bring it with him so we were just in perpetually we were just one issue after another issue depending on what was happening at the particular time. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: Okay and then what happens? Then when the ground war actually begin. Kent: So now the ground war starts okay and now we realize wow it's a million meals a day to keep this going it's six million gallons of jp4 and diesel and Bo gas to keep this going it's ammunition are we going to get it there quick enough it's the unit with the right hook the air board is going a hundred kilometers 160 kilometers in a day and all of a sudden we got log [60:45 - 63:53] bases far forward but is it going to be able to reach okay the unit's now that are moving that fast so it's a rush to move everything forward water fuel food are we're gonna need replacement parts I mean if we don't have to worry about barrier material anymore cuz we're moving so damn fast okay we don't even have to think about that but now now what are you gonna do with the dead we had a grave battalion that was located at KKMC graves and registration battalion and here's a side bar we didn't know how many casualties were going to have I mean this was the mother of all wars this is 500,000 Iraqis on one side and almost 200,000 combat but 500,000 on the other side that's going to clash at where we've got these trenches dug and oil that's there and everything like that okay and what are we going to do with casualties and are we prepared for the casualties and all of a sudden the Saudis come online and said what are we going to do with Iraqi casualties because we have a tremendous responsibility for our own �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock casualties and how it works from the company back to the battalion to the division to the Corps and out of country and a KKMC the great Battalion was out of country as soon as possible that is a primary mission and a core value as far as the u.s. is concerned so we pray we try to press that upon the Saudis what are we going to do with the Iraqi casualties okay whether it's in Iraq across the line perhaps perhaps in Saudi Arabia where we gonna have to take care of and so forth so we come up we've got to come up with a equivalent kind of Saudi company with some platoons to do that so in about two days we're working that with the Saudis they took a band unit of Saudis and converted it to a platoon of Saudis okay now you got to have the trucks you gotta have the back hose you got to have the wipe wrapping material what are you going to do and so forth and we were making great progress we were ready to launch that group and all of a sudden Saudis say hey I can't cross the line between our country and Iraq and we don't necessarily want to bury them because they've feared that the Iraqis would find them and make it an incident etc okay so we have that great fear hanging over a head as well as we had three evacuation hospitals locator to KKMC the Emerald City was such it had an eight-story hospital so the three evac’s were located all around it using the resources there etc. I mean this was huge this is a mother of all battles that was going to happen on about a 300 mile front here right in front of us not more than sixty to a hundred kilometers from us so we have all of those things that we were working through okay ground war okay we're going the AirCam pen is damaged as much as it can we've seen it we've watched it we see it's getting closer and closer EPW’s start to show up we got the 800th MP brigade in here the start and develop forty five thousand �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock EPW’s is expected over around KKMC and also further to the west now we got to start thinking about refugee camps okay because all of a sudden we've got deserters beginning to show up so that's huge on top of the supply mission and we're working all of this to the best of our capability at that particular time so we launch now we got to keep the fuel going the water going and everything like that okay we had probably a hundred buses from the Saudis because to move the troops forward they didn't have enough military assets on their own we brought only one bus back after the brown war because they had ground them into the sand and everything that was going forward okay was designed now to bring back our own casualties as necessary but all of a sudden we had all these EPW’s that we're being brought back on anything that was a supply [63:54 - 68:46] nature where we took the flatbed forward with the ammunition and everything like that well they're coming back empty okay but now hey we had EPW just corralled in the sand in the desert and a couple of soldiers watching over them waiting to be picked up I mean that's what was happening behind the battle lines in that particular time there was always something going on that needed attention and support as much as we could get from the Saudis the Saudis basically paid for everything in country we had to keep track of it though okay all those buses all those trucks ect. They paid for now the trucks where did the trucks come from they were all consigned for by the Saudis so they moved the coalition forces first and they were then sitting in �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock the truck farm and that's why they were offered to the US because we were late coming into the theater with a 7th Corps and trying to move supplies forward ok but they're all contracted and that 180 they were privately owned by the the third country national driver of that particular truck so in spite of everything you know looking like a war it was still contracting payments and everything like that going on at the same time. Did I lose you? James: No, No. So the shooting war only lasted a few days. Kent: So 100 our war okay now now we have the problem in Basra with the Shiites ok fearing Sunnis and Saddam ect. Okay and now we had refugee needs that were starting to develop okay and the next thing that was happening after the 100-hour war we put the tents up at Southwind when Schwartzkopf went up there to negotiate the end to it etc okay provided the security for it so some more logistics kinds of things happening okay so now the 100-hour war ends we're trying to stabilize things in southern Iraq with the 1st armored division the first entered division etc ok and as things begin to quiet down now what happens it's Katie bar the door because the US wants to get at soldiers home so redeployment becomes our top issue and at the same time that that's happening we have the issue happening with the Kurds way up north so now we're flying some of that supplies tentage water MRI’s okay that we didn't use we build up about 45 days worth of supply we use three days worth or a hundred hours worth and now we're starting to ship that stuff up to northern Iraq to support the Kurds so we got another �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock logistics mission that's happening at the same time that we're trying to now move the 18th Airborne Corps out and the seventh Corps out ok so here's another story 1st Armored Division comes back they got a redeployment area that's 20 by 25 kilometer square huge area before they can send their equipment to the port they've got to clean it this is U.S agricultural kind of requirement ok which means you need water you need water you need water you always need water so what happens in their 20 by 25 kilometer square area they had a Saudi that they had contracted who had a private well of his own and there was also a well in a small Saudi Vale that village that had about probably 15 huts in it ok they were more than a hut not a Tin Hunt or anything like that it was substantial mud and so forth ok so the first Armored Division had promised to repair the well that had broken remember this is two thousand feet deep ok and in the meantime he had a private well that was outside the little village and the 1st Armored Division had sent over some guys to put down a fifty thousand dollar bag and start drawing [68:47 - 73:24] water off of it and he got angry because they weren't repairing the well that was part of the deal ok so all of a sudden Kent Morris and I go out there he's my linguist and we find four guys over here with ak-47 Saudis and over on this side is four guys with m16s and each claiming the bag the water etc and the guy saying I'm not gonna pump anymore till you start paying me and the us saying hey we need it never going to take it so we went out and a day later we cut a contract for thirty thousand riyals a month it's about eight thousand dollars a month to draw that �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock water okay he started out at a hundred and twenty thousand riyals a month okay the Saudis knew when they had somebody that they could make some money off oh I mean that was the bad thing about host nation and contracting is the doggone cost kept going up every time he went back and he needed more it had doubled it had tripled and we needed to bring the Saudis in to find out what's a reasonable rate for whatever is involved whether it's water whether it's fresh fruits and vegetables whether it's bread I mean you lived on MREs for about 30 days and then you know that was a morale Buster so we had to get the fresh fruit water and everything like that that we got from the Saudis we got them from the Saudis okay at a cost at a cost. James: so how long did you wind up spending in Saudi Arabia then? Kent: I was there too I got back in June and by that time we had brought into into Saudi Arabia 400,000 short tons of ammunition we only used 50,000 short tons so short we had 350,000 tons to clean up pack up and ship back okay we had firing ranges before we launched the ground war where they did practice in the desert and there was unexploded ordnance that didn't explode when they fired at downrange and to this day I know that some camel herder or bedowin is going to stumble on that blown to hell okay there then we had to bring in the legal team we had to solve that particular issue pay the amount at etc. I mean during during the buildup we had almost 25 vehicles passing a single point in a minute on Tapline Road which is MSR Dodge and at one time during the buildup we were losing almost a soldier a day to a traffic �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock accident part of that was due to the inexperienced Saudi drivers they drove like a teenager excuse me if you were on a two-lane highway and going too slow they’d just cut to the desert went around okay we didn't have enough MPs to put all over the place so it's a dangerous place to be and one time the,slogan when the briefing slide was what not one more soldier that we were losing to a traffic accident because of the high intensity as far as supporting the troops the two cores are out there plus the British division was out there the French division was out there coalition forces were out there all using the same two lane highway MSR dodge. James: Now did things eventually wind down for you or…? Kent: when I left we were trying to move everything out okay including all the equipment came in the ammunition that came in and everything like that okay so we're beginning to wane down it's all coming back to KKMC except we were going to put a brigade size unit in Kuwait so in that case we were cleaning up the equipment to move it to a new base and that was gonna become [73:25 - 77:38] a support base in Kuwait just outside of Kuwait City in the event Saddam decided to do something again the Shiites that were still in southern Iraq because that hadn't settled down all together okay so when I left we still had a host nation office that was still working in supporting the Redeployment in terms of moving equipment out and so forth move the personnel out first �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock then we moved the equipment out etc okay I mean you the ammunition dump that we had you couldn't even see to the end of it I mean just stacked up and it came in at a pallet but by the time it came back though came back in vehicles the pallets were broken so it had to be cleaned up had to be repalletized then reloaded put her on to an 18-wheeler ship back to the port loaded back up on the ship and taken out again okay we had we had 20-foot and 40-foot containers stacked double and triple high in the desert okay got in too late. James: Now, did your unit go out together or did you leave individually or…? Kent: so we came we had an advance party that came in that was I think about the six strong early December then the main unit was a hundred and fifty they came in before Christmas and then we came out in May most of us came out in May early June we left behind though a fairly sizable cell of about twenty thirty some of those were volunteers that came from other units that augmented the 21st TACOM that was working with the 22nd because the movement took place for another year to get stuff out of country so there were some volunteers that stayed well after that yeah. James: Alright because yours was a reserve unit and there is an expectation that they get to go back home. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: Yeah we thought we thought it would be over at about two months right I was listening to this story earlier here in Korea they thought it was gonna be quick well I remember Pagones getting up on a stage and saying you know you longings are gonna be here in the last out he's absolutely right. James: Now did you get into Kuwait yourself? Kent: I was in Kuwait several times James: What were you doing there? Kent: we had in the hospital it's about 300 patients those three M evac hospitals the Iraqis came across the line because they got hurt and things like that I mean that kept hitting the units all along so we had a build up of 300 patients in the evac hospitals that was located there KK MC and we did one bus trip back to softmod which was up through Kuwait and then into southern Iraq we also did what about 18 Chinook lifts of which about we had about 24 Iraqis each and [77:39 - 80:43] getting because the evac Hospital couldn't leave until excuse me the patients were cleared out some didn't want to go back okay so wanted to claim asylum and so forth that was a whole �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock other issue that we had to work through so yes probably Highway one where a A-10 shot up the highway and just terrific desert action I mean you could smell that when you drove through there and I was through there about two days afterwards okay work in that particular area is devastating I mean the number of vehicles everything that was on the vehicles and everything like that. James: now were there also oil fires? Kent: oh yes yep so you drove through a black region I mean it was just like night so our guys our guys were exposed to plutonium as far as the ammunition is concerned they were exposed to pesticides because we used a lot of pesticides in the desert there they were exposed to the oil fires that were there so I don't know what's going to come out of the Gulf War when we really start to look at 10 15 years later like we looked at Agent Orange coming out of Vietnam and so forth okay it's hard to say. James: and that's independent of any kind of chemical or biological agents the Iraqis might have had someplace or whatever Kent: yeah yeah �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: at the same time all right now thought you would talked about you know your being in Saudi Arabia and so forth and being able to see the news and that kind of stuff did you have more personal communication with home and you would have in Vietnam Kent: oh yes I might also share with you I think we left a million dollar telephone bill because we figured out how we could direct down the home without but now if you were unit in the sand I mean you had the the phone banks there etc. okay but remember we were inside the Emerald City okay this is this is a well developed area so personally I knew where I could go to find a phone and I could direct dial home the only thing I had to watch was the eight hour difference between home and us now we didn't abuse it but everybody on the team could have to call back at least once okay so that was much different much different. James: Alright now when you do leave that what's the physical process of getting out where do you fly out of and where do you go? Kent: So KKMC we went back down to Dahran, Dahran we loaded on a plane a civilian plane in this case it wasn't a c-130 I remember I don't remember where we stopped but we flew directly in to Indianapolis in this case so not the East Coast not the West Coast I mean family [80:44 - 83:41] �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock was there waiting when we came in etc and it was Katie bar the door nobody wanted to hang around the center any longer than you have to just a quick debriefing safety instruction go out on leave and then come back and you start working on what you need to do as far as reports are concerned and so forth all right very pleasant. James: Kind of a contrast to coming back from Vietnam. Kent: yes the 180 again just a complete different. James: Okay so what kind of cleanup then did you have to do once you got back you have to have a lot of worked a lot of paperwork to do? Kent: Not bad at all because we didn't take any heavy equipment transportation wise over with us so it's mainly personnel equipment after-action reports doing things of that nature lessons learned we always had lessons learned I always say lessons forgotten because they got written down and it seemed like it always came up two years later and said did we just go through this nut throw but people change and that's what happens they don't necessarily read the afteraction report or the lessons learned or things change in terms of the equipment and everything like that I mean when we went to Operation Joint Endeavor 95 96 I mean we commuted communicated by the internet I mean that's how we came through those three different kinds of �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock things I mean that was just that absolutely amazing I was still communicating with IUSB in terms of my work role via the Internet at that time. James: So you’re back in 91 then you have… things are relatively quiet for four years? Kent: For about four years I still at IUSB in 95 the balloon goes up for operation Joint Endeavor the mobile I the unit gets mobilized again not 150 I want to say about 80 or 90 we fell in on Kaiserslautern at that particular time and we the main operating base was out of Kaiserslautern Germany and we had a forward log unit at the end of the rail line in Hungary because we were now moving stuff out of Germany down to Hungary and then from Hungary on into Serbia Kosovo etc Croatia okay. James: So this is all peacekeeping and what used to be Yugoslavia the other support. Kent: Yeah again a very safe environment long missions now I'm working with the Germans the Austrians and the Hungarians and a liaison kind of way to make sure the rail lines are open making sure that we have convoy clearances in terms of moving stuff via the highway and everything of that nature so again in a very safe kind of environment protective kind of environment working with the host nation solving problems keeping things moving etc I mean I couldn't ask for anything better again okay. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock [83:42 - 86:43] James: Alright were there notable differences between how the Germans Austrians Hungarians worked or was it fairly seamless? Kent: W ell the Germans were very well prepared because remember we had reforger and return of forces to Germany during the Cold War then we had reforger where we moved everything out of Germany okay the seventh Corps down to Saudi Arabia so a lot of experience there okay and and prepositioned equipment and Germany and everything like that where we had nothing pre position as far as the Saudis were concerned so we had that experience coming out of Germany again in supporting operation Joint Endeavor and the liaison were just excellent okay I mean they knew the inside and the out the Australian liaison officer know who to contact to get the convoy clearance if there was any problem along the road and everything like that again just tremendous professional and personnel in a counterpart kind of way okay at all military okay but the military knew who would contact in a civilian kind of way. James: Right. Within Austria or Hungary, was it different there. Kent: No same thing. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: Okay. Kent: Great liaison again the only thing is in Hungary we jammed so much in terms of the rail they didn't have time to unload it we backed up the trains when we're starting bad. James: Now I guess if you and then that's getting right down to the point pretty much where you rule. Kent: so 96 I come back third deployment or third combat area not quite so close combat each one of those times I am at IUSB and IUSB is a little bit unsung with me now they I got pulled out twice as a professional person there and we all understand the laws and everything like that but that puts a tremendous strain on the office that you're trying to run and everything like that okay I kind of felt like I had out warned my welcome there I always refer to myself when I got mobilized for Desert Storm but I was a closeted reservists most of the professors there the staff there didn't know that I was participating or anything like that so they were utterly surprised and I guess that was part of my education is to write the letters home from the Gulf and kind of educate him a little bit more on what a reservist does when he's mobilized and so forth okay so I came back in 96 assuming my same job again kind of associate dean for student services and registrar and I had applied part of that to West Point for registrar's and an assistant dean kind of position but I didn't make it any place and they hired in person kind of thing I learned later so the �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock second time I said I'm gonna give this another shot but I downplayed my military bio because the first time I did play my military bio with West Point you'd think that'd be a positive right so I [86:44 - 89:50] downplayed that work more on the civilian part of it. Got invited to an interview and they were pleasantly surprised to hear my military background as I went through the committee and was shown around and everything like that and that went well I mean in 97 I was headed then in June to United States Military Academy stayed there for thirteen years and absolutely loved every year of it okay put me back in higher education again I had the adult student so I had missed the maturity of the adult student and had pretty much the 18 to 21 year old and some immaturity I shouldn't say that okay but great students cadets again but a different kind of cadet okay so I was back working in higher education absolutely loved it again okay teaching leadership course psych course and so forth and then stayed there for 13 years to 2010. James: So you're doing that then through 9/11 and through.. Kent: I'm a civilian though I'm a civilian in a military setting okay because I hit my mandatory retirement date after 28 years so and I hit that the same year 97 that I went to West Point so I went in as a civilian �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock James: Right so what was the response at West Point to 9/11. Kent: well that was devastating and I remember sitting at my desk when we saw the first thing happening on TV and it impacted it impacted many parents that were connected to the towers and had son or daughter Westland I mean that's where you really felt it but in addition to that a lot of the firemen and the policemen didn't live in Manhattan proper they lived upstate you know an hour and a half two hours away because of the cost of living and oh by the way if you're a policeman or fireman you went down for three shifts you could work the 3 shifts you had a place to stay you come back to the community etc so some of the local communities really got hit hard in terms of firemen and policemen so that was a second whammy during 9/11 so it's not only the Academy but the small community fort Montgomery that we lived in or the surrounding communities there that we really felt the impact of that and that's where our security went up at at West Point and all of a sudden you didn't have enough MPs to put on the front gate in an extended kind of way and so the Dean at one star was out there pulling security at the front gate we were pulling security there any military was pursuing security civilians helped out kind a way and I remember the Dean coming back one night and saying boy you never want to be on duty when the hockey team comes back because their bags are really strong there's a lot of little stories like that that you know you'd never hear any place else but just kind of humanizes everything that happens and what happened after 2010 ok I’m on social security by nowI’m getting older maybe it's time to retire and Diane wanted to come back at that particular time so I �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock came back spent a year we built a new house but the whole Walker lower basement was undeveloped I said well that's going to be my task for a year so 125 sheets of sheetrock 10 foot high so forth I have totally immersed myself in that took my lunch back into the basement worked hard there and I literally flunked retirement I flunked retirement and I was serving on a [89:51 - End] committee at at the alcohol addictions and Resource Center in South Bend and I had served on when I was with IUSB on the board of directors went back I showed my resume there and Steve Camilleri the executive director for the center of the homeless on my resume and say hey you know we're opening up a center a 24 bed Center for homeless veterans and he talked me into that okay so in 2012 I became a 2011 the end of 2011 I became the director of the Robert Miller Veterans Center for homeless veterans of 24 bed facility and I've been there since almost 5 plus years James: it was that South Bend Kent: that's in South Bend. James: Alright yeah well there are worse ways to flunk retirement I think. �Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Kent Laudeman Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Chad Hitchcock Kent: It keeps me busy, it gets me out of the house I think. James: Alright well thanks for a pretty remarkable and unusual story. different thank you very much for taking the time. Kent: Thank you for what you're doing with veterans okay. � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_LaudemanK2133V Title A name given to the resource Laudeman, Kent (Interview transcript and video), 2017 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2017-06-20 Description An account of the resource Kent Laudeman was born in 1943 in Bremen, Indiana. After graduating high school, he attended college to avoid the draft for seven years, but was eventually drafted into the Army in 1968. He completed both basic and advanced training at Fort Dix, New Jersey, before being sent to Fort Jordan, Georgia, for MLS training and then Fort Ben Harrison for basic officer training. In August of 1970, Laudeman was deployed to Vietnam for only a year. Due to his struggles supporting a family, he went to USAR in Kingsbury as an on-reserve instructor and, at the end of 1990, was called to action in Saudia Arabia in KKMC (King Kalaat Military City). After a year in KKMC, he returned to the states until 1995, when he was brought to Hungary for Project: Joint Endeavor. In 1996, he returned to the United States after his last deployment. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Laudeman, Kent Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/34d7f3fa88b9612de4b684bd32ddaabe.mp4 68b5f5449ebbc07797731c1102cfb553 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/dc740b15f7c41949f1b3d43c064f2476.pdf 286210e5e9d6a20ea4430ea619ec1818 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Will Holton Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Grace Balog Interviewer: We are talking today with Will Holton of Grand Rapids, Michigan, and the interviewer is James Smither of the Grand Valley State University Veteran’s History Project. Okay, now Will, can you start us off on some background on yourself? And to begin with, where and when were you born? Veteran: I was born in Crockett County, Tennessee. Interviewer: And your date of birth? Veteran: January the 19th, 1919. Interviewer: Very good. And how long did you live there? Veteran: When I was 4 years old, my parents went to Blytheville, Arkansas. And they stayed at Blytheville, Arkansas until I was 14. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, and so at that time, when you were in Arkansas, what was your family doing for a living? Veteran: Oh, farmer. We were farmer. Interviewer: Alright. And did you rent land? Or did you own land? Veteran: Well, before we went to Arkansas…Okay, my father was raised by Arleyy Loud and Book [?] Loud, so far as I know, I am just going by what I am told because see I don’t know. He owned, you know like—He was their guy so he run things. So I say, when I was four years old, �then he left and went to Arkansas. We stayed there like ten years and then we come right back to where we left. Then we stayed there until I was 16, then we went to Alamo. That’s the county, the biggest town in Crockett County. Then there, I started to work for the county. (00:02:00) Interviewer: Okay. Now, how much schooling did you have? Veteran: 10th grade. Interviewer: Okay. And so then, you started working for the county? Veteran: At 19 years old. Interviewer: Okay, and what work were you doing? Veteran: Back then they had what they called a WPA and so you wasn’t supposed to get on the WPA until you were 20 years old, but I got married when I was 18 years old. Before I got married, I signed up. They had a program that’s called you work two days and you go to school three days. That’s what I signed up for. But I got married before the card come back. When it come back, it said the WPA. So, my daddy didn’t sign up for me… Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: So, they had to—I wasn’t old enough but beings I was married, they had to let me work so they give me the water—I was a water boy until there was a man that…A hard guy that knowed my parents. He seen after the tractors and things. When he found out I was, you know, he took me—then I worked with him, gas up the tractors and caterpillar and put the new regular tracks on and everything. And so, I worked there for three years. Then after that cut out, I went to Paris, Tennessee. And they were building an army camp, and I worked up there all winter. �And when that job was played out, I come back to Alamo. And then I went to work at the fish plant in Malvern. Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: But then I worked at—my wife died. And then, about 6 months after my wife died, I had to go to the Army. (00:04:01) Interviewer: Okay, you got a draft notice then. Do you remember how you heard about Pearl Harbor? Veteran: I heard about Pearl Harbor after I got out to the Army. Interviewer: Okay, so when that happened, you didn’t have— Veteran: I mean, Pearl Harbor? Oh yeah. Interviewer: The attack, yeah. Veteran: Pearl Harbor, I said they bombed Pearl Harbor in ’41. I was at home then. It was in ’42, I went to the Army. Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: I thought you was talking about the bomb. Interviewer: No, no. That comes later. Veteran: I heard about that after I got out to the Army. Interviewer: Right. Okay. Now, when the war started, did you expect that you would have to go in the Army? Or did you think that because you had a family to take care of and everything else, they’d leave you alone? �Veteran: Well to tell you the truth, I just didn’t really think nothing about it at all. Interviewer: Okay. Now, did you notice other people getting drafted or going off? Veteran: Oh yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, now when they drafted you, how did that work? Did they send you a letter? Or…? Veteran: Yeah. Well see, I lived right there in the town, and so I passed the draft board—I was ready to hit the draft board. Interviewer: Oh Okay. So, you are right there anyway… Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Yeah, and so you— Veteran: So, they just knowed—they didn’t have to send me the letter, they just called me because they all knowed. Interviewer: Alright, they said “Hey Will, you’re going in the Army now.” Veteran: They called me and then they gave me a piece of paper then I read it. It said what time to be at the, you know, draft boards. Interviewer: Okay. Where did they send you for the first part of your training? Veteran: Fort Benning, Georgia. Interviewer: Okay. And then how did they get you to Fort Benning? Veteran: On the train. �Interviewer: Okay. Alright. Veteran: From home, I caught the bus to Jackson, Tennessee. Then from Jackson, Tennessee, I had to catch a train to Fort Benning, Georgia. Interviewer: Alright, now this is 1940s, and the south is still segregated. So, did you have to ride on the back of a bus or in a separate train car or…? Veteran: Well you know that’s…A lot of folks said that but at that time, at Tennessee, I had never rode the bus. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I never went nowhere. Whenever I’d go, I just sat wherever I wanted because I never rode the bus. Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: You know, I have heard a lot of people talk about that but…See in Crockett County, in Tennessee, you know I heard stuff said like Jim Crowe? I never experienced it. Interviewer: So, this is just sort of small towns and small communities and people know each other… Veteran: Yeah. Well no, I wouldn’t say they love each other, I just say I never experienced it. I don’t know what the other folks did. Around my hometown, most of the people, they knowed me. Lot of them said I did every a good self. (00:07:08) Interviewer: Alright. Okay. �Veteran: Because I did, I guess I like this example. The white people raised my daddy. Well, in that town, I would help, you know, I didn’t care if you were white or black. I just didn’t see color, I see person. I don’t care what color you is. If you’re nice, I would be nice. But if you wasn’t nice, I wouldn’t be nice. Interviewer: That makes sense. Alright, okay well now you’ve gone and joined the Army. Now… and you get to Fort Benning, and what happens there? Veteran: Well I said and then they sent us down to Cusseta, Alabama [actually Georgia]. Interviewer: Well, talk a little bit about the training at Fort Benning. What did you learn there? Veteran: Well I said you do infantry training. Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: You learn how to shoot a gun, lay out at night and sleep in the blankets and things. Just Army… (00:08:10) Interviewer: Okay. And then, they also have to teach you how to follow orders and how to march and those kinds of things? Veteran: Oh yeah. Well, I got most of that after I hit—they didn’t teach you much. Would take us to camp south of Alabama. That way before you returned, you had main training. At Fort Benning, Georgia they just—you didn’t get around just keep your upside, you didn’t just sit around in the bed. But the captain said at Alabama, they start doing the real training. You know you lay out at night and sleep in the shelter there. And I tell you…And then we got to Texas, then they issue a rifle. Then they make you have—you go to bed at night, you keep your rifle in �bed with you. You could move but if they caught you moving without your rifle, you got extra duty. Interviewer: Do you know where you were in Texas? Veteran: They said west Texas, but I forget what camp it was. Interviewer: Alright. Well, there were a lot of camps. So there is Fort Bliss in El Paso, or do you think you weren’t that far over? Veteran: Well, all I know is that we were right outside Abilene. Interviewer: Okay, so— Veteran: I don’t know what name of the camp. Interviewer: Alright, well there were a lot of them so…Actually no, somebody researching that could look that up and they’d figure that out. Veteran: I told you it was around Abilene, Texas. Interviewer: Okay, now were all of the men—was this an all-black unit that you were training with? Veteran: We had a couple of—we had a guy named Elwood Lorett—we had a couple of white guys. Well, let’s say it like that. When they come to the state, they settled as white. But see they Frenchmen. When they back in France, they settle as Africa. But see now, what they was, I don’t know. (00:10:10) Interviewer: Alright. But the Army itself was segregated, so you would get put into an allblack unit? �Veteran: Yeah, I would say so. Interviewer: Okay. Now the people who were—now the drill instructors as they were training you, how did they treat you? Veteran: Well they were…they was black. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: We had the captain, and most of the lieutenant, most of them was all white. But they didn’t train you. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: The first sergeant and the sergeant and the staff, all of them would train you. Interviewer: Mhmm. Okay, so the non-coms were black. The non-commissioned officers, the sergeants and the corporals, those were all black. Veteran: Right. Interviewer: Okay, so they were training you. Now, how did they treat you? Veteran: Well they was really nice, and like I said, in the Army I wasn’t really that nice because I was trying to get a dishonorable discharge. But I said, they treated me nice. We had a few little frictions but I say…they had me a couple of times but I’d say I had good sense. Interviewer: Well, what were you doing to try to get a discharge? Veteran: Some orders, I wouldn’t follow. Interviewer: Okay. �Veteran: Like if they put me on extra duties, some I’d do, some I wouldn’t. And they said “they going to put you in the guardhouse.” And I said “I don’t care.” Interviewer: So, did they put you in the guardhouse? Veteran: No, they wouldn’t. I said the captain asked me…I was corporal of the guard and I had an apartment in town, so when you go out at 5 o’clock in the evening, you can’t get off until 5 o’clock the next evening. But, when I took my meal off a guard at 5 o’clock in the morning, I asked him for his sergeant. I had an apartment in town, and there was something I wanted to go get. And I asked him, “Could I go?” And he said “No.” I told him I was going anyhow. So he told the captain. The captain called me into the office, and I went in the office, saluted him. He says, “Did you tell the sergeant you going to town?” “Yep.” He said, “Don’t you know you could be court martialed?” I said, “Yep.” He says, “You going?” “Yep.” “If I gave you a pass, will you go and come back and make a good soldier?” “Yep.” I just wanted an hour but he gave me a 12hour pass. But I was going in the house. (00:12:50) Interviewer: Okay, sure. That’ll help. Okay, so maybe you were actually good at your job? Veteran: Oh yeah, I’d say. Interviewer: Okay, now when you were in Texas, were you now training as an engineer unit? Veteran: No, truck driver. Interviewer: You were a truck driver at this point, okay. Veteran: I got pitched so well. I trained down there as a truck driver. �Interviewer: Okay. But were you now training with the unit that you had served with overseas? Or had you not joined them yet? Veteran: No, no. Interviewer: This is just general training still? Veteran: When they sent me to Alabama, they take so many—after you train at this for 18 weeks…I forget, however…Then they bussed us up. They put you where they think they need you. You know, you didn’t—I’d guess I was in about 5 different outfits. The last outfit was the end of the year one when I went overseas. But I went from infantry training to truck driver training. Then I went for that big gun. The ringing, I don’t hear so good. Interviewer: Okay, so you had artillery training? Veteran: What? Interviewer: Artillery training then? Veteran: Yeah, 155 millimeter. Interviewer: Yeah, those are big guns. (00:14:12) Veteran: Yeah, so that’s the reason I don’t hear so good. Interviewer: Okay, now do you remember where you did the artillery training? Veteran: Yeah, Camp Wilson, Louisiana. Interviewer: Okay, that’s in Louisiana. Alright. Okay. Veteran: And then from there, they sent us down to Camp—Camp Shelby, Mississippi, where we took engineer training. �Interviewer: Alright. Now, with the engineer training, what were they actually teaching you to do? Veteran: Build a—we had to, like I said, pontoon—you know what a pontoon bridge is? Interviewer: Mhmm. Veteran: And then infantry rafts and things. They teach you how to. In other words, we stayed between the field artillery and the infantry so in Germany when they’d go put bombs in the highways, you know, and mines. Our job was to clean out the mines. And we had a bridge brought in on a truck. We put out a bridge—we’d have to blow up a bridge, then put our bridge down and let the truck go by until we could get another built. Then we’d take our bridge up and put it on the truck. You know. Interviewer: And then do it again. Veteran: That was our job. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Until I said we had to go up for reinforcements. Interviewer: Right, but that comes later in the story. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: So, we are going to try to follow things in order. So, you are bouncing around a lot in the west, from one camp to another, and one training assignment to another? Veteran: Yeah. �Interviewer: So, this would be going on probably through much of 1943. So, you’re spending probably the better part of a year doing this? Veteran: Yeah, because you had 13 weeks. At each place, you spent 13 weeks. Interviewer: Yeah. And you’ve got about 4 different places, so. Veteran: Until I was in Mississippi. Interviewer: Right. Okay. Veteran: So, when they…they sent one lieutenant down…one they had sent to Fort Benning Georgia. I mean from Camp Wilson, Louisiana to Mississippi. They sent a lieutenant and said he was training us to go overseas. So, we went through the 13 weeks of training. And at first, when it got time to take a test, the first sergeant told us to flunk the test. He said if you didn’t—if we didn’t flunk the test, we was going overseas. So, we flunked the test. So that lieutenant left and they sent another, Captain Emerhoe. He looked like he was around 60 years old. So, the sergeant said we had to go back over that same test. And he told us we could pass the test because he was too old to go anywhere. So, when the test come up, we would all pass the test. Then a week after we passed the test, they quarantined us. That means you couldn’t go nowhere. So, then we asked sergeant “what’s the matter?” He said, “I don’t know.” In about another week, they said “You’re going to Camp…Camp Shanks, New York.” He told us then, “Now we know where we’re going.” (00:17:40) Interviewer: Yeah. Because that was one of the main places for sending people over across to Europe from. Veteran: Yeah. �Interviewer: Alright. Now, during the time when you are at these different bases, were you always able to move around off base without any trouble? Was it— Veteran: Oh yeah, we didn’t have no trouble. When we was in Mississippi, they issued us all knives. And they told us men, two of you three stay together. So, MP—the police, the regular police, couldn’t arrest us. (00:18:16) Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: After one MP—we didn’t—they didn’t have nothing to say to us. So, they told us you’re going over-seas, you may get killed, so don’t take nothing off of nobody. That’s the order we got from the Army. Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: Till… then the police didn’t mess with us, unless there was an MP with them. If the MP with them, they can say something to us. But if the MP wasn’t with them. Interviewer: But if anybody was going to arrest you, it would have to be the MP? Veteran: Right. Interviewer: Right, okay. So, okay, so they worked better than maybe most people think they did. Okay. Veteran: Well I heard a lot of people saying things went on in the Army that I don’t know nothing about. Interviewer: Yeah, well, the idea here is we want to know what you saw and what you did and what you remember. So that, that’s good. Okay, now, so they send you now to Camp Shanks, New York. Now, what unit are you with now? �Veteran: 1697 Engineer Company. Interviewer: Okay. So, you are now with your engineer battalion, and you have been training with them in Mississippi and now you are moving as a group…Okay. What kind of ship did they put you on? Was it just a regular transport? Or an ocean liner? Veteran: It was the USS Bliss. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I ain’t got the picture but it… Interviewer: Well, was it a really big ship? Veteran: Oh yeah, it was a very big one. Interviewer: Okay. Did you have—was it just your battalion on that ship? Veteran: Oh no, there was a thousand of us. Interviewer: Okay, so that…So it’s either a big Army transport or a converted ocean liner. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Yeah. So, a big ship. Okay, so in the meantime, when your ship sailed, were you in a convoy? Or were you by yourself? Veteran: No, my whole company, my whole outfit. Interviewer: No, was the ship with a lot of other ships? (00:20:14) �Veteran: No. Well it was, as far as I could see, because I said once you get on the ship, the ship is so big, you know. But when you, when we got…After we left the dock, they let us come out on the top. I could see two other ships, like a convoy, but I don’t know how many. Interviewer: Yeah, but that would be part of a convoy, because you wouldn’t see that many of them at once. Veteran: No. Interviewer: But if there were other ships there then you had an escort. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay, do you remember what the weather was like when you went across the ocean? Veteran: Well the weather was good, if you could say, how the water with the waves flying, if you could say that is good. But it wasn’t raining or nothing. Interviewer: Alright. Do you know what time of year it was when you went over? Was it, you know, when you got over to England, was it warm or cold? Veteran: It was kind of cold. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: You’d have your cold days. I would say it was in the fall of the year. Interviewer: Okay, that makes sense. Alright. Now, when you were crossing the ocean, did you ever have any…Did you have any U boat scares? �Veteran: Yeah. Yeah, a lot of them. Because the ship we was on, the motor went bad and all those other boats went up and they left. Loaded up about two of those little U boats, and they would take them…Because they said one time that they came on the ship that the Germans was trying to tow the main boat. And them little U boats, they were like ducks, going around. (00:22:05) Interviewer: Yeah. But those— Veteran: And then they would drop those ash cans over the back. Interviewer: Okay, so they left a couple of escorts with you, and they were protecting you against the Germans. Alright, so you survived that. Veteran: And after they got that motor fixed, what they said was “oh, you can’t go by what you hear” they said. Then they, they said, they run into top knot then we caught back up, because we took about a day or so to catch back up with them. Interviewer: Alright. And then do you know, do you remember where you landed in Britain? Did you land up in Scotland? Or did you land in the south— Veteran: In England. Interviewer: In England. Veteran: Uffcott, England. Interviewer: Okay. And what happens after you get there? Do you go to a camp or…? Veteran: Well, we head back to a…Like a big place where the rich folks stays. Interviewer: Okay. So, a big estate of some kind. �Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And at there we was, they say 50 miles from London where the Germans were dropping their rockets and… Interviewer: Yeah. Veteran: So, we could, you know. They said we was 50 miles from there. I didn’t go, some of the soldiers went but I didn’t because the Germans were dropping some of them rockets in London. Interviewer: Okay. So now you are getting into 1944, because that is when they are sending the buzz bombs in and all that. Okay. Now did you—and so what were you doing, what was your unit doing at this place where you were staying? Were you training more? Or just sitting around? Veteran: Mostly we were sitting around. Well, we’d do a little but you know, most days we were just sitting around. Interviewer: Okay, and then did you get to go into any of the towns in the area or go to a pub or something like that? Veteran: I said I didn’t, but some of the soldiers I said. Interviewer: Yeah. Okay. Veteran: They said we were 50 miles from…We was in Uffcott, England, and they said it was 50 miles from there to London. Some of the soldiers went. I didn’t. (00:24:06) Interviewer: Okay. �Veteran: Because they said they were dropping them bombs. Interviewer: Right. Okay, but did you go into the local town? Did you go into Uffcott or…? Veteran: Well that, there ain’t no time. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: They have a little here what they call a pub, maybe one year. There wasn’t no town or something like that. It’s a village. That’s what you’d call a village. Interviewer: Right. Okay, so not a lot going on there? Veteran: No. Interviewer: Okay, now was it just your battalion that was on that base? Or were there— Veteran: Right. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: It was just us out there. Interviewer: Alright. And within that battalion, did you have a particular job? Or did you just do whatever they wanted? Veteran: Let’s see, I was…At the time, I was a Corporal. You had to go on guard, but you didn’t—we didn’t do no kind of work. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: But you had to stand guard. Well, I didn’t stand guard, but I had to put people on guard and stuff like that. �Interviewer: Alright. Okay, and so then—but if the unit is actually doing engineer work, if they are building a bridge for instance— Veteran: That’s after we went into Germany. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: After they said the Germans broke through the American line, then we, after reinforcement, then they sent us into Germany. Interviewer: Okay, now— Veteran: Then we started building, you know… Interviewer: Yeah, then you go to work. Okay, now probably, given the timing of things here, the big German breakthrough happened in December of 1944, and that was the start of the Battle of the Bulge. And the Americans in fact sent a whole bunch of engineer battalions in there as reinforcements. Okay, now do you remember—okay, how did they get you across the English Channel? Veteran: Through the ship. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And then there, right where we were, there were a lot of other ships that were sunk, they say a lot of the soldiers were still in them boats. Of course, some of them we went through, passed some of the ships to cross the channel. Interviewer: Okay. And then, did you go into a harbor and get off at a dock? Or did you land on a beach somewhere? (00:26:18) �Veteran: On the beach. Interviewer: Okay. Because they were still using Omaha Beach and places like that still. Okay, and then when you land there, then how do they move you forward? Veteran: So, we had our own trucks and things. Interviewer: Okay. So, you just drove? Veteran: Yeah, they got the orders and we moved. I don’t know what kind of orders they got. Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: But our captain was in on them so went he said, and we went. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. Veteran: Let’s see, we had, we didn’t have just one company. It was 1697 in that combat battalion. So, we went by ourselves, wherever they sent us. We didn’t send with no other thing. Interviewer: Right. So, they had, they split—the battalion has several different companies in it. Veteran: Right. Interviewer: So, your company, with your captain, kind of goes by itself. Veteran: Yeah, in a company. Interviewer: Right. Okay, and so you drive across France and probably, did you stay in France? Or did you go into Belgium? Or did you go straight to Germany? Or do you not really know? �Veteran: When we left Uffcott…After we crossed the English Channel, I don’t know where we went! Interviewer: You wouldn’t know where you were. Okay. Do you have an idea of how long it was before you started to build bridges? Or how long it took you to get towards the front of the line? Veteran: Well, I said, after they got reinforcements, well I guess about maybe a week or 8 or 10 days, then we fell back and started doing that. Interviewer: Okay. So probably what is happening is you are being moved up toward where they think the front line might be, and if the Germans came that way, you would have had to fight them. (00:28:04) Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: So, when you first went forward, did you have to dig fox holes or anything like that? Or did you just camp? Veteran: No, we didn’t. They should be done, but we didn’t dig no fox holes. Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: I said it should be done, but we didn’t dig—I guess some part, some soldiers did, but we didn’t, no. Interviewer: Sure. Okay, so they weren’t, that—the Germans weren’t getting that close to you then? Veteran: No. See, we went to work. We went and relieved these guys so these guys could go up to the front. �Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: So, we were close enough to see the flashes from them guns and things but we wasn’t exactly on the front. We left these guys so they could go up to the fight, until they could get reinforcements, and we fell back. Interviewer: Yeah. Okay. But now they have got you over there and now you start building then. Did you spend most of your time building bridges, or were you doing mind-clearing or…? Veteran: That’s what we did, we cleared mines out of the street, we built bridges, and we cleared mines. That was our job. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: So, the goal was to bring the ammunition and stuff through. We keep the road clear and things. Interviewer: Alright, now when your unit was building bridges, what were you doing? Veteran: I said I was a guard. I had a .30 caliber machine gun. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I had a .30 caliber machine gun, the guy in the first battalion had a .50 caliber machine gun mounted on to the back of the truck. I was in the second battalion and I had a .30 caliber machine gun that was on a tripod. Interviewer: Mhmm, yep, and so you were protecting…? Veteran: The guys working. �Interviewer: The engineers, yeah. Okay, so you didn’t have to do the heavy lifting? Veteran: No, not me. Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: I wasn’t big enough. Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: I was very small back in them days. Interviewer: Okay, now as you are doing this work, did you look around much at the countryside? Or see anything of the people? Or…? (00:30:08) Veteran: No, I didn’t. Interviewer: Okay, you just— Veteran: I couldn’t speak their language so I just didn’t. Interviewer: So, you just didn’t. Now— Veteran: A lot of soldiers did, but me, I just didn’t. Interviewer: Okay, you just mind your own—Okay, now, you had mentioned before that you had been married, you know, your wife had died, but you still had children at home at this time? Veteran: Yeah, I had one kid, and she was just all of 3 years old. Interviewer: And who was she living with? �Veteran: Well, I left her with my mother. But when I was going overseas, I got a letter from my sister. She said she had her so… Interviewer: Okay. Alright, now did you—and did you write home very much, or did they write to you? Or did you just…go away? Veteran: They mostly wrote to me when they wanted something. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, so now you are over in Europe, you are building bridges. Now, when you started doing this, was it during the winter? Was it cold? Veteran: Yeah, I would say it was winter in England. Yeah, it was cold. Interviewer: Yeah. Okay. And then, did you move around a lot? Were you moving forward regularly? Or did you stay in one area for a long time? Veteran: I forget. We stayed in one little village until we get the work done. Then we move up. We always moved up. Interviewer: Okay. So, you keep moving forward and advancing. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Alright, and did they tell you much of anything about what was happening in the war, or did you just…? Veteran: Well, I said mainly—Me? Not me, I didn’t get any word. Interviewer: Okay, so your captain might have known something. Veteran: Yeah, yeah, they knew everything. Interviewer: Okay. �Veteran: The Sergeants the same but… Interviewer: Alright. Now, were you normally—did you sleep in tents or in houses or on the ground? (00:32:04) Veteran: On the ground. We had shelter halves. I had a half a shelter and the other half, and you put them together and you just… Interviewer: Make a little pup tent. Okay, alright. Veteran: Or sleep on the truck. Pretty much wherever you wanted to sleep, but you couldn’t sleep in no house. Interviewer: Okay, so you didn’t get to borrow somebody’s house to sleep there. Veteran: Oh, no. Interviewer: But some guys did. Veteran: Well, the captain, he might have but we didn’t. Interviewer: Okay, now while you were doing this work, did you ever get hit by enemy artillery or aircraft? Or ever see any of that? Veteran: Yeah. We were guarding an ammunition dump. Before we—when we first got into Germany, well they had the little black out light on the truck, and they told everybody don’t turn your light on, just use the little black out light. So, we traveled mostly at night, when we were going on up to the front. And one night, some guy turned his light on and the Germans dropped one, they said, this like personnel bomber. It hit close enough to the truck to turn the truck over on one side. �Interviewer: Okay, so maybe German artillery that shot at you or something? Veteran: Yeah, I said after we got into Germany, we was camping in the woods and on our side. Every night at 10 o’clock, there was a guy, I would come over…When you were talking about…you know what I mean? We know the different sounds of every different plane. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: We knew when it was an American plane, we knew when it was a German plane. One night, we got the truck stalled at…and a couple of them weren’t very nice so we called them Bed Check Charlie. If you got a line going, he would turn the machine gun on and shoot at us. So, every night, we’d be out, we’d hear the plane, so we’d say here come Bed Check Charlie. So, we turned out all the lights. So, one night we got a truck stalled, and we had a light on, trying to get the truck un-stalled, and he come over and turned his machine gun on the truck. (00:34:21) Interviewer: Did he hit the truck? Veteran: Well, didn’t, he shot at the truck but he didn’t—that, you know, he couldn’t keep it from running, he just shot. So, they finally…We was on one side of the woods, and he was…But we didn’t know that. But you know, every night at 12 o’clock, he’d come over. So, they finally called him, I guess to—the whole outfit went off and left him. And they said he run out of petrol. I guess he couldn’t run his plane no more and that got him mowed down. Interviewer: Alright, so eventually, that’s not a problem. Alright. Veteran: But he, every night, we had a little plane so we named him Bed Check Charlie. Interviewer: Okay. Alright, now you are, you’re kind of working your way—Now, do you remember crossing over the Rhine River into Germany? A really big river? �Veteran: Yeah, I said when we crossed over, there were a lot of boats that sunk, and they said a lot of soldiers were still inside. Interviewer: Well, I think that was the English Channel. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: But then, when you go into Germany, the Rhine River is a major river that’s inside Germany. And there were—that was an obstacle, a major obstacle when we crossed it in March of 1945. But, do you remember crossing any really big rivers after you were in Europe or not? Veteran: No, I don’t. Interviewer: Alright. Veteran: The English Channel was the biggest I’d known. Interviewer: And then, as you are getting into the springtime and the Allied armies are moving forward, you’re going to move forward, you’ll build more bridges. Did the scenery change at all? (00:36:00) Veteran: Yeah, I’d say. A lot of towns we went to…I remember in Stuttgart, Germany…And we were building bridges in Stuttgart, Germany. One place when we was in Germany, like we was in this little village and we had to go through another little village to build a bridge. It was evening when you’d come back. They said that a squad of German prisoners was hid in the building we went through, in the little village we went through. So, when they got back, on our way back, they called the infantry in. They wanted them to wipe out the squad of Germans. So, �we went through, I guess they was hid in the buildings. But when we come back, we had to wait for them to get through fighting before. Interviewer: Okay. Alright. Now when you went to Stuttgart, could you see damage from the bombing? Veteran: Oh yeah. It was pitiful. There were kids on the road, asking for something to eat. They was sleeping in them old buildings. It was pitiful. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I’d see kids peeking around, begging for something to eat. So, we’d give them a lot of our rations. See, we had a C-ration. Interviewer: So that was mostly canned goods and dried things and, yeah. Veteran: Yeah, you had canned ration and C-ration. Sometimes, you’d get enough…So they gave us a box for your breakfast and your dinner and your supper. You carried it with you. But every night they would…As I said, a lot of the times, kids would be coming by, asking, what it means in Germany, for essence. So, a lot of time we, the soldiers just gave them something. Interviewer: Alright. Okay, now did you also go through villages that were still in good shape that hadn’t been bombed? Veteran: No. (00:38:02) Interviewer: Okay. So, you mostly saw areas that had been hit pretty hard. Veteran: Mhmm. Interviewer: Alright. And do you remember seeing any German prisoners of war? �Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Okay, and what did they look like? Veteran: Just ordinary white folks. Interviewer: Okay, well did you notice if some of them were kind of older or younger? Or you didn’t— Veteran: Well, I’d say mostly younger. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: I’d say after the war, after Germany surrendered, they sent us to Nancy, France. And we stayed there about 10 to 15 days. Then they sent us to Le Havre, France. Then they gave us 100 German prisoners to put in a water line. Interviewer: So, you’re going back, you’re doing more engineering work now? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: But you have German prisoners to work for you as laborers? Veteran: Mhmm. Interviewer: Alright. And what impression did you have of them? Veteran: Oh, just ordinary people to me. Interviewer: Okay. How did they behave? Veteran: They just did whatever you told them to do. Interviewer: Okay. �Veteran: There wasn’t nothing, they didn’t raise no sail or nothing. A lot of them were like us, I guess: glad it was over. Interviewer: Yeah. Alright, and then at that point, now do you see more of the French people now? Veteran: I said, when we were in Nancy, France. After we left Nancy, France…But to tell you the truth, I didn’t care for the French more than nobody else. Interviewer: Okay. But I meant were there a lot of civilians around now? Veteran: Oh yeah. Interviewer: Now, were the French doing any better than the Germans? Or, were they hungry too? Veteran: No, they had their own country I guess. They seemed to be doing… Interviewer: Okay? So, there was a difference there? Veteran: Yeah, they was a different race of people. See, over there, they call French African. In Nancy, France, they called French African. When they come to the states, they’re called Moroccan. I could never tell the difference. (00:40:05) Interviewer: Mhmm. Alright. Veteran: See, we had some in our outfit, called Moroccan in the States. When you get into France, they’re called French African. Interviewer: Well, the French had colonies in Africa, and so, including in North Africa, including Morocco. �Veteran: Yeah, well that was in Nancy, France. Interviewer: Right, but they just think of you like the people from their colonies. Veteran: I guess so. Interviewer: Or something like that. And so, it was a little different. Okay. Now then you said you got assigned Germans to help you work. And then, do you have a sense of how long you stayed in France? Veteran: Well now, I’d say I was there…Okay, when did the Japanese surrender? Interviewer: That’s in August of 1945. Veteran: Well, when the Japanese surrendered, we was a day from seeing the Pearl Harbor—I mean, from seeing the Statue of Liberty. We was on our way back to the states. Interviewer: Okay. So, they loaded you—they took you to Le Havre for a while, they put you on a boat. So now, summer of ’45, you’re on your way home. Okay, now what happens when you land in New York? Veteran: They sent us to Fort McPherson, Georgia. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: And we stayed there…They gave us a 30-day leave, and then they say they’d give you three months jungle training. They was supposed to go—that’s why we left, that was our assignment. But I say, the Japanese surrendered so we didn’t have to do that. Interviewer: Okay. �Veteran: We got a 30-day leave and we went back to the camp. Then they sent us down to…Where I got discharged…What’s the name of the camp? In Georgia… Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: With Fort Benning on one side… Interviewer: Okay, but it’s somewhere down in that area, but you are in Georgia and… (00:42:07) Veteran: Yeah. Alexandria, Louisiana. Fort Beauregard on one side of the town, and a camp on the other side of the town. Interviewer: Well at, Fort Benning, I think, is kind of close to the border between Georgia and Alabama. There’s a river in between. Anyway, okay. But, basically, you get discharged? Veteran: Huh? Interviewer: You get a leave home, and then you come back, and then you get a discharge? Veteran: Mhmm. Interviewer: Okay. So then, you probably are getting out of the Army in 1945. After the— Veteran: No, after that. I got out in 1946. Interviewer: Well, the war ends in August of ’45. And you were almost back to the states. And then, if you’re not spending a lot of time any place after that… Veteran: Well, I am sure they sent us to…We got back to the states, they sent us to Camp Shank, New York—No, they sent us to… �Interviewer: You went to Fort McPherson. Veteran: Yeah, in Georgia somewhere. And we stayed there. We got a 30-day leave. Interviewer: Right. Veteran: We were back to camp. We hung around camp. I don’t know exactly how long. Then they sent us down to Louisiana. Interviewer: Mhmm. And how long did you stay in Louisiana? Veteran: It was about the whole winter. Interviewer: Oh okay. That would take it to ’46. So that’s where it wraps up, okay. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Now, when you were in Louisiana, did you have any work to do? Or were you just sitting around? Veteran: Mhmm. After we come back from overseas, after you got back to camp, you just sit around. Interviewer: Okay, now when you had that 30-day leave, what did you do? Veteran: I went home to see my kids. Interviewer: Mhmm, alright. Veteran: That was my biggest thing. Most of my mind was on my kids, you know, I just. Interviewer: Right. And did she know who you were when you got home? Veteran: Oh yeah. (00:44:01) �Interviewer: Okay, good. Veteran: She knew who I was. Interviewer: Alright. So, after you got your discharge then, what did you do? Veteran: After I got my discharge, I went up—They didn’t pay me yet, see, when I got my discharge. They didn’t give me all my money. And then they asked me to stay around Alamo. They owed me $1040. They asked me to stay around Alamo. They sent me $100 a month. So I got that. And then they had this thing called the GI Bill. So I signed up to go to school on this GI Bill until I got all my money. Then I left to come to Benton Harbor, Michigan. Interviewer: Okay. So, when you say you went to school, were you finishing high school? Or getting a GED? Or? Veteran: No, agriculture school. Interviewer: Okay, agriculture. Okay so vocational school. Okay. Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Alright. And then, how did you wind up going to Benton Harbor? Veteran: I went there to gather fruit. But after I got there…After I got there, I got working on an asparagus farm, cutting asparagus. I didn’t like that job, so a couple of days and then I quit. There was a guy there…He mowed the lawn and he killed chickens for the rest of them. And he asked me would I like to work with him. 90 cents an hour and he gave me a place to stay. You know, to live in the house with him. He had a wife and two kids. And I told him I’d rather do that than cut asparagus, so I left with him. So, I went and lived with him and his wife. Every �other night, I’d stay home and keep his little girls, him and his wife would go to the show. Next night, I get the car and go where I want to go. (00:46:15) Interviewer: Okay. Did you have your daughter with you or was she still with your sister? Veteran: No. No, I didn’t. They wouldn’t let me have her. That’s the reason I didn’t stay around home because… Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: See, she was about 6 years old then. You know, she knowed me but you know…It had been three years and so. And I think two families can’t raise no kid. Like if she asked me to do something, I say yeah but they may say no, see. And I couldn’t hurt her like that so I just told them they just take her. Wherever I’m at, if she needs something, let me know. You know I wouldn’t doubt that they’d have tried to raise the dead for her. And so, I just left, come to Benton Harbor, Michigan. And then after I got there, then after I started staying with him, then I would work in flower yard for people. Then one lady asked about trimming trees and things for the flower yard, and so. I didn’t say anything. After we left, he called me to tea and said if we had done that job, we could have made money. And I told him well, I know how to trim trees. So, we went around, bought all pf the equipment. He bought all of the equipment. Then before long, we started trimming trees all summer. When the snow started falling, then I left and went to Benton Harbor, Mich—I went to Cleveland, Ohio. Interviewer: Okay. And what did you do in Cleveland? Veteran: I run an elevator, a freight elevator at a paper company. Interviewer: Okay. Now, did you eventually settle down into a job, a long-term job? �Veteran: Oh, well… Interviewer: Or did you just bounce around a lot? (00:48:08) Veteran: I just bounced because I worked there all winter. Spring come, my mama asked me to come back down. I had a baby brother. He got himself into debt or something, she…Well. I’ll say it like this: I am a little odd kid in the family, you know what that is. My mama, bless her soul, if she wanted something did, I am the fifth child. If she wants something did, she’ll call me. But when I get it done, she want me to move out. That’s the way I was raised. There was ten of us kids, but I was just the hardball in the crowd. Interviewer: Alright. Now, did you eventually get married again? Veteran: Oh yeah, I’d say about…I got married. I say, I went back home. I stayed there three years until I got him out of debt. Then I come to Chicago. Then I got married in Chicago. Interviewer: Mhmm. And what were you doing in Chicago? Veteran: I worked at the paper company. I worked there 18 years. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Then I left that, come over here. And I worked at Ottawa Steel 18 years, before I retired. Interviewer: Alright. Well, when you look back at the time you spent in the Army, do you think you learned anything from that or if it did you any good later on? Veteran: Well, what do you mean by it? Interviewer: How do you think your time in the Army affected you? �Veteran: Well, I guess…I guess, I don’t know it affected me any kind of ways. Because I said most of my mind was in just getting back to my kids, you know, and whatever I had to do, I just did it you know. So, I don’t think it hurt me nowhere. It taught me to be more ornery or what. Most of the time, I look back and say… (00:50:34) Interviewer: Alright. So, you were the same man when you came out— Veteran: Yeah, it seems. Interviewer: --then you were when you went in? Veteran: You know, because I say mostly, I don’t know if you people can understand it or not but I say you go off leaving your 3-year old child, and she had never spent time with nobody but you and her mother. And you go off and leave her. You people don’t know how that hurt. So, my mind was just—I say when I first went with the Army, I did everything I could think of to get a dishonorable discharge, but after I found out they weren’t going to discharge me. I just did what I was supposed to do. Interviewer: Alright. Okay, did you learn anything about different kinds of work or equipment that helped you later? Or, did you already have all the skills you needed? Veteran: That’s what I was going to say, I didn’t do nothing in the Army I thought that. I mean, I didn’t do nothing in the Army. Interviewer: That’s right, you had the machine gun. Veteran: Except drive a truck. When I went to the Army, I didn’t know what a spark plug was. But they sent me to schools, teach you all about how to maintain a truck and everything. Interviewer: Alright. �Veteran: And the big gun, 155 mm. I didn’t know nothing about them. But I say, after I got out of the Army, then I, the only thing I worked in was on cars. I went to mechanic school, and after—Well, I finished mechanic school right there in Letit and Bold. You know they used to have it out there? I finished mechanic school out there. Interviewer: Mhmm. (00:52:18) Veteran: So, I worked part-time, working on cars. Also, I worked at Ottawa Steel, but as a hobby, I worked on cars too. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: So, I went to welders school. In other words, everything that Uncle Sam paid me to go to school for, I did it. Interviewer: Okay. So, maybe that’s the one thing you got out of the Army? Veteran: Yeah. Interviewer: Uncle Sam paid for some school. Veteran: I finished barber school, agriculture school, I finished welding school, I finished mechanic school. Long as Uncle Sam paid me, I did it. Interviewer: Alright, sounds good. Veteran: But also, I worked. I said, I worked at Ottawa Steel out there on, you know where that used to be? Out there on…What used to be out there? You know where Ottawa Steel used to be? Interviewer: No, I don’t but… Veteran: Let me see… �Interviewer: Was it close to Grand Rapids, or…? Veteran: Yeah, right on the line. Interviewer: Alright, well. Veteran: I got to think of that street. It was right where the border of Comstock Park and Grand Rapids join. Interviewer: Okay, that would be out on near Alpine Avenue area. Veteran: Yeah! Interviewer: Okay, very good. Veteran: It used to be Ottawa Steel. Half the plant was in Grand Rapids, half the plant was in… Interviewer: Some part of Comstock Park, okay. (00:54:03) Veteran: I worked there 60 years before I retired. Interviewer: Alright. Well, it makes for a very good story, so thanks for taking the time to share it today. (00:54:13) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_HoltonW2098V Title A name given to the resource Holton, Will (Interview transcript and video), 2017 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2017-02-02 Description An account of the resource Will Holton was born in Crockett County, Tennessee, on January 19, 1919, and was likely drafted in either late 1942 or early 1943. After Basic Training and advanced training, Holton was then sent to Camp Barkeley, Texas, for trucker training, and was then sent to Louisiana for 155mm artillery training before winding up at Camp Shelby, Mississippi, with the 1010th Engineer Company. Holton was then assigned to the 2nd Platoon, A Company, 1697th Engineer Combat Battalion and was deployed to Europe, supporting the ground troops during the Battle of the Bulge in late 1944-45. He guarded the other engineers while they cleared mines, opened supply routes, and built temporary bridges, continuing this construction work in France after the war. Holton later returned home and was discharged in 1946. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Holton, Will Thomas Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant World War II https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/8594c172309ea1e69f49201101d736f8.mp4 c9e4a9f798dc7bb79ba847665999e62c https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/1b9e35a3c0bfba4628a8cbd8517fb769.pdf 1101c78e2fd9301735d5f77ae1319c86 PDF Text Text Hodges, Terry Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Interview Name of War: Vietnam War Interviewee’s Name: Terry Hodges Length of Interview: (58:23) Interviewed by: James Smither Transcribed by: Chelsea Chandler Interviewer: “Okay, Terry. Begin with some background on yourself. And where and when were you born?” I was born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. January 1st, 1948. Interviewer: “Okay. Did you grow up in Baton Rouge, or did you move around?” I spent my whole life in Baton Rouge up until the graduation from high school, and then I went to college at Hammond, Louisiana at Southeastern Louisiana University. Interviewer: “Okay. Now what did your family do for a living when you were a kid?” My mother was an executive secretary for the Department of Conservation for the state of Louisiana. I grew up with three brothers, and we all grew up in our grandfather’s house. My parents divorced when I was six, and Mother never remarried. Interviewer: “Okay, and then when did you graduate from high school?” 