Thought it might be beneficial for the many military folks on the board to have a thread where we can post applicable info that concerns and/or affects us.
"Military Report" is the largest of the newsletter-type updates and covers all branches of the military. Of particular interest to the vets on the board is the proposed "health reform bill" article below.
Anyone who wants to receive this free update can subscribe at:
Week of November 30, 2009 AF Changes Crossroads Website - Effective Dec. 1, the Crossroads website will be hosted on the Air Force portal. More...
AF Heroism Award Nominees Needed - The Air Force Sergeants Association is seeking nominations for the 2010 Pitsenbarger Award, which recognizes an Air Force enlisted servicemember who has performed a heroic act. More...
AF Initiates New Fitness Standards - The new Air Force fitness standards will officially begin July 1, 2010. The updated program will test Airmen twice during calendar year 2010. More...
AF Records Transferred to Archives - Approximately 177,000 official military personnel files from the Air Force were transferred recently to the National Archives and Records Administration. More...
Air Force Urges Holiday Safety - For the Air Force Safety Center team, the holiday season can be one of the most dangerous times of the year. More...
An Overview of VA Home Loans - For veterans and active duty military personnel, a VA loan can be the most flexible home financing option available. More...
Army Develops Global Network - The U.S. Army is developing a global network that Soldiers will be able to access anywhere in the world using capabilities similar to a Blackberry or iPhone. More...
Beneficiaries, Vets Shielded From Health Reform - The national health reform bill passed by the House last month and the Senate version to be debated in early December pose no threat to current military health care benefits. More...
Exchange Online Mall - The recent addition of Fingerhut, Government Vacation Rewards and 21 additional name-brand websites is driving sales growth of 26 percent at the All-Service's Exchange Online Mall. More...
Exchanges Offer Shuttle Program - To ensure military Families living and working near smaller locations enjoy the same selection as those at bigger installations, the AAFES has instituted a "Shuttle Program." More...
Exchanges Sponsor Contest - The Army & Air Force Exchange Service is encouraging military shoppers to share their photo memories for a shot at a $1,000 shopping spree. More...
Featured Job: Government and Law Enforcement - Use your military experience to land a federal job. Search thousands of Federal, State and local jobs in Law Enforcement and Homeland Security on Military.com. More...
Gift Cards for Our Troops - Any American can send an Army and Air Force Exchange Service (AAFES) gift card by simply calling 800-527-2345 or logging on to the AAFES website . More...
HooahMail Speeds Delivery - The Army's HooahMail program makes it possible for friends and family members to put a paper letter and photograph into the hands of their loved ones in Afghanistan, in some cases, on the same day it is sent. More...
Navigating Voc-Rehab - Disable veterans seeking to tap into their Voc-Rehab benefits to learn new skills with the goal of starting a new career must first tap into their own sense of purpose. More...
Navy Revises Family Care Plan - The Navy recently announced revisions to its Family Care Plan policy, which includes a new deployment deferment option for eligible Sailors. More...
Navy to Eliminate Field Records - As the Navy moves forward with plans to eliminate the enlisted field service record, Sailors need to establish a self-service account that will allow them to access to their new digital record. More...
New Program Connects Vets with Peers - A group of area veterans met last week in Fredericksburg to talk about their military experiences, share information and forge new friendships. More...
New VA Redesigns Website - The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) rolled out the first phase of a large-scale renovation for its Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) website. More...
Online GI Bill Benefits Transfer - A new Air Force module launching this month in the virtual Military Personnel Flight will simplify the process of transferring Post 9/11 GI Bill benefits to dependents. More...
VA Expands Pilot Application Process - The VA has announced the expansion of a program with the Department of Defense (DoD) to streamline the application process for people retiring or exiting the military due to disabilities. More...
VA Pilots E-Health Records - The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and Kaiser Permanente recently announced a new, pilot program designed to exchange electronic health record (EHR) information. More...
VA to Launch Women Veterans Study - The VA is launching a comprehensive study of women veterans who served in the military during the Vietnam War to explore the effects of their military service upon their mental and physical health. More...
What College Will Give You Credit for Military Service - Your service in the Military may have earned you up to a full semester of college credit. Military.com connects you to hundreds of schools who recognize the work you've already done. More...
What College Will Give You Credit for Military Service? - Your service in the Military may have earned you up to a full semester of college credit. Military.com connects you to hundreds of schools who recognize the work you've already done. More...
What is VetSuccess? - VetSuccess is a partnership between the VA Vocational Rehabilitation and Employment (VR&E) program and the Department of Labor's Veterans Employment and Training Service (VETS) program. More...
Thanks CB, now I know where to send gift cards to help soldiers that are in "hot zones". This especially helps because the military no longer accepts packages sent to "any soldier", because of the threat of terrorism. I already proudly support the USO directly, and the ability to send gift cards will enhance my small donation to the USO.
____________________ "Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters." - Ben Franklin
you can pick out a thank you card and Xerox will print it and it will be sent to a soldier that is currently serving in Iraq . You can't pick who gets it, but it will go to a member of the armed services.
It is FREE and it only takes a few seconds.
This is a great way to say thank you and let our troops know we are behind them. Please take the time to pass it on for others to do also.
Thanks for taking to time to support our military!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Only two defining forces have ever offered to die for you; Jesus Christ and the American G.I. One died for your soul, the other for your freedom
Last edited on Sat Dec 19th, 2009 02:29 am by Cherokee Bill
____________________ If you are ashamed to stand by your colors, you had better seek another flag.
~Author Unknown
Our US Navy Ceremonial Guard Silent Drill Team was invited to compete in an International Tattoo in Norway. The Navy competed against military units from all over NATO & won 1st place. Once you see the video you'll understand why they won..
****Note****
The military tradition of Tattoo stretches back to the 17th century, during the reign of King William III of Great Britain. English soldiers who served during a war in the Netherlands often spent their evenings in local taverns.
Each evening at the soldier's 10 p.m. curfew, drummers would march through the streets to signal soldiers to go home. It was also a signal to Dutch innkeepers to stop serving ale.
In their native language, the Dutch drummers would say, 'Doe den tap toe,' which meant, 'turn off the taps.' Often, intoxicated soldiers heard only the last two words, and soon adapted the Dutch phrase into their own language, turning 'tap toe' into 'tattoo.'
I came across this article and thought I would share it with all of you.
I want to thank God for the kind of young people that we have in this country.
This is on Military.com and that is a membership website so I am posting the complete article. If anyone is a member, go read the comments that are there. They are good.
The two teenagers got to the cemetery first. He wore his dark green dress uniform from the National Guard. She wore a long black dress. They stood on the edge of the road, across from rows of matching military headstones, waiting for the funeral of the man they had never met.
Mike Colt, 19, and his girlfriend, Carol Sturgell, 18, had driven more than an hour from their Tampa homes last month to be at Florida National Cemetery in Bushnell.
They weren't really sure why they had come. They just knew they had to be here.
"It's kind of sad, huh?" asked Sturgell, scanning the sea of white gravestones.
Colt nodded. "Yeah, but it feels kind of important."
At 12:20 p.m., a Tampa police car pulled up, then a white Lincoln Town Car. Another police cruiser followed. Two officers stepped out.
"Thank you for being here," Colt said, shaking both of their hands.
"No, thank you," said Officer Dan College. "If it weren't for you guys, none of us would be here."
More than a month ago , on the last Saturday of November, the young couple was hanging out at Sturgell's house when her brother rode up on his bike, all excited. He had found two fishing poles in this huge pile of trash. Come check it out, he said. So they did.
At the edge of the trash mound, sticking out from beneath a box, Sturgell spied a worn green folder.
She pulled it out, brushed off the dust. Across the top, bold letters said, "Department of Defense." Inside, she found retirement papers from the U.S. Army; a citation for a Purple Heart issued in 1945; and a certificate for a Bronze Star medal "for heroism in ground combat in the vicinity of Normandy, France ... June 1944." In the center of the certificate there was a name: Delbert E. Hahn.
Why would anyone throw that away? Sturgell asked.
And who is that guy? Colt wanted to know. Must be old, a World War II vet. Looks like he served at D-Day!
That night, they took the paperwork back to Sturgell's house and searched Delbert E. Hahn on the computer. Nothing. They talked about who he might have been, the life he might have led.
The next morning, they went back to the trash heap and searched for more clues. They rummaged through boxes, overturned furniture, picked through piles of the past. Colt moved a ratty couch - and something fell out. A metal vase, or box, some kind of rectangular container about a foot tall. On the base was the name: Delbert E. Hahn.
"It's him," Colt told his girlfriend. "This must be him, in his urn."
Sturgell screamed. She didn't want to touch it. It was kind of freaky, she said, discovering the remains of some dead guy.
"He shouldn't be here," Colt said. "No one should be thrown away like that, just left in a parking lot."
The dead man wasn't alone. Under the couch, the couple found two more sets of remains: a cylinder-style container with Barbara Hahn printed on the bottom and another urn, which had no name.
Tampa police Cpl. Edward Croissant had just reported for the night shift that Sunday when his officers showed him the urns. This kid and his girlfriend had found them and brought them to the station.
Then an officer told Croissant about the Purple Heart. The Bronze Star. And the Normandy invasion.
And Croissant became irate. He had served eight years in the Navy. He's in the Coast Guard Reserve. "I had three uncles in World War II. That was the greatest generation. If it wasn't for those men, we would have nothing," he said.
"That man saw combat. And someone just dumped him there? He deserves a better ending."
Police called the Department of Veterans Affairs and learned Hahn had died in 1983, at the age of 62, -and was a highly decorated war hero. The staff sergeant had served in the infantry and been honored with five Bronze Stars and two Purple Hearts.
Barbara Hahn, they learned, was the soldier's wife.
So how did their remains end up in that mound of garbage? Where was the rest of their family, or friends, anyone who would want their ashes? And who was in that third urn?
Neighbors filled in some of the story: Barbara Hahn had been a widow forever, they told police. For years, her mother had lived with her. Her mother's name was Barbara, too.
The elder Barbara had lived to be more than 100. They thought she died around 2000. That third urn, neighbors told police, must be her.
The younger Barbara, the soldier's wife, got sick in 2003. A couple came to care for her, and she wound up willing them her mobile home. When she died, the couple moved in, took out a mortgage, then didn't make payments.
The bank foreclosed on the trailer late last year.
In November, officials sent a maintenance company to clear it out. The workers must have just dumped everything behind the vacant building on Busch Boulevard, neighbors told police. Including the remains of three people.
Just before 1 p.m. Dec. 16 , the two teenagers led the car line through Florida National Cemetery. Police followed, then the funeral director who had the urns. Outside a wooden gazebo, two rows of National Guardsmen stood at attention.
The funeral director handed the first soldier a flag, the next one the cylinder with Barbara Hahn's remains, the third one the brass urn with Delbert Hahn.
(Barbara's mother's remains are still in the evidence room of the police station. Since she wasn't a veteran or married to one, she wasn't entitled to be buried in the military cemetery.)
