Newspaper Page Text
The Red and Black, Wednesday, July 5, 1972
Page 7
Vietnam veterans—painful reminder
By JOSEPH A JAMES
Editor's note: James served
as an artillery forward observer
with the First Infantry Division
during 1969-70 in Vietnam.
“It’s something that stays
inside of you. You might have
a real good buddy, somebody
you have a lot in common
with, but no matter what,
you’ll always feel different
than him in some way. And the
reason you do is because
you’ve seen dead babies and he
hasn’t.”
The speaker is Snake, a
23-year old University of
Georgia student, and the
source of the difference that he
speaks of is the fact that he is a
Vietnam veteran.
Tuesday Still raining
Resupply choppers can 7 get in.
CO says we may get hot chow
Thursday if rain lifts a bit.
Snipers picking at 2nd
platoon. Raining harder now.
Was I ever anywhere but here?
According to Mrs. Helen
Roberts, Veterans
Representative at the
University of Georgia, there
were less than 800 veterans
enrolled at the university three
years ago. But spring quarter
1,312 were attending school.
Although only a small
mud along this creek smells
like a dead sow’s intestines.
Stains the skin. Covered less
than 200 meters this morning.
Too thick to walk through;
mostly crawled. Half company
has runs.
Under provisions of the G.I.
Bill, a veteran is entitled to
between S175 and $230 per
month from the Veterans
Administration while he is
attending school. The amount
depends on marital status and
number of children. Few
Vietnam veterans consider the
G.I. Bill a favor from the
government; most consider it a
debt that the country owes
them. Vietnam veterans come
to school for many different
reasons, but all feel obligated
to collect on that debt.
“I tried for three months to
get a job,” a former marine
explains, “and when I couldn’t
find anything, I decided to go
to college. It helps to get that
money from the VA, but I sure
as hell don’t feel particularly
grateful for it. It’s the least the
country can do for men, as I
sec it.”
Another veteran says that he
didn’t even bother to look for
a job after returning from
Vietnam. “The way my head
was when I got back,” he says,
“I could no more see dropping
into the nine-to-fiver than 1
could see going back to ’Nam.
both mean hello; to the G.I. ‘s
that taught them, it means,
"Reace, little one” or "Screw
you, gook."
If the Vietnam veteran’s
political orientations were
altered by the war, so were his
attitudes towards drugs. “I
never smoked grass before
’Nam,” a south Georgia veteran
says, "and I figured anyone
who did was probably a
pervert. About my third week
in-country (in Vietnam), I had
my first joint. Bought my first
ounce the next day. I knew
guys who messed around with
hard stuff, but I never touched
it. I still smoke a little. No
harm done to anyone, right?”
Even veterans who have
never used marijuana express a
tolerance for its use by others,
a tolerance many did not
necessarily have before going
to Vietnam.
Current disinterest on the
part of students concerning the
war has led some veterans to be
skeptical of how much
sincerity exists in student
protest of anything. There is a
suspicion towards the motives
behind the activism.
“I think that we’re seeing
less war protest,” one Vietnam
veteran explains, “because of
two reasons. The first is that
students, like the general
public, believe that the war is
ending. The second reason
Learn to
number of Vietnam veterans,
30 to 3S, are actually members
of the campus chapter of
Vietnam Veterans Against the
War, even fewer are members
of the Athens chapters of the
American Legion and Veterans
of Foreign Wars. And despite
the large number of veterans
enrolled at the university, the
Veterans Club, a campus social
organization, had to fold last
fall due to a lack of interest.
Veterans say that they are
not joining these organizations
because they see little point in
affiliating with groups that
only serve to perpetuate bad
memories of the military and
Vietnam.
The VVAW has many
supporters among returning
Vietnam veterans, but as one
ex-infantryman puts it, "I'm
just not up for joining any
organizations, at least not for a
while. I think they (VVAW)
are doing a good job, but I’m
just not interested at this
point. Maybe later.”
“Most veterans," Chuck
Searcy, a VVAW coordinator,
explains, “need time to
readjust to a normal
environment before they feel
like participating in war
protest. They need time to
cool their heads.” and if
cooling their heads means
abstention from active war
protest, it also means not going
down to the VFW to swap war
stones.
Thursday Point man hit this
morning Medevaced out. The
School seemed like a good
idea.”
Saturday In night defensive
position. Christ, it’s quiet.
People cleaning their weapons.
Wet socks, rotten with mildew,
hanging on branches. Eating
cold C's. We look like a Walter
Cronkite show.
Many veterans say that prior
to going to Vietnam they were
conservatively oriented in their
political and social attitudes
but claim that the war
experience radicalized them in
many respects. “Before going
over,” a former artilleryman
says, "1 took for granted that
Washington knew what was
best I figured we were justified
in being there and all. It didn't
take long to see that the whole
thing was a bad joke. Sure, we
were building some schools and
hospitals, but they hardly
balanced out with the napalm
and defoliating agents. After
seeing through the deception
of our Asian policy, I started
doubting a lot of our other
national policies. My
confidence in our present
administration is just about
nil."
