For some reason there’s been a lot made of Veteran’s Day this year (or perhaps I’m just more aware of it?). I’m a veteran of the Vietnam War era.

In early March 1963 of my senior year in High School all interested seniors were invited to an assembly with the military recruiters. Army, Navy, Marines, and Air Force were all represented, quite resplendent in their dress uniforms (for some reason the Coast Guard wasn’t there that day). Each gave a short presentation and if we were interested, we could stay and meet with one or more of the recruiters.

My High School class was very small … about 32 seniors as I recall. Not many of us went to the assembly and only four of us stayed to talk with the recruiters. I was interested in flying and talked a bit about that with the Air Force recruiter. There I learned that to be a pilot I had to go to college first, but that there were many other opportunities to fly. I took their qualifying test which measured ability in each of four areas. I scored at the top in each of the four areas. The recruiter said he’d be sending me some information.

Later that month I turned 18, old enough to enlist. I skipped school and took the bus from Soda Springs to Pocatello and met with the recruiter. I signed all the paperwork and was told that I’d receive my orders close to graduation from High School. Further, the Air Force, in honor of the centennial of the formation of the Idaho Territory, was putting together a squadron of enlistees from Idaho. We would have our own squadron flag and supposedly lots of other recognition.

A couple of days after graduation at the end of May, 1963 I was on my way to Lackland AFB in San Antonio, Texas along with fifty other Idahoans and began my time in the Air Force.

I got out of the Air Force in August, 1968. During my tour of duty:

• I went to Chinese language school at Yale University where the highlight definitely was meeting and marrying Nina.
• I went through further training at Goodfellow AFB in San Angelo, Texas where Nina and I started our married life together and our oldest son was born.
• I was then sent to Yokota AFB in Japan. Nina and our son James joined me there where we spent the next three years.
• I spent more than 3,000 hours flying and rattling around in the back of specially equipped RC-130 RC-135 reconnaissance Rivet Joint aircraft flying throughout the Pacific Rim.
• I also spent 18 months in Vietnam on temporary duty assignments during the time we were living in Japan, much of that time in the air over the Gulf of Tonkin and over Laos.

For the most part I enjoyed my tour in the Air Force. When we got out to go to college at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana our family had increased by two more daughters. I’ve never regretted leaving the Air Force and felt that I had done a good thing for my country.

However, even at a conservative, midwestern college like Purdue, the opposition to the Vietnam War was evident and disdain for servicemen was always present. Revealing my time in the Air Force was inviting ridicule and derision. Since most of us who spent time being shot at and managing to get out with life and limb intact weren’t very interested in talking about our experiences, that was never a problem for me.

My dad served in World War II seeing action in France and Germany. He wouldn’t talk very much about it either, until he got some forty years away from those events. My grandfather also served during World War I, but never left the United States. The devastating flu epidemic had broken out and he spent his time as an orderly in a military hospital. My oldest son spent time in the Navy. We have a bit of history of serving our country in my family.

I’m very thankful today for a few things:

1. A free country where service in the military is not coerced. A volunteer military is a better force to be reckoned with. I saw too many conscripts in Vietnam who made life dangerous for those around them.
2. A different attitude today towards our military men and women. They are putting themselves in harms way at the behest of our government.
3. The technology (such as drones flown from thousands of miles away) that keeps more of our military people out of harms way.
4. A growing distaste for solving the world’s problems with military might but still the resolve to do what has to be done (along with a concern about getting too soft and vulnerable).
5. What I learned and the impact it has had on my life from my tour of duty in the USAF.

Thank you to all who have served, those who are now serving, and to those who will yet serve our country. A sincere thank you.