George Arthur Roods, Sergeant, US Marine Corps, Vietnam War

okay we're rolling this is an interview at the New York State Military Museum Saratoga Springs New York 31st of January 2005 approximately 9:30 or 10:30 a.m. interviewers are Wayne Clark and my crew sir could you give me your full name date of birth and place of birth please full name is George Arthur roots I was born April 16th 1945 and then I was born in victory Mills New York okay what was your educational background prior during service I graduated high school in Saratoga High School all right did you were you drafted or did you enlist I enlisted and you went into the Marines why did you select the most Marines why did you decide to enlist uh well one of the reasons I decided enlist this because at the time they were drafting I had taken a draft physical and I was pretty sure they were going to draft me anyways and I prefer to make my own choices and the Marine Corps offered me a guaranteed school as long as I pass a certain test so safety equipment and the idea of making a parachute jump kind of excited me and I really wanted to do it I still in my wine teen years so I wanted the excitement I guess but it was a good school how long were you in the Marines I was in four years active what were the dates January 1966 January 70 where did you go for your basic training ah Parris Island and then Camp Lejeune for her future training and tell us about your basic training it was an experience if you took it with a sense of humor you made it through with no problem it was rough just like they say and you told the line and it's like they say they make a man out of you you either make it or you go home and feel bad I guess I don't know what the word is but it was a it was a good experience it gave me a lot of discipline and a lot of self-confidence it was then an eight-week basic yeah it was an accelerated program at that time because they want they needed people to you know fill spaces and get people overseas yeah it was no you ended up going into helicopters not my first year first I went to Lakers New Jersey for a school and safety equipment parachute rigging you know and it was like a six-month school five or six I can't remember just doing you know I made one parachute jump you packed your own shoe the premise was if you weren't willing to jump your own and then we're gonna allow you to pack a chute for a pilot so and after Lakehurst I a station in Cherry Point North Carolina manic 24 approximately about a year and I volunteered to go to Vietnam they gave me 30 days leave and then I think it was September 67 I went to Vietnam why did you decide to volunteer to go to Vietnam I think like every young man at that age it's like just turn a phony I think I probably call it naive but I had a sense of duty to my country too but I also you know you want to test yourself do I have what it takes to do it and just wanted to experience it life I guess is the word but I kind of had a wild side to me when I was younger too I think that was some of it to put them all together those were my total reasons for lying to go in retrospect how would you rate your training ah well the thing because I was in fixed-wing and I didn't have any specific orders for any one unit you know they didn't assign you until you actually got into country so I didn't go through the regular training that they gave in California they gave you pre pre deployment training but I had had some survival training while I was in North Carolina okay it's uh but it wasn't the same training as you got pre-deployment and actually what happened with me is I was a direct route right over there I had a couple days in Los Angeles San Bernardino area McGuire Air Force Base I think it was while I was waiting to go and then got the oka now and I spent I think it was a week a week on Okinawa you know they give you the all your shot and all that stuff and then I didn't hang it's processing and you know can I weigh your story or your seabag you know and all this stuff and I think because I was airwing maybe that's why I didn't get the pre-deployment training that they usually give you and when did you arrive it today I know it was in September right I don't know exactly the date but I do remember vividly and I remember there was September 67 you said oh right yeah yeah did you what was it like when you got off the year it was a shock because it felt like somebody was just pushing me right down to the tarmac give it well trying to remember it yeah yeah what's not the steel plating I don't think we had that in marble but but the heat you know that's the first thing I remember it was it was unbelievable I I didn't expect it to be that oppressive even though I just came from Okinawa I remember the smell okay now it was kind of that jungle II know you know I noticed that but I didn't notice at Vietnam I just noticed the heat and remember getting off the plane and you had to go check in you know they had different places you know that he had to go you presented your orders and so I think it was a Lance Corporal at Korbel asked me that was where they're gonna sign you either fixed-wing at the Navy Air Force Base or helicopters and he said it was almost like your choice you know I said you want to go into helicopters oh you know yeah okay normal mom all right yeah sorry my up you know so and that's that's how I got in helicopters he said okay you know I did the orders you know they put you all through the you know filled everything out and he said go out here and wait there'll be a six bike coming by and pick you up and take you there you know it's that open truck there didn't even have a covering around it and I'm sitting there thinking I don't even have a weapon and they're gonna drag me through the neighing over to my base you know and I'm thinking about this you know that's how I went