V A L O R. The Veterans of Vietnam. A Publication of the National Vietnam Veterans Committee

Transcription

1 V A L O R The Veterans of Vietnam A Publication of the National Vietnam Veterans Committee Volume 1, Issue 1 - Spring 2006 A Letter From the President James C. Roberts The Last Ace Retired Air Force Brigadier General Steve Ritchie Good Morning, Vietnam! An interview with Adrian Cronauer The Veterans of Vietnam A profile of Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jim Nicholson By Paul Rodriguez What the Vietnam POWs Can Teach Us Taylor B. Kiland

2 From the President James C. Roberts Dear Friends, If you are reading this inaugural issue of Valor: The Veterans of Vietnam, it is likely that you share my feelings toward America s most misunderstood war. As a Naval veteran of Vietnam, I witnessed firsthand the heroism and sacrifices of our men and women in uniform. They, like the generation before them, served with honor, but were instead treated with contempt by many upon their return home. Intelligent people can disagree on the necessity of America s involvement in Vietnam. Some, like Stanley Karnow in his Pulitzer Prize winning history of Vietnam, believe that while America s intentions were noble, Vietnam proved too complex to be a successful venture. Others share the view of President Reagan, who in 1981 said that soldiers in Vietnam who obeyed their country s call and fought as bravely and well as any Americans (were) denied permission to win by Washington politicians and bureaucrats. Still others take a view somewhere in the middle, that mistakes were made on the ground, especially in General Westmoreland s strategy of search and destroy missions in a war of attrition, but that the war was allbut-won once the focus was shifted toward emphasiz- ing the control of territory in South Vietnam. It was when Congress eliminated all support for the South Vietnamese military that Vietnam fell to the Communist North, and led to the deaths of millions in Southeast Asia. What cannot be questioned is the honor with which the vast majority of Americans who served in Vietnam discharged their duties. War is always hell, but the depictions of American soldiers engaging in widespread raping, torturing, and killing of Vietnamese civilians by some is disgusting, and false. These soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines rose to the challenge, served honorably and never lost an engagement, then returned home to live their lives. Of course, like soldiers throughout history, some were scarred by what they lived through, but for too long we have lived with the stereotype that the typical returning veteran from Vietnam was a drugged-out loser, who could not cope with life. These veterans, like those that came before them, should be treated as what they are: heroes. For the past decade, I have served as the President of the World War II Veterans Committee, an educational foundation dedicated toward preserving the legacy of World War II history, and its veterans, and passing it on to succeeding generations. I have watched as the public s interest in World War II history has grown immensely over the last 15 years. As the veterans of World War II 2

3 have passed from the scene, it seems that Americans of all ages have rediscovered the importance of World War II, and of its veterans. B.G. Burkett and Glenna Whitley wrote another important book about Vietnam titled Stolen Valor: How the Vietnam Generation Was Robbed of It s History. Now, it seems we are on the cusp of a renewed interest in the history of Vietnam. More and more books and documentaries are being produced on the subject, and the National Vietnam Veterans Committee plans to be a part of this effort to educate the public on the true legacy of Vietnam Veterans. The Vietnam veterans, like the World War II Generation before them, created a legacy of honor, sacrifice, and heroism. It is a legacy that must be reclaimed for our generation and passed on to future generations. My own view of the war echoes that of journalist Fred Barnes: It was a just cause and we had it won. The author as a Naval Gunfire Director Officer on board the destroyer The Vietnam USS Henderson off-shore South Vietnam, 1970 War was not lost in Vietnam: it was lost in Washington, DC. Reclaiming, preserving, and passing on that legacy is the mission of the National Vietnam Veterans Committee and this publication. I invite you to be an active partner with us in this important work. Sincerely, Despite this loss and the human tragedy that ensued for millions of people in Southeast Asia, the American presence in Vietnam held the line against communist expansion for long enough to permit many fragile regimes in the region to strengthen and resist the communist tide. In his book, Vietnam: The Necessary War, Michael Lind makes the case that, Vietnam was a battle in the sevendecade-long war against communism. It was, he writes, a battle that had to be fought and it was a war that we won. James C. Roberts President VALOR 3

