MercuryNews.com: Vietnam War Memorial coming
For more than 15 years, a replica of the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington, D.C. has traveled to educational institutions throughout United States mainly in the east. But next month it will make its first appearance west of the Rockies.
DeVry University's Fremont campus will host "Bringing Home the Wall" Aug. 10-13, a scaled-down replica of the memorial.
The replica was created in 1993 by St. Cloud, Fla. residents Tom and Dee Twigg, 67 and 64, respectively, as an alternative for Vietnam veterans and their relatives who can't travel to the nation's capital.
A Vietnam veteran, Tom Twigg said the exhibit started out as a coffee table created by his wife called "The Missing Man" table.
According to the National League of Families of American Prisoners and Missing in Southeast Asia, the "Missing Man" table ceremony is a dignified, solemn moment in many formal dinners and other occasions. There have been many different ways to conduct the ceremony, but the message is always the same.
The table is typically set for six guests, and all the seats are empty. There's usually a white tablecloth with a single place setting, preferably white, accompanied by an inverted wine glass, a salt shaker, a slice of lemon on a bread plate with a pile of spilled salt, a small bud vase with a single stem red rose, a red ribbon tied around the vase and a lit candle. Each item symbolizes a different aspect of missing prisoners of war.
Tom Twigg said the mother of a Vietnam veteran who had been killed in action approached his wife at one of their Missing Man ceremonies over the 1994 Thanksgiving weekend.
The woman, who was seated in a wheelchair and using an oxygen tank, handed Dee Twigg the soldier's medals he earned during the war two Bronze Stars for bravery and a Purple Heart for being killed during service.
The woman told the Twiggs she couldn't make it to Washington to honor her son or his fellow soldiers, and wanted to honor them. The mother requested the medals be placed at the Missing Man table.
Upon hearing the story, Dee Twigg asked the woman to give her one year and she would bring the wall to her.
"It started out very small and was for the women like her who just couldn't get to the memorial," Tom Twigg said.
The original memorial wall is made up of two rock walls 246 feet, 9 inches long and 10.1 feet high. Each wall has 72 panels, 70 of which list all 58,129 veterans' names killed during the conflict.
The Twiggs' replica stands 46 feet long and 8 feet tall, made of a wooden frame and PVC.
Tom Twigg said it takes about three hours to set up.
He added educational institutions typically contact them to visit and teach students about the war.
However, Tom Twigg said the wall does make appearances at Veterans Affairs hospitals and veterans ceremonies all over the eastern United States.
He said DeVry University has been one of their biggest supporters, asking the Twiggs to about half a dozen of their campuses nationwide.
Wayne Anthony, director of public outreach at DeVry's Fremont campus and a Vietnam veteran, said it presented a great opportunity to bring the memorial and history to the Bay Area.
"We don't have anything like this in the Bay Area," he said. "The closest thing we have here is a memorial in Sacramento that honors our California veterans."
Anthony said the memorial will come to DeVry during the school's national open house week. That week will be dubbed "Red, White and U" to commemorate the memorial.
"We're just happy (the Twiggs) had this week off, because they travel everywhere. We're very excited to have them come here."
The wall will be displayed on the campus' eastern corner at 6600 Dumbarton Circle beginning at 9:30 a.m. Aug. 10. The national anthem will be sung and there will be a presentation of colors ceremony.
After the wall is displayed in Fremont, the Twiggs will move on to Phoenix.
Tom Twigg said attendance to the wall varies. But on one occasion in West Virginia as many as 20,000 people visited their display.
"We've been to hospitals where many times there are vets in wheelchairs," he said. "They get to touch the wall and get very emotional. It's their chance to say good bye."
Tom Twigg said questions from students at the many educational institutions they visit are amazing.
"Our kids really need to be educated," he said. "They're going to be our future leaders, and if they have to make a decision to go to war, they need to be educated about war and the consequences."
Friday, July 29, 2011
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
U.S. Navy Vietnam veterans fight for benefits
The Sacremaento Bee: U.S. Navy Vietnam veterans fight for benefits
WASHINGTON — Doug DeWitt served his country in the U.S. Navy during the Vietnam War, but now he feels abandoned by the nation for which he fought.
Forty years after his service, the 67-year-old Anaheim, Calif., resident suffers from diabetes, high blood pressure and other ailments that he blames on exposure to Agent Orange, the main chemical the United States sprayed during the war. He has tried for years without success to get disability compensation from the Department of Veterans Affairs.
"I don't have the strength that I used to have. I can't do the walking I used to because of the pain in my legs," he said. He added that the VA has not been helpful in resolving his claim.
"They won't listen to you. You can talk till you're blue in the face," he said.
DeWitt is one of potentially thousands of so-called "blue water" Navy veterans who have been excluded from easy approval of their Agent Orange-related disability compensation claims by the Veterans Affairs Department. He's in a group of veterans who served on deep-water ships off the coast of Vietnam but didn't touch land or serve on waterways inside the country.
A study issued in May by the Institute of Medicine has dimmed the hopes of these blue water veterans. The report said there was too little data to conclusively determine whether they had been exposed to Agent Orange. Because it appears unlikely that the Veterans Affairs Department will change its policy on its own, veterans now are intent on finding a legislative solution.
A VA spokeswoman, Michele Hammonds, said she couldn't talk about individual veterans' claims because of privacy rules. She cited a number of Agent Orange-related resources at the department, among them a medical exam offered to Vietnam veterans who might have been exposed between 1962 and 1975.
The Agent Orange defoliants sprayed on Vietnam contained dioxins, highly toxic chemicals that have been linked to a variety of illnesses including heart conditions, diabetes and several cancers.
In 1991, Congress passed the Agent Orange Act, which gave the Department of Veterans Affairs the authority to declare a number of medical conditions "presumptive" for Vietnam veterans and to grant disability compensation to those affected.
Blue water veterans were granted this status until February 2002, when the department amended its procedures to limit veterans who didn't touch land from easy approval of their claims.
"This change ... is an unfair and unjust result that has been litigated endlessly — and ultimately against these veterans," said Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif., speaking at a May 5, 2010, House Veterans Committee hearing.
These veterans can still submit claims to the VA, but they often are denied and the process takes much longer, according to John Paul Rossie, the executive director of the Blue Water Navy Vietnam Veterans Association.
His organization says there are tens of thousands of possible Navy veterans who've been left out of easy approval of their claims for illnesses linked to Agent Orange. John Wells, the group's legislative affairs and legal director, said it's a matter of moral responsibility that the nation takes care of its blue water veterans.
"If today's veterans ever get the idea that they're not going to be taken care of, I'm not sure how many of them are going to show up and enlist," he said in an interview.
But the cost of the VA covering health care costs for these veterans could reach into the hundreds of millions of dollars, at a time when Congress is trying to get the enormous U.S. deficit under control.