1966. Interviewer: “Okay, and then where did you go after that?” (1:00) I went to—on a football scholarship to Southeastern. Interviewer: “Okay, and then how long did you stay there?” I was there three years, and that’s where I was at when I was drafted. Interviewer: “Okay. Now was it a four year school?” Oh, yes. Interviewer: “So you had another year left. So how was it that you came to be drafted?” I went there on a football scholarship and always wanted a vehicle of my own. So after my junior year of spring training, I dropped out of school. Went to work. Worked the rest of that spring and �Hodges, Terry that summer because I wanted an automobile for my senior year. And worked, made enough money, bought a car. Used car, but my car. And was actually back at school. Football practice always started—two a day—on August the fifteenth. And I was there for approximately a week practicing football and got a draft notice. (2:05) Interviewer: “Okay. Now what did you do once you got that notice?” Well, I’d been drafted. Interviewer: “Okay. Did you request an extension or anything, or did you just do what they told you?” I just did what I was supposed to do, I guess. Is how I felt about it. Interviewer: “All right. So where did they send you for basic training?” I went to basic and advanced infantry training both at Fort Polk, Louisiana. Interviewer: “Okay, so relatively close to home anyway.” Yes. Yeah. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now describe the basic training experience. What was that like?” Regimented. Getting up earlier than I was used to getting up. But it wasn’t a bad experience. I mean, I was physically active all my life, so it wasn’t any kind of physical problem or mental problem or anything like that. Just went through basic. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. How did the drill instructors treat you?” Okay. I still recall my drill instructor for our barracks was—Sonny we called him. But he was a really nice guy. Fairly young fellow. But got along with him fine. As a matter of fact, in basic, I was one of the guys in—for whatever reason—I was elevated to barracks leader. You know, platoon leader, what have you. Interviewer: “Well, you were maybe a year or so older than a lot of the guys there.” Yes, I was, and I was somewhat more proficient in the athletics of it. Interviewer: “Yeah, yeah. I mean, football player, so yeah.” Yeah, but see, I didn’t realize that that was not a good thing for me at the time. I should have been saying, “Hey, I love to type,” and things like that. So I wasn’t the brightest bulb on the tree at that point in time. �Hodges, Terry Interviewer: “Yeah, but they kind of wanted a lot of infantry men at that point, so I don’t even know if that would have helped you.” I agree, I agree. Interviewer: “All right. Okay, so you get through it, and how long was the basic training?” I think it was six weeks. I believe that’s what basic was. Interviewer: “It’s usually eight.” Okay, eight weeks. That’s probably—You know. Interviewer: “Yeah, but not all that long in the whole.” (4:05) No, no. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and then you stay then. And then for your advanced training, is that infantry training?” Yes. Yeah. At Fort Polk. Interviewer: “Okay, and how was the advanced training different from basic?” Well, weapons were involved. You know, becoming acquainted with the M16 and the .60 caliber machine gun. Going to firing ranges instead of just going on long walks, so to speak. And, of course, it was geared toward getting you prepared. Everyone knew that pretty much—that we were going to be going to Vietnam. So that was the end of ‘67. Interviewer: “Yeah. Now did they make any effort to teach you how to deal with the Vietnamese themselves? I mean, do they have a mock village or anything like that?” I don’t recall that. No, I do not. Now I do recall that we were introduced to a Vietnamese fellow who was a sapper as they call them, and he was showing off his skills as far as stealth and what they were capable of doing and so on. I remember that. Other than that… Interviewer: “But nothing about the society or the people or…?” Oh, no, no. There was nothing that I recall. It was primarily geared toward, you know, patriotism and being the best soldier you could and so on. Interviewer: “Yeah, and just how to function as an infantryman in the field.” Exactly, exactly. Be the best soldier you could, which would give you the best chance of being successful. �Hodges, Terry Interviewer: “Okay. Now were a lot of the instructors Vietnam veterans?” I believe they were. Yes. Yeah. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now did you have any sense of who the guys you were training with—where they were from or why they were there or…?” They were from all over. There was a large contingency from New York that were in my barracks. (6:02) But there was a lot of people that were from Louisiana. Palled up with a guy from Port Allen, which is across the river from Baton Rouge. Ronnie Gisler. We became good friends. Also met a fellow named Browning. Robert Gwinn Browning who actually ended up in Vietnam with me. He was my bud, you know. So you make relationships and go through, but we all kind of enjoyed all of the rappelling and firing weapons and so on. Interviewer: “Okay. Yeah. So at that point you’re still kind of playing soldier for the most part.” Yeah. There was an ominous overtone always, but, well, there was a reality that was there. But, I mean, I grew up—I was a Boy Scout. Had always spent time in the woods. So it wasn’t that foreign to me. Some of these guys from New York—It was quite a bit of culture shock for them. Interviewer: “All right. How much did you know about Vietnam at that point?” Other than the fact that we’re involved in a very bad—what I thought to be a very stupid war… Interviewer: “Okay, so you had an understanding that maybe the war wasn’t such a good idea.” Oh, I knew for sure it wasn’t a good idea, and I knew for sure that there were people that were getting killed or maimed that—for what I thought were fairly political reasons. And I’ve always held that belief. And I always had the realization that once I had got drafted, that, boy, I had really messed up. And actually my brother—one of my younger brothers—ended up getting my car. So I did a lot of that for nothing as it turned out. Interviewer: “All right, so you complete AIT, and that’s probably the same length of time as the basic was.” Yes. Yeah, I think so. I think so. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, and then do you get orders for Vietnam, or do you go somewhere else first?” (8:01) No. In typical army fashion, there were—I don’t know—twenty something guys, I think, in the entire company that had signed up to go to NCOC School at Fort Benning, Georgia. Shake n’ Bake school. And they took thirteen or fourteen of us that had not signed up and sent us. And I don’t think any of the guys that actually signed up actually went. Got orders to go. And we were �Hodges, Terry somewhat apprised of what Shake n’ Bake school was all about and so on. And Ronnie Gisler from Plaquemine hadn’t signed up as well, but he was sent also. And so we were, of course, flying out of the same airport. Going to Fort Benning to start Shake n’ Bake school. They flew us up. We arrived there on base on a Friday, and the school actually started on Monday. So once you got in and got settled in, they actually gave you a weekend pass. So we went into town and, of course, do what young men do, you know, in a town you’re not familiar with. We hit all the— every bar we could and so on. And Ronnie and I both decided that we had no desire to go through NCOC School. So we reported back in, you know, Saturday evening. Sunday evening. And the first formation on Monday morning Ronnie and I went up to the attic in the barracks and hid. And they had the formation. We could hear them. They were right outside in the company area, and they were looking, you know.“Where’s Hodges? Where’s Gisler?” And everything. And we were just sitting up there saying, “I ain’t going to do this. I’m not going to do this.” And so they ended up getting everybody there in formation, and they marched them off. They were going somewhere, you know. I don’t know. But when they left the area, we came down into the barracks, went in through the CO’s office, and he said, “Well, y’all missed the first formation, you know. You’re going to be—It’s not necessarily court-martialed, but you’re going to be busted. Back to E1.” And he said, “At E1 you can’t go through this school.” (10:17) So we said, “Mission accomplished.” That was great, you know. But then we got—Shortly after that, we got orders for Vietnam, which is where we knew we were going to go anyway. So when we got to Vietnam, we were automatically made E3 again because I don’t think you could be in country without being at least a PFC. Interviewer: “Yeah, yeah. That was a standard thing. Now why did you decide you didn’t want to do the NCO training?” What I—What my belief was was that it was a very serious place, and I didn’t think—from everything I had heard—that NCOC—Shake n’ Bake sergeants weren’t that well thought of. Didn’t necessarily know exactly what to do. And I didn’t want to be in that position. I just—I felt if I were going to tell men what to do that I should—I should go through it first, I guess. And I did not think that a pretend NCOC School would prepare me to do that. I just didn’t—I didn’t think it was right to show up over there and start telling men what to do when I wasn’t apprised of what actually was happening. So that’s the reason that Ronnie and I both decided not to go through it. We were the only two that didn’t go that particular day. Interviewer: “Yeah. Of course, it was—I think you’re the first people I’ve ever heard of who were sent to NCO-School when they didn’t actually sign up for it. So that wasn’t a normal circumstance to be in.” No, we did not sign up. We did not. We did not. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Did you get a leave home before you went overseas?” (12:01) A few days, yes. Yeah. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. And then—And how do they get you to Vietnam?” �Hodges, Terry Flew to—What base was it? I don’t really recall. Interviewer: “Did you go to Seattle?” It could have been Fort Lewis. Interviewer: “Yeah, Fort Lewis, Washington would be—If you went up there, that’s where you went.” And then went from there over to Cam Ranh Bay. Interviewer: “Okay. What’s your first impression of Vietnam when you get there?” Hot, hot. The day I arrived—Went out on the steel tarmac. It was 114 degrees, and you could see the heat waves coming off the tarmac. So it was—It was quite warm. Interviewer: “Even for a man from Louisiana that was a little—” It was quite warm. Interviewer: “All right.” Yeah, it was hot. Interviewer: “Okay. What did they do with you once you get off the plane?” You got off the plane with your duffel. Well, you got issued your—you know, your gear and stuff like that. And then they started calling people’s names and assigned you to a company. I think I was in Cam Ranh for like two days. Got my orders to report to Delta Company. 1st of the 506. Interviewer: “Okay. In the 101st Airborne Division.” 101st Airborne, yes. Interviewer: “All right, and then how did you get up to join them?” Helicopter to the rear at Camp Evans, and then they later—Helicopter again out to Firebase Kathyrn. Interviewer: “All right, and so when was this that you got out there?” Early June. It was early June. Interviewer: “Okay. Early June now of 1970. All right, and then when you join your company, what kind of reception do you get?” �Hodges, Terry Cordial. Nice. I mean, people were, you know—They were helpful. Got my first squad leader. Was Randy Beek who I thought the world of. Really nice guy. Concerned about people. And got issued a bunch of gear. (14:08) What have you. But the—And then you’ve got to get into the flow of things. The very first job I was given was to burn a bucket of shit. So that’s the first thing I did on Kathryn. Was to mix fougasse in with a pile of shit and burn it. That was my first job. I guess they figure if you’ll do that, then you’ll probably be responsive if they ask you to do something else. Interviewer: “Well, yeah, that and you’re the low guy on the totem pole, so you get the ugly job.” Exactly, exactly. And you’ve got to realize that. Interviewer: “Okay. Now how long did you stay on Kathyrn before you moved out?” We weren’t there probably another three or four days, and we rucked up and we’re sticking to the jungle. Interviewer: “Okay. Now did you walk out, or did they fly you someplace else?” No, they flew us out. They flew us out. Interviewer: “Okay. Had you ridden in helicopters—except for the trip up?” No, no. Interviewer: “Okay. This is all new. And then that first trip out in the field. Do you remember anything about that?” No, it was rather uneventful. It took me—When I first stood up with my full gear on, full sack, I remember I was thinking to myself—And I was in fairly good shape. And I said, “Man, there’s no way I’m going to be able to walk around with this on my back.” I mean, my legs were wobbling almost. But by the third day I was hupping with the best of them. As a matter of fact, I was starting to—I walked point. And I walked point for most of my time over there. Interviewer: “Okay. Walking point is something a lot of people don’t always want to do.” I wanted to watch after my own butt. I didn’t want somebody else watching. Plus, it—There’s an added benefit if you walk point. You don’t have to carry as much ammunition. So there was an ulterior motive as well. Interviewer: “All right. Okay. Now you said you had—Growing up, you had spent a lot of time in the woods and that kind of thing. Did that sort of help you at this point?” (16:03) �Hodges, Terry I was acclimated to the woods. Not so much thick jungle, but I had always loved being in the woods. Became a Life Scout. Always hunted and so on. So I was quite comfortable in the woods. Interviewer: “Okay. Now at this point, sort of—Now it’s June 1970. Were you encountering many enemy? Did you have much contact, or was it quiet?” No, no. Nothing prior to that day. That was the first interaction with an enemy that I had. Interviewer: “Okay, so before that—And this is getting into the latter part of July when you’re sent out to the Ripcord area, and your company gets in trouble. So before that, basically are you just patrolling in the jungle? And how long would you stay out if you’re— When they take you out, would you be out for a few days or couple weeks or…?” A few weeks. It got to be the routine that we were out for forty-five days or thereabouts, and then back in the rear for seven. There were a couple occasions during the monsoons where we stayed out much longer than forty-five days because they just couldn’t get to us. Everything was socked in. Interviewer: “Okay, and so when you’re out there, what would be sort of a typical thing to do in a day? Were you usually in the jungle areas, or…?” Yes. Yeah. Interviewer: “Okay. All right, so you have stayed someplace for the night. You get up in the morning. Now what happens?” You put your sack on, and they tell you which direction they want to go in that day. And you start matriculating that day. Interviewer: “Okay. Now would the company usually operate as a unit, or would you break down into platoons?” We would break down into platoons more often than not. (18:00) The company didn’t do anything that I recall as a single unit going in one, you know—Everybody went in the same direction, but we were—We weren’t one after the other for 125 men or something like that, which, I guess, tactically didn’t make any sense. Interviewer: “Okay. Well, I guess the other thing would be were the platoons within contact of each other and able to support each other.” Certainly. Yeah, yeah. Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay. All right, and so now who was your company commander at that point?” Workman. �Hodges, Terry Interviewer: “Okay, and how would you describe him?” I didn’t have a whole lot of contact with him. You know, as far as captains go, I guess he was just fine. Interviewer: “Okay. Did you see more of your platoon leader?” Yeah. LT Thompson. I thought he was a great guy. He was a great guy. Interviewer: “Okay, and about how large was your platoon?” I don’t really know. I really don’t know. We had what? Four squads? Probably ten men per squad so thereabouts. I didn’t pay attention to a lot of that. Interviewer: “Well, a lot of times a lot of the units were pretty badly under strength. Now maybe when you came in, did some other new guys come in with you?” Oh, yes, yes. I think, as a result of the conflict in May, they were undermanned. So there was— Yeah, there were several people. Browning and I both were put in the same platoon. Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay. All right, so initially—And so, I guess, then—So you’re—You basically—You’d advance. You’d go to wherever you’re supposed to go to. And what would you do at night if you’re out in the field?” You always set up an LP at night, and nobody enjoyed doing that. But you took your turn. Interviewer: “LP being a listening post?” Listening post. Other than that, you spread around. If it were possible to dig a hole, you dug a hole. If not, then you just made do with what was available to you and try to protect your position. (20:12) And hunker down and go to sleep. Interviewer: “Okay. When you first went out in the field, did you keep thinking there were RAD guys out there, or did you hear things? Or were you jumpier, or were you just…?” I knew I was in a war. I mean, I knew that there were people out there with bad intention. And you try and steel yourself to that, but I didn’t—I didn’t give it a whole lot of thought. I just knew that it wasn’t going to be pleasant. It was my job to take care of myself and everybody else that I could, and if something were to happen, then to—It’s time to man up and do your job. Interviewer: “Okay. Now when you’re moving through the jungle, would you go on trails, or would you make your own?” No, we tended to stay off the trails because there were booby-trapped trails, and so we learned very well—I was taught very quickly that your best avenue through the jungle is to make your �Hodges, Terry own way through the jungle, which, of course, makes for very long days because it’s thick, and everything gets hung up. And it’s hard, and it’s hot. And it’s humid, and it’s pretty miserable. But that was—That’s what we did, day in and day out. Always tried to do my job as point man looking where I was supposed to look. Interviewer: “Okay, and when you’re point man, about how far would you be ahead from the next man behind you?” Not that far, but then, if you’re in triple canopy jungle, you’re not going to be very far away from anybody. There’s just—It’s not like an open trail where, if somebody’s lagging back a little bit, you get a little space in there. Everybody’s kind of trying to—And you’re punching a hole so people can follow, but everybody gets hung up. (22:07) So there may be spaces at times, but they always close it up. So I wouldn’t say very far away at all. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Now did you have rules, especially when you were camped? Light discipline or noise discipline?” Oh, yeah. No, you didn’t make any unnecessary noises. You know, that’s common sense, I guess. Interviewer: “Would people smoke in the field?” Sure. Sure, they would, but you always cup your cigarette. You don’t ever light a cigarette in the open. You know, you used common sense about that. Interviewer: “Yep. Okay. All right, and how much food would you carry or water?” Six canteens I think it was. Maybe sometimes a little bit more. As much food as you could stuff in your sack. I remember getting—Sometimes we had a resupply with a whole case of food, and that was great. And you carried all of it, but then you’re also responsible for carrying your own ammunition. Sometimes you had to carry extra .60 ammunition for the M60, so, you know, it was about an eighty-five pound sack on your back. Interviewer: “Okay. Now did you—What did you do with the C-Ration cans or things like that? Your garbage, basically. Did you have to bury that, or did you take it with you? Or just leave it?” We just left it. I mean, we weren’t overly neat about that or anything. We did. I guess there were times when we buried it. I don’t think it would stay buried. I think the critters—As soon you’d leave, they’d go dig something up, you know, because they would smell it. But no, we didn’t. We certainly didn’t carry it with us. You’re always trying to shed weight. Interviewer: “Okay. Now did you have a Vietnamese scout with you?” (24:01) I’m sorry? �Hodges, Terry Interviewer: “Did you have a Kit Carson scout? Yes, yes. I did. I did. As a matter of fact, mine walked slack for me sometimes. Interviewer: “Okay. Now some of those people were actual ex-NVA or Viet Cong and knew what they were doing, and others seemed to be staying out of the South Vietnamese army. Was this guy actually good at his job?” He seemed to be. Seemed to be very conscientious. Interviewer: “If he’s walking slack with you, that says something already, I guess.” Yeah, well, it—No, he was—He was concerned about what he was doing. He always seemed to be doing his job. And then I told him. I said, “If somebody ever shoots me and it’s your fault, I’m going to shoot you.” Interviewer: “Okay, so you spend about a month and a half or something like that out there—been patrolling around—or maybe, I guess, like June and into July. And then, while that’s going on, the siege of Firebase Ripcord is getting more complicated, and the more and more NVA are concentrating around that. And then your company is sent in.” We were sent in from the rear from Camp Evans. Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay, and so, well, tell me about that expedition. You get the orders to go out. Now what happens?” We kind of knew this was not going to be good. I had heard that actually our captain, Workman, had volunteered us for this even after another company captain had declined to take his company in there. So we knew this wasn’t, you know, an ideal thing to do. And as we—And leaving the firebase. Everyone was pretty tense about that, I think. I was. I know I was. Interviewer: “Okay. Now were the more experienced guys acting different, too? Because the young guys—You hadn’t really been in anything big yet, but the older guys would have been in firefights and things before. Did they seem—” Well, I think it was probably the older guys that were telling me, “This is not going to be good. You need to really tighten up.” (26:13) Interviewer: “All right. Okay, so you head out there. Did you take fire as you went in, or…?” Yes, we did. We did. They were firing on us as we were landing. All the birds. And, of course, it’s a known fact if they’re shooting at you when you’re landing, they don’t care if you know they’re there or not, which is not the norm. Normally, it—I mean, if they’re around, they don’t want you to know. But if they let themselves be known like that, that’s not a good situation. �Hodges, Terry Interviewer: “Okay, and then do you recall where you’re—You had a string of helicopters come in to bring you in if you’re coming in on Hueys. Do you know where you were in the string or how far back?” You know, I don’t really recall that. Probably the third, fourth bird. I know that we were told that the birds would definitely not be sitting down. They’ll be getting you close to the ground, and when they yelled, you jumped. And it was a pretty good jump. Interviewer: “About how high up do you think you were?” Probably six, eight feet. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. You hit the ground, and now what do you do?” People were yelling, “Over here, over here! Move, move, move!” So we moved in that direction. Interviewer: “Okay, and then that day now do you get into any actual—any other action, or do things quiet down after you land?” Things did sort of quiet down after that. And we were at landing zone, and we started moving down a finger in the mountain to set up. And it was not early in the day. It was more afternoon, so we started trying to set up a night position, which is the first thing that we did. (28:05) Our platoon there. And when you’re setting up a position, of course, the first thing you—Once you decide that, you know—The powers that be decide we’re setting up here. My squad went out from our perimeter to do a recon of the area. So we were—started going out so far, and I was up front. And I saw smoke off to my left, and I knew—Didn’t know if it was a spent shell or what, but we radioed in and said we were going to go make our turn now and go check this out. So we did. It was nothing. It was a spent shell. And we reconned all the way around the left side of our perimeter. And we came back to 180 degrees, and then we came back in the back side. The other squad—Another squad went out, and they were to—responsible to cover the right side. And I don’t know whether they just hadn’t set up yet because they didn’t know where we were setting up. Whatever reason. The second squad out got hit. They got ambushed. And that’s when my good friend, Browning, got hit. Little Bit. Patrick DeWulf. Got hit. Several guys got hit. So that’s when it all really broke open and started. (30:00) It was bad, and we could hear them down there screaming, you know. We didn’t know what was going on. So I—For whatever reason, I said, “Well, I’ve got to go see if I can get to Browning. Get to Little Bit.” So I got on my belly and started going down the finger, and a .60 caliber machine gun was firing over my head. Got a little too close, so I screamed back, “Get the fire up!” You know. “You guys!” From here to the camera I had a sixty round hit, and I said, “Get it up.” And I said—And they did, you know. But I went down. And going down, going down. And I found Browning who was dead. I don’t know if he had—I don’t know what happened, but his—All of his stomach was gone. He was definitely dead. We had support—air support—that day, and the jets were doing their ordinance down there. And they had knocked trees over. A tree had fallen on top of Browning, and I could not get him out from underneath it. Couldn’t stand up. So I got his dog tags and his wallet and personal stuff and started to go down some more. And I heard Little Bit again, and then I heard rapid fire. And that was that. So I made my way back up to our perimeter. And we ended up �Hodges, Terry staying there that night. No. Excuse me. We didn’t. We moved our perimeter because we were getting chewed up. (32:06) Interviewer: “Were you being hit with mortars or with small arms fire?” Small arms. Our own grenades. At least, we figured they were our own grenades. RPG. So we moved up past the LZ up onto—higher onto the finger of the mountain, and that’s where we stayed the night. It got—For whatever reason, there wasn’t that much going on that night. I mean, you didn’t sleep or anything. And right at very first light—It was dusk, and I remember I was—For whatever reason—I don’t know. But I was cleaning my weapon. Because I was firing it the day before, and I said, “Well, you better clean it quick.” And I almost had it all the way back together, and we started hearing boop, boop. And we knew mortars were coming in. So I slapped my gun together, and I recall a mortar round hitting in front of me. It did not go off through gravel and dirt and everything, you know, on me. But I was on the ground anyway. But it didn’t go off. But a lot of others did. And they knew exactly where we were. They knew— They didn’t miss a single shot, I don’t think. Normally with mortars, you try and adjust. They were right on from the very first one. So we were up and getting off that—getting off the mountain, and I remember seeing—Of course, we were trying to pick up the guys that were wounded, hurt, or worse, and get them down to the LZ. And I remember, you know, there were quite a few people that were very physically messed up. But we got down, and that’s where we formed our perimeter again. (34:10) And fought through the day. I don’t know about the other guys, but I found that they had trees there that had big wings that would come out for roots or whatever. And I found a hole in the—in between the wings, and we had a lot of ordinance from people that we’re not going to use it. And I put claymore mines out in front of me, and I put—I had ample supply of grenades. And if you wanted to come at me, you better be getting down, you know. But we fought through the day, and, of course, we took casualties through the day. And they would attack at one side, attack at another side. Interviewer: “And when they’re attacking, could you ever actually see them?” Yes, yes. Interviewer: “Okay. How close were they getting to you?” Thirty yards, forty yards. Something like that. And you’d take them out, you know. There seemed to be a lot of them, so… Interviewer: “Okay. Now were there at this time—Now I think we’re talking here kind of—This is about July 21st, 22nd because I think you were pulled out the day before they pull out of Ripcord itself if my chronology is right. So it’s about that point.” We were pulled out that next day. Yeah, that morning. Later that afternoon we were—As a matter of fact, Workman said, “Buddy up. When dark comes, try and slip out into the jungle.” Then they would have birds patrolling the area for the next few weeks trying to find you and pick you up. (36:04) �Hodges, Terry Interviewer: “Okay, so you were actually expecting to have to disperse into the jungle.” Yes. Interviewer: “Now had there been—Because there were efforts to bring in helicopters, and they were having some problems with that.” Yes, they were having large problems with that. Interviewer: “Okay, and what do you know or recall, or what did you see of that?” We were told—And it was late in the afternoon, and we were told the Ghost Riders were coming in. And I have utmost respect for those guys because they knew they were going to get chewed up. They were, you know, the first birds in the previous day. They already had everything zeroed in, so they knew they were going to get chewed up. And they came in anyway. And first bird got out. Was taking fire. Everyone was taking fire. I ended up being on the third bird out, and then the next bird they shot down. And that’s where—To my memory, that’s where Captain Workman caught the prop—the blades—and was cut in half. But I was on the third bird out. Interviewer: “So you got out of there.” Entirely fortunate to. Interviewer: “All right. Now the—Did the—Was part of the company left behind and stuck there until the next day, or did they all get out eventually?” No, I think they all got out. They left bodies. They left—I’m sure they left a lot of ordinance, but I think most everybody got out. I think three or four helicopters were shot down. Interviewer: “Because there’s a point where C and D companies of 2/506 come out to help with the evacuation and that, I think, was after you left.” Yeah, we were gone. We were gone. (38:09) Interviewer: “Yeah. Okay. Now through all of that did you get hit?” No, no. To my recollection, there were thirteen or fourteen of us that were not wounded. Interviewer: “And that was out of the whole company that—” That was out of the entire company. Yes. Interviewer: “All right, so once you get back to Evans, now what happens to the company?” �Hodges, Terry There was a colonel, general, somebody—Came in and told us that they didn’t want us sitting around and dwelling on what had happened and that they were going to send us right back out to the—And they sent out back out to Firebase Kathyrn, and then we got started getting new guys in, you know, in subsequent days. But we did not stay in the rear. Interviewer: “Okay, and do you think that wound up being a good thing for the company?” I don’t know. Interviewer: “Well, how did the men react to all of that?” I think they would have liked a little time just to be able to commensurate with each other. To talk things out. And we did somewhat on the firebase, but it—That was, as far as firefights go—I was in several firefights, and that was by far, in a way, the worst day I would encounter in— during my tour or duty over there. Interviewer: “All right. Okay. Now how long do you think you stayed on Kathyrn before you went out in the field again?” (40:03) I guess a week. Maybe two weeks. I don’t really recall to tell you the truth. I know it took them probably a week or longer to get back into that area to get the bodies out. And Browning’s wife had requested that if he were killed that I accompany the body, which I didn’t know about. But we were off the firebase, so it had to be several—you know, a few weeks that we were on Kathryn. And we were actually back out in the field, and we were actually involved in a firefight. Nothing like that day. But they sent a Loach out, and I was up firing and, you know—and so on. And they crawled up to me and said, “Hodges, that bird’s for you.” And I said, “Really?” And he said, “Yes.” And I said, “Well, then I’m out of here. I’m gone. I’m going to wish you guys luck.” You know. But went and got on the bird and never will forget. He went straight up in the air hundred or so feet and just buzzed the treeline all the way down. It was—And it was great. I was getting in—But he took me straight to Camp Eagle, I think, where they took my weapon, ammo, you know, all that type of thing. And then I—They—I got on a—I guess the C-130 went from there to Cam Ranh, I think, and from Cam Ranh—And I still hadn’t—We’d been out in the field for almost two weeks, three weeks, and I hadn’t bathed or anything. (42:16) From there I went to Osaka, Japan. Browning’s body—Turns out was already back in the States, and they were trying to catch me up to the body. And actually put me on a commercial flight out of Osaka. Not having bathed or anything in a few weeks. But I would say the people on that plane were just—They were marvelous. They were very, very, very kind people. Flew from there to the West Coast and then from the West Coast all the way over to Dover, Delaware, which is where Browning’s body was. Interviewer: “Right. Did you get a chance to change clothes or bathe or shave along the way anywhere?” Yeah, in California. In California I did. Or it might have been not until Dover. I don’t really remember. I remember getting my patches and all that kind of stuff in Dover, so now I’m not �Hodges, Terry sure. And then took a truck ride. Browning was from Georgia, and we took a truck with his body in the back from Dover, Delaware into his hometown in Georgia for the funeral. Interviewer: “Okay, and what—Was anything running through your head through all of this, or were you…?” No, I was just bone tired. I mean, I was just really tired. I was really glad to be where I was. I was not happy at all about why I was there. I thought it was all a total waste. I always thought everything over there was a total waste of some very good men, but I met some outstanding men there. (44:01) Interviewer: “Had you ever met Browning’s—his wife?” No. Interviewer: “Okay. She just heard enough about you that…?” I think Browning and I talking one time—I think we kind of made this deal that if something happens to me, I’m going to ask your wife, and if something happens to you, you know. We kind of made that pact. But we were probably sitting around drinking beer, and you know how that goes. But after that my wife flew up to Georgia and met me, so I was able to spend a few days with her before I had to start matriculating back to Vietnam. Interviewer: “Okay. While you were in Vietnam, how much contact did you have with your wife?” Well, we were out forty-five days, and then one night of the seven days we were back you would stand in line and wait for the MARS Radio. And they would place a call, and you got to talk to her for fifteen or twenty minutes or five or ten minutes. Whatever it was. But that was the only contact that we had other than letters. Yeah. Interviewer: “Yeah. All right, so—But now you’ve got to go back to Vietnam, right?” Correct. Interviewer: “Okay. Was that just something you accepted you had to do, or…?” Yeah. Interviewer: “Yeah? Okay, so…” But my wife became pregnant, you know. So that’s—And that’s my only job. So my daughter came out of Browning passing away. Interviewer: “All right, so now you head back out again. When you rejoin your unit, where are they?” �Hodges, Terry They were back on Kathyrn, I think. I think they were. They might have been in the rear. I think they were in the rear. (46:03) Interviewer: “And has the monsoon started yet, or was it still dry at that point?” It was still dry at that point. The monsoons were—Well, I don’t know. I think the monsoons had just started because it was very wet in the mountains. I remember that I had a very hard time the first day getting up and down the mountains. I remember that. Wading through a little river. I remember falling face-first. My legs weren’t underneath me again at that point in time, but that didn’t take long either, so… Interviewer: “Okay. Now in these later months was there much contact with the enemy, or were they largely gone?” We didn’t have too much action after that. Little skirmish here and there. Maybe a sniper. Something like that. But nothing anywhere near, you know, the episode in June at Ripcord. So it wasn’t that bad, and not too long after that I got my drop of two weeks and processed out. Interviewer: “All right. Now while you were in Vietnam—let’s see—did you ever spend any time in areas where there were civilians, or were you always out in the field someplace?” No. By the time I had gotten on the 101st Airborne Division, we had been banned from the city of Huế, which was the largest town. You know, a very large town in Vietnam as far as Vietnam goes. But no, they were—They wouldn’t allow us in the town anymore. Interviewer: “Okay, and there were not really civilians in the hill country where you were operating.” No. No, there weren’t. It wasn’t like the lowlands where you had farmers and so on. No. Saw very few civilian people. (48:14) Interviewer: “Did you see any of the South Vietnamese military?” No. Not that I recall. Interviewer: “Yeah, so it was really just largely Americans, and you had your, you know, Vietnamese scouts or whatever.” Chiêu Hồi Scout and up and down in the mountains constantly. Interviewer: “All right. Now there are a variety of stereotypes about Vietnam and what happened there, and so we’ll ask about that just to see what you think of them. One of them has to do with drug use. I mean, was that something that you were aware of or saw any of?” �Hodges, Terry Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Sure. When we were back in the rear, blacks got really involved with heroin. I would smoke pot. If it weren’t illegal, I would smoke it again honestly. But mostly just drank beer. Alcohol. You know, hard alcohol. Interviewer: “Now when people were out in the field, did anybody smoke anything, or…?” No, absolutely not. That’s a good way to get lit up. Interviewer: “Okay, and in terms of just sort of racial issues and so forth—” Well, I say no. I was talking to Dale Tauer earlier, and there were occasions where people were smoking out there, but I did not. Interviewer: “Yeah. It seemed to have happened occasionally. It just—” Yeah, obviously so. I wasn’t aware of it. Interviewer: “Yeah, yeah, yeah, and that’s kind of what I’m asking. Okay. Yeah, and another issue has to do with race relations and things like that. And in the rear did the blacks and whites kind of segregate