Vietnam Veterans Day; Just a Grunt

[M]

Some words about a shared past from someone who I knew.

I’m told that today is Vietnam Veterans Day. Hand salute to all who served.

Over the years I’ve put thoughts on paper and on this day I would like

to share a short story.

Just a Grunt

This could be the title. Not sure though because not everyone may

understand exactly what that means. After all, more than 3 million

served and another half as many claim, wished, or almost did. It’s been

said that the ratio of support personnel to those actually fighting is

somewhere around 85-15%. That said, the math looks like 450,000 young

men actually had a front row seat. I hate using statistics, but spread

over the years ‘65 to ‘73 the count is about 56,000 per. My tour and the

following year had the unique distinction of having even higher numbers

of Front Row Seats. Timing is everything.

This is not intended to diminish the service of support troops. They

were absolutely vital to the effort, and, always will be. Besides, not

many got to choose what (or where) their job would be; the job was more

or less assigned. I had a background in construction but somehow my

highest test scores were for infantry. This was a surprise because I

missed that class in high school. I guess I was predisposed to kill (or

be). Who knew?

For those who served in a leg, or grunt outfit the front row has a

special meaning. There’s just a difference between those who were mostly

outside the wire and those who were not. There were no cots, no tents or

bunkers, no sheets, no mosquito nets, no hot chow, or ice (ice?) There

wasn’t electric or chow halls in our little slice of the war. We had

what we carried or we did without. We sloshed thru waste deep paddies,

walked into ambushes, set off IUDs (we called them booby traps), endured

mortars, artillery, snipers, and short rounds; drank rice paddy water,

got dysentery, climbed hill after hill, dealt with the bugs and leeches,

bathed in bomb craters, ate cold C-rats, drank warm beer, and wore the

same set of fatigues until they seemed to flake away. We walked in the

rain, slept in the rain, ate in the rain, fought in the rain, and

watched some die in the rain.

We were certainly not on the Bob Hope Show itinerary.

We traveled in a zone where mental strength trumped physical every day.

Yeah, it was different, real different. I hear tell that there’s now a

ribbon for that 03xx MOS. .

Funny though, when asked, I reply……’Yeah, I was there. I was just a…….

grunt’