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Vietnam War

Service Reflections of SGT Bill Lee, U.S. Marine Corps (1966-1969)

Service Reflections of SGT Bill Lee, U.S. Marine Corps (1966-1969)

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PRESERVING A MILITARY LEGACY FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS The following Reflections represents SGT Bill Lee's legacy of his military service from 1966 to 1969. If you are a Veteran, consider preserving a record of your own military service, including your memories and photographs, on Togetherweserved.com (TWS), the leading archive of living military history. The following Service Reflections is an easy-to-complete self-interview, located on your TWS Military Service Page, which enables you to remember key people and events from your military service and the impact they made on your life. Start recording your own Military Memories HERE. Please describe who or what influenced your decision to join the Marine Corps. I grew up in a dysfunctional, alcoholic, domestically violent home on Minneapolis's North Side. I was just hanging out after being expelled from two separate high schools. My girlfriend, at age 16, was an Irish Catholic beauty on the dean's list. She had gone away to be a nun...

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Service Reflections of ET2 David Ingebright, U.S. Coast Guard (1966-1970)

Service Reflections of ET2 David Ingebright, U.S. Coast Guard (1966-1970)

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PRESERVING A MILITARY LEGACY FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS The following Reflections represents ET2 David Ingebright's legacy of his military service from 1972 to 1976. If you are a Veteran, consider preserving a record of your own military service, including your memories and photographs, on Togetherweserved.com (TWS), the leading archive of living military history. The following Service Reflections is an easy-to-complete self-interview, located on your TWS Military Service Page, which enables you to remember key people and events from your military service and the impact they made on your life. Start recording your own Military Memories HERE. Please describe who or what influenced your decision to join the Coast Guard. Commanders inspection at Monterey It was 1972, and I had just graduated from the Electronics Technician program at the DeVry Institute of Technology in Phoenix, Arizona. The Vietnam War was in full swing, and the draft lottery was being used to draft young men my age. Since...

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Service Reflections of ET2 Dennis Sethe, U.S. Coast Guard (1964-1968)

Service Reflections of ET2 Dennis Sethe, U.S. Coast Guard (1964-1968)

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PRESERVING A MILITARY LEGACY FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS The following Reflections represents ET2 Dennis Sethe's legacy of his military service from 1964 to 1968. If you are a Veteran, consider preserving a record of your own military service, including your memories and photographs, on Togetherweserved.com (TWS), the leading archive of living military history. The following Service Reflections is an easy-to-complete self-interview, located on your TWS Military Service Page, which enables you to remember key people and events from your military service and the impact they made on your life. Start recording your own Military Memories HERE. Please describe who or what influenced your decision to join the Coast Guard. What influenced me was that the CG helped people in distress and saved lives. Also, I was able in High School to learn electronics every school day for an hour at a nearby navy base. I received the highest scores there. After graduating High School, I saw a Coast Guard...

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Service Reflections of 1LT Jack Downing, U.S. Army (1968-1973)

Service Reflections of 1LT Jack Downing, U.S. Army (1968-1973)

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PRESERVING A MILITARY LEGACY FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS The following Reflections represents 1LT Jack Downing's legacy of his military service from 1968 to 1973. If you are a Veteran, consider preserving a record of your own military service, including your memories and photographs, on Togetherweserved.com (TWS), the leading archive of living military history. The following Service Reflections is an easy-to-complete self-interview, located on your TWS Military Service Page, which enables you to remember key people and events from your military service and the impact they made on your life. Start recording your own Military Memories HERE. Please describe who or what influenced your decision to join the Army. Receiving Trainee of the Post Award by Gen. Collins I was living in Casper, WY, and received my draft notice. I was to report to my Draft Board in San Antonio, TX. I got my physical in Denver, Colorado, and reported to the Draft Board. I decided to see what kind of deal I could get if...

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Service Reflections of ETC Julius Marold, U.S. Navy (1964-1985)

Service Reflections of ETC Julius Marold, U.S. Navy (1964-1985)

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As a child, I had always had an interest in the Navy. My parents had been in the Army during WWII, so they couldn’t understand why I was so fascinated by all things Navy. My favorite TV shows were Silent Service, Men of Annapolis, Navy Log, Victory at Sea, and McHale’s Navy. I had a stack of paperback books about the Navy. I liked the idea of going into submarines, but my vision wasn’t good enough. After registering for the draft in 1964, my next stop was the Navy Recruiting Office in Babylon, New York. He wasn’t in, so I went to the one in Hempstead. The SMC in charge was in, so I signed up with him, and at the end of September, I was off to Great Lakes RTC.

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The Road Not Taken by Max Boot

The Road Not Taken by Max Boot

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In chronicling the adventurous life of legendary CIA operative Edward Lansdale, The Road Not Taken definitively reframes our understanding of the Vietnam War. In this epic biography of Edward Lansdale (1908 - 1987), the man said to be the fictional model for Graham Greene's The Quiet American, best-selling historian Max Boot demonstrates how Lansdale pioneered a "hearts and mind" diplomacy, first in the Philippines, then in Vietnam. It was a visionary policy that, as Boot reveals, was ultimately crushed by America's giant military bureaucracy, steered by elitist generals and blueblood diplomats who favored troop build-ups and napalm bombs over winning the trust of the people. Through dozens of interviews and access to never-before-seen documents-including long-hidden love letters-Boot recasts this cautionary American story, tracing the bold rise and the crashing fall of the roguish "T. E. Lawrence of Asia" from the battle of Dien Bien Phu to the humiliating American evacuation...