themselves, or…?” Yes, they did. Yes, they did. (50:08) Blacks thought they were being entirely persecuted and fodder. Meanwhile, some very good white guys were getting killed, and I didn’t see the distinction. Interviewer: “All right. Now in the field, if you had black and white soldiers out there together, did everybody work together?” Yes. Yeah. It actually—Toward the end it actually got to the point to where the black guys weren’t actually going out into the field, which I didn’t—I thought a large degree of that decision was because they—The most of them were starting to have drug problems, but I think it was also that the army made a conscious decision. They reacted to pressure. Political pressure. That the blacks were being disproportionately maimed and killed, so they allowed them to stay out of the field, which I wasn’t really happy about. Understatement. I wasn’t happy about it. Yeah. Interviewer: “All right. Now did the army make any effort to encourage you to stay in?” No, they did not. They did not. Interviewer: “Okay. In fact, you get an early out. Did they just offer that to you, or did you request it?” Nobody ever mentioned it to me. I got to Fort Lewis, Washington and just processed out as everybody else did. Nobody ever came up and said, “Hey, we’d like for you to re-enlist,” or anything, which would have been a large waste of their time, effort, and energy. But no, they never did approach me about that. (52:08) �Hodges, Terry Interviewer: “Yeah. At that point, you’d had enough time in service. They were starting to let people out early on a fairly consistent basis, so I think a lot of other guys went out in a similar deal. If you had been in long enough, and you had put your year in at Vietnam, then…” That was—That was it. Yeah. I had put about a year in prior to that. Eleven months, sixteen days days over there, and they were more than happy to let me go home. And I was more than happy to go home. Interviewer: “Okay, so what did you do once you got out?” I went back to school. Went back to school. Actually, when I got out, my daughter was only seven days old. And, of course, we resided in Baton Rouge. My football to my college—My football team—My head coach offered me my scholarship back. I had one year remaining and also another year of being the student, you know—the coach. You know, the assistant—Not assistant coach, but—To work with the program for another year. And my wife said, “You either go back to school there, or you be a dad.” So I stayed home and was a dad. Interviewer: “Okay, and did you find a job?” Yeah, I went to work for Mabel. I went to work for the—It was, what? Southwestern Bell at the time, I guess. Installing telephones and climbing poles and doing that sort of thing. Interviewer: “Okay. Did you have any trouble readjusting to civilian life?” No, but that’s not me. I kind of—Just like I didn’t have that much trouble going into the army, I just—“That’s where I am. I’m going to make the best of this. Do the best I can.” And I didn’t fret over a whole lot. (54:20) Interviewer: “Okay, and once you were back, I mean, would you talk to anybody about Vietnam, or…?” No. No, I did not. Had no desire to do that. I didn’t think they would understand. I’ve got three brothers. Never really discussed it with them. My marriage, you know, fell apart, and I ended up going back to LSU and finished school. So it’s kind of roll with the punches, I guess. Interviewer: “Okay. All right. Did you stay with Southwestern Bell, or did you go on to other things?” No, I went on to other things once I graduated. Actually, I quit working for Bell when I went and I started the GI Bill to go back to school and had a part-time job. And one of my younger brothers and I shared an apartment, so it worked out. Interviewer: “Okay, so what kind of job did you wind up doing then after you finished?” �Hodges, Terry I ended up in marketing, so I got a sales job with old Sperry Remington when they had actually dealerized about that point in time. And the fellow that was given the state of Louisiana—I went to work for him in the Baton Rouge office. Eventually transferred to the New Orleans office and then back to the Baton Rouge office. But I was thirteen years with him. Interviewer: “All right. Now to kind of look back on things, how do you think your time in the service affected you, or what did you learn from it?” (56:06) I already knew how to play with weapons, so I didn’t learn that from them, I don’t think. And I enjoyed the bigger guns and the explosives. I enjoyed fooling with that. I didn’t really learn a whole bunch as far as—You learn about things you don’t want to know about. I learned about war. I learned about the human capacity for sacrifice and, I guess, a lot of bad odds to do what, in your mind, says you’re supposed to do. People caring about people. It’s probably the one thing that I’ve gathered from getting back with these guys just for the last two years. The last two reunions. Is that they’ve filled in a lot of pieces of what went on that bad day, but it’s also—We also have a camaraderie that you’re not going to find anywhere else, and we’re also commensurate with the fact that there was some really, really good young men that were wasted. And you feel a loss about that, but then you also feel very fortunate to have reconnected with them because they’re some great guys. They are just truly great guys. Feel about them more— I’m not one that has a lot of friends. Don’t need a lot of friends. Never wanted a lot of friends. I consider each and every one of them a true friend. And I’ve got a few of them back home, you know. But that’s who I pal with. That’s who I play golf with. My circle’s not that large, but it’s a good circle. Interviewer: “Yeah, well, it is certainly a good group of men here. I’d just like to close up by just thanking you for taking the time to share this story today and help fill in another piece of it.” I appreciate the opportunity. Thank you, Jim. (58:23) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_HodgesT2281V Title A name given to the resource Hodges, Terry (Interview transcript and video), 2016 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2016-11-02 Description An account of the resource Terry Hodges was born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, in 1948. He graduated high school in 1966 and attended Southeastern Louisiana University for three years before he recieved his draft notice. Hodges attended both basic and advanced infantry training in Fort Polk, Louisiana, and rejected then opportunity to attend Noncommissioned Officer Candidate School at Fort Benning, Georgia. He was then sent to Vietnam in 1970 where he was stationed at Camp Evans and then Firebase Kathryn with Delta Company, 1st Battalion of the 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne. He remembered his unit coming under fire during the siege on Firebase Ripcord after which his unit suffered heavy losses. He also had to accompany his friend's body back to the U.S. for the funeral in Georgia. Having served eleven months and sixteen days in Vietnam, Hodges was eventually given an early-out in April of 1971 and returned to his home in Baton Rouge. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Hodges, Terry Lynn Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b6848d882890e7fe158bdaf32be7e144.mp4 abf68dc163b456c00ec37afc0685de5e https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/d56e62990df10e9f1450cb574697342e.pdf d2d22fe1941cf6754aa58a42378bcf06 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Raymond Hines Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Christopher Kroupa Interviewer: Alright now we’ve gotten to the point in your story where you’re working with 2nd Battalion of the 506th, you’ve been talking some about Colonel Lucas, the battalion commander, and you were heading out to a firebase called Gladiator, Veteran: Correct, Interviewer: Okay now what, roughly when was that? Veteran: *laughs* Interviewer: Well was Ripcord, Ripcord, we already established… Veteran: We were, we had not gotten that, we had not established troops on Ripcord at that point, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: Okay, Ripcord was still, we had had people up there and got run off, Interviewer: Right Veteran: And that had happened twice, Interviewer: Right Veteran: At that point, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: I think twice, I don’t know Interviewer: Okay so now we’re kind of in early April 1970 before the people actually march up to the top, Veteran: Correct Interviewer: And set up, okay, Veteran: Yes �Interviewer: So pick up the story then from there Veteran: Well, not much more, we, they built the TOC there, I didn’t like the TOC, I didn’t like, when you’re building a TOC, when you’re, when you’re building a structure, a TOC, it was a, a bunker if you will, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And the steps going in were from the uphill down, the way they had it they didn’t actually have steps, they had, it was like a funnel going down into the TOC, Interviewer: Was this on Gladiator or was this on, Veteran: This was on Gladiator, Interviewer: Yeah okay, Veteran: And eventually I'm sure they got it straightened out but at that point they didn’t have it, and I didn’t want to spend the night there okay, for me that’s a funnel when, mortars come down, mortars come relatively straight down, they hit a funnel they’re gonna follow it, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: That goes right into the TOC, didn’t have a blast wall, didn’t have basic things that to me were basic, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay, and I don’t remember where I slept but I didn’t sleep in there that night, they were upset with me and so, that’s okay, (2:00) Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: The next morning they went back to the rear and took the showers and came back out and I was going to go back to the rear but nothing ever came. I sat on the pad for a while and they came back and I was rather upset but, which led to me being replaced, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: Yeah, I was upset, anyway, the next day Colonel Lucas had me come with him and we went back to the rear and we talked to my commander and, I got to talk to my commander, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: It was, he was gonna replace me and he did, he had another captain come in, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Andahe, Ray Williams, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: My boss, the S3 advised against it because it was a rough area but anyway he sent me back with this guy and I was gonna train him into my job and when I was happy he was able to do it, then I was to come back to work with the S3, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And we were there for a day or two I don’t know, several days and it became apparent to me that I didn’t have enough time in country and that’s what I told my boss, I said sir I don’t have enough time in country to get this guy back to where he ought to be, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay, but anyway I turn my stuff over to him and, and we went, I went back to the battalion headquarters, assistant S3, Interviewer: Alright, and so are you, is this at Camp Eagle or Evans? Veteran: Evans, Interviewer: Okay, you’re in Evans, alright, Veteran: So I'm back at Evans, and assistant S3 assigning fires that kind of stuff, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Not much happened, same, same kind of thing happened, (4:00) Interviewer: But did you, were you aware of Ripcord being set up or what were you, Veteran: I'm aware of it but I wasn’t out there, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: Now you’re talking on the phone, on the radio, Interviewer: Right, �Veteran: Radio contact, Interviewer: Right, Veteran: With people you weren’t, wasn’t out there, Interviewer: Yup Veteran: Wasn’t flying around, Interviewer: Right, Veteran: So I was aware that being set up and I was aware of assigning fires and the whole thing but, not, nothing specific, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: After a while, after a while we had the incident on fire support base Henderson, where the brigade commander Colonel Bradley and his S3, Major Tex Turner, the artillery liaison officer, Captain Hopkins, Fred Hopkins, and the Sergeant Major and I think his name was Long or Longest, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I'm not, I'm not sure of his name but they went in there and they were hit with a mortar round and the Sergeant Major was killed and Fred was wounded, he had a bad wound on lower leg, and was basically medevacked, that would have been the third of May I’ve been told, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I don’t remember dates, but that, that happened apparently on the third of May, and if you read the, Hopkins, Chuck Hawkins wrote an article for the VFW, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I believe it’s for VFW about Ripcord, he left out the artillery officer totally, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I confronted with him, confronted him with that during this meeting, he said well I probably left a lot of people out and the significance of him leaving that out is that Fred was part of the party, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: That came out with Colonel Bradley, Interviewer: Right, Veteran: So, leaving him out is significant, (6:00) Veteran: whereas if he’d been out there as part of the artillery out there, it would be coincidental, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Anyway, same round that killed, that killed the Sergeant Major wounded, wounded Fred, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I went over there and it was right after it happened so it would have been probably the fourth of May, they sent me over there, and then I, I was the Artillery Liaison with the third brigade until I rotated back to the states, well I left and I can’t tell you exactly when, perhaps three or four days before so somewhere probably the twenty-forth, the twenty-fifth of May, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: I'm guessing I don’t remember correctly, Interviewer: Alright Veteran: I know the day after I left, the day was, was, it was one year exactly, twenty-nine May, and I left, Interviewer: Okay, now were there any other kind of significant actions or things that went on that you were providing support for or was it just mostly small or routine engagements? Veteran: Well we, it was, you’re, when you’re dealing with the Brigade Commander, you’re at a different level or course, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: I don’t know I wasn’t following as closely what was happening on Ripcord, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I know that was going on and that was a big part of the entire brigades’ efforts, Interviewer: Right, �Veteran: I do know we went back to Brad, to Interviewer: Henderson? Veteran: Henderson, and I was explained what happened and pretty much the same story over and over again, but went back there, it was, its secondhand knowledge and I could tell you what they said which is slightly different then than the version I hear going around, (8:01) Veteran: But, nevertheless, it essentially alright, then we, we had a, an insertion, I'm not sure what we were gonna do but it was in the Co Chien River, there was a sandbar in the edge of the river and we’re flying around and they decide they wanna put and insertion right there on that sandbar, and I'm trying to find an artillery, do an artillery prep, it’s out of my normal amount of range with not communicating with the regular artillery battalion, so I ended up having to find somebody to do that, I think pretty sure the ARVN’s did that out of, out of Dong Ha or somewhere up there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I don’t really remember what happened that, when they did artillery prep is, they blew the sandbar away, so they had to land on the, the banks of the river, it was just right by the banks of the river anyway, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They, they did that getting serious okay, Interviewer: I wonder why you would insert on a sandbar, not sure what that would accomplish Veteran: Who knows, I mean who knows if there's mines on it, who knows anything about it, Interviewer: Yup Veteran: And to do an artillery prep, maybe it was a, anyway the artillery prep blew it away, Interviewer: Yup, Veteran: So it wasn’t an issue anymore, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Let me think was there anything else that happened, I don’t, I really, it was really fairly routine, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Colonel Bradley was fixing to leave and he was talking about leaving and going back to Maine, turns out he didn’t go back to Maine, he went to Florida and became a real estate mogul or something and, Tex Turner, I don’t know what, I know he went to the, to the Ranger school for a while he was coming out of the Ranger school, I don’t know what else he did, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And he’s retired now and last I heard he was in, in Virginia (10:00) Veteran: And we, near Williamsburg somewhere in there, Interviewer: Alright, so now you’re heading out of Vietnam, Veteran: Out of Vietnam, Interviewer: Where do you go, Veteran: We go, alright so my, I'm in Vietnam and I go to Camp Eagle, I flew down there, report to DIVARTY, and you’re processed out and you get on a truck to go to someplace else and maybe Da Nang, Interviewer: Probably Da Nang if it’s a truck, Veteran: I don’t really remember, I remember going and it’s kinda a blur, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But we went down the road, one thing I do remember, there were some other, there were some NCOs who were on the same truck and the NCOs were talking to oother NCOs and talking about how they, they were too old to have been in the field you know they were just too old, they're probably near thirty, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay, thirty to me is not old, thirty is rather prime, but and I'm thinking to myself it probably had something to do with that yellow strip down your back rather than your age, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Nevertheless, I didn’t say anything and we went on, we got down there and you had to report in and when, I left out of Cam Ranh Bay, and we went to Cam Ranh Bay and I, you had to show up for the manifest, if your name was called you went on and processed out whatever the �rest of it was, and so but you showed up for the next manifest when the next plane was coming, so I had some time, I went over the sand, sand dunes and went out on the beach in Cam Ranh Bay, it was pretty neat, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: You could walk probably half a mile only to be wait deep in the water, very shallow, came back made the next manifest and came home, Interviewer: Alright now, Veteran: Flew, flew to Osaka Japan I don’t know why we went there but, (12:00) Veteran: That’s where we were, you know if the duty-free shop bought some stuff for my wife and, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Came on and we went to Seattle, SeaTac, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We were processed in and we walk into this room and an NC, E6 NCO comes in wearing a, this right shoulders to his left shoulder, he’s got this hundred and first patch, he starts giving us this stateside verbiage that, y’all a lot of, hate to think think cause it irritates me every time I think about it, I wanted to go home, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I don’t want any trouble and I want to go home, this guy starts with this, this verbiage talking to officers and everybody else about we had our sleeves rolled up and in stateside you don’t roll your sleeves up okay, so we’re in out jungle fatigues but we got our sleeves rolled up like we do, yeah okay, all he had to do was tell us we’re to roll them down and I'm just come back from a combat zone and I really wanted to kill a person, alright that’s what I really wanted to do, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Or at least give him a punch or two, but I didn’t do that so we get processed out, so how you treat people and they weren’t treating us very well, you were treated better in Vietnam, it, it made a difference in Vietnam I mean you have to say that, anyway I got a flight home and, and came back home, my next assignment was Fort Sill, I went to the artillery advanced course there, most of the, I knew a lot of the captains, we’d been together, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: In Vietnam so, let’s see Ben King was there, (14:00) Veteran: Ben Phillips, Quigley, Mark Quigley, and feels like there were one or two more, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I’d been with in Vietnam, we’re in the same advance course class and got through that and I was assigned to, I went to 3rd of the 7th, eight-inch howitzer artillery in, in Nuremburg Germany, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: Which was probably a mistake, but it was, you look back and see it’s a mistake and you don’t see it looking forward, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They’d been deprived during the Vietnam era because everything went to Vietnam, Interviewer: Right Veteran: And so things were not in great shape and the commander was not a great commander, he was a helicopter pilot, when I got there Patton had just been on there, Patton the, they have a lot of small bases around Major towns or they did at that era, and so a movie would go into one and go to the next one and the next one and you know, anyway Patton had just been on that base, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And the Colonel and, and the ma-, XO, his Major it was, his, shadow, shadows a good word right, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: His shadow both had swagger sticks, okay you can imagine this now right, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They got swagger sticks and he was an interesting tour, Interviewer: What was the attitude of German civilians toward Americans at this point? And this more radical, �Veteran: They didn’t really care much for us, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: It was, they were tolerant, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Mostly tolerant, (16:00) Veteran: Sometime while we were over there, they were making a movie about Hitler in Munich, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And the actor who was playing Hitler walked down the street and people stood and saluted, I know why, okay, Interviewer: Wow Veteran: Now, that wasn’t everybody, but it was interesting, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: It was interesting, anyway we got by fine there was, there was some attitude, overall, we got, one of the problems, actually one of the problems you have, we had in Germany was that the people speak English, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We didn’t speak much German, so you end up learning a little GI German, where did we live there, let me think about that, first time, the second time, I have to sort through where we lived, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: Because I was there, the first time I was there was in Wurzburg, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We started out, started out in, on the economy, then we moved, I started out, started out in the upstairs, an upstairs apartment from a German, it was about twenty miles away from, from base, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I mean it was a fairly long drive but it’s what you could find, if the Germans, Germans like to rent to Americans because they would move on, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Germans once they rented, they had a more or less a contract, until they got ready to move, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So in a sense they like to do, anyway we get, we did that and then I had another apartment, I found another apartment and the landlady didn’t like our little dog okay, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: She was afraid of dogs, she did, they’d use dogs against them some, she’d seen that happen somewhere during the war, Interviewer: Mm-hmm (18:00) Veteran: Anyway, so we ended up, ended up moving to a different apartment and we were there for a while and then, didn’t plan on going into quarters but we were offered quarters and we did go in and lived on base there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: It was about a couple of blocks from where I worked, a lot more convenient, didn’t have to worry about the heat, I mean, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Everything’s covered, Interviewer: Right Veteran: So I was in, we were in Merrell barracks and Merrell barracks was built by Hitler to, Nuremburg Germany, too, for the SS troops to control the crowds during the Nuremburg Rallies, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And he had, he built it out of brick, it was built out of brick, well-engineered, it was built to be faced with marble later, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Because you had deep windows that were faced in marble and they were gonna face it later with marble and of course that never happened, in the chapel they still had decorations and chapels still had swastikas around the edge of the floor, Interviewer: Uhm Veteran: Well you say uhm but swastika is an ancient symbol, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: Of good luck and then you can find those in Jewish temples, Interviewer: Yeah, you can find then in the oven Veteran: Yes, so it, but that was there so it was a Nazi symbol Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: And that was Merrell barracks, it was an interesting place it was not a terribly great tour, but it worked out, Interviewer: Okay, what, I don’t what’s the caliber of the enlisted personnel that you had, we’re kind of getting into that post-Vietnam era, Veteran: Well we were, I was, it was post-Vietnam for me, but Vietnam was still going on, Interviewer: Still going on, but we were Veteran: People that were there who were still a draft army, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Still had a bunch of people and the drug culture was coming on, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: Brought on probably initially in Vietnam but they had, we had problems (20:00) Veteran: With it over there, we had no tests for it, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: Cause this is before you could test for, for marijuana or any other drugs, Interviewer: There’s a point when heroin becomes a real problem and its, Veteran: I don’t know when heroin become a problem, but I know we had everything that, we had more than just marijuana, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: But everything started with marijuana, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And you’d get fresh kids in and they would, oh I'm gonna be straight I'm gonna be straight, you get them in and, and the three weeks later they were smoking pot, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And it was the culture that we had, I had a guy who went to a bar, several of them went to a bar, and they broke a window, a glass pane in the door in the bar and left, they were, had been drinking they were, he was pretty much too drunk to feel the pain, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They walked back to the, to the barracks, this is at night and the MPs, when they call the MPs they followed the blood trail to Merrell barracks and when they came into Merrell barracks, they had the CQ guy cause they were afraid to go into the barracks, this is MPs, Army MPs, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Alright, that’s the culture we were dealing with, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Does that make sense to you, you probably haven’t seen that but that’s, Interviewer: Well I knew actually I’ve talked to some people who were in Germany, kind of in that period at times there were definitely discipline problems, Veteran: There were, there were discipline problems and you couldn’t get anything done really you couldn’t, it, it was a major problem that, maintenance was a major, I think I mentioned maintenance once before, the military, the Army had sold out to a maintenance program that didn’t work, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay, and we had a, maintenance Warrant Officer (22:00) Veteran: Who was a good, probably a very good sergeant but he wasn’t a good maintenance Warrant Office and that unit he was, that was for us, we were the lower echelon and he was an echelon above, we were supposed to be able to send things to him to be fixed, the only thing I ever saw them fix was the commander’s Jeep and their vehicle, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Which is a Jeep, alright, that’s the only thing I ever saw them fix period, you had to turn something in to get it fixed, you had to have everything there and they go by and inspect and then you might not get it back with everything on it, all the parts on it, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Because they were prone to scavenge, to keep their two little vehicles running, it was a nightmare, Interviewer: So what was your actual job there? Veteran: I was a battery commander to start with, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: As a battery commander I didn’t do a great job at it, I have to admit, I did what I could do, we came in and I was supposed to be alpha battery commander, an alpha battery was okay, bravo battery had been, was the disciplined battery, Interviewer: Oh Veteran: Everybody you needed discipline, didn’t fit in got put in bravo battery, the other thing was we technically I had a hundred people there, full complement, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I could only control, I only had control of about fifty five to fifty six of them, so you looking on paper it looks like you’re all there so why can’t you do and, let me tell you something, you cannot do one hundred percent of the job all the time with half the people, Interviewer: So where, Veteran: You cannot maintain that for a long period of time, �Interviewer: So were the other people there or doing something else? Veteran: We were not at full strength by any means, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: So none of it was full strength, (24:01) Veteran: The maintenance system, you couldn’t get parts, getting parts was a big problem, we couldn’t get support, we had in our howitzers, eight-inch howitzers have the same engine transmission that a Greyhound bus has okay, Greyhound buses run, our engines didn’t, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And when our engines didn’t run you can’t get there, you can’t move shoot and communicate, Interviewer: Right Veteran: So we could shoot, we could communicate so so better, but moving was a real problem and our, we couldn’t, we weren’t supposed to change the powerpack, engine transmission that came together and was a big unit, we weren’t supposed to do that a the battery level, but at the battery level we didn’t do that we had down ve-, down weapons, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: so we end up doing that at the battery level I mean, out of necessity, there was a maintenance company on the, on the base and one of the things they had, I had to go through, in the interim between, go, before I went over there was go to Fort Knox and we had a, a class it was a several week or two on maintenance, Knox was the big maintenance, Interviewer: Right, Veteran: Thing, and I went to that and they said yeah go talk to the Warrant Officer he’d be glad to, happy to see ya, I went and talked to the guy when I first got there, went and talked to the guy, he talked to our Motor Warrant, our Motor Warrant talked to our Battalion Commander, our Battalion Commander told me not to do that again okay, even when I said it exactly like that but that’s what it came down to, well you’re gonna mess up the relationships we got going, (26:00) Veteran: We didn’t have a relationship alright, we didn’t have a reala-, relationship, and I was nice with the guy, I wasn’t being ugly or anything I just wanted to introduce myself then when I �was there, I need, that wasn’t the way he took it, oh well, now you like special, I like special forces a lot better because, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: If that had happened with Special Forces, we’d just have it out and it’d been over when one of us walked away and the other one may or may not have, anyway, different, Interviewer: Special Forces might have more of an interest in getting the job done too, Veteran: Special Forces was, is a good organization that they do and they’re dedicated and they got, that’s one of the things, one of the better things I've done, when I got out of OCS I applied for Airborne, Ranger, Special Forces, and didn’t get it, I did that several times, didn’t get it, ended, ended up there so Interviewer: So when do you finish up the tour in Germany? Veteran: Well I wasn’t, I went, that’s not quite the end of it so, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: When I left there, and I was there for a year as a battery commander and went, was the S2 intel, Intel Security Officer, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And we changed Commanders, battery, Battery Commanders, so when, in, when classified material came in I had to sign for it okay, and I had to show it to the Battalion Commander and he wanted me, the guy that came in was you can trust me guy guy, alright, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I'm the battery, Battalion Commander and you can trust me so I don’t need to sign for it, bullshit I'm signing for it, I can’t just leave it with you, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Anyway we had a little bit of a rile over that but, and I'm not a, and have never been a yes-man so anyway, (28:00) Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: We got through that, I ended up, that’s when I got, no its not, I went to VII Corps artillery working in the S3 shop and I worked there for a while and I was just an S3, I was the nuclear NRASS, nuclear release authentication system officer for them and, Interviewer: What does that mean? Veteran: There's a system, you can’t, we have nuclear weapons, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Alright, the nuclear weapons are locked away, we don’t tell people that but they’re locked away, but you have to have authority to use them, you have to, that’s the President, comes from the President down through the Air Force to the Army, Air Force through chain, it’s not chain of command its indirect chain of command, but we have to have it and if that part went through the Air Force, and down and there's a, an authentication system and there are devices on the weapons that have to be, you have to be, have two parts, two parts, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Of the combination to open, to be able to use them and you have to have two different people and your authentication system to open the correct cards and its, its complicated, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But that’s the way it works, anyway I was responsible for training and for testing for run around that and other things, we ended up being rifted from, from there, I was in, from Nuremburg Germany to Stuttgart Germany, we were living on the economy there and got rifted and went back home, (30:01) Interviewer: Explain, so you usually see that word as “riffed” rather than rifted but explain what that means, Veteran: Because of the reduction in force the, the Army has set levels of office, officers to enlisted, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And so when thy reduce the size of the Army they reduce the size of the Officer Corps, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And there had been I think, I think mine was the fifth RIF that they had had and I got, when I was notified of it and there's no recourse really, got a little stamps with, with Pentagon �stamped on your papers, no, they’ve reviewed it and its done so you’re out basically, so I was an Officer, a Reserve Officer on active duty without a college degree, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And now my source of commission was OCS, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And all those things counted against staying in, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And so I was out, Interviewer: Would they have allowed you to stay as a sergeant or was that not an option? Veteran: I could have gone back, I could have gone back as an E5, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: When you report to OCS, you’re, you’re promoted to E5, I could have gone back to that and I declined okay, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So I, I was out and I went to, went back to school, decided, with my wife and I went to the library one day, we were looking to get, kept hearing rumors of more riffs, more riffs coming along and sat down and looked through some career publications and trying to see, if I'm rifted what am I gonna do, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And one of the things I wanted to do is, was be a veterinarian, my grandfather was a real, he was a cow doctor he wasn’t really a certified veterinarian but a late doctor, (32:01) Veteran: And I decided that’s what I wanted to do, so I went, when I got out I went back to school, went to Clemson for year and got the prerequisites and I did well, I applied myself and did well and I had, my, my wife told me later she didn’t really want me to be accepted to go through, to be a veterinarian, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Because of the, it’s the hardship in your own school, �Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: How much money in the, but I got accepted, I had, so I had one shot at it, one shot at being a veterinarian and I got accepted so then I spent four years at the University of Georgia, I was a year at Clemson and I took animal industries which taught me a lot, it was, I didn’t grow up on a farm, I had both my grandparents were farmers but I wasn’t, we lived in town in Spartanburg anyway, I went to Clemson and then I went to University of Georgia for four years and learned to be a veterinarian and when I graduated from there I went to Junaluska Animal Hospital in Waynesville area of North Carolina, mountains of North Carolina, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Practiced there two years and then I went to South Carolina and went into a partnership with a guy, called him a three P veterinarian, Interviewer: Means? Veteran: Which means he cures everything with penicillin, panel log, and prednisone, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: Three P veterinarian, now you could treat a lot with those three things I’ll grant you but there are multiple other things and not a very progressive person, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Okay, he had been there a long time and then when he graduated