4 The Last Ace Brigadier General Steve Ritchie (USAF-Ret) Honorary Chairman Over 200 speaking programs a year! That was part of being an Air Force recruiter as well as running my own business. It s seldom that the master of ceremonies at these functions skips over the phrases, Air Force s only Vietnam pilot ace only MiG 21 ace last American ace And yes, I am proud of those words. But at the same time, it s important to think about what they mean. I can t help but interpret them differently, now that it has been nearly 35 years since the incidents that put these phrases into such widespread circulation. Back then, we all thought we had learned a lot prior to the challenges of Southeast Asia. In the 24 years since, part of what I have determined is that the same basics which prepared us for combat are the same basics that run an individual s life. And which form the foundation for a successful company. Or more important, a successful and honorable nation. In the first place, when the term ace is used in an introduction, it seems as though I am taking credit for something in which I played a relatively small, although high profile, role. A fighter pilot is many things, but selfgenerated is not one of them. We are the result of an enormous web of training, preparation, leadership, and support that enables us to carry out a specific mission an important job. : Central to those skills is understanding that, as General George Patton put it, We fight wars with hardware, but we win wars with people. No one in any position of responsibility in any walk of life is immune to the same basic concept. It does not make any difference whether the war is of the shooting variety, or it is on Wall Street, or it is of the ethical, philosophical, and political struggle which, in the long run, defines a nation. The bottom line is fundamentals that are as true today as they were 5,000 years ago. It is absolutely certain that a huge amount of what went into making me successful in combat was that some of my earliest commanders taught the value of people and how much effect they have on success. We were not out there en route to Hanoi alone. We were being assisted by radar operators over 100 miles away. We successfully fired missiles only because technicians in maintenance did their job day in and day out. Sometimes mechanics would sweat all night under very difficult conditions to make sure our airplanes were ready for the morning go. I remember the very positive effect some of our commanders had when they took the time to get to know and understand us. They made us a part of their team, and we became committed to their cause. We would do anything to keep from letting them down. So, I spent a significant amount of time meeting and working with the radar and avionics troops, the missile techs, the load/ arming crews not only everyone who touched our airplanes but all the individuals and organizations that joined together to support the successful conduct of a very complicated mission. 4 Valor - Issue 1

5 We all made an effort to know and understand each other and worked hard at making certain that what we did was as good as we could possibly do it. And it worked. Our airplanes had excellent serviceability rates. Our missiles were the most reliable. The radar folks knew us and knew how to make it work for us. Those people are the only reason I am now introduced as an ace. We were a team and believed in the basics of preparation, discipline, dedication, and loyalty. There is nothing more uplifting than being part of something in which a large number of people from incredibly diverse backgrounds and disciplines pull together to make something work in an environment of individual freedom. That, of course, is what made us the greatest nation ever. Steve Ritchie returns after scoring his fifth kill That is what makes us able to do incredible things in times of war and times of peace. However, it seems that many are turning away from the basics the honesty, freedom, determination, and human spirit that resulted in the highest standard of living for the greatest number of people in all of history. It is increasingly important that we learn from our experiences and mistakes and carefully analyze the successes and mistakes of other nations in history. Yes, I wear the title of ace, and I am very proud of it. But what makes me the proudest is knowing that title is the result of many, many devoted people working together. The simple concept worked for us in combat and it has worked for me in personal and professional endeavors. More important, there is a great lesson to be learned. As a nation, if we perform as a team and return to the fundamentals that built us, we CAN make it work. In fact, we HAVE to make it work. VALOR Valor: The Veterans of Vietnam Valor: The Veterans of Vietnam - Issue I. A quarterly publication of the National Vietnam Veterans Committee th St, NW Suite 856, Washington, DC Telephone: Fax: The National Vietnam Veterans Committee is a project of the American Studies Center, a 501(c)(3) non-profit public educational foundation. Valor is mailed to donors to the National Vietnam Veterans Committee who make a contribution of $50 or more per-year. Contributions help to fund the Committee s various speaker conferences, student programs, the National Memorial Day Parade, documentary and oral history projects, and this publication. To make a contribution or subscribe, call National Vietnam Veterans Committee Brig. Gen. Steve Ritchie (USAF-Ret) - Honorary Chairman James C. Roberts - President Michael Paradiso - Publisher Tim G.W. Holbert - Editor/Program Director Valor - Issue 1 5

