You left out the 120 degree heat, 100% humidity, crotch and foot rot, and often as not, dysentery. Then the biting flies, the leeches, the snakes, the pounding rain that lasted for weeks.
Eating food from cans that were packed before we were born, sleeping maybe four hours per day and patrolling all night.
The booby traps and mines and Panji Pits that littered every trail, the little bastard with the PE scope waiting his chance to put one through your head.
All that, and the warm welcome waiting for us when we got home.
Great stuff! Small wonder all those young ladies want to share the fun.
Well Chain I didn't want to paint too rosy a picture for any lasses with their eyes on combat arms.
But I did leave off the obvious caveat that the difference between an Army Sergeant and a Marine Gunney was like night and day comparison. Woe to the Gyrene or Grunt that flagged early on a 10k hump. Army would call in an evac or vehicle pickup, I don't even want to guess what the Gunney would do.
/Salute Gyrene
‘All that, and the warm welcome waiting for us when we got home.’
all veterans have my eternal admiration and gratitude, for what very little that may be worth...