Any US soldiers that served in WWI, WWII, Korea, and Vietnam?

Absolutely not what the original question was about, but remarkable nonetheless:

Before becoming Prime Minister Churchill was indeed re-appointed as First Lord of the Admiralty , prompting a general message to the Royal Navy , “Winston is back!”

Even as Prime Minister he was in harm’s way, flying unescorted a
number of times across the Atlantic and from North Africa.

There is a theory that the civilian aircraft carrying actor Leslie Howard home from Gibraltar was shot down by the Germans in the mistaken belief that Churchill was aboard

Not that remarkable in the National Guard. I’ve had several soldiers stay in until mandatory retirement age. Some had long breaks in service others just kept doing it part time for decades. One of our trucks had a 60 year old gunner who was a Marine veteran of Tet and his vehicle commander had been a Navy swift boater.

In fact here is Andy.

My understanding is that a five star is never actually retired so that would count.

I was visiting a senior living place last month and they had a wall with pics and info about residents who served in the military.

One of them served in WWII, Korea, Vietnam and “Dessert”* Storm.

Wow.

  • At least spell it right if you’re honoring someone like this.

I served with a Master Chief who got into the Navy at the end of WWII. (at age 16) He may have made it to Desert Storm but I am not sure. So he was in over 40 years already when I knew him but was only around 58. I know he got bumped up from our Cmd Master Chief to Fleet Cmd Master Chief. I checked, he never made the final step to Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy.

He joked his wife was a light weight and retired a Sr Chief after only 30 years.

All that said, WWI to Vietnam would be quite the long stretch.

From my (limited) experience in the US Army, and my understanding of its 20th Century history, no one is going to be allowed to stay in the service for 50 years or until age 65, unless they are a high-clout general or admiral, and even then it’s a stretch. So I think Bradley, Rickover and Eisenhower are as close as we’re going to get. No sergeant or field officer could qualify.

Though to nitpick, you could have been younger than 18 in 1918 to qualify. Plenty of kids lied about their age to enlist.

I don’t know if it was there 6 years ago, but his wiki page today says:

So he was technically on “active duty” in 1918 when he was a freshman at Annapolis. I don’t know if that counts for the OP’s purposes.

I can’t remember his name but he was the General in charge of the selective service system during the Vietnam War. His service began in the national guard in something like 1912 and he didn’t retire from active duty til around 1972. If anyone can find his name please post it.

Lewis Blaine Hershey

Ol’ Fuss and Feathers also served in the Aroostook War and the Pig War. It seems that they just couldn’t have a war without him.

Clearly he was in the Catering Corps. :slight_smile: