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Vietnam War

SGT John Podlaski, U.S. Army (1970-1971)

SGT John Podlaski, U.S. Army (1970-1971)

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What do you miss most about your time in the service and what made this especially significant to you?:

What I miss from my time in the service. Remember when we were younger, we had lots of friends. Although we had our favorites and best friend – it was a crushing blow when our family had to move to another location. We lost that best friend – never to be seen again. However, we met new friends, and with some, a lasting relationship. When I was in Vietnam, I was assigned to a squad of soldiers in one of the infantry platoons. Although the size should be a dozen or so soldiers, we generally ran with eight soldiers. We spent 24 hours a day with one another and got to know each other rather well. Oftentimes, we shared intricate secrets that we kept to ourselves for many years. Trust was never questioned. Was it possible to have eight besties?

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LtCol Gene Hambleton, U.S. Air Force (1943-1972)

LtCol Gene Hambleton, U.S. Air Force (1943-1972)

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On April 2, 1972, the third day of the Easter Offensive, the largest combined arms operation of the entire Vietnam War, 53-year-old Air Force Lt. Col. Iceal 'Gene' Hambleton was a navigator aboard one of two United States Air Force EB-66 aircraft escorting three B-52s. Bat 21, the call sign for Hambleton's aircraft, was configured to gather signals intelligence, including identifying North Vietnamese anti-aircraft radar installations to enable jamming. (Photo is Bat 21 in Korat Royal Thai Air Force Base, Thailand.) During Bat 21 Gene Hambleton was the Only Survivor Midway through the operation, Bat 21 was destroyed by an SA-2 surface-to-air missile, and Hambleton was the only survivor, parachuting behind the front lines into a battlefield filled with thousands of North Vietnamese Army soldiers. The bodies of the aircrew were never found. Because of Hambleton's knowledge of Top Secret Strategic Air Command operations and an expert in surface-to-air missile countermeasures, his rescue...

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Service Reflections of MSgt John Bradley, U.S. Marine Corps (1968-1989)

Service Reflections of MSgt John Bradley, U.S. Marine Corps (1968-1989)

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I was named after my Great Uncle John Vander Schaff, who was in the Army from 1907-1911, serving in the Philippine Insurrection, Cuban Insurrection and Mexican Border Campaign; he then joined the US Marine Corps serving from 1911-1919. He served in the Peking Legation Guard and later was Marine Barracks Manilla, Mare Island and Marine Guard at Portsmouth Naval Prison. He was transferred Sea Duty in WWI, although he did not serve in combat as he was reassigned to escort military prisoners from France back to the US. He was discharged in 1919. I grew up with his often hilarious stories of his time overseas. I also come from a family where every male had served in the USA or Navy since the American Revolution, and on both sides during the Civil War, it was expected I would put in a hitch during the Vietnam War, as did all of my cousins. The big difference was I stayed in for 20 years.

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USS Midway Historic Aircraft Carrier & Naval Museum

USS Midway Historic Aircraft Carrier & Naval Museum

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The USS Midway aircraft carrier is America’s most popular naval warship museum. Located in downtown San Diego, the museum is open 10am to 5pm 7 days a week, closing only for Thanksgiving and Christmas Day. The museum holds over 700 events a year, from Navy retirements and re-enlistments to changes of command. What is the USS Midway Known For? Commissioned after the culmination of World War II, the USS Midway was one of the longest-serving aircraft carriers of the 20th century. The United States Navy used the Midway throughout the Cold War, until the carrier was decommissioned in 1992. Midway was an important contributor to the US war effort in Vietnam.  During Operation Frequent Wind, known by civilians as the evacuation of Saigon, the Midway was the scene of a heroic rescue. Major Buang-Ly of the Republic of Vietnam Air Force loaded his family of seven onto a 2-seat Cessna O-1, evaded enemy ground fire while fleeing occupied Côn Sơn, and pleaded with Midway to let him land. After...

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Missions of Fire and Mercy: Until Death Do Us Part by William E. Peterson

Missions of Fire and Mercy: Until Death Do Us Part by William E. Peterson

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At the age of 19, William E. Peterson embarked upon a life mission which many would gladly have missed. He went to war in Vietnam! In this 302 page book he brings to life his journey from his decision to enlist in the Army, through twelve months of helicopter combat, to his return home. It takes the reader on a wild ride with a helicopter crew chief and door gunner with the First Air Cavalry, C/227th Assault Helicopter Battalion. The typical memoir written by a Vietnam veteran begins with a short accounting of his youth and ends with his homecoming. Sandwich between is a detailed rendering of the serious, heartbreaking nature of war: fear, tragedy, loss, sorrow, growth, and relief interlaced with nature's emotional shutoff valve, humor. While Peterson's Mission of Fire and Percy does much of the same things, his writing has much greater clarity since it is drawn from scores of letters he send home to his family, friends and girlfriend Cindi. He adds anecdotal recollections to what he...

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Service Reflections of LCDR Curtis Smothers, U.S. Navy (1962-1986)

Service Reflections of LCDR Curtis Smothers, U.S. Navy (1962-1986)

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In 1962, I was 19 years old, at loose ends in my life, and facing the draft. I didn’t relish infantry duty in Vietnam, so I decided to enlist in the Navy. As a Midwestern boy, I had only seen the ocean a couple of times, and when the recruiter told me I was to be sent to San Diego for boot camp, I was excited. I told the recruiter that I didn’t want to go to the Great Lakes training center in the winter. I was in luck because RTC San Diego was accepting new drafts of recruits.