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Service Reflections of HM2 Steven Bowyer, U.S. Coast Guard (1967-1973)

Service Reflections of HM2 Steven Bowyer, U.S. Coast Guard (1967-1973)

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PRESERVING A MILITARY LEGACY FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS The following Reflections represents HM2 Steven Bowyer's legacy of his military service from 1967 to 1973. If you are a Veteran, consider preserving a record of your own military service, including your memories and photographs, on Togetherweserved.com (TWS), the leading archive of living military history. The following Service Reflections is an easy-to-complete self-interview, located on your TWS Military Service Page, which enables you to remember key people and events from your military service and the impact they made on your life. Start recording your own Military Memories HERE. Please describe who or what influenced your decision to join the Coast Guard. Why I joined the United States Coast Guard Upon graduation from High School in 1966, the draft was in place. I, however, wanted to be able to choose for myself rather than the government. I had no idea at the time which was the right branch of the Armed Services to join, and I...

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Service Reflections of SSGT Dennis Bengtson, U.S. Air Force (1969-1973)

Service Reflections of SSGT Dennis Bengtson, U.S. Air Force (1969-1973)

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PRESERVING A MILITARY LEGACY FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS The following Reflections represents SSGT Dennis Bengtson's legacy of his military service from 1969 to 1973. If you are a Veteran, consider preserving a record of your own military service, including your memories and photographs, on Togetherweserved.com (TWS), the leading archive of living military history. The following Service Reflections is an easy-to-complete self-interview, located on your TWS Military Service Page, which enables you to remember key people and events from your military service and the impact they made on your life. Start recording your own Military Memories HERE. Please describe who or what influenced your decision to join the Air Force. At the time, so many Marines and Army were going to Viet Nam, and I still wanted to do my part. If I went to the Navy and got assigned to a ship, went out in the ocean, and did not see land, I couldn't wrap my head around that being from land-locked Iowa. I had already taken...

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Service Reflections of CDR Thomas Nelson, U.S. Navy (1970-1997)

Service Reflections of CDR Thomas Nelson, U.S. Navy (1970-1997)

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PRESERVING A MILITARY LEGACY FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS The following Reflections represents CDR Thomas Nelson's legacy of his military service from 1970 to 1997. If you are a Veteran, consider preserving a record of your own military service, including your memories and photographs, on Togetherweserved.com (TWS), the leading archive of living military history. The following Service Reflections is an easy-to-complete self-interview, located on your TWS Military Service Page, which enables you to remember key people and events from your military service and the impact they made on your life. Start recording your own Military Memories HERE. Please describe who or what influenced your decision to join the Navy. CPT Quinlan, USMC - Class Officer for my AOC class My family history certainly helped me decide. Many of my ancestors were in wars, particularly my 4th great-grandfather, who signed the Declaration of Independence and was commander general of the Virginia Military who fought in the...

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Service Reflections of CAPT Bruce Lake, U.S. Marine Corps (1965-1970)

Service Reflections of CAPT Bruce Lake, U.S. Marine Corps (1965-1970)

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PRESERVING A MILITARY LEGACY FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS The following Reflections represents CAPT Bruce Lake's legacy of his military service from 1965 to 1970. If you are a Veteran, consider preserving a record of your own military service, including your memories and photographs, on Togetherweserved.com (TWS), the leading archive of living military history. The following Service Reflections is an easy-to-complete self-interview, located on your TWS Military Service Page, which enables you to remember key people and events from your military service and the impact they made on your life. Start recording your own Military Memories HERE. Please describe who or what influenced your decision to join the Marine Corps. My Dad (on the right) at Camp LeJeune 1947 My father had served as a Marine and was stationed at Camp LeJeune, where I was born. His brother had also served as a Marine and served in Korea a few years later. Whether you were in the service for several years or as a career,...

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SP4 Robert Kickenweitz, U.S. Army (1966-1968)

SP4 Robert Kickenweitz, U.S. Army (1966-1968)

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List the names of old friends you served with, at which locations, and recount what you remember most about them?:

Darkest Day for Blackhorse, SUOI CAT, By Robert Bob Kickenweitz. The 21st of May 1967 was a beautiful sunny Sunday morning, the day you were happy to be alive. I got up, put on a clean set of fatigues, and went to breakfast at the mess hall. Leaving the m ss hall, I noticed steam coming up from our tent as the dew from the night before was evaporating from the heat of the sun into little clouds. Yes, that’s just what we needed in South Vietnam: a little more humidity! After breakfast, I walked up to our chapel about one block from my tent for Sunday mass. Our chapel was located on the southwest corner of an intersection, with the 7th Surgical Hospital on the northwest corner, and across the street diagonally from the chapel on the northeast corner was the 37th Medical Group, and on the southeast corner was Regimental Headquarters.

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SP4 Eugene Dawson, U.S. Army (1966-1968)

SP4 Eugene Dawson, U.S. Army (1966-1968)

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List the names of old friends you served with, at which locations, and recount what you remember most about them?:

Richard Henry and I connected during induction to basic training at Fort Polk, LA, in February 1966. During our first recreational break, we headed directly to the recreational center and checked out guitars and amps. We hit it off right away. He was the lead singer and rhythm guitar guy, and I was the lead guitar guy and backup singer. We were both assigned the same MOS, transferred to the same locations in California and Maryland, assigned to the same unit, 81st Quartermaster Platoon, and deployed to Vietnam together.

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