On May 20, the Institute of Medicine, an arm of the National Academy of Sciences, issued a report saying it was impossible to conclusively say that blue water vets were exposed to Agent Orange because of the lack of data from 40 years ago.
But the veterans' claims have been bolstered by a 2002 study done for the Australian Department of Veterans Affairs by the National Research Centre for Environmental Toxicology in that country. Australia deployed navy ships and destroyers to the U.S.-led war effort in Vietnam.
"The study findings suggest that the personnel on board ships were exposed to biologically significant quantities of dioxins," said the Australian study.
Some American experts also have backed up the veterans' claims. In a 2005 article in the Journal of Law and Policy, Mark Brown, then director of the Environmental Agents Service at the Veterans Affairs Department, wrote that, "there is no obvious scientific or public health basis for excluding" the blue water veterans from the same presumption that is granted to veterans who served on Vietnamese soil.
In recent years, Australia and New Zealand have begun to provide benefits for the Agent Orange-related claims of their blue water veterans.
An estimated 12 million to 19 million gallons of herbicides and defoliants, mainly Agent Orange, were sprayed on Vietnam by the United States during the war to kill off forest cover used by the Viet Cong.
The blue water veterans say they were exposed to Agent Orange primarily through the water they drank on ships, which often was distilled from water taken from the sea or from harbors when ships were anchored close to shore. Potentially toxic runoff from rivers flowed into that sea and harbor water.
In 2009, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., authored a bill to expand the definition of the veterans covered by the VA to include blue water vets. While that bill did not pass, her spokeswoman said last week that the senator plans to reintroduce a similar bill soon.
Meanwhile, California veteran Doug DeWitt, a petty officer on the aircraft carrier USS Valley Forge during the Vietnam War, has submitted claims for disability compensation for several years, but they have been denied. He is appealing his case.
He feels let down by the government.
"I think the way the VA is looking at us (is) they're just waiting for us to die off so they don't have to pay us," he said.
WASHINGTON — Doug DeWitt served his country in the U.S. Navy during the Vietnam War, but now he feels abandoned by the nation for which he fought.
Forty years after his service, the 67-year-old Anaheim, Calif., resident suffers from diabetes, high blood pressure and other ailments that he blames on exposure to Agent Orange, the main chemical the United States sprayed during the war. He has tried for years without success to get disability compensation from the Department of Veterans Affairs.
"I don't have the strength that I used to have. I can't do the walking I used to because of the pain in my legs," he said. He added that the VA has not been helpful in resolving his claim.
"They won't listen to you. You can talk till you're blue in the face," he said.
DeWitt is one of potentially thousands of so-called "blue water" Navy veterans who have been excluded from easy approval of their Agent Orange-related disability compensation claims by the Veterans Affairs Department. He's in a group of veterans who served on deep-water ships off the coast of Vietnam but didn't touch land or serve on waterways inside the country.
A study issued in May by the Institute of Medicine has dimmed the hopes of these blue water veterans. The report said there was too little data to conclusively determine whether they had been exposed to Agent Orange. Because it appears unlikely that the Veterans Affairs Department will change its policy on its own, veterans now are intent on finding a legislative solution.
A VA spokeswoman, Michele Hammonds, said she couldn't talk about individual veterans' claims because of privacy rules. She cited a number of Agent Orange-related resources at the department, among them a medical exam offered to Vietnam veterans who might have been exposed between 1962 and 1975.
The Agent Orange defoliants sprayed on Vietnam contained dioxins, highly toxic chemicals that have been linked to a variety of illnesses including heart conditions, diabetes and several cancers.
In 1991, Congress passed the Agent Orange Act, which gave the Department of Veterans Affairs the authority to declare a number of medical conditions "presumptive" for Vietnam veterans and to grant disability compensation to those affected.
Blue water veterans were granted this status until February 2002, when the department amended its procedures to limit veterans who didn't touch land from easy approval of their claims.
"This change ... is an unfair and unjust result that has been litigated endlessly — and ultimately against these veterans," said Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif., speaking at a May 5, 2010, House Veterans Committee hearing.
These veterans can still submit claims to the VA, but they often are denied and the process takes much longer, according to John Paul Rossie, the executive director of the Blue Water Navy Vietnam Veterans Association.
His organization says there are tens of thousands of possible Navy veterans who've been left out of easy approval of their claims for illnesses linked to Agent Orange. John Wells, the group's legislative affairs and legal director, said it's a matter of moral responsibility that the nation takes care of its blue water veterans.
"If today's veterans ever get the idea that they're not going to be taken care of, I'm not sure how many of them are going to show up and enlist," he said in an interview.
But the cost of the VA covering health care costs for these veterans could reach into the hundreds of millions of dollars, at a time when Congress is trying to get the enormous U.S. deficit under control.
On May 20, the Institute of Medicine, an arm of the National Academy of Sciences, issued a report saying it was impossible to conclusively say that blue water vets were exposed to Agent Orange because of the lack of data from 40 years ago.
But the veterans' claims have been bolstered by a 2002 study done for the Australian Department of Veterans Affairs by the National Research Centre for Environmental Toxicology in that country. Australia deployed navy ships and destroyers to the U.S.-led war effort in Vietnam.
"The study findings suggest that the personnel on board ships were exposed to biologically significant quantities of dioxins," said the Australian study.
Some American experts also have backed up the veterans' claims. In a 2005 article in the Journal of Law and Policy, Mark Brown, then director of the Environmental Agents Service at the Veterans Affairs Department, wrote that, "there is no obvious scientific or public health basis for excluding" the blue water veterans from the same presumption that is granted to veterans who served on Vietnamese soil.
In recent years, Australia and New Zealand have begun to provide benefits for the Agent Orange-related claims of their blue water veterans.
An estimated 12 million to 19 million gallons of herbicides and defoliants, mainly Agent Orange, were sprayed on Vietnam by the United States during the war to kill off forest cover used by the Viet Cong.
The blue water veterans say they were exposed to Agent Orange primarily through the water they drank on ships, which often was distilled from water taken from the sea or from harbors when ships were anchored close to shore. Potentially toxic runoff from rivers flowed into that sea and harbor water.
In 2009, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., authored a bill to expand the definition of the veterans covered by the VA to include blue water vets. While that bill did not pass, her spokeswoman said last week that the senator plans to reintroduce a similar bill soon.
Meanwhile, California veteran Doug DeWitt, a petty officer on the aircraft carrier USS Valley Forge during the Vietnam War, has submitted claims for disability compensation for several years, but they have been denied. He is appealing his case.
He feels let down by the government.
"I think the way the VA is looking at us (is) they're just waiting for us to die off so they don't have to pay us," he said.
