Today, still moving into senior housing in Sioux Center, we wouldn't have to travel far to meet up with a Vietnam vet among the 100 or so residents.
During the Vietnam War era (1964–1973), approximately 27 million American men were eligible for the draft. Out of this pool, 2.2 million were drafted into military service. Not all draftees were sent to Vietnam, however; only about 650,000 of them actually served in-country, making up roughly 25% of the total U.S. forces stationed there.
So how many Vietnam Vets are there, in truth? It's hard to know the exact number, but let me try to do the math. The number of Vietnam War veterans still alive today is estimated to be around 610,000 who served in land forces and 164,000 who served at sea, according to research from the American War Library. This means roughly one-third of those who served in Vietnam are still living, which means that on my morning walk, I wouldn't have to get far up the street to find someone who remembers the jungles.
Fifty years ago, I was a recently married graduate student at Arizona State University, willing--even proud--of waving my 4F draft status card should people ask. My heart was, and is, perpetually silly, enough out of cue for the medics at Sioux Falls to pass me into draft eligibility. Let me make this clear--I missed the most important conflict of my own late 60s era.
I was driving a school bus for a little Christian school in the middle of Phoenix, Arizona in 1973. When I look back on it now, all of it seems rosy, especially going out into the desert to pick out the dairyman's kids. Everyday I got away from the central Phoenix apartment while my wife hurriedly, I'm sure, got ready to teach at the same little school.
Here's what I remember. The radio was on, tuned to public radio, I'm sure, as the kids stepped up and in. The news included, almost as an afterthought, the fact that with the withdrawal of all U. S. personnel and the fall of Saigon, one could safely say that the Vietnam War [upper case] was over. It was over, I thought, as I was coming from Tempe toward central Phoenix along Washington Avenue. It was over, the whole fricking mess was over.
The kid in the seat behind me, a cute kid in fourth grade maybe, a kid who quite regularly had an opinion on things, was sitting up close as if listening to the news.
"Hey, Stevie," I said over my shoulder, "you hear that?"
He hadn't.
"The Vietnam War--it's over."
He did a kind of fourth-grade thing just then, kind of cheered, as if the Phoenix Suns had just hit a buzzer-beater.
And then, in a far more inquisitive tone, he leaned up forward, hoping for wisdom. "Who won?" he asked me.
It's much easier to say, today, "wasn't us." But back then, the kid, Stevie, the cute kid, was in fourth grade. Maybe ten minutes later I'd let all the kids off the bus at Phoenix Christian. I figured I'd let the teachers take care of answering that one, if it even came up.
In Ho Chi Minh city, then and now, there was a real celebration.
5 comments:
("Who won?" he asked me.)
The real lesson of Vietnam was finally driven home in a radio broadcast circa 1985.
Vietnam was featured on National Public Radio’s All Things Considered. According to the report, the Vietnamese government was then making a special effort to get all the Amerasian children out of Vietnam and into the U.S.
After the Cuban Revolution of 1959, Fidel Castro was once quoted as saying that Cuba “would never again be an American brothel.” The South Vietnamese soldier was asked to risk life and limb in an effort to maintain a similar American brothel in the southern half of Vietnam.
While the Vietnamese are practicing a doctrine of racial purity straight out of an SS manual, the U.S. has become, in effect, the world’s racial dumping ground. Consequently, when the Vietnamese decided to get those Amerasian children out of their gene pool, the logical place was to dump them in our muddied gene pool.
I am thinking of changing my opinion from "all wars are banker's wars" to "all wars are race wars".
26 And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written,
thanks,
Jerry
Not all draftees were gund ho of their excursion in Veitnam. Numerous GI s after conceding that they despied what they were doing and why., were discreedly assigned the duty of constructing previes for the brass and swiping the deck for the officers.
You and your comrades could have had an oppertunity to influence people
that had power to command military action in the Southeast. That would have accomlished more than you and your hippie friends waving your draft
card protesting in Sioux Center Central Park.
Netflix has a new 5-part miniseries on the Vietnam war. Worth watcing.
All this brings to mind as to what makes up a "warrior". Naturally, we immediately think of a persons who commits him/herself to conflict and battles. What is to be gained by the taking of a life? A Sioux Headman of the Hunkpapa Sioux had this to say and it banks on the rendering of "true justice" which is Biblical. QUOTE: "Warriors are not what you think of as warriors. A warrior is not someone who fights, because no one has the right to take another life. The warrior for us is one who sacrifices for the good of others. His task is to take care of the elderly, the defenseless, those who cannot provide for themselves and above all, the children, the future of humanity". Sitting Bull 1831-1890. It reads like the rendering of True Justice, which is Biblical. Research: The CRC mission work to the Sioux Tribe in the latter part of the 1890's. Why did they leave so soon after arriving?
The meek shall in inherit the earth.
There are sheep, wolves and wolves in sheep's clothing.
Manfred's Remus Baker remains more than an enigma. We know orders were issued in Siberia dated 1920, but we are forbidden to see a copy. When President Woodrow Wilson sent U.S. troops to hold the Trans-Siberian railroad, secret instructions were given by Woodrow Wilson (Jacob Schiff) in person to Gen. William S. Graves.
We have not yet located these instructions, although we know they exist.
I am still waiting for my reparations for what the Yiddish empire did to New Amsterdam in 1664.
Both FDR's gang (Bernard Baruch and his pets) and the Japanese maintain the myth that "the dumb blond got lost." concerning Amelia Earhart.
Poker champ Nixon claimed all our POWs were back when he knew perfectly well all captured electronic warfare warriors had been shipped to the Soviet Union.
The west died at Stalingrad.
Without exception, all wartime policies were implemented and directed by (Talmudist) Zionist Jews, including the continuing propaganda and falsifications associated with the events.
thanks,
Jerry
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