and I'm sitting there waiting and they had camp units they were platoons they were they work with the civilians you know with the civil action civil action right and guy was recruiting and he came up to me and goes how'd you like to be in camp and I said I don't even want cap is and they told me and he says yeah he says you get to live out the Ville he says you get all these perks you know we get to do whatever we want you know and it's it's great you know and I'm weighing this against the helicopters I said no I want to do the helicopter just have one Acton civil action and a little antidote I'm sitting there watching you ever see the Vietnamese going sort of little tiny scrawny things and I'm watching this thing and he's barking in a mud-puddle houses problem he's hopping all around it and all of a sudden this big rat came out when I'm to the puddle and then to the other and I went whoa about that time that you know the truck came pick us up that's where I got my first glimpse of the nangan place called cabbage patch they had all these little huts that just made out uh they were shanties then corrugated steel some of them they just made him out of whatever they had in dirt floors some had just like cloths for doorways that wasn't even a doorway you know yeah I'm gonna get to see the Vietnamese people on it was it's like being dumped in all of society it was interesting to me and I got to see the first public bathrooms all the old paint wake up in the ditch first I didn't know what was going on and then it throwing that that was my first first taste of Vietnam and the base itself Marble Mountain was interesting because it was a conglomeration you had Army and Marines there and you had ROK Marines they had an observation squadron there used to fly those little spider planes yeah they were a little bit on the wild side and we were right next to a like a storage facility had warehouses and when you first went in the base you know you see all these bunkers and stuff and first thing that struck me it was this Vietnam but this was all sand because it was on a beach and going through the base you had to go around like through the army site first you know past all these bunkers and then into the marine site and that's kind of just impressed you know that it was all sand like that it was very there was always activity always something coming and going yeah the helicopter was just a bustle of it can impress me of course I anytime you go to a new base you're lost right away where do I go the truck stops you get off and somebody says you're here yeah okay where do I go you know so just following other people I mean it you know to the administration office and got signed in you get assigned to hooch you know and I'm thinking well you know like stateside you know this is I got a hooch and everything else but don't work that way you get a cot that's about it and I ended up buying this other guys homemade footlocker and his chair it's like you know pass it on to the next guy he sells it to you you know and the guy sold me at the front tape-recorded it didn't work for me kids here was a new guy let's get him you know and first impression was pretty good you know you get a shoujo jungle fatigues and your your boots and everything and Aaron we should have weapon at all yeah but in the Air Wing at that time they were that's when the ar-fifteens were pretty new and what they did is they issued unto the grunts the infantry first Air Wing still had the m14 so we had a boot camp and that's what they issued us and we used to take them that was like your extra weapon when you flew you know in case your machine gun broke down so you had 14 and we had a lot on on the helicopters but you brought your own personal weapon you know it's like a survival almost and usually you kept it in your in your hooch you know unless your floor like you around what they call a ready action platoon if we got mortared or rocketed you had a fallout you serve so much time everybody had a certain amount of time on ready action so you would bring around 14 your helmet and your flak resin all that so yeah and mine kind of got pretty bad yeah but I was getting worried when I checked out for a marine you know I kind of you know how the climate was there yeah if you didn't keep up on it it was it wasn't good it's not like nowadays no when you started flying where you flying strictly Hughie's yeah yeah my squadron was was Huey's well when I first got there I was they called it the feral off but actually safety equipment we didn't have any parachutes and there was only one other guy there is a sergeant his name was Jay born he was a good guy and he was so happy to see me because he could start flying and I couldn't fly right away you had to get checked out and you had to have a physical and since I was there I ran the shop for about the first month while he flew and other guys gradually started coming in what was your I listen be able to this vertical marine observation but our primary duties we had multiple we did inserts and action you're talking about my personal other than units just they you know what you up ever you assigned to Marine observation squadron two and our basic duties were like emergency medevacs in a hot zone you know we had what they called slicks they didn't have any rocket pods or anything like that just to 60s on the door and if somebody had to get out of it real fast they would go in and they had you know the Red Cross was on the side and stuff like that and they would they do it they'll start they couldn't get him get him out of there that was one of our day strictly that's what those birds were designated for today I think we had like two of them that did that that's all they did the other gunships we flew cover for what they call inserts and extracts they take a platoon out of the forty sixes and stuff like that