TogetherWeServed Blog - The Most Incredible Military Stories

Service Reflections of SSG Peter Olsen, U.S. Army (1967-1973)

Too much partying, and it turned out a 1.2 GPA would not keep me from being drafted. So I volunteered for the draft. Once I got back from Vietnam, I actually received 2 degrees and maintained a 3.7 GPA while working full time as a police officer. Funny story – After I left school to volunteer for the draft, I thought it would be a quick process. Not so. The first month my draft board did not meet for some reason. The second month the draft board did not take up my request. The third month a draft board member died of old age – no meeting. In the 4th month, the draft board finally met and acted on my request but did not approve it until the 5th month.

The American Indian Wars – The Battle of Bear Valley

Battlefield Chronicles

When we think of the Indian Wars that pitted the American Indian tribes against the United States Army, we tend to think of U.S. Army Cavalry, wearing their trademark stetson hats, sabers gleaming, riding into battle. They're usually fighting Native tribesmen who are shooting rifles while riding bareback across the Great Plains. That may have been how some of those battles looked, but after the closing of the frontier in 1890, it looked a lot different. The last great battle (The Battle of...

The X-15 Rocket Plane by Michelle Evans

Cold War, Military Book Reviews

When the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the first man-made satellite, into low-earth orbit in 1957, it set the Space Race in full motion. The United States was determined to break the barriers of man's entry into space and dominate this undiscovered country. While NASA projects Mercury, Gemini, and especially Apollo are often remembered and celebrated, a little-remembered partnership between the US Air Force and NASA brought an incredible new aircraft, arguably the first-ever manned...

Where Are the Alien Bodies?

Cold War, Military Myths and Legends

By now, we all know the gist of the story. An unidentified flying object crashed in the desert near Corona, New Mexico, in 1947. Military and government agents from nearby Roswell Army Air Field rushed to the site and found alien bodies hidden among the wreckage and debris. Then, they immediately covered it up and left the American public in the dark. The Army didn't help matters any, releasing a report claiming to have captured some kind of "flying disc." It immediately retracted that claim,...

Service Reflections of TSgt Marion Cochran, Jr., U.S. Air Force (1970-1981)

Air Force Reflections, Cold War

I was graduating from high school in 1968, and the conflict in Vietnam was going on. I had a fairly low number in the lottery and knew I would get drafted. I didn’t want to go to Vietnam, so I picked the Air Force instead of the Army and began talking to an Air Force recruiter. My Dad was an MP in the Army in WW2, and I thought I’d like to get into the Security Police field. Every time the recruiter would get a slot, I’d put him off because I was working my 1st job out of high school and was enjoying it. Then one day, while I was at work, my Brother, who is 10 years younger than me, called and said I had a letter. I asked what it said, and he started out, stumbling over a couple of words since he was learning to read, “Greetings, you are hereby ordered…” I said that’s enough. I told my boss I had to get off. Drove up to the Air Force recruiter’s office and said, ” Please, please, get me in.” I joined the AF 2 days before I was supposed to go into the Army.

MajGen. Keith L. Ware, U.S. Army (1941–1968)

Profiles in Courage, World War II

MajGen Keith Lincoln Ware was born in Denver on November 23, 1915. His military career began on July 9, 1941, when he undertook his basic training at Camp Roberts, California, following his induction into the Army under the Selective Service Act. He attended Officer Candidate School at Fort Benning, Georgia, and was commissioned a Second Lieutenant of Infantry on July 18, 1942. Keith Lincoln Ware Was Awarded the Medal of Honor Assigned to the 3rd Infantry Division, he sailed on October 22,...

WW2 – The Battle of Saipan

Battlefield Chronicles, World War II

War inevitably equals mass casualties, whether numbering in the dozens or the hundreds, or the hundreds of thousands - this truth that has accompanied war for thousands of years. A generally accepted fact is that these casualties, whether civilian or military, are usually the direct result of enemy soldiers attacking, disease, and famine in the wake of an invasion. Sometimes, however, other means account for mass deaths in war. Such was the case of the Battle of Saipan in the Second World War...

The Hero Dog Of Verdun

Military Myths and Legends, World War I

A courageous World War I war dog was widely hailed a hero, after battling bravely through no man's land to deliver a life-saving message to French troops during the Battle of Verdun in WWI. The Hero Dog Of Verdun Service The wonder dog - named, oddly enough, Satan - was assigned the dangerous task of delivering the message from French commanders that contained the words that would bring vital relief to the besieged soldiers under heavy attack by the Germans. The life-saving message read: " For...

Service Reflections of SGT Timothy Meltabarger, U.S. Marine Corps (1981-1990)

Gulf War, Marine Reflections

When I graduated from High School in 1980, I was about four months away from turning 18. I worked in the Oil Field with my brother through the Summer and decided that I needed to get an education, so I enrolled in a Technical College in Okmulgee, Oklahoma. I entered college as the hostages in Iran were being released. I was in a drafting program and sat at a table in a classroom with about 40 people. About 25 percent were veterans, and none were Marines. We had a radio that played in the classroom, and on March 30, 1981, I listened to the news of Reagan being shot. When the semester was over, I decided to quit college and go back home and do something greater. Exactly what, I had not decided.

Famous Military Unit: American Forces Network (AFRTS)

Famous Military Units, Global War on Terror, Vietnam War

In 1984, the first commercially available DynaTAC audio-only cell phone cost just short of $4,000, with each call billed at 45 cents per minute. Forty years later, anyone in uniform accesses audio-visual news from thousands of sources using a personal cell phone throughout the world, wherever a signal and transmission tower can reach. Yet, for eighty years, the most reliable military broadcast remains the Armed Forces Radio and Television Service (AFRTS). AFN Was Founded in 1942 as the Armed...

The Philippine-American War

Battlefield Chronicles

After its defeat in the Spanish-American War of 1898, the Treaty of Paris (1898) transferred Philippine sovereignty from Spain to the United States, ending centuries of Spanish control over the politics and economy of its longstanding former colony. Filipino leaders, however, did not recognize America's authority and had no intention of ceding their homeland to a new colonial power. The decision by U.S. policymakers to annex the Philippines was not without domestic controversy, either....

The Patient Was Vietcong by Dr. Lawrence H. Climo

Military Book Reviews, Vietnam War

Thousands of books about Vietnam have been printed. Nearly all of them are memoirs, authored by those who experienced what is scripted. A few are fiction, occasionally written by someone who was in Vietnam at the time of the war while others are creations of fertile minds. Some have been made into Hollywood movies. What makes "The Patient was Vietcong" different than the standard Vietnam War narrative of books and movies and all those memoirs? Because it is about a healer whose remarkable and...

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Service Reflections of SSG Peter Olsen, U.S. Army (1967-1973)

The American Indian Wars – The Battle of Bear Valley

The X-15 Rocket Plane by Michelle Evans

Where Are the Alien Bodies?

MajGen. Keith L. Ware, U.S. Army (1941–1968)

WW2 – The Battle of Saipan

The Hero Dog Of Verdun

Service Reflections of SGT Timothy Meltabarger, U.S. Marine Corps (1981-1990)

Famous Military Unit: American Forces Network (AFRTS)

The Philippine-American War

The Patient Was Vietcong by Dr. Lawrence H. Climo

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