that was the degree, was veterinary medicine, it wasn’t for us it was a doctorate, Interviewer: Mm-hmm (34:00) Veteran: So you had to have at least two years of undergraduate, most people had four, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So when, when I completed my veterinary degree I went back and applied for a degree when I completed the work, I applied for a degree from Clemson and I got it, so my, I graduated from Clemson in April and then Georgia in May, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: It’s a moth apart because of the graduation dates anyway, so I have a DVM, went to Junaluska, went back to, went to Union South Carolina and practiced, started out in a partnership �and then ended up being a sole practitioner and a, a year before that I had gotten back on Reserve, back in the Reserve, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: To make, to build time for retirement and they called me one day, they were looking for active-duty veterinarians and I was burned out from veterinary practice, I lived a mile away from my practice and every night I would leave it, 5:30 or 6 o’clock when I could get away, closed at five, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: 5:30 to 6:00 when I could get away and have calls to go back every night okay, I changed my hours one time, moved it from five to six, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I sat there from five to six and then had the same thing happen, so I changed it back, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: if it’s not going to help me, why bother anyway, I, I went back in as a veterinarian into veterinary corps and my first assignment was a 10th Special Forces group, I had wanted to be Special Forces before and didn’t get in, Interviewer: Okay, now what year was this that you’re going back in? Veteran: 1984, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: ’84 to ’87 I was with the Special Forces group, (36:00) Interviewer: Okay and where were they based? Veteran: Fort Devens Massachusetts, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: So I wasn’t jump qualified, so I had to go back to jump school now at this point I’m forty years old, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And I went to jump school and broke my ankle on me forth jump, I spent three months in a cast, about three months, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I jumped again and got my fifth jump on the third of April and jumped into Fort Lewis Washington on Saturday the sixth of April, which is my birthday, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: When you jump after being broken you, it still makes you a little antsy, but we got through it, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: It was interesting jumping into Fort Lewis because its, it was turned out to be a rough drop zone, there were hillocks and they, and I picked out one of those and was looking at, I had a broke, had the broken ankle before so trimalleolar fracture was a fairly serious thing, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Fortunately they didn’t have to go in and mess with it, it was a closed, so I didn’t, it wasn’t an open fracture, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: It was closed and so I didn’t have to, I healed better than I would have done if, if pinned things and done that, Interviewer: So they could just hold it in place with a cast and, Veteran: With a cast yes, yes, Interviewer: So why were you jumping into Fort Lewis? Was this, Veteran: It was a way to get there in part, we, the National, National Air Guard from Rhode Island or, would fly us out there and if we had a jump at the far end, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So we loaded into a C-130 and flew out there and we spent one night in Fargo, North Dakota, Interviewer: Mm-hmm (38:00) �Veteran: Then went out there and jumped in, and what we were going there for is there had, part of the training, part of the medical section and the medical section is involved with training for the 18 deltas who were refresher training that kind of stuff, and we wanted to send people to a mountain medical course put on by University New Hampshire and they saw that there was a school called mountain medicine course being given at Fort Lewis Washington, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And what it turned out to be, there was a medical battalion there and this was a getaway for them, a treat for them to go up on the mountain and campout, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They hadn’t expected us to do that but anyway, we went, it was a great fun time, we got a little bit of medicine and some cross country skiing and some downhill skiing and that was a, being from South Carolina I did not have a lot of experience skiing, didn’t have any experience skiing, Interviewer: So what do either the Army or the Special Forces have need of a veterinarian for? Veteran: I'm glad you asked, I was hoping you would ask that question, you know of course that the Special Forces is engaged in guerrilla warfare, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We took care of the gorillas, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We took care of the gorillas, Interviewer: As in Africa ape gorillas, as opposed to, Veteran: You didn’t get the joke, Interviewer: People with submachine guns? Veteran: No, no its what do we really did, I told that once to, to a General, we went through a receding line and he asked the same question, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: What, after the receding line, well we take care of the gorillas, anyway, it was a, what we really did is, is anything to do with food stuff we took care of, �(40:01) Veteran: Anything to do with animals, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Use them as pack animals and other things, how they ended up and how they ended up with a slot for a veterinarian in the Special Forces groups was out of World War two and when the y formed tenth group, tenth group was the first one formed and was formed as a stay behind to, so when Europe was overrun tenth group was going to be there in Flint Kaserne Germany to organize the resistance and the first soldiers were predominantly people who had been in World War two, they were Foreign Nationals, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They had been in the resistance movements over there and they had used pack animals so when they looked at the tam on knee, they said where’s the veterinarian, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So that’s how they got the veterinarian in, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: When they use them a lot, it turned out to be a good thing because of the use of the military working dogs now, the military working dogs has become, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: A big program throughout the military not just Special Forces and not just the Army, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So that’s been a, been a boom, but we did, we do food inspections we did, I did a lot of things, I was also their Preventive Medicine Officer and it was a time when the, the medical department would not provide an MD to be a Preventative Medicine Officer so I did that as well, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I had just did it, and did a lot of inspections and a lot of training stuff like that to do, but then the other thing I did while I was there was, I went to the Special Forces Qualification course and the Officer, Officer Branch, Officer part of them, Interviewer: Mm-hmm (42:00) �Veteran: At Fort Bragg and got through that have a long tab, from there, from, from tenth group I went to a-med advance course, I’d been to the artillery advance course but that didn’t count because I was an a-med and so I went to a-med advance course and from there I went to be the OIC of the UK and Ireland Division of Veterinary Attachment Europe, and it’s a TDA, was at that time I was there, it was a TDA, not a TONE, Interviewer: Did you have, Veteran: A Table of Distribution and Allowances Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: TDA, TONE, Table of Organization, Organization and Equipment, so more, most units, the real units in the Army, the permanent units in the Army are TONE’s, Interviewer: Okay this is similar to what they used to call TDY, the Temporary Deployment, Veteran: No, TDY is when you go someplace, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: And, temporary duty, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: This is, this is more or less permanent, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: But it, haven’t even been there I don’t know how long but it, it’s a Table of Distribution Allowances, you’ve got a mission that doesn’t fit in with, with a TONE unit, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: You’re not a field unit, we were not a field unit instead, well we did what I did, I had twenty six people that worked for me and England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland, Northern Ireland, and they, they, twenty six people to, two civilians and I had two veterinarians that worked for me, part of the problem was that it had never been properly organized, (44:01) Veteran: To function that way, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And so we had to basically two missions, the missions were to do the inspections, fulfill the role of the USDA and the FDA for offshore procurement of UF, foodstuff, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: That was one mission and the other was taken care of military working animals and the civilian pets, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So when I got there, there was an OIC and there was a one veterinarian in charge of the food inspection and the other one was in charge of the, the animal, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Part of it, and the one in charge of the animal part of it was doing the pet, they made a circuit where you would go to different bases, took him a week and he, during that time he was away one night, spent one night away from home every week, the second week he was supposed to be taking care of the military working dogs, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: In Britain because of the rabies quarantine, the military working dogs are owned by the RAF, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But they're in use, what happens is, it was an agreement between the Air Force and the RAF, Royal Air Force that they would get the dog when a handler would come in, they would get the dog for the duration of the handler’s time there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And it would go back to the RAF, and for that we gave them $40,000, okay, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We took care of it all the way, everything else and that was a big issue because there had been a letter written by the, the Chief of Security for the Brit-, American Air Force there out of Mildenhall, because they weren’t getting the support, (46:00) Veteran: Veterinary support they needed, and so this veterinarian that came in that was there when I got there, his thing was well do we own those dogs, I had a quick answer for him, yes, we do we get them everything they need just like they’re ours, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And then he had a big, to-do about being away from home and his child growing up without him, I had been in veterinary practice in the states and living in the same house with my children and you’re called away so much that you really almost grow up without knowing them, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Because you don’t spend, can’t spend a lot of time, so I didn’t have a lot of sympathy for the guy, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: He also did not have a, did not have a, a veterinary license, he flunked the National Board, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: And they, at one point you didn’t have to have a license, but they started having, requiring all veterinarians to have a license in some state, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And he didn’t have one, so the OIC was allowing him to have Saturdays off so he could study for his boards, you know he did, I really believe he studied, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: For his boards, he also had the other OIC had a problem with him in that the Australian trench coat, the one with the cape and the slouch hat, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: He decided that’s what he was gonna wear, where we were supposed to be wearing our instruction said we dressed like the, with a coat and tie like the business population, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay, and this is what he wore around and the other guy didn’t like it, but he didn’t do anything about it either (48:00) Veteran: And I was a quick fix, you can’t wear that anymore, well everybody likes it, well this is not Australia, you don’t fit in with the population, you can’t wear that anymore, and the other �one, our, our Dr. Fairichild, Sharon Fairichild, she was in charge of food inspection and they had a list in, we were not computer, were not a great on computers, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Beginning of the computers stuff, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Had a word processor and you know the old tractor feed paper, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: Okay, there was a, a list of initial inspections that were required that were behind, was that long, I don’t know how many it was, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: A bunch because you know it’s very, a lot of inspections and both veterinarians were paranoid about the OIC, had a right to be because the OIC was not totally fair either frankly, Interviewer: Alright so where are you in the chain, are you below the OIC? Veteran: I'm waiting, I'm waiting for the OIC to leave, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: And I took over, Alright so how long a period was that? Veteran: It turned out to be a, a month or so, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: Longer than normal, longer than it should have been, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But I got to see Carl, Carl Berryman, and things like he would degrade the British, British are blah-blah-blah-blah, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And then put on his little hat and his little, do I look British, this guy’s crazy alright, �Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Come on, it’s a lot of crazy people in the world but you know why do I keep running into all of them, anyway he finally left and we, we separate things out, (50:01) Veteran: My Commander, it was in Germany, was a full, full Colonel, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Full bird Colonel, he had his own little hang-ups too, he had, we had four TDAs, we had one we were operating on, we had one that should have been and we had, it kept, you never knew really what the real TDA was but what I found out was until I got somebody on the ground, when I went in I had orders for Lakenheath, and Lakenheath is not where we were, we were in RAF West Ruislip down by London, but whoever wrote the things didn’t know this and I found out that it, it, until they got on the ground I could move people around, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And get away with it, I'm not sure it was legal, but it worked, so I put people where they needed to be, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And so the twenty-six people that I had were all in, in one- and two-man assignments they were out there on the civilian slaughterhouses, slaughterhouses and you know inspection points, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Different places, it was a, a challenging job, it was one of the better jobs I've had, and I enjoyed it, I was on the road though all the time I needed another veterinarian, I ended dividing the territory into three sections, two had veterinarians in charge and they did everything, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Food inspection, and military, and working dogs, the dog work and the food inspection work, and the third one I didn’t have a veterinarian for, we didn’t do the, the animal care there and we didn’t have the, the mission, didn’t have working dogs, Interviewer:Mm-hmm Veteran: And we didn’t do civilian dogs and that was mostly Navy up north, (52:00) �Veteran: and I ended up doing a lot of that, I did all of it really, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Scotland and Ireland, went to Wales several times, interesting, interesting stuff in its own right, went down to, in England down to Cornwall down, the western, southwestern, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: Part of England, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And there was a Marine base down there and they wanted me to come in and inspect some, some MREs that they had stored in a little hut, been stored there like three years old or something, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They were old, anyway I did the inspection and what I found was that they were, they had been temperature abuse, I mean they were, there was no heat no anything, they'd just been sitting there for a long period of time and so I condemned them and that hit because I condemned those they had to go back, veterinary corps had to go back and recheck that whole lot which is worldwide, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Cause a little bit of a wave but heck with it, hats what my job was, Interviewer: Almost three years old anyway Veteran: Yeah what the heck, yeah nobody like to eat, it should have, they should have been eating them in rotating them out, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But they didn’t anyway, but we would go in and I would do inspections, initial inspections so in and inspect plants, we did, they were trying to get the milk suppliers under the, our, FDA’s milk plan, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And, and then they were trying to get everything to fall under the FDA’s plan for, for fluid milk, which is not, we didn’t have a lot for ultra-high temperature pasteurization, �(54:00) Veteran: So what they did in Germany, this is our full bird Colonel, nice guy but still had his quirks, but his ruling over there, what they did over there is they pasteurized it first, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: With HTST, high temperature short time pasteurization which is what most of our milk over here is, and then they ran it through the, the ultra-high temperature of pasteurization so your pasteurizing it twice and we did not have that option and most of the plants, the plants are, are, were very modern the HTST plants, high temperature short time plants, most of them in Britain were run by computers and what the, our plan in the US pasteurization requires a, a pump to be timed and set and wired set so it won’t change the output, well if you don’t have that you don’t have that pump and your pump is, is not a fixed volume pump, what we ended up doing was using the pasteurization, the pasteurizer as the pump, to set the volume, but in the, the British plants many of them, the guy sitting on the, on the floor supervising the milk going through he got too much blown back, too much wasn’t, didn’t meet the pasteurization qualifications, he could change the temperature, and we couldn’t allow that, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We had, had to go through the pasture, it was, it was very interesting I thought, (56:00) Interviewer: You learn all sorts of things in the military, Veteran: You learn things you had no idea you would ever needed to know, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: One of the worst things we had to do was inspect eggs, and the reason it was a bad job was because we have a different standard in the US, we wash eggs, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And reoil them, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: Over there they don’t, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So you had dirty eggs, people complain about dirty eggs, well you have to think about this guys, guy gets up at three in the morning to be there by six and they wondering when they �start out, he’s got a bunch of eggs they tell him how many he has, how many cases he has to inspect, the plant people pull those cases out of the lot and they run them through the machine and you’re looking and you pick out and you get so they don’t pass, they get one free relook, so you go out and come back in an hour and they're supposed to be reworking these eggs you know, they don’t, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: You come back in an hour and you inspect another batch and they don’t pass and then they can call the contracting officer, not the veterinarian but the contracting officer and give them another look, so you’re working about, you start out at three in the morning you’re working about three four in the afternoon and it’s about time to go home, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And you’re tired anyway and they pass them just because they really haven’t been reworked, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: A lot of interesting thing I learned about food inspection and things like that, go into a plant and you seen the thing on the news where somebody is licking an ice cream, don’t know if you’ve seen it or not, so fat its going on and put it on YouTube where they go a store take it out, a carton of ice cream, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Take the top off lick it put the top back on put it back in, Interviewer: Ewe Veteran: No lie, well one place we went you went in and there was chocolate and they written something in the chocolate, (58:01) Veteran: Okay, well you can’t have that stuff, this is not, this is not right, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Anyway that was a relook, Interviewer: Alright back out of this a little, how long did you spend in England? Veteran: Two years, �Interviewer: Okay and when do you finish that duty? Veteran: I came back to University of Georgia, I applied for a long-term civilian education, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I applied for a PhD program well I got into that and went back to University of Georgia and in the department I was in, not the school but the department they required you to have a master’s degree which I didn’t have so my major professor said go ahead and start and I will talk them out of this, well he lied, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So I got a masters and a PhD in three years and five months and the reason its three years and five months, about a year out I saw I wasn’t gonna make my deadline, so I asked for a six-month extension but instead of having me report on the last day of six-month they had me report on the first day of the six-month so I didn’t get, but I got it done, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I went on so, Interviewer: Alright so what field did you do the, Veteran: Microbiology, Interviewer: Okay, alright and what were you gonna do with that? Veteran: Actually what I did with that is I went into, went to work for a Walter Reed Institute of Research and HIV research, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: It sound interesting sounds important and it is but its like Trivial Pursuit they’ve already looked for all the obvious things and so they, so and I went to lots of meeting, I met all the famous researchers and other than that I can’t say I, I personally accomplished a great deal toward the, but you’re looking at, at small things that we still don’t have a good vaccine for, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: For prevention, I was working at the area I was working in was a vaccine for the prevention, (1:00:02) Veteran: Of HIV, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I was not the, the lab animal veterinarian but I ended up doing that, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We had a civilian contractor who got another job and quit, and I was the only veterinarian on staff, and I ended up doing lab animal vet for a while through that so, interesting stuff, Interviewer: Okay are you doing that at that point as a civilian or are you still in the military? Veteran: I'm in the military, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: And then I hit twenty years and I had to retire, had to retire going active duty and I already been passed over for a Lieutenant Colonel so I, I decided to retire, Interviewer: Alright, now tape number three is about up, Veteran: Oh my gosh what’s our time doing, three thirty okay, Interviewer: So we’re gonna stop it cause I, *Screen goes black* Interviewer: Okay so we are kind of working through your veterinary career, Veteran: Right, Interviewer: In the military at this point I think you have been talking about how you were involved with HIV research and wound up supervising lab animals and so forth, and when did you finish that particular stent? Veteran: That was 1996, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: It was August, I got out of the military in August of ’96, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: About the, I think the first of August, �Interviewer: Okay, and then from there, Veteran: I went to the diagnostic lab in South Carolina, Clemson veterinary diagnostic lab in Pontiac or just outside of Columbia, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: I worked there for, for seven years as Supervisory Microbiologist, and we dealt with a lot of things, the lab was, had not had a Microbiologist in a few years and it needed it, a lot of corrections and those kinds of things, (1:02:02) Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And we moved into a new building which helped a lot but just finding creative way to get equipment was an interesting thing, Interviewer: So that’s kind of like being in the Army? Veteran: Very much like being in the Army, we all had an interesting thing happen though when I first got there, we, Salmonella Enteritdis had become an issue and we had an outbreak that the FDA, the USDA had done all the chicken work, egg work, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Prior to the and the FDA decided to take it over, they lost, lost funding for it, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And FDA decided to take it over and so the first case the FDA did was in South Carolina there was a Mexican restaurant in Winder Georgia that they had to, customers had an outbreak in the egg source for that was a company in South Carolina, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And they found that, found the Salmonella in the Chile Riano, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: A Chilean egg and they would, it was temperature abused, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: But the Salmonella we traced back to the, to the company, and the thing about Salmonella Enteritdis is that we’ve had Salmonella and chickens all along, Salmonella grows at a little higher temperature, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Than normal, and the chickens have that higher temperature about 103, the difference in this one in the other Salmonella is that the others were in the gut and this would, would go in, invade the ovary, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And come out inside the egg, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: now not the outside of the egg, so that became an issue, we ended up writing a, an egg quality assurance plan for the industry in South Carolina and, and there were only five major producers, (1:04:01) Veteran: There might have been some backyard flocks, but these were all the commercial producers there were five of those who were in our plan, got it approved all voluntary and got it approved through the FDA, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Which was a major accomplishment because some of the other states, Pennsylvania had been working on it longer and didn’t, didn’t, we beat them to it, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: To get the approval from the FDA, also when West Nile virus came through we, we coordinated with our department of health and environmental control and monitoring for the West Nile virus, interesting stuff, when I, I left there I went to work for a, 2003 I went to work for the Joint Special Operations Medic Training Center with a contract company, Global Services and it was the refresher training for 18 deltas, the Special Forces Medics, and I was the veterinarian to support that, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Group and other work as needed, Interviewer: Okay, at this point are you meeting people who’ve been Iraq and Afghanistan on missions like that? �Veteran: Oh yes, well the this I part of, yes, what we, the special, you go through the, the qcourse, the Special Forces Qualifications course to become an 18 delta and that’s a yearlong course, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And so there's a lot of surgical training maybe the Special Force’s makes are trained in surgery, trained as first responders and they use animal models, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: In their training and the animal model we used was goats, so my job was to be sure that the goats were not, did not suffer at all, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Follow all the rules and that everybody was following the rules, (1:06:02) Veteran: Which is kind of sometimes difficult with Special Force’s troops but, only, the only group that’s worse is MD’s okay, MD’s have no respect for animals I've learned this the hard way, but we get through that, I did that and I also taught classes they finally made this, converted that from a, a contract position to a government service position, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I did that from anyway, form 2000, 2003 to 2010 I was contractor 2010 to 2012, I was a GS Army GS 13, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And then I transferred to the Air Force as an Air Force civilian and GS-13 and, Interviewer: Why did you make that switch? Veteran: Wait, one of the things in making a switch from a contractor to, to a GS that position put me under the military veterinarian, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And the military veterinarians didn’t appreciate that, that you're a veterinarian, they think you're more like a slave or a technician and want to tell you how to do your work, it, they hired me for a veterinarian not a tech, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And that job came open and I took it and I was up, I never regretted taking it, I like the, working with the Air Force, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They had had one person doing that job and she was, she had a military career in the Army, I don’t know if she retired or not, but she was, didn’t get it off the ground really, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So I took it over and had lots of contacts and we got it going, (1:08:02) Veteran: In the Army we used goats as our model and this other one used pigs, you know there's, there's a lot regulation and paperwork, you have to plan it well in advance, has to have approval from everybody going its not just something you jump out and do and when we were doing animal model training it’s not random, you have a set protocol and this is what you do, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And you have, you really have to watch MD’s when they're doing that because they don’t like to follow rules, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: Not like these Lieutenant Colonels, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Anyway, I did that until I retire in, in 2015, Interviewer: Alright, now, I guess if you look back over the whole thing and the time you spent in, in service, can you sum up I mean how you think that affected you or shaped you? Veteran: Everything, everything you do shapes you and it certainly did me, okay, I was quiet, shy, I tell people I was shy until I kissed the Blarney Stone but, which I did but too, I did kiss the Blarney Stone but I was, it was more what I did in the service and what you have to do that brought it out, brought me in a maturation if you will, it’s like being in Vietnam it makes you, it changes you, you don’t want it to change you but it changes you regardless, Special Forces training changed me going to the instructor course for the Special Forces they have an instructor course there and that helps train you a lot, how to present things and how to give classes so, Interviewer: Yeah, how do you think Vietnam affected you? �(1:10:01) Interviewer: If you look at that piece of things, Veteran: Vietnam effects, effects everybody you have a different outlook on life, there's a certain fatalism alright, part of the thing like going to jump school and everybody worries about, jumping out of airplanes but so what, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: You got a parachute, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: That’s, overcome your fear, I, it, I can say it certainly affected me alright, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I don’t, Interviewer: Yeah, but for you it’s really kind of one stage of many cause you had a whole series of different things, Veteran: I had a whole stage of, yes many different things I’ve done and you learn from each of them and each of them changes you somewhat, you can’t undo any of it, are there things I would have done differently, you, you bet there were, I recognize things too if I had not had a wife and a child I would probably be filling up a hole in Vietnam right now, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Alright, because you can become addicted to that, that adrenaline rush, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And things, the, the one job I would have extended for, I would not have extended for any of the jobs I had although the one I liked best was being the Liaison Officer but with the like second of the 506, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But the one job I would have extended for would have been to be an Infantry Company Commander, because they're the ones that do things, they're the ones that are in control, the Battalion Commanders not in control he may think he is but I mean he’s flying around at 10,000 feet trying to tell you on the ground what’s going on, he’s not in control, �(1:12:00) Veteran: Brigade Commanders from the Brigade Commander above they really didn’t know what they were doing, I don’t think, I didn’t know, didn’t know the Generals, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Had very little interaction with them, but brigade, the Battalion Commanders had some control, Interviewer: But they're not really leading men on the ground, Veteran: They're not leading men on, well I’ve been told some of them did, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay I’ve heard of some that did, Colonel Honeycutt if you read about him, I didn’t know him personally okay, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But if you read about him, he was, he was an on the ground kind of a guy and I just don’t know, Colonel Lucas was not, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: He liked the helicopter, Interviewer: Very much so, Veteran: He liked starched fatigues and shined shoes and airconditioned hooch, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, alright well since we are at a Ripcord reunion and we get back to that, Veteran: Right, Interviewer: Ill fainted Commander at the end I guess is probably a good place to wind up the interview, Veteran: I think it is, Interviewer: So thank you very much for sharing stories, Veteran: Okay, I gotta go get... (1:13:20) � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_HinesR2319V2 Title A name given to the resource Hines, Raymond (2 of 2, Interview transcript and video), 2019 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2019-07-26 Description An account of the resource Raymond Hines was born on April 6, 1944 in Wellford, South Carolina, and graduated high school in 1962. Hines received his draft notice in 1965 and chose to enlist in the Army. He completed Basic Training at Fort Jackson, South Carolina, and Advanced Infantry Training at Fort Devens, Massachusetts, where he became a Morse Intercept Operator. He also trained in Artillery OCS at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, before transferring to Fort Bliss, Texas, as part of the Air Defense for only two months before being transferred to Wurzburg Germany. From Germany, Hines was deployed to Vietnam with the 2nd of the 319th as a Fire Direction Officer and proceeded to report to the Bravo Battery at Firebase Bastogne. He saw heavy combat with this unit. While in Vietnam, Hines also worked as an assistant S-3 fireman, and a Liaison Officer for the 2nd of the 506 at Fire Base Ripcord. After taking some additional advanced artillery courses, he deployed to Nuremberg Germany with the 3rd of the 70th House Artillery before transferring to the 7th Corps Artillery as a Nuclear Release Authentication System Officer. He would later return to Europe after recieveing his veterinarian degree in the United States to care for military service animals. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Hines, Raymond Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/5433f5039206d237f7bb85a7a027df43.mp4 da810e75451199a656df4e8292a138a4 https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/e4cdfcb4a1081db4155ff45fc6a6b73b.pdf f57421e906c4a5c6b2be3a9490472646 PDF Text Text Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project Oral History Interview Veteran: Raymond Hines Interviewed by James Smither Transcribed by Christopher Kroupa Interviewer: Alright we are talking today with Raymond Hines of South Carolina, the interviewer is James Smither of the Grand Valley State University Veterans History Project. Okay, begin with some background on yourself, so to start with where and when were you born? Veteran: I was born in, on the, April 6 1944 in Wellford South Carolina. Interviewer: Okay, and what part of the state is that in? Veteran: That’s in Spartanburg County, the upper, upper part of the state. Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Northwest part of the state. Interviewer: Okay, now did you grow up there, or did you move around? Veteran: I grew up in Spartanburg. Interviewer: Okay, and what was your family doing for a living when you were a kid? Veteran: My father was a city policeman in Spartanburg. Interviewer: Alright, and then did you finish high school? Veteran: I did, in Spartanburg high school, 1962 Interviewer: Okay, and what did you do when you graduated? Veteran: I went to Spartanburg Virginia College for two years and then one year at the University of South Carolina. Interviewer: Alright, and did you finish college at that point? Veteran: I did not, I graduated with an associate degree from Junior College and then I went into engineering in the University of South Carolina, have a brother-in-law who is an engineer and I felt it would be a grand thing to do, learned when I got there that you needed to start in engineering if you were gonna be an engineer, and the other thing I learned besides how to drink beer was that I didn’t wanna be an engineer. �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: *laughs* Interviewer: Alright, so Veteran: Ended up on academic suspension. Interviewer: Mm-hmm. Veteran: That put me number one, number one draft pick, I was number one on the draft list for Spartanburg County. Interviewer: And when was that? Veteran: 1965 (2:00) Interviewer: Okay, alright, and so when did you actually then, so you get drafted and then once you get the draft notice, Veteran: I get the, I got the notice to come for a physical and of course I passed that. Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I talked to the recruiters, I had some college, I talked to the recruiters, and the only service where you could go to OCS without having a degree was, was the Army. So I went, I joined the Army, Okay, and when I was down there I did fairly well on my intel, on the intelligence test that they did and the recruiter for Army Security Agency came in and talked to us, and talked to me, and talked to the other guys but you had to sign it for four years, and I ended up doing that, and well you don’t end up going to Vietnam, Army Security Agency, and you’re pretty safe and it’s kinda like a sissy agency, but nevertheless that appealed to me at the time, I did that and then later I went, I went to OCS in field artillery and ended up in artillery. Interviewer: Alright, so to kinda back up here, so basically once you got the draft notice, Veteran: Right Interviewer: You kinda weighed your options and decided to go to ahead and enlist Veteran: Yes Interviewer: And enlist with the expectation that you go to officers’ candidates’ school once you finished your regular training? �Veteran: Well there was no expectation, it was with the hope I would get Army Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: Because there was no expectation there, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: There was no guarantee either way, it was just the only service where I could, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: There was that opportunity. Interviewer: Okay Veteran: And the other services there was not that opportunity, so that’s the one I took where there was a least a pathway there. Interviewer: Alright so where did you go from basic training? Veteran: Basic training at Fort Jackson South Carolina. Interviewer: Okay Veteran: And then I went to Fort Devens Massachusetts for AIT and I was a Morse Intercept Operator. (4:02) Interviewer: Okay before we get there, a lot of people these days don’t really even knows what goes on in basic training, so what was basic training at Fort Jackson South Carolina like in the mid 1960s? Veteran: Oh, it’s just jolly fun I’ll tell you what. Basic training in South Carolina, it was in December, I reported in, signed in the first day of December and it was several days we were processing, it was the build-up for Vietnam, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And they were processing people in and we’d march around and they got us up till we got to the basic training thing and get us up at 4:00 in the morning and we’d have to clean up the barracks, clean everything up and fold up the mattresses and whatever else, take our stuff, our stuff in a bag, I had a little bag and I didn’t even take a coat it hadn’t been cold, I had a sweater turned out to be the coldest winter in South Carolina in a hundred years, then we walked around �and we sit on our bags in a line waiting for the mess hall to open, and then they took us down to, there was a processing unit today its right, its down from where the hospital is, but there was one big, big building down there where we were processed in and the finally we get to basic, our basic training company, and mine was on Fort Jackson Boulevard right now the highway goes through there, I-77 goes right through where our World War two barracks were, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: The barracks were real interesting, they were two-story World War two barracks you could walk up to the windows and shake ‘em, we would put a blanket over the window to keep the draft out at night, guys would go out training, come back in, it was better on the second floor, I was on the first floor, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: It was better on the second floor because heat rises, but and then the heat ducts were on the ceiling anyway they were right down the middle of things the way they were designed, no insulation, you were, they weren’t designed for, for cold, (6:04) Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They were designed for heat, and we didn’t have to worry about that I don’t imagine guys in the summertime did, but we didn’t have to worry about the heat, see guys come in and stand under a light bulb to try to get warm, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: As kind of an unusual thing, anyway all I can say is its typical training, we just took raw recruits, it was a draft army, I was in basic training with the draftees’ form Puerto Rico, Baltimore, as well as Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania was a big one, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Big group, and then other people I don’t know who else, trying to think who else was there not many, there were three or four guys that wanted to be pilots, helicopter pilots Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: One guy was Kelly, Kelly, no I won’t talk about Kelly. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Let’s leave Kelly out because Kelly was one of those guys that would tell you one thing, and then he was, he was the student who stood out in front of the formation and, and he �would tell us what to do and then the drill sergeant would show up out there and it wasn’t the right thing and Kelly would jump on us for not doing the right thing when he had just told us to do it. Interviewer: Hopefully Veteran: Yeah, there are lots of Kelly’s’ Okay Interviewer: Okay Veteran: So, if you hear me say it, that’s a Kelly, that’s what I’m thinking about. Interviewer: Alright, now so was it just physical training and marching and discipline and that kind of thing? Veteran: Pretty much yeah, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Bayonet training, rifle range, hand-to-hand combat, I, there was a, had a training accident doing hand-to-hand combat, (8:00) Veteran: The guy was supposed to pull his punch and he didn’t, and he, but, he hit me in the face with his hand from behind, anyway and my teeth went through my lip right here and came out so I had stitches right here before I even got out of basic training, Interviewer: Wow. Veteran: It really hasn’t caused me any problem, it did get me out of going to the gas chamber because I couldn’t, they didn’t think I could put the mask on, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But I got that letter so, Interviewer: Alright, and I guess it sounds like you would have had a real kind of ethnic mix of people in this training Veteran: We did Interviewer: Yeah cause by now the military’s integrated and so, Veteran: There was a, in today’s world we have to be careful how we think about race and say racial things okay, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm, yup Veteran: I grew up in a racial community, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I grew up in the Jim Crow era, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Alright, when we got to basic training, blacks were given a priority, okay, it was reverse integration, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We did have a black assistant drill sergeant who was a great guy, okay, and I wanna say that, and I didn’t have any problem with race, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But it was, everybody wasn’t equal Interviewer: Okay, and Veteran: And if you’re white, you certainly weren’t equal Interviewer: And where did the Puerto Ricans fit in? Veteran: In between, everywhere, we had, we had Puerto Ricans from Puerto Rico , and we had Puerto Ricans from Baltimore, Baltimore. Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Baltimore, if I say it right, I can’t say it right, that makes sense, anyway, (10:00) Veteran: Just, they were just there, just it was just it was a mix and it was not, I really didn’t have any problem with it, I don’t today, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: And it, it, I’m, I only point it out because it was a fact that happened, Interviewer: Right �Veteran: Okay, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: Not that, that, I feel badly about it, our drill sergeant was white, our assistant drill sergeant was black, and he was a real nice guy he was, don’t have anything to say bad about either one of them really, Interviewer: And, how easy was it for you to adjust to being in the Army? Veteran: Yeah, I don’t think we had a choice, I mean, you adjusted, Interviewer: Well there are, some people push back more than others and some people have a harder time Veteran: In our, in our company we had two guys, draftees from Pennsylvania and they called them flip and flop and one, they had a drill sergeant behind him the whole time yelling at him and then we’d go on a march and one of them would fall down and they’d say, don’t, don’t step over him, don’t step over him, but it’s a different world then you have today, okay, it wasn’t, they finally got out I think, they got, which was what their goal was, whether or not it was real or not I can’t say. Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They weren’t in my platoon, they were in a different platoon, but they were, Interviewer: Alright so how long did basic last? Veteran: Two months, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: At least two months. Interviewer: They come to eight weeks at some point, so yeah, alright so you get through that, so Veteran: I got through that, Interviewer: So, you gotten through your, okay now, Veteran: I got, I caught a cold before I got to basic training, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: We were, they were moving us around, part of the time they had us housed in tents, we’d go into those old barracks, (12:00) Veteran: And you get there about nine or ten o’clock at night and then you’d have to make your bed and shower, shave, and whatever you did and then you had to, they’d wake you up at four in the morning and go through the thing and, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: You go through it, they finally put us in tents, and the tents were okay, they were warmer okay, we knew where we were and they had coal stoves and so hanging above the tents was a coal smoke from these, from these little pot-bellied heaters in the tents and I caught a cold, which I kept until I got to Fort Devens, I got to Fort Devens, got to Fort Devens and they had World War two barracks also but those were insulated and they had heat, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: Okay, Interviewer: You’re in Boston now, Veteran: You’re in Boston and that’s where I learned how to goof off also when we were in, we got in, report in, we were in a casual company waiting on our classes to come up, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And we went to formation, we go to formation, and first day we went as accident, we didn’t carry over boots so they had some people working out in the fields, we got, we ended up on that detail, being selected for that detail, a couple of us in the same barracks did, so we went back to get our over boots and heard the truck leave that was carrying us out to where we’re gonna be working and then we reported back to the acting sergeant and he just wanted us to disappear so he would have to, so we disappeared, he figured out if you, you figured out quickly that if your name wasn’t down, they didn’t have accountability of you, you home free, let’s say I learned how to work the system. Interviewer: Okay, so what did the actual training there consist of once that starts? Veteran: Well in training didn’t happen for a while that we were in transition for a while basically, we’re in a casual company and doing, ash and trash kind of things, (14:09) Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: Alright, shoveling snow first time of my life I had that much snow to shovel, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They had a, that snowstorm we had us out there in a fenced in area where we couldn’t just leave, you couldn’t sneak off anyway, and me and this other guys we were shoveling snow, I went one way and he went the other and, from the middle, we did it really nice looked good, then they put us doing some other stuff like trying to shovel snow where they’ve been running trucks in and out all day, I mean you’re not gonna get that up come on, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And then they put us back out there, called us back out there to shovel that same sidewalk again and they’ve been walking on it and it’d been snowing all day and they’ve been walking on it all day and we didn’t do as good a job that day, then it’s just kinda been time came and we had to go home, I mean what can I say. Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: No, I think overall, I did, and I think all the people I was with, we did it, those things we considered important we did well, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And we didn’t consider them important, we could have just considered it make work, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We goofed off, Interviewer: Okay so your kind of getting, you’re learning the system or whatever for a while, Veteran: That’s right. Interviewer: But at a certain point your actual training program starts. Veteran: We had a training program, training program consists of, we were in old, those old barracks, World War two Barracks again for the training area, we had the company area and we had the training area, and so when you leave the training, the company area to go to the training area, and you had the instructors and they played tapes of Morse code, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: De-da, Alpha, De-da, Alpha, and you had to hit alpha, (16:00) �Veteran: So you had your hands on the typewriter, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We had a typewriter and we had a headset on, and the saying come over and you were, had the beginning you yell the letter, you repeated the sound and yelled the letter, okay teaching us to do, okay so then from there it got, we got after the first phase when you learned the alphabet, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: You were just listening to code and typing it, at different speeds and speaking kept getting faster. Interviewer: And how long were you doing that? Veteran: Eight, maybe nine months, eight or nine, it was a long time. Interviewer: Now are they adding stuff to that or is it just constant repetition of just doing Morse code? Veteran: It was Morse code, you, and it didn’t, it wasn’t like they were sending you letters, anything that made sense, it was random. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: Because basically, and that was in the era of the Morse code and everything was, was encrypted, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Everything they sent and you would send out would be encrypted, Interviewer: Right Veteran: So, it didn’t make sense, you’re just listening and typing, and it got to be like a reflex you, you were daydreaming and doing that so, Interviewer: How many hours a day would you do that? Veteran: We’d start at eight to about three if you were on, you went to eight from, you had a lunch break, but you went started at eight I guess probably, I think it was eight until noon, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And you come back at one and go till if you were with your peer group, where you should be, you went home about three, if you weren’t you went home about five. Interviewer: And so how well did you do with this? Veteran: I passed it. Interviewer: Okay. Veteran: That’s all I can say. Interviewer: Did you have to stay till five a lot? Or did you usually go to three? Veteran: It’s, it’s not like you’re, it’s not like something you actively learn, you almost passively learned this stuff, so I don’t even remember, (18:03) Interviewer: Okay Veteran: It’s just day to day you did what you had to do. Interviewer: It would seem like something that would just drive you crazy after a while that’s just this constant, Veteran: You know it, you would think it does, but it really didn’t, it’s kinda like music in a sense, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But you’re sitting there listening to it come across and you’re not actively thinking about it, it’s like driving a car. Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: And you can actively think about it if you need to you do, but most of the time you’re thinking about other things. Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: In between, its, Interviewer: Alright so what were you really being trained for once you have this skill what are you gonna do with it? �Veteran: Well what you do, had a listening post all over the world and you would go sit in a listening post with a radio or two radios and you would listen to conversation, to transmissions, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And they’re sending it by hand, its still hand done with a Morse, hand key code, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So, the other thing is that the Morse person sending the Morse has his own signature, the way they send Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: You can pick out signatures, you can pick up one person from the other and that’s part of it, and a buddy of mine, I got, we applied for OCS, a buddy from North Carolina, anyway, I got selected for OCS and he didn’t and he went to Turkey and he was listening and he was able to pick up the same operator on different time zones on time, day time is over here and night time is over there and sometimes you use that as intel, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: It was basically Army intelligence, Interviewer: Right Veteran: Then, but that’s what I did. Interviewer: Okay, But I’ve never used it which is probably a good thing. (20:00) Interviewer: Alright so your, so when do you finish at Fort Devens then? Veteran: I reported in December of 66 to OCS Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Let me say this too, while I was there, what they did when we applied for OCS, is they put us into Delta Company, the training company, so most, most of the other companies were classes, I mean the classes would be together, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And but the people who were in, who applied for OCS got moved out of there into Delta Company, and we were in the Honor Guard, so in addition to training, we got to march in parades and do extra stuff, and shine boots more, and be inspected more, and shine floors and stuff like that, preparing us for OCS supposedly, but the main thing was we had a little scarf instead of a, so what it was called the Honor Guard and, Interviewer: I guess while you were at Fort Devens, I mean when you’re not training, I mean Veteran: Mm-hmm Interviewer: Could you go off the base and go into town, or do other stuff? Veteran: If you had a pass you did, if you were allowed a pass, and most of the time we were, town wasn’t very far away, wasn’t a very big town there, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: It wasn’t very big but, or could go into, to Boston but that was expensive, we didn’t make a lot of money, Interviewer: A lot of money okay, Veteran: Although I was gonna tell you too that, that Tommy Franks and I were PFCs together up there, if you read Franks’s book, he talks about Sam Long, Sam Long was our sergeant in charge of our, the honor guard, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, Alright Veteran: Anyway, I think he was actually a corporal but, but he was, he was God to us, he had that kind of control, and our sergeant major was named Scaglioni, big Italian guy. Interviewer: Alright, so now you go down to OCF, that’s Fort Benning Georgia? (22:00) Veteran: No, Fort Sill Oklahoma. Interviewer: Oh, Fort Sill Oklahoma, you were in artillery OCS. Veteran: That’s correct Interviewer: Okay so you’re at Fort Sill, Veteran: Now having said that, and what you just said, makes me think you’ve been in, doing infantry guys and infantry guys tend to leave out the rest of us, especially artillery. �Interviewer: Well I’ve talked to artillery guys too, I just had to back up and remember but, Veteran: That’s alright Interviewer: But, but I talked to, but there are more infantry than there are artillery, Veteran: Definitely more, well let me tell you what, when I ended up being rifted [usually “riffed”: demoted when fewer officers were needed], there were more artillery guys rifted than there were infantry guys, they ended up in artillery with a gap in your groups because of the rift, okay, but whatever that’s worth, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: Not much but, Interviewer: Alright so off to Fort Sill with you, Veteran: Alright were in Fort Sill, Interviewer: Fort Sill Veteran: Got into Fort sill, let me think about that one for a minute, I can’t remember how I got there, we are in the, called the Robinson barracks, but Robinson barracks was an area not a single barracks, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: At least not when I was there, and then they, they, it was, you started out, it was what six months long, you started out as they would give you a hard time, under-class, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Middle-class, upper-class, they had it divided into three, three groups, upperclassmen had like horseshoes on their heels, on the bottoms of their heels so they click when they walked, you watched, you watched out for upperclassmen, typical stuff just a lot of harassment, a lot of push-ups, you just do it okay, I mean just do it and go on with life, Interviewer: So, could the upperclassmen tell you to do push-ups (24:01) Veteran: Yes Interviewer: or things like that? �Veteran: Middle-classmen could tell you to do push-ups, and I, but they were really there for guide, to guide us and help us, and then you had a, a faculty officer who advised ya and told you things, don’t think I got much out of him but that’s beside the point, Interviewer: Did you ever have a lot of classroom work? Veteran: A lot, that was mostly classroom, so you had the company area and that kind of stuff to shine ya shoes and whatever, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And then you had classes, and the classes were very much like classes except you, our gunnery professor, I remember him throwing chalk at people when they give him the wrong answer but other than that it was pretty much the same, he was a good guy to, he was, heck of a guy. Interviewer: So, it was a lot of math and calculation for, Veteran: Yup Interviewer: Like trajectories? Veteran: We had, we had health and survey, you had to learn survey, that was a biggie, gunnery, you know where you figure, where you calculate and how you do this laying the firing battery, how you lay the battery, and aimon circle is what we used to lay it with, and the guns we went through the guns, and the gun positions, we went through maintenance, the maintenance stuff went through that, and at that time the maintenance well, didn’t have a problem in, with that there, and they didn’t have a problem, the Army at that time had a maintenance problem and the maintenance problem was that they had a maintenance system that they bought into, there was more work than doing the maintenance, okay, and they should have taken it all out and thrown them away, and start over again, and maintenance warrants, warrant officers were really glorified sergeants, (26:02) Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Now today you would find warrant officers throughout the military, Army, Navy, all of them I think have warrant officers, and they’ve, they changed that status, but until more modern times, you’d say warrant officer and I’d say poo okay, except for the pilots, the pilots were also warrant officers, because most of them were motor sergeants, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But, I’ll talk about that later, but that’s after Vietnam when I was in Germany for instance, �Interviewer: Okay, alright so Veteran: Alright yeah, go ahead and get me back on, on track. Interviewer: Yeah, we’ll go, okay yeah so just kinda talk about the sort of curriculum or whatever, Veteran: Am I ok, I’m wiggling around my chair so, Interviewer: You’re fine, you’re all in the shots so Veteran: Okay Interviewer: No problem with that, so we kind of going through the curriculum I guess of the artillery OCS Veteran: Yeah you had to learn it, you had to learn tactics, you had to learn how to give the fiveparagraph field order, you had to, all the artillery stuff, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Survey, surveys a biggie, Surveys a biggie because we operate, that allowed us being on a survey grid, allowed you to coordinate artillery from different units in different places, Interviewer: Right Veteran: And then the gunnery, kamo, you had to learn it all, what you do if your track breaks, Interviewer: Have to explain that Veteran: Well if the track breaks, what do, what’d you gotta do Interviewer: If the track breaks, Veteran: Yeah, the track on, if you have a, a mechanized vehicle, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And you have, you’re out there on tracks, Interviewer: Right, Veteran: And if the track breaks, and they do break sometimes you gotta go in and repair, somebody’s got to do it, �(28:01) Veteran: So we didn’t actually do it, we supervised it Interviewer: Right Veteran: Stand there Interviewer: Because some of the artillery was self-propelled, Veteran: Some was, Interviewer: And so that would have tracks, and did you also have vehicles that would tow guns that were tracked, or was that not something you had? Veteran: No, I don’t think there were any, any tracked to any, track vehicles other than some of the howitzers Interviewer: Alright Veteran: And then we had towed guns that were towed but, mostly by truck, Interviewer: Mm-hmm alright and then did you spend time out in the field like with, on a firing range, with, actualing firing guns? Veteran: Yes, we did, you did every position multiple times and you were forward observer and you were bi-direction officer and you, you fulfilled the role of, in almost every position, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, okay so how long did this school last? Veteran: It was, let me see, we, I graduated when it started in December, graduated in May the 29th. Interviewer: Okay so you’ve now been in, in the Army almost a year and a half at this point, Veteran: That’s right, Interviewer: Okay, and having completed that, now what happens to you? Veteran: Hey I’m a second lieutenant, and I went, I was selected because of my academic score, now you have to remember, I came from my, my father was a city policeman in Spartanburg South Carolina, okay Interviewer: Okay Veteran: We didn’t really have any, any connections anywhere, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: One of my classmates had connections somewhere and I never have figured out where or who, I think he was a spy maybe, yeah, I don’t know, but he had connections. And Interviewer: So, you said, Veteran: The other thing I was very shy, since then I have kissed the Blarney stone and I can talk at into an item, but at that time I was very shy, (30:00) Veteran: And so I wasn’t terribly outspoken but, we were going to graduation and as I came up to get my certificate, the officer they brought in says well how does it feel to be the number one academically, that’s the first time I knew I was number one academic, I said no you must be talking about Haynes this other guy, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But it wasn’t, it was me, alright Interviewer: Alright Veteran: So, I didn’t know that, but I was, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Number one academically and, I was selected for Air Defense at that time the branches were together, Army and Air Defense were one branch, so I went into, I went to Fort Bliss Texas to learn about homing all the way killer missiles Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Hawk, Interviewer: Hawk Missiles okay, Veteran: Hawk Missiles, 33 kilometers range, anyway and then I went to, I have to grin because I’m sitting there thinking about, you have, in artillery you have to shoot move and communicate, those are the three things that you do alright, and Hawk missiles, we have the same mission, shoot move and communicate, we could shoot I couldn’t guarantee we could communicate or, and we should couldn’t move, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: Alright but that’s a different story, that was in Germany afterwards, anyway I went to, went to Fort Bliss and I went to Germany, Interviewer: How long were you in Fort Bliss? Veteran: Two months maybe Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Wasn’t very long Interviewer: Mm-hmm, alright and then Germany Veteran: And Germany and I was in Wurzburg Germany, I was with six for the fift-, I think I told you 54th, (32:00) Veteran: But I think its 6th of the 52nd , Bravo Battery, 6th of the 52nd and we were in housing was in Wurzburg, but we were in, was an airfield just north of there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Can’t think of the name of the town, I was up there and why I say that is because we got there and all the priority had been going to Vietnam, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: this was not a division asset, this was a higher-level asset Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: and their vehicles wouldn’t move, the highest you could order any parts was a 12, which meant you never got anything, no kidding, I mean you’re protecting the entire area, it’s like it’s like you prioritize the local sheriff instead of the FBI, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Anyway, different story, and it’s a pet peeve, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But I got ended up being, motor officer dealing with things and it just didn’t work, the other thing is and your trying to align things, it was electronic, everything was electronic, everything was subject to the weather, we were, the weather was terrible, the whole time I was there, I mean when I got there they told me, they said we had summer on Wednesday this year so �the next year or next spring, here comes, we had a week of beautiful weather in April, it was perfect spring weather in April and that was summer, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay, and in Germany things don’t work well in cold, electronics don’t work well in the cold, and we had statuses, we had different statuses with the Hawks and if you were on a five minute status, the highest priority we had was five minute status, and you had to have missiles ready to launch, (34:05) Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Lit going in five minutes, you called and five minutes later you had to be able to launch, and that was a tough status to maintain, especially in the middle of the night in the cold, and most of the troops you had were rejects form the other, the other Army, Interviewer: Alright well did you have some people with, with technical knowledge and specialization? I mean was there some kind of core of people who were competent or was this just a place where, Veteran: We had, Interviewer: People wound up? Veteran: No, we had people who were, who worked on missiles, we had warrant officers who worked on missiles, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And these warrant officers were probably the best that I saw, they were definitely better that motor warrants, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Because motor warrants tended to be, sergeants Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay, and I don’t mean to be ugly about it that’s just the way I see them, anyway, but so they knew more, the whole thing was just kind of, to make a long story short, about this, when they separated the branches, they separated air defense from field artillery in Germany I went with field artillery, I think I was the only one, but I did, I had enough of ‘em Interviewer: Mm-hmm, well how long were you with air defense? �Veteran: Two years. Interviewer: Okay now what was life in Germany like? Outside of the job. Veteran: Well, truth of the matter it wasn’t much outside of the job, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Okay, Interviewer: Did you not go out, go off the base much or? Veteran: I didn’t get off the base and I didn’t get off the air base very much at all, okay, you, I, I was on, you had to have an officer on the, on the site (36:03) Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We had a barracks down below, down at, by the river, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And we had the site up on the hill, and my job was up on the hill okay, and we had three, no four officers, should have had four officers and two warrant officers, so we had battey commander and an XO and then two other officers, okay and we lost, we only had four, they moved people around and we ended up with, with battery commander, XO, and me for a long time and then they finally got another one, but the XO says I gotta be down here, well you can’t leave, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: You’re stuck on that mountaintop, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: You got, somebody’s gotta be there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And then the other thing would happen when, and some, they would pull night duty but then they wanted to talk about things like more, like what’s happening with the motor stuff and you’d end up leaving late, it was a nightmare for me, I, I, if you told me I had to do that again I tell you, there’s no way, I’d go to Vietnam twice before I did that, �Interviewer: Okay so basically you were, you were working and sleeping and that was maybe about it? Or not that much sleeping? Veteran: That’s right, I wasn’t off very much, I got off, I remember it well but I got off for Thanksgiving, okay, in Wurzburg Germany because my wife was, we were newly married, I got married right after I got out of OCS and we went, we went to a pet shop and bought a puppy alright, that’s why I remember I got off for thanksgiving, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I hated that Interviewer: Now did you live on the base or off it? Veteran: I lived on the base, but it wasn’t, not, not where I stayed, (38:01) Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Now where I worked, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: You had to go down the hill, down the river, through town and up on the other hill, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: It was, what’s the name of the barracks I can’t remember the name of the barracks, the, Third Division, the Rock of The Marne, what is it, Third Division? Interviewer: Could be Veteran: Yeah, their headquarters was over there Interviewer: Right Veteran: And that’s where our barracks, that’s where our quarters were Interviewer: Okay now could your wife stay with you or did she have to be in town or what was, Veteran: She was there, she was Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Over in our apartment, �Interviewer: Okay, okay so you had, there were basically married officers’ quarters or something Veteran: Yes Interviewer: Like that Veteran: There were, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Started out on the economy and we were in upstairs of a German house for a while and then we went into temporary quarters for a while and then permanent quarters, then they decided to move, change that particular building to NCO quarters and we moved again and all this was going on at the same time so it was kind of, nonsense Interviewer: Yeah so what was lifelike for your wife at that point? Veteran: Not very good, I wouldn’t think it was very good Interviewer: But did she have a job or did she Veteran: No, she didn’t have a job, she could drive, and she had a lot of free time cause I wasn’t there, I don’t know, you know I, I Interviewer: So how long in total was your tour in Germany that time? That was, was it three years or did you just do Veteran: Well I was there and then they transferred me to 69th group, which was also there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay and I was there for, when did I leave, let me think for a second, I was there until I got orders for, for Vietnam Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Then I went back through Fort Sill for a month, probably had a month’s leave, Interviewer: Mm-hmm (40:04) Veteran: And I went back anyway so its several months there, Interviewer: Okay so when did you leave Germany then? �Veteran: That’s what I was trying to think it was, that was a, ’69, it was in, it was 29, Interviewer: Sort of early ’69? Veteran: Early ‘69 Interviewer: Okay, alright so you go back, Veteran: Well yeah, my son was, my son, my son had to be a month old, he was born in February, so it was March of ’69 Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Or April, around March I think, Interviewer: Alright and so now you got orders for Vietnam, Veteran: Yup Interviewer: So, where does your wife go? Veteran: We bought a house and during the leave time we bought a house, she went in with her, her parents while we were doing that we stayed with her parents or my parents back and forth, they’re both in Spartanburg and then she had the house, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: She had a lot to deal with, with the house and no furniture and all that stuff and, and I’m on my way to Vietnam, I’m, yep Interviewer: Alright now when you went through Fort Sill, did they do anything for you to prepare you for Vietnam or? Veteran: That was the purpose of what they were doing and we had some things, we’d go out, they had a, a firebase laid out on the ranges and, so a lot of the guys that were through there had been to Vietnam already, some had and they had comments about the way the firebases were laid out, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Just took it all in I mean what can you say we, we shot and it was the first time I shot an M16, they’d go out there to the range and they had some enlisted guys out there shooting and they left their rifles there and we got down and shot two magazines full, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And that was it, I’ve been trained in basic training on the M14, Interviewer: Right Veteran: Okay so I was familiar with that one but the M16 I wasn’t, (42:00) Veteran: And so then I get to Vietnam and I’m issued an M16, and I was the senior, I was the first lieutenant and I was a senior first lieutenant, actually should’ve made captain the day I got there but, it didn’t catch up with me till