and the 30 Force which were leftovers from like Korea those sort of workhorses mm-hmm and they would go into his own and we would be circling around like a perimeter area if they yelled fire you know or something like that we would shoot up the perimeters the tree lines or wherever they said the fire was coming from they'd give us a you know coordinate or whatever and we would go in and give him cover we also did recon inserts and extracts we cover for them they would take a squad out put him out of him sometimes as soon as they touched down they'd start taking fire we have to take them out and we also flew what they call a sniffer which was one helicopter it was slick it didn't even have mounted six days you you know right on your lap basically and they would have a scoop in the front they had this machine that I checked out on it and trying to run with the call it across but I had two gauges and wouldn't indicate one or two and what what I would do is scoop up the air and it would be able to tell the amount of ammonia for a human and the smoke it would pick up those two two things and depending on whichever one it was one or two yeah it would register on this gauge and you would yell out you you would be watching the gauge and the copilot would have a map and they would be flying in treetops and sometimes the skids would be going right through types of the trees it was like it was a hell of a ride that was exciting it was like a roller coaster I mean you were whoa and you would yell it out and he'd be marking in the map you know one or two and what it was like a recon that's what it was doing and then they would go back they either send somebody in there you know or they check it out let's see what was there and those missions was almost guarantees you were gonna take fire because you were so low and they would have two birds following you you'd be on the trees and the other two would be up high and if you took fire door gonna throw smoke if he could you know would come in and be covered for you and I flew it maybe three or four times most of the time I was a door gunner one time I flew it as a as a guy operating the equipment I wish I got what they call it but I screwed up so bad they were before they start the mission they take you out and fly you over like you know a friendly position like Koreans or Marines or something you know and see if he could pick up the ammonia smell and I remember the pilot flying over this one fourth this one base I don't know how many times I didn't know cuz I'm watching this and I'm not calling anything I mean he's getting mad it's like he's gotta get something get anything so we had to scrub the mission but it was it was a darn exciting mission it was good it was did you ever get shot down uh I had a couple expanses we took around and hydraulics and we did an auto rotate and I can still remember the you know the sinking feeling in your stomach and you react so fast it's it amazed me that you could do it you know because of the training you have procedures first thing you're supposed to do is unplug the rocket pods you know and strap yourself in anything loose you know get ready right and I remember doing all this stuff and you had to get ready to drop the pods you know and what we did was like a little spiral and and they had this beeper that goes off it's like a you know there's and you're on a rotating and we came down as a little bit of a jar but it wasn't anything like what I expected you know and we were pretty lucky and when you when you went on you set up a perimeter first thing I had to do was open the copilot's door so he could get out okay and then take my m16 and I would go to nine o'clock okay and the crew chiefs on the other side in the pilot and the copilot get on so you're all around it you know and we were out of there and no time at all what it was was just a hydraulic leak that's what it was it just our hydraulics went and we were able to get down and my other experience would scared me more we had a new pilot he was he was training the pilot was letting him fly and we were covering an insert okay and as you're going around the 46s a balloon trip and this was in the mountains and the 46s would come out and a tight spiral like this you know and we're going around like this and we're looking at the tree lines and we weren't really watching you know the stuff coming out and all of a sudden the crew chief yelled you know 12 o'clock you know and he looks up and you see this big wheel from the 46 and when they happened the copilot just let go of the stick he let go of it and I'm thinking we're dead you know because we were we weren't up that high and the birds on its side and I'm looking at the trees and the pilot grabbed it I I don't know how he did it but he pulled us out at the last second straighten it out and I remember all of us just turning looking at each other going oh like this you know and the same thing you know even though you think you're dead you you you know you still do the things you got to do you know you you don't plug it you buckle it up you know you get everything ready and and all you're thinking is and this happens like maybe a couple seconds I know I don't know how long that was maybe five ten seconds you know really and and I never thought that pilot was gonna I never thought he was gonna pull it home I was just thinking this is it you know to this day I still think about that I can still get that feeling you know but yeah that was about my only other close call and I'm sure everybody had this you probably had too and most of the time you probably didn't know it's luck of the assignment you know mm-hmm and we had a guy that was wounded got shot in the arms okay and he was sent home and he had an R and R in the books and I'd already had one are in art to the tile and this almost the Malaysia and what they