6 Good Morning Vietnam! An Interview with Adrian Cronauer Good Morning, Vietnam! These are the three words that will always be associated with Adrian Cronauer. The inspiration behind, and screenwriter for, the hugely popular movie with Robin Williams in the role of Adrian Cronauer, he has had a fascinating and multifaceted career. He spent seven years in New York City working as a television and radio voice talent, owned an advertising agency, managed a radio station, was program director of a TV station, and a news anchor. He has also taught broadcasting at the university level and is the author of a textbook on radio and television announcing. Adrian is now an attorney whose expertise is communications law and currently serves in the Department of Defense. He is a member of numerous boards and commissions, and has received a host of awards and has acted in many charitable and civic organizations. Recently, Adrian sat down for an interview with James C. Roberts, which will appear on an upcoming episode of the radio series, Veterans Chronicles. The following is a partial transcript of that interview. James C. Roberts: First, I would like to talk about the movie you are forever destined to be linked with, Good Morning, Vietnam. How was it that you got to be a disk jockey in Vietnam, and what years did you serve there? Adrian Cronauer: I was in Vietnam from , and in the Air Force from I had started in broadcasting when I was about 12 years old on something called the DuMont Television Network. It was a small organization. They had a kids show on Saturday mornings, which featured an amateur-hour for the kids. I wound up as a semi-regular on the show, playing the piano for the other kids, who used to sing, tap dance, etc. I caught the broadcasting bug, and that s when I decided that was what I wanted to do. In college at the University of Pittsburgh, I worked at the campus radio station before transferring to American University. Later, when I joined the Air Force, I was going in for pilot training. But before I was going to start my training, I found out that they were holding people over for a year before starting them in flight school. Then there was a year to year and a half of flight training, three to four months of OCS, then a four year commitment. I said, Wait a minute! I don t want to make the Air Force a career, I just want to fly! So I dropped the flight training. They were looking for something for me to do, and noticed that I had broadcasting experience, so everything developed from there. JCR: So you say you arrived in Vietnam in 1965? AC: The spring of JCR: That was about the time things started to heat up. AC: Actually, when I had put my paperwork back in, I had been on the island of Crete for a year and a half. I d seen a bit of Europe and the Near East, and I wanted to see a bit of the Far East. So I put in for Japan, but was denied because it was a three-year tour. I asked what they had by way of one-year tours, and the answer was either Korea or Vietnam. Korea didn t sound that exciting, but Vietnam at the time was a small advisory mission. So I put in for Vietnam. About three or four weeks after I sent my paperwork in, I was sitting in the newsroom watching the television when I saw a story about how the Vietcong had just blown up a radio station in Saigon, and I said, Whoops! Actually, I said something a lot stronger! Then there was the Gulf of Tonkin incident. Lyndon Johnson began his escalation of the war. So in a year s time I watched Saigon go from a sleepy French colonial city to a complete nightmare with this massive influx of money, equipment, and personnel. By the time I left the traffic was unmanageable, the economy was in ruins, the black market was out of control. It was quite an experience to watch that. JCR: What was your daily routine like? AC: I would get up usually about five or so, stop by a little bakery and pick up a danish, then head to the station and 6 Valor - Issue 1

7 pull some records and get ready to go on the air. I d go on the air at 6, and be off the air by 9. I wrote copy and did production for the rest of the day. In the afternoons, and during my spare time this was true as it was in the movie I did teach English during my off duty time. I did not teach my class how to swear or use New York street slang. And I was not teaching English because I was trying to meet this pretty Vietnamese girl at least not one in particular. But for most GIs, it was difficult to know the average Vietnamese. About the only people you can get to know are bar girls and such. But the Vietnamese, like most cultures, have a respect for teachers. So I figured by teaching I could break through some of that reticence; to get to know some of the everyday, ordinary Vietnamese people, and it worked out very well. JCR: How important did the American command in Vietnam regard the broadcast operations as being? AC: We were there for the morale factor. Almost all of our listeners were men in their mid to late 20s, and very few had been out of the United States before. Many had not been outside of their own hometowns. The military came along, and quite literally picked them up, dropped them halfway around the world, and dumped them in a totally alien environment. Not surprisingly, culture shock would set in. It was our job to be an antidote to homesickness. And the way to do that was to sound as much as possible like a stateside radio station. So that s what I tried to do. JCR: What were your perceptions of the war while all this was going on? AC: When I left, we were winning. The thing that very few people realize is that we never lost a single significant military battle in all the time that we were there in Vietnam, including the Tet Offensive. And yet it was portrayed in totally different terms. Walter Cronkite went to Vietnam after the Tet Offensive and said that we were losing, which was a complete fabrication. And yet, once he started on that, everyone else fell in line and started portraying it the same way. There is a book called Big Story by Peter Braestrup, which is a case study of the 68 Tet Offensive and points out that the Vietnam War was, among other things, the first war we fought in the age of the jet transport. It used to be Adrian Cronauer during his broadcasting days in Vietnam a reporter would have to take a long ocean voyage to get to a place like Vietnam, so he would stay there for months and years even, developing a full understanding of the culture, of the politics, of the background. And then when he wrote his stories he could put them in that context. With Vietnam, you could fly in, file a few stories, and fly out again. It is like the old fable of the blind men and the elephant. One felt its leg and said it was like a tree. Another felt its tail and thought it was like a rope, while yet another felt its side and said it was like a wall. All of them were quite correct, but in putting their stories together, you did not really know what an elephant is like. We had the same phenomenon happening in Vietnam because of the reportage of people who did not have the knowledge or the background to put it in the proper context. JCR: So this poor grounding of the American reporters in Vietnamese history and culture really negatively colored the reportage that we got out of the war? AC: Yes, it did. We were winning, even when we left Vietnam. We left in 1973, but when we left the Vietnamese were capable of defending themselves. They needed economic and logistical help from us, though, and our Congress cut them off at the knees, which I think is one of the most shameful aspects of our history. JCR: Back to this very famous movie. The question you get more than any other must be just how realistic is the movie? AC: Anybody who has been in the military will tell you that if I did half the things in that movie, I d still be in Leavenworth right now. A lot of Hollywood imagination went into the movie. I was a disk jockey in Vietnam and I did teach English in my spare time. I was not thrown out of Vietnam; I stayed for my full one-year tour and I was honorably discharged, thank you very much. None of the characters in the film are based on real people. They are all stereotypes. But as is true of stereotypes, you can name any character in the film and I can probably think of a halfdozen people who fit the profile during my years in the Air Force. Valor - Issue 1 7

