Virginia Veterans Remember; 102

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poems by it's been welcome to our special virginia veterans remember i mean really as we face the current realities of war in iraq memories of the persian golf vietnam and korea and even world war two are brought closer wage war had its own distinctive fortunes they're all united in their aggregate loss of life virginians who served in combat or my distinguished group and we're fortunate to have with those three virginians who've served our country in some of those wars we begin with matt jones he

served in the korean war with the third infantry division next a man is donald green he was with the us marine corps and served in desert storm and mr nicole that she is a registered nurse who served for the us army in vietnam it's good to have you with us all three and i'd like to start with who was a civilian drafted perhaps or who was already in service let me start with you four thousand reserved one of three huge and i got mad and start to college and join the reserves and the korean war started and in january the fifty one house called back to active duty nehru couple west because he already in the reserves and what about you what was your situation at the time could join the marine corps served for her school and but five years later was when the storm happened with invaded kuwait and our entire reserve unit was mobilized and sent overseas is he in

another will have to ask you whether you were captive but tell us about your interest in serving in the army i am i joined the army nurse corps my second half of my junior in college and then when i graduated from and stevie i serve two years active duty and one of those years with in vietnam and we should put out you serve about three and half years old gray college right including college and you don't serve six years with the us marine corps and then finally ned you weren't far behind with five and half years of service now let's start with your story you shared a compelling story and it related to a day that you'll never forget that sort of humanized the war for you tell us about that as sean watland and jewelry station where we have the time with oh i don't come here are different and that they detected friction for

vermeer attached to them to their country and geographically where where you are we will move they've been in holland rover a lot of show probably forty miles for that that was your social and for those who followed awards show won about the thorne well recently behind which for the third time hours of walkability more around vaillancourt the student from it was walking up this plant and just you just actually blew him in law was almost and i just picked him up and started walking back down the hill towards aid station and parts of your driving on the ground war and he died long before that institution moroccan still failing and he was talking to me at first religious park do you remember what he said here i have no idea volunteer

and first learned more wages shorter a little sugar and individually and he actually smoking and our holy only pressure one and launch and then obviously many years have passed between those incidents and now when you think back on that is it more of a blur for you or those days still as crisp as they were at the time a sore point i did not talk about the war for forty years and grilled war veterans group came together and rich and has a wife and we can get you guys to stop and watch responded we know a certain kind of goes for the same word we talk to each other now and when we have an agreement between us we made the centrist know twenty percent we can make it as a larger forget

and then also to sort of a flash memory or some particular answers come in over the uproar richard warp in portsmouth or rodeo show on the little town of troy i'm not telling him to stop and japanese and korean and anguish and he kept coming but the time i've spoken to portland oregon to stop and raise both homes and they don't have money talking and he stood there and bob nora canceling the think about it as a grenade explodes it goes up ordered called the porter blues for corroboration of islam still who can do you think he knew he knew had grenades and a cell anemia get close to it a possible to lunch is usually brokered <unk> that rather than stopping in perhaps turning over the

grenades he stop and drop and now you shared with us a story about a young man who really impacted you while you were serving in vietnam tell us that story actually we had i worked at the twenty fourteen back hostile and long pants and away we should say that wasn't your first pick we wanted the station no no either china between the knife or the nouns and an angry at you now and later a very christian of reading that didn't hang but i really thought china beach would be the place to go in but it i was in and long fan and i know you're in it which was disappointed we had then one which was directly across from the nurses station and we were all packed in together about thirty patients enters the station and in that one is the most seriously injured patients and you as a young man in his thirties and he's a mole to me than that now is very young at that time and he had lots of its eyes were blown out he was

on an innocent debated he couldn't talk he had both arms were injured and hanging up bandaged in hanging on iv pole he had a domino and chest injuries and leg injuries and no way we can communicate with beckham was to ask him to swing one arm free as in the other arm for now and you it's really difficult taking care of him you know the nurses tried it wasn't difficult because of its care but at this time the emotional part of nursing really seemed to rip to head home on hours and you take care of what security and needs north vietnamese south vietnamese koreans cambodians filipinos australians all together in a room and going through that day after day after day of covers the days that stays awake and i stood by major leticia started pouring from iraq

my faith and down my face from my eyes and i didn't want to say anything and in one the santa come out because again one upset him and he has a code and that nurses to cry right out know you don't hire nurses don't cry you just stay upbeat the goal of the nurse was to use all of your expertise to help then become well but also emotionally to pour all the life that you have into them to give them the will to live so you don't want them to see your tears you say that for sometimes years later and then very salient standing back by his bed and then a couple of the other nurses came instead around him and were just all very stylish with their seats tears tears coming down their cheeks and i thought harrison's young man then and he just had me the absurdity of war i'm man's inhumanity against a man the tragedies ally had did look was around everywhere seeing people dying or limbs blown off or