did is they were going around the hangar all the shops and they were asking who wanted to take an R&R and if he the guy before our shop he wanted to go but he didn't have any money in the books you know you saved your money from week to week and I had some money saved and I was scheduled to find the next day and what they call a skunk on is a free kill zone you know they go out the Vietnamese were told nobody's supposed to be in this area if you're there you're considered see they all knew they weren't supposed to be there and I hadn't been on one yet you know and I was all excited about going because as the young pilots usually full of those they were the ones that really you know took the chances don't really gave you a ride for your money and I was scheduled a flying little lieutenant was in charge of my shot and I liked I mean we were good friends and he liked me you know there's always fun to fly but this guy when the yarn art came around like a chicken well I'm lazy you know party so I was just going back and forth with it and the guy said you got to make up your mind he says it can't be here all day and I said okay put me down so the next day I was in the flight Shack and when you went on R&R he'd usually like took one of the slicks that they flew two generals around him taking one of those two Danang and then you catch your flight out of there so I was waiting in the ready room flightcheck and the guy that took my place on that his name was Joe so determined he was a sergeant young guy he's a good guy he worked in the records s2 I think they called it and he said I got your flight and he goes thanks a lot you know we're kidding each other you know and I went on my own are when I come back everybody in that had been killed they got shot down they were all dead years later I didn't think about it much at that time cuz your mentality you know okay that's years we are not thinking about it that's just what if I had said yeah I wanted to go you know and I've never gotten touched with us as family they never found him they never brought him back I thought about it but I never did and it's just it's fate yeah either way no did you ever get involved with the maintenance and I'm gonna get you out the crew chief at all yeah that was part of your duty you had to go out load the the bird up you had to wash the windows you had to clean up the brass afterwards you had to make sure the m79 had its rounds you know the ammo boxes under the seats you had to help load the Rockets you had to know how to set the in the back of the rocket pods they used to have a little switch and what's up meeting it was another guy you could set it for single fire or you could set it for ripple mm-hmm and this guy had screwed up and set it on ripple sight could imagine what happened first time the pilot went on a gun run okay he crippled off that left five think he was mad it was mad what stuff we had a lot of funny things happen to like there was one guy in avionics did not want to fly and the Master Sergeant charter of a shop just kept on him you know I kept poned an item until he finally you know went through all the stuff and started flying in his first flight uh Huey hard gun runs your duty as a gunner was to cover actually just to cover the back of the bird as it was coming out of the gun run you know because you take fire from behind you really weren't supposed to fire going in but we always did but they would kind of do like this they would go up in the air and then do like a bank and then swoop down and then up like that that's like a roller coaster and when it did it this guy got sick and he threw up in his ammo can and I don't know how he did it I don't know if his gun mount broke or what but anyways he ended up putting around rent in the back of the bird and one you can see on the rotor where it squiggle down the rotor announce the last time he flew and the only dumb thing I ever did was I didn't check the copilot's when the copilot got in the pilot's hat armor we used to have these big armored vests that they supposedly stopped a 50 caliber revolver complaints yeah well what we used to do was sit on them because the only place you didn't want to get shot was you know so we sit on it but the pilots had armor and their seats and when they got in you had to slide like there's a little door you slide it forward you know after he got all buckled in and then you close his door and make sure it's you know it's secured right and we get up there and we're up there about 1,500 feet also those doors swinging open no pilot says amazing get out there and close it so they had to go out on the run but we had the safety belts so I wasn't too worried you know but it did look down and I got thinking about just closed that door now that was the last time I did that too I always made sure it was closed after and and there was another time - we had a warhead came off one of the Rockets on my side and it was just like flapping like this so I told the pilot and we landed it a supply base nobody call it a ham salad charlie or something like that I can't remember but this one it was a supply place you know how all that crates around and everything so when we landed used to take it off and go give it to the ordinates sergeant over there so this guy's sitting at one of the crates and there's a couple guys around him and here I come with the warhead and as I'm walking over these other two guys they just kind of spread out like this and give it to the sergeant nice little passes get rid of the singles okay wait well sir his shoulders I guess they you know they didn't arm you know I'm not a hundred percent sure they had a travel just so far something before before they armed and if it isn't really tightened down it doesn't you know he said one of the things that left grace impression on you were your medevac missions yeah we