Discharged in 1964, got the originals, 186396xx, can say it frontwards & backwards, remember the Ser # of my first issued Weapon, M1, number of eyelets in boots low quarters. Code of conduct & chain of command meant nothing in my first year, don’t want KP or butt patrol, better know the above at anytime the CO or First Shirt asked, not just at inspections, How many panes of glass in the barracks, that one put a lot of guys on KP.
We learned to be very observant & that actually helped me much during my service.
I didn’t vote, but my father still has them, Vietnam '68-'69, IIRC. He wasn’t even an American when he got sucked into the war (moved over here from Poland about a year previous.)
I voted other because while I"m not a veteran, I have my dad’s dogtags from WWII. So he kept them, along with his footlocker, his entire uniform, and his discharge papers, a diary, and two albums filled with photographs that he took during his tour of duty.
I know that there has been an active market in forged dog tags over there, as they know that American visitors will purchase them. But this one had my original service number and religious preference on it. I’m not sure how someone could have obtained that information. And it just looked like it had been lying in the dirt for 30-40 years.
I have a military keepsakes box up in the attic. My original smartbook from Basic. Stuff from Desert Storm. Medals/Ribbons, etc. I’m pretty sure my dog tags are in that box.
I thought we had to give them up upon discharge, as I don’t recall keeping them. If that’s not the case, they were pulverized by me in the most violent and abusive method possible and tossed into the fiery pit of Hell with prejudice. It was the least I could do.
I still have mine. They’re around the neck of a wooden statue that I picked up in Haiti on R&R in 1970 while stationed in Guantanamo Bay.
My younger son wears my father’s dog tags from WWII.
Mine are aluminum while my Dad’s are brass. (at least I think they are. mine are silver, Dad’s are gold )
I don’t think my father kept his. When he died, I found his discharge papers but no dog tags. He was in the Army for I believe two years from about 1950-52 (but stayed stateside and was not sent to Korea) and died in 1999.