"Let us open the gates of the Lord," said a military chaplain, who led the procession of strangers into the gazebo. "Let us remember," said the chaplain, "none of us lives only unto himself."
The teenagers sat on the front bench. Three officials from Veterans Affairs sat behind them. They had spent weeks searching for the Hahns' relatives, any distant kin or friend, someone who might want their ashes - or at least want to come to their burial.
They couldn't find anyone. Even the couple whom Barbara Hahn had willed her home to didn't show.
By the time the chaplain lifted his head from the Lord's Prayer, a long line of men had wrapped around the gazebo.
Wearing blue denim shirts and work boots, they clasped their caps in their hands and bowed their heads. Dozens of groundskeepers from the cemetery had left their Christmas party to come pay respects to the man who, in death, had been so disrespected.
A bugler played taps. The riflemen fired three shots. And 56 people watched the honor guard fold a flag over the urns of the man and woman they never knew.
____________________ MGySgt USMC
(Ret)
Note: No trees were killed in the sending of this message, but a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
For all you Air Force folks.....here's a fun game where you identify Air Force base locations (they even have some old long-forgotten bases for we oldies-but-goodies!)
It's bad enough that we're faced with some really nasty threats out there, (with a growing China, a rouge North Korea, a fruit cake in Iran and Islamo-fascist terrorism), but I'm concerned more that the biggest threat we're up against resides right under our noses - in Washington DC.
Between the current occupant of the White House, (who's obviously hell bent on bankrupting the nation, crippling our intelligence and war fighting capabilities and degrading our Constitution by granting rights to sworn enemy combatants), I don't know which is worse.
Couple that with the lunatics running the congressional insane asylum, China's growing Military might should be the least of our concerns.
Personally, I think that right now the Obama administration poses a much greater danger to the well being of the American people and to this nation than any threat imaginable.
...and that's putting it mildly!
____________________ There is no such thing as common sense because if sense were common then everyone would have it - Liberals wouldn't exist and Obama wouldn't be president!
As I See It — A Fast Track to a Train Wreck
With the national debt at unprecedented levels and growing, many are calling for "fast track" legislative action on recommendations by a special commission to address the growing disparity between federal spending and revenues — including Social Security, Medicare, and military/federal retirement programs.
MOAA Government Relations Director Col. Steve Strobridge, USAF-Ret., provides some perspective in his February As I See It column. Dozens of members have commented — check them out and add your own.
MOAA President Accepts Top Honor
A record-breaking crowd gathered Feb. 23 at the Association TRENDS Awards where Vice Adm. Norb Ryan Jr., USN-Ret., MOAA president, received the top honor of Association Executive of the Year.
Breaking Barriers
The military always has been on the cutting edge of the latest trends and movements in U.S. history, and this was no less true than during the Civil Rights Era. Don Vaughan highlights five of the many brave servicemembers who led the way toward equality in the services and acted as examples for other African-Americans coming up behind them.
VA and the New Agent Orange Provisions
Last fall, the VA announced three additional illnesses had been added to the list of conditions considered service-connected and presumptively associated to exposure to Agent Orange. The rulemaking process to include them in federal regulations is underway. Get the latest here.
The Key to Success in Afghanistan
A recent article from the Council on Foreign Relations asks experts on Pakistan to evaluate President Obama's strategy. Do you agree with their assessments?
Female Engagement Teams: U.S. Leaders Tank Ditch to Progress
Female Engagement Teams are not a new idea in the fields of Iraq and Afghanistan. So why then are they not incorporated into mission-planning efforts and given the focus they deserve? Blogger Gina DiNicolo discusses these issues in her latest blog post Inside the Headquarters.
Follow MOAA on Twitter
You can’t get your marching orders from @MilitaryOfficer, but you can get just about everything else. Follow MOAA on Twitter to get the latest discounts, event notifications, articles, and more!
A Rousing Send-Off
An Air Force Reserve captain is surprised by the farewell some fellow officers give to a soon-to-be retired four-star general after the general’s final flight at his command.
____________________ If you are ashamed to stand by your colors, you had better seek another flag.
~Author Unknown
Profiles of Valor: U.S. Army Col. Robert Howard
Ret. Col. Robert Howard was laid to rest Wednesday at Arlington National Cemetery. He died Dec. 23 at age 70. Howard served five tours in Vietnam, was wounded 14 times, and was the most decorated soldier from that war, including eight Purple Hearts, four Bronze Stars, four Legion of Merit awards, the Silver Star, the Distinguished Service Cross (twice) and the Medal of Honor -- a medal for which he was nominated three times for three separate actions in a 13-month period.
Howard's Medal of Honor citation reads, "1st Lt. Howard (then SFC.), distinguished himself while serving as platoon sergeant of an American-Vietnamese platoon which was on a mission to rescue a missing American soldier in enemy controlled territory in the Republic of Vietnam. The platoon ... was attacked by an estimated 2-company force. During the initial engagement, 1st Lt. Howard was wounded and his weapon destroyed by a grenade explosion. 1st Lt. Howard saw his platoon leader had been wounded seriously and was exposed to fire. Although unable to walk, and weaponless, 1st Lt. Howard unhesitatingly crawled through a hail of fire to retrieve his wounded leader. ...
"Through his outstanding example of indomitable courage and bravery, 1st Lt. Howard was able to rally the platoon into an organized defense force. With complete disregard for his safety, 1st Lt. Howard crawled from position to position, administering first aid to the wounded, giving encouragement to the defenders and directing their fire on the encircling enemy. For 3 1/2 hours 1st Lt. Howard's small force and supporting aircraft successfully repulsed enemy attacks and finally were in sufficient control to permit the landing of rescue helicopters. 1st Lt. Howard personally supervised the loading of his men and did not leave the bullet-swept landing zone until all were aboard safely. 1st Lt. Howard's gallantry in action, his complete devotion to the welfare of his men at the risk of his life were in keeping with the highest traditions of the military service and reflect great credit on himself, his unit, and the U.S. Army."
Rest in peace, Colonel.
____________________ Life without God is like an unsharpened pencil - it has no point
He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to attain what he cannot lose. - Jim Elliot
Military families live in a state of uncertainty, and circumstances are always changing. This is especially true of our Special Operations forces, which since 9/11 have seen demands on them increase. Special Operations personnel is a rare breed of human: expertly skilled, highly trained and wholly dedicated. The challenges they face are particularly dangerous and unpredictable, which makes their job not only difficult on them but their family as well. It takes a special kind of person - an honorable person - to do this job. That's why they are the perfect people to highlight at the Restoring Honor rally. Read more about our amazing Special Ops in this special to Fusion Magazine HERE, and find out how you can donate to the Special Operations Warrior Foundation HERE.
____________________ Life without God is like an unsharpened pencil - it has no point
He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to attain what he cannot lose. - Jim Elliot
Below are web-sites that provide information on veteran's benefits and how to file/ask for them. Accordingly, there are many sites that explain how to obtain books, military/medical records, information and how to appeal a denied claim with the VA. Please pass this information on to every veteran you know. Nearly 100% of this information is free and available for all veterans, the only catch is: you have to ask for it, because they won't tell you about a specific benefit unless you ask for it. You need to know what questions to ask so the right doors open for you -- and then be ready to have an advocate who is willing to work with and for you, stay in the process, and press for your rights and your best interests.
FedEx to UPS: Lift the Stranglehold on FAA Reauthorizations
FAA Reauthorization Act Too Important To Be Held Up by Backroom Deal
March 11, 2010 - Congress appears ready to make a decision on much-
needed legislation that would modernize air transportation in this
country, provide air travelers with new rights, and upgrade our
nation's airports. Unfortunately, the House version of this measure
contains a 230-word bailout provision for UPS that could disrupt
express package delivery. Currently, the Senate version does not.
It's time for UPS to abandon their Congressional bailout -- in the
interests of our safe skies.
National economic interests should always come before narrow corporate
interests. We strongly urge UPS to compete rather than work for their
special-interest bailout provision. The provision, written by UPS
lobbyists and slipped into the House version would benefit only one
company, UPS. The measure is designed to undermine the service
reliability of its main competitor, FedEx Express. This legislation to
modernize the FAA is too important to be held up by a backroom deal
engineered by UPS lobbyists. Winners and losers should be decided by
fair competition in the open marketplace—not in the halls of Congress.
UPS should improve shipping services to their customers – instead of
lobbying Congress for a special competitive advantage.
The Marine Corps' top officer said March 25 that even if the ban on openly-serving gays in the services is lifted, he would draw the line at forcing heterosexual Marines to bunk with gays on base.
this was passed to me by a bud who was Army.... probably true, not sure..
=============================================
Anyone who is a veteran MUST...go and sign up with the VA and get enrolled in the VA medical system or face fines for not having bought health insurance.
The VA health system qualifies as being enrolled in an approved health care system and is exempted from the new Obama HC law.
____________________ Carolina I knew you
before the highways got to you
and I loved you as one of your own
and I still do
My young Marine is coming home from Okinawa next Saturday on 20 days of leave and then she's headed to Cherry Point to join her new unit - at least she's safe and stateside...
Until September that is - then she's off to the Middle East...
...but daddy loves his young warriors!
____________________ There is no such thing as common sense because if sense were common then everyone would have it - Liberals wouldn't exist and Obama wouldn't be president!
I bet it is an awesome thing to be a man's man and have a daughter who YOU KNOW can kick your butt should she so choose. Of course, she would never do that.
____________________ I wasn't born in Texas, but I got here just as soon as I could!!!
That's what I love about my kid's Susie, I raised them to be independent. To depend on no one other and God and self. And yea, she could probably do some serious damage! (LOL)
____________________ There is no such thing as common sense because if sense were common then everyone would have it - Liberals wouldn't exist and Obama wouldn't be president!
16echo20 wrote: this was passed to me by a bud who was Army.... probably true, not sure..
=============================================
Anyone who is a veteran MUST...go and sign up with the VA and get enrolled in the VA medical system or face fines for not having bought health insurance.
The VA health system qualifies as being enrolled in an approved health care system and is exempted from the new Obama HC law.
When obamacare was 1st being talked about, it did say that VA health care DID qualify as approved health care to satisify the requirement to have health care. The first thing that went through my mind was "once the public option and single payer system were put into effect, how long will it be before they dismantle both Medicare and the VA healthcare system". Think of the money that could be saved once everyone is under those two options. And it will not surprise me when they start dismantling them. Medicaid will be left intact as it is part of the redistribution of wealth for those that don't want to work and want something for nothing.
____________________ Life without God is like an unsharpened pencil - it has no point
He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to attain what he cannot lose. - Jim Elliot
Another little bit of info about Tricare, Ialways suspected that it probably wouldn't survive long under the Progressives, so folks better keep your ears to the ground and your powder dry:
PS: even though I have heard quite a bit about this lately, and even the American Legion had a little something the other day that pretty much said the VA and Tricare was safe from this Administration, I feel that nothing anyone even slightly connected to politics says is chiseled in stone, so a lot of vigilance and suspicion is suggested.
Subject: Another Close Call for Tricare ............
