[ladtx]

Hard to believe it has been 34 years this month that I departed Oakland for Tan Son Nhut AFB in what used to be Saigon. Most of us were very young and thought we were invincible. I was 22 at the time. We lived every day over there as if it were our last, resulting in some wild times both in the air and on the ground. Unlike the Air Force and Navy jet pilots, the helicopter pilots (Army, Air Force, Marine, and Navy)were close enough to smell the paddies and the smoke, something none of us can forget. We lived our lives both in the mud and the humid air just above the treetops, occasionally climbing high enough to cool off, our only respite. Now most of us have grown paunchy, gray, and hard of hearing because of the noise of those screaming transmissions, radios and rotor blades. You couldn't tell by looking at us now that we were once those young, skinny, clear-eyed pilots. I have a hard time believing it myself sometimes, but like anyone who has been to war, it defined each of us. We are different men than we would have been, not necessarily better, just different.

[LadyX]

Understand all you relate, ladtx.
My husband was in the Air Force, based at Tahkli across the border in Thailand, where the then new F-111s were.
He had trained in Alaska for a year to be the forerunner of AF Special Forces - had to take on five men simultaneously, and beat them all, in order to 'pass.'

He headed a 12-man Strike Team, most days securng the perimeter of the airfield against communist infiltrators intent upon bring the planes down as they took off or landed.

Other days, he went to the surrounding Thai villages, where pointed out were 'strangers.' Eliminated them. Often it was too late to save their food supplies and some of the villagers from rape and torture - oh, but why were we there??? Useless endeavor?? NOT...

The communist infiltrators routinely singled out the educated/leaders to demoralize them and eliminate resistance. One day had taken the village chief's 5 year old grandson and punctured his eardrums with bamboo shafts, making the whole village watch.
Next was his 12 year old granddaughter - several did the unforgivable, and then hacked off her private parts, decapitated her, stuffing them in the mouth, and impaled it on a fence post.

Still think it was a useless war??? They were trying to stop the communist invasion of ALL of Asia from this, and then on to our shores - - and in many ways succeeded.

He often was ordered to board choppers with his team to be dropped into the Hot Spots in NAM to supplement the fighting forces - - the Tet Offensive and Da Nang, for example.
One day was dropped in NORTH Vietnam to search for a downed F-111 - three days before they were picked up.

A mile down the road from where we live is a Veterans Memorial Park where they just added an old chopper, mounted on a tall pole as if descending to land....it is all he can do to quell the memories of all those trips - yes - I know your feelings, ladtx.

Want to know what he did in his off time?? Bartered things for food from the cooks - borrowed the Chaplains' jeeps, commandeered a couple of his men, and took the food to outlying villages to prevent mass starvation.

One day when he arrived, the village chief greeted him with tears in his eyes and placed his hands on Bernie's head - the Ultmate Salute - - said all the communists left for the entire village was three scrawny chickens they missed....and here was No. One with food aplenty.

When he went into town to a restaurant to eat, he was revered by the locals and served full course meals with their appreciation - true No. One GI... not the drugged up ones portrayed in Oliver Stone's insulting Platoon.

Yeah, protestors - proclaim 'PEACE' - - but you can count on the military to LIVE THEIR BELIEFS of better things for all mankind while you stand there and pat yourself on the back, hating them.

God bless the ladtx's and all of his kind in America - -