Page 3 - Ft. Irwin High Desert Warrior March 2016

www.aerotechnews.com/ntcfortirwin 3High Desert Warrior
March 4, 2016
Respect

It can be

complicated

By Gustavo Bahena

Editor mother was especially close to his family. That Those are his heroes, the Veteran was tell- He was part of the re-building the Army
aspect of the war is a very sad memory, said ing me. needed after the Vietnam War and then part
The heroes are the ones who didn’t come the Veteran. of a transition that has resulted in the most
back from Vietnam. But they are also the heroes of this nation, modern, professional, volunteer fighting force
He knows where the names of his friends from the moment they fell in death. We must in the world.
That’s what a United States Army Vet- are engraved on the Vietnam War Memorial. not forget them – that’s also what the Veteran
eran told me one afternoon as I listened to He keeps a plaque – a tribute – to his friends, was saying. Still he doesn’t consider himself a hero.
him remember his life as it related to the which I believe is his tangible manifestation of It’s complicated.
Vietnam War. their faces, their laughter, and their human- Our anonymous Veteran is very humble
ity that is forever imprinted in his mind and and reserved about his service in Vietnam, So, it’s our job to recognize and appreciate
He said it was okay to write about our heart. Sometimes we need a material item to which included being at Firebase Ripcord. But the complexities involved with the Vietnam
conversation, but to not use his name. remind us, and to allow us to hold with our consider this: he reenlisted and served in the War and its Veterans – and it requires a per-
hands something that was good – that’s what Cold War. Deployed to Granada. Deployed sonal touch to make it human.
Our talk was brief, but what I learned from I also learned from our anonymous Veteran. to Panama. Trained at the NTC. He became
hearing and watching him as he spoke gave a “lifer,” as he put it, and served for 26 years. Thank you anonymous Veteran for help-
me a greater appreciation for the man and ing us understand the Vietnam War Veteran.
the situation surrounding not just his experi-
ence, but that of others who served and died
in Vietnam.

He planned to enlist in 1966 with three
friends before finishing high school. They
would all get their GEDs in the military. All
they needed was parent authorization. His
friends got it. His father asked him to get his
diploma first.

Perhaps it was a delay tactic.
His father had served in World War II.
Other relatives had also served in the “big
one” and in the Korean War. These men who
had liberated Europe, battled for islands
in the Pacific, and fought on the Korean
peninsula were by now settled down and
raising families.
Our anonymous Veteran told me he and
his generation grew up under the mentorship
of these Veterans. When Vietnam became the
next war, it became their fight. They would
not let their fathers down.
But, was it easy for grown men – husbands,
fathers, who survived warfare in far-off places
– to allow their sons to go to combat knowing
it could kill them?
It’s complicated. That’s what I learned.
The draft eventually took our anonymous
Veteran to Vietnam in 1968. He and his dad
exchanged kisses before he shipped out. After
our Veteran returned from Vietnam, his father
passed away of natural causes the next day.
His three friends were killed in Vietnam.
One before he shipped out himself.
He tried to get streets in the town me-
morialized with the names of the three. The
authorities were not interested. One even told
him he didn’t want to hear anything having
to do with Vietnam. That described the mood
many Veterans encountered upon returning
home. The positive, welcome home sentiment
was not there.
Mothers in his hometown scanned the
casualty lists, which were published every
day in the newspapers. The casualty counts
were high, the Veteran told me. What did
the moms of his friends think of him when
he had returned and their sons had not? One

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