For Immediate Release: March 20, 2010
House Republicans turn back sneak attempt to force TRI CAR E into healthcare takeover.
( WASHINGTON , DC ) – House Republicans have turned back a last-second power grab by Democrats to fold the nation’s TRI CAR E health insurance for military families into their proposed takeover of the nation’s healthcare, according to House Republican Conference Secretary John Carter.
House Republicans forced an immediate vote on the floor to remove TRI CAR E from controls by a new federal “health exchange” which will overturn all existing health insurance plans.
“This was an incredible sneak attack on our service members and their dependents’ healthcare, that the Democrats knew would never be acceptable,” says Carter. “The original House bill protected TRI CAR E from the new mandates, but the revised bill introduced this week attempted to sneak this takeover back in. This is treachery.”
Carter says while Republicans uncovered and turned back this attempt, it provides prime evidence of why the overall bill should be rejected. “The gross partisanship, closed doors, and secrecy used to produce this horrible legislation almost succeeded in sneaking in this attack on military healthcare. What else has not yet been discovered? We have got to kill this bill in the House, in the Senate, and if necessary, in the courts.”
Once the attempt was unmasked, the entire House voted to exempt TRI CAR E from the Democrat bill.
John E. Stone Communications Director U.S. Rep. John Carter (TX31) Secretary, House Republican Conference 409 Cannon House Office Building Washington, DC 20515 Office - (202) 225-3864 FAX: (202) 225-5866
____________________ Not Racist; Not Violent; Not
Silent Anymore.
GO GATORS!!!!!!!!!!!!
Here is another item from the Museum of the United States Air Force about the opening of the flight nurse exhibit and some really poignant tales from another part of the Greatest Generation. God bless them for their service and laying the groundwork for our current air evac program, which has helped in saving many lives of our heroes.
One of the 'offensive' bumper stickers
A federal judge has permanently banned officials at Camp LeJeune Marine Corps Base in North Carolina from censoring bumper stickers and window decals critical of Islam and its prophet, Muhammad.
Here is an interesting true story that I verified on several sites:
This is a great TRUE story. I think you will find it interesting. I am sure most of the former Navy types have heard of Stratton and Hegdahl.
Doug Hegdahl was interviewed as part of a show on POWs on the Discovery or Military Channel
THE INCREDIBLY STUPID ONE”
(SN HEGDAHL, USS CANBERRA – PRISONER OF WAR)
By Dick “Beak” Stratton, Captain, USN (Ret.)
It was a warmer than usual summer day in Clark, South Dakota, when a rather large and ungainly young man, a recent high school graduate, set about finding his way in the world. The salivating Navy recruiter asked the youngster what it would take to have him sign up: “why, I’d like to go to Australia.” It was as good as done. After all, in 1966, if you were lucky enough to ship out on the USS Canberra, more likely than not, during the course of your hitch, there will be a port call to the ship’s namesake—Canberra, Australia.
This young man came from a solid, patriotic Norwegian Lutheran stock that believed when your country called, you answered. You did not go to the bus station but to the recruiting station. You did not go to Oxford, you went to Vietnam. So Douglas Brent Hegdahl III shipped out to boot camp at San Diego, where he slept through the Code of Conduct lectures since he would not be fighting in the trenches. Lo and behold, he did get orders to the USS Canberra. At that time Canberra, with 8-inch guns mounted on the pointy end and missiles on the round end, was assigned to steam with the Gulf of Tonkin Yacht Club in the South China Sea off the coast of Vietnam. (And, yes, she did have Canberra, Australia, on her Port of Call list.)
Doug’s battle station was the aft ammunition handling room for the 5-inch guns, located aft in the bowels of the ship. One morning he had the 0100 watch while the Canberra was steaming down the coast of North Vietnam firing its 8-inch guns against targets of opportunity (bicycles, water buffalo and occasional trucks) on Highway 1. At about 0330 he rolled out of the rack. Being a prudent farm boy, he locked all his valuables in his locker and then proceeded to go out on deck for a breath of fresh air before manning his battle station.
Now there is a non-repetitive exercise in the surface Navy called “going out on deck when big guns are firing.” If the concussion does not blow you over the side, it will at least blow out your eardrums. But Doug must have slept through that safety lecture. He doesn’t know what happened. Either not being night-adapted, or being without his glasses, or concussion did it, he ended up going arse over teakettle into the South China Sea about three miles offshore with no life preserver, no identification, no nothing. Meanwhile he watched the Love Boat merrily steaming over the horizon, firing at the coastline and never missing him for two days.
There is not much to do in the South China Sea at 0345. He took off his boondockers and hung them around his neck in case he needed them when he reached shore. He stripped off his dungarees, zipped up the fly, tie off the cuffs and popped them over his head, as he was taught, to make a life preserver. He reports back to you that it doesn’t work. (He missed the part about old dungarees, with holes, out of the Lucky Bag would have to be kept wet if they were to hold any air at all.) So he put on his trousers, socks and shoes. (Sharks? Sea snakes?)
Somewhere along the line he had heard that drowning was a “nice way to die;” so he thought he would try it out. He put his hands over his head and down he went—bloop, bloop, bloop. Now both he and I had heard the myth that when drowning you would get cuddly, warm, all the nice things in your life would flash by in your mind and you would go to your eternal reward to the sound of music (harp?). Doug resurfaced and reports back to us that it is all malarkey: there are no movies, there is no music and it’s colder than Hell!
As dawn came he started swimming away from the sun, hopefully towards shore. He could see the haze of land, but the harder he tried, the further back it receded. So he just rolled on his back, playing like a whale, humming a few tunes and saying a few prayers. Notice he never gave up. How many people have we been exposed to in the course of our lives, in a situation like that would have just plain given up? About 1800 that same day, a Vietnamese fishing boat came by and hauled him out of the water—some twelve hours later.
Even those peasant fishermen could figure out that this moose would never fit in the cockpit of an A4 Skylark. They turned him upside down and inside out which garnered them absolutely nothing. Remember, he had prudently left everything back on the ship in his locker. Picture yourself being tortured to admit you were a CIA agent who entered the water in Coronado, California to swim ten thousand miles across the Pacific to infiltrate their shores!
When the authorities got him ashore, they showed Doug piles of materials allegedly written by Yankee Air Pirates who had been captured before him.
(95% of those captured in North Vietnam had been tortured, were not offered the option of death, and were made to give more than Name, Rank, Serial Number and Date of Birth sequence permitted by the Military Code of Conduct and required by International Law.) Doug recognized that something was amiss, but, as he said later, “Geeze, they’re officers, they must know what they are doing.” So he decided his best ploy was to pretend to be stupid.
He got them off target by comparing farms in North Vietnam and South Dakota. He didn’t realize that even then the Communists were categorizing him to gauge his usefulness to their cause. His dad had about ten motel units, numberless vehicles and all kinds of land—but no water buffalo. No water buffalo meant in Vietnamese parlance that he was a “poor peasant.” This is just as well, as Communists had murdered over 20 million “rich peasants” in their various revolutions, because those folks are unreconstructed capitalists. A little miffed at first, Doug caught on right away—he is a quick study—it was to his advantage to play out the poor peasant act to the bitter end.
Tired of the verbal jousting the Communist cadres told him that he would have to write and anti-war statement for them. He joyously agreed. The interrogators were dumbfounded. This was the first Yankee to agree to do anything without being tortured first. They brought out the paper, ink and pens. He admired them all and then stated: “But one small thing. I can’t read or write. I’m a poor peasant.” This was quite credible to the Vietnamese since their poor peasants could neither read nor write. So they assigned a Vietnamese to teach him penmanship, spelling, grammar and sentence structure. Immediately his learning curve went flat. Eventually, the interrogators gave up in disgust; writing a confession for him and having him sign it in an illegible scrawl. He admitted to the war crime of shelling the presidential birthplace of Ho Chi Minh and signed it as Seaman Apprentice Douglas Brent Hegdahl III, United States Navy Reserve, Commanding Officer, USS Canberra. No one has ever seen this piece of paper.
Doug was shuffled around from pillar to post, since his captors didn’t know where he would fit into their propaganda plans. One mistake they made was to put him in for a while with Joe Crecca, an Air Force officer who had developed a method of creating the most organized memory bank we possessed to record the names of pilots shot down and imprisoned in Vietnam. Joe took this young Seaman and, recognizing the potential, painstakingly taught Doug not only 256 names, but also, the method of memorizing, cross-referencing and retrieving those names. It was no easy task that Joe set for himself for it was not intuitively obvious to Doug the value of such mental gymnastics.
It was a hot summer day when I first met Doug. I was in solitary confinement again. The Communists did not care for me, which was OK because I didn’t like them either. My cell door opened and here was this big moose standing in his skivvie shorts (prison uniform of the day). “My name is Seaman Douglas Brent Hegdahl, Sir. What’s yours?” It is awful hard to look dignified when you are standing in your underwear, knock-kneed, ding-toed, pot-bellied, unwashed and unshaven for 100 days. I automatically recited, “Dick Stratton, Lieutenant Commander, USSTiconderoga.” Immediately I saw that I probably made a mistake as his eyes rolled back in his head and you could see what he was thinking: “Cripes, another officer!” But notice that instinctively he asked the critical and most important question for survival: “Who is your senior?” The rule we lived by was: “If I am senior, I will take charge; if junior, I will obey.”
The Communists took a siesta for two hours every afternoon which was a good deal for us as we were free from torture and harassment. I was laying on the floor on my bed board and Doug was skipping, yes, skipping around the room. I asked: “Doug, what are you doing?” He paused for a moment, looked me in the eye and cryptically said: “Skipping, Sir” and continued to skip. A stupid question, a stupid answer. After a moment, I again queried: “What ya doin’ that for?” This stopped him for a moment. He paused and cocked his head thoughtfully, smiled and replied: “You got anything better to do,Sir?” I didn’t. He continued skipping. I guess he did learn one thing from boot camp. You can say anything you want to an officer as long as you smile and say “sir.”
One siesta period he said: Hey, Beak, you went to college and studied government; do you know the GettysburgAddress?” We got a brick (no paper or pencils for the criminals) and started to write it out on the tile floor until we got it correct. Then he stopped me with the question: “Can you say it backwards?” Well, who would want to say theGettysburg Address backwards? Certainly not the Jesuits at Georgetown and especially not me. Doug could say it backwards, verbatim, rapidly. I know because I could track him from the written version we had on the floor.
“So what?” you might say. The so what is that when they threw him out of Vietnam, and throw him out they did, he came out with 256 names that Joe Crecca had taught him memorized by service, by rank and alphabetically; next to each name he had a dog’s name, kid’s name or social security number to verify the quality of the name which we had picked up by tap code, deaf spelling code or secret notes. He still has those names memorized today and sings them to the tune of “Old MacDonald Has a Farm.” One of our intelligence officers asked him if he could slow the recitation down to make for easier copying. Doug replied “No” that it was like riding a bike, you had to keep moving or you would fall off. If it weren’t for Joe Crecca, Doug and our government would not have had those names until the end of war five years later.