Monday Went through a
village along the river today:
little kids waved at us like kids
in Belgium and France waved
at our fathers. But these kids
are different. Some of them
flash us the peace sign and
others flash us the bird. Ten
years of G.I.'s taught them
both greetings. To the kids.
protest is down is because
fewer and fewer students
consider what's left of the war
to be a direct threat to them;
they feel fairly confident that
their chances of being sent over
are getting smaller and smaller.
If this was the main drive
behind the protest, I think it
makes the other reasons for
protest seem small.”
On the subject of amnesty
for deserters and draft evaders,
feelings are divided. Those
against granting amnesty base
their opposition on the premise
that it would be unfair to those
men who did serve. They also
argue that the granting of
amnesty would be setting a
dangerous precedent.
Those veterans who support
the idea of amnesty feel that
the country would be setting a
much worse precedent by not
allowing the resisters to come
out of hiding unpunished. This,
they say. would be tantamount
to continued defense of the
war as a legitimate policy.
Wednesday No sleep in 41
hours. Set up two ambushes,
one last night, another this
morning. Sores on arm worse.
Mail due tomorrow. Hope
every football team in every
conference lost their games last
weekend.
A frustration every Vietnam
veteran shares is the feeling
thlt nobody really gave a damn
about the sacrifice. The
Vietnam veteran doesn’t want
a parade, but he wants to hear
"I think that we re seeing less war
protest because, one, students, like
the general public, believe that the
war is ending. The second reason
is because fewer and fewer students
consider what's left of the war to
be a direct threat to them; they feel
fairly confident that their chances of
being sent over are getting smaller
and smaller."—Vietnam veteran
something different than,
“Hey, where you been?
Haven't seen you around." Or,
“I heard it isn’t that bad over
there. Tell me about the
whores.”
People can not really
comprehend where the soldier
has been, what he was told to
do, so perhaps a genuine
offering of gratitude or
understanding is impossible
and always will be.
While in Vietnam, Snake
served as an infantryman with
the 25th Division. He was there
for 14 months, extending two
months beyond the normal
12-month tour to get an
“early-out” from the Army.
Married only three months
before going overseas, he was
divorced four months after
returning to the States. After
quitting his welding job, Snake
bummed around for a half
year, then came to the
University to complete work on
a degree. On the wall of his
small efficiency apartment is a
photo-poster of an endless row
of tombstones in Arlington
National Cemetary. The
message beneath the photo is:
"Our Only Vietnam Deadline."
Fingering the Montagnard
bracelet on his left wrist. Snake
is talking about himself. “I’ve
been back over a year, and still
have dreams. I try to forget
’Nam. and sometimes I think
I've done a pretty good job of
it. Then, out of nowhere comes
one of those black rushes. It’«
horrible. Second month over,
one of my best buddies got hit
real bad. Leg, chest, the works.
Two of us tried to hold him
together until a medevac ship
could get in. The ship came in,
but by the time they had him
inside, I knew that it wouldn’t
do him any good. The chopper
lifted him out of the bush, and
1 remember thinking, ‘He’s
already dead.’ After the ship
was gone, I just sat there on
the ground. The blood on my
hands from where I’d been
holding on to him was still
warm. I wake-up a couple of
times a month feeling that
warm blood all over me.
"School’s alright, 1 suppose.
But I don’t really feel that I’m
a part of it, you know. Kids
talk about how unaware their
parents are, but what the kids
don’t see is that they're not
much better tuned-in
themselves. Their lives are as
closed as their parents. Lots of
them oppose the war. but for
many of them it’s a
follow-the-leader deal
“For students a major hassle
is a D in major subject. It’s
funny. It’s real scary to get
into a situation where your
hindsight is 20/20 and be able
to see that the only hassle is
that there has to be a system
that can only measure itself by
giving out A’s and D’s. None of
it has a damn thing to do with
living or dying.
“I’ve got friends here. V** I
don’t go out much. I’U go over
to somebody's place and get
stoned, but I’m not much for
bars or big crowds anymore.
Groups can really bring me
down.
“Freaks can give off as many
bad vibes as frat rats. Christ,
they’re both so busy checking
each other out that they don’t
consider that it’d be a good
idea to check themselves out.
Seems like everybody is
becoming more and more
polarized.
“I’ve found that since
getting back I’m harder to be
friendly with. In fact. I’ve had
people tell me that, people that
I knew before ’Nam. I know
it’s not healthy, but that’s the
way it is. I know guys that
come back from ’Nam, and
they don’t seem any different
than when they first went over.
“But for me, that war waj
the great divider, and it’s like
that for a lot of guys.”