Saturday, July 23, 2011
Putting faces to names on wall latest Vietnam memorial project
From Clarion Ledger.com: Putting faces to names on wall latest Vietnam memorial project
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington, D.C., needs help putting faces to the names of the fallen.
The "Call for Photos" project announced Friday at the War Memorial Building in Jackson is a new partnership by the Mississippi Vietnam Veterans Memorial and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund.
Friends, families and individuals can submit photographs of fallen servicemen and women. Photos will be displayed in the future Education Center, a multimedia learning facility at the Vietnam memorial.
"We can use this event today to encourage the other states to get the job done," memorial founder and Vietnam veteran Jan C. Scruggs
told the more than 100 people, many of them also veterans, gathered for the announcement.
Scruggs said construction could start in 2012 if the campaign raises enough funds.
Of the 58,272 men and women on the Vietnam wall, 637 are from Mississippi, according to the Department of Defense.
The Mississippi Vietnam Veterans Memorial has 32 additional names not listed on the DOD roster as casualties.
Brenda Jacobs of Booneville contributed a picture of her first husband, Army Sgt. Kenneth B. Carpenter, who died Jan. 2, 1968, in Vietnam.
"It's so heartwarming to me that they are willing to do this," Jacobs, 65, said. "I feel like a veteran because I went through every phase of the Vietnam War."
The "Call for Photos" project aims to include all the faces of war casualties from Mississippi and other states.
"We actually have over 20,000 photographs of the 58,000, so we're doing pretty good," Scruggs said.
The facility's exhibits also will include a selection of more than 150,000 items left at the memorial wall, a timeline of the Vietnam era and a history of the wall.
By receiving photos across the country, the Education Center will be able to honor the sacrifices made by those who died, those who fought and returned, as well as friends and families of those who served, organizers say.
This is especially helpful to the youth and future generations to learn more about those who served, they say.
(Page 2 of 2)
"This is a great day for our Vietnam veterans," said Col. Robert Thomas, assistant adjutant admiral for the Mississippi Army National Guard.
"Vietnam veterans have a substantial presence in the Mississippi National Guard. We still have several combat veterans of that era serving in the Guard today."
In 1995, the Mississippi Vietnam Veterans Memorial began collecting photographs as part of its memorial in Ocean Springs to display the faces of fallen soldiers.
"It's important that you remember the Mississippi Vietnam Veterans Memorial is meant to be a healing, teaching, living legacy for all Mississippians for generations to come," said Mississippi memorial president retired Air Force Lt. Col. Dick Wilson, a Vietnam veteran.
Wilson presented Scruggs with pictures of Mississippians for the Education Center.
At the War Memorial Building, visitors viewed information on the Education Center and photos of Mississippians featured on the virtual wall: Gregory Inman Barras of Jackson (died Dec. 18, 1968), Harold Van Cummings of Jackson (April 14, 1970), Richard Terry Smith of Gulfport (July 29, 1967), Sylvester Ellis of Columbus (May 6, 1970); Angus W. McAllister Jr. of Biloxi (Feb. 24, 1969) and William Thomas Mangum Jr. of Jackson (Feb. 17, 1968).
Mississippi has 38,220 veterans of the Vietnam War.
The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington, D.C., needs help putting faces to the names of the fallen.
The "Call for Photos" project announced Friday at the War Memorial Building in Jackson is a new partnership by the Mississippi Vietnam Veterans Memorial and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund.
Friends, families and individuals can submit photographs of fallen servicemen and women. Photos will be displayed in the future Education Center, a multimedia learning facility at the Vietnam memorial.
"We can use this event today to encourage the other states to get the job done," memorial founder and Vietnam veteran Jan C. Scruggs
told the more than 100 people, many of them also veterans, gathered for the announcement.
Scruggs said construction could start in 2012 if the campaign raises enough funds.
Of the 58,272 men and women on the Vietnam wall, 637 are from Mississippi, according to the Department of Defense.
The Mississippi Vietnam Veterans Memorial has 32 additional names not listed on the DOD roster as casualties.
Brenda Jacobs of Booneville contributed a picture of her first husband, Army Sgt. Kenneth B. Carpenter, who died Jan. 2, 1968, in Vietnam.
"It's so heartwarming to me that they are willing to do this," Jacobs, 65, said. "I feel like a veteran because I went through every phase of the Vietnam War."
The "Call for Photos" project aims to include all the faces of war casualties from Mississippi and other states.
"We actually have over 20,000 photographs of the 58,000, so we're doing pretty good," Scruggs said.
The facility's exhibits also will include a selection of more than 150,000 items left at the memorial wall, a timeline of the Vietnam era and a history of the wall.
By receiving photos across the country, the Education Center will be able to honor the sacrifices made by those who died, those who fought and returned, as well as friends and families of those who served, organizers say.
This is especially helpful to the youth and future generations to learn more about those who served, they say.
(Page 2 of 2)
"This is a great day for our Vietnam veterans," said Col. Robert Thomas, assistant adjutant admiral for the Mississippi Army National Guard.
"Vietnam veterans have a substantial presence in the Mississippi National Guard. We still have several combat veterans of that era serving in the Guard today."
In 1995, the Mississippi Vietnam Veterans Memorial began collecting photographs as part of its memorial in Ocean Springs to display the faces of fallen soldiers.
"It's important that you remember the Mississippi Vietnam Veterans Memorial is meant to be a healing, teaching, living legacy for all Mississippians for generations to come," said Mississippi memorial president retired Air Force Lt. Col. Dick Wilson, a Vietnam veteran.
Wilson presented Scruggs with pictures of Mississippians for the Education Center.
At the War Memorial Building, visitors viewed information on the Education Center and photos of Mississippians featured on the virtual wall: Gregory Inman Barras of Jackson (died Dec. 18, 1968), Harold Van Cummings of Jackson (April 14, 1970), Richard Terry Smith of Gulfport (July 29, 1967), Sylvester Ellis of Columbus (May 6, 1970); Angus W. McAllister Jr. of Biloxi (Feb. 24, 1969) and William Thomas Mangum Jr. of Jackson (Feb. 17, 1968).
Mississippi has 38,220 veterans of the Vietnam War.
Compensation for war victims is long overdue
From Thanh Nien News: Compensation for war victims is long overdue
The long struggle to win compensation for suspected victims of Agent Orange has, with few and recent exceptions, met with stubborn resistance from those responsible for poisoning the land and people of Vietnam.
The main excuse has been the lack of scientific clarity about the connection between Agent Orange and human health. While it is true that questions remain about the health effects of Agent Orange, it is likely that they would have been resolved by now if a long-term epidemiological study had been launched at the end of the military war in 1975.
Instead, Vietnam was subjected to the continuation of the Vietnam War by economic means, an invasion from the north, and a war in Cambodia against a homicidal regime supported by the United States and its allies (one that continued long after the grisly crimes of the Khmer Rouge were exposed).
Thus Vietnam, shattered by decades of war and further impoverished by the economic embargo, lacked the scientific and financial resources for a systematic study of Agent Orange and its effects. The moral responsibility to conduct such a study has always lain elsewhere, of course.
Consequently, no one – and least of all the United States – is entitled to complain about the lack of indisputable scientific evidence for postulated links between dioxin and various medical conditions, including birth defects.
It is against this background that the Agent Orange/dioxin issue ought properly to be understood. For a variety of reasons, it has become the only war-related issue through which the Vietnamese have channeled their bitterness and sorrow, and it has therefore acquired enormous symbolic weight. In that context, it is not primarily a question of science: It has to do with a longing for justice, and for acknowledgement of the terrible suffering to which Vietnam and its people have been subjected.
There has been some improvement in the attitude of the US government, in recent years, although that may have more to do with geopolitical than with humanitarian concerns. But the disparity between the vast consequences of the war and the “aid” (not “compensation”) is enormous – especially if one considers such factors as the heavy debt of the puppet regime in Saigon, which Vietnam was forced to assume as a condition for ending the economic embargo.
It should also be kept in mind that the legacy of Agent Orange is only one of several war-related issues, and regarding most there is little or no dispute, scientific or otherwise. According to Robert McNamara, one of the key US officials responsible for conducting the war, the number of Vietnamese who were killed was the equivalent of 25 million citizens of his country. The number of wounded was several times greater, of course; and the emotional scars were and are so many and so deep as to defy calculation.
To that can be added the destruction of forests and farmland, the millions of landmines and other unexploded ordnance left hiding in the soil, the disruption of normal family life, hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese MIAs, the effects of malnutrition, etc., etc. The list is long, and the consequences will continue to be felt long into the future.
One may well ask: What level of compensation would the United States demand for death, misery and destruction on that scale? Some indication is provided by what has transpired since the death of 3,000 office workers in New York in September of 2001 (0.0001 per cent of 25 million).
By comparison, the amount of compensation being asked for suspected victims of Agent Orange is a very small thing. Not even a hundred or a thousand times the amount requested would begin to compensate for all the terrible consequences of the Vietnam War.
Why, then, quibble over a lack of scientific certainty on the effects of Agent Orange, for which the victims of the war are surely not to blame? The most likely answer is that it has never been about the science, but rather the avoidance of responsibility: Great powers are not in the habit of compensating their victims. Among other things, that would set a very expensive precedent and perhaps even make war too costly to contemplate.
All the more reason, then, to continue the struggle for compensation of the victims of the Vietnam War. It is the very least that can be demanded of those responsible.
Monday, July 18, 2011
Vietnam's Ghosts: Still Alive in the U.S. Government
From Time: Vietnam's Ghosts: Still Alive in the U.S. Government
Interview of authors by Mark Thompson
Interview of authors by Mark Thompson
There is really nothing new in the war game, as Haunting Legacy: Vietnam and the American Presidency from Ford to Obama by the father-daughter team of Marvin and Deborah Kalb makes clear. It could hardly be more timely, as America and its leaders grapple with the challenges posed by Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya – all at once. The pair summons the ghosts of Vietnam, which sometimes flit about offices inside the White House, State Department and Pentagon even today. Marvin Kalb spent 30 years covering foreign affairs and other issues for CBS and NBC news before teaching at Harvard. Deborah Kalb spent two decades as a Washington journalist for Gannett News Service, Congressional Quarterly, and U.S. News & World Report. Marvin Kalb had this email exchange with Battleland over the weekend:
Why did you write Haunting Legacy?
The Vietnam War was the only war the U.S. ever lost, and it left a deep scar on the American psyche. From then on, American presidents, whenever faced with the need to send troops to war, worried about getting trapped in another Vietnam, meaning another war without a clear mission, without an exit strategy, without Congressional support. Deborah and I wanted to explore this crucial dimension of recent American history. That's the reason we wrote the book.
What surprised you about what you found as you wrote it?
What surprised us most was the way Vietnam, in many guises, kept reappearing in presidential deliberations about war and peace. One would think that 35 years after the war ended, its political and strategic lethality would end too. But it hasn't. Vietnam keeps influencing presidents, like an uninvited guest to dinner who refuses to leave the table.
Explain how Vietnam has manifested itself in our current conflicts.
In many ways. I shall address only two.
In October, 1983, 241 Marines were murdered in their barracks in Beirut, Lebanon by Islamic fanatics. President Reagan knew exactly who they were, where they were, but he took no action against them. In fact, he pulled American troops out of Lebanon a few months later. He explained in very revealing letters that the American people had been "spooked" by Vietnam, and he didn't want to put them through a similar experience again.
When President Obama ran for office in 2008, he paid the obligatory visit to the battlefields in Iraq and Afghanistan. He invited Senators Jack Reed of Rhode Island and Chuck Hagel of Nebraska to accompany him. On the 14-hour flight to the wars, he asked both colleagues about the lessons of Vietnam, not about Afghanistan.
When he opened his first National Security Council meeting, after assuming office, he pronounced: "Afghanistan is not Vietnam." Why raise Vietnam, if it were not very much on his mind? His first decision was to beef up American forces in Afghanistan, because he did not want to run the risk of losing the war, which would have been reminiscent of Vietnam and disastrous for a liberal Democratic president.
Marvin and Deborah Kalb discuss their new book with Ted Koppel recently / Photo by The George Washington University
Vietnam is viewed as a war we lost. Did we? Is that a fair conclusion?
The U.S. lost the Vietnam War. No doubt about it. Whether you argue it was the result of faulty strategy or Congressional refusal to fund the war any further, the U.S. lost and the communists won. Some people argue that we also lost the War of 1812. We did not lose that war. In fact, after the British sacked Washington in 1812, the U.S. went on to win quite a few major battles, and the war ended in 1814 with the Treaty of Ghent, which made it clear both sides emerged from the conflict with their heads held high.
How did the presence of the draft make Vietnam different than today's wars?
The draft during the Vietnam War meant that many served in Vietnam against their will. Anti-war demonstrations spread from one anxious campus to another. President Nixon decided early in his administration to end the draft as one way of discouraging demonstrations. An all-volunteer army was then created, and it is this volunteer army that has been fighting for the U.S. ever since. Very few anti-war demonstrations happen, principally because there is no draft.
Should Congress be compelled to declare war?
That is a very tough question. Ever since World War II, the U.S. has fought many wars without a single declaration of war, as stipulated in the Constitution. Congressional resolutions authorizing wars have become a convenient substitute. One reason is that a declaration implies a total dedication to fighting and winning the war in question, and no president wants to make such a commitment at this time--nor does the Congress.
Why do you think our troops today are treated so much better than our Vietnam troops were when they came home?