something and what this young man was going to face when he got home if you left again on i'm the good part of the story is about ten years ago our i found him and i have not met in riyadh but he's the only name of all the patients i took care of that i remembered and i went on the internet and call them and it's like major stems light yet festival this it's more for kaufmann hours your nurse how's martha minivan but i was your nurse and vietnam and just know it's toast stay intact their e mail and he's just an amazing you know you to me as academy of a hero he came home went to bryan line rehab went on to get its masters in counseling you know has a happy family it's he's a hero you know what if it don't you have a story that stands out for you from a war though there are so many crammed

into a short period time where we had come back from now for half days but one of the most vivid is one night we were in the middle of all the wildfires that their of the republican guard and set on trying to destroy the oil economy of kuwait and we were in our fire position's but the noise from the fires that surrounded us was so loud that you couldn't have a conversation that person actually a deal next year and the smoke from the fires were so it was so dense that at nighttime it was so dark and see a different face and if the wind shifted and the like from the fires are so bright that you know like every book the flashlight and during that time they're supposedly we don't know this for a fact what we've understood at the time that there was a column of iraqi tanks about a thousand years after flight going past us that didn't realize we were their home court in venture to time from your perspective what was the purpose of the persian gulf war dave kuwaiti government had been a

friend of the us for many years and david very unjustly been taken over by saddam hussein to protect our friend and with a few friends which really had in the middle east we're going to liberate them home then i'm sure there were some financial parts of what the oil but overall was to have sons building in the middle east and nothing was totally justin good reason to be there in fact of this day feel that we should've pressed on and that i think we could have the we should have and we definitely could have republican guard was weakened saddam hussein's forces were very weakened as quint was depleted and we were strong and on a rolling very easily could've gone all the way to baghdad a matter of days and it wouldn't have what's going on right now what's your opinion of our war in iraq i think that we should be there on that i think eddie and results will be just five means in the stories in the future we'll say that it was the right thing to

do to get a sign out power to liberty iraqi people as well as to head to those to build in the region eventually more when you feel the same way basically yes it but after you know i have my memories from the war or just a crime burned flesh you know so much pain and suffering and so when i think of war and that's the first thing that comes to my mind and i'm working with the families of the young men and women who were injured that i work with him through the families of the winter fun and mcguire hospital you know you stay how allies suggest so or so that changed you know they will never be the same time because of war i hate war but i love democracy you

know so i mean i love america you know i support our troops one hundred percent and i'm so proud to have been part of the army nurse corps but loris is obviously a conflict and i just hope and pray that we'll see some good i feel like we do on the right day what bothers me is so much of the controversy that just keeps going on and on and on and the politics for their own vision of wanting power when we forget sometimes about the troops and what's going on in their lives now where do you lean on this issue of the war in iraq now support the trust in the ocean park you just could not let them keep all gone the world often without stopping it if we think we have problems with her assumption that emerged were the result so i had really been there and paypal have

three for years had been willing to give a bailout for a little late and these theaters crippled nuclear movement and also willing to put the love song the lion well shaped in our security today is that women who are serving in iraq are facing the same atrocities <unk> you and you think i'm curious to know if you were able to redo your time served would you would you do it differently would you have not served in korea would you know have served in vietnam and let's start with you mara i was already witnessed it would not at this age are were up every on land our vote again on combat missions a young person's game that's richard mourdock well first off you don't want to have a family so your nearest possible for them with all

of which rely on the line let's talk about that before we get your answer what were the sacrifices that your family and you and you are but parents really owns that word about it and i think i didn't have a permit girlfriend anything like it the lawyer i wanted a state where where i have the hospital and the army the first time i had gotten out after three years and started college and got called back to active duty and i was a little bit surprised that they hadn't called me earlier actress award the normal about six months one article so that's nice take on the korean war what it with desert storm would you do it again torreon loan you know some again enlisted marine corps one of reasons i chose a marine corps was because i wanted to do is have that adventure see the elephant they used to call it home

and managed to do that and i'm truly grateful that i had that opportunity to do that for my country and for myself ok now that you are the way we do it again absolutely i'm blind my my only hesitation was you know i wish i had been a little wiser i wish i'd known a little bit more my skills had been better honed a nursing because i wear like six months out are nursing school out of college and i know how to do many of the procedures that we have to do immediately when we got here but yes i would do it again you know i had it there were parts of vietnam that i really had a good time on our in our you know there were parts i met people that i would never have an opportunity any other way to me and i understood camaraderie and friendship in a way that i've never been able to understand it or experience it here because when you're all together and that's a real world fighting for each other's lives