In trying to get people to accept early propaganda releases, the Communists would have some “good cop” interrogator like the ones we called the “Soft Soap Fairy” talk to the prospect and sound him out for pliability. They got Doug one day and asked what we eventually learned to be the lead question: “What do you want more than anything else in the world?” The answer of the weak and willing was : “To go home to my family.” Doug thought for a long time, then cocked his head with a smile and said> “Why, I’d like a pillow, Sir.” This was not an unreasonable response since we had no pillows on our cement pads or bed boards. However, the response sure confounded the enemy. They eventually came up with a name for Doug amongst the guards and interrogators: “The Incredibly Stupid One.” His original resistance ploy had paid off.
Because they thought him stupid, they would let him go out in the cell block courtyard during the siesta to sweep up the grounds period monitored by only one sleepy, peasant guard. I thought that was great since it kept him from skipping and I could get some rest. However, curiosity got the better of me and I started to watch him through a peephole we had bored in the cell door. He’d go sweeping and humming until the guard was lulled to sleep. Then Doug would back up to a truck, spin the gas cap off the standpipe, stoop down and put a small amount (“Small, because it’s going to be a long war, Sir.”) of dirt in the gas tank and replace the cap. I watched him over a period of time do this to five trucks.
Now, I’m a liberal arts major who shot himself down, so all I can do is report what I saw. There were five trucks working in the prison; I saw Doug work on five trucks; I saw five trucks towed disabled out of the prison camp. Doug Hegdahl, a high school graduate from the mess decks fell off a ship and has five enemy trucks to his credit. I am a World Famous Golden Dragon (VA 192) with two college degrees, 2000 jet hours, 300 carrier landings and 22 combat missions. How many enemy trucks do I have to my credit? Zero. Zip. Nada. De Rien. 0. Who’s the better man? Douglas Brent Hegdahl, one of two men I know of who destroyed enemy military equipment while a prisoner of war.
Later on, Doug, having left his eyeglasses on board Canberra, discovered that he had difficulty linking up isolated cell blocks throughout the prison compound with his defective distance vision. So he went to the authorities and asked if he could read some of their propaganda. They were delighted. Here was a prisoner, without being tortured, volunteering to read their swill.
But then Doug cautioned them with his: “Small thing [They never learn]; I cannot read without glasses.” So they trolled out a dime store clerk who fitted him with glasses by trying one on after the other until Doug said he could see. His near vision was OK. Unbeknownst to the clerk, he was fitting Doug for distance vision, Now, in between sweeps and gas tanks he was able to link up cell blocks not only by sweeping in code but now also using the deaf spelling code.
The Vietnamese were big on token propaganda releases of prisoners to make various peace groups look good and our government look impotent. They would try to pick people who had not been tortured or in jail long enough to look emaciated. Usually they were volunteers, violators of direct orders from their Seniors and traitors to our cause of resistance. These releases always were of three at a time. The magic of the number three was always a mystery to us. As our leaders exercised greater internal communications and controls, it became harder for the Communists to make up a propaganda release party. Seeking to round out the number they finally turned to “The Incredibly Stupid One” who, although not volunteering, was certainly too dumb to do them any harm.
As part of this conditioning they had both Doug and I examined by “the Doctor.” This was a female soldier we saw through a peephole we had in the door get briefed up and then dolled up like a physician. The physician made a grand entrance worthy of a world-famous brain surgeon. The effect was somewhat spoiled by the face mask protecting her chin rather than covering her mouth; she really had no ideas what the face mask was for. The exam, after looking in all the holes in your head and listening your heart, consisted of “feeling you up” under the guise of palpitating your internal organs while the translator asked, “The Doctor wants to know if you miss your wife (girlfriend)? Wouldn’t you like to be with her now?”
Then they would pull Doug out for interrogations sounding him out for an early release. They told him not to tell me as I was an officer who did not care about his welfare like they did. They informed him: “Stratton would never even speak to you if you were in America.” Doug would come back from each go around and immediately tell me everything that was said. One time he plaintively asked: “Beak, you’d speak to me if we’re home now, wouldn’t you?”
They started to try to fatten us up with large bowls of potatoes laced with canned meat. No one else in the prison was getting it. As a result I told Doug we couldn’t take it. We could either not touch it and turn it back in; in which case the guards would eat it. Or we could dump it in the slop bucket so that no one could eat it without getting sick. Doug thought this was a bit on the scrupulous side, but went along with it. I told the Camp Commander that under no condition would I accept an early release even if offered and if they threw me out I’d have to be dragged feet first all the way from Hanoi to Hawaii screaming bloody murder all the way. It was time to cut to the chase. Doug would have to go.
Doug did not want to go. We finally told Doug that as long as he did not have to commit treason, he was to permit himself to be thrown out of the country. He was the most junior. He had the names. He knew firsthand the torture stories behind many of the propaganda pictures and news releases. He knew the locations of many of the prisons. It was a direct order; he had no choice. I know, because I personally relayed that order to him as his immediate senior in the chain of command.
Well throw him out they did. The 256 names he had memorized contained many names that our government did not have. He ended up being sent to Paris by Ross Perot to confront the North Vietnamese Peace Talk Delegation about the fate of the Missing in Action. He entered the Civil Service and is today a Survival School instructor for the U.S. Navy and the James B. Stockdale Survival, Evasion, Resistance, And Escape Center (SERE), naval Air Station, North Island, Coronado, California. And yes, he can still recite those names! You can watch him do it on the Discovery Channel special on Vietnam POWs—Stories of Survival.
A while after Doug had been released, I was called over to an interrogation. It was to be a Soft Soap Fairy kind of gig since there were quality cigarettes, sugared tea in china cups, cookies and candy laid out on the interrogation table. A dapper, handsome Vietnamese, dressed in an expensive, tailored suit and wearing real, spit-shined wingtip shoes, came into the room with a serious look on his face—all business. “Do you know Douglas Hegdahl?” “You know I do.” “Hegdahl says that you were tortured.” “This is true.” “You lie.” Rolling up the sleeves to my striped pajamas (prison mess dress uniform), I pointed to the scars on my wrists and elbows and challenged: “Ask your people how these marks got on my body; they certainly are neither birth defects or the result of an aircraft accident.” He examined the scars closely, sat back, stared and stated: “You are indeed the most unfortunate of the unfortunate.” With that he left the interrogation leaving me with all the goodies. Upon release I compared notes with Doug and we determined that time frame was the same time he accused the Vietnamese in Paris of murdering me [I had not written home once writing became voluntary] for embarrassing them in a Life magazine bowing picture. Thanks to Doug, despite the scars on my body, the Communists had to produce me alive at the end of the war.
“The Incredibly Stupid One,” my personal hero, is the archetype of the innovative, resourceful and courageous American Sailor. These sailors are the products of the neighborhoods, churches, schools and families working together to produce individuals blessed with a sense of humor and the gift of freedom who can overcome any kind of odds. These sailors are tremendously loyal and devoted to their units and their leaders in their own private and personal ways. As long as we have the Dougs of this world, our country will retain its freedoms.
____________________ Not Racist; Not Violent; Not
Silent Anymore.
GO GATORS!!!!!!!!!!!!
Here is an interesting true story that I verified on several sites:
This is a great TRUE story. I think you will find it interesting. I am sure most of the former Navy types have heard of Stratton and Hegdahl.
Doug Hegdahl was interviewed as part of a show on POWs on the Discovery or Military Channel
THE INCREDIBLY STUPID ONE”
(SN HEGDAHL, USS CANBERRA – PRISONER OF WAR)
By Dick “Beak” Stratton, Captain, USN (Ret.)
It was a warmer than usual summer day in Clark, South Dakota, when a rather large and ungainly young man, a recent high school graduate, set about finding his way in the world. The salivating Navy recruiter asked the youngster what it would take to have him sign up: “why, I’d like to go to Australia.” It was as good as done. After all, in 1966, if you were lucky enough to ship out on the USS Canberra, more likely than not, during the course of your hitch, there will be a port call to the ship’s namesake—Canberra, Australia.
This young man came from a solid, patriotic Norwegian Lutheran stock that believed when your country called, you answered. You did not go to the bus station but to the recruiting station. You did not go to Oxford, you went to Vietnam. So Douglas Brent Hegdahl III shipped out to boot camp at San Diego, where he slept through the Code of Conduct lectures since he would not be fighting in the trenches. Lo and behold, he did get orders to the USS Canberra. At that time Canberra, with 8-inch guns mounted on the pointy end and missiles on the round end, was assigned to steam with the Gulf of Tonkin Yacht Club in the South China Sea off the coast of Vietnam. (And, yes, she did have Canberra, Australia, on her Port of Call list.)
Doug’s battle station was the aft ammunition handling room for the 5-inch guns, located aft in the bowels of the ship. One morning he had the 0100 watch while the Canberra was steaming down the coast of North Vietnam firing its 8-inch guns against targets of opportunity (bicycles, water buffalo and occasional trucks) on Highway 1. At about 0330 he rolled out of the rack. Being a prudent farm boy, he locked all his valuables in his locker and then proceeded to go out on deck for a breath of fresh air before manning his battle station.
Now there is a non-repetitive exercise in the surface Navy called “going out on deck when big guns are firing.” If the concussion does not blow you over the side, it will at least blow out your eardrums. But Doug must have slept through that safety lecture. He doesn’t know what happened. Either not being night-adapted, or being without his glasses, or concussion did it, he ended up going arse over teakettle into the South China Sea about three miles offshore with no life preserver, no identification, no nothing. Meanwhile he watched the Love Boat merrily steaming over the horizon, firing at the coastline and never missing him for two days.
There is not much to do in the South China Sea at 0345. He took off his boondockers and hung them around his neck in case he needed them when he reached shore. He stripped off his dungarees, zipped up the fly, tie off the cuffs and popped them over his head, as he was taught, to make a life preserver. He reports back to you that it doesn’t work. (He missed the part about old dungarees, with holes, out of the Lucky Bag would have to be kept wet if they were to hold any air at all.) So he put on his trousers, socks and shoes. (Sharks? Sea snakes?)
Somewhere along the line he had heard that drowning was a “nice way to die;” so he thought he would try it out. He put his hands over his head and down he went—bloop, bloop, bloop. Now both he and I had heard the myth that when drowning you would get cuddly, warm, all the nice things in your life would flash by in your mind and you would go to your eternal reward to the sound of music (harp?). Doug resurfaced and reports back to us that it is all malarkey: there are no movies, there is no music and it’s colder than Hell!
As dawn came he started swimming away from the sun, hopefully towards shore. He could see the haze of land, but the harder he tried, the further back it receded. So he just rolled on his back, playing like a whale, humming a few tunes and saying a few prayers. Notice he never gave up. How many people have we been exposed to in the course of our lives, in a situation like that would have just plain given up? About 1800 that same day, a Vietnamese fishing boat came by and hauled him out of the water—some twelve hours later.