8 JCR: When did you get the idea for writing the screenplay? In Vietnam or after you came home? AC: In 1979, when I was in New York doing commercials. M*A*S*H was number one in the ratings, and WKRP in Cincinnati was very popular, as well. I figured if you put them together you get Armed Forces Radio. So I did a treatment for a TV sitcom, and called it Good Morning, Vietnam. In 1979, I guess it was a little too close in time, and nobody believed you could do a comedy about Vietnam. Several years later, still thinking in terms of television, I reworked it as an idea for a movie of the week. This time, a friend s agent got it into Robin Williams hands, who read it and thought that as a disk jockey, he could do his comic shtick. But rather than as a TV movie, we should do it as a feature film. He and his manager bought an option on it, and every year they would renew the option. After about four years they called me up one day and said, Well, we ve finally decided to go into production. But we have decided to throw away the original and start all over again. So I spent a week in Hollywood telling him everything I could think or remember happening in Vietnam. They would say things like, Oh, that s a great incident! We ll have to use that in the movie of course, we ll have to change it some. So it went through five different versions. Each time I made suggestions for additions and deletions. Some changes they accepted, and some they ignored. Finally, I found myself sitting in a screening room in Hollywood, watching a rough cut and saying to myself, Son of a gun, they actually made a movie out of this! JCR: So there was some similarity between what you envisioned and what they produced. I have heard you say that the movie has been very good to you. AC: It has. It has opened a lot of doors for me. It helped pay for law school with my career change. And it opened up the college lecture circuit which also helped pay for law school. So I came out of three years of law school in the black, which is highly unusual for a new law school graduate. This has led to a lot of opportunities, including my present job. JCR: Talk about that a bit if you would. The POW/MIA mission. AC: I am special assistant to the director of the government s POW/MIA office. We have 88,000 people who are still missing from America s wars. Approximately 78,000 of those are from World War II. About 8,100 are from Korea and 1,800 from Vietnam. There are about 120 from the Cold War, and one each from the first and second Gulf Wars. Of course we will never be able to account for every one of them, especially the ones from World War II. But our goal is the fullest possible accounting. We have over 100 people in our office in Washington, and more than 500 people working around the world whose job is to try to account for missing Americans. We have three goals in our office. First, we want to make sure that our people don t go missing to begin with, so we want to be sure that they are trained properly in survival, evasion, resistance, and escape. We want to make sure that they have the proper equipment, the best electronic twoway radios and locator beacons, and that the people who go looking for them are trained properly themselves. We also want to make sure that whenever we get reports of live Americans anywhere in the world, we investigate them immediately. Unfortunately, with the exception of the one girl in the first Gulf War, we have never received any reports that led to a live American since the mid-1970s. But we still investigate them. Thirdly, most of our efforts are devoted toward trying to account for people who are still missing. We try to find their remains and return them to their loved ones, for an honorable hero s burial on American soil. There are various organizations around the world that help us with that. There is what is called the Joint POW/MIA Command, which searches crash sites and burial sites to try to find the remains. The remains are brought back to the central identification laboratory at Hickam Air Force Base in Hawaii. There is the Life Sciences Equipment Laboratory in Texas, which tries to identify remains through artifacts of some kind a piece of uniform, a button, the sole of a boot, any information that will help identify somebody. Then there is the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory in Rockville, Maryland. Here they are collecting samples from everybody in the military just a little pinprick with two drops of blood on a postcard-sized piece of blotting paper. The identification material is put on it, and it is sealed in foil, then kept in a giant refrigerator. I don t know if you realize it, but in 1998, enough circumstantial evidence had accumulated that we were able to identify the man buried at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier from the Vietnam War. We exhumed the remains and found 8 Valor - Issue 1

9 out that it was indeed an Air Force pilot named Michael Blassie, who was returned to his family and is now buried in St. Louis. The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier from the Vietnam era is now empty. This is not official government policy. But my opinion is that I don t think we will ever have another unknown soldier due to the ability to identify remains through DNA testing. JCR: In our final few minutes I would like to return to the matter of Vietnam. It is frequently observed that over 30 years after the fall of South Vietnam, the scars are still manifest in our country, and I think that is true to some extent. What do you have to say about measures that could help bring healing to these scars? AC: Well for some people, Vietnam is still considered unfinished business. When I was in Australia in 1992, they dedicated their memorial to Vietnam veterans. I was interviewed on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. I did not realize it but the anti-war sentiment there was far more virulent than it was in this country. It almost tore the country apart. The lady who interviewed me might have been an anti-war type in those days, and somewhere in the interview she said, Well by now enough time has passed that we can begin to forgive you for what you did. I am not always the most eloquent or quick-thinking person in the world, but on this occasion, I didn t hesitate. I told her that I don t think anybody who served in Vietnam feels he needs to be forgiven for anything, but that she was right in one respect that enough time HAD passed, and that the Vietnam veterans could begin to forgive her for what she did. I think that among Vietnam veterans in this country the healing process involved forgiving those who spit upon us, who were less than cordial to us when we came home. You will find that in rallies to support our troops today, the people who are leading the movement are Vietnam veterans. Because Vietnam veterans are determined to see that no other American troops ever get the shabby treatment that we got when we came home. JCR: Adrian, I wanted to ask you about the question of parallels, or lack thereof, between Vietnam and Iraq and Afghanistan. AC: I think there are very few parallels. First of all, I am hearing from the troops that are coming back that the attitude is very patriotic, that they feel they have a mission that they are dedicated to fulfilling. Also, in Vietnam, we had a draft, while this is an all-volunteer military. Also, there is not one country trying to take over another. Though there is civil strife in Iraq, it is not like Vietnam where there was the communist North trying to take over the free South. We do not see the massive demonstrations, as before. I think at this point, the support for the war in Iraq is much more enthusiastic than it was for Vietnam. JCR: It seems to me that there is one parallel between the two conflicts and that is the media coverage of it. In my view, the media coverage of what is happening in Iraq, and to a lesser extent Afghanistan, is overwhelmingly negative. I know that many of the returning troops I have talked to feel that way, too. AC: Yes, and I think that part of it has to do with the Adrian Cronauer (left) with James C. Roberts general idea in the media that if it bleeds, it leads. The fact that almost 300 million Americans get up every morning and go to work, come home, have dinner, watch a movie or play with their kids, go to bed, then get up the next day and do it all over again is not news. But if one psychotic person takes an Uzi and shoots up an office, that is news. So to some extent, that phenomenon exists. But I also think that there is something that in the long run, is very positive. By embedding these young reporters into the military units in Iraq, they were able to see the conflict first-hand. They got to see what the troops actually do, which gives them a much better understanding of what is going on. These young reporters will move on in their careers, and will become the editors and the news executives in another generation or so, and they will bring with them the knowledge that they have gained by witnessing the war from the perspective of the troops. VALOR Valor - Issue 1 9

10 The Veterans of Vietnam A Profile of Jim Nicholson, Secretary of Veterans Affairs By Paul Rodriguez Jim Nicholson s approach to his job as Secretary of Veterans Affairs is one of holistic care that some might contend springs not only from advances in medical sciences and therapeutic techniques but, so too, from life s experiences centered on hard work, studying hard and praying hard. This job is one of enormous responsibility and I think about that a lot, says Nicholson, a former ambassador to the Vatican and head of the Republican National Committee between 1997 and Nominated in 2005, he s now in charge of a vast bureaucracy serving nearly 7.5 million veterans with state of the art technology and care. The paradigm now is holistic where, for example, we now involve the family immediately in the recovery and sometimes even bring them back to, for example, Walter Reed within a day or less when a member is hurt in the war, Nicholson notes. We put them up, detail people to help them in their trauma and they are there to help the service member heal. And this is new! he proudly smiles. Without denigrating his predecessors, Nicholson says I m so impressed by the genuine compassion and warmth of the care givers now. I visit hospitals all over the country; like in Tampa where we treat multiple traumas and you d think these service members were [the medical staffs ] own children. Indeed, the mission Nicholson brings to the VA is part of a life-long mission to overcome huge obstacles and never giving up either on one s self or on the opportunities America provides for all her people. And this strength of conviction can be directly traced to his mother and his rough and tumble upbringing as an itinerant farmer boy growing up in rural Iowa. I do think often how lucky I ve been from humble beginnings, such a miserable alcoholic father and hard times where we lived in a tenant house out on a farm with no electricity or plumbing and didn t have enough food, he recalls honestly. But because of his mother, who had extraordinary faith and would lead us in prayer and maintain a sense of dignity even though we were rag-a-muffins and people would tend to make fun of us, he says he learned a lot. We didn t have a Christmas tree when I was growing up, other than the one the family would take down on Christmas Eve from the one-room schoolhouse he attended along with his six brothers and sisters. When he was about 10 years old, Nicholson recounts, his family moved to Strubble, Iowa, a town of 99 people and where his father later would be institutionalized for alcoholism at a place called Cherokee when young Jim was a freshman in high school and his older brother was finishing his own freshman year at West Point. It was at the end of the older brothers freshmen year that life began to turn around for the younger Nicholson. My brother was home and we didn t have enough money for him to go back, Nicholson remembers. And I still remember that Memorial Day weekend when it rained eight inches. That flooded a lot of low lands and bridges used by the Great Northern Railroad. I was 15 then and weighed maybe 120 pounds. I knew the railroad had to hire people to rebuild track and so I went over to talk with the boss, a big man named George Kahlonis. [Laughing as he finishes the narrative, Nicholson says] he took a look at me and said, I don t think so son. So I went off and focused and prayed and came back. I said, I need a job and he asked me if I had a Social Security number. I told him yes and he agreed to give me a try. Well, I ended up working the whole summer! 10 Valor - Issue 1

