Dr. John Llewellyn
(336) 759-7229
llewelly@wfu.edu
Two facts. When I attended UofL, the NROTC and AFROTC Units in 1972 didn't do "Colors", the campus police did, because in the past they were harrassed and spat upon because of the Vietnam war. In 1981, at Camp Fuji Japan, my "Tank Leader" told me that he was spat upon by Jane Fonda herself after he returned from Vietnam and was pulling front gate duty at Camp Pendleton during an anti war protest. He's retired in Sterling, VA. I can track him down and get the exact dates and times for the "Professor"!! A USMC MGYSGT wouldn't make something like that up!! Semper Fidelis.
I bet he places the blame on the National Guard for the deaths at Kent State. (As long as he is rewriting history, he may as well go for it.)
Has there ever been a definitive account written by a Viet Nam Vet regarding the treatment they received at home?
Where did this idiot obtain his data? Who is this idiot?
Let me assure you that I can spot and and read a wannabe's line of BS from afar.
The field of academics in history has been the field of those of those who cannot make living in the real world for far too many years.
What company will hire a history major, much less even a PHD? Only on a campus, could such a fool BS his way past a hamburger flipping job.
Let this idiot email me, and; I will provide the proof to let him see the real forrest where he, hopefully, will have a reality check. There is no threat here. I never want to hurt anyone again after war.
How about the guys who couldn't get a job for years, because they were considered drug-addicted, psychotic losers? I know at least two of them...
Does trying to run them over on the highway while hitch-hiking in uniform count?
Well it seems John is an expert in Liberal BS. I grew up in the sixties and seventies and was horrified at the treatment our troops were treated. Next he will be saying that nobody ran away to Canada to hide from the draft. Oh wait Jane Fonda never went to North Vietnam... yeah right tell us another.
Sent the idiot the following.
I read your article with great interest and can only say that you obviously are living in a dream world where spitting on soldiers does not exist. Hell, I was spit on and railed against when I was merely an ROTC member at Ohio State during 1968-1971, never mind the insults flung at me while serving on active duty. Your little article in no way dispels an urban myth, but is a feeble attempt at creating a new one. No wonder our college students are so ignorant with “professors” such as yourself.
What a flaming maroon!
I wonder if this idiot will dispell the urban myth of voter intimidation in the 2000 election?
This guy is a clown. I was in High School ROTC in 1970 and was spit at and being called "Baby Killer". Things died down somewhat by 1974 when I enlisted but we servicemen still weren't welcomed in too many areas. It wasn't until the Reagan presidency that we started to get some respect from the American Civilian populace. So his crap about this being an urban myth is just that - CRAP! Perhaps he should be visited by vets and re-educated about what really happened. Most vets learned real quick to ditch the uniform and try to blend in. And that hurt because we were all proud of our uniforms. F*ck this clown proffessor and the horse he rode in on!!!!!!!!!!!
To those Vietnam (and GW I and II) vets on this board--THANK YOU. THANK YOU for your service to this country. Thank you for being willing to risk your lives for the cause of freedom in the world.
And Welcome Home.
Dear John Llewellyn,
Had you asked me how it was when I returned, I would have to say that I didn't experience any spitting, but then I was in civilian clothes and as a fleet sailor stationed in Iceland, I didn't look like I was in the military.
I volunteered in August 1974 to serve my country and when I reached my first training station after boot camp we were warned to wear civilian clothes and wear a hat while off the base in the US. The only time I ever violated that unwritten rule was at home in Clearwater, Florida in 1975. They spit at me, punched and tried to kick me as I passed by. They also called me a baby-killer.
As a recent graduate of Class A school at the tender age of 18, I had absolutely no idea what they were talking about and dismissed it as aberrant behavior, I also didn't violate the 'rule' again. Even when I was married in 1977. By the time I got out of the service in 1980, I had completely forgotten about the incident.
