Posted on 05/14/2022 11:13:14 PM PDT by pboyington
The VA certainly thinks that way.
The questions I related are asked every time I go to see
them.
That is not something I dreamed up.
You didn’t like his survival knife? I forced my dad to buy me one when I was a kid.
I know that history well. I landed on my first tour in February 68 and spent a year in the Tet Counteroffensive the the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment.
From you post history you are an author. Do you have a website?
It’s just called “First Blood”! The Rambo titles came afterwards.
It works as an action film.
I’ve heard people say that about “Taxi Driver”...the unhinged Vietnam Vet etc.
The Stolen Valor business is strange. A family fiend now dead who was a WW2 vet said it was pretty common for combat service support and service support veterans to pretend to be combat vets after 1945 but most of it just sort faded away as masses of men got back to creating a life for themselves. He also said real florid PTSD cases to be seen including men drinking themselves into falling drunk cases on a Saturday night but they seemed to fade as the years went by. Anyone have any insight into this history,
that all the vets only wanted their country to love them like we loved our country
A very eloquent and I believe correct statement. A career army officer I know of tracked one of his sons down in a commune in Oregon circa 1970 to see if he was a doper or not. The man told the communards as they gathered for their evening meal about that in response to some jackass calling him a murderer. He said he was trained to kill the enemies of his country and this fellow should tw=ell his ideas to his elected representatives to who the soldier served in faithful obedience to the Constitution and that vets only sought the respect due them for serving faithfully thier country. Apparently one could hear the proverbial pin drop. The commune leader then speaks up and says ‘That settles it, the colonel is sleeping with Barb tonight (she was the commune uber babe). Her comment was something like ‘As though that wasn’t going to happen’. The colonel who had recently finished a bruising divorce figured ‘oh why the hell not’. Barb was indeed all that and some more and the next morning asked him straight up, ‘you want me to tag along. I’ll follow you to Viet Nam if you just say the word. Colonel’s remark later was ‘damndest thing, that is the last thing I was ever expecting’.
Indeed. When I returned from my first tour I had lost so much weight and had a persistent upper repiratory tract infection which caused me to constant sniffle that they thought I had become a crazed doper ready to explode into homicidal rage. Took a couple of weeks to convince them I just wanted quiet, sleep, good food and be let alone to read. This crap was posionous, even my next door neighbor who was the wife of a retired career army officer if I was having flashback and rage issues since it was reported many GI’s had these issues. Damn the media harpies. Guys who had issues like after every war were viewed with the deepest suspicion rather than just given a welcome and asked if they wanted anything (not the current Playboy centerfold).
Hell’s Angels was actually the division title of either the 13th or 17th Airborne Divisions. Many of the original HA’s came from the work force of the then GM plant at San Jose, Ca.
Thanks for the info. I will look in to it.
Hunter Thompson’s book on the HA’s is very good reportage. I think it the best thing he ever wrote before he became a living cliche of a doped out out of control writer who produced ever bigger ever worse books until his demise.
I had some lady with a ten-year-old kid in tow come up to me while I was in uniform and say loudly "I'll never let my son join the Marines!".
I said "Lady, I never asked my mother if I could join the Marines - and when your son is a man, he won't ask you either". Her kid grinned and at me and she dragged him off, scowling at me.
Ah, yes - welcome home.
THAT!!! WW I and II vets came home, and went forward with life and living. I have known a few vets that milk PTSD like a cow. It's their "go to" excuse for everything.
The reason for this is that our military services generally do an excellent job of weeding out the psychologically fragile during boot camp - and combat vets usually consider themselves lucky and grateful to be alive.
PTSD is the normal human reaction to excesses of fear, sleeplessness, and shock at seeing things that most other young people will never see in their lifetimes. Everyone I knew who had served in direct combat has some level of PTSD - it's something that no amount of counseling, or drinking will really change much. It just takes time and finding a wife who supports you through the process - and doesn't get embarrassed when you dive under the table when there's an unexpected pop nearby.
The jailbreak scene at the beginning of the movie. One of the best I’ve ever scene. I really likes the part of Deputy Sergeant Arthur “Art” Galt played by Jack Starrett.
One of my all time favorites.
I lost count of the movies/shows about Vietnam infantry combat and the yelling I did at the TV from the outright fakery.
I will give credit to Hal Moore and Galloway on the movie "We were Soldiers" for the realism and some reduction of hollywierdness in the typical combat movie. It showed that having the actual commander and journalist in the combat giving the movie producer the truth of what happened to have the movie portray more realistically what was happening.
Burkett in his book 'Stolen Valor' really opened some eyes. I was proud to be in the same unit, the 199th Light Infantry 4th Btn 12th Inf that First Lieutenant Burkett was a platoon leader in.
Spielberg did a great job in Saving Private Ryan. Epic movie. Probably my favorite scene is where Upham gets enraged when he sees the German who was shown mercy, blowing away his pals, and Upham enacts vengeance.
Great story but it never mentions if his son was a doper or not?
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