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Chapter 10

  by Kathy Hufford

   ONLY TWELVE MONTHS

 

 

Young Vietnamese boys selling Coke to us about 30 miles NW of Saigon in the spring of 1967.

 

 For a large view of this photo see Kent's Photos under the Mustang section of this site.

 

If you have read the book Catch-22, the Viet Nam war, at times seemed like the book. Things should not be like they were there. Much of it was caused by politics at home, such as trying to build a “Great Society” and fighting a war at the same time, without getting the public engaged. The National Guard, as units, were not called up to prevent a backlash from the public and the governors of the states. Combat tours were limited to 12 months. Most of the troops in Viet Nam never got their boots dirty. They lived in camps, with air conditioning, PXs, swimming pools, and clubs to drink in. I was even lucky to have many of those amenities in base camp. When I crossed the barbed wire in my aircraft every morning tho, I became a target.  I could be in the middle of a fire fight along side the road to Saigon getting my aircraft shot up. And the next day be in an unarmed jeep going down the same road to Saigon to visit the PX to look at stereo equipment. You could buy a case of beer or Coke for $2.40. Hard alcohol was just as cheap. Drugs were available, but being in aviation units, no one did drugs because they were flying and were required to take random, frequent drug testing. I never saw drugs in Viet Nam . When we were with the ground troops in the field, we never saw any drug use. Seeing some of the movies like PLATOON made me think that movie was made on the moon.

We flew to Viet Nam in commercial leased Boeing 707s. Most of us came home that way too. In February 1967, I flew to San Francisco wearing my uniform. Then got on the military Charter at Travis AFB and flew to Viet Nam . Returning in February 1968, we landed at Travis, and then was told to change into civilian clothes, which I did, then flew to home. On my second tour, I flew from Tacoma in civilian clothes, got to Travis, then put on a uniform. Upon return in August 1971, we wore civilian clothes the whole way. Leaving Travis in August 1971, the buses were assaulted by “anti-war” protesters. I did not get spat on, but others did. Not a good welcome back.

Every military person I know, that has been shot at is “anti-war”. It is not an academic thought process to a person in the military. When someone decides to use military power as an element of policy, then we know it will be a military person that pays for that policy in blood. The “anti-war” movement got fired up in the mid-60s and that was fine. This is a free country. That movement turned bad in the early 1970’s when it started attacks on the members of the US military. I will never forget that time. It was not till I worked for three years in the Midwest in the early 1980s with Army reserve units did I change my mind about the “American public” view of the military. Working in little Midwestern towns then, when I went to breakfast in uniform, I could not pay for my breakfast. Someone always from the restaurant paid for it. I am starting to see a bad anti-soldier trend in the anti-war movement in the IRAQ war.  Making personal attacks on members of the military because they served, to most of us that served, is the most distressing part of the “legacy of the American involvement in the Viet Nam war” and no monument or parade, after the fact will make up for it. Jane Fonda’s apology years later is not accepted nor wanted.

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