Randy Benson |
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SEGREGATION ABROAD
Randy: Actually ’68, ‘69 was the pivotal year in Vietnam. Until ’68 everybody was pulling one way. What happened in 1968? If you were a Black American, you’d know the answer. What happened in 1968?
Benett: Martin Luther King.
Randy: Martin Luther King was executed. And Bobby Kennedy. So suddenly you had every Black American in Vietnam pulling the other way. ‘Cause he was disappointed and pissed off. And he hadn’t been treated very well anyway.
It was like Mohammad Ali said, you know, “Nobody…none of those Vietnamese ever tried to lynch me.”
You know that’s how all the black guys felt over there and they started hanging together rather than with everybody else. So all of a sudden, all the lily-white guys are over here in the mess hall and all the black guys are over here. And all the black guys were giving each other fist bumps and stuff, you know…starting to talk sedition and rebellion and fragging officers…that’s when fragging started.
Fragging
Randy: 3 % of all the officers in the Army in Vietnam got fragged. And that’s only the ones that got fragged, that’s only the ones that were identified as having been murdered by their own troops by grenades. That doesn’t include automatic weapons, that doesn’t include knives. 3 %, that’s a lot of officers and not one of them got fragged before 1968. It doubled in ’69, it doubled again in 1970. Google this stuff, you’ll be appalled. Your government doesn’t, hasn’t just started lying to you recently.
Reaction from Home
Benett: What happened when you came home?
Randy: Got spit on in the airport. They’ll tell ya that didn’t happen much, but it happened to me. Welcome home, [mimics spit noise]. You didn’t want to wear a [uniform]. It was bizarre. it wasn’t like today. If you wore a uniform in the airport all the high school and college aged girls would spit on ya. True. Not all of ‘em.
Benett: What about your family? And your friends?
Randy: My family, people in the United States, the war was on television every night, but they didn’t tell you much. Our camp in Danang got destroyed and I phoned home over a satellite link. The Seabees had a…not a satellite link, over a short wave link, the Seabees had a short wave radio relay where you could talk on the telephone in Danang and your parents would get the call in Dallas but it was over short wave radio, basically. So I called them to tell them I was alright, but they had no idea what I was talking about. Our camp…the bomb dump next to our camp blew up for two days and two nights. It was the biggest bomb dump north of Tan Son Nhut airbase, which is the 2ndbiggest bomb dump in Vietnam.
Object Description
| Profile of | Randy Benson |
| Title | From Texas to California to Da Nang |
| Profile bio | Randy Benson was born February 16, 1945 in Dallas, Texas. Growing up in 1950s Texas, he was a cowboys and Indians playing, cartoon loving, adored big brother to his little sister Ann. Randy made a few attempts at college in the 60s, but he “kept getting kicked out!” In 1966, when things didn’t work out at Rice University, he was drafted into the military to go to Vietnam. He decided at that point to join the Naval Reserve. A six year commitment. He was hired as part of the Aggressor Army for military training in Port Hueneme, California. Starting out as an Engineman 3 (E 3), Randy was quickly promoted to an E 5. He was then offered a position in the Mobile Construction Battalion 5, or MCB5, or more commonly the Seabees. The Seabees are part of the U.S. Navy who provide various construction services for the war effort. For Randy, it meant a longer commitment, but more importantly, a non-combative one. December 1968, Randy and the Seabees flew into Da Nang, Vietnam. The majority of his time served in country was as part of a Security Squad Paving Crew maintaining Route 1, which connected Da Nang and Hue. |
| Profiler bio | Benett Rogers, Jacqueline Truong, and Minghao Zhang |
| Subject |
American Da Nang The Draft Viet Nam Aggression Army ARVN California Da Nang Fragging Hue Randy Benson Seabees Segregation Texas US Navy |
| Profiled by | Rogers, Benett; Truong, Jacqueline; Zhang, Minghao |
| Profile date | 2014-03-01 |
| Geographic subject (city or populated place) | Na Dang; Hue |
| Geographic subject (state) | Texas; California |
| Geographic subject (country) | USA; Vietnam; China |
| Coverage date | 1964; 1967 |
| Publisher (of the original version) | http://anotherwarmemorial.com/randy-benso/ |
| Type |
images video |
| Format | 1 image; 3 video files (00:15:33); 3 transcripts |
| Language | English |
| Contributing entity | University of Southern California |
| Part of collection | An Other War Memorial -- Memories of the American War in Viet Nam |
| Filename | bensonrandy |
Description
| Profile of | Randy Benson |
| Title | Segregation Abroad |
| Format | 1 transcript, 1p. |
| Filename | bensonrandy-vid2_tr2.pdf |
| Full text | SEGREGATION ABROAD Randy: Actually ’68, ‘69 was the pivotal year in Vietnam. Until ’68 everybody was pulling one way. What happened in 1968? If you were a Black American, you’d know the answer. What happened in 1968? Benett: Martin Luther King. Randy: Martin Luther King was executed. And Bobby Kennedy. So suddenly you had every Black American in Vietnam pulling the other way. ‘Cause he was disappointed and pissed off. And he hadn’t been treated very well anyway. It was like Mohammad Ali said, you know, “Nobody…none of those Vietnamese ever tried to lynch me.” You know that’s how all the black guys felt over there and they started hanging together rather than with everybody else. So all of a sudden, all the lily-white guys are over here in the mess hall and all the black guys are over here. And all the black guys were giving each other fist bumps and stuff, you know…starting to talk sedition and rebellion and fragging officers…that’s when fragging started. Fragging Randy: 3 % of all the officers in the Army in Vietnam got fragged. And that’s only the ones that got fragged, that’s only the ones that were identified as having been murdered by their own troops by grenades. That doesn’t include automatic weapons, that doesn’t include knives. 3 %, that’s a lot of officers and not one of them got fragged before 1968. It doubled in ’69, it doubled again in 1970. Google this stuff, you’ll be appalled. Your government doesn’t, hasn’t just started lying to you recently. Reaction from Home Benett: What happened when you came home? Randy: Got spit on in the airport. They’ll tell ya that didn’t happen much, but it happened to me. Welcome home, [mimics spit noise]. You didn’t want to wear a [uniform]. It was bizarre. it wasn’t like today. If you wore a uniform in the airport all the high school and college aged girls would spit on ya. True. Not all of ‘em. Benett: What about your family? And your friends? Randy: My family, people in the United States, the war was on television every night, but they didn’t tell you much. Our camp in Danang got destroyed and I phoned home over a satellite link. The Seabees had a…not a satellite link, over a short wave link, the Seabees had a short wave radio relay where you could talk on the telephone in Danang and your parents would get the call in Dallas but it was over short wave radio, basically. So I called them to tell them I was alright, but they had no idea what I was talking about. Our camp…the bomb dump next to our camp blew up for two days and two nights. It was the biggest bomb dump north of Tan Son Nhut airbase, which is the 2ndbiggest bomb dump in Vietnam. |
| Archival file | Volume3/bensonrandy-vid2_tr2.pdf |