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Black Ops Vietnam By Robert M. Gillespie

Black Ops Vietnam By Robert M. Gillespie

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Have you read "Black Ops Vietnam" By Robert M. Gillespie? During the Vietnam War, the Military Assistance Command, Vietnam Studies and Observations Group (MACVSOG) was a highly-classified. It was a US joint-service organization that consisted of personnel from Army Special Forces, the Air Force Special Operations Forces, Navy SEALs, Marine Corps Force Reconnaissance units, and the CIA.  This secret organization was committed to action in Southeast Asia even before the major build-up of US forces in 1965 and fielded a division-sized element of South Vietnamese military personnel, indigenous Montagnards, ethnic Chinese Nungs, and Taiwanese pilots in its varied reconnaissance, naval, air, and agent operations.  MACVSOG was, without doubt, the most unique US unit to participate in the Vietnam War, since its operational mandate authorized its missions to take place "over the fence" in North Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, where most other American units were forbidden to go. During its...

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Vietnam War – Siege of Plei Me

Vietnam War – Siege of Plei Me

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J. Keith Saliba's book's real-life setting is an isolated, heavily fortified frontier outpost In Vietnam's West-Central Highlands near the Cambodian border and the Ho Chi Minh trail, the main conduit for troops and supplies from North Vietnam. "It was a 20th-century version of the Wild West frontier fortress," Saliba said, in territory Army Special Forces soldiers called "Indian Country"-remote, dangerous. The Siege of Plei Me Was the Beginning of the First Major Confrontation In October 1965, the camp at Plei Me was guarded by a 12-man American Army Special Forces "A-Team," along with Montagnard fighters native to the region and a small contingent of South Vietnamese Special Forces soldiers. But by Oct. 19, almost 2,000 North Vietnamese soldiers had crept into position around Plei Me. An equal number were deployed to ambush any relief force sent to the camp's rescue. And so begins the battle he describes in "Death in the Highlands: The Siege of Special Forces Camp Plei Me" (released...

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CAPT Michael Lilly, U.S. Navy (1968-1998)

CAPT Michael Lilly, U.S. Navy (1968-1998)

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Where did you go to Boot Camp/ Basic Training? What specific memories do you have of instructors, fellow recruits and any rigorous training?:

Saturday, July 20, 1968, is still the longest day of my life. This is how it began as I entered Naval Officer Candidate School – officer boot camp – at Newport, Rhode Island.

“HEY, YOU!”

The voice belonged to a khaki uniform.

I pointed to myself, “Who me?”

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A3C Michael Bell, U.S. Air Force (1963-1966)

A3C Michael Bell, U.S. Air Force (1963-1966)

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Where did you go to Boot Camp/ Basic Training? What specific memories do you have of instructors, fellow recruits and any rigorous training?:

Lackland, in winter…

I quit my high school senior year in South Bend on the November day JFK was assassinated. Being a foster kid and ward of Cook County court I was given one choice; enlist or go back to school. I chose USAF because my uncle had been in blue working on Boxcars in Japan during Korea, and everyone else in the family going back to the 1700s had been Army. I scored high on “Abstract Reasoning” – as my wife and kids would attest still holds true 60 years later. In almost exactly one month I found myself in Indianapolis taking the physical, and the oath with about 20 other guys my age. After spending that night in a seedy hotel part of the city, we were put on the civilian equivalent of a C-131 (aka T-29) Samaritan recip. Bound south vector to San Antonio, at age 17; my first airplane ride, and into the unkowable.

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Firehammer by Ric Hunter

Firehammer by Ric Hunter

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If you'd like to know what it's like to pilot a high-performance jet in training and combat - without risk and actually having to get into one - you cannot do better than to read Ric Hunter's just published 'Firehammer.' A resident of Burnsville, retired Col. Hunter had 27 years and 4,000 hours of high-performance jet time, and was commander of an F-15 C Eagle squadron. His book describes the last days of the Vietnam War, including the SS Mayaquez rescue and the final evacuation of military personnel from the island of Koh Tang. Although the book is fiction and meant to be entertaining as well as informative, Col. Hunter was actually one of the pilots involved in this last battle of the war. The fictional star of the book is Capt. Randy "Pepper" Houston, who was assigned to an F-4 Phantom squadron. The detailed description of his demanding and hair-raising training to fly a different model jet than he'd previously flown and his later combat experiences have the ring of authenticity...

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Brig Gen James Robinson Risner, U.S. Air Force (1943 – 1976)

Brig Gen James Robinson Risner, U.S. Air Force (1943 – 1976)

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James Robinson Risner was a man of humble origins, son of an Arkansas sharecropper, educated at secondary school level, not particularly ambitious, a common man save for two things: He could fly the hell out of an airplane; and, under terribly difficult circumstances as a Prisoner of War in North Vietnam, he rose to a level of heroic leadership matched by few men in American military history. Born in Mammoth Springs, Arkansas on Jan. 16, 1925 and raised in a religious family, Robinson Risner made his first critical life choice between attending Bible College or joining the Army Air Forces during World War II. When he passed the tough entrance exam for pilot training by one point, his future aloft was set. Flying came easily to the gifted trainee, which led to a coveted assignment flying fighters after graduation. But Robbie's repeated requests for combat duty were ignored by the Army's personnel system, and he spent the rest of the war defending the Panama Canal. Postwar peace and...

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