One reason is that during the Vietnam war the troops were fighting an unpopular war with rising casualties and little reward. Now, though the wars may still be unpopular, we live in a post-9/11 environment, in which the American people and their government are united in their opposition to terrorism. It is patriotic to be fighting terrorists who hurt the U.S. and killed many Americans. That wasn't the case in Vietnam.
Who do you believe was most responsible for the quagmire than Vietnam became?
In a way everyone was responsible. No one understood Vietnam, its people, history, religion and culture. We stumbled into a colonial war run by France and converted it foolishly into an anti-communist cause, forgetting all the while that the Vietnamese were inspired by a strong sense of nationalism and a determination to unite as one country. We saw Vietnam as part of the Cold War.
When you visit the Vietnam wall, what do you tell those 58,000 names etched into black granite?
I did not fight in Vietnam--I just covered the war. My war was Korea. What I tell the 58,000-plus who died in Vietnam is that I pray that next time an American president sends troops abroad to fight, it be for a clear goal, with a carefully thought-through strategy, with popular and Congressional support, and with the tools to do the job and with an exit strategy in mind that satisfies the interests of the American people.
Thursday, July 14, 2011
NJ Vietnam Veterans Memorial Foundation to Host A POWs Story
From AsburyParkPress: NJ Vietnam Veterans Memorial Foundation to Host A POWs Story
The New Jersey Vietnam Veterans Memorial Foundation will host former prisoner of war David I. Drummonds A POWs Story on Saturday, July 23 at 1 p.m. at the Vietnam Era Museum and Educational Center. Drummond, a New Jersey resident, will share his personal account of capture and survival as a POW during the Vietnam War. Several items from his time imprisoned are on display in the museums lobby.
Drummond was born in Preston, England, and moved to the United States with his parents at the age of four. He lived in Jersey City, North Bergen, and Westwood, and became a naturalized US citizen in 1961. In 1969 he graduated from Newark College of Engineering, where he participated in U.S Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps (AFROTC) and was commissioned as an officer in the United States Air Force. On December 22, 1972, during the Linebacker II raids, the final bombing operation of the Vietnam War, the B-52 bomber that Capt. Drummond co-piloted was shot down over North Vietnam. Drummond and his fellow crewmen were taken prisoner by the North Vietnamese and held until the end of the war and Operation Homecoming in March 1973. Drummonds crew was the only captured B-52 crew to have all its crewmembers return alive to the USA.
After his repatriation, Drummond left the Air Force and began a flying career with American Airlines. He worked for Bell Helicopter Company as a flight test engineer testing experimental helicopters, and later returned to American Airlines. He currently flies as captain of an American Airlines Boeing 777. David and his wife Jill live in Manalapan and have one son, Ian.
Attendees are asked to RSVP to (732) 335-0033. Teachers who attend this program will receive professional development credit hours. Admission is free for veterans and active-duty military personnel. Adult admission is $5.00; student and senior citizen admission is $3.00. Children under 10 are admitted free. The Vietnam Era Museum & Educational Center is located adjacent to the New Jersey Vietnam Veterans Memorial off the Garden State Parkway at exit 116. The Museum & Educational Center is open Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. 4 p.m. Please visit our website at www.njvvmf.org for more information.
The New Jersey Vietnam Veterans Memorial Foundation will host former prisoner of war David I. Drummonds A POWs Story on Saturday, July 23 at 1 p.m. at the Vietnam Era Museum and Educational Center. Drummond, a New Jersey resident, will share his personal account of capture and survival as a POW during the Vietnam War. Several items from his time imprisoned are on display in the museums lobby.
Drummond was born in Preston, England, and moved to the United States with his parents at the age of four. He lived in Jersey City, North Bergen, and Westwood, and became a naturalized US citizen in 1961. In 1969 he graduated from Newark College of Engineering, where he participated in U.S Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps (AFROTC) and was commissioned as an officer in the United States Air Force. On December 22, 1972, during the Linebacker II raids, the final bombing operation of the Vietnam War, the B-52 bomber that Capt. Drummond co-piloted was shot down over North Vietnam. Drummond and his fellow crewmen were taken prisoner by the North Vietnamese and held until the end of the war and Operation Homecoming in March 1973. Drummonds crew was the only captured B-52 crew to have all its crewmembers return alive to the USA.
After his repatriation, Drummond left the Air Force and began a flying career with American Airlines. He worked for Bell Helicopter Company as a flight test engineer testing experimental helicopters, and later returned to American Airlines. He currently flies as captain of an American Airlines Boeing 777. David and his wife Jill live in Manalapan and have one son, Ian.
Attendees are asked to RSVP to (732) 335-0033. Teachers who attend this program will receive professional development credit hours. Admission is free for veterans and active-duty military personnel. Adult admission is $5.00; student and senior citizen admission is $3.00. Children under 10 are admitted free. The Vietnam Era Museum & Educational Center is located adjacent to the New Jersey Vietnam Veterans Memorial off the Garden State Parkway at exit 116. The Museum & Educational Center is open Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. 4 p.m. Please visit our website at www.njvvmf.org for more information.
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
'Muster' to focus on Vietnam
Times-Herald.com: 'Muster' to focus on Vietnam
This Oct. 20-23 Coweta County will play host to a very special visitor: The Vietnam Memorial Moving Wall.
The half-sized replica of the Vietnam Memorial Wall in Washington, D.C., contains the names of all those lost during the Vietnam War, including 20 from Coweta County.
The wall will be the main attraction of the 2011 Veterans Muster, which will be at the Coweta County Fairgrounds on Pine Road south of Newnan off U.S. 29.
Congress recently declared 2011 as the 50th anniversary of the beginning of the Vietnam War. To recognize that occasion, the Coweta Commission on Veterans Affairs, which organizes and operates the annual Veterans Muster, decided to focus this year's event on the Vietnam War.
The members of the Commission on Veterans Affairs have worked tirelessly to bring the Moving Wall to Coweta and their efforts are to be applauded.
The Moving Wall is accompanied by other structures, including a space with exhibits about the Vietnam War and those who fought there. During its stay in Coweta the wall and accompanying exhibits will be open for viewing 24 hours a day and manned by volunteers ready to provide both security and assistance for visitors.
The Coweta Commission on Veterans Affairs has also started a website ( cowetacova.org ) containing information about the wall, the war and the Cowetans who died in Vietnam.
Much of the website information about Cowetans killed in Vietnam was provided by Steve Quesinberry, chairman of the Social Studies Department at Newnan High School. Quesinberry teaches a class on the Vietnam War and has spent countless hours outside the classroom researching the war, local events related to the war and local veterans who died in Vietnam.
The 2011 Muster will be a great event. To help commemorate the visit of the Moving Wall, The Times-Herald will, over the next 14 weeks, run a series of articles about the Vietnam War.
