Anecdotal evidence only!
I was in combat in Viet Nam. I did not arrive there until I was an E-3 for over 6 months. I knew nothing and it was only through the smarts of others that I survived those first few months. (The “baton” gets passed after those few months and now you’re the wise old man).
Men talk/don’t talk about combat for many reasons.
1). Was the combat culturally acceptable? Was it a good war?
2). How many Vets are left from your particular conflict? How many share your memories?
3). How close are you to other men you served with?
4). How active are you in Vet organizations?
From my own experience the older the Vet the more he is willing to speak, especially as his generation starts to fade.
WWII vets fought a culturally good war, they were less reticent to talk about it. Still, guys caught in really horrific circumstances remained closedmouth as a group, (even as they talked to each other).
Most Viet vets I stumbled upon were very tight-lipped; part of that was certainly the inability to share a particular horror with someone who really can’t grasp the choices made. Another part was not wanting to bring the approbation of their acquaintences down upon themselves.
I couldn’t really speak about it until the mid 80’s, and then it was my uncle, a veteran of the Phillipine Campaign in WWII that helped me deal with a majority of the shit in my brain.
I would say that as a rule: Watch what your sargeant does, he’s the one who will most likely survive.
my son (Marine infantry) did two tours in Iraq; discharged Feb 05. saw extended and repeated combat. Over the past few years I see that he opens in stages. He will have told me about a battle or skirmish before, but then adds details that he didn’t want to talk about as time goes on. I think it will all gestate within about 10 years.
re Fool on the Hill – if you arrived in Nam as an E-3 for already six months, I will assume you didn’t arrive “right out of basic”. It sounds like you had some extended training before you went into the bush. that was my only point; not that E-3’s weren’t new to combat, but that very few died as a result of being sent “straight from basic.”
I was a Marined in Vietnam, 2/69-2/70. My entire time was spent with a rifle company, Golf company 2nd Bn., 7th Marines. There is a web site for the company at www.golfco7thmar.com
A couple of reasons that so many newbies got killed. Just my $.02 mind you.
The first was that they were often walking point and thus much more likely to either trip a booby trap or walk into an ambush. Neither of which got any easier to spot as you gained experience. Mostly, it seems to me, experience got you exempted from being point which was a dangerous thing to be.
The second was that as they came into country they were assigned to companies that were short handed, which usually meant that a lot was going on with them at the time.
In August 1969 my platoon probably got in 10ish new guys. By the first of September they had all been killed or wounded. Not that the “old guys” faired a whole lot better. We had about 45 men in the platoon in the middle of August and by the 29th we were down to 13. I kept a diary is why I can remember all this.
The best option is to introduce the newbies during down time, when the unit was pulled off the line for regrouping and reorganization. Then the vets can go into as much detail as they need to educate the newbs about survival and working as a team. The US Army in WW2-well they didn’t have any down time at all, with the brass feeling the need to keep pushing steadily towards Germany (ostensibly to beat the Russians), so the rookies got fed into units which were in combat, and the vets were too busy trying to survive to show them the ropes.
Has there been an “Ask the Vietnam combat vet” thread yet, or something similar? If agreeable and willing to answer questions, may I suggest that some of the vets here (e.g. Foolonthehill-hey nice nick) start one?
You have a few things slightly twisted. I will attempt to set things right based on my Army service from 1966-1968, about 2.5 years.
First of all, a recruit was only an E-1 until the end of basic. He then was given two weeks leave and a rank of E-2. So the only way any E-1 was in combat would be if he was busted. Both E-1 and E-2s were Privates.
If you kept your nose clean, an E-2 would be promoted to E-3 (Private First Class) within months. In the Vietnam era, AFAIK, it was not common to be sent directly to Vietnam out of basic. Usually you were sent to a stateside or overseas assignment for a few months to a year, then Vietnam was a definite possibility.
Of course you might argue that a few months stateside didn’t prepare you much for combat, but it did prepare you for the Army way of doing things. It gave you a chance to learn what to hate and how.
Enlistees had the option (before enlisting) of requesting where they would serve for the first year only. They could be guaranteed this location if the position was available before they signed up, but after that first year, they were at the top of the cannon fodder list. Still, some thought that was better than making the list sooner as a draftee.