In the late 90s I was invited to participate in a training program in my home state and speak with some like-minded individuals engaged in political activities. Allow me quickly add that I am no longer engaged in any political activities. After two days of exposure to these folks, I remembered what had happened. It wasn't troubling me, I just chalked it up to their ignorance and the real blame belongs to those that lied to them.
Now maybe it would be nice to soothe the wounds that apparently were ripped open during the latest presidential campaign and gloss over what really happened last week. One candidate held his medals up high and proclaimed himself a hero in public. I respect everyone that serves and served, it took(takes) a lot of guts just to get on the plane. That being said, there are unanswered allegations of illicit behavior. Well, not really unanswered, the candidate admits that he did these things and there are copies of it on the internet. I bet all the negativity about the current president could not drive the voters to cast a ballot for a man that embodied the image of the propagandist that turned Americans against Americans. Maybe if he had apologized for painting the lot of us with such a broad vitriolic brush, some could have forgiven him. Another maybe would have been for him to release his complete military records by filling out Form 180, instead of just the portions he wanted people to see. That probably made more than a few people uneasy, proclaiming oneself a hero and yet be unwilling to provide open access to the records.
Getting back off the rant, there are people in the US that loathe the military and use their first amendment rights to express these thoughts in many mediums. I once heard on a radio show that, "the only reason they join is to kill brown people," referring to enlistees. At demonstrations, people hold signs that say "We support our troops when they shoot their officers." And how many internet websites proclaim much the same ? I just checked Google and for the terms 'US military baby-killer' and the results say there are 27,700 pages.
Now I do not care one way or the other whether these folks get a life, but to sweep this under the carpet is to gloss it over and leave the wound festering. I know in my heart that my service was honorable as is the case for the vast majority of veterans and their families.
Thank you for your time and attention,
Three years after Dick was killed I moved to a middle income neighborhood populated by many mid-level government bureaucrats and school teachers. Most people had at least an undergraduate degree.
My children entered a new school which they said they liked but they also seemed to be a little less enthusiastic about school than they had been. Several months into the semester I had Parent/Teacher conferences. The night before the two older boys came into tell me that they had told everyone that their parents were divorced and they did not want me to tell the teachers anything different.
I couldn't believe it and asked them why they would tell a lie and added that they should be very proud of their father. The younger one started to cry and said that the kids said "daddy was a baby killer" and the older one said "yes,and they said soldiers were pigs and killers so we just decided to say that you got a divorce". I didn't quiz them on the particulars since it wasn't going to change what they had perceived.
I told them to tell the truth,their dad had died because he believed America was a great country and needed to help people make their countries great too. I added that he died to assure that their school chums and their parents would remain free to continue living the nice lives they were living. I left it at that.
More revisionist history. If you don't like history the way it was, just make up your own. It's either that or this guy's been smokin' too much weed, and the little grey cells are shot.
As a Vietnam veteran I have to admit I have alway believed this story was a myth. I don't know a single veteran who wouldn't have literally killed anyone who spit on him. Anti-war protestors were nuts but they weren't suicidal. I found the more prevalent attitude was to be ignored, dismissed, or treated with disdain. The up side was that a good number of girls on campus thought it was cool to take a trophy Vietnam veteran to parties as her date. I was more than willing to comply.
I returned in July '67 and stopped in LA for a visit with a relative. Gave myself a night on the town and went to the Sunset Strip. At Whiskey a Go Go (or some such) I had no problem. I was hooted out of another bar.
On the street, two young gays in a car offered me some money. A middle-aged gay, walking his dog, offered me his hospitality.
The best I was treated was back home in NYC and I was treated rather well.
How you were treated depended much on where you were.
Well I will add a comment to this old thread because just today I talked to a woman who married a West Point Graduate. One of her comments was about how when he was at West Point in 71-72 and they went into New York. They were spit on. He said that it was one of the worst experiences of his entire life. I guess the author did not did too deeply or research too much. I know there were a wealth of other posts but I wanted to add one more.
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