later Interviewer: Okay Veteran: So anyway, they, I remember it well, having to carry the M16 to my, my M16 was dirty, I didn’t, didn’t know how to deal with it, didn’t know how to clean it, one of the guys, I was doing something and I asked him to hold it and he cleaned it for me, said sorry this was awfully dirty so I don’t know how to, so he showed it to me, showed me one of, one of you know 18 year old kid and he showed me how to do it, and after that I cleaned it every day, and I cleaned my ammunition every other day, cause I didn’t want it jamming, Interviewer: Okay but that part was after you got to Vietnam, right? Veteran: After I got to Vietnam Interviewer: Okay Veteran: That was while we were in country trying, go ahead Interviewer: Okay so were gonna go back, so you have your or-, Vietnam orientation course or whatever, Veteran: Right Interviewer: At Fort Sill and, Veteran: Right Interviewer: That kind of thing and you experimented with the M16, Veteran: Then I had to leave and Interviewer: Yup �Veteran: Then I, so I left from, I can’t remember the date, but I left from Greenville Spartanburg and flew to Atlanta, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And in Atlanta we changed planes, got on the right plane, there was a, another lieutenant, and there was a warrant officer there who were going to the same place, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Going to, Oakland Army Airfield, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: So it turns out the lieutenant was reporting in early, and we didn’t know that at the time he was flying but we flew, flew out there and they, the plane was delayed, they were working on the plane, I remember it still because, my sister lived in Atlanta and, in Atlanta area and she came down to the airport and in those days they let her come in, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: She came in and we talked, and we talk and then she’d go out and then she’d come back in and I kept wanting to go and just, I’ve already committed myself psychologically, let’s just get this thing over with, (44:01) Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: And, finally we took off, we, we took off at three, three o’clock, and we got there a three o’clock, and that’s the only time I’ve made, I don’t know how fast we were flying, they said we had a tailwind and they I don’t know if they have speed limits in the air or not, but I’ve never had, I’ve never made that trip that fast again, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: Okay, but I remember we left at three and we got there at three and you got the threehour difference so, Interviewer: Mm-hmm right, yeah because I think in that area three hours from Chicago to the west coast was good, so from Atlanta would be that much better, Veteran: Right Interviewer: Okay, Alright so you go, so you’re in, you’re processing out of Oakland, �Veteran: Yep and we get, so we get, get into the airport and we go, well not to Oakland we’re getting out of the airport and we go, you had to walk two blocks and we saw the, the little Berkeley girls, don’t go, don’t go, all that stuff so but we go and we get on a bus, and the bus goes takes us out there and as you’re going you see Alcatraz off in the, in the bay out there and we go over to, to Oakland and report in and, what’s his name, anyway, the warrant officer and I went to the officers club and had a surf-and-turf, came back, had to report in I think at 8:00 we report in and we get seated and we fly, fly first to Alaska, I think it was Fairbanks, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And why we went to Alaska, I have no idea, Interviewer: Well a lot of them went through Anchorage, Veteran: Maybe its Anchorage, Interviewer: That’s more, a little farther south and on the coast, Veteran: Maybe its Anchorage, Interviewer: Yeah cause it’s the, the northern circle, its shorter Veteran: It probably was Anchorage, I don’t know we didn’t get out Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: You could see snow out there, out the window but they didn’t let us out, something went on up front, and in the first-class section I don’t know who was in the first-class section, but I wasn’t (46:00) Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I know that, anyway we go and then flew from there to Hawaii, and I think he name was Al it seems like, anyway he kept talking about Mai Tai’s, and I never had a Mai Tai, so we were gonna get Mai Tai’s and oh we got to Hawaii at 3:00 in the morning, and bars were all closed so we didn’t get any Mai Tai’s, and we flew, I think we stopped again, I’m thinking we stopped, we either stopped on Okinawa or Guam, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I can’t remember which one, I mean Guam was, I can’t remember, we stopped on Okinawa or Guam and we did get out of the aircraft but we couldn’t take pictures of the flight line because they’re active, I didn’t know we could take pictures of the flight line, well we �couldn’t, we were confined into this little area and it was hot and they put us back on the plane and we went to Vietnam, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, and where did you land in Vietnam? Veteran: Tonsonut Interviewer: Okay that’s outside of Saigon, alright, what’s your first impression of Vietnam when you get there? Veteran: Alright, I come from Germany and then come through the states, and come through Fort Sill, and it’s still springtime, I’m not really acclimatized to hot weather, you think about Germany where you can wear a coat every day, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And not feel uncomfortable, first thing was the heat, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So they roll ahead, these roll upstairs that came in and the first thing they open the doors and the heat just comes in, whoosh, that’s the first thing, then the stink it smelled like, and you don’t notice it so much anymore cause they built in a lot of the marshes around our beaches, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: It used to be like when we’d go to Myrtle Beach you get down near the coast you had that rotten vegetation smell, (48:04) Veteran: I mean again they filled in a lot of those and they have condominiums and stuff in there now so you don’t have that smell but, that’s what it was like, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay, that’s the closest I can come to describing it, but it was a distinct odor, and the other thing about that, later you got used to that and it didn’t bother you, you weren’t so much aware of it but you still could smell the villages and the people, villages you could, was a different smell, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But that hit you, and instantly you were wet, we had to walk 100 meters, and have a formation 100 meters away from the plane roughly, and you thought you were gonna die from breathing the hot air coming in your lungs and I was constantly, I was wet, totally, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Sweating, and that little walking struggling with my duffel bag anyway, then they put us, put us on I can’t remember, buses, put us on buses, and we went to, Interviewer: Usually its Long Binh or Bien Hoa, Veteran: That was at, Tan Sonh Nhut was right by Bien Hoa, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: We went to Long Binh, to the processing company, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And these buses had the windows, they had, grates over the windows, and the glass was mostly knocked out, they’ve been in rock fights I reckon, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I don’t know, anyway, but we made it over there alright, went to the replacement company and they did this and they did that, main thing we do is went into the officer’s club and drank beer, Interviewer: Right, now did you have orders yet for a particular unit or? Veteran: No Interviewer: Were you gonna get those, Veteran: That’s where I got them, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: They gave us our clothes, we had some briefings I don’t remember much what, like I say most of the things was, (50:01) Veteran: Most of the officers went to the house just to drink beer Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And it was, we got two pair of boots and, four sets of uniforms, whatever else we got I don’t remember, don’t remember, and then, hell I remember what they gave me, because I �almost lost it, anyway, we moved us then to the, next day, moved us to Bien Hoa, which was the rear area for the 101st at that time, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And we had P-training, country training and basically it was to allow you to acclimatize to the area, but they also had some other things, they had some displaces booby traps and different things, scenarios and, about ambushes and stuff like that, Interviewer: Did they teach you anything about the local culture or how to behave there or what to stay away from? Veteran: No Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Don’t remember it, Interviewer: Alright Veteran: If they did, I don’t remember it, Interviewer: Alright Veteran: Having said that, it would have been a waste of time, frankly for 101st it was a waste of time, most of us anyway Interviewer: Because 101st wasn’t operating in populated areas or? Veteran: No, we weren’t, most, well there were a few units that were, but I never was, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay, I don’t remember anything, Interviewer: Okay, just asking Veteran: If they did, I forgot it but, Interviewer: Alright, Veteran: They taught us how to shoot M16, and I remember that well, I remember we were, they taught us the point and shoot method, it was a NCO, this bug black NCO from Fort Benning and I don’t know if he developed it, but he was the one that instructed us, and he was showing us how to shot, basically M16 is a straight line, the whole thing comes back in a straight line, so all you do is, you’re used to pointing things, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: you grab, the front grip and your rifle and you point and pull the trigger, and where you’re pointing is where its gonna go, it’s pretty accurate, really for close shooting its very accurate, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: and he talked, we had to think about shooting laying down and we did it in the daytime, we did it in the night, they threw, we threw hand grenades, don’t remember much else besides that, I mean there’s some things I remember, I remember the NCO, we got there at night and they had, a female officer I think she was a nurse but I wouldn’t swear to it, a female officer showed up, a more senior officer at least a major, major lieutenant colonel, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Something she had wings, but anyway and this guy was instructing us, telling us before it’d been all men and he was talking about, you lay down like this and you couldn’t see, put one, one ball on top of the other would, as he, somebody was, one of ‘em whispered to him and said you put on testicle on top of the other, anyway I remember that to this day. Interviewer: Alright, so you’ve got your, your sort of orientation, Veteran: Right, yup, Interviewer: And now where was the 101st operating the time you went there? Veteran: In the, they, at that time they were having, hamburger hill I guess, Interviewer: Okay and for people who aren’t aware of the nickname, what part of South Vietnam was that in? Veteran: Very, almost in, in I Corps, north, northern part of South Vietnam, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Northwestern Part of South Vietnam, (54:00) Interviewer: Yeah, kind of, of in, in the mountains, kind of close to the border, Veteran: Yes Interviewer: With Laos, �Veteran: That’s very much so, Interviewer: Okay, and Hamburger Hill, the major battle was very costly that went on for an extended period of time, so that’s going on when you get there? Veteran: I don’t know if it was or not, Interviewer: Or, Veteran: I wasn’t, I wasn’t personally listening to the news okay, Interviewer: Right Veteran: I don’t know when it, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: I mean I just know that it was happening because I ended up being a replacement for Hamburger Hill, Interviewer: Right Veteran: And that was one of the motivating factors for getting me, Interviewer: Okay so what unit of the 101st were you assigned to? Veteran: Well, we went, let me finish my story, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: By going north, we end up, we go, we fly up to Cam Ranh Bay I think, we fly to Cam Ranh Bay, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And then we have a truck to go up to Camp Eagle, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I had my, I had my helmet in my bag with my stuff and it got switched with somebody else’s, and they, somebody had to find it then we got it switched out, anyway, it got switched, got straightened out, so I ended up with a helmet and didn’t have to go the whole year without a helmet, which is a good thing probably, although I never got hit on my head, but went to, we flew up to, to camp, no we drove up from Cam Ranh Bay to Camp Eagle, �Interviewer: That’s kind of a long trip isn’t it? Cause you got to go over, through, or did you, or through Da Nang, cause Da Nang is closer to Hue, Phu Bai where Camp Eagle is, now you could have, there is, you could take highway 1, you could drive from Cam Ranh Bay, Veteran: Well let me, now I’m not sure, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I know we drove for a ways, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: And I was thinking it was Cam Ranh Bay that we were at, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Cause coming back out, I know coming back from, coming back from R and R, we land, I land, ended up landing at Cam Ranh bay and caught a flight, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Up to Eagle Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: Because we went out over the, I think it was in, I don’t remember, Interviewer: Driving from Da Nang was pretty common, driving from Cam Ranh was a lot less common because Cam Ranh Bay was pretty far away, Veteran: It might have been, might have been Da Nang I don’t know, Interviewer: But anyway, a place on the coast, Veteran: We drove Interviewer: And you drove, Veteran: We drove in a truck and we, yeah anyway, we went up there, so I got into, I remember spending the night there and reported to the, DIVARTY, I don’t remember where to, Interviewer: Divisional Artillery, Veteran: Right, Interviewer: Yeah �Veteran: And they sent me out, they did whatever paperwork they’re gonna do and, which I don’t really remember and, and then they sent me, they sent me for a day out to, Currahee on the valley floor, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And then came back and I was assigned to second of the three nineteenth and went up there and reported in and had to go out to, the colonel was out to Eagles’ Nest and I went there and he assigned me to, had a choice of being a forward observer or a fire direction officer and I chose being a fire direction officer, I was really not in great shape, physical shape, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But I did that and, I had to fly back, flew to, the battery, bravo battery on Bastogne Interviewer: Okay Veteran: And I reported to, I reported to Captain Davis and Captain Scales was there already, because I remember him telling me to go, to go report to him, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So Davis was the commander, but Scales was there, Interviewer: And was Scales replacing Davis or? Veteran: Scales was, it was a transition, Scales was going to, but usually you do that with a ceremony and, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: That hadn’t happened yet, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: Okay so, I was there and, so I was the fire direction officer, one of the fire directions officers and JD Caldwell was the other one, and JD was, JD was a good guy, he’s a real right guy but a good guy, but he was a pot smoker, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay, I’m not going to talk about him pot smoking but, he didn’t do it around me, but I knew he was doing it on the firebase, Interviewer: Okay �Veteran: I always thought he did his job, but I was recently talking to one of my fire direction guys this year in fact, and he said he was never there, he’s always, never in the thing, cause I would go on, I was there Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: He would come on and I’d go to sleep, we were on, we had a rotating schedule, eight on and eight off, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And you’re never, basically you’re working or you’re sleeping, Interviewer: Right Veteran: Because you never adjust to that schedule, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: There’s just no spare time, anyway, but I didn’t, Interviewer: So, if the officer isn’t there, do the enlisted men just do the work? Veteran: Yeah, see you had, you had to have a fire direction officer there when the guns, when they were firing, Interviewer: Right Veteran: And that was, that was a requirement, you could sometimes, they would, if you had a lot of interdiction fires, fires that you, where you do the mission, you plot them out and they would just fire them, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: On schedule, but other than that, especially if you had a, a contact mission, you had to have the officer there, he’s basically saying they’ve got his initials on every one of those rounds that goes out, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And if something goes wrong, he’s the one they’re gonna hank, (1:00:00) Veteran: Anyway, where was I, talking about, about getting there, �Interviewer: You, you got there, you got out to Bastogne and you’re, so this is a firebase, this is along the, is it like along the one side of the A Shau Valley that its, Veteran: Yeah, it’s along the east side of A Shau, Interviewer: Yup Veteran: It was right across from Hamburger Hill Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We were at about the same altitude, it was maybe a few meters, a few feet shorter, especially since they blew the top of it off, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But we were at a thousand feet, Keer, he was in the valley floor, Eagle’s Nest was about twelve hundred feet, and then Airborne, I’m not sure what altitude was for airborne, everyone was at Tiger Mountain and, before I got there, I think May the twelfth, they had had, they had been overrun, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay, and some of my guys were there, they had part of the guns from Bravo up there, and part of the fire direction team and the whole thing, and anyway, I went to this year, to reunion, fiftieth reunion in Clarksville where those guys, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: From that base being overrun, but it happened before I got there, Interviewer: Right Veteran: I was in the battery for four days and we had a sapper attack, you’ll hear about Bastogne being overrun, and I guess technically we were overrun, I think, I think of being overrun and that you’re put out of business, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We were never put out of business, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: Okay, we had them in the battery area, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But they were never put out of business, I’d gotten off at midnight, though let me back up a little bit, (1:02:00) Veteran: the day before in the afternoon the day before, I’d been out down on the landing pad on Bastogne Interviewer: Okay, I’m gonna pause right here because this, *Screen goes black* Veteran: What am I gonna talk about? Interviewer: Okay so you were gonna tell the story for the attack on Bastogne when you were, Veteran: Okay, on Bastogne, I got to the battery and I reported in, I reported to Captain Davis who was the battery commander, Interviewer: Yup Veteran: Then Captain Scales was also there, and he said report to him, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And Scales says no report to him, Sergeant Brown was there to, the first sergeant, anyway, and I was the fire direction officer, the other fire direction officer was JD Caldwell, Interviewer: Right, you talked a little bit about him already, alright Veteran: And JD was an experienced guy if you read the report, I didn’t realize that he had been the guy that organized the resistance and organized the, to firebase airborne, he was a guy that organized everybody and got them going and got them responding to the attack, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So that’s, I didn’t know that, never knew that until just recently, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Anyway, he was the other one, and I had been on, we were working eight on and eight off, I had been on until midnight and I was in bed asleep and he came back there and it’s one, one-thirty, in that general time frame, I wasn’t really watching my watch, but he said you might, �might outta get up, we might be being moored, anyway let me go, let me back up because I didn’t tell you about seeing the guys out, outside the wire, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: The night before I’d been down on the, the VIP pad, we had two landing pads, and Bastogne basically was kind of like that, (1:04:01) Veteran: And you had a landing pad down here where the VIP’s came in and the one over here was a supply pad, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Where all our supplies came in, and then they kinda went up to the right and there was another hill over there, we were on top of the mountain, we’re on the very top, half way down between here and the VIP pad was the brigade talk, and there was also an infantry, battalion talk, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: There was at least one, there may have been two, but I know there was one, and over there somewhere they had, ARVN liaison people, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So, there were some ARVN’s on the base, anyway I would have been down, and you have to figure the firebase, there’s not a lot of room, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: There’s not a lot of places you can go, and I was down on the, on the VIP chopper, pad, looking around and I see these two Vietnamese out there, its, the wire’s here and they’re out just beyond the wire or in the wire, and they saw me looking and they waved at me and I waved back at them, and I turned to an infantry solider who was standing there and asked him, do we have Vietnamese working outside the wire, and we look back around there and they’re gone, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And he reported it, he did report it and, and I was green, I was brand new to war, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Anyway, that night this happened, and so they, JD came back and told me to get up and I started getting up and I, I slept in my underwear and I had everything laid out I could get �dressed in the dark and didn’t have any problem with that getting dressing, but I was, I dressed and came out before I, (1:06:00) Veteran: Before I got out while I was dressing, excuse me, Barroom, Barroom, Barroom, excuse me, and what they, what had happened was they, there was a guy had thrown three satchel charges trying to get in, into the commanders, battery commanders, into the hooch, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Our, our, we were set up with a, it was a cut through the top of the mountain, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And we had PSP on top of that and sandbags and, and on our end of it we had a CONEX, one of those small CONEX’s, that had our fire direction stuff in it, our radios and the two computers set inside there and then the charts were outside there, and then we had it blocked off except for a doorway, to get through and then we slept behind that and there it was totally blocked off between us and the, the battery commander, and then, the, everything went wild, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: I mean, Interviewer: So, sappers had gotten in the wire, Veteran: The sappers were not only in the wire, they were on, the first one that I know was killed, was killed right up, over the top of me, almost over the top of me, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: It’s like, if this is where I was laying, right over you was where he was killed, Mm-hmm Veteran: And when you stood up, I could reach the thing, so it was, distance wise, straight-line distance is less than ten feet, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay, from me Interviewer: Yeah �Veteran: But he was on top, we had PSP set up between, but he was, the theory is that he was coming, to give us one of those satchel charges I don’t know if he was or not but, you didn’t make it, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: DeWitt Williams was captain and he was the artillery liaison officer with the third brigade, and DeWitt was coming in at that time, had been down in the talk and was coming back to, to sleep, he was, had been sleeping with, (1:08:00) Veteran: The, the battery commander, and, in his hooch, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So he was coming back there to sleep and he saw this guy and he shot him, he also saw another guy because that night they were having a big poker game at the XO’s hutch, can’t remember the XO’s name, Tom something or other, maybe Meyer, not sure, anyway our XO, but they were having a poker game and my chief computer was over there, the guy that, that the senior fire direction NCO, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Was over there, he was coming back, but DeWitt saw him as he paused on a wall, the wall that separated us from the battery itself, on top, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Separated the battery, he paused on that and DeWitt shot him through both calves, alright, so he’s crawling along and we’re in the dark up by the entranceway, I’ve been shot, where, I don’t know, that sounds odd but it’s really true, so he’s crawling in and he falls off the door, we come out the door and we had steps, you had a blast wall, and he had steps to go up, up to the right, up to the top, well he came along right over the door and fell in and broke his collarbone, so he, so we get him in and he’s sitting there in one of the chairs and he’s counting his money, and I don’t know how much money had made but he was a big winner in that game, but he was a loser, I don’t know if he was a loser or not because he got shot through both calves and he would have been back with us from those wounds, but he broke his collarbone and that evacuated him back to the states, Interviewer: Mm-hmm (1:10:00) Veteran: Okay �Interviewer: Alright, so that’s how this thing starts, so now what happens? Veteran: We get out, we start changing the thing, we were never none functional, Scales came into the, he was in the FTC and something came over the wire which I didn’t hear and he ran out and he, at that point he had his M16 with him, he had the, cover guard, the hand guard on the front of his M16 was on, he came back later and it was gone, it’d been blown off, he went into the battery, over to the battery, to the guns, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And the first gun, I’m calling it the first gun because it’s the first gun I came to but I don’t know how they had them numbered, they may have had them numbered in a different way, Interviewer: Right Veteran: But the gun, when you first, when you went you couldn’t get to the guns unless you went over the wall but normally you went around by the, between the gun and the, and the commanders hooch over here, so you went around and you went up, that guy, the gun, the gun crew was the crew chief was short, a short timer, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And we had started out with mortar rounds, or so they thought they were mortar rounds at least, and he had his crew in the bunker, and Scales ran them all out because the bunkers not where you wanna be, you need to be out, they had a, a fighting ditch and a parapet, a wall, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They come out and a guy pops up from behind there and shoots a rifle grenade, hits a guy on the head, on his helmet and killed him, and he shot the next guy with a, his AK-47, with bullets, killed him and he was shot a number of times (1:12:00) Veteran: And this kid ran out to the fighting wall and he laid a satchel charger on that kids leg and he, his lap and blew his legs off, and our medic was over there treating that guy and they were firing directly over him, ended up medic, ended up having his ear, ear drums blown out, couldn’t hear anything, and there’s more about him later, let’s see what did I leave out, the three blasts that I heard at the very beginning, Scales got out of the hut first, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And then those three blasts, the first sergeant was trying to get out behind him, and he got blown back, all three times, they blew away the blast wall, blast wall was gone but it did, its purpose was to keep them out of the, out of the bunker, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: First sergeant tore down the wall between us that came out through the fire direction center, came out through our, our area, they let’s see what else went on that night, Interviewer: Now did you go to the fire direction center or were you, Veteran: I went to the fire direction center and we went outside and it was a guy, it was a soldier, enemy solider that came up, this was, this, there’s a gun parapet here, there’s just a walk way between us but there’s a wall, but there’s just a walk way between us and then over there was just with, you went off down the hill but there was a stump there still and this soldier came up behind that stump, he shot an RPG over our heads which is probably a good thing because it went over our heads and we, it could easily have killed us, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But it’s like shooting off a rock, a bottle rocket and, everybody was shooting at him and he after a few minutes, he turned around and walked, went back, (1:14:00) Veteran: So, I don’t know if he didn’t, who knows what shape he’s in but, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But he went back, I remember going from there to the, it was a bunker on that side of the base, on the east side of the base and I remember running from where I was to there and I felt like one of those cartoon things where you know you are running but it’s like slow motion, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: That’s what it felt like, and I was there for a while and things kinda settled down, but we ended up, it’s interesting, interesting to watch things happen, before that I had noted already that we had problems with people walking through the concertina wire, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Separating stuff off, there were paths through it Interviewer: Right Veteran: And I’d, I’d try to get guys to work on it and they, you couldn’t get anybody to constantly work on those, just stood there and supervised, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: Anyway, afterwards you couldn’t get anybody to stop, but we got a fire mission you gotta come down here, no I’m gonna finish this, Interviewer: Do you know how many men you’re, they lost in that attack? Veteran: I think we lost four and I think they lost, we, and in, in our battery, I think it was four people, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And about eleven wounded, and then we were pretty close matched overall on the firebase, there were a lot more killed on the firebase but it was a, I walked down to the, walked down to the VIP pad, halfway down there, there was a human brain lying beside the trail, okay, looked like intact but its, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Obviously not much in it but walked down to the, (1:16:00) Veteran: The pad and on the right side of the pad we had roles of concertina wire there, there was a human body without a, a brain, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I think that he probably got hit by a fifty caliber, the battery owned a fifty caliber, usually the infantry used it when they were there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But the battery owned a fifty caliber, they were supposed to have turned it in, but they didn’t, changed it for sixty, and they got the, we had sixties, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But had that fifty caliber, I think that’s what happened to him, Interviewer: This was a Vietnamese guy that was hit? Veteran: Yes, Interviewer: Okay, �Veteran: Yes, it was, I don’t think that M60 would do that, but then you never know, there were, you know you looked at the people, the, looking at the wounds that was my first experience looking at wounds, it looked like little dark spots, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: About that big, about the end of your finger, on the other side it was huge, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They blew, blew the back out, we had it, we had, we killed at least two in the battery area, it may have been more than that but I remember the two for sure, and then we lost, lost two dead and several wounded, it seems like we lost up to four but I can’t remember for sure right now, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: The field, first sergeant was wounded, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: He was a, a, your field first sergeants like the, he ran the guns, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: The XO runs the guns, the field first sergeant was his senior NCO, it’s all the, all the gun sergeants report to him and they’ve got there crew, yeah the satchel charge went off beside him, I think he probably lost some fingers but he wanted to be carried down on a stretcher, but we put everybody on the VIP pad who had to be evacuated, and he wanted to be carried down but the stretcher was down there already on somebody else on it, we got mad and got up and walked down, showed them, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Anyway, that’s the last I saw of him we had a new one later, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: But Interviewer: So now you know you’re at war, Veteran: Knew we were at war, it changed things too, they tell you, they tell you things they told us when we came through different, we had a medic talk to us, we, Betty I think was the one that told us this, said that you won’t believe your eyes, you won’t believe your eyes, you’ll check everything, you’ll check everything, fell everything and check everything and I thought when �she said it, this is not gonna be true, this is crazy, but when you actually, happened you didn’t believe your eyes, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: You felt everything okay, right here you know Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: you had to feel it as well and, and everything stopped, everything’s everyone, everything stopped you were on a, on an adrenaline high, your adrenaline was there, you’d been up for twenty-four hours roughly, and you were just on an adrenaline high until, until it stopped sending you, go to sleep, well after, after the everything stopped, been stopped for thirty minutes or so, then we could get medivacs in and had to been, I think it had to been thirty minutes at least since the last round, before we get a medivac in, but we got all kinds of heli-, I think, helicopters coming in, in and out of that VIP pad everybody running over there and get off and walk around the base a little bit, (1:20:00) Veteran: And you’re back on so they could write up, get write up for a medal, it’s how they got their medals, you think I’m kidding but I’m not, Interviewer: No, that’s, Veteran: You think I’m kidding but I’m not kidding, I don’t know how much money we spent if you think about, now think about economics, I don’t know much money we spent just on, on helicopter fuel just to get those VIP’s and get their, Interviewer: Okay, so you get an air medal for flying in a place that’s a combat zone or, Veteran: No Interviewer: Where fighting is taking place, Veteran: No, the way, Interviewer: Or is it a combat infantry badge they’re after or? Veteran: I don’t know, no I, seriously they probably put themselves in for a silver star, Okay, I’ll tell you a story about that in a minute Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I don’t know �Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: what medals they put themselves in for, I really don’t but they came, that’s if you got a desk job how are you gonna get a medal, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Alright, if you’re a staff officer, how are you gonna get a medal, and I’ll tell ya, another anecdote when were off the air about someone who’s here Interviewer: Alright, but in the meantime, you have the VIP’s going up and the wounded get evacuated, and how much longer did you stay at that base after that event? Veteran: Several months Interviewer: Okay, so how do things change or what, what comes next now after? Veteran: We had another attack later, we’ll let me tell you the rest of this story, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We pilled the bodies up on a, a cargo net, the Vietnamese bodies, I didn’t take any pictures, I got pictures, actually pictures of some of the Vietnamese piled on a cargo net, I didn’t take any pictures of American dead or wounded but I did take picture of Vietnamese wounded, dead, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Didn’t take wounded but, they, they pile them up on a cargo net and, (1:22:00) Veteran: They haul that thing over the jungle and dropped them way they thought, intelligence had that that’s the way they were gonna go, leave to the east of us, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I told you about the VIP’s command, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Well we had this helicopter come in and this guy got off and he didn’t have anything on his jungle fatigues, he walked, didn’t have a hat on, he walked to the top of the hill which was where we were, looked around like this, turned around, got back in his helicopter and left, three months later one of the guys got, and at that time there was a Navy jet bombing to the east of us, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I don’t know what he was bombing, I mean I have no idea, but when he, one of our guys got a letter from his mother, it contained a newspaper clipping, air power saves paratroopers, ya right, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: The other thing was, today and the way we were fighting today, they fight a lot at night, they have night-vision goggles and things where you can see at night, well we didn’t have those, we fought, with, with our eyes, but we also had flares so we lit the night up, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We had flares from our guns, we had illumination rounds, they had flares from aircraft you had hand