11 The first day I worked 20 hours and got paid time and a half after eight hours and double time after 16 hours. So I made a lot of money, had food, bought dad a car, and my brother got back to West Point. It was an act of God, Nicholson says about that time. It built me up and the next year of high school I got on the football team and made All-State. It s things like that you think about, Nicholson says wistfully. And because his spirit wouldn t break and he kept working, he was able to also join up on the railroad s baseball team and that led to an athletic scholarship to West Point. Attending the Military Academy, Nicholson says, was the most profound thing in my life. Going from rural poverty to an environment I was at first overly awed and intimidated about, to then learning I belonged after all. I got over self-doubt of growing up in an alcoholic family and from there learned a sense of duty. After serving eight years on active duty as a paratrooper and Ranger-qualified Army officer that included one year ( ) in Vietnam where he earned the Bronze Star and Combat Infantryman Badge, the Meritorious Service Medal, Republic of Vietnam Cross of Gallantry, and two Air Medals, Nicholson was assigned to West Point on staff and attended graduate school at Columbia, where he earned a master s degree. When he got out of the Army as a major but staying in the Army Reserve (where he retired after 22 years as a colonel), he moved his wife, dog and five-month old son to Denver where he went to law school. I thought it would be a nice place to live and so I went to school full-time and worked full-time for the mayor s office in Denver. By that time, his wife Susanne was pregnant again. Investing in a small apartment building would lead to larger real estate holdings and building custom homes. None of this success would have occurred, he states flatly, were it not for the faith of his mother. It was so fascinating to me given the settings we were in and the reasons that woman Committee President James C. Roberts with Secretary Nicholson had to be down in the dumps. But she had so much faith and love for this country and taught us never to give up. It is this philosophy that Nicholson brings to his job at the VA, which has over 230,000 employees at hundreds of medical centers, nursing homes, benefits offices and national cemeteries throughout the country. With a fiscal 2005 budget of more than $70 billion, Nicholson also wants to expand services to the least among his charge. Specifically, the estimated 185,000 homeless veterans and indigents who need VA s help. I know the hopelessness and the self doubt that comes with all that, Nicholson says, and I have a major endeavor here to help them if only because we are able and we are the only agency in government that can treat and administer to the homeless vets. Giving strength to his mission are the young men and women he visits almost daily. When I go to Walter Reed for example, I say to them, How can I help you and the thing they most often say is, Sir, help me to get back to my unit. That s a profound phenomenon and it says to me that they have tremendous morale and they feel like they are doing something important and making progress. So that side is very positive because they also know the people back home appreciate them. That is a stark contrast to when I came back, Nicholson says. When I came back and the Army sent me to college the students had taken over the school and so that s very different today. People in America will disagree about politics but not anymore about the servicemen. When asked what he would like people to think of his tenure at the Veterans Affairs Department, he says simply: He was someone at the helm who really cared. I think this is so because of my background growing up poor and so forth. I feel the pain of some of these people and I reflect that here and so do my people. VALOR Valor - Issue 1 11

12 What The Vietnam POWs Can Teach Us (And It Has Nothing To Do Wit ith The Vie ietnam War) By Taylor Baldwin Kiland Men who grew up too young to fight in World War II saw their fathers tested physically and mentally by war. This generation of men had a tremendous sense of faith instilled in them at a very early age faith in the unwavering loyalty and indomitable bonds of the nuclear family, faith in their government and faith in their country. The Vietnam conflict shattered that faith for a generation of youth, but mostly for those who did not serve in uniform. For the aviators captured and held as POWs, time stood still. For the most part, these men did not experience the unrest, the cultural and spiritual conflict our country witnessed during that tumultuous season. They never lost their faith in our system, but clung to it some might say naively. Regardless, it sustained them and empowered them. Aviators are known for pushing the limits of physics and for cheating fate. They signed up for Vietnam to be tested. In their profession, they couldn t afford to be ambivalent, nor to lose their convictions. Jubilant former POWs celebrate as the plane that will be carrying them home takes off from Hanoi in 1973 Courtesy of the National Archives Two former POWs, and longtime friends, who served their country long after the Vietnam War ended: Orson Swindle and John McCain What happened when these aviators had their dignity and independence stripped away in a prison in North Vietnam? They survived. Collectively, they endured out of a fear of losing their dignity. They felt an innate sense of obligation to do what s right in the eyes of their fellow prisoners and to show honor to their country. It was never a solitary struggle, as each of them supported and validated the others. It constantly motivated them. Some prisoners or victims of unfortunate fates wallow in self-pity, some reflect on their lives and opportunities lost. Some lose their faith; some gain a renewed sense of spirituality. For those whose fate dictated that they spend precious personal and professional years in torturous isolation in North Vietnam, they had two choices: self-destruction or a search of their inner core and a beseeching of their Maker for the patience to tolerate their captors and simply endure. Get through each day, one day at a time. Get out mentally and physically intact. Return with their names and reputations whole. In 1973, they finally did come home and, in 1975, the war did finally end. 12 Valor - Issue 1