Describing it in different
ways, giving it different names,
all Vietnam veterans arc
familiar with Snake’s "great
divider.” It divides those who
were there from those who
were not there; it is a
chronological boundary line,
segregating live events into
things that happened before
the war and things that
happened afterwards. One
veteran looks back on the war
as a “second puberty.”
Another sees it as "an extra
birthday, one I didn’t need.”
Troop, a 26-year old senior
majoring in political science,
was a member of a “Lurp”
(Long Range Reconnaisance
Patrol) unit in the III Corp area
of Vietnam. Single, Troop
shares a garage apartment with
two other students. He hopes
to enter law school next fall.
“I guess I’m not what you’d
call bitter about having had to
go over. What I’m bitter about
is that v/ith the evidence in so
long ago, the people of this
country arc letting the war
continue. I’m no anarchist, but
I think the people of this
country have a right to stop
this thing.
“We could get men, women
and children organized and
disguise everyone as if we were
going to be a stream of tourists
going through the White
House. Once inside, we could
all run up the stairs to the
living quarters and get Nixon in
a comer and tell him
everybody is tired of this
bullshit, tell him we’re tired of
hearing about his schedules.
“But he’d probably go on
national TV,” Troop laughs,
“and say that none of us were
Americans He'd tell everybody
that we were Albanians. You
know, the same thing he said
about the vets that marched
last year. He said that they
were not even real veterans.
Wow."
b rid ay Read in "Stars and
Stripes” that some more
Senators are in-country. Wish
one would fly out here to see
our jungle-rotted feet. He’d
probably just hold his nose and
make a speech about how well
Vietnamization is going.
Explaining the realities of
Vietnam to other students and
the general public is, veterans
agree, the best way to counter
the government's reports on
the war’s causes, progress, and
value. This can be done
through guerilla theater, as
performed on the steps of the
U S. Capitol, or it can be done
through establishment of
dialogue
The campus chapter of
VVAW has chosen the latter as
its means. 1 feel that the
presentation of basic
knowledge.” Coordinator
Searcy says, “lays inroads of
understanding in a much more
effective way than guerilla
theater, which often only has a
temporary effect on those who
see it."
With that strategy in mind,
the VVAW has attempted to
take the issue of Vietnam to
students and the Athens
public. Through the showing of
films and the planning of talks
before local groups, such as
workers at W'estinghouse. the
VVAW is confident that it is
getting its message across.
In their day-to-day contact
with students, veterans have
contributed as individuals to
the public education
concerning the war. Whereas
the public has grown to
distrust the information
provided by its government n
regards to Vietnam and the rest
of Southeast Asia, people are
usually very receptive to the
information the veteran brings
home. With no motive for
deceit, the veterans' versions of
how things are rarely suffer
from problems of credibility.
“1 was in college before I got
drafted,” Troop continues. “I
guess I was like everybody else.
I went to classes, got drunk,
tried to get laid. Hell, I’m
trying to do those things now,
but it’s different. I don’t take
any of it as seriously as I used
to. Before I went into the
Army and over to Vietnam, I
used to enjoy a good time, but
just like everybody else, I knew
that doing real well in school
was what my main concern
should have been. That’s just
the way we’re brought up. As I
see it now, everything is just
about equal. I want to get good
grades so I can get into law
school, but I don't see
anything to be gained in
sacrificing to the point of
losing interest in enjoying
myself. That’s where people,
especially college kids, can get
derailed. You can get so far
into something that you can’t
see out, and before you know
it, you’ve sacrificed too much
for too little.
“With our parents, it’s their
careers that can run away with
them. With students, it can be
grades, causes or desire for
social acceptability. You just
can’t take any single aspect of
your life too seriously, or
you’ll inevitably end up taking
yourself too seriously. That’s
how this country allowed itself
to get into ’Nam.
“Take heroes, for example.
College students hate the old
ones, but they create their own
new ones. People create them,
because they think they need
them. Who knows, maybe in
the next war we can get all the
heroes together and let them
fight it out.”
In the distance we could
hear the sound of a helicopter’s
rotors chopping through the
air. “Must be on the TV,”
Troop guessed. looking
towards the next room where
one of his roommates was
watching the evening news. But
when the noise became louder,
we realized that it was being
caused by a real helicopter that
was flying over the house.
“Probably on its way from
Ft. Mac to Stewart,” Troop
said. The helicopter's noise
peaked as it passed overhead,
becoming fainter as the bird
mate its way eastward. Finally,
we could no longer hear it. We
sat silently. The TV was giving
Troop’s roommate the latest
story from Belfast.
Digging into a pocket in his
jeans, Troop pulled out a small,
shiny object and tossed it to
me. It was a Zippo lighter with
a map of Vietnam engraved on
one side. Engraved on the
other side was a message that
read: "Fighting For Peace Is
Like ing for Chastity .”
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Photos
by
TOM HILL