picked up a couple and that's when everything got serious nobody oh my god one time I had a tell a guy uh we we went into his own and they had taken fire and it was a recon I think but uh that was a scariest time because you really thought something might happen then and we're picking up a guy I guess he one guy had bad feet thinking at the jungle right the other guy had some shrapnel from a booby trap and we picked up two and we were gunship when we weren't too slick and we got him in there and tried to lift him we couldn't get off so the pilot told me he said she gotta tell the guy he's got a bleed he's got to get off so I'm you only and this guy didn't want to get off you know and I felt really bad you know finally I had a yellow you know you're gonna get your ass off of here and I turned to him you know next one it'll get you and the look on his face you know having to get off after he still you're something out of here no and we picked one kid up on time and appreciate and make it there's a hospital one thing Charlie meant that's what they call it when I picked this kid up and we all know you know pull them in their head the IV and everything laid them down on the floor and he was like ash gray and you can see the shrapnel just walked up in peace hanging out here and he was the first real bad when I looked at you know and your first impression you go you know yeah we thought no way you know and we were going just above the pad he's trying to get him back there as fast as we could and when we took him off we're pretty sure he was about done that you know that makes you feel bad I enjoyed the other types of missions better you know it's nice to bring somebody out see that now for someone that's watching this tape sometime what's the difference between the gunship and the slick slick slick were used mostly to transport the VIPs you know we used to have to cart around this Korean general on time you'd like to get up there and look at his tanks and his troops you know it's like that and they also use them we did some aerial photography and basically what they would take us click for that we had some army photographers just about an area called Hawaii in and they go out and check it every one so I'll take photographs and you just carry on all regular m60 was yeah you know on your lap and that was a regular slick that was just carrying a general or something sometimes they didn't have anything they just you know they didn't go that long the gunship now would have yeah to em 60s mounted on each side you know and like they were like poles which you can zust with the Gunners and then you had two fixed ones on each side so you have a total of 3 M 60 s on each side and then you have two rocket pods that capability I think we used to carry eight rockets some were smoke some where H II can't remember what I think there's only a couple smoke most of them are 80 but I think they had the capability each pilot carrying like 16 pretty sure and then some of them the gunships not all of them had what they call it tacked in the front they had two sixties but they weren't that reliable I said they Jam a lot I guess a lot of problems in the profile usually he's the one that fired that you know then in the helicopter we all had our own personal weapons used to carry a Smith & Wesson 38 plus my m14 plus we had an m79 plus we had smokes you know the markers on both some regular frags and pilots they they were the Cowboys they'd carry anything you can think of from grease you know 45 Thomson you know whatever they had and whatever they wanted you know I can remember one of the copilot's firing at him 79 one of these you know shoot-'em-ups you know we used to they'd want you to set the hooches on fire sometimes you know that they thought were being used you know destroy them so some of the crew chiefs were taken like a 200 round belt and be all tracers you know nothing in between did you have much contact with the Vietnamese people only on the base we used to have them in the in the mess hall and I had miss Duty for a while and then they had one little guy we called Joe he was a good guy used to have a lot of fun with him get around everything and had women working there in the PX they had one we had a little PX goodbye you know snacks and stuff there was one there and they used to build their bunkers and clean the we had a showers like a just a big open building pipes and they'd come in there at the wrong time usually being caught a few times taking a shower and you hear a lot of giggling and stuff and there they are other no not really because we were we were more restricted than the army you know to just go on roam around you had to get a pass to go to China Beach you know you had to take the bus down there so get off base was kind of really not that easy to do yeah see right here we have much kind of take with the South Vietnamese Army units at all huh no not not at all really had more with the Koreans because we had them on the base you know what well so most of my service was just you know basically where your impressions of the Korean forces ah from the ones I saw I liked the the spider plants are who look crazy I remember one came in one day for landing at marble mountain and he overran the runway and he ended up and those down he gets out and he's laughing and the wrong do you know and I'm thinking boy if you were a marine you wouldn't be laughing he'd be having a problem yeah not that much over race relations I think we had maybe one or two you know southern boys they had a problem with it one of the sergeant's in my shop was black and he had some problems you know those guys that's all I remember I don't think it was all that bad terrible no you were there dream tap could you talk about that a little bit yeah that was kind of surreal we were kind of the pampered I mean we weren't flying I