I was extraordinarily fortunate to actually serve with a WW2 USAAC vet.
It was 1975 in Thailand. LtCol Harley Hooper was on his final assignment and I was on my second; we were flying AC-130s in the 16SOS.
I wondered why nothing really bothered him while everything seemed to bother me; I was that young.
Harley told me he had served as a B-24 crew member in Europe prior to D-Day. He was shot down, captured, escaped, and was being hidden by the French underground in Paris, August 1944.
One day he heard singing, the “la Marsellaise”. When he looked out an window he saw Allied troops marching a newly freed Paris enroute to fighting German forces east of the city.
Harley told me it was both the best and worse day of his life. The best because for the first time in two years he knew, for an absolute fact, he was going to go home alive. The worse because he was the only one his B-24’s 11-man crew who went home.
How do you talk about this to the “home folks”?
To repay Harley for this important history lesson I bought him his brandy for the next six months. It was a very cheap price.
Sorry for the length but it is important to me and, IMHO, the reason why so many real combat vets, past, present, and future, don’t talk about their combat experiences.
1944 to 1975 is one hell of a career - just think about the leap in military technologies he's seen.
And thanks for the post, and for bringing LtCol Harley Hooper his brandy.