These stories will examine the causes, the victories, the defeats and the national unrest that followed the war from beginning to end. Each article will feature comments and stories about the Vietnam experience from current Coweta veterans who served there.
This series is intended to help readers understand more about America's most unpopular war. We also hope it will enable readers to realize how this war was different from any other, mostly for the way those who fought it were treated by some of their fellow citizens.
Soldiers from America's other wars came home to ticker tape parades, victory rallies and cheers from a grateful nation. Many who returned from Vietnam were spat upon, called "baby killers" and held up as a symbol of all that was wrong with America. And all because they served their country with dignity and honor.
In the 36 years since the last two servicemen died in Vietnam in 1975, America's Vietnam veterans have begun to win acceptance and are now honored at local and national events honoring all veterans. But the scars from that long ago war remain.
The Vietnam Memorial Moving Wall is called "The Wall That Heals" for a reason.
We hope events like the 2011 Veterans Muster will help heal those who served their nation in Vietnam and help all of us better understand why the wounds from that war are still so painful and so deep. Today, we start by explaining how America was drawn into the Vietnam War. And why.
Monday, July 11, 2011
Gen. Bruce Clarke on the history of the Vietnam War: Still hasn't been written
Foreing Policy: Gen. Bruce Clarke on the history of the Vietnam War: Still hasn't been written
Gen. Bruce Clarke, one of the heroes of the Battle of the Bulge, also was historically minded. I was struck by this comment in his oral history. I think he was right when he said this in 1970, and still is: A good operational history of the Vietnam War, taking into account views of both sides, still has not been written.
I don't think the history of the Vietnamese war will be written before the year 2000. . . . I think by the year 2000 we will see what the import of the Vietnamese war was in southeast Asia, but it will take that long to, I think, sift it out. I don't think you could get the history of the Vietnamese war by studying any of our papers. I certainly wouldn't want to take it out of the big papers. It's my opinion that it has been the poorest reported war of the four that I've had something to do with."
(Pp. 31-32)
The more I learn about the Vietnam war, the more I agree with him.
Btw, Gen. Frederick Franks mentions in the awkward, dull memoir he penned with Tom Clancy that in the waning days of the Vietnam War, Clarke was the only senior officer who visited the amputee ward in the old military hospital in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, when Franks was recuperating there from war wounds.
Gen. Bruce Clarke, one of the heroes of the Battle of the Bulge, also was historically minded. I was struck by this comment in his oral history. I think he was right when he said this in 1970, and still is: A good operational history of the Vietnam War, taking into account views of both sides, still has not been written.
I don't think the history of the Vietnamese war will be written before the year 2000. . . . I think by the year 2000 we will see what the import of the Vietnamese war was in southeast Asia, but it will take that long to, I think, sift it out. I don't think you could get the history of the Vietnamese war by studying any of our papers. I certainly wouldn't want to take it out of the big papers. It's my opinion that it has been the poorest reported war of the four that I've had something to do with."
(Pp. 31-32)
The more I learn about the Vietnam war, the more I agree with him.
Btw, Gen. Frederick Franks mentions in the awkward, dull memoir he penned with Tom Clancy that in the waning days of the Vietnam War, Clarke was the only senior officer who visited the amputee ward in the old military hospital in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, when Franks was recuperating there from war wounds.
Saturday, July 9, 2011
Former Vietnam enemies share reconciliation story
Hartford Courant: Former Vietnam enemies share reconciliation story
EAST HARTFORD, Conn.— On the morning of April 16, 1972, in the midst of the Vietnam War, U.S. Air Force Major Daniel Cherry awoke at the Royal Thai Air Force Base in Udorn, Thailand, ate breakfast, and was briefed on his daily mission.
Cherry, an F4-D Phantom pilot, was to be part of a group that was to escort B-52 bombers in a raid over North Vietnam.
About the same time, North Vietnamese Air Force Pilot First Class Nguyen Hong My, an MiG-21 pilot, was preparing to take off to intercept them after intelligence learned of the bombing raid.
When the B-52s were late arriving, Cherry's Phantoms were already in the sky approaching the target area. Because of the high fuel consumption rate of the F-4s, a decision was made to scrap the mission and go hunting for MiGs instead.
It was a decision that would have a significant impact on the lives of both Cherry and My.
Recently, at the Pratt & Whitney Hangar Museum, Cherry and My stood on the stage together and told their incredible tale of combat, survival, and reconciliation that brought two former enemies together, 36 years after it happened.
On that April day, it wasn't long before Cherry and My were locked in deadly aerial combat about 30 miles southwest of Hanoi, the capital of North Vietnam.
For four minutes, both of their planes looped, turned, dived, and did barrel rolls so each of them could maneuver into a position for a clear shot at the other.
My had evaded five air-to-air missiles that had been fired at him -- but his luck was about to run out.
"One of my radar-controlled missiles ripped into his MiG," Cherry said. "It tore his right wing off."
As My ejected from the cockpit, a malfunction in the suppression straps broke both of his arms and compressed three of his discs in his spine, he told the packed audience through a translator.
As My's parachute aimlessly drifted to earth, Cherry came to within a few hundred feet of him as he flew his Phantom back to Thailand.
"While Cherry was drinking champagne over his victory, I was lying in a jungle," My said. "The thing I feared the worst was a tiger jumping out and attacking me. I couldn't move my arms."
After six months in a hospital, My returned to flying but broke his arm again and had to be permanently grounded due to his injuries.
My retired as an insurance salesman in Vietnam after the war, married, and raised a family.
Cherry retired a brigadier general from the Air Force with a host of awards, including two Silver Star medals, two Legion of Merits, and 10 Distinguished Flying Crosses.
Fate, however, was about to intervene in both their lives.
While visiting the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio, Cherry learned that his Phantom he flew that day was on display at a Veterans of Foreign Wars post outside of the city.
"It was a very emotional experience seeing my plane again," he said. "It was also very sad. There was grass growing all around her and she had suffered significant bird abuse."
Cherry knew it was his Phantom because of the number, 550, and the red star painted on the aircraft that represented the MiG he had shot down.
After working with the local VFW and the Air Force, Cherry was able to have the plane dismantled and brought back to Aviation Heritage Park, in his hometown of Bowling Green, Kentucky, for restoration.
The park pays tribute to the history of aircraft and her crews dating back to World War II, Cherry said.
While the Phantom was being restored, Cherry said he began to think about the fate of the pilot he had shot down on that April day.
Cherry began to investigate and finally wrote a letter to a female Vietnamese news anchor, who hosts a popular television show in Vietnam, explaining the situation.
To his surprise, two weeks later he received a response saying they had found My and invited Cherry to Vietnam to be on the program to talk about his experiences.
Cherry made the long trip to Vietnam and as he sat and explained to her what had transpired, My appeared from behind the curtain.