flares, and from our base, the next morning from our base all the way to the ocean was a line of parachutes from the flares that we had had, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: You could see them it’s just like a, like, it’s almost like a, you think of an airshow, you know with the balloons, it’s kinda like that, but it, these were just gonna fall somewhere, it was a, it was, interesting night I’ll tell you what, and I have to think, (1:24:00) Veteran: Scales, I’m glad Scales was there, I thought Scales, I had blocks get, Davis out of my, I think Davis probably had a, a nervous breakdown Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I think but I don’t know, I had blocked him out of my memory, I didn’t remember him period, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Until I, I was talking, we were talking about the battle when I was visiting with the, the two guys in my fire direction center, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Tom Jenkins and, and Michael Delaney or Stump, were two of the guys in our fire direction center, and they were at this other meeting, the one from airborne, being overrun, we were talking about this and they were telling me, remind me of Davis, I had, I, still there’s a vague memory, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Not very clear, not something I kept around but, Bob got a Silver Star, and then he was, he was the battery commander and he’s now a retired two-star general, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And shows up on Fox and Friends every once and a while, Fox News, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I saw him Interviewer: Yeah, I remember him, and he was something of a talking head during the Iraq war and, Veteran: He had, is, I just saw him recently like within the week, I think, on, the noon thing that they did, anyway he’s one of their talking heads, so, but he deserved that Silver Star, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: He’s one of the few that deserved a Silver Star, we had another one later, we was, we were preparing to leave, and we had another separate attack which we call in the wire, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They had two mad minutes, one right after the other, had a mad minute, they reloaded, and had another mad minute, (1:26:00) Veteran: And caught more people coming in the wire, Interviewer: Okay, now explain for general audience what a mad minute is, Veteran: Mad minutes, planned time when, on, on command or on signal everybody fires, they throw grenades, they fire everything for a minute, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Then it stops, so I, at that point I was in bed also, this was 3:00 in the morning maybe, it was before 5:00, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: Most things happen about 5:00 in the morning okay, right about the time the sun’s fixing to come up, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They wanna hit right about then, and that’s when, usually when it happens, but I was in bed and I heard the mad minute and I heard the second mad minute, and then I heard a machine gun when the second one stopped, the machine gun didn’t, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I was awake and ready to go, that’s just conditioning, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And it, again we caught them out of the wire the second time, caught them in the wire before they got into us, the first time they were already there, they were, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: Some, my guys, one of my guys speculated that they were already there, that they were part of the ARVN detachment, and I can’t tell you there were no okay, I wouldn’t tell you that they’re not, but who knows, Interviewer: Okay, so you mean for the first attack, when they were already inside, Veteran: Yes, for when they were in the wire, Interviewer: But that of course was also the thing where the concertina wire wasn’t in particularly good condition and so forth the first time, Veteran: No, this was internal, now not the external, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: Because we had it around the outside, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: But, but you don’t want people running around, (1:28:00) Veteran: you want to guide where they go, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And so, just the internal concertina wire to, to guide people, yeah, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: That wasn’t in as good a shape, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: Anybody, you could get them to stop, it could get them to stop, we’ll put up a little more concertina, it’s a, it’s a motivating factor I’ll tell you what, Interviewer: But the second time though, now was the second mad minute, was the idea there that, that if, Veteran: I don’t know, Interviewer: You had the first mad minute they might think that, Veteran: I don’t know, they’d have a mad minute, they’d have a plan one, and I don’t know who came up with the idea, there was an infantry company, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: That was providing security, Interviewer: Right Veteran: And I, I really don’t but it caught them off guard, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They had one than they waited, Interviewer: Yup, Veteran: Then the second one, and after the second one was over, there was a guy in a hole that they’d seen go into a foxhole, it was a, a listening post that we’d had down outside the wire, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Was outside the wire but it was within sight of our bunkers, and they’d had a listening post out there, but they’d recall people, didn’t have anybody in it, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: It was empty, but the guys that had occupied it on that section had a bunker up there they were in the bunker and I saw this guy go in, so I was over there and he says, hey lieutenant we got on down here stuck in this, that, stuck in this hole, so we tried to get him to chieu hoi, cause you know how much Vietnamese we knew which was about chieu hoi, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Anyway, so we yelled chieu hoi, chieu hoi, and nothing happens to them, so I grabbed, I had a, a M79 grenade launcher, grabbed one from somebody, (1:30:00) Veteran: I don’t remember who I got it from, only had three rounds, and we had our kamo guy was named Marion and Marion shot the M79 all night long for the whole time we was out there, okay, so I figure Marion knows how to shoot this thing, so I told him, Marion put a round in that hole down there, he took the M79, shot it and if the hole is right down here like in the parking lot, he shot like we has shooting for the ball field okay, he didn’t have a clue how to shoot it except to pop, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So, I took it away from him, and there was, we had a behind our fire direction center, we had a, a radio relay from special forces, two off, two NCOs, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And one of the guys took it and shot direct fire at the hole, hit the rim and this guy comes out and he’s not chieu hoiing, he’s running, he’s gonna go home and he runs down and up the other side, and he was running and he turned to run along the woods, well everybody, there is no shooting going on, no artillery going on, so this guy is running and everybody is sitting there, so everybody shoots him, it’s like a shooting gallery, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: pap, pap, pap, maybe a hundred guys shooting at him, I don’t know, a bunch, and of course he’s, still trying to struggle so he’s, he’s down and let me tell you one thing, I don’t ever wanna be shot by a high-powered rifle, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: The human body wasn’t made to be shot by a, high-powered rifle, it acts like a rag doll, really, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: The guy was still struggling, wiggling, trying to crawl, and, �(1:32:00) Veteran: The SF sergeant shot him again with a M79, he stopped, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And everybody cheered, sounds cruel, sounds inhumane, but that’s kind of the stage we were at, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We were kind of at an inhumane stage, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: We were, we were standing over there and I was, Scales in that same area, and Scales was behind me, we were about this far apart, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Like you were Scales and I was standing here and we had been firing, having a blocking fire, being fired into the jungle down there, and it’d been going on, a round went off, a piece of shrapnel flew by my head, just, from this way, actually more this way, by my head and there was a guy standing to the left over here and it hit him flat on the, on the leg, it was a piece of shrapnel big as my, big as my arm, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: About like that and if it had hit him sideways it would have cut his head, his leg off, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: If it had hit me, it would cut my head off, that’s fate we stopped that from firing, we stopped, called a, called a halt to that, Interviewer: Yeah Veteran: But you, have the feeling that somebody’s looking out for you, you know you get that, the other thing you learn quickly is that no matter what you do, you become a fatalist to a point, no matter what you do, you can’t protect yourself, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So you do what you can do and then you let fate take its place, �Interviewer: It’s an effect that a lot of sliders talk about, if they see combat then you adjust to it in some way so you can function, do your job, (1:34:03) Veteran: Well part of the thing is, it’s like fear, when I first got over there I was afraid alright, and you can’t live in fear, you can’t function with fear, and eventually you either adjust to it or you go crazy I guess, I don’t know, I adjusted to it, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Doesn’t mean you’re not cautious, doesn’t mean you don’t do everything you can to protect yourself, one of the things I did was make rules, I had rules about things, if I thought it was bad, it was bad till I proved it wasn’t bad, okay that one of my rules it’s still one of my rules, if I think it’s bad, its bad till I found out it’s not bad, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Or questionable, if it’s questionable its bad, yeah, let me think what else there to tell you about, Interviewer: Well, anything else from the time that, that you, you’re Bastogne, I mean what, anything else from that or are those really the main things that stand out? Veteran: That’s pretty much the main thing that was, we didn’t have, I don’t think we had any wounded, if we did it was few, Interviewer: Okay, another, now did you have a lot of fire missions from there? Veteran: Oh, we fired all the time, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We, we, I was over there while we were on Bastogne, we fired the one millionth round, before we left, we fired the two millionth round, Interviewer: Just from that battery? Veteran: No just, Interviewer: Or in Vietnam Veteran: This, it probably was in Vietnam, I don’t know what, it was in Vietnam Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: The two millionth round, yeah, but that was, I mean that’s, and it’s a lot of territory if you think about it, it’s a lot of territory, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: That’s a lot of bullets too, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Yeah, we fired a lot, we did Interviewer: Okay, and then at what point do you leave that or where do you go next? Veteran: When, one of the things, one of the projects they had, (1:36:00) Veteran: Of course they had the highway one, that, that the Navy, the Seabees built, Seabees built highway one along the coast, Interviewer: Right Veteran: Just outside of Camp Evens, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: It went north I guess all the way, I don’t know all where it went, to Saigon at least, Interviewer: Well the original highway one goes all the way back to the French, Seabees probably improved it, Veteran: Well they, they paved it, okay Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: Let me just say this, they paved highway one, so the Army engineers had a project where they were, we were gonna keep the A Shau Valley open year-round even during the monsoon, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And they paved a road out there okay, and they, they built a fire bade where the road entered the valley, and some Congressman come over, had a ceremony, had this congressman and one of them hops in a jeep and they take off down the, the road, that was a hot incident, I mean you were listening on the radios not here, he’s on the road somewhere, so this wasn’t a safe area, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: This was, in Vietnam the only place you could count on being safe was what you could see and control with your M16, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Alright, that was what you owned, nothing more, and it was hard to get that point across to people but this guy made the trip and he got through, but it rained one time and it washed out in five places, and they decided that it wasn’t feasible to try to have, try to keep it open, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They also made a base out there, they were gonna move, they moved from Eagle’s Nest down to this new base I, can’t remember the name of it right now, anyway I’ll think about it, the name of it but I can’t remember it right now, Interviewer: Right, Veteran: But it was, it was on a mountain, but it was a small, much smaller mountain (1:38:01) Veteran: As where the road came out so they could actually get vehicles traffic to that base, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And the other thing that happened is the monsoon is, monsoon was beginning, building up to the monsoon, the canopy comes down somewhat and jungle rats went up the mountain, jungle rats invaded Eagle’s Nest, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: When I was, when I was in Bastogne, we built bunker bunks, out of ammo boxes, put four ammo boxes together to make a bunk, and we had another one, so I was slept on the bottom and the other, the other fire direction officer, excuse me, slept on top, an old super, super rat would come down the wall, the dirt wall, I’d be a sleep, it’d jump, hit on me, and bounce off to the other wall, so you’re lying there at night and all of a sudden somebody jumps on you and you’re awake and your, you know just not a good time, so finally got a big trap and they sent me a, a big trap and I caught super mouse, Nice coat I was thinking that, that sure would be a nice, if I had a bunch of those I could make me a rat coat and get me one of those hats with the big mirrors on it and be a pimp, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: West Coast, Interviewer: Well was there only one of them, Veteran: There was, where you were, they only had one, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: They moved us off though, and moved us off there, they couldn’t keep us resupplied, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So, we went to Firebase Blaze and, and at Blaze we, I remember swimming, going swimming, there was a stream there, and swimming in the river and bathing for about three days, and then they moved us down to firebase fury, which is farther south, and fury was, (1:40:00) Veteran: It’s the only time I came across a, punji pits, they were punji pits with the bamboo spikes in them, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: There hadn’t been war down there, I mean we had, it had been occupied at some point, I don’t know who but not while I was there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: One thing that had happened, it had a infantry patrol in there, somebody had been wounded and they called in a, a medivac, the medivac didn’t come in but another helicopter did and he had him throw smoke in the, in the, NVA also threw smoke and he went in on the wrong smoke, Interviewer: Oh, Veteran: Even though they were telling him that’s the wrong smoke, he went in and got shot down, and there were the remains of that helicopter, it wasn’t right on the base, it was, was just off it but you could see it, so you’re awake in the morning, every morning you wake up and you’re outside waiting on somebody to stick their head up right, before dawn, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: At dawn, and then the howler monkeys come in, yes, so you’re already tense, you’re already tight, and the howler monkey starts making that racket, oh god, oh, ah, they howl in the evening, and howl, but they really howl in the morning, waking up oh, it’s the only time I heard howler monkeys, then they moved us from there to, there was a place, so they were gonna put a �fire base in, and the first of the 506 was doing it and sometime in June I think of ’69, and the battalion commander was killed, and they put us over there, and I think at that point there were, put us over there to be bait battery, I always thought they did but it was, turned out that’s the, that’s when Ho Chi Minh died, when Ho Chi Minh died, they called, called a truce, a unilateral, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Ceasefire, (1:42:00) Veteran: It was the honor, they didn’t do it for three days, they didn’t bother us, and then they moved us from there to Hamburger Hill, and nothing happened on Hamburger Hill it was just a blown off top of the mountain, Interviewer: So, when do you think you were there? Veteran: I can’t tell you exactly, Interviewer: Okay because it can’t be during the monsoon season, Veteran: No, it wasn’t because we was, but they were worried about the monsoon coming on, Interviewer: Okay Veteran: But, and there’s two monsoons in the north, I don’t know about the south, but they’re two monsoons, anyway the, the only thing I remember is it was Sunday because two chaplains came out, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And had services on Hamburger Hill, and then they moved us from there back to Evans, we’re at Evans for a while then we had to build up and went to the DMZ, we, we drove up and, and were lifted onto the firebase Sandy, well, Rings called it Sandy, the 101st renamed it Scotch, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And we were up there, the battery commander changed, Scales’ time was up and there was another, somebody had extended to get command of the battery, and I outranked him because I was already a captain, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So, they moved me into the assistant S-3, which I started, went back to my lock and worked there, �Interviewer: Okay, now explain what an S-3 is, Veteran: Operations, so basically, we had an S-3 who deal with operations, was a Major, and about, several Captains, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: There were assistant S-3’s and what we did is, I assigned fires, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay, I cleared fires, (1:44:00) Veteran: I’d be sure everybody was doing what they were supposed to be doing, and monitored the, the, monitored what they were doing, checking their work if necessary and following the missions, so that’s basically what I did, I was the one that did, that you, monitored everything really, but when you’d hear the thing come in, if there was any question about anything, sometimes when, the way that the, it worked, the way they had it setup to work, it was a lot of safety involved, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So, the battery you’ve got, at least when I was there, we had a computer, a guy doing the, the calculations and you had the, the fire direction officer and the fire direction officer’s checking the work of the other one, excuse me, *phone rings* Veteran: Go away, I don’t want to talk to you, it’s a robo call I guarantee it, Interviewer: Alright, Veteran: Anyway, Interviewer: So, Veteran: And then, and while that’s going on, you’re sending the computer, computer is a person not a machine, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, yeah, yup Veteran: You’d send it to the battalion, and battalion checks it and you, if there’s any disagreement you worked that out before anything’s ever fired, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And then, if there’s any problem with it, or if, if, you have to trust your people, but you also have to check on ‘em, Interviewer: Yup, Veteran: So that goes on to, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Anyway, that’s what I did, Interviewer: Okay, and was that sort of the last part of your tour, was doing that? Veteran: No, it turned out not to be, I did that and then, (1:46:00) Veteran: I was, I went on R and R at Christmas, and came back, came back New Year’s Eve and on New Year’s Day I went, I was assigned to be the liaison officer for the 2nd of the 506th, that’s how I got into the Ripcord, I wasn’t really at Ripcord, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But I was in the transition into Ripcord, so I can tell you a lot about what happened there, Interviewer: Mm-hmm, alright because the Rip-, Ripcord itself, I mean they’re trying to establish it as early as March of, of 1970, so there are several, they don’t actually do it until you’re in April, Veteran: No, we didn’t try to establish it in March, I mean they may tell you they’re trying to establish it in March, let me tell you what happened, Interviewer: Okay, Veteran: So, we had, we had Colonel Crowell as the battalion commander, and we had Colonel Crowell was the battalion commander, Major Koenigsbauer was the infantry S-3, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay, and, and I was the liaison officer and then we had to transition from Colonel Crowell, to Colonel Lucas, alright, so, and then we had to change a command and Lucas was in charge, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So just, in the transition we go out to that, we’re put in three companies of infantry and to the west of, of ripcord, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And at that time, I’m out, I didn’t have it listed as Ripcord, I had it listed as Carroll, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I talked to Chuck Hawkins, he says well no, I’m sorry, talked to somebody else, and they said well Carroll was up here in the north and it was a Marine firebase, that’s true, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I was on it, I saw it, I know about it, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But I think the Marines named every other firebase they had Carroll alright, and they didn’t stay named because they changed, Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: It was we went on Scotch, on Sandy and they changed it to Scotch, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: One was Scotch, and one was Soda, (1:48:00) Veteran: And I don’t, we were on Scotch, anyway Carroll, this thing was named Carroll, so there were more than one Carol, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I understand that, and I had it still on my map as Carroll, but later after we got there, they changed it to ripcord, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Okay, so, don’t wanna say anything bad, I’m thinking about what I’m saying, that’s so I don’t offend West Point Officers because they have thinking it’s not mine, West Point officers �for the most part are very good and very effective, and most of the Generals are West Point officers, but, going to West Point doesn’t make you any better than anybody else, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They do take care of each other, but it does ensure a way of thinking that many officers, many Army people, that was another thing that I was not good at, you’re going this way, and that’s the way we’re going and that’s it, *phone rings* Veteran: That’ll get rid of you totally I hope, anyway, and then you go this way, just, and that’s the only way you can go, and if this way is, you’re, anyway, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So, we get into that about Carroll, ripcord, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We got out there anyway, we were going out there and one of the missions that we had was, there’s a river, ripcord’s up here, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: There’s a mountaintop going here, there’s a stream here, supposedly that stream had something in it that would make people sick, supposedly, and then stream, and we were going, that was one of the reasons for putting people in out there, (1:50:00) Veteran: So they had three to three companies they were gonna put in, well we had a good landing zone on the, at the top and the bottom, but not in the middle, and you’ve got, I’m sitting in the middle, I’m sitting in, you’ve got a bench seat in the, in the Huey, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And I’m sitting in the left door, Colonel Lucas is sitting in the middle, and Colonel Crowell is sitting in the right door and normally it would have been the S-3 in the middle, but he didn’t even go because we were already more or less full, he’d have to sit in a jump seat, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Or I would have or something, anyway so we go and Colonel Crowell says we’ll call the Air Force and get them to bomb it and make it bigger, well that didn’t happen, okay, didn’t �happen, May, March the 12th, March the 12th, so we’ve got troops in the air, we go in and we try to get in, you can get in, but you’ve got to hover in, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Which is not a way you want to have to worry about, you didn’t have the glide path, oaky there was a hole there, but you couldn’t get into it, so we put those alternate, alternate was to put them on, on Carroll, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Which became Ripcord, Interviewer: Right Veteran: Put them on there and we got mortared, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: We got run off, a couple people killed, and back to eight people and start all over again, so then we’re gonna have, we got, there was also ARVN, an ARVN insertion at the same time and that one, (1:52:00) Veteran: They found some intelligence, intelligence, intelligence and ARVN don’t go together but that’s what they found, intelligence, anyway so we’re going, we make a free fire zone, and you had to do arc lights and stuff like that, for an arc light you had to clear an area three miles wide and five miles long, and then you can call an arc light on it, Interviewer: OK Veteran: B-52 strike, but that and anything else that came up, so the other thing happened was the weather came in, so the weather didn’t cooperate with us, so instead of being five days, it was like two weeks, Interviewer: Yeah cause April 1st was the second time, Veteran: April 1st was the second time, and so April 1st, who we put troops in, they also have planned, by this time they’ve decided they’re gonna make this a firebase, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So they’ve got, and the TOC’s gonna go in, and so they’ve got advanced party for the TOC, Major Laws in one of the last two helicopters, one of the last two helicopters were action tracks, people going in the artillery for, forward party, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And the, the TOC forward party, and then the rest of it was, was the insertion of the company, company and they go in and, and we’re mortared again, in fact the troops, so here’s ripcord, and then down the ridgeline is Kaka Bow, Kaka Bow Ridge, runs up to the, same way, the pilots reported troops in the open, moving up Kaka, along Kaka Bow Ridge toward ripcord, Okay now in the middle of, a big insertion, and with, and they had a proper artillery preparation, I did, (1:54:00) Veteran: I planned the artillery prep, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: The problem was it’s just too big, I mean it was too, and we couldn’t, I couldn’t kill all the mortars, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: And before we had a few places where they could shoot a mortar from, now they had a lot of places they could shoot a mortar from, you know you just open the canopy up, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: So we did ‘em a favor in doing that, anyway, that was a bad day, they were mortared, some mortars, Interviewer: Yeah that’s, Veteran: I lost a lieutenant and a forward observer, that’s another sad story this kid was waiting to hear, he was waiting to hear about his, I think his third child, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: It was his third child, one of his children he had a child ready, bout to pop out, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I don’t know waiting to hear about it, he’s on the ground, I'm talking to him from the air, I told him to be safe, get in a safe place, where you can see but in a safe place, the last heli-, the last helicopter coming in had Ben Keen, Captain Ben Keen, Charlie battery commander, second of the 319th, Ben Keen made him move to where he could see better, he was also exposed when he got blown up, �Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: By the mortar, blown in half, I didn’t know that until much later which is probable a good thing, because I'm not in jail, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: I don’t think I could have gotten away with shooting him with everybody looking at me, in self-defense I don’t know, IInterviewer: Yeah, it’s tough Veteran: I don’t mean to, don’t put that in there, God knows, edit that out, not worth saying, that’s the way I felt, but Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: Ben Keen, I don’t wanna talk about (1:56:01) Interviewer: Okay so, and then basically then they, the company that lands walks off that night, they leave, Veteran: Carrying a body, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: The bodies Interviewer: Yeah, Veteran: More than one, yes, they go over to the other hill, the, I don’t remember, the hill to the southeast, Interviewer: Maybe one thousand at that point or, Veteran: I think it was one thousand, I think that’s where it was, I'm pretty sure that’s where they went, and then that night the recon lieutenant just changed position, changed commanders, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Wilson, this kid Wilson, I don’t remember his first name, teenager had been to recon platoon leader alright, Interviewer: Mm-hmm �Veteran: And he was, he did well, he did, he was a good platoon leader, operated well alone he was a, anyway this other guy Wilson who was new to that and he wasn’t new to the country company, he was, he’d been there a while, but he took over the recon platoon and he was talking about, he had been given orders by Colonel Lucas to go sneak and peak on ripcord, that’s a stupid thing to do, you just got your ass run off and you’re gonna send some people, sneaking and peak back over there, I'm sorry but that’s my opinion and Wilson thought he was gonna be killed and he was killed, I mean it’s like a death sentence, that, that always didn’t make, several things that Lucas did didn’t make sense to me, one was why didn’t he divert to ash and trash when you get on a hot LZ because they’re in the way, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They’re not part, they, it’s just stupid stuff that’s in the way, (1:58:00) Veteran: You don’t need them, divert those two things, we can, reschedule it, anyway, I have to leave that like me being green and the, well Bastogne, and it was, he’d been, he’d been in country six months, but he hadn’t been Interviewer: He had no combat experience, he was not a ground combat commander Veteran: He was good about wanting you to have your ironed clothes ironed Interviewer: Yup Veteran: And that was one of the issues he and I had, they had, they decided that we could always, they washed our clothes, you sent our clothes in the laundry to be washed, just see we had clean clothes but they were wrinkled alright, so they decided they could iron clothes, they could do ten sets per, for the battalion, so he gave it over to the Sergeant Major, the Sergeant Major did the staff, and the First Sergeants, staff I don’t know if it include, including the company commanders, and the First Sergeant, alright, but that let the artillery liaison out, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Well you gotta go to your battalion, he’s got the same problem you got, he’s already got that done over there alright, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: Well you could iron them, I ain’t ironing them okay, that’s not gonna happen, it didn’t happen, but that was one of the things, alright so now I'm like I said I’ve always been kind of a slob but I'm, oh well, anyway, I'm not walking around in ironed fatigues right, the rest of his people are, cause now they got that, so that was, that was one of the things, �(2:00:01) Veteran: That, one of our content points of contention, when it, when I told him that when we were doing the planning for this mission we went up and met with the ARVN’s, Don Hi I believe, and he was talking with the ARVN commander and he was talking about ammunitions, well we need more ammunition, and so Lucas volunteers to give him some of ours, I said sir you can’t give those to him, well I'm allocated so many rounds and I can give him some of that, I said sir, you’re allocated, but it belongs to that battery commander down there that has it, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: You’re allocated it for who are used, but you can’t give it away here like that, he didn’t understand, maybe he did understand he’s too, never mind, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: But that was, so then he, we got, he got ordered to go to the field, move out, we moved out to Gladiator, he got ordered to go out there and we got our packs down, got our packs on the tawk, we’re going out next morning, to have our packs in there that night, and I had, when I came through, central issue, I would, I had, you were issued two canteens, well I got one regular canteen with canteen cup, the whole thing, and, and the other one I got was a two quart canteen, where it had a cover and a strap and also could be put on the belt, but that’s what I was issued, so I had that hanging on, I had my, my canteen on my web belt, but I had that on my pack, he decided he wanted it, he liked it, we’ll get you one, well, there wasn’t any to get okay, so I go back and there's my pack without my canteen on it, (2:02:01) Veteran: he’s got my canteen, he took my can, they took my canteen and gave it to Lucas, I wasn’t real thrilled with that okay, you have to think about the situation too, you’re in Vietnam what else they gonna do to you, Interviewer: Mm-hmm Veteran: They’re not going to shot at you in jail, Interviewer: Yeah, alright now this tape is about up, Veteran: Okay Interviewer: So I'm going to stop it here Veteran: You might say Lucas and I didn’t see eye-to-eye, � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Veterans History Project Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Grand Valley State University. History Department Description An account of the resource The Library of Congress established the Veterans History Project in 2001 to collect memories, accounts, and documents of U.S. war veterans from World War II and the Korean War, Vietnam War, and conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, and to preserve these stories for future generations. The GVSU History Department interviews are part of this work-in-progress, and may contain videos and audio recordings, transcripts and interview outlines, and related documents and photographs. Coverage The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant 1914- Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Subject The topic of the resource Afghan War, 2001--Personal narratives, American Iran Hostage Crisis, 1979-1981--Personal narratives, American Korean War, 1950-1953--Personal narratives, American Michigan--History, Military Oral history Persian Gulf War, 1991--Personal narratives, American United States--History, Military United States. Air Force United States. Army United States. Navy Veterans Video recordings Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James Boring, Frank Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27 Language A language of the resource eng Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived <a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/455">Veterans History Project interviews (RHC-27)</a> Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context RHC-27_HinesR2319V1 Title A name given to the resource Hines, Raymond (1 of 2, Interview transcript and video), 2019 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2019-07-26 Description An account of the resource Raymond Hines was born on April 6, 1944 in Wellford, South Carolina, and graduated high school in 1962. Hines received his draft notice in 1965 and chose to enlist in the Army. He completed Basic Training at Fort Jackson, South Carolina, and Advanced Infantry Training at Fort Devens, Massachusetts, where he became a Morse Intercept Operator. He also trained in Artillery OCS at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, before transferring to Fort Bliss, Texas, as part of the Air Defense for only two months before being transferred to Wurzburg Germany. From Germany, Hines was deployed to Vietnam with the 2nd of the 319th as a Fire Direction Officer and proceeded to report to the Bravo Battery at Firebase Bastogne. He saw heavy combat with this unit. While in Vietnam, Hines also worked as an assistant S-3 fireman, and a Liaison Officer for the 2nd of the 506 at Fire Base Ripcord. After taking some additional advanced artillery courses, he deployed to Nuremberg Germany with the 3rd of the 70th House Artillery before transferring to the 7th Corps Artillery as a Nuclear Release Authentication System Officer. He would later return to Europe after recieveing his veterinarian degree in the United States to care for military service animals. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Hines, Raymond Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource Smither, James (Interviewer) Subject The topic of the resource Vietnam War, 1961-1975--Personal narratives, American United States. Army Oral history Veterans History Project (U.S.) United States--History, Military Veterans Video recordings Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource video/mp4 application/pdf Type The nature or genre of the resource Moving Image Text Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Veterans History Project collection, RHC-27 Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource <a href="https://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a> Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections & University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401. Relation A related resource Veterans History Project (U.S.) Language A language of the resource eng