Even those peasant fishermen could figure out that this moose would never fit in the cockpit of an A4 Skylark. They turned him upside down and inside out which garnered them absolutely nothing. Remember, he had prudently left everything back on the ship in his locker. Picture yourself being tortured to admit you were a CIA agent who entered the water in Coronado, California to swim ten thousand miles across the Pacific to infiltrate their shores!
When the authorities got him ashore, they showed Doug piles of materials allegedly written by Yankee Air Pirates who had been captured before him.
(95% of those captured in North Vietnam had been tortured, were not offered the option of death, and were made to give more than Name, Rank, Serial Number and Date of Birth sequence permitted by the Military Code of Conduct and required by International Law.) Doug recognized that something was amiss, but, as he said later, “Geeze, they’re officers, they must know what they are doing.” So he decided his best ploy was to pretend to be stupid.
He got them off target by comparing farms in North Vietnam and South Dakota. He didn’t realize that even then the Communists were categorizing him to gauge his usefulness to their cause. His dad had about ten motel units, numberless vehicles and all kinds of land—but no water buffalo. No water buffalo meant in Vietnamese parlance that he was a “poor peasant.” This is just as well, as Communists had murdered over 20 million “rich peasants” in their various revolutions, because those folks are unreconstructed capitalists. A little miffed at first, Doug caught on right away—he is a quick study—it was to his advantage to play out the poor peasant act to the bitter end.
Tired of the verbal jousting the Communist cadres told him that he would have to write and anti-war statement for them. He joyously agreed. The interrogators were dumbfounded. This was the first Yankee to agree to do anything without being tortured first. They brought out the paper, ink and pens. He admired them all and then stated: “But one small thing. I can’t read or write. I’m a poor peasant.” This was quite credible to the Vietnamese since their poor peasants could neither read nor write. So they assigned a Vietnamese to teach him penmanship, spelling, grammar and sentence structure. Immediately his learning curve went flat. Eventually, the interrogators gave up in disgust; writing a confession for him and having him sign it in an illegible scrawl. He admitted to the war crime of shelling the presidential birthplace of Ho Chi Minh and signed it as Seaman Apprentice Douglas Brent Hegdahl III, United States Navy Reserve, Commanding Officer, USS Canberra. No one has ever seen this piece of paper.
Doug was shuffled around from pillar to post, since his captors didn’t know where he would fit into their propaganda plans. One mistake they made was to put him in for a while with Joe Crecca, an Air Force officer who had developed a method of creating the most organized memory bank we possessed to record the names of pilots shot down and imprisoned in Vietnam. Joe took this young Seaman and, recognizing the potential, painstakingly taught Doug not only 256 names, but also, the method of memorizing, cross-referencing and retrieving those names. It was no easy task that Joe set for himself for it was not intuitively obvious to Doug the value of such mental gymnastics.
It was a hot summer day when I first met Doug. I was in solitary confinement again. The Communists did not care for me, which was OK because I didn’t like them either. My cell door opened and here was this big moose standing in his skivvie shorts (prison uniform of the day). “My name is Seaman Douglas Brent Hegdahl, Sir. What’s yours?” It is awful hard to look dignified when you are standing in your underwear, knock-kneed, ding-toed, pot-bellied, unwashed and unshaven for 100 days. I automatically recited, “Dick Stratton, Lieutenant Commander, USSTiconderoga.” Immediately I saw that I probably made a mistake as his eyes rolled back in his head and you could see what he was thinking: “Cripes, another officer!” But notice that instinctively he asked the critical and most important question for survival: “Who is your senior?” The rule we lived by was: “If I am senior, I will take charge; if junior, I will obey.”
The Communists took a siesta for two hours every afternoon which was a good deal for us as we were free from torture and harassment. I was laying on the floor on my bed board and Doug was skipping, yes, skipping around the room. I asked: “Doug, what are you doing?” He paused for a moment, looked me in the eye and cryptically said: “Skipping, Sir” and continued to skip. A stupid question, a stupid answer. After a moment, I again queried: “What ya doin’ that for?” This stopped him for a moment. He paused and cocked his head thoughtfully, smiled and replied: “You got anything better to do,Sir?” I didn’t. He continued skipping. I guess he did learn one thing from boot camp. You can say anything you want to an officer as long as you smile and say “sir.”
One siesta period he said: Hey, Beak, you went to college and studied government; do you know the GettysburgAddress?” We got a brick (no paper or pencils for the criminals) and started to write it out on the tile floor until we got it correct. Then he stopped me with the question: “Can you say it backwards?” Well, who would want to say theGettysburg Address backwards? Certainly not the Jesuits at Georgetown and especially not me. Doug could say it backwards, verbatim, rapidly. I know because I could track him from the written version we had on the floor.
“So what?” you might say. The so what is that when they threw him out of Vietnam, and throw him out they did, he came out with 256 names that Joe Crecca had taught him memorized by service, by rank and alphabetically; next to each name he had a dog’s name, kid’s name or social security number to verify the quality of the name which we had picked up by tap code, deaf spelling code or secret notes. He still has those names memorized today and sings them to the tune of “Old MacDonald Has a Farm.” One of our intelligence officers asked him if he could slow the recitation down to make for easier copying. Doug replied “No” that it was like riding a bike, you had to keep moving or you would fall off. If it weren’t for Joe Crecca, Doug and our government would not have had those names until the end of war five years later.
In trying to get people to accept early propaganda releases, the Communists would have some “good cop” interrogator like the ones we called the “Soft Soap Fairy” talk to the prospect and sound him out for pliability. They got Doug one day and asked what we eventually learned to be the lead question: “What do you want more than anything else in the world?” The answer of the weak and willing was : “To go home to my family.” Doug thought for a long time, then cocked his head with a smile and said> “Why, I’d like a pillow, Sir.” This was not an unreasonable response since we had no pillows on our cement pads or bed boards. However, the response sure confounded the enemy. They eventually came up with a name for Doug amongst the guards and interrogators: “The Incredibly Stupid One.” His original resistance ploy had paid off.
Because they thought him stupid, they would let him go out in the cell block courtyard during the siesta to sweep up the grounds period monitored by only one sleepy, peasant guard. I thought that was great since it kept him from skipping and I could get some rest. However, curiosity got the better of me and I started to watch him through a peephole we had bored in the cell door. He’d go sweeping and humming until the guard was lulled to sleep. Then Doug would back up to a truck, spin the gas cap off the standpipe, stoop down and put a small amount (“Small, because it’s going to be a long war, Sir.”) of dirt in the gas tank and replace the cap. I watched him over a period of time do this to five trucks.
Now, I’m a liberal arts major who shot himself down, so all I can do is report what I saw. There were five trucks working in the prison; I saw Doug work on five trucks; I saw five trucks towed disabled out of the prison camp. Doug Hegdahl, a high school graduate from the mess decks fell off a ship and has five enemy trucks to his credit. I am a World Famous Golden Dragon (VA 192) with two college degrees, 2000 jet hours, 300 carrier landings and 22 combat missions. How many enemy trucks do I have to my credit? Zero. Zip. Nada. De Rien. 0. Who’s the better man? Douglas Brent Hegdahl, one of two men I know of who destroyed enemy military equipment while a prisoner of war.
Later on, Doug, having left his eyeglasses on board Canberra, discovered that he had difficulty linking up isolated cell blocks throughout the prison compound with his defective distance vision. So he went to the authorities and asked if he could read some of their propaganda. They were delighted. Here was a prisoner, without being tortured, volunteering to read their swill.
But then Doug cautioned them with his: “Small thing [They never learn]; I cannot read without glasses.” So they trolled out a dime store clerk who fitted him with glasses by trying one on after the other until Doug said he could see. His near vision was OK. Unbeknownst to the clerk, he was fitting Doug for distance vision, Now, in between sweeps and gas tanks he was able to link up cell blocks not only by sweeping in code but now also using the deaf spelling code.
The Vietnamese were big on token propaganda releases of prisoners to make various peace groups look good and our government look impotent. They would try to pick people who had not been tortured or in jail long enough to look emaciated. Usually they were volunteers, violators of direct orders from their Seniors and traitors to our cause of resistance. These releases always were of three at a time. The magic of the number three was always a mystery to us. As our leaders exercised greater internal communications and controls, it became harder for the Communists to make up a propaganda release party. Seeking to round out the number they finally turned to “The Incredibly Stupid One” who, although not volunteering, was certainly too dumb to do them any harm.
As part of this conditioning they had both Doug and I examined by “the Doctor.” This was a female soldier we saw through a peephole we had in the door get briefed up and then dolled up like a physician. The physician made a grand entrance worthy of a world-famous brain surgeon. The effect was somewhat spoiled by the face mask protecting her chin rather than covering her mouth; she really had no ideas what the face mask was for. The exam, after looking in all the holes in your head and listening your heart, consisted of “feeling you up” under the guise of palpitating your internal organs while the translator asked, “The Doctor wants to know if you miss your wife (girlfriend)? Wouldn’t you like to be with her now?”
Then they would pull Doug out for interrogations sounding him out for an early release. They told him not to tell me as I was an officer who did not care about his welfare like they did. They informed him: “Stratton would never even speak to you if you were in America.” Doug would come back from each go around and immediately tell me everything that was said. One time he plaintively asked: “Beak, you’d speak to me if we’re home now, wouldn’t you?”
They started to try to fatten us up with large bowls of potatoes laced with canned meat. No one else in the prison was getting it. As a result I told Doug we couldn’t take it. We could either not touch it and turn it back in; in which case the guards would eat it. Or we could dump it in the slop bucket so that no one could eat it without getting sick. Doug thought this was a bit on the scrupulous side, but went along with it. I told the Camp Commander that under no condition would I accept an early release even if offered and if they threw me out I’d have to be dragged feet first all the way from Hanoi to Hawaii screaming bloody murder all the way. It was time to cut to the chase. Doug would have to go.
Doug did not want to go. We finally told Doug that as long as he did not have to commit treason, he was to permit himself to be thrown out of the country. He was the most junior. He had the names. He knew firsthand the torture stories behind many of the propaganda pictures and news releases. He knew the locations of many of the prisons. It was a direct order; he had no choice. I know, because I personally relayed that order to him as his immediate senior in the chain of command.
Well throw him out they did. The 256 names he had memorized contained many names that our government did not have. He ended up being sent to Paris by Ross Perot to confront the North Vietnamese Peace Talk Delegation about the fate of the Missing in Action. He entered the Civil Service and is today a Survival School instructor for the U.S. Navy and the James B. Stockdale Survival, Evasion, Resistance, And Escape Center (SERE), naval Air Station, North Island, Coronado, California. And yes, he can still recite those names! You can watch him do it on the Discovery Channel special on Vietnam POWs—Stories of Survival.