"I was very apprehensive, I didn't know what to expect," Cherry said. "As he approached me, he looked like a warrior. He shook my hand and said `I hope we can be friends."'
Since that initial meeting, My and Cherry's friendship has "blossomed." My has also visited the U.S. and even sat in the cockpit of the Phantom that shot him down that day.
Cherry wrote a book on his experiences titled "My Enemy, My Friend" with all proceeds going to Aviation Heritage Park.
"I want Vietnam veterans to move on and forget the past," Cherry said. "Ours is a message of reconciliation."
EAST HARTFORD, Conn.— On the morning of April 16, 1972, in the midst of the Vietnam War, U.S. Air Force Major Daniel Cherry awoke at the Royal Thai Air Force Base in Udorn, Thailand, ate breakfast, and was briefed on his daily mission.
Cherry, an F4-D Phantom pilot, was to be part of a group that was to escort B-52 bombers in a raid over North Vietnam.
About the same time, North Vietnamese Air Force Pilot First Class Nguyen Hong My, an MiG-21 pilot, was preparing to take off to intercept them after intelligence learned of the bombing raid.
When the B-52s were late arriving, Cherry's Phantoms were already in the sky approaching the target area. Because of the high fuel consumption rate of the F-4s, a decision was made to scrap the mission and go hunting for MiGs instead.
It was a decision that would have a significant impact on the lives of both Cherry and My.
Recently, at the Pratt & Whitney Hangar Museum, Cherry and My stood on the stage together and told their incredible tale of combat, survival, and reconciliation that brought two former enemies together, 36 years after it happened.
On that April day, it wasn't long before Cherry and My were locked in deadly aerial combat about 30 miles southwest of Hanoi, the capital of North Vietnam.
For four minutes, both of their planes looped, turned, dived, and did barrel rolls so each of them could maneuver into a position for a clear shot at the other.
My had evaded five air-to-air missiles that had been fired at him -- but his luck was about to run out.
"One of my radar-controlled missiles ripped into his MiG," Cherry said. "It tore his right wing off."
As My ejected from the cockpit, a malfunction in the suppression straps broke both of his arms and compressed three of his discs in his spine, he told the packed audience through a translator.
As My's parachute aimlessly drifted to earth, Cherry came to within a few hundred feet of him as he flew his Phantom back to Thailand.
"While Cherry was drinking champagne over his victory, I was lying in a jungle," My said. "The thing I feared the worst was a tiger jumping out and attacking me. I couldn't move my arms."
After six months in a hospital, My returned to flying but broke his arm again and had to be permanently grounded due to his injuries.
My retired as an insurance salesman in Vietnam after the war, married, and raised a family.
Cherry retired a brigadier general from the Air Force with a host of awards, including two Silver Star medals, two Legion of Merits, and 10 Distinguished Flying Crosses.
Fate, however, was about to intervene in both their lives.
While visiting the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio, Cherry learned that his Phantom he flew that day was on display at a Veterans of Foreign Wars post outside of the city.
"It was a very emotional experience seeing my plane again," he said. "It was also very sad. There was grass growing all around her and she had suffered significant bird abuse."
Cherry knew it was his Phantom because of the number, 550, and the red star painted on the aircraft that represented the MiG he had shot down.
After working with the local VFW and the Air Force, Cherry was able to have the plane dismantled and brought back to Aviation Heritage Park, in his hometown of Bowling Green, Kentucky, for restoration.
The park pays tribute to the history of aircraft and her crews dating back to World War II, Cherry said.
While the Phantom was being restored, Cherry said he began to think about the fate of the pilot he had shot down on that April day.
Cherry began to investigate and finally wrote a letter to a female Vietnamese news anchor, who hosts a popular television show in Vietnam, explaining the situation.
To his surprise, two weeks later he received a response saying they had found My and invited Cherry to Vietnam to be on the program to talk about his experiences.
Cherry made the long trip to Vietnam and as he sat and explained to her what had transpired, My appeared from behind the curtain.
"I was very apprehensive, I didn't know what to expect," Cherry said. "As he approached me, he looked like a warrior. He shook my hand and said `I hope we can be friends."'
Since that initial meeting, My and Cherry's friendship has "blossomed." My has also visited the U.S. and even sat in the cockpit of the Phantom that shot him down that day.
Cherry wrote a book on his experiences titled "My Enemy, My Friend" with all proceeds going to Aviation Heritage Park.
"I want Vietnam veterans to move on and forget the past," Cherry said. "Ours is a message of reconciliation."
Vietnam pilot buried in Arlington decades after going missing
Reuters: Vietnam pilot buried in Arlington decades after going missing
Remains of an Air Force pilot who went missing during the Vietnam war were interred on Friday at Arlington National Cemetery, four decades after he failed to return from a flight over Laos.
Air Force Maj. Richard G. Elzinga of Shedd, Oregon was returned to his family and buried with full military honors, a Department of Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office statement said.
Elzinga and his co-pilot went missing in action on March 26, 1970 when their O-1G Birddog aircraft failed to return to base from a familiarization flight over Laos.
The Defense Department's POW/MIA Spokeswoman Air Force Maj. Carie Parker said some 83,000 service members remained missing. "There is an ongoing effort by the US government to recover remains from conflicts as far back as World War II," she said.
From the Vietnam War specifically, 1,687 servicemen are still missing. The statement did not say when Elzinga's remains were recovered or in what condition.
Joint U.S.-Lao People's Democratic Republic teams conducted investigations between 1994 and 2009 to recover remains of missing personnel.
Remains of an Air Force pilot who went missing during the Vietnam war were interred on Friday at Arlington National Cemetery, four decades after he failed to return from a flight over Laos.
Air Force Maj. Richard G. Elzinga of Shedd, Oregon was returned to his family and buried with full military honors, a Department of Defense Prisoner of War/Missing Personnel Office statement said.
Elzinga and his co-pilot went missing in action on March 26, 1970 when their O-1G Birddog aircraft failed to return to base from a familiarization flight over Laos.
The Defense Department's POW/MIA Spokeswoman Air Force Maj. Carie Parker said some 83,000 service members remained missing. "There is an ongoing effort by the US government to recover remains from conflicts as far back as World War II," she said.
From the Vietnam War specifically, 1,687 servicemen are still missing. The statement did not say when Elzinga's remains were recovered or in what condition.
Joint U.S.-Lao People's Democratic Republic teams conducted investigations between 1994 and 2009 to recover remains of missing personnel.
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Saluting a Veteran, "It's Never Over for Us"
Hazelwood Patch: Saluting a Veteran, "It's Never Over for Us"
In the final installation of this series, a mission during the Vietnam War reverberates in the lives of family members and friends 42 years later
In the final installation of this series, a mission during the Vietnam War reverberates in the lives of family members and friends 42 years later
Aug. 5, 1969
In two weeks, Sgt. Jim Donnelly was due for some R & R in Hawaii. He had asked Sue Markus, his fiancee, to meet him there. One year and three days shy of his wedding date, Donnelly was leading his platoon into the Boi Loi woods.