13 For Americans under the age of 30, the Vietnam War is as distant as World War II. The 600+ living former POWs are the longest-held group of POWs in our nation s history. Some were held for almost nine years. They returned home to a country they did not recognize culturally or politically; they returned to children they barely knew. After the homecoming parades and the awards ceremonies were over, these 600+ men struggled to return to a normal life as fathers, sons, husbands, neighbors and co-workers not unlike the brave soldiers and sailors who are returning home from Iraq and Afghanistan. One day they are fighting insurgents in Iraq; the next week they are back working at their civilian jobs and mowing the lawn on weekends. How will these returning soldiers and sailors fare physically and emotionally over time? The returning POWs from Vietnam may be a helpful indicator. Like the Vietnam POWs, some of the most severely wounded veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan seem to be more comfortable as role models than victims. Despite the fact that they face long, hard physical rehabilitation for months or years to come, many of these young men and women comment on their renewed purpose in life, a better appreciation for life and the desire to serve as a positive example for others. Not to trivialize the horrific impact war trauma can have on veterans and their families, but it is important to remind ourselves that there is life after war. There are tragic consequences to sending our best and brightest young men and women to fight a cause in a foreign land, but we must remember that most of them will move on with their lives. Many of them will overcome any physical and emotional setbacks and will find success and happiness. Surprisingly, many will claim that their lives are richer for the experience. Just ask the former POWs from Vietnam and their families. Commander Paul Galanti with wife Phyllis and two sons, Jamie and Jeff. Galanti was held in captivity for 2,432 days in Vietnam. He returned to enter a long career as a consultant, political activist, speaker, and veterans advocate Courtesy of Jamie Howren The Vietnam POWs did not retire or retreat; on the contrary, despite some severe, lingering physical ailments sustained in Vietnam, they have some of the lowest rates of PTSD of any group of Vietnam veterans. Most finished out their military careers with more than 20 years of service and, as a group, can boast a surprisingly high number of public office holders elected, appointed, or volunteer. They have a strong track record of giving back. More than thirty years later, most of these men are at peace with their lives journeys and don t seem to harbor much bitterness. Most will agree their wartime experience was tough. But they will allege that it strengthened their characters and their will. They will also say that, within those prison walls, they met the best friends they have in life. Those are the consequences they do not regret. Taylor Baldwin Kiland is the co-author of Open Doors: Vietnam POWs Thirty Years Later ( She lives in Arlington, Virginia. She will be moderating a panel at the Committee s Annual Conference on November 10 with some of the former POWs. VALOR Valor - Issue 1 13

14 The National Memorial Day Parade May 29, 2006 Constitution Avenue Washington, DC On Memorial Day May 29, 2006 nearly 200 military units, veterans organizations, and community groups will march down Constitution Avenue in Washington, DC in the 2 nd Annual National Memorial Day Parade. In what will be a magnificent salute to America s veterans and honored war dead from the Revolution to Operation Iraqi Freedom, the parade will step off at noon, following the Memorial Day ceremonies at Arlington National Cemetery. Representing the men and women who served in America s military will be veterans from World War I through Afghanistan and Iraq. While almost every town of any size across the country has its own Memorial Day parade, for over 60 years the nation s capital was without its own parade honoring the servicemen and women who have preserved our country s freedom. In 2004, coinciding with the dedication of the World War II Memorial, A Parade Salute to World War II Veterans was held on Memorial Day, largely sponsored and organized by the World War II Veterans Committee (the sister organization to the National Vietnam Veterans Committee). The parade proved so successful that the city requested that the tradition of a Memorial Day parade for the nation be revived. In this 2 nd Annual National Memorial Day Parade, hundreds of veterans will join active servicemen from all branches of the military, as well as dozens of military and school bands. Honorary Grand Marshals from World War I, World War II, Korea, Vietnam, Desert Storm, Operation Enduring Freedom, and Operation Iraqi Freedom will lead the veterans of each of their respective eras (the Honorary Grand Marshal from Vietnam in the 2005 parade, Rear Admiral Robert Shumaker, is pictured above). For information on the parade, or how you can participate, call VALOR

