The Vietnam Wall ...

Per email from old friend ...

"... I am just back from having Sam, my grandson, in DC for a week. The Vietnam Wall was incredible, and so when I got home I looked it up and found you can search for someone who died there. This is what I found - newspaper articles, and all. Makes the wall seem really "alive" .."

http://thewall-usa.com/guest.asp?recid=44432

Capt. Joe Rosato, USAF :usa: , was my very close friend going way back to high school days in Hudson, Ohio. He was shot down in Vietnam in June 1966 on a mission out of Cam Rahn Bay.
I was at Cam Ranh at that time and was unaware he was stationed there ... I deeply regret missing this chance to see and talk with him again. He was a hero from a youngster on to a decorated jet pilot. RIP, Joe ... you are not forgotton!

:usa:

Thanks for posting the link SBA - took the opportunity to look up some old friends that are on the wall and reminisce a bit. I certainly miss my friends and comrades.

We took a POW harley run a few years back when the Wall was out here (there's a travelling wall that happens every once in awhile). Eventhough I've never seen it in person, I still welled up. It was pretty powerful.

http://thewall-usa.com/info.asp?recid=15522

PFC Tim Ewing , 1st Cav. , was KIA at An Khe in 1966 . I never knew him, but in 1968 when I was stationed as Post Engineer at Camp Radcliff, An Khe, with the 4th Infantry Div., his father, Gerald Ewing , joined my staff as Real Estate Specialist - a DOD civilian position. He left his properous farm real estate broker business in California to specifically take this position at An Khe, where his only son was killed. I never asked him why, but I knew he was there for deep personal reasons. His job as Real Estate Specialist was to keep track of all the leases and agreements connected with the base, including the main camp and dozens of satellite bases in the countryside around the area. Many times we drove together through the very site where his son was killed ... the infamous "An Khe Pass" . We became great friends at An Khe, and for many years afterwards, until I lost track of him.
I had always planned, someday, and maybe still, to write a book about Vietnam, and I told Gerald I wanted to dedicate it to his fallen son. Gerald's wife, an RN and great lady, sent me copies of photos, high school year book items and newspaper clippings covering her son's short life ... they still reside up in my attic.
The photo that hit me the hardest was young Tim playing
the drums with his high school swingband ... a handsome happy lad anticipating a full life ahead of him. I lost a lot of friends in Vietnam, but Tim, who I never knew, remains in the top ranks of my memory.

:usa:

You need to get off your butt and write Dan. My Dad kept saying the same thing about his experiences leading up to WWII (he enlisted in 1938) and during the war and as a POW and the events that led to his interment by the Russians and eventual release to the Americans - and his subsequent assignment as a company commander to the 5th Ranger Battalion in preparation for the invasion of Japan.

He never did it.

And his story was an interesting one - his battalion commander when he was a corporal was LTC Dwight D. Eisenhower. His first assignment was to the 4th Infantry Regiment and his first job was to guard Custers old house with a broomstick handle. Custer's home was at Ft Abraham Lincoln. The barracks were made of stone and next to the window was a large wood sign painted with the words, "Soldiers will please refrain from shooting buffalo from the barracks window." His next assignment was to Camp Lewis Washington and the 15th Infantry Regiment. :D He told me about all of it and when I retire retire I am going to sit down and write. I got all his stuff. Some time in the near future I am going to donate his POW ausweise (ID papers) to the POW/MIA museum at Andersonville. He was a prisoner at OFLAG 64 in Poland and they have a special display for that camp.

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Originally posted by River Rat
You need to get off your butt and write Dan.

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Quite true, RR :cool: Everytime I go to the VA Med Center I see all these old Vets and know EACH one has a story that needs telling. Too bad somebody can't invent a "brain-tap" to transfer all these memories to a computer disk before they are lost forever. I bring this idea up every year at Stanford ... after all the human brain has got to be electrically "digitally operated" ... via "O"s and "1"s just like a computer ... all we need is the interface from the brain to a USB port.