Remember that there were draftees, who had 2 years to serve, and enlistees, who (for the army), signed up for 3, and were sometimes discharged up to 5 months early (as I was). So the Army had more time to play with enlistees. I was sent to a permanent party assignment in San Francisco after basic (just the luck of the draw) and stayed there for a year and a half. Just when I thought I was going to sit out the war in the shadow of the the Golden Gate, they sent me to Vietnam with about a year and a half to go in my term. (The standard Vietnam tour was one year or til the end of your term, whichever was shorter.)
Most everyone I know attained E-4 (Specialist 4th Class or Corporal) before discharge, even the 2-year draftees. I myself made it from E-2 to E-4 twice. There was a shortage of willing re-enlistments (even the enlistees weren’t volunteers, but often trying to avoid the rigors of being a draftee), so if you re-upped, you moved up in the ranks fast. A friend of mine attained E-6 (Staff Sgt) within 4 years, although that was exceptional.
Possibly what I am about to tell might not fit in this thread, but I guess it has to do with the “what makes veterans talk about their combat experiences”. Warning, long story with a longer establishing narration…
My father was a veteran from the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). He fought for the Republican side (anti-Franco). In other words, the side that lost. His experiences post-war were not nice, to say the least.
He spent 3 years in hiding in a windowless attic until 1942, when he was denounced and arrested. During his detention the head of the local Phalanx had him beaten to within an inch of his life (this particular individual owed his life to my father, but that’s another story that I might tell later on). Afterwards he was tried for “military rebellion” and sentenced to death; he spent one month in death row expecting every morning to be taken out and shot. In the end his sentence was commuted to 30 years in jail, after some friends interceded on his behalf, pointing out that he was a doctor and there was a shortage of them. Finally, in 1948, there was an amnesty and he was put out of jail, but blacklisted: He could not work in any hospital in the land. Fortunately, he was good enough as a doctor to be able to make a living with a private practice (go figure: The Franco authorities are incompetent enough to think that barring someone who is a doctor from working in hospitals will be enough to ruin his livelihood).
Anyway. When I was born my father was already 59, and by the time I was 7, I noticed that there was one other man who would come to our home once a year. My father would get together with him, a big pot of coffee, a bottle of brandy and two glasses, go into his desk room with him, and the two of them would be there alone for several hours. No one was to bother them. The visit would leave later in the evening, the coffee and brandy having been drunk.
Then, when I was 16, the day after the yearly visit of this man, my father took me to his side and told me: “Son, you must have been asking yourself why this old man comes every year to visit your father, and why we lock ourselves in my desk to drink brandy and coffee for hours”. He then told me the story I am about to tell you.
In late 1938 the Republican armies were retreating all over Spain. The forces of Franco were advancing; the last desperate offensive of the Republic (The Battle of the Ebro) was in its last throes, having failed. My father was in a unit that was retreating from that battle from the Teruel area towards the south, towards Republican territory.
The area where my father’s unit was was mountainous and wooded. His unit was doing what amounted to a fighting retreat, with the enemy very close after them, “biting at their heels” so to speak. The path for their retreat was relatively “safe” (through the woods) except in one place, where they were forced to go through a pass that was an open area, some 150 metres wide, between two stretches of forest cover. The Republican command had promised that there would be forces protecting that stretch, so that they could pass.
During all that trek, the unit my father was in (I don’t know what the technical term for it would be) had shrunk in size, between casualties and desertions, from 800 men to roughly 200 by the time they arrived to that particular point.
The officer in charge of the remaining men of my father’s unit (he might have been a colonel, but I don’t know how to translate military ranks from one language -or, more precisely, from one country- to another) sent a few soldiers to cross and check the situation. They couldn’t see how it was from under all those trees.
Possibly those poor guys were really surprised, in their last seconds alive, to see that, instead of their own people, the enemy was there, some distance away, with a few heavy machine guns, a few light cannon and other things. As soon as they saw some guys from the other side getting out of the forest, they started lobbing mortar rounds in the area of the forest from where they saw them come out.
Surrender was not considered. The Spanish Civil War was rather uncivil in that neither side took many prisoners. Going back was not an option, because they had the enemy behind as well, somewhere.
The colonel in charge said, essentially: “Guys, we have to take our chances. Let’s try to run to safety on the other side of the gap, and good luck”. And they set off, to go through the worst lottery cum gauntlet imaginable. Stakes: Your life.
200 men began the mad dash.
16 made it to the other side. One of them, obviously, my father. Otherwise I wouldn’t be here today.
