What Are They Going to Do, Send Me to Vietnam? PDF Download

Author: John Podlaski
Publisher: John Podlaski
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 353

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Book Description
In 1970, John Kowalski was among the many young, inexperienced soldiers sent to Vietnam to participate in a contentious war. Referred to as “Cherries” by their veteran counterparts, these recruits were plunged into a horrific reality. The on-the-job training was rigorous, yet most of these youths were ill-prepared to handle the severe mental, emotional, and physical demands of combat. Experiencing enemy fire and observing death up close initiates a profound transformation that is irreversible. The author excels at storytelling. Readers affirm feeling immersed alongside the characters, partaking in their struggle for survival, experiencing the fear, awe, drama, and grief, observing acts of courage, and occasionally sharing in their humor. "Cherries" presents an unvarnished account, and upon completion, readers will gain a deeper appreciation for the trials these young men faced over a year. It's a narrative that grips the reader throughout.

Author: Edward A. Hagan
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 1476623686
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 230

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Book Description
American military advisors in South Vietnam came to know their allies personally--as few American soldiers could. In addition to fighting the Viet Cong, advisors engaged in community building projects and local government initiatives. They dealt firsthand with corrupt American and South Vietnamese bureaucracies. Not many advisors would have been surprised to learn that 105mm artillery shells were being sold on the black market to the Viet Cong. Not many were surprised by the North Vietnamese victory in 1975. This memoir of a U.S. Army intelligence officer focuses on the province advisors who worked with local militias that were often disparaged by American units. The author describes his year (1969-1970) as a U.S. advisor to the South Vietnamese Regional and Popular Forces in the Mekong Delta.

Author: Warren Hunt
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
ISBN: 9781974397808
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 142

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Book Description
""An important contribution to the literature on the war."" Gary R. Hess, Emeritus Distinguished Research Professor, Bowling Green State University. Author, --"Vietnam: Explaining America's Lost War." In his Reflections on the Vietnam War: A Fifty-Year Journey, Warren E. Hunt chronicles his long struggle to come to grips with the meaning of the Vietnam War and how it affected him before, during and after his tour in Vietnam with the U.S. First Infantry Division. Using a stylistic mix of personal anecdote, historical reflection and essay, the author weaves his experience of the war into a broad context encompassing the course of his life. Starting out as a naive and patriotic teenager drafted at age 19, he traces his path through military training, his impressions of Vietnam and its people, the absurdity of daily basecamp life, and the crucible of enemy fire. Returning to a nation torn apart by the war, he soon realizes that, even though he is no longer in the army, he cannot escape the war''s insane grasp. Catastrophic events in Vietnam and on the home front, along with the dawning awareness of suicides among his fellow veterans, prompt him to seek answers to the questions that haunt his daily life: Why did America go to war in Vietnam? How could we lose? Why did so many people have to suffer in vain? His quest leads him to the unveiling of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., where painful memories and powerful emotions merge to initiate a healing process for the author, his fellow veterans and the country at large.

Author: Marc Phillip Yablonka
Publisher: Casemate Publishers
ISBN: 1612006884
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 274

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Book Description
A military journalist shines a light on the unsung heroism and contributions of enlisted combat reporters in the Vietnam War in these revealing interviews. Vietnam Bao Chi brings together interviews with thirty-five combat correspondents who reported on the Vietnam War. These brave men and women wrote the stories, captured the images, and filmed the television coverage of their fellow servicepeople on battlefields from the Mekong Delta to the DMZ and from the Tet Offensive in 1968 to the fall of Saigon in 1975. Here you will meet Marine Dale Dye, who would go on to play an integral role in the making of the film Platoon; Green Beret Jim Morris, whose books, including War Story, recount the combat operations of Special Forces units in the Central Highlands; John Del Vecchio, whose classic work of fiction, The 13th Valley, mirrors his own existence as a combat correspondent with the 101st Airborne Division; and US Navy Frogman Chip Maury, renowned for his free-fall and underwater photography in Vietnam. Yablonka’s extensive experience as a military journalist brought him into contact with many of these combat correspondents, giving him a unique insight into their professions and lives. This book honors these brave chroniclers in uniform who brought the Vietnam War home to us. “[This] valuable collection of profiles . . . shines light on the all-but-forgotten role of American military báo chí (press in Vietnamese)." —Publishers Weekly

Author: David O. Scheiding
Publisher: Covenant Books, Inc.
ISBN: 1646709713
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 286

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Book Description
Does God really exist? If he does, why does he let bad things happen to good people? Is the Bible fiction or nonfiction? After a twenty-five-year military career and eighteen years of running his own businesses, the author became concerned about what he observed happening to the American society and the direction that the country appears to be heading. Don't Fly Today provides the author's perspective while answering the above questions and concerns. The author does this by analyzing the path of his life and has compiled very compelling empirical evidence that his life had to have been guided by a higher power. The author then discusses the Bible prophecies as he addresses his concerns about the United States and its future. The author does this by analyzing what has changed during the time period when our government leaders were from the "greatest generation" to the present time when our leaders come from the baby boomers and the following generations. If you or if you have heard any of your friends or others ask any of the above questions or express similar concerns, then Don't Fly Today is an extremely compelling story and a must-read.

Author: Bill Jones
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 1476675171
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 203

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Book Description
A poignant memoir that recounts the author's hair-raising--and occasionally hilarious--experiences as a young, not especially gung-ho Marine artilleryman in Vietnam. Gritty and disturbing, Bill Jones' unvarnished narrative probes the lasting physical and emotional wounds of war and offers a combat veteran's wry insight into the influence and relevance of America's long and indecisive misadventure.

Author: Tim O'Brien
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
ISBN: 0547527047
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 301

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Book Description
A politician’s past war crimes are revealed in this psychologically haunting novel by the National Book Award–winning author of The Things They Carried. Vietnam veteran John Wade is running for senate when long-hidden secrets about his involvement in wartime atrocities come to light. But the loss of his political fortunes is only the beginning of John’s downfall. A retreat with his wife, Kathy, to a lakeside cabin in northern Minnesota only exacerbates the tensions rising between them. Then, within days of their arrival, Kathy mysteriously vanishes into the watery wilderness. When a police search fails to locate her, suspicion falls on the disgraced politician with a violent past. But when John himself disappears, the questions mount—with no answers in sight. In this contemplative thriller, acclaimed author Tim O’Brien examines America’s legacy of violence and warfare and its lasting impact both at home and abroad.

Author: Dan Brookes
Publisher: Pen and Sword
ISBN: 1526744031
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 258

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Book Description
What was it like to be a military combat photographer in the most photographed war in history — the Vietnam War? Shooting Vietnam takes you there as you read the firsthand accounts and view the hundreds of photographs by men who lived the war through the lens of a camera. They documented everything from the horror of combat to the people and culture of a land they suddenly found themselves immersed in. Some even juggled cameras with rifles and grenade launchers as they fought to survive while carrying out their assignments to record the war. “Shooting Vietnam” also finally brings recognition to these unheralded military combat photographers in Vietnam that documented the brutal, unpopular, and futile war.Firsthand accounts and photographs by military photographers in Vietnam from the mid-1960s to the early 1970s, “Shooting Vietnam” puts the reader right alongside these men as they struggle to document the war and stay alive while doing it — although some didn’t survive. The cameras around their necks often shared space with a rifle or grenade launcher that enabled them to stay alive while performing their assigned military duties, killing, if necessary, to survive.Often, during a brief respite from trudging through swamps and rice paddies or jumping from a chopper into a hot landing zone, they would wander the streets of villages or even downtown Saigon, curiously photographing a people and a culture so strange and different to them. It is these photographs, of a kinder, more personal nature, removed from the horror and death of war that they also share with the reader.The accounts in this book come from young men thrust into a conflict half way around the world, and all who had their own unique perspective on the war. Some were seasoned photographers before the military, others had only recently held a camera for the first time.

Author: Sam Gaylord
Publisher: AuthorHouse
ISBN: 1728348498
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 114

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Book Description
At some point in your life, you may have experienced a medical scare, felt the death of a loved one or was forced to go through a life changing crisis. Did you wonder WHY? Why is this happening to you? Why is this happening to your loved one? WHY? Why? Why NOT Me? provides the readers an insight into Sam Gaylord’s life. There have been many stumbling blocks thrown at him. Sam has risen to the occasion, overcoming many obstacles. He shares with his readers how he climbed over hurdles and became more and more determined to make the best of his situation. Sam shares his doubts and fears. He learned to stop asking Why? and starting asking, “Why not?” Facing each one head on, he found the initiative and motivation to triumph, move forward and become a stronger man. “Some men see things as they are and say why – I dream things that never were and say why not.” -George Bernard Shaw “Adversity is the state in which a man most easily becomes acquainted with himself.” -John Wooden

Author: Robert M. Givens
Publisher: Archway Publishing
ISBN: 1480895210
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 245

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Book Description
Robert M. Givens grew up in the Midwest, graduating in 1966 from Millikin University in his hometown of Decatur, Illinois, and from Indiana University in 1968. He married his college sweetheart, Connie, and by age twenty-four worked as assistant to the dean of students at the University of Connecticut. His wife was a schoolteacher, and they both were hopeful that his job at a respected university and his age would help him avoid the draft. However, as the US increased its military involvement in Vietnam, more bodies were needed to fight in this unpopular war. Robert received his draft notice in early 1969, and, after five months of training, he was sent to serve in the infantry in South Vietnam. The war experiences were intensely personal for Robert. He thought his education somehow made him intellectually superior to most soldiers; he thought his age and marital status gave him some vocational privilege; he felt secure in his religious agnosticism. All of these views were challenged during his time in Vietnam. The war-time experiences were life changing for him. He and his fellow soldiers came home from a war in the fields of Vietnam to a war of protests raging in the streets of our cities. This story tells in poignant ways how these experiences eventually reformed Robert’s life including a new-found faith in the Lord. And years later, he found heroes who emerged and encouraged him and other returning soldiers, helping both them and our country to heal.