Why a Soldier?: A Signal Corpsman's Tour from Vietnam to the Moscow Hot-Line - Softcover

Fitz-Enz, David G.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0804119384 ISBN 13: 9780804119382

Verlag: Ballantine Books Inc., 2000

Inhaltsangabe

An inside look at the U.S. Army Signal Corps describes its accomplishments during the Vietnam War, including its development of a rapid-response system that combined flexibility, state-of-the-art communications technology, and interdependence among the various branches of the military. Original.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Col. David G. Fitz-Enz was a regular army officer for thirty years, retiring in 1993. Among his decorations are the Soldier's Medal for Heroism, the Bronze Star for Valor with four oak leaf clusters, the Air Medal, and the Legion of Merit with three oak leaf clusters. He is a graduate of Marquette University, the Army Command and General Staff College, and the Army War College. He is published in Military Review, the army's professional journal. <br><br>Colonel Fitz-Enz is the national president of the American Military Retirees Association and vice president of Cannonade Film Works, Inc.

Aus dem Klappentext

He was one of the best, Airborne, proud to serve his country and fight its toughest war--in the hell that was Vietnam.<br><br>Known to all as "Fitz," Signal Corps officer David Fitz-Enz served two tours in Vietnam. He was a soldier, combat photographer, and platoon leader, fighting America's cruelest war--from the VC-infested rice paddies of the Mekong Delta to the dreaded Ia Drang Valley, where the enemy ruled the night. <br><br>Dispensing with traditional, sluggish chains of command, the Signal Corps developed a rapid-response system based on greater flexibility, cutting-edge communications technology, and interdependence between the branches of the military during the war. Now commanders in the field were able to call in artillery, air strikes, and reinforcements at a moment's notice. Fitz-Enz himself orchestrated the first-ever hook up over tactical systems between the President in the Oval Office and a general in the Vietnam jungle. The only book of its kind, WHY A SOLDIER? gives us the inside view of the Corps as it launched an exciting new era in strategic and tactical communications that set the groundwork for all future military operations.

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Why Not Join the Navy?

It was New Year's Eve, 1963. I was seventeen years old, and Bill Swanson,
a high school classmate, and I were out roaming the streets of Rockland,
Maine, trying to find somebody who would buy two underage boys some
alcohol. Our goal was Gluek Stite, a rank but strong malt liquor that came
in small six-ounce cans. The stuff would gag a maggot, but it would get us
drunk in minimum time. All of us who drank for the sole purpose of getting
hammered used it.

Earlier in the evening, as I left my house in Spruce Head, I had asked my
mother for some money so I could get something to eat and go to the
movies. Needless to say, I did neither that night.

Bill knew a Coast Guard sailor called Reb who would buy kids beer. We
found him in his room, above the Oasis Lounge in Rockland. We walked up
the outside stairs to Reb's room and gave him the money. He went to the
market across Park Street to make our purchase.

Reb came back to the room, handed us the brown sack, and we drank down the
malt liquor and waited for the buzz that would signify the first stages of
adolescent intoxication. Reb just lay back on his bed reading a magazine,
every once in a while looking at us with a big grin as we drank.

A few minutes after having downed our six-packs, we left Reb's room for
our first stop, the barroom downstairs. The operators of the place didn't
question our ages. I proposed to one woman that she might dance with me.
She gave me a quizzical look and impolitely declined the offer.

We then strode valiantly, however unsteadily, out into the street. I was
walking toward Park Street along Main when I was overcome by nausea. Right
in front of Phil's Corner, a small luncheonette, I felt the immediate urge
to throw up. To steady myself, I grabbed firmly onto a parking meter (a
long since discarded fixture on Rockland's Main Street) and proceeded to
spray yellow Gluek Stite all over my shoes and the surrounding sidewalk.
Just then a Rockland cop, Officer Hanley, walked up and asked if I was all
right. Bill had seen Hanley walking down the street and had put some
distance between us, and he shouted at me to run. In an alcohol-induced
haze, I ran as fast as I could south down Main Street. Figuring Hanley was
hot on my tail, I ducked behind Phil's and then back out onto Park Street.
Of course it wasn't the brightest choice; Phil's Corner was only about
fifty feet square and there were no buildings around it. As I ran around
the building, trying to look back and see if Hanley was following me, I
blasted around a corner and ran directly into him. He hadn't moved an inch.

