Attitudes toward the war
What were the attitudes of you and your fellow soldiers towards the war at the time? How did you guys think about it? Cause obviously we have a very different perception now way after…
Sure… For the year that I served in the Northern I Corps person of South Vietnam… the artillery soldiers that I served with – with very few exceptions and I say very few meaning maybe four people at most – was very positive very impactive… we did not have drug issues we did not have disobedient issues, we had exceptionally well-trained troops that did a damn good job period… We were very fortunate some of the units have spent more in the field as opposed to on fire bases… perhaps didn’t have quite as close of a communication control with their folks, but we did and… we had very few difficulties, we had very positive attitudes, we knew why we were there, we knew that if… if the people in the United States would tone down their anti-war rhetoric and leave us alone… there was virtually no doubt that the commitment there would have been completed in half the time and the US forces were certainly more than sufficient to be completed successfully… and looking back at it today many years later, there wouldn’t be a North or South Vietnam – North Vietnam would not exist… so it’s unfortunate that the public sentiment was allowed to go in the direction that it went for as long as it was allowed to go there and … and that the support and control of our troops was adversely affected by it because we had pretty open communication, we heard the news, we had daily reports so we knew what was going on and that was all the way down to the last private so it was unfortunate but… be that as it is that’s the way it is… they’re still trying to figure out a way to welcome us home…