They managed, by some miracle, to make it back to Republican-held territory. Their fates and stories diverge afterwards.
By the time my father and the other old man met at my home, they were the last two left of that group of 16. They gathered every year on the anniversary of that event, to remember their comrades and drink to them.
My father died a couple of weeks after he told me this story. I am grateful that he did, so that it wouldn’t be lost.
Just my 2 eurocent!
JoseB
P.S.: As a tragicomic detail, the man who came to visit my place had an “interesting” postscriptum to this incident. After making it “home” from that massacre, he was given a furlough (well deserved, I think). Unfortunately, transportation was totally chaotic, and he had to change buses several times. More unfortunately still, the man was illiterate, and at a certain point he got in the wrong bus because he couldn’t read the destination.
He ended up back in the frontlines, where he spent the rest of the war.
But, obviously, he survived. That’s some consolation.
P.P.S.: Sorry for my mistakes in English ortography and grammar.
JoseB, what a striking and tragic story. Thank you for sharing it, and my blessing (for it’s worth) on your father and his friend for their service to their country.
I am sure that there are people of both types. My grandfather left France at Dunkirk and landed again in Normandy on D-Day. He never said a word about combat. The only time I ever heard him mention anything at all about the war was when we went out to lunch on June 6, 1994 (for reasons unrelated to D-Day) and he exchanged a couple of sentences with another veteran to the effect that 50 years ago that day they were both in a very different place.
A question about Vietnam and being drafted vs volunteering. Why didn’t people who were about to be drafted volunteer for the Air Force or something? Also, would it be possible to do such if you lottery number got called? Or once you’re told you’re being drafted are all other options lost?
A couple of my Bro’s buddies did just that- volunteered for the Navy to get out of being drafted for the Army. Meant an extra year of service, usually.
Not really - it balanced out. Instead of being drafted for 2 years active duty, 2 years active reserve and 2 years inactive reserve you could volunteer for 3 years active duty and 3 years inactive reserve. Volunteers finished their military obligations sooner, at least the intrusive ones.
In addition, they had more choices for branch of service and jobs.
You can see where someone would choose this route, and indeed lots did. Most casualties in Vietnam were volunteers - this included most of the Marines, Navy and Air Force and the better portion of the officer corps.
I’ll be the first to admit that it was a curious kind of volunteerism, not entirely altruistic and often fatalistic. But there were wars to consider - these rules applied from 1951 through the Vietnam Era, and included the Korea draftees and volunteers.
A good friend of mine ended up with a low lottery number near the end of the draft. He went through his physical and everything. Before he was actually given a date for boot camp, he “volunteered” for the Army National Guard.
It was really hard to get into the Air Force (almost impossible) because so many guys of that age were in (Navy was a little easier) and your time was markedly longer. Many of the men of draftable age looked toward the National Guard, but for many of those units, you pretty much had to “know” someone. Air National guard was virtually impossible to get in. Army National Guard, somewhat easier (even there, there were geographic problems.
I ended up with a low number (30) and being drafted. I looked at all the alternatives. I ended up in Vietnam.
There was no lottery at the troop peak. Who was chosen was up to local boards. Did they choose by random selection? Hardly. Local boards often knew the candidates personally, and if they didn’t like someone or wanted to teach them a lesson, those candidates went to the top of the list.
When I got drafted, I explored all options (including going to Canada, which in retrospect, would have been the best one). The “desireable” services like Air Force had a minimum of 6 year terms, where the Army was 3 and a draftee had 2. Little did I know that being a draftee would have been the best choice for me and I would have saved a wasted year, but the recruiters are salesmen and you have to gamble with what you know.
The only service I could have tolerated morally was the Coast Guard – it always seemed like a good service and less likely to start wars 10,000 miles away, but it had a 6 year minimum period.
I could have gone in the Army as an officer, but that, too, required a longer committment than the minimum. No matter how you look at it, they gotcha.
Once you had a draft notice in hand, you could go to any recuiting office or service and sign up to cancel the draft status, but you had to agree to begin service on or before the draft date. IIRC, that was about 30 days or less.
It got even worse if you reported on the official date, having settled personal affairs and ready to be shipped to boot camp, then they found something about you (medical or other) that postponed your induction. You could be sent back home to wait for another notice at any time, or never.
That’s why not all enlistees were volunteers. You could tell by their serial numbers if they were enlistees (the number began with RA instead of US), but it didn’t tell the real story.