mean we actually I have to say we had a pretty easy we actually had an outdoor movie on the beach and this is one of the most bizarre things I can think of I remember watching Cool Hand Luke we used to take her we had our lawn chairs you know beach chairs we'd go over there set them in the sand you know we'd have our snacks and stuff in the movie coming on we're watching Cool Hand Luke and marble mountain was to the south of the base I think yeah South there was a prisoner of war camp between us in the mountain and you can see the mountain there was a monastery in there and the VC had overrun it and on top of the mountain there was a 105 and 155 and they blew the 155 up I think and we were scared to death there and turned on 105 on us and we're watching the movie and they had puffs you know the what was the c-47 together yeah certain Lynette and they had cobras and the Antilles and they were trying to get him up they were it was awesome they were just blowing the hell out of that place and we're sitting there watching Cool Hand Luke I'm watching the tracers going to the mound so watching the rockets and it was just it was unbelievable you know and thank you how long it took him to get him off we were getting hit pretty often we were getting rocketed in the motor pretty often darn tat you know a lot and I remember going across the Danang bridge on the other side of Bridge there was a Vietnamese army base that's all I can remember but so as we're going into the nang on the left side they have a whole row of bodies they had like 20 bodies I guess they pulled them out of the river it was in one of the magazine's they had a picture of it yeah I don't know if it's wife or something like that I remember seeing them all strung out there that was during that day so today the bodies were floating down there pretty good you know we we were up all night you know we always had Birds up there there was a lot going on uh myself I didn't you know other than the rocket attacks other motors I didn't do all that much during Tet you know just be an observer I guess remembrances of this as I motor around going off during the day by the by the mess hall they never came in that far they used to walk them down our flight line mm-hmm and a lot of times they didn't make it to the to the barracks area you know where the who just were but this one time I don't know I always thought you know we had Vietnamese on the base all the time I always thought they were you know scoping us out and this one here it was about the farthest down that I remember coming from nobody got hurt but I sure woke everybody up I was on a ready accent pretend that this was a neat story we had a fallout you know everybody else got the bunkers we had a fallout and everybody's looking at everybody I don't want to be here and we got our rifles and her helmets and they marches down to officer country right by their the club and we're standing there and they're giving us orders what we were supposed to do is set up a perimeter you know in case they came in on the beaches or attacked us and we were supposed to be there to stop him right and while we're standing here all of a sudden this round goes right to the roof the officer's club everybody looks at everybody it's just like one of those instant things like this and the next thing you see is just people running you know and this one guy they had a bunker to hand out like a false front the door was this high but the roof of the bunker was here so he ended up going right out onto the roof of the bunker and another guy ran into the door of a hooch trying to get out of there and when it was all over we all came back out and you see all these rifles and helmets laying in there and what it turned out to be was one of those Papa I'm one of those motor flares that they shoot up you know the luminate it was a dud and it didn't the parachute never opened so what happened is the wrong went through the officer's club so it wasn't a regular motor of rocket it was just one of these square things and nobody wanted to say anything about a later on you know the lieutenant in charge he was one of the ones that ran through so it it never really got a lot of notoriety did you ever have to pull for America harder yeah I was on it for a while I decided for a while that was kind of an eventful for me it was really yeah we had towers and yeah beneath each Tower you had a bunker usually had an m60 in it and it was just you're always tired because you didn't get much sleep and it was you didn't want to sleep in the bunker because of the rats I got bitten by a rat back then when you got bitten by a rat I was painful you know so that was one of the biggest worries you yeah I I didn't have much you know as far as they had that wasn't much happened when you weren't flying did you have to work in the shop yes I did and I made a lot of friends I was one of the ones that would people would come and look for what Benny's you know I had all the good stuff I had pen flares I had survival knives I'm the one that sold the bullet holes the bullet loops for everybody I'm the one that camouflaged your helmet for you you know and gave you the flights and the good gloves you know the flight boots and all that so people and one of the the biggest the hottest commodities there was these pigtails for communication if you had one of those that worked you had gold and you better keep an eye on it and we had control of that too I'm stuck so I always had a good one you know but eventually they would break they were just poorly made but have you had a good one you could you could trade that for almost anything about it ah that's interesting - and we used to fly we would go whatever you had a mission like especially recon we were going to the recon base and we would land the pilots would go up and get their briefing and that gave us a chance