15 The History and the Legacy Classic Books on Vietnam Steel My Soldiers Hearts The Hopeless to Hardcore Transformation of U.S. Army, 4th Battalion, 39th Infantry, Vietnam By Colonel David Hackworth Simon and Schuster Trade; 444 pages $16.00 (Paperback) In January 1969, one of the most promising young lieutenant colonels the U.S. Army had ever seen touched down in Vietnam for his second tour of duty, which would turn out to be his most daring and legendary. David H. Hackworth had just completed the writing of a tactical handbook for the Pentagon, and now he had been ordered to put his counterguerilla-fighting theories into action. He was given the morale-drained 4/ 39th a battalion of poorly led draftees suffering the Army s highest casualty rate and considered its worst fighting battalion. Hackworth s hard-nosed, inventive and inspired leadership quickly turned the 4/39th into Vietnam s valiant and ferocious Hardcore Recondos. Drawing on interviews with soldiers from the Hardcore Battalion conducted by his partner and coauthor, Eilhys England, Hackworth takes readers along on their sniper missions, ambush actions, helicopter strikes and inside the quagmire of command politics. With Steel My Soldiers Hearts, Hackworth places the brotherhood of the 4/39th into the pantheon of our nation s most heroic warriors. Goodnight Saigon The True Story of the U.S. Marines Last Days in Vietnam By Charles Henderson Penguin Group; 448 pages $24.95 (Hardcover) Charles Henderson, Marine Corps veteran and author, chronicles the final days of America s involvement in Vietnam through the voices of those who were thereand those who would never be heard again. On January 17, 1973, the Paris Peace Accords concluded America s involvement in Vietnam, supposedly ending decades of bloodshed. What took place, however, was far from peaceful-as the combined forces of the North Vietnamese Army and Viet Cong launched an all-out offensive to end the war with complete victory over the beleaguered south. A Better War The Unexamined Victories and Final Tragedy of America s Last Years in Vietnam By Lewis Sorley Harcourt Trade; 544 pages $27.00 (Paperback) Neglected by scholars and journalists alike, the years of conflict in Vietnam from 1968 to 1975 offer surprises not only about how the war was fought, but about what was achieved. Drawing on authoritative materials not previously available, including thousands of hours of tape-recorded allied councils of war, awardwinning military historian Lewis Sorley has given us what has long been needed-an insightful, factual, and superbly documented history of these important years. Among his findings is that the war was being won on the ground even as it was being lost at the peace table and in the U.S. Congress. The story is a great human drama of purposeful and principled service in the face of an agonizing succession of lost opportunities, told with uncommon understanding and compassion. Sorley documents the dramatic differences in conception, conduct, and-at least for a time-results between the early and the later war. Meticulously researched and movingly told, A Better War is sure to stimulate controversy as it sheds brilliant new light on the war in Vietnam. Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife Counterinsurgency Lessons from Malaya and Vietnam By John A. Nagl University of Chicago Press; 280 pages $17.00 (Paperback) Invariably, armies are accused of preparing to fight the previous war. In Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife, Lieutenant Colonel John A. Nagl a veteran of both Operation Desert Storm and the current conflict in Iraq considers the now-crucial question of how armies adapt to changing circumstances during the course of conflicts for which they are initially unprepared. Through the use of archival sources and interviews with participants in both engagements, Nagl compares the development of counterinsurgency doctrine and practice in the Malayan Emergency from 1948 to 1960 with what developed in the Vietnam war from 1950 to Here, culled from extensive interviews and research, are harrowing, neverbefore revealed accounts from people of every level and involvement in the Vietnam War-NVA and Viet Cong soldiers, U.S. embassy personnel, guerilla commanders, civilians, generals, double-agents, and leaders from both sides, including former president Gerald Ford and North Vietnamese military commander General Tran Van Tra. From the impending invasion from the north, to the gut-wrenching hours before the fall of Saigon when a brave pilot defied orders and rescued the last five Marines from the roof of the U.S. embassy, this is the Vietnam War as it was: raw, brutal, tragic-and haunting to this very day. All books available at bookstores and online at Amazon.com In examining these two events, Nagl the subject of a recent New York Times Magazine cover story by Peter Maass argues that organizational culture is key to the ability to learn from unanticipated conditions, a variable which explains why the British army successfully conducted counterinsurgency in Malaya but why the American army failed to do so in Vietnam, treating the war instead as a conventional conflict. Nagl concludes that the British army, because of its role as a colonial police force and the organizational characteristics created by its history and national culture, was better able to quickly learn and apply the lessons of counterinsurgency during the course of the Malayan Emergency. Valor - Issue 1 15

16 Spend Veterans Day Weekend in the Company of Heroes Ninth Annual Conference November 9-11, 2006 Arlington, Virginia From the Greatest Generation through the latest generation... For the past eight years, the World War II Veterans Committee has brought together some of America s greatest heroes for a three day conference dedicated to learning about, and from, the men and women who served during World War II. This year we welcome veterans from the Greatest Generation through the latest generation, including vets from World War II, Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq, and more. To request an information packet and registration form, call James Nicholson, Secretary of Veterans Affairs and veteran of Vietnam Bob Feller, Baseball Hall of Famer and veteran of World War II Ed Shames, platoon leader in E. Co., 506 PIR, 101st Airborne - Band of Brothers Celia Sandys, noted author and granddaughter of Sir Winston Churchill Speakers Include Steve Ritchie, The only Air Force Ace Pilot in the Vietnam War James Webb, Decorated veteran of Vietnam, former Secretary of the Navy, and best-selling author Adrian Cronauer, Famed Vietnam Disc Jockey and subject of the movie Good Morning, Vietnam And Many More! National Vietnam Veterans Committee A Project of The American Studies Center th St., NW, Suite 856 Washington, D.C NONPROFIT ORG. U.S. POSTAGE PAID WALDORF, MD PERMIT NO. 30