"Better come with me, son," were his next words.

We drove to the Rockland Police Department, where I was placed in a cell
painted therapeutic green. It had a hole in the floor and no mattress on
the bed. My mother's cousin, Bruce Gamage, was on duty that night and he
saw some degree of humor in my situation. I knew he had done more bad shit
when he was young than I ever had, so I was quite sure I was not the first
adolescent to have this experience.

My father and Sonny Drinkwater, a lobsterman friend of his, came to bail
me out. It required some surety to obtain my release so Sonny put up his
house for bond. In those days, drinking as a minor was quite a serious
offense.

I was unceremoniously dumped into the back of Sonny's car and we drove to
Spruce Head. I made some comment to my father about never being thought of
by anybody as much more than a waste. That drew a hard slap across the
face. That was the last time I ever gave him reason to hit me.

At the time, I lived in a rented house in Spruce Head with my mother,
stepfather, and two sisters, Heather and Cheryl. My parents divorced when
I was ten years old, and I had lived with each of them for a while as they
still lived in the same town. That way, I did not have to change schools.

My father shoved me through the door with a comment directed at my mother
that he had brought "her little boy" home. I went to bed with thoughts of
impending death running through my mind. The next day I got up early and
my mother ordered me to saw a cord of firewood into stove lengths, and
then split and stack it.

The legal system in those days was not as understanding as it is now. I
was fined thirty-five dollars, given a suspended fifteen-day jail
sentence, and placed on one year's probation for my heinous crime. And I
had to visit my probation officer every week. I had visions of never being
able to get a job or vote or do any of the other things people take for
granted, and in my own mind I felt like a convict.

When I returned to school after holiday vacation, word had spread about my
run-in with the law. The Key Club (junior version of Kiwanis) had taken a
vote and expelled me from it.

To get to my probation officer in the Post Office building, I had to pass
by the military recruiters' offices. Most of the time the recruiters were
not in and a sign on the door announced when they would be. One afternoon,
a few months after my "conviction," the Navy recruiter happened to be in,
a first class boatswain's mate in a blue uniform bedecked with ribbons and
gold hash marks. A sign on his desk read "BM1 Allen, USN." I kind of liked
that. A title in front of your name. A uniform and that look in the eye
that told others you had seen things they could only dream about or see in
movies. I walked in. He looked up from filling out some forms and asked if
he could help me. I told him I was considering joining the service and
wanted to see what the Navy had to offer. He asked me if I was still in
high school. I said I was for the moment, but that it might not last much
longer. He pointed to a chair and said he would be right with me.

I looked around the room. Posters from the World War II era were all over
the walls, one showing an attractive girl and another a girl in dress
blues saying her man was in the Navy--that sort of thing. I didn't know if
she was making an offer to other sailors who weren't at sea, or if she was
just a prop to attract dumb high school kids like me into signing on the
dotted line. Around a recruiter's office there is always the implication
that you are going to have more fun, get laid more, and see more exciting
places and things in the military. They always seem to leave out
information about fighting wars, getting your ass shot off, scrubbing pots
and pans, and cleaning heads.

After a few minutes Bosun's Mate First Class Allen looked up from his
paperwork. He stood and with a smile reached out and shook my hand, and we
introduced ourselves. He asked me what I meant about not being in high
school for long. I told him I was fed up with the place and going to quit.
He said that was not a good idea because he could not guarantee me a
school if I did that. He said that he would enlist me if I passed the
Armed Forces Qualification Test, but it would be much better if I didn't
quit. Also, the Navy would give me E-2 (Airman Apprentice) out of boot
camp if I had a high school diploma. I didn't know what
that meant, but I figured it might translate into more money.

I looked over the brochures he had that described navy career fields and
told him I would like to be a photographer's mate. I was interested in
photography and diving, but I understood the Navy didn't enlist you and
send you directly to diving school.

Allen told me to talk my decision over with my parents and then come back
in a couple of days. Even though I would be eighteen when I joined, it was
always good to have the approval of the...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Ballantine Books Inc.
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2000
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0804119384
• ISBN 13: 9780804119382
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Auflage: 1
• Anzahl der Seiten: 404
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Nicht verfügbar