to talk to the recon guys you know just the regular guys and they always wanted to trade and I would always bring an extra survival knife or some pen players and I traded a so I've away for a beautiful sleeping bag liner this thing was like you know gossamer is real white and warm is great you know and there were more than anything we had a survival knife or anything like that these guys they want to do you could get anything we get long range sea rations you know mmm all the good stuff so you always bought stuff to trade with one out stuff what did you think of the rotation system where you just had one year in we had thirteen months that's what I was I think yeah uh I didn't think much of it at the time you know for me it was another one of life's experiences I was glad to come home I could have shipped over you know I could have gone for another tour but toward the end I think is when reality started setting in hey you can die you know especially if it ended with the sermon and Lieutenant in my shop again I was really angry when he got killed because he was a great guy and I got thinking you know hey you know you're pushing your luck you know I could have phoned for another month but I didn't have to and I had a buddy that got shot in the lip he was a crew chief he was I got a clipping of it home I should have brought it but I remember the day he came in with all this plate gear he was the crew chief but after that you didn't have to find a short time at uh you know let's flight there and he put it on the counters not flying anymore and you know the visors on the helmets were mmm-hmm come down while his was shattered right there the bullet come in came in this side came in under his jaw out through the cheek episode of top lip and never hit a tooth but I just you know ripped his lip apart everything it was a 30 caliber and he just ended up with a big toothache and he had a big thing in it he was that what they call when I was small concepts of what they were doing that day and you know it was just seemed like there was more and more that you know then again you know and I think I've been here a long time you know and I'm lucky a few times you know it's time to call it quits get out of there were you aware of the peace movement yeah I was I guess I'm a redneck I my feelings are basically what they are today you know it's okay to be against the war but when guys are fighting and dying you know you own the respect you own you know to support them because I feel if you don't it was obvious back then as it is now our enemies watch our news they read our our articles and they take the pulse of the nation and they say okay we're having an effect oh we got those keep it up and these people are gonna quit they're not supporting their own troops in a long I think they probably contributed to you know our total casualties thing I also look at what happened after we got out you know the millions have died and the encouragement it gave to the oceans and Cambodians to go ahead and do the same thing America's not gonna do anything all these people died and suffered all those years for nothing you know yeah they don't okay no are they what was your experience like when you came back I'm from Saratoga so you know how to college was I remember the bait down in deandra's one time where we almost outside but I kind of down you know did you come back in in a uniform yeah I came back through Los Angeles Airport and there was a an experience there there was two young Marines three three gonna take that back right out of boot camp about a San Diego apparently and they were going home you know from boot camp and the airport was they were crowded and I wanted to get something to eat in the restaurant and I was corporal in and I heard this guy yelling corporal corporal over here over here yes so I go over and I'm talking to him you know and I could see that right on a boot camp and everything and they're asking me about Vietnam and where I was going down and they're asking me for little tidbits you know how to get along in a Marine Corps and stuff like that you know trying to be honest with them and as aseptically on silver knows a guy who would his family or something and I I just see him kind of snicker and sneering you know and I just got the impression you know because we were talking about Vietnam you know that's not and just the impression it kind of perked me a little put and put on your uniform you know you're not saying anything you know just kind of let it go but that was probably the only incident that happened to me nobody spit on me but I had friends that told me that happened to him yeah I won were you discharged January 17 yeah well that's that's enough from the active you still had I mean some of the stuff is I've seen you know and heard from other people you know I I just you know we weren't bloodthirsty or anything like that it was more you know you did what you had to do we didn't go out and shoot or any of that stuff I mean I saw a lot of Vietnam they have you know the Eike Eike order I was all down there and I got to see all that and I talked to I had a friend that was avium the mo6 was up quaint tree and he was parachute rigger school with me and he got killed up there and he was some Long Island and I remember talking to him he was just the same as me he was excited to fly and it wasn't it was more you know just the action it wasn't really mm-hmm I want to go out and kill somebody or something like that it wasn't that did you ever make you so yeah hey Bill say that again did you make use of the GI Bill no no I should have you know you know I laughs my insurance too I could have kept that and I had thought about it I thought about you know school or something like that but I worked at General Electric the year before I went in which was another reason I didn't because I was pretty