he changes you and that car changes you for the better he talked about wishing that you were older or march or wiser one of our interviewees actually said that the armed services wants you young because my year last year that's exactly rushing to get ready to go with a true in the marine corps you know we were made up primarily was reserve unit and live mostly college kids in gas to each other find a year two thousand they were all making their live and starting families of the rural mostly young what was a very wise experienced leaders over couples nat wasn't even married or had a girlfriend that time neither there's one right you know i was twenty one years old one of the suit you're grading it all out you can ask a serious question

and it's something that has brought on by one of the folks we talk to about his experiences in world war two he said that he lost his brother to the war he lost a very close comrade war they never cried you cried until about four years later so i'm going to point blank ask you what was the first time you cried about this persian gulf war ii probably it's shortly after nine eleven the motion just love it we failed they were elaborate and playfully beloved are going to get stung a lot of wood cassette unless it's huge wooden so is more of a feeling of we could've preempted that's what it in and researcher brought up before that are still in combat when i had a friend

he was killed but he wouldn't get them already did that is is talking into a special award and has he was killed of course instead of tentative tolerance for absolutes through poetry and i shook and cried and i got up the health law go into the head of the rig on charges a word no employers wait when you say that was to that it was a friendly fire was because of bats fugitive and costumed social norm down on an unknown monthly you so we know from some chinese we'd put down the night before and you could say a land and he would go get some weapons and i had told him not to go and use just don't wanna turn now back and open to sort of said well i've been through a dozen towns kamel they would walk in and they got from here a quantity and sound above while and you stop

you know a landmine can do too if you just take your product or ways and the time i got there he was he was paroled going on when he passed away i got up and took the port about merlot pollster i went looking for switzerland and mara how solid jobs and stop me you said you don't need to your militia rest of his life as possible while to aspire where he's city's live in today's line and the georgia deserved to be able and that's a wealthy over an outcry and an actual trial and probably won and martha you talk to us about your experience with the young man and an artist you're trying to choke back tears but what about the first time you have a real cry over europe but as a patient in vietnam

there was one experience in vietnam when i just openly cried and couldn't take your patient i one night they had blown up a children's theater and so we had a lot of children that came in on our unit and one of the children i went to take care of us about three years old and their armistice lines just almost like straight down this way and i unwrapped a child's arm and it just it just really hit me i get a nicer to crime and they had asked another nurse to says the doctor but those two after those two time to just says like now you just stop then when i got home it it took a while to really cry but i think the first time i really cried was more about isolation and loneliness i felt as a veteran and it's a one man and having served in the army the country was so and receptive two veterans

vietnam veterans at that time and that included the nurses to there were few of course who were supportive to me and i became engaged soon after i came home and my fiance who is now my husband of thirty five years was extremely supportive but on the whole people don't want to hear any was that loneliness and that often brought tears to me that i had worked hard and i had i serve my country well and the reception that i received was just so hurtful when you compare the korean war and desert storm with the public perception of vietnam would you say that the vietnam war among those three and got the worst bill of the record why i don't like the public understand the broad proportions david cancel political before we

talk regularly we're absolutely lies and voila like we're not the free and that the water politics involved in shelton the tune in trouble switching gears a little bit i'm interested to know how each of you relates to the media and i'm talking specifically about feature films or television series for instance national forest and saving private ryan or any number of more related movies and television series yes just to know or these things that you enjoy watching and i'm not really out of the water a recent years of my ashes were all of the maryland your gestures that the measure we shorted i enjoy them from most part of the world from my wife or watch with me because i mean if they get your best wrong rifle for that battle were wrong uniform and beacons like that

it's angelo watchman there there's capers and just like it is for anybody else i enjoy into you know it's like there was one time on mass where they were operating outside kids and been an ally for a grenade and then again one of the soldiers chats with that happen in my hospital to we all sit outside the perimeter wire the hospital one soldier was being operated on and china beach you know the toll of them even though there were somewhat hollywood you know put in it it's still head home to the heart of the matter pain and joy and fun and intense sadness and despair so every episode eleven international climbers shows such such fun times two in vietnam being silly whenever we could you know get trouble for some time for wyoming criminal my hair that's a good upbeat note it's good to know that in the

face of tragedy that people can still commune with one another and still find some humor and some joy in their fellowship i wanna thank you all for joining us back to i want to say their names more time i hope you remember them article donald green and that jones again thank you for your service and sacrifice its thinking now if you'd like to learn more about virginia's role in world war two korea vietnam the persian gulf you can go to the virginia war memorial online at va war memorial dot org i'm in a really rich unity idea stations thanks for watching he's been it's been these

virginia veterans remember join us for a special interview with virginians surveyed korea vietnam and the persian gulf but at this age thing altogether and simply a law fighting for each other's lives he changes and that right there fb as boy