Dutch furious after Putin’s daughter is found living in Holland

So like most of us during the Cold War, you opposed, rather than “opposed” and “fought”.

My service was during the cold war as an infantry officer. During that time period a number of people on my post died in training related accidents. Some died as a result of artillery impacting outside the established impact area. Some died in high speed vehicle testing for the new army inventory that they so enjoy today. We tested the Humvee and Fast Attack Vehicles (Dune Buggies) before they ever got into the inventory. Some were parachute accidents in the 2/75 Ranger Bn. Some were gunshot accidents with military weapons during live fires. It's an inherently dangerous job. I loved it. All of those people who died in training didn't die in combat but they're still dead and they were all training (as I did) to fight the WARSAW PACT in a war. Are they any less of a hero? 2nd Division Vet, I thank you humbly for your service. You at least got to serve a lot closer than I ever did to a real live enemy. My sole eyeball contact was a brief trip to the Berlin Wall during a REFORGER exercise in Germany. But even then we had soviet operatives dogging us all over the exercise areas trying to steal machine-guns (the venerable M-60), M-16's and cause all sorts of havoc to disrupt the exercises. We had to watch what we said in public because there were real live spies looking for INTEL on what we were doing in the testing process at our home post. We got intelligence updates of a classified nature every three month, year around. It wasn't ground combat but yeah, people died and yes the spy versus spy game was very real. Just because it was "cold" doesn't make it that much less of a "war." At least not until 911.

I myself was permanently injured in a parachute jump with the Germans, i’ve seen a guy die in training, after complaining about our method of repelling out of helicopters we watched as an SAS member training with us burned in and crushed both ankles, I can go on for a long while listing injuries in my units, and I know that our military used to lose in excess of 2,000 men a year in training and peacetime deaths, I’m well aware of the high speed of some units during the Cold War, and injuries outside of combat zones.

Thank you for your service as well. I got busted up in a helicopter mishap, too. But I FELL from about 20 feet up. Like a dummy. It was a stupid accident and entirely my fault. It sort of validates why LT stands for LOONY TUNES. The thing was, I never told the army about my bad back when I left active duty because I had it in mind to go play in the IRR or National Guard for some extra $$$ when I might need it. So I didn't get any disability for a service connected injury and I sorta hid it all from the docs. That was probably stupid too. Now that I'm older, I feel it more.

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