Yesterday we voted. Next Tuesday we honor current and former members of the military. Due to the past and present military service of some, our nation as a whole again celebrated its freedom yesterday with an election.
To honor those veterans, this is the fourth year that the El Dorado News-Times will recognize their contributions with a special section honoring veterans. Throughout the year we interviewed local folks who have served. We can’t interview everyone, nor will everyone agree to an interview, but again this year we have found nearly two dozen willing to give us a glimpse into their time in the service.
Months ago, in the early spring, I interviewed Robert Mayhan who said that he saw all the gory details of the Korean War, and did not talk about it for the next 30 years.
That sentence summarizes the response I typically receive from those who served on the front … silence. When they do talk, as Mayhan did, the conversation flows until it reaches a certain point and then it stops, shifts and moves to safer topics. That is OK. We do not need to know the specifics the hell of war creates. Plenty of movies and books have portrayed that. But we do need to remember in this eleventh month of the year that our freedom originates from our national Constitution and rests on the backs of our veterans.
Through four years of interviewing some 80 plus service men and women, my insight has increased. Each year I appreciate even more just how vast an undertaking it is to have a prepared military force and to maintain them when the enemy draws a battle line.
Yes, we need guns and bullets, but they are worthless without a vast interwoven support system which prepares food, sets up camps, take care of medical needs, does the requisite paperwork, packs and ships supplies and monitors the radios.
Just last month I sat and listened as Nate Smith spoke about the heavy burden he felt as an Army captain supervising the sergeants training each new group of raw recruits. “That is a lot of responsibility – preparing those 18- to 19-year-old kids in case they have to go to war. Dealing with lives is a lot of responsibility. You have to keep stone-faced through all of it. You gotta be no nonsense,” he said.
He began his military career as an officer dealing with defense weapons. He spent years directing the regular drills necessary to have a sharp and prepared force. But the intensity of the constant preparation necessary in a good army hit him hardest when he spoke of those years at boot camp.
He provided the rest of the story to every soldier’s memory of their initiation at boot camp, a necessity that has changed little through the years. It is basic training for everyone: your personal comfort is not as important as your personal preparation to serve.
Basic is always followed with some kind of specialization.
I think that is the aspect of the military that always astounds me. It seems that every year I hear of another niche that I had not considered: the man in charge of the ship’s store, the dietitian planning meals for the troops and the officers, the medics and the disbursement officer keeping track of the pay for each soldier.
This year Danny Terry captured my imagination as he described the big guns he manipulated in Vietnam – guns with such long barrels they traveled mounted on a carrier and then aimed at sites 15 and 30 miles away. Although way beyond visual sight, they hit with an accuracy developed through training and experiences on the battlefield.
Terry and his friend Lindy Long have found a common bond in the decades since they served: they restore Army Jeeps.
Through my interviews with them, I discovered another world with its own shows, magazines and nationwide network to find the illusive replacement part from the decreasing supply of original parts. I share their therapeutic hobby in this year’s edition.
Over the course of many months I interviewed veterans from World War II to the present day. I was sad to read last week that one of this year’s interviewees, Richard Bidwell, a Korean War veteran, 81, died last week. He and all five of his brothers served … one giving the ultimate sacrifice in WWII. His war has passed, many more have come, but his contribution remains and we all have benefited – as the election underscored yesterday and has for more than 200 years.
(Joan Hershberger is a staff writer at the News-Times and author of “Twenty Gallons of Milk and Other Columns from the El Dorado News-Times.” Email her at joanh@everybody.org)