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War is an unholy, horrible thing. When one checks back, I don't believe you can find any period of time on record, when there were no wars anywhere on this earth. There have been but very few of our years since 1775 when we, ourselves were not involved in some way with some war. Check it out. But, that doesn't mean we are the warringest people in the world but we do get our share.
After World War one, we had some skirmishes here and there but nothing really bad until World War two came on us in 1941. As I was in the single digit age, I rarely heard of a war, or even knew anyone in the military services. But I did learn of a couple of men who joined the Marine Corp when I was about 10 or 11 years old and then a young man about 18 who was a friend of our family, joined the Army. Then when I was 11 years old, whamo, Japan bombed Pearl Harbor and just about eradicated our Naval fleet. Within a few short weeks, the draft was put into effect and everyone in the area started leaving for military service. My three oldest brothers went, two joined and one was drafted. Then when we nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945,this long and horrible war ended. I was then 15 years old. My brother just older than I had joined the navy shortly before the war ended. It appeared that I might have slipped into a gap of peace.
This was a war where the young men of our nation stood tall. Many had joined of their own free will to help end the war, but even those who were conscripted, served and fought nobly. Some of these men served for four years, almost all of it, in overseas combat. Many came home maimed, limbs missing, some had lost their feet due to frostbite and a great number suffered from what was then called shell-shock. It later became known as combat fatigue. Many married men came home to find their wife had gone to another man, some simply had been unfaithful and much mental stress was the result. Some developed mental illness and had to be placed in an institution. Of my four brothers, one had died, one came home to his wife and small son he had never seen and the other two remained in service.
Things changed a great deal after that. The draft was continued and a large army was maintained, although restrictions on health and abilities were tightened since there was no need for the massive number that had been during the past war. But peace was very short lived.
The Korean peninsula was a politically divided nation and as World War two was winding down, Japan (our enemy then) and Russian (one our allies then) troops were fighting and the Russians advanced to the 38th parallel about the time WWII was over and the United Nations formed. Negotiations for a unified Korea took place but were never successful, though Japan was conquered and Russian troops had gone home. But on June 25, 1950, North Korea invaded South Korea. The United Nations, and the United States took the side of South Korea and came to their aid, but as it has been since, the U.S. had to bear the load. The draft was re-energized here and I was called upon April 3, 1951.
It is difficult to imagine how a small country the size of Korea, could ever be the base of a long and dreadful war that took thousands of lives of American troops. I can tell you personally that I was blessed in that I was not ordered to go into Korea and into battle. I was chosen to be placed with an Anti Aircraft battalion and assigned to Battalion Headquarters Intelligence Department where I was trained as an Intelligence Aircraft Plotter. At this point in time, the war was truly raging in Korea and men were being brought home with the same identical problems incurred in WW2. No one, wanted to go and get into that fray. But twice monthly, our battery would be called out into formation and names would be read of those being pulled and deployed to Korea. That was possibly the most tense moments, I have ever spent.
The defense department had a set program for the draftee. Everyone was called up for a two year tour, and after you were in for 18 months, and had not been deployed to Korea, you would not be in that last six months. But it was a very stressful 18 months to reach that point. I even read names of a couple of men with whom I completed basic and advanced training who had been killed in Korea. But unless someone has gone through what our combat troops go through, it is unlikely you can appreciate them as they should be.
During training at Fort Bliss, Texas, I've often slept in a Pup-tent and thought about the roughly 2,000 miles back to my home and it would seem as though, I'd never be able to go back, week after week. When we finished our basic, and then advanced (AAA antiaircraft) training, there were no formalities of graduation and invitations for our families to come visit us, nor even a leave to go home. My first 5 day leave with a 2 day pass combined, was for New Years, 1952. (From April 3, 1951)
I have told all of this on my part simply because it is the only first hand experience I've had. But it carried with it some of the feelings that any young men must have when they are far away and especially facing unimaginable hardships and the possibility of death at any turn.
I hear people often say, well no one made them join up, and that is true but if they had not, many more would have been conscripted as I was and unless you have gone, thank those fine young people who have willfully dedicated their lives to protecting this country, so you won't have to.
But my main reason for writing this is to try and get across to those who are living it up here, while many of our young men and women, are in Iraq, on in Afghanistan or any other place where we have troops. They are assigned to a very unpleasant tour of duty. I don't know what length of time they are required to spend in those places, but I do know they are often sent back after returning home for a few months. And that must be the most difficult thing to do, that a human could imagine.
And now this thing at Fort Hood. Whether these troops were training, or expecting to be deployed to one of the places of combat, I don't know. But now, this can cause much stress on those who are not even overseas. Have you ever dreamed of being a long way from home and have no means of getting back? I have, and it caused some of the empty feeling a person gets when he is away from loved ones and home. I can recall my first few weeks in the army. We always attended church on Sundays when I was home and somehow, that was my roughest days, not to be able to be back there, and not knowing for sure whether or not I ever would be.
If you have friends or relatives in service, get in regular touch with them and let them know how proud you are of them. And if you don't, when you see a military person in a cafe, Wal-Mart, or where ever. Stop and thank them for their service. It will help make their day and you'll feel better for it
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