When Matt Switanowski had first spotted a bunker, the platoon pulled back and called in air strikes and artillery.
“We could see the pilots they were so close to us,” Switanowski said. “You could almost shout to them. One piece of shrapnel almost tore my knee off we were so close.
“They were dropping 250-pound bombs and artillery, but it took a direct hit on a bunker to do any damage,” he said.
The barrage continued for 45 minutes.
“After all this, we went back in. This time, the dog stayed back. I was the first guy in, the sergeant behind me, and Art with the radio behind him,” he said.
After walking about 75 feet, Switanowski spotted a bunker and told Donnelly that he would check it out. He asked Donnelly to cover him.
“I only took those three steps when a machine gun opened up from somewhere else,” Switanowski said. “We never saw it.”
He said the North Vietnamese had been waiting for him to move out of the way.
“They knew the guy with the radio operator was in charge,” Switanowski said.
“That first burst hit the sergeant. Art yelled to me that the sergeant was gone. He died instantly. Next came the grenade. They threw it in the (bomb crater) where the sergeant and the radio operator had fallen. The sergeant probably saved Art’s life because his body absorbed most of the blast.”
Switanowski and the radio operator made it out. There was fighting back and forth, with the Americans’ goals being to recover Donnelly’s body and inflict payback. With help from South Vietnamese soldiers, they were able to do just that and killed a number of North Vietnamese Army regulars.
Donnelly was the only American casualty that day.
“It wasn’t worth it,” Cabral said. “Not for him.”
Cabral remembered putting the body in the chopper and closing Donnelly’s eyes.
Back home, Sue’s parents arrived at her workplace at the Department of Agriculture and asked that she be excused.
“On the way back home, they told me Jim had been killed,” she said. “From there it was just silence.”
Sue said when Jim had left St. Louis that last time, she cried because she had a premonition he would not be coming back alive.
“Once I got home, I sat down at the kitchen table, took off my engagement ring and said, ‘Well, it’s over.’ And I just cried.”
“It’s not over for us”
Donnelly’s life and death reverberates in the lives of those he served with, his family members and those he loved.
“I think about him constantly,” his company commander, Capt. Ron Cabral, said. “I go to the doctor, and I still blame myself for what happened. I couldn’t stop the bullets.”
Switanowski said he’s been able to talk about that day just a couple times with some of his buddies from the Manchus. He emailed Sue about the details of that day about five or six years ago.
The Manchus have been true to their motto, “Keep up the Fire.” They have a website for their own Vietnam vets, www.manchu.org. They use it to correspond and share memories.
They also have regular reunions, where members of Donnelly’s 1st Platoon never fail to drink a toast to Staff Sgt. James Donnelly. One table remains empty at every reunion in remembrance of those who died in their country’s service.
Switanowski said they never have to renew their friendships. Some bonds don’t need renewing.
“We pick up just like it was yesterday,” he said.
Unfortunately, the pain can return like it was yesterday, too, he said.
Sue Markus married another Vietnam veteran, Jim Johnson. They live in North St. Louis County near Florissant.
As hard as it on Sue, she said it was even more difficult for the Donnelly family.
Donnelly’s father, Jim Sr., died of an aneurysm a couple of years after his son’s death. His mother also has passed away. Donnelly’s sisters both live in North County and stay in touch. When they talk about their brother, there are always tears, she said.
Sue said losing a loved one never stops hurting.
“The pain subsides, but it never goes away,” she said. “We have the memories we’ll always have inside, so it’s never over for us.”
June 11, 1969
Well Dad, write more when you can, and I know what you think when you read this all, but life is not that bad. It’s just those certain days that are hard to take.
And the rains are hard to take, too. Wet 24 hours a day and sleep in one foot of water on ambushes. Ringworm and leeches are getting everyone.
Believe me, home will look so good to me!
Write soon.
Love, your son,
Jim
Monday, July 4, 2011
Set to retire, the last Army draftee ‘loves being a soldier’
Boston.com: Set to retire, the last Army draftee ‘loves being a soldier’
FORT BELVOIR, Va. - He didn’t join the Army willingly, but as Command Sergeant Major Jeff Mellinger prepares to retire, he is grateful he found his calling.
Tweet ShareThis Mellinger, 58, was drafted to fight in the Vietnam War, and the Army believes he is the last draftee to retire, after 39 years. Most did their two years and left. But Mellinger had found home.
“I think I’m pretty good at it, but I like it,’’ he said. “That’s the bottom line. I love being a soldier and I love being around soldiers.’’
When the draft notice arrived in the mail in 1972 at his home in Eugene, Ore., tens of thousands of troops had been killed and antiwar protests were rampant. The return address on the letter was the White House. Just 19, he was impressed that President Richard Nixon would write to him. “I opened it up and it said, ‘Greetings from the president of the United States.’ I said, ‘Wow, how’s he know me?’ ’’ Mellinger said, laughing.
Once the path was set, he said, he didn’t consider trying to find a way out.
He earned a spot in the Army Rangers, and would go on to do more than 3,700 parachute jumps. He was made a command sergeant major in 1992.
Nearly a decade later, he was sent to ground zero in New York right after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Then came his time as the top enlisted soldier of the multinational forces in Iraq, where he says he survived 27 roadside bombings during his deployment of nearly three years straight.
FORT BELVOIR, Va. - He didn’t join the Army willingly, but as Command Sergeant Major Jeff Mellinger prepares to retire, he is grateful he found his calling.
Tweet ShareThis Mellinger, 58, was drafted to fight in the Vietnam War, and the Army believes he is the last draftee to retire, after 39 years. Most did their two years and left. But Mellinger had found home.
“I think I’m pretty good at it, but I like it,’’ he said. “That’s the bottom line. I love being a soldier and I love being around soldiers.’’
When the draft notice arrived in the mail in 1972 at his home in Eugene, Ore., tens of thousands of troops had been killed and antiwar protests were rampant. The return address on the letter was the White House. Just 19, he was impressed that President Richard Nixon would write to him. “I opened it up and it said, ‘Greetings from the president of the United States.’ I said, ‘Wow, how’s he know me?’ ’’ Mellinger said, laughing.
Once the path was set, he said, he didn’t consider trying to find a way out.
He earned a spot in the Army Rangers, and would go on to do more than 3,700 parachute jumps. He was made a command sergeant major in 1992.
Nearly a decade later, he was sent to ground zero in New York right after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Then came his time as the top enlisted soldier of the multinational forces in Iraq, where he says he survived 27 roadside bombings during his deployment of nearly three years straight.
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