wild and I thought if I keep it general elect or I'm gonna end up losing my job so after four years in the Marine Corps you know I had five years servicing General Electric I was a little more mature you know more able to hang on to the job did you join any veterans organizations at all you know I didn't when I came back I had a year down and New River down you know Jacksonville North Carolina and I dated this girl down there and she had a friend that was in the local American Legion and said why don't you come and take a look you know so I did and kind of their response I got it was kind of cold you know it's kind of like you know it's like you didn't fit in you know when I came back here it was the same thing you know just you know I didn't want to do it I I the one or go session I want to is Papa smoke you know what is there Papa smoke is all the helicopter squadrons that's Marine Corps helicopter squadrons that's what is this and it's an organization and my old squadron is there every two years we get together and and it's not like a bunch of you know sob stories or ot you know and all that it's just a good time mainly we talk about the funny stuff that happened you know the real hilarious stuff not were there any individuals that you stayed in contact with oh yeah yeah I have a buddy in Georgia we keep in contact all the time the sergeant that was in charge of my shop when I went there with him and I keep in contact we're pretty close one guy he's not doing too good he just probably got cash out pretty soon but we still keep in touch we email each other yeah it's you know they're close it's a pretty good you ever watched any of the Vietnam and these you know for a long time I didn't I didn't like them I'd I hated applix know whatever I can't even say it full mono Jack I hated all that crap I didn't I think these guys took a lot of liberties you know then buy it one second you know I mean you may be an incident here and there but people look at that and they say okay that's the whole Marine Corps that's the whole army that's all Vietnam you know and it's too much generalization in it and it really irks me because it wasn't like that not at all yeah and but when they started changing it a little bit like they had one came out not too long ago helicopter heroes or something like that it was more like a documentary it's more like a documentary you know it showed more but I you know when John Wayne movie was just the opposite it went too far the other way there was nothing that really showed it like it was you know people do you read much about no I don't I don't I'm doing better I there's a book by Marian Starkey he was a Marine up around quaint tree they were up around her or was it Josette up north you know almost to the DMZ I'm trying to remember it was a hallow store if you ever get a chance to visit these guys who are unbelievable what they did you know I mean they paid a price but you want to read something about real heroes and read it read that book that that'll shock you and you know case on that area you know these guys really had it yeah I can't imagine what they went through to do that stuff well it's a good book I read that you know and it was really awesome it was pretty good we had some good guys our outfit too you know mm-hm fantastic stuff you know how do you think your time and service changed your head and effect on your life examine matured me alive uh yeah what there's good bad you know I mean in a good way and a bad way you know I mean makes you a little cynical too but it also as far as you know trying to try to think it award you learn to depend on people and you learn you know that there's some really good guys out there you know that you can really trust but then again it goes the other the other way too you know but I think I've matured me and made me realize hey you know you're not involved what's gonna happen you know I mean and you you think you're gonna live forever you know and it's a wake-up call so it made me want to live my life you know more to the fullest and you know do do things that were good for a change you know I want it to settle down and get married that's what I want I'm gonna have kids and you know bring them up all right I think I did so far but yeah you know you know just get away you know I've got a lot of wildness out yeah yeah I'll say that but also you know you got to see how other people lived you know I realized this is a good country I mean we have things that well yeah I remember and you know in the mess hall they're seeing a young beautiful Vietnamese girls you know out into the garbage and you know where they did the garters I'm a marine and I can't remember the name but I remember seeing them reach into the trash cans you know the floating garbage you know all that stuff right up to their elbows to take out chunks of meat you know what's wrong cans taken home so either read it themselves or someone in the black market they take these big you know the big cans their game yeah and they you know like we had steak or beef or something they'd be taken out and there's a beautiful young girls you know how bad is this you know we remember a a wooden pallet dropping off a truck going down the road by the time this guy back up to get it it was gone you know it ran out and you know and that's how desperate they were for stuff like that when you see that and then you come home and see what we have here you know and that's got the rest of your life you think about it you know I'm grateful for what I got yeah yeah yes do next one job today

Channel: New York State Military Museum

Views: 37,327

Rating: 4.7562075 out of 5

Keywords: Veteran., Military., 16th Marine Aircraft Group, 2nd Marine Observation Squadron, United States Marine Corps, Vietnam War

Id: eaYhGq9C6Zk

Length: 51min 28sec (3088 seconds)

Published: Tue Jan 26 2016