A few years ago I went to the 50th Wedding Anniversary in Tucson of my old 1947 GI Bill college roommate Jack T. and his "Okie Baby" sweetheart wife, both now retired educators living in a retirement home. Jack was an 18 year old WWII Infantryman in the invasion of Germany, and was wounded by a grenade and sent back to duty after recovering, and then wounded again. I first met Jack when I walked in the U. Of Arizona 'Stadium Dorm' , my new home, and he looked up in amazement ..."YOU ?" ... He said I looked just like the German Tiger Tank driver that, about an hour after the battle, probably saved his life by stopping his tank, climbing out and dragging the wounded Jack out of the middle of the road, giving him a drink of water and pouring sulfa powder on his injuries, and leaving him where the medics could find him. An interesting side to "humanity" on the battlefield. Jack and I became best of friends and have remained so all these years. The whole post-war GI Bill scene was full of Vets who rarely even talked about their experiences unless pried out of ... no glory-grabbing, no whining ... just a universal desire to get on with post-war life.
I can't help but wonder where the "post trauma syndrome" was back in those days, in contrast to the prevalence now in later war Vets. :shrug:

:smokin:

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Originally posted by SBA
I can't help but wonder where the "post trauma syndrome" was back in those days, in contrast to the prevalence now in later war Vets. :shrug:

:smokin:

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True - I know that the landing at Salerno in the second wave deeply affected my Dad. Everyone in the first wave was either killed or seriously wounded. He said the only reason the second wave made it ashore was because the Germans were reloading their machineguns. When Saving Private Ryan came out I asked him if he had seen it. He replied that one of his buddies from WWII had seen it and it brought back the nightmares - and that no he had not seen it because he didn't need to go through that again. I do know that those first 15 minutes of the movie were intensely realistic - the only thing missing was the smell of combat....

Thanks for sharing guys, youngnz' like me forget to pause every now and then to think about the ultimate sacrifice those individuals made and for the freedoms we now enjoy because of them.

Griz - the thing that really really got to me was when I visited the American cemetary near Bastogne. There are over 50,000 of our dead there. I walked by each and every tombstone (took me nearly 2 hours to do it) and noted that my perception of the average age was about 23 years old. All I could think of was the lost promise of youth and a future for these young men, who died so long ago, probably scared out of their wits. Yet they overcame their fear and although surrounded by a numerically and technically superior force managed to hold their ground despite the freezing weather and constant shelling. We owe so much to those young men. I know I had tears in my eyes walking among those head stones...

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Originally posted by River Rat
.... these young men, who died so long ago, probably scared out of their wits.

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Scared, sure, but I've always observed, with amazement, how, regardless of the situation and the odds against them, our USA troops stand fast and fight ... that "get 'er DONE !" attitude. :usa: It isn't just good training and good equipment ... we can note other "Allies" ,with the same or more, making themselves scarce when the going gets rough ... it's an American cultural thing, evolved from generations of a sense of patriotism and duty.

:smokin:

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Originally posted by SBA

I can't help but wonder where the "post trauma syndrome" was back in those days, in contrast to the prevalence now in later war Vets. :shrug:

:smokin:

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I read an arctile that stated almost 65% of all PTS claims by Vietnam Vets were faked.. More people claimed to have had it than actually saw duty in the battle zones.. It's kinda hard to think PTS could occur in a REMF :shrug:

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Originally posted by SBA
Scared, sure, but I've always observed, with amazement, how, regardless of the situation and the odds against them, our USA troops stand fast and fight ... that "get 'er DONE !" attitude. :usa: It isn't just good training and good equipment ... we can note other "Allies" ,with the same or more, making themselves scarce when the going gets rough ... it's an American cultural thing, evolved from generations of a sense of patriotism and duty.

:smokin:

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True - which is why I also said:

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Yet they overcame their fear and although surrounded by a numerically and technically superior force managed to hold their ground despite the freezing weather and constant shelling. We owe so much to those young men.

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