A while after Doug had been released, I was called over to an interrogation. It was to be a Soft Soap Fairy kind of gig since there were quality cigarettes, sugared tea in china cups, cookies and candy laid out on the interrogation table. A dapper, handsome Vietnamese, dressed in an expensive, tailored suit and wearing real, spit-shined wingtip shoes, came into the room with a serious look on his face—all business. “Do you know Douglas Hegdahl?” “You know I do.” “Hegdahl says that you were tortured.” “This is true.” “You lie.” Rolling up the sleeves to my striped pajamas (prison mess dress uniform), I pointed to the scars on my wrists and elbows and challenged: “Ask your people how these marks got on my body; they certainly are neither birth defects or the result of an aircraft accident.” He examined the scars closely, sat back, stared and stated: “You are indeed the most unfortunate of the unfortunate.” With that he left the interrogation leaving me with all the goodies. Upon release I compared notes with Doug and we determined that time frame was the same time he accused the Vietnamese in Paris of murdering me [I had not written home once writing became voluntary] for embarrassing them in a Life magazine bowing picture. Thanks to Doug, despite the scars on my body, the Communists had to produce me alive at the end of the war.
“The Incredibly Stupid One,” my personal hero, is the archetype of the innovative, resourceful and courageous American Sailor. These sailors are the products of the neighborhoods, churches, schools and families working together to produce individuals blessed with a sense of humor and the gift of freedom who can overcome any kind of odds. These sailors are tremendously loyal and devoted to their units and their leaders in their own private and personal ways. As long as we have the Dougs of this world, our country will retain its freedoms.
____________________ Not Racist; Not Violent; Not
Silent Anymore.
GO GATORS!!!!!!!!!!!!
EDITORIAL: Sink the Murtha The Navy can do better than honoring this hack
The late Rep. John Murtha, Pennsylvania Democrat, has achieved his highest undeserved honor. Navy Secretary Ray Mabus has decided to name the Navy's newest San Antonio Class amphibious transport-dock LPD 26 the USS John P. Murtha.
loner1115 wrote: EDITORIAL: Sink the Murtha The Navy can do better than honoring this hack
The late Rep. John Murtha, Pennsylvania Democrat, has achieved his highest undeserved honor. Navy Secretary Ray Mabus has decided to name the Navy's newest San Antonio Class amphibious transport-dock LPD 26 the USS John P. Murtha.
Here is some information of the activities occuring during what will probably be one of the last Doolittle Raiders Reunions at the Museum of the United States Air Force through out this weekend, it will also be a salute to the Billy Mitchell B-25 Bomber, which was so aptly named for another of our unsung heroes until it was deemed that he did know what he was talking about but not until years after his passing. These valiant men who are so soon leaving us should be revered for the heroes that they were: http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/doolittle.asp
____________________ Not Racist; Not Violent; Not
Silent Anymore.
GO GATORS!!!!!!!!!!!!
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
Our airport here in Milwaukee is named after Billy Mitchell and has a B-25 bomber mounted outside as you enter.Parks and streets are also named Mitchell.Only fitting as hes one of our local heros.
Profiles of Valor: U.S. Marine Cpl. Matthew Bradford
Marine Cpl. Matthew Bradford just re-enlisted in the Corps, but he is no ordinary Marine -- he became the first blind double amputee in Corps history to re-enlist. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer tells his story:
Bradford, who grew up in Winchester, Ky., and Dinwiddie, Va., had made up his mind that he was going to deploy as many times as the Marines wanted him to when he was hurt a few months into his first tour of Iraq.
A rifleman, he was on patrol in Al Anbar province and trying to help clear an area of roadside bombs when one of them exploded right under him the afternoon of Jan. 18, 2007.
Bradford lost his eyesight, and he had a fractured right hand and fragmentation wounds to the lower abdominal area. But what he said he hated the most was losing his legs. He required amputations below the knee on the right leg and above the knee on the left.
Now that he has re-enlisted, Bradford will leave Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio to work with other wounded Marines at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina. The only regret he says he has is that he won't be able to return to combat duty in Iraq. Semper Fi!
____________________ Life without God is like an unsharpened pencil - it has no point
He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to attain what he cannot lose. - Jim Elliot
Recieved this in an email, sent to Glenn Beck hoping he will read it on the air and sent it to Sen. Mitch McConnell or Ky alone with some others. pass it on
This venerable and much honored WW II vet is well known in Hawaii
for his seventy-plus years of service to patriotic organizations and causes all over the country. A humble man without a political bone in his body, he has never spoken out before about a government official, until now. He dictated this letter to a friend, signed it and mailed it to the president.
Dear President Obama,
My name is Harold Estes, approaching 95 on December 13 of this year. People meeting me for the first time don't believe my age because I remain wrinkle free and pretty much mentally alert.
I enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 1934 and served proudly before, during and after WW II retiring as a Master Chief Bos'n Mate. Now I live in a "rest home" located on the western end of Pearl Harbor , allowing me to keep alive the memories of 23 years of service to my country.
One of the benefits of my age, perhaps the only one, is to speak my mind, blunt and direct even to the head man.
So here goes.
I am amazed, angry and determined not to see my country die before I do, but you seem hell bent not to grant me that wish.
I can't figure out what country you are the president of.
You fly around the world telling our friends and enemies despicable lies like:
" We're no longer a Christian nation"
" America is arrogant" - (Your wife even
announced to the world," America is mean-
spirited. " Please tell her to try preaching
that nonsense to 23 generations of our
war dead buried all over the globe who
died for no other reason than to free a
whole lot of strangers from tyranny and
hopelessness.)
I'd say shame on the both of you, but I don't think you like America, nor do I see an ounce of gratefulness in anything you do, for the obvious gifts this country has given you. To be without shame or gratefulness is a dangerous thing for a man sitting in the White House.
After 9/11 you said," America hasn't lived up to her ideals."
Which ones did you mean? Was it the notion of personal liberty that 11,000 farmers and shopkeepers died for to win independence from the British? Or maybe the ideal that no man should be a slave to another man, that 500,000 men died for in the Civil War? I hope you didn't mean the ideal 470,000 fathers, brothers, husbands, and a lot of fellas I knew personally died for in WWII, because we felt real strongly about not letting any nation push us around, because we stand for freedom.
I don't think you mean the ideal that says equality is better than discrimination. You know the one that a whole lot of white people understood when they helped to get you elected.
Take a little advice from a very old geezer, young man.
Shape up and start acting like an American. If you don't, I'll do what I can to see you get shipped out of that fancy rental on Pennsylvania Avenue . You were elected to lead not to bow, apologize and kiss the hands of murderers and corrupt leaders who still treat their people like slaves.
And just who do you think you are telling the American people not to jump to conclusions and condemn that Muslim major who killed 13 of his fellow soldiers and wounded dozens more. You mean you don't want us to do what you did when that white cop used force to subdue that black college professor in Massachusetts , who was putting up a fight? You don't mind offending the police calling them stupid but you don't want us to offend Muslim fanatics by calling them what they are, terrorists.
One more thing. I realize you never served in the military and never had to defend your country with your life, but you're the Commander-in-Chief now, son. Do your job. When your battle-hardened field General asks you for 40,000 more troops to complete the mission, give them to him. But if you're not in this fight to win, then get out. The life of one American soldier is not worth the best political strategy you're thinking of.
You could be our greatest president because you face the greatest challenge ever presented to any president.
You're not going to restore American greatness by bringing back our bloated economy. That's not our greatest threat. Losing the heart and soul of who we are as Americans is our big fight now.
And I sure as hell don't want to think my president is the enemy in this final battle...
Sincerely,
Harold B. Estes
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
Here is another inspiring tale of the “Doolittle Raider’s’ Reunion held at the Museum of the United States Air Force this last week end. I most imagine that there won’t be any as memorable as this one, I only wish they would publish some videos of the B-25s in action and during the fly over, It must have truly been something to behold as there are only one picture of the static display.
More Vermont National Guard families have reported receiving prank phone calls.
The calls were made last week to relatives of deployed soldiers, suggesting that their loved ones had been wounded in Afghanistan.
The guard believes at least nine families got the calls. But they appear to have stopped.
"That's the good news," said Bill Sorrell, D-Vt. Attorney General. "As there's been public notice of this and notice getting out that this is illegal. This is no joke. This is not protected free speech. Under federal law, it's a felony for which you can go to prison for five years."
Investigators are working with the phone company to try to trace the calls. Sorrell says it appears the hoax is limited to Vermont and that the caller not only knows who the deployed soldiers are, but also how to reach their families.
This is a comment from a reader. Wonder if he is the caller.
What about all the innocent families of predator drone attacks? I would argue it is free speech. These people signed up and know the risks. People are upset about the wars, which everyone pretty much knows by now, they are not needed, and are fueling anti American Views around the world. We need to bring all, all, the troops home. We should protect America, from America. We should not have a military base in every other country in the world. We should no tindiscriminately kill innocent people. I would say a lot of people think the wars are just money makers, and the profiters do not care about these sick issues. God help us all.
____________________ MGySgt USMC
(Ret)
Note: No trees were killed in the sending of this message, but a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
More Vermont National Guard families have reported receiving prank phone calls.
The calls were made last week to relatives of deployed soldiers, suggesting that their loved ones had been wounded in Afghanistan.
The guard believes at least nine families got the calls. But they appear to have stopped.
"That's the good news," said Bill Sorrell, D-Vt. Attorney General. "As there's been public notice of this and notice getting out that this is illegal. This is no joke. This is not protected free speech. Under federal law, it's a felony for which you can go to prison for five years."
Investigators are working with the phone company to try to trace the calls. Sorrell says it appears the hoax is limited to Vermont and that the caller not only knows who the deployed soldiers are, but also how to reach their families.
This is a comment from a reader. Wonder if he is the caller.
What about all the innocent families of predator drone attacks? I would argue it is free speech. These people signed up and know the risks. People are upset about the wars, which everyone pretty much knows by now, they are not needed, and are fueling anti American Views around the world. We need to bring all, all, the troops home. We should protect America, from America. We should not have a military base in every other country in the world. We should no tindiscriminately kill innocent people. I would say a lot of people think the wars are just money makers, and the profiters do not care about these sick issues. God help us all.
Talk about sick issues, I wonder what this sick clown would say if his loved ones were having their throats slit or blown to smithereens by these peaceful innocent Jihadists. Of course this fits right in with the "Blame America First Crowd" We have heard this same old story a long time back about just taking care of the Home continent, just before "Peace in our Time" immediately before WWII.
____________________ Not Racist; Not Violent; Not
Silent Anymore.
GO GATORS!!!!!!!!!!!!
The following is from an Army Aviator friend who takes another trip down memory lane:
It was just before Thanksgiving '67 and we were ferrying dead and wounded from a large GRF west of Pleiku. We had run out of body bags by noon, so the Hook ( CH-47 CHINOOK) was pretty rough in the back. All of a sudden, we heard a 'take-charge' woman's voice in the rear.
There was the singer and actress, Martha Raye, with a SF ( Special Forces) beret and jungle fatigues, with subdued markings, helping the wounded into the Chinook, and carrying the dead aboard. 'Maggie' had been visiting her SF 'heroes' out 'west'.
We took off, short of fuel, and headed to the USAF hospital pad at Pleiku. As we all started unloading our sad pax's, a 'Smart-Ass' USAF Captain said to Martha.... Ms Ray, with all these dead and wounded to process,there would not be time for your show!
To all of our surprise, she pulled on her right collar and said....Captain, see this eagle? I am a full 'Bird' in the US Army Reserve, and on this is a 'Caduse' which means I am a Nurse, with a surgical speciality....now, take me to your wounded. He said, yes mam'... Follow me.
Several times at the Army Field Hospital in Pleiku, she would 'cover' a surgical shift, giving a nurse a well-deserved break.
Martha is the only woman buried in the SF (Special Forces) cemetery at Ft. Bragg.
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
Gates suggests big changes coming for Navy
By ANNE FLAHERTY
Associated Press
May 4, 2010
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Defense Secretary Robert Gates on Monday called into question the Navy's heavy and expensive arsenal of ships and subs.
In a speech before naval officers and contractors, Gates did not say he was planning to cut any programs or its budget.
But he did say the military must rethink whether it can afford such a massive naval fleet at a time when the Army and Marine Corps need more money to take care of troops and their families.
"Do we really need 11 carrier strike groups for another 30 years when no other country has more than one?" Gates asked.
Please send the link to everyone you know. They are trying for 7,500,000 views of it.
____________________ MGySgt USMC
(Ret)
Note: No trees were killed in the sending of this message, but a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
____________________ MGySgt USMC
(Ret)
Note: No trees were killed in the sending of this message, but a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
Yes indeed this just goes to show you what PC is doing to the Brass in the Military, none of these heroes should have ever been charged, but all the Muckedie Mucks had to play the MSM Game after Abu Garib? which most of us knew was little more than a bunch of kids doing kids stuff, but our beloved press didn't see it that way of course and had to paint all the Military with a broad brush of sadistic loons and then wonder why the Military hates to see them around.
____________________ Not Racist; Not Violent; Not
Silent Anymore.
GO GATORS!!!!!!!!!!!!
can you imagine the horror if this was done today, from the American Communist Lovers Union
American Minute for May 7th:
World War II ended in Europe on MAY 7, 1945, when German emissaries met at General Dwight Eisenhower's Headquarters, a schoolhouse in Reims, France, and signed an unconditional surrender. The War in Europe lasted five and half years, costing millions of lives. After the war, Eisenhower was elected the 34th President by the largest number of votes in history. In remarks broadcast from the White House as part of the American Legion "Back-to-God" Program, February 7, 1954, President Eisenhower stated: "As a former soldier, I am delighted that our veterans are sponsoring a movement to increase our awareness of God in our daily lives. In battle, they learned a great truth-that there are no atheists in the foxholes. They know that in time of test and trial, we instinctively turn to God for new courage...Whatever our individual church, whatever our personal creed, our common faith in God is a common bond among us." At the next year's "Back-to-God" Program, February 20, 1955, Eisenhower stated: "Without God, there could be no American form of Government, nor an American way of life. Recognition of the Supreme Being is the first - the most basic - expression of Americanism."
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
spectregunshipper wrote: can you imagine the horror if this was done today, from the American Communist Lovers Union
American Minute for May 7th:
World War II ended in Europe on MAY 7, 1945, when German emissaries met at General Dwight Eisenhower's Headquarters, a schoolhouse in Reims, France, and signed an unconditional surrender. The War in Europe lasted five and half years, costing millions of lives. After the war, Eisenhower was elected the 34th President by the largest number of votes in history. In remarks broadcast from the White House as part of the American Legion "Back-to-God" Program, February 7, 1954, President Eisenhower stated: "As a former soldier, I am delighted that our veterans are sponsoring a movement to increase our awareness of God in our daily lives. In battle, they learned a great truth-that there are no atheists in the foxholes. They know that in time of test and trial, we instinctively turn to God for new courage...Whatever our individual church, whatever our personal creed, our common faith in God is a common bond among us." At the next year's "Back-to-God" Program, February 20, 1955, Eisenhower stated: "Without God, there could be no American form of Government, nor an American way of life. Recognition of the Supreme Being is the first - the most basic - expression of Americanism."
Yet on the 3rd of May the SC made this horrific blunder.
____________________ MGySgt USMC
(Ret)
Note: No trees were killed in the sending of this message, but a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
another hero was returned home for closure to the family, had a friends on board that flight, we took of at the same time and we came home they didn't. Be sure to check out the burial photo and see the patriot Guards doing there thing
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
____________________ "Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters." - Ben Franklin
, and his Medal of
Honor citation can be found at http://www.army.mil/cmh-pg/mohiia1.htm.
Old Cuz - your links don't work!
____________________ "Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters." - Ben Franklin
Sorry K the C but these were the links I got with the original post, and I noticed that they all had a period at the end of each one once I got rid of the period I was able to access most of them , one had been changed and the Cols wouldn't work, but I suspect that he has since gone on to other pursuits as Randolph was one of the Bases recently transferred to part of a Joint Use Base, and are administered by Fort Sam Houston now as best I can figure it out.
____________________ Not Racist; Not Violent; Not
Silent Anymore.
GO GATORS!!!!!!!!!!!!
President Barack Obama — who came to power with the help of government employee unions across the nation and has lavished on them hundreds of billions in stimulus funds to keep them on federal, state and local payrolls with no strings attached — is moving to cut spending on salaries for military personnel.
For example, the military brass claims that an average sergeant in the Army with four years of service and one dependent would receive $52,589 in annual compensation, according to the paper. This figure includes basic pay, housing, and subsistence allowances, as well as tax benefits.
Meanwhile, a U.S. postal letter carrier, with no supervisory or hazardous duty, makes approximately $80,000 a year when all benefits are factored in.
The U.S. Postal Service, for example, is slated to give letter carriers an increase of 1.9 percent this coming year.
And postal employees are considered to be grossly overpaid compared with their private counterparts. A postal supervisor, for example, can make $70,000 or year or more, plus significant benefits.
Last year, Congress had to help fill a $3.8 billion deficit at the federally backed agency, but there has been no discussion of salary cuts for postal employees. Instead, postal officials have focused on reducing service, including Saturday delivery.
____________________ MGySgt USMC
(Ret)
Note: No trees were killed in the sending of this message, but a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
this is off the subject but to keep from starting another board here it is.
The tolerant left evidently is responsible, unless some radical teaparty person who in just totally revolutionary pulled this off, but it stinks to high heaven
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
spectregunshipper wrote: this is off the subject but to keep from starting another board here it is.
The tolerant left evidently is responsible, unless some radical teaparty person who in just totally revolutionary pulled this off, but it stinks to high heaven
I read that over on FOX and got thoroughly pi***d off. Bet ya someone from the aclu is behind this. I hope the war dead come back to haunt these lowlifes.
STEVEN wrote: spectregunshipper wrote: this is off the subject but to keep from starting another board here it is.
The tolerant left evidently is responsible, unless some radical teaparty person who in just totally revolutionary pulled this off, but it stinks to high heaven
I read that over on FOX and got thoroughly pi***d off. Bet ya someone from the aclu is behind this. I hope the war dead come back to haunt these lowlifes.It's Bush's fault.
____________________ MGySgt USMC
(Ret)
Note: No trees were killed in the sending of this message, but a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
The third graders, their teachers and the school are real (The teacher wrote the song), and they've gotten wonderful feedback from all over the world. Maybe they're angels?
From the third graders of Tussing Elementary, Colonial Heights , Virginia .
loner1115 wrote: The third graders, their teachers and the school are real (The teacher wrote the song), and they've gotten wonderful feedback from all over the world. Maybe they're angels?
From the third graders of Tussing Elementary, Colonial Heights , Virginia .
Now that's what I'm talking about. While most schools wouldn't put up with what this teacher and kids did I thinks it's refreshing to see (and hear) kids being taught patriotism. I bet they're allowed to draw American flags in art class and express their patriotism without being told it's offensive.
BTW, I lived in Colonial Heights back in 89 while going to school for 7 months at FT Lee.
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
can one of the military wiz kids on this board please this old Vietnam vet why we must tell the enemy what we will do in 4- 5- 6 months ahead of attack? Sounds rather stupid to tell them what you will do.
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
spectregunshipper wrote: can one of the military wiz kids on this board please this old Vietnam vet why we must tell the enemy what we will do in 4- 5- 6 months ahead of attack? Sounds rather stupid to tell them what you will do.
Just as stupid as publishing the ROEs so the enemy can figure out how to put or people in harms was with as little risk to themselves as possible.
____________________ MGySgt USMC
(Ret)
Note: No trees were killed in the sending of this message, but a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
Busy day tomorrow and next Tuesday for the 1108th AVCRAD. Two elementary schools we sponsor are having their field days. The kids love it when we show up. The kids get a big thrill when we bring one of our display helicopters.
President Barack Obama — who came to power with the help of government employee unions across the nation and has lavished on them hundreds of billions in stimulus funds to keep them on federal, state and local payrolls with no strings attached — is moving to cut spending on salaries for military personnel.
For example, the military brass claims that an average sergeant in the Army with four years of service and one dependent would receive $52,589 in annual compensation, according to the paper. This figure includes basic pay, housing, and subsistence allowances, as well as tax benefits.
Meanwhile, a U.S. postal letter carrier, with no supervisory or hazardous duty, makes approximately $80,000 a year when all benefits are factored in.
The U.S. Postal Service, for example, is slated to give letter carriers an increase of 1.9 percent this coming year.
And postal employees are considered to be grossly overpaid compared with their private counterparts. A postal supervisor, for example, can make $70,000 or year or more, plus significant benefits.
Last year, Congress had to help fill a $3.8 billion deficit at the federally backed agency, but there has been no discussion of salary cuts for postal employees. Instead, postal officials have focused on reducing service, including Saturday delivery.
That's why some military families qualify for food stamps and WIC.
____________________ I wasn't born in Texas, but I got here just as soon as I could!!!
President Barack Obama — who came to power with the help of government employee unions across the nation and has lavished on them hundreds of billions in stimulus funds to keep them on federal, state and local payrolls with no strings attached — is moving to cut spending on salaries for military personnel.
For example, the military brass claims that an average sergeant in the Army with four years of service and one dependent would receive $52,589 in annual compensation, according to the paper. This figure includes basic pay, housing, and subsistence allowances, as well as tax benefits.
Meanwhile, a U.S. postal letter carrier, with no supervisory or hazardous duty, makes approximately $80,000 a year when all benefits are factored in.
The U.S. Postal Service, for example, is slated to give letter carriers an increase of 1.9 percent this coming year.
And postal employees are considered to be grossly overpaid compared with their private counterparts. A postal supervisor, for example, can make $70,000 or year or more, plus significant benefits.
Last year, Congress had to help fill a $3.8 billion deficit at the federally backed agency, but there has been no discussion of salary cuts for postal employees. Instead, postal officials have focused on reducing service, including Saturday delivery.
That's why some military families qualify for food stamps and WIC.
here is the pay and benefits for military, i ran the numbers and an E-1 under 2 yrs with dependents will get about 31, 878 a month. That is with the lowest housing allowance i could find,$885. a month. it is broken down according to where you are stationed, some places are over 1200 a month houseing
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
Yeah, but if you live on base, you get nothing...unless you move in to "privitized housing". The people who rent to the military know what the allowance is and they get every penny of the allowance. Housing allowance is not taxable.
31,875 a month? An E-1 just coming in makes just short of $1,500 a month that is taxed. I did not look up BAS.
____________________ I wasn't born in Texas, but I got here just as soon as I could!!!
Bro Eddie wrote: The 3 is real close to the $. Might be a mistake while typing.
the totals work like this for an E-1 under 2yrs servicewith dependents
base pay----$1,447
housing----- El Paso Tx for an example $924.
subsistence(food allowance) $323.87
total--------------2,694.87x12----$32,338.44
Now if the person in the Navy there is sea pay or flight pay and other special pay
I am not saying the military does not need a pay raise, they need more than gov employees or politicians and they definitely have one thing over both, they earn their pay
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
spectregunshipper wrote: Bro Eddie wrote: The 3 is real close to the $. Might be a mistake while typing.
the totals work like this for an E-1 under 2yrs servicewith dependents
base pay----$1,447
housing----- El Paso Tx for an example $924.
subsistence(food allowance) $323.87
total--------------2,694.87x12----$32,338.44
Now if the person in the Navy there is sea pay or flight pay and other special pay
I am not saying the military does not need a pay raise, they need more than gov employees or politicians and they definitely have one thing over both, they earn their pay I think what threw us was your post that an E-1 would make $31,878 a month, rather than making that much in one year. If I was still active I'd make at least $63,000 a year now. Since I'm retired, I make less than that. I do a lot less work now than I did when I was active though, and spend a lot more time with the wife.
____________________
Equal rights for unborn women.
"Patriotism means to stand by the country. It does not mean to stand by the president."
- Theodore Roosevelt
the totals work like this for an E-1 under 2yrs servicewith dependents
base pay----$1,447
housing----- El Paso Tx for an example $924.
subsistence(food allowance) $323.87
total--------------2,694.87x12----$32,338.44
Now if the person in the Navy there is sea pay or flight pay and other special pay
I am not saying the military does not need a pay raise, they need more than gov employees or politicians and they definitely have one thing over both, they earn their pay I think what threw us was your post that an E-1 would make $31,878 a month, rather than making that much in one year. If I was still active I'd make at least $63,000 a year now. Since I'm retired, I make less than that. I do a lot less work now than I did when I was active though, and spend a lot more time with the wife. do military families still get free healthcare on base, they did but now I don't know, and there are some agencies on base to help those in need
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
spectregunshipper wrote: do military families still get free healthcare on base, they did but now I don't know, and there are some agencies on base to help those in need
Basically, yes. Some smaller bases/posts just have a clinic for routine appointments. If the military member (or family member) needs emergency care or specialized care he or she is referred to the nearest base with a hospital. If there is no base nearby with a hospital, they are referred to a civilian hospital.
The base/post clinic/hospital health care is free to the military member (and family) but I think they may be charged for part of the costs if they use a civilian hospital.
I'm not in the medical field, but this is my understanding of how it works. And yes, there are agencies on base to help lower-ranking folks if they run into "cost" problems.
____________________ If you are ashamed to stand by your colors, you had better seek another flag.
~Author Unknown
loner1115 wrote: An E-1 under 2 makes $1447.20 a month.
Know things have changed but when I first went in the AF in 1960, my pay was $77 a month.
hey I made a lot more than you in 66....... $92 a month
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
Know things have changed but when I first went in the AF in 1960, my pay was $77 a month.
hey I made a lot more than you in 66....... $92 a month
What did you find to spend it all on?
In 75 I made $168 + BAS + BAQ Total was about $250. My wife had to work as a waitress to make ends meet. I washed dishes in a cafe on fri, sat and sun nights so that we could pay for my son to be in a private school.
Most months my wife made more in tips than my pay from the MC.
The pay for the military will never be 'enough' for what they do, but since Reagan took office it has been, at least, enough for reasonable people to live on.
I remember many times the silly servants getting a raise double what the military received.
I think that all military pay, pensions and allowances should be at least equal to the percentage of pay increase for the senate and house.
____________________ MGySgt USMC
(Ret)
Note: No trees were killed in the sending of this message, but a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
Know things have changed but when I first went in the AF in 1960, my pay was $77 a month.
hey I made a lot more than you in 66....... $92 a month
What did you find to spend it all on?
In 75 I made $168 + BAS + BAQ Total was about $250. My wife had to work as a waitress to make ends meet. I washed dishes in a cafe on fri, sat and sun nights so that we could pay for my son to be in a private school.
Most months my wife made more in tips than my pay from the MC.
The pay for the military will never be 'enough' for what they do, but since Reagan took office it has been, at least, enough for reasonable people to live on.
I remember many times the silly servants getting a raise double what the military received.
I think that all military pay, pensions and allowances should be at least equal to the percentage of pay increase for the senate and house.this is not the military but, i worked for the TSA in Gulfport Ms and was making about $13 per hour, and being told "we are on the front line defense of the flying public, yet a cook for the federal prison makes about $25 hr. see any problem with this, I say let the bums in prison cook there own food
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
Know things have changed but when I first went in the AF in 1960, my pay was $77 a month.
hey I made a lot more than you in 66....... $92 a month
What did you find to spend it all on?
considering gas was about .35 cents a gallon and food was cheap a chicken was about 25 cents a lb etc plus the commisary was reasonable plus you made rank and moved up in pay
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
Know things have changed but when I first went in the AF in 1960, my pay was $77 a month.
hey I made a lot more than you in 66....... $92 a month
What did you find to spend it all on?
In 75 I made $168 + BAS + BAQ Total was about $250. My wife had to work as a waitress to make ends meet. I washed dishes in a cafe on fri, sat and sun nights so that we could pay for my son to be in a private school.
Most months my wife made more in tips than my pay from the MC.
The pay for the military will never be 'enough' for what they do, but since Reagan took office it has been, at least, enough for reasonable people to live on.
I remember many times the silly servants getting a raise double what the military received.
I think that all military pay, pensions and allowances should be at least equal to the percentage of pay increase for the senate and house.this is not the military but, i worked for the TSA in Gulfport Ms and was making about $13 per hour, and being told "we are on the front line defense of the flying public, yet a cook for the federal prison makes about $25 hr. see any problem with this, I say let the bums in prison cook there own food
+1
I think that all work around a prison should be done by the inmates, and that everyone should have a production job that brings money in from civilian and other government agencies.
____________________ MGySgt USMC
(Ret)
Note: No trees were killed in the sending of this message, but a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
Know things have changed but when I first went in the AF in 1960, my pay was $77 a month.
hey I made a lot more than you in 66....... $92 a month
What did you find to spend it all on?
In 75 I made $168 + BAS + BAQ Total was about $250. My wife had to work as a waitress to make ends meet. I washed dishes in a cafe on fri, sat and sun nights so that we could pay for my son to be in a private school.
Most months my wife made more in tips than my pay from the MC.
The pay for the military will never be 'enough' for what they do, but since Reagan took office it has been, at least, enough for reasonable people to live on.
I remember many times the silly servants getting a raise double what the military received.
I think that all military pay, pensions and allowances should be at least equal to the percentage of pay increase for the senate and house.this is not the military but, i worked for the TSA in Gulfport Ms and was making about $13 per hour, and being told "we are on the front line defense of the flying public, yet a cook for the federal prison makes about $25 hr. see any problem with this, I say let the bums in prison cook there own food
As far as I'm concerned, they can all be stuck way out in the boonies and can hunt or grow their own food before they cook it.
Bring back Devil's Island. Although that was no where near as bad as it was made out to be.
Ever see "Escape From New York"? That's the way it should be. Let them take care of themselves.
____________________ Life without God is like an unsharpened pencil - it has no point
He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to attain what he cannot lose. - Jim Elliot
As far as I'm concerned, they can all be stuck way out in the boonies and can hunt or grow their own food before they cook it.
Bring back Devil's Island. Although that was no where near as bad as it was made out to be.
Ever see "Escape From New York"? That's the way it should be. Let them take care of themselves.
Can we use San Francisco as the west coast prison???
____________________ MGySgt USMC
(Ret)
Note: No trees were killed in the sending of this message, but a large number of electrons were terribly inconvenienced.
Know things have changed but when I first went in the AF in 1960, my pay was $77 a month.
hey I made a lot more than you in 66....... $92 a month
What did you find to spend it all on?
In 75 I made $168 + BAS + BAQ Total was about $250. My wife had to work as a waitress to make ends meet. I washed dishes in a cafe on fri, sat and sun nights so that we could pay for my son to be in a private school.
Most months my wife made more in tips than my pay from the MC.
The pay for the military will never be 'enough' for what they do, but since Reagan took office it has been, at least, enough for reasonable people to live on.
I remember many times the silly servants getting a raise double what the military received.
I think that all military pay, pensions and allowances should be at least equal to the percentage of pay increase for the senate and house.this is not the military but, i worked for the TSA in Gulfport Ms and was making about $13 per hour, and being told "we are on the front line defense of the flying public, yet a cook for the federal prison makes about $25 hr. see any problem with this, I say let the bums in prison cook there own food
Know things have changed but when I first went in the AF in 1960, my pay was $77 a month.
hey I made a lot more than you in 66....... $92 a month
What did you find to spend it all on?
In 75 I made $168 + BAS + BAQ Total was about $250. My wife had to work as a waitress to make ends meet. I washed dishes in a cafe on fri, sat and sun nights so that we could pay for my son to be in a private school.
Most months my wife made more in tips than my pay from the MC.
The pay for the military will never be 'enough' for what they do, but since Reagan took office it has been, at least, enough for reasonable people to live on.
I remember many times the silly servants getting a raise double what the military received.
I think that all military pay, pensions and allowances should be at least equal to the percentage of pay increase for the senate and house.this is not the military but, i worked for the TSA in Gulfport Ms and was making about $13 per hour, and being told "we are on the front line defense of the flying public, yet a cook for the federal prison makes about $25 hr. see any problem with this, I say let the bums in prison cook there own food
When were you in my neck of the woods?
2002 till 2005 when i hurt my back and then had to get a senator to get involved to get the surgery because the workmans comp was draggfing things out and did not want to authorize it, nice for the gov to pull crap like that, wonder why i do not trust them, duuuuuuuh. But there where about 4 or 5 who where going thru the same thing. Left before the storm
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
For those on here that have served or are now serving, THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE!!
____________________ "Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters." - Ben Franklin
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
Here is an article by the Commemorative Air Force (Formerly Confederate Air Force, until PC kicked in) about the gathering of the B-25s at The Museum of the United States Air Force at Wight-Patterson AFB, OH to commemorate and enhance what will probably be one of the last Tokyo Raiders reunions. They had a total of 17 B-25s that participated in the display and fly over. At the bottom of the article there is a link to a video of part of the fly over:
____